Ganersam Volume 2
Chapter 22

There was silence.

There was darkness.

There was Emma right beside me who also could not move.

Smack

I looked into the corner of my eye, and the unfortunate girl lay motionless on the floor. She was hit when one of her feet was up.

Unable to move, she must have lost balance and fallen. I could hear a faint sound coming from her, grumbling irritatedly.

I would laugh at her, if not for the sound of footsteps arriving from our front, echoing in the empty room. The lights went back on, and from the other side, a figure walked ominously toward us.

The figure of a woman, quite the fine lady if you ask me. She had short black hair tied in a bun, she was wearing a long black dress and a scythe on her right arm, with a small black beret on her head. The scythe had a black hilt, with its blade colored blood red. The hilt was almost 2 meters in length, with a smaller sharp blade on the end of its grip.

She approached us. Her footsteps stopped, and she slammed the butt of her scythe onto the floor.

“Who are you?”

I tried to shout, but I couldn’t pull the voice from within me.

She looked at us with a stern expression, devoid of any emotion.

“You’re quite the brave adventurers. But unfortunately, this is where you’ll meet your ends.”

I tried to look at my right hand, where the shield generator was. The shield was on, but this dart somehow penetrated it with no issue whatsoever. It didn’t even reduce the shield’s durability.

“I won’t let you!”

Nia’s hoarse voice filled the room. She moved from behind us, passed me on my left, and stood still in front of us, blocking the view of the lady. She aimed her polearm at the lady, a frown visible on her face.

“N14...”

She said slowly, her eyes on Nia, who was slightly shaking.

“My name is Nia, and I came here to stop you!”

She yelled, her voice trembling. I tried to move a bit, as Nia’s body is blocking my view of the lady on the other end, but I couldn’t. My muscles refused to respond to any input from my brain.

“Nia... I wish I never need to see you again, but I guess that comes to this.”

The lady let out a sigh.

Nia pointed her polearm forward and dashed straight at the lady. The lady swung her scythe in a horizontal arc. The heel of the scythe crashed into Nia’s polearm, sending it off course. A loudclangcould be heard as the two weapons hit. The lady then pushed the scythe forward and Nia jumped back to dodge. Nia took a step back, slightly wobbling.

Seeing Nia nearly losing balance, the lady took three steps forward and continued her attack, the sound of her shoes filled the dry air. She used the knife at the end of the scythe to chase after Nia, trying to stab her. Nia put her right foot back, she used the body of her polearm and crashed it into the end of the tip of the lady’s scythe, before pushing the two weapons down. It was a risky move, but it succeeded in deflecting the attack. Both weapons crashed into the floor, making a loud screeching sound as they grazed the floor’s ceramic surface. She pushed her foot and dashed at the scythe-wielding lady.

The lady swung the scythe low across the surface, from left to right, blocking Nia’s path and forcing her to jump over it. She continued running, however, and closed down the distance. Using her free hand, the lady swiftly pushed Nia back. She then swung her scythe back, this time at a higher angle, forcing Nia to cancel her attack and evade. The lady then used the butt of her scyther to attack Nia, stabbing her in her chest. The attack slammed Nia into the wall. Nia pulled herself to her left, escaping the scythe while holding her chest. She took a step back and with her free right unleashed a spell directed at the lady.

“Paralyze!”

The lady swung her scythe, and its thick black hilt absorbed the spell like it was nothing.

“Your magic won’t work on me, sweetie. I taught you those spells.”

“That, that doesn’t matter anymore!”

...

From my point of view, that does matter. It looked like the scythe was the one that absorbed the magic, though.

I don’t think teaching got anything to do with this one.

“Lightning Strike!”

Nia fired off her second spell. The lady dodged to her right and ran at her. Her target was Nia’s chest which probably still hurts. Nia charged in with her polearm, turning her body around so that her right side faced the incoming attack. The lady swung her scythe down, and the two blades clashed in the middle.

Clang

The sound of metal crashing filled the air. We watched as Nia dueled the lady. Nia may suffer from the attack prior, but she did her best to make any mistakes. She spun her polearm and started stabbing the lady. The lady was on the defensive for quite a while, taking a step back, dodging, and deflecting Nia’s attack. It looked like Nia had superior speed and technique.

The lady let her scythe absorb all the hits, to which it came out unscathed. The lady then took three steps further back and swung her scythe wide.

This time, it was her turn. Now in the offensive, the lady used the scythe’s wide range to stop Nia from attacking, while at the same time forcing Nia to keep her distance.

Unlike Nia’s attacks, the lady’s attacks seemed more random. Her attacks were slow and clunky, awkward even. The scythe was pretty long, however, and that gave her a considerable advantage. If it was a bit shorter, Nia would have the upper hand by now.

The lady’s strength seemed to come from her raw power. She had been damaging the wall every time her scythe uncontrollably smashed into it, creating cracks in the once smooth surface.

She may not be a professional when it comes to wielding scythes, but an accidental hit could prove to be highly fatal, especially with Nia’s half-injured condition. She struggled to stop the swinging scythe.

Realizing that horizontal attacks wouldn’t be able to reach the lady, Nia leaped backward. She quickly pushed her polearm again, but this time her hands were on the bottom end of the hilt.

Holding a polearm like this provides the best range, but had terrible balance, the polearm became really unstable, but Nia’s goal was not to hit the lady.

She successfully baited a swing from the scythe. The scythe slammed down, striking the polearm. Just before the two weapons hit the floor, Nia pulled the polearm back.

Slam

The scythe hits the floor tiles, breaking them into tiny pieces.

Nia then jumped high above. She pointed her polearm downwards, straight at the lady. An aerial attack. Considering the scythe’s wide range, it was a very risky move, but the lady’s movement had been quite sloppy so far, so Nia probably calculated that the lady wouldn’t be able to pull the scythe up in time.

The lady watched as the sharp metal tip rained in on her. She raised her hand and casually grabbed the sharp end of the polearm and swung it around, throwing Nia to the side. Nia’s back slammed into the surface, and she slouched down to the floor.

“Nia!”

I yelled, but like before, the voice simply won’t come out.

I glanced out of the corner of my eye. Like me, Emma also struggled against the paralyze. I glanced down at the dart-like thing on my chest. This must be some kind of paralyze dart.

The lady took a step, her foot hitting Nia’s polearm which now lay on the floor. She stopped, crouched, and picked it up.

“A human-made weapon? What happened to the polearm I gave you, sweetie?”

She threw the polearm onto the floor and slowly walked toward Nia who was struggling to stand up.

"Sigh... It must end this way, does it?”

She lifted her scythe up, ready to swing it. I try to move my body, if only I could reach my LIAR.

The lady held her scythe at a diagonal right position and pulled it down on Nia. Unable to move, Nia watched as she pulled her scythe on her. The scythe missed and slammed into the floor. Following the attack, that somehow missed, silence fell in the room. Nia looked at her, clearly exhausted most of her power. The lady didn’t move, either. She simply stood there, scythe stabbed into the ground.

“Nia, do you know about the human mother N4 rescued?”

“Yes... what about her?”

“That was N10.”