Devil Insider #5: Unburnable Burnt
They stare at each other in silence. The tension can be felt in the air, from the anger of the cerberus, but Nell remains calm and collected, though with a murderous grin written all over her face. She teases the cerberus: “What are you waiting for, doggy? Let’s go out for a walk!” and in response, the cerberus spits a ball of fire at her without warning, but she just jumps sideways to dodge it, but it manages to light her sleeve on fire, she tears it off mid-air and is left without an scratch though.
Landing right next to the gate, she jumps forward, steps on the gate and runs on it to give herself extra distance, and she jumps from the gate to attack. The cerberus turns one of his heads towards her and opens the mouth in an attempt to crush her, but she lands on the bottom of his mouth and grabs one of his teeth before stabbing between two of them with her sword. He growls from the needle-like pain on his teeth and tries to shake her off, but her grip is strong, on top of her sword being stuck between his teeth. “Argh! You wretched worm!” he yells out.
“What’s wrong buddy? Can’t quite chew this snack? That’s unfortunate!” she exclaims before twisting her sword to release it, breaking his teeth and cutting his mouth in the process, and she jumps off acrobatically. The cerberus screams in pain with all of his mouths.
After landing, Nell takes her sword and throws it at the cerberus, and it lands on one of his eyes piercing it. She mocks him with a big grin on her face: “Got dirt into your eye Fido?” as he exhales fire at her from all three mouths. Unable to dodge, Nell simply runs forward, and jumps away right as the flame about hits her, and it does, she comes out the top of it though, lit in her own bloody flames that go out the moment she gets out. He exclaims: “You cursed pest! Die already!”
Nell lands on the face of the cerberus to retrieve her sword, forcefully taking his eye out with it in the process, and in response, while screeching he slashes her as soon as she jumps away. She falls on the ground and stands up getting tired.
Before Nell can make her stance, the cerberus breaks off one of the chains binding his legs to the gate, and throws it at her. The chain wraps around her body, and he pulls it towards him when the chain tangles to tighten it and keep her from moving, but this also pulls her towards him, and when she reaches him, he pins her to the ground with his massive claws.
The cerberus celebrates, exclaiming: “I’ve got you now! You slippery little bastard!” as he squashes Nell onto the ground, also pulling on the chain, tightening its grasp on Nell.
Struggling to move, Nell says to the cerberus “Good job buddy, I didn’t really think you could get this far! However, in spite of what it looks, I am not cornered!” and so horns of crimson fire form on her forehead, shocking the cerberus from his core, and the rest of her body goes up in the same fire. It burns the cerberus so he lets go and backs up screeching, having felt a kind of pain he’s never felt before then.
The chains break, and Nell jumps out of the crimson fire, and while the cerberus is distracted with his own pain, she gets close and cuts off one of his heads, and the other two scream from the top of his lungs, as she steps back to see what he does.
Blood all over his body, one head missing, one’s missing an eye, and the other’s mouth is a mess. Growling and grumbling, retreating slightly in hesitation. He did not expect such a tiny foe to be so formidable. It may be the first time he’s ever felt fear, it is the first time he’s felt a burn.
Having transformed, and starting to heal, Nell says to the cerberus “Well..I was not expecting you to be that strong, congrats buddy!”, and while the cerberus is trying to gather his strength, she goes on: “I was seriously expecting this to be over in like a minute..guess that means I shouldn’t judge books by their cover quite as often! What do you think Fido?”
The cerberus goes up in large flames, bright like the sun, exclaiming: “A mere human should never be able to do this to me! Even the Umbrian Witches and the Mokshan Sages used to fear me! You…you’re not a human, are you..?” and Nell responds: “Who knows? I haven’t been sure myself for a while now..one thing’s for sure though…you’re still in my way, and I don’t have all day buddy. I told you before, got places to be, things to do”
The chains binding the cerberus melt off, and he prepares to tackle Nell, who also prepares to rush forward, as her sword lights up in crimson flames. Nell and the cerberus stare at each other, with determination and anger written on their faces respectively. And so, they jump forward to attack one another…
