Finding my Parents in Another World-Chapter 47: (Zoe) Circle of Corpses

"Come, child."

"Come hither. Possess me and obtain power. Power beyond your wildest imagination."

"Come, child."

The voice was persuasive. Not just the words, but there was also some kind of magik infused within them. Zoe had to grit her teeth and concentrate hard to just zone out the voice.

The Holder in front of her stood up. There was a rigidity in his movements, almost like he were a corpse puppet being controlled by some other being. Considering the Spear itself seemed to be sentient, Zoe didn’t discount the possibility that the Spear was controlling the man rather than the opposite.

The Holder started walking forward, his movements slow, deliberate and mechanical. He didn’t speak, he just levelled his dead eyes at Zoe and automatically classified her as an enemy.

There was a shimmer to Zoe’s left, and almost instinctively she turned around with her arms raised, ready for a surprise attack.

"As per your request, I have manifested to provide my assistance." The voice of AD came, as she slowly rose up from the floor. Again it seemed she was in one of her disposable bodies, tethered to the floor. And again she took on the shape of a human woman, except with a completely blank-as-a-sheet-of-paper face.

"You should really work on your entrance, AD, I almost attacked you."

"That would not have been wise." The robot cloud said unhelpfully.

The Holder was close now, so Zoe turned her attention back to him. Atleast for now AD was on her side, and with the numbers advantage she felt more confident of taking on the man guarding the Spear.

"Inito." Zoe whispered quietly, activating her [[Sand Queen]]. Almost as soon as the four sand pillars rose up around her though, the Holder attacked. He crouched down, slamming his Spear on the ground, and then using the Spear as a launching pad jumped up in the air.

Some robotic movement, Zoe thought ruefully. The Holder raised the Spear in the air, and then threw it towards Zoe. Like a rocket it soared through the air, the inscribed letters glowing in the light.

"Let me strike you. Stay still. Die. Live. Become a part of me."

"SHUT UP!" Zoe shouted almost involuntarily as the pillars formed a shield in front of her. The Spear however smashed through all four of the pillars as if they were butter and Zoe ducked at the last moment as it whished past inches above her head.

"The Spear of the Goddess cannot be stopped by any barriers. The runes inscribed on it allow it to go through any object as long and as far as the one wielding the Spear desires it to." AD said. The cloud hadn’t made a single move to assist in the initial encounter, and Zoe wondered whether it was even going to help.

"Would have been useful to know before he threw the Spear." She grunted, standing up.

"Noted. Will keep that in mind for future interactions." AD said, still remaining stationary.

Zoe looked ahead. The Spear was back in the hands of the Holder, who was now twirling it in his hands and looking at the both of them in turn. Then, as if making a decision, he raised the Spear again and threw it- this time at AD.

The robot cloud made no attempt to dodge or block it. The Spear soared through the air and pierced her right in the head. As Zoe had seen previously, AD began disintegrating immediately and soon was reduced to a pile of dust.

"It seems the Holder is confused by my presence."

Zoe jumped back in surprise again, as AD materialized, this time on her right.

And she was right. Zoe looked ahead to see the Holder once more looking at the two of them. There was no expression on his face, but there was a hint in his movements that he was not sure how to approach.

Probably never faced an enemy that could regenerate from a Spear to the head.

As she thought, another plan began to form in Zoe’s mind. AD was functionally immortal, she couldn’t be killed or harmed by the Holder’s Spear no matter how many times he attacked. If that was the case...

"AD, can you make new bodies of yourself even if you are not in them? Like dummy ones?"

"Affirmative. However they will only last for a few seconds if I do not occupy them immediately."

A lot of questions arose in Zoe’s mind about the nature of the being called AD, but those would have to wait. Right now, she kept an eye on the still circling Holder and whispered her plan to AD.

"What do you think, will it work?" She asked at the end.

"I am not equipped to judge the efficacy of a plan, I can only assent to going along with it." Came the robotic, if predictable, response.

Zoe sighed. "Can’t ask for more I guess. Just follow this plan this."

"Affirmative."

.XX.

Zoe didn’t know how long the Holder would circle around them without attacking, but every second that he didn’t was a boon for her.

Slowly she raised her hands, and the four pillars spiralled upwards, moving through one another to obfuscate the exact position of each one. The Holder looked up warily, but still didn’t make a move.

Suits me just fine.

With a sudden roar, Zoe brought her hands down, and with it, the pillars shot out towards the Holder. It seemed he could hear after all. The shout had diverted his attention downwards for a second, which was a second too long, as the pillars had already reached him by the time he realized it was a diversion.

Again expressionlessly, the Holder struck out his Spear to try and cut off the edges of the pillars before they struck him. He succeeded in cutting off the first two harmlessly, but they were just fronts for the latter two, which is where Zoe had concentrated most of her magik. Realizing he wouldn’t be able to maneuver his Spear back to neutralize the last two pillars, the Holder instead balanced the Spear sideways on the flat part of the pillars and jumped up. As if in an Olympic high jump event, the Holder twirled in the air above the two pillars and landed on the opposite side lithely as the final two pillars sailed away beneath him, striking the wall beyond harmlessly.

However as he looked up, he was surrounded on all sides.

By the constantly appearing and disappearing dummy bodies of AD.

It was truly a spectacle to behold. As AD had said, the bodies she could create would immediately crumble to dust if she were not in them. However there were no restriction as such on the number of such bodies that could be made, which was the key that Zoe had realized some time back. As such, by creating a number of such bodies surrounding the Holder on all sides, it eliminated his visibility completely. Essentially he was surrounded by a constant stream of dust rising and falling on all sides.

There was a frustrated grunt from inside as the Holder swung around his Spear futiley. It was futile, as the ones he was trying to kill were already dead. There would be no second funeral.

Zoe crouched down, making herself as small as possible. There was a chance that the Holder would grow frustrated enough to think (if that being could even think) that his only chance for victory was throwing the Spear randomly in any direction, hoping to hit Zoe. And the chance that it would hit her or come in her direction was small but never zero.

Evidently the Holder could think, for it was not long before the Spear went whizzing out from the circle of dying ADs. It went the opposite direction of Zoe though, and this was the chance she was waiting for.

She stood up and starting sprinting forward towards the circle. She held out her hand and the four pillars of sand twirled around her forming a single coagulated structure. Deftly, she moved through the decomposing clouds and jumped towards the man who had held the Spear moments back.

The Holder turned around at the last moment to see Zoe rushing towards him, a large sand sword in her hand. His face still expressionless, he ducked Zoe’s first swing and punched her hard in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her. Grunting Zoe smashed her elbow on his head and then used her pillars to stab his ankles, causing him to buckle.

The Spear was already flying back to him, and Zoe realized she would have to end this before it got here or everything else would have been in vain. She swung her sword again, but the Holder wasn’t defeated yet. He ducked beneath the swing and kicked out, catching Zoe on her arm. Thrown back, Zoe let the sword in her hand disintegrate and instead conjured sand spikes from the ground where the Holder was lying down. Unable to stand up due to the injuries on his ankle, the Holder was forced to roll over to avoid the spikes, but he couldn’t avoid all of them as one of them went straight through his right arm.

Still there was no pain, no expression on the Holder’s face. His right arm was bent at an unnatural angle, with a sand spike sticking out of it but he still held it out in preparation for the Spear, which was dangerously close now. 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

Almost shouting in frustration Zoe cast Sand Prison around the immobile Holder, who wasn’t able to roll away from this one. The sand rose up around him in a radius too wide to roll away from, as the Holder tried futilely to do the same anyway.

Zoe’s breath was heavy, but her mind was still sharp. She reached deep into her dwinling magik reserves, feeling the pulsing energy in her fingertips. With a flick of her wrist, jagged spikes of sand erupted from the ground, protruding from the prison’s walls, closing in on the Holder. There was no screams from the inside, Zoe wondered if the being even felt pain. But quickly there was a pool of blood around the floor of the prison.

The Spear still relentlessly came towards the circle. In fact, it seemed to be approaching even faster now.

And the voice in Zoe’s head was growing even stronger.

"Good, good my child."

"Now....take my power for yourself!"