Fire Emblem: Close Horizons (IC)

[Ascaloth]

”The Bloodwind was it? Bastard’s just human – get him! Kill him and we’re famous!”

Behind Falcon's back, the bandit who had yelled to his mates to attack the swordsman leapt, and brought his axe down on the seemingly unwary Bercan... only to strike thin air.

"Hey, hey! You got something to say to me, you do so with words to my face, not an axe to my back!"

Scolded Falcon, who had somehow reappeared behind the thug, and was wagging a finger with his left hand towards the latter. For some reason, his sword was in his right hand for what seemed to be the first time since the battle started.

Snarling, the thug turned around for another shot at Falcon... but the expression on his face turned from rage to surprise, as a fine rusty mist began spraying out from a ring around his torso. Slowly and gradually, the top half of the thug's body separated and fell away from its lower half; in one movement, Falcon had drawn his sword and cut the thug so cleanly, the latter's blood sprayed out in a mist rather than gushing out as a liquid.

With that, the tribesman turned to the other four thugs, who had seen their comrade's untimely death, and were even now leaping at Falcon to avenge his death.

"Yeah, an axe to the face isn't much better..."

Dodging the second thug's axe, Falcon leapt and somersaulted over the latter, his blade flashed out, and by the time the swordsman landed on the ground, the second thug was already falling, his back spraying out the fine red mist from a bottom-to-top cut.

"And it certainly doesn't mean..."

Before the third thug could even move, Falcon struck out like a viper, and the thug fell backward with a diagonal cut in his chest, spraying out the blood mist.

"Guh...!"

Grunted Falcon as the fourth thug blindsided him from the right, attempting to hack into his sword arm; the swordsman let go of his sword and pulled his arm back, but not soon enough to avoid getting a gash. In the meantime, his unwielded sword was slowly falling to the ground...

"...that you're any less dead!"

Falcon yelled; his left arm grasped the still-falling sword in a reverse grip, and the swordsman dashed past the fourth thug. Gurgling, the thug could not spare any more time for Falcon, as he desperately tried to catch his detached head from falling... and his headless body crashed to the ground, adding to the blood mist which hung in the air.

"Ugh...!"

Falcon grunted; he had forgotten about the last thug, who managed to give the swordsman another gash on his already-injured right arm. Not without consequence, for the Bercan immediately retaliated with a reverse-grip strike on the thug's axe arm, and followed it up with an icepick stab on the latter's left thigh.

Slightly winded, Falcon watched the thug as he staggered back from the double strike, clearly appalled at the carnage that the tribesman had visited on his comrades.

”He bleeds - help! Somebody help, The Bloodwind’s betrayed us!”

To that, Falcon shifted his sword back to his right hand, and sighed.

"I really should quit drinking during work, really messes up my game," he said, looking around at the bodies of the fallen thugs, which have now coloured the air above them a rusty tinge. "And I should also quit imparting life lessons to dead people. Kinda a waste, don't you think?"

The swordsman turned to the last thug, and despite the bleeding gashes in his right arm, he actually smiled genially at his terrified adversary, as if the slaughter of the previous minute had never happened.

"So," he said to the last thug, cocking his head. "You, on the other hand, can still benefit from the advice. What do you say? You go hide yourself in some hole, and I don't hunt you down like the dog you are. Square deal?"

OOC:

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Falcon attempts to intimidate Thug #1