Chapter 114: One Saint, Two Masters
The Nightmare Creatures that had crossed over from the Dream Realm were the worst kind of abominations—aerial abominations.
They were grotesque looking creatures that seemed to resemble dragons or wyverns.
The first wave consisted of numerous such creatures, with their builds ranging from the size of a PTV to the size of a small building.
Most them seemed to be of the awakened rank, however there was more then a few fallen creatures in-between.
Hugo was not sure what alien he should use. He was already in the process of selecting the creature, his eyes and omnitrix glowing azure blue.
The logical answer here was a creature that could fly, but Hugo did not think his flying aliens would be enough, even as Titans, with this many creatures.
Thankfully he had [Fusion] which vastly increased his versatility. Now, the question was what aliens should he fuse together?
He needed something that could fly, naturally, alongside something that could unleash powerful projectiles.
'I heard dragons aren't fond of water...'
Hugo slammed his Omnitrix, activating both his Dormant Ability and his Ascended Ability at the same time, transforming directly into the fusion alien.
His skin became metallic blue, as two long, moth-like wings appeared from his back. The metallic carapace continued spreading around his body, encasing it like armor.
By the end of the transformation, Hugo looked like a sleek, menacing moth trapped in battle armor.
He had fused Water Hazard and Big Chill together, giving birth to a powerful creature. Hugo had focused on two creatures that shared a similar source element so that the two aliens would benefit from each other.
For now, Hugo was only using his powers as a Tyrant, not using his Titanic power just yet to avoid essence drain.
'[Fusion] already drains a lot, so I should be careful with my essence..'
For that reason, he decided to avoid using [Omni-enhanced] as well.
Saint Cor looked at him briefly, before he assumed his Transcendent form, transforming into dozens of black crows and rising to meet the Nightmare Creatures like a tide of darkness.
Hugo spread his wings and took to the air. As he did, he also commanded Zed to transform into the natural hunter of dragons—a strange dragonfly-like abomination—and unleashed her upon the horde.
Hugo did not want to use his Tyrant ability now, as that was a long and slightly uncomfortable process. As he was right now, he was confident he would be able to kill a lot of abominations without his minions.
Beneath the ground, Jet sighed and raised her scythe.
"I guess I'm the only one without a fancy transformation."
She clicked her tongue and crouched, then augmented her legs with soul essence and launched herself into the sky to meet the abominations.
Hugo, as a fusion of Water Hazard and Big Chill, was able to unleash ice and water from his mouth, hands, or shoulders. Using this deadly ability, he unleashed a terrible wave of ice from his arms, targeting dozens of draconic creatures and freezing them in place before they could hit him.
As he did, Hugo soared at a terrible speed, weaving through them and using his own hands to rip apart the dragons apart. His combat style, adapted from the Stone Saint, could be used in the air if he was careful enough.
He needed firm defense and violent offense, and thanks to the nimbleness of bigchill and tbe sturdiness of water hazard, he could achieve both.
[You have slain a fallen Demon: Draconic Spawn]
[You have slain a awakened Beast: Lesser Draconic Spawn]
Dozens more notifications from the Spell rang in his ears as the frozen Nightmare Creatures fell to the ground and died like frozen popsicles.
A spear of ice manifested in Hugo's arms, as he drove it into the heart of one of the bigger wyverns.
[You have slain a fallen Devil: Crimson Wyvern]
He did not stop to catch his breath, as he was suddenly surrounded from all sides by abominations...
Those monsters did not care if they killed one of their own, what mattered to them was killing the enemy.
To that, Hugo curled into a ball, hugging his legs tightly. He generated as much ice as he could, shaping it into a protective cocoon around his body while filling that cocoon with ice. Then, in a single explosive moment, he unleashed it all—spikes and shards of ice exploded outward in every direction, targeting as many abominations as possible.
Meanwhile, the high-pressure water from his Water Hazard half cut through the swarm like bullets, piercing multiple creatures in a single stream alongside the ice.
Far away, Wake of Ruin moved like a natural calamity. The old Transcendent spread his crows far and wide, each of them tearing apart their target in moments before moving on to the next target, not allowing them any breath. Despite the numbers, it was the Nightmare Creatures that were overwhelmed, not Cor.
Jet, on the other hand, was having a bit of a problem. Unlike her two comrades, she did not have any means of flight. So, being the smart girl that she was, Jet launched herself like a missile towards the draconic abominations, landing above them, then killing them before they could even react.
she used the bodies of her previous kills as a platform to jump towards her next prey and did the same thing, creating a savage bloodbath. Soul Reaper Jet did not seem to tire, quite the opposite, actually. The more she killed, the more powerful and boisterous she became.
Zed, on the other hand, was no less savage. Having assumed the form of the dragon's natural predator, she latched onto them like a plague given form and sucked the blood from their bodies, leaving nothing but bones when she was done.
The wielder of the Nemetrix was just as ferocious as her master, fighting savagely against the Nightmare Creatures to the point where they were starting to run away from her.
'Too much blood...' Hugo thought, as he phased through a creature using Big Chill's ability, then undid the ability, bursting out from inside the creature using ice spikes.
He continued flying at a terrible speed, making sure no abominations got past him and into the city. He had gotten much more savage with his abilities, killing dozens of abominations at the same time. Waves after waves of them, they all fell to his ice.
Thanks to that, Hugo had found himself Falling into a more animalistic behavior. No, that was not quite accurate...
Noble creatures were not human, and so they naturally possessed different instincts from them, making them seem feral and savage from a human perspective. in other words, noble creatures were monsters that walked the path of ascension instead of corruption.
The more Hugo killed, the more his Noble Creature instincts took over. That was naturally because of his flaw... but it felt so... So good.
[You have slain a...]
[You have slain a...]
[You have slain a...]
[You have slain a...]
Dormant, Awakened, and Fallen abominations we're slain by him, and suddenly Hugo found himself floating motionlessly in the sky, bathed in blood.
Beneath him was an ocean of blood, with corpses piled up to form small hills, each of them frozen and dead...
'Kill kill kill kill!'
He ripped and tore, chasing down the creatures smart enough to flee. He grabbed them by their wings, bit through their necks, chewed on their insides.
—————
[Jet's POV]
Jet was a powerful Ascended, by all means. She was one of the deadliest Masters in the world and even Saints were wary of fighting her due to her insidious Aspect.
Her Aspect allowed her to do few things, making her less versatile compared to other Awakened but infinitely more deadly in a single area.
That area was killing.
She launched forward like a missile, decapitating the head of a Fallen Demon with a single strike, reaching deep into its soul.
[You have slain a Fallen Demon: Draconic Spawn]
Jet felt her broken soul core absorb the Fallen soul, further empowering her.
Then, she used the body of the Fallen creature as a platform to jump higher and latch onto another dragon to do the same.
Sometimes multiple dragons came at her. In that situation, Jet simply let herself fall to the ground, making the abominations collide into each other.
She was a veteran master, so she knew how to deal with mad Nightmare Creatures the most. Controlling the battlefield was an important skill that any successful Awakened must possess.
Looking to the side, she saw her mentor, Wake of Ruin, destroy dozens of abominations at once, his crows spreading throughout the battlefield like a dark tornado.
At that moment, Jet felt envious of the old man.
'Ah, if only I could become a Saint myself...'
She clicked her tongue, letting out her frustration on the Nightmare Creatures.
Jet had been an Ascended for a long time now, and she was unable to conquer the Third Nightmare because of two simple reasons: there was no cohort willing to accept her due to her troublesome personality And the great clans would never allow someone as dangerous as her to challenge the Third Nightmare and become a government Saint.
She turned her attention to Hugo for a second, looking at the boy.
Much like Sunny, the young man was a prodigy of the third generation, one wielding incredible powers, perhaps the most out of his generation.
She had read his file and couldn't believe the things he had pulled off on the Forgotten Shore. She always assumed they were exaggerations from the traumatized survivors, but now that she was seeing him with her own eyes, she realized the file didn't do him any justice at all.
The boy had assumed the form of a strange metallic moth and was currently tearing through the Nightmare Creatures, taking on dozens of them at once.
Hundreds of abominations had fallen to his hand, each of them being encased by sickly ice and freezing to their deaths.
The scene was so chilling that Jet felt almost bad for the Nightmare Creatures...
'If anything, he's the Nightmare Creature.'
She wasn't thinking that just because of his power, no. What made her think that was because of his fighting style and the frenzied way he killed the creatures—he used his clawed hands, his legs, his wings, and even his mouth.
She had seen him rip one of the giant creatures apart with his own hands just now, leaving a bloody mess.
'To think the random brat I saved all those years ago would become this...'
Jet had remembered Hugo, of course. He was an important part of her life—not romantically, gods no, Jet was not a creep.
As a child, the boy had miraculously survived a horde of Nightmare Creatures that killed his mother and hundreds of people thanks to a nightmare gate opening in the middle of a park. She remembered his small frame, crawling out from under his mother, covered in her blood.
That scene had stuck with Jet for years, causing her to go to many therapy sessions... But it was also a motivation for her, as her conviction to kill Nightmare Creatures and protect humanity had been set aflame because of that sight.
She was glad that she had saved him, all the way back then. Though Jet had not expected that she would meet him again at a random police station, back when he was a Sleeper and she definitely hadn't expected to meet him now, as an Ascended and a co-worker.
Of course, Jet only thought of this briefly, as she returned to killing the abominations, unleashing the full power of her Aspect.
'The second wave is coming...'