Almost immediately, the mermaid recovered with incredible speed and lunged at me with ferocious movements. She advanced in an incredibly erratic manner, like a beast out of control, but in reality there was a terrifying precision in the way she opened her black jaws. The water vibrated with the force of her charge, as if the lake itself were roaring with her.
It no longer mattered that my first instinct was to cut off her tail, try to stop her, and leave, but I changed my mind. There was no room for doubt or mercy.
With incredible dexterity, I concentrated the mana in my right palm, enveloping it with a layer so thin and precise that it shone like a crystalline blade under the water. Tilting my head slightly to one side, I felt the icy touch of her fangs passing millimetres from my skin, biting only the empty space where my neck had been a second before.
