Chapter 159: Captivating Performance
Noirette’s decision settled like a spark igniting dry tinder—quick, inevitable, and laced with that reckless thrill she hadn’t felt since her days surviving in Fathomi as an individual, not a Living Deity.
The air thrummed with the chaos of battle, the serpentine hiss of the five-headed Voidling’s venom spraying in arcs that melted stone and flesh alike, the frantic twang of crossbows loosing bolts that embedded harmlessly in its entropic scales, the guttural shouts of the Void Hunters as they dodged tails that whipped like flails forged from shadow and spite.
When looked closer, the beast was a nightmare made manifest, each head a writhing coil of obsidian muscle banded with voids that drank light, its eyes glowing with the cold hunger of entropy.
But it was pale in comparison to many things that Noirette had faced before.
The hunters, dozens with sizable equipment and Curio items, fought with the grim desperation of those who knew one wrong step meant dissolution into fuel for others to enhance their Well of the Soul’s attributes.
Noirette moved with a confidence that bordered on arrogance.
Her red draconic eyes locked onto her target, a female Void Hunter perched on a shattered outcrop, crossbow raised, her bisque-colored scarf fluttering like a ghost in the wind.
Noirette noticed that this Void Hunter was rarely targeted nor even communicated or interacted much with the other Void Hunter.
Not to mention, Noirette also sense some hidden force active trying to hid the Void Hunter existence.
Noirette grinned mischiveously.
The woman was mid-reload, her lithe frame taut with focus, sweat beading on her brow beneath a mop of cropped auburn hair.
Bolts flew from her weapon in a steady rhythm, each one nicking the Voidling’s flanks but drawing no more than irritated snaps from its heads.
Without wasting much time, Noirette closed the distance in a few purposeful strides, her presence slicing through the din like a blade through silk.
She reached out with a gentle hand, one palm settling lightly on the hunter’s wrist—steadying the tremble of exertion—while the other rested on her shoulder, fingers brushing just enough to send a shiver through the fabric of her cloak.
The touch was electric, deliberate, Noirette’s skin warm against the chill of battle-sweat.
Noirette tilted her head, letting her lips curve into a seductive smile that promised secrets and sins in equal measure. Her gaze, those crimson slits, held the hunter’s like a whisper, drawing her in until the world narrowed to just the two of them amid the storm.
The Void Hunter froze, crossbow dipping forgotten in her grip. Her cheeks flushed a deep rose, eyes widening as if beholding some forbidden idol.
The clamor of the fight—the sizzle of venom, the clash of steel—faded to a distant hum.
The Void Hunter was stunlocked, utterly, her breath catching in her throat as Noirette’s allure wrapped around her like invisible chains.
"What... what does this bisque-colored scarf you’re wearing does?" Noirette asked, her voice a ravishing purr, low and intimate, laced with that velvet timbre that could unravel resolve as easily as thread.
The hunter swallowed hard, her free hand twitching toward the scarf as if to shield it, but the motion died under Noirette’s gaze.
Words tumbled out in a rush, breathless and unfiltered, as if confessing to a confessor who absolved with a smile. "It’s... it’s the Fallacy Cover. Exotic Tier Curio Item. It... reduces the existence of the wearer. Makes you harder to notice, to sense—like you’re a shadow in the corner of an eye..."
Noirette merely just gazed back and it was enough to make the Void Hunter yield and explained further.
"Enemies miss you... allies overlook you unless you speak. It’s saved my skin more times than I can count against things like... like that."
The Void Hunter jerked her head toward the Voidling, but her eyes never left Noirette’s face, mesmerized by the way her face was looking at her.
Noirette leaned in closer, her breath ghosting against Melisya’s ear, the tantalizing curve of her smile inches from the hunter’s blushing cheek.
The scent of her—wildflowers crushed under iron and something faintly divine—filled the space between them, intoxicating.
"Melisya," Noirette cooed, the name slipping from her lips like a caress, as if she’d always known it. "Such a pretty name~" She let the words hang, her voice dipping into a husky note that sent fresh color flooding Melisya’s face. "Can I borrow the Fallacy Cover? Just for a moment. I’ll defeat that beast for you in return~"
Enraptured, Melisya didn’t hesitate. Her fingers fumbled at the clasp, untying the scarf with trembling hands, and she pressed it into Noirette’s palm like an offering to a queen. "Y-yes. Take it!"
Noirette draped the Fallacy Cover around her neck with a flourish, the bisque fabric settling against her skin like it was fated.
"Thank you, Melisya."
"Kuh...!"
Melisya was defeated, or atleast, her heart.
The scarf hummed faintly, a subtle warp in the air around her, as if reality itself bent to accommodate her diminished echo.
Noirette turned then, casual as a stroll through a garden, and sauntered toward the heart of the melee combat rustling in the periphery.
The Void Hunters clashed in a desperate scrum, spears thrusting at coiling tails, shields buckling under venomous strikes, one man roaring as he hacked at a head only to be flung aside like chaff, the rest casting skills and spells in an attempt to wear the Voidling down.
The Voidling loomed, its five maws gnashing in discordant fury, scales rippling with voids that pulled at the edges of vision, threatening to unmake the world bite by bite.
As she walked, Noirette’s mind turned inward, a quiet reckoning amid the roar.
She no longer possessed her Well of the Soul—that shimmering core of quantified power, the ledger of her progress, where attributes stacked like blessings.
The strength to shatter mountains, speed to outrun fate, intellect to unravel cosmic knots...
It had been her crutch, her crown, imbuing every fiber with effortless supremacy. Comprehension had flowed like water, thoughts crystallizing into strategies before they fully formed, her body had moved with the precision of a god’s whim, heavy blades light as feathers, distances collapsing under her stride.
Now? This vessel was a prison of flesh and bone, heavy as wet clay, slow as molasses in winter. Her limbs ached with unaccustomed weight, each step a reminder of mortality’s drag—demoralizing, yes, but not defeating.
She remembered how it felt, the ghost-echo of that power thrumming in her veins like a half-forgotten song.
Skills etched into a forced muscle memory, experience forged in intense battles—they lingered, defiant against the void of her severance.
That alone was enough.
All she needed to do was to will her body to remember, to mimic the impossible until it became real.
A cry shattered her reverie—one of the Void Hunters, a burly figure in moon-silvered plate, swept aside by the Voidling’s tail.
The appendage, thick as a tree trunk and barbed with entropic thorns, cracked like thunder against his guard.
His gleaming sword, its blade sheathed in a radiant moonlight that hummed with warding runes, flew from his grip in a wild arc.
It tumbled end over end through the air, hurtling straight toward Noirette like fate’s own gift.
Noirette saw it coming, time dilating in that hunter’s instinct she could never unlearn. A grin split her face—feral, triumphant.
"That’ll do," she murmured, already shifting her stance.
The sword whistled past, and she lunged into its path, catching the hilt mid-spin.
Momentum bit deep, the weapon’s weight yanking her forward, but Noirette twisted with it—using her body’s pivot, channeling the fall’s force into a spiraling whirl.
Her feet dug into the earth, feet carving furrows as she spun, dismissing the drag with a roll of her shoulders.
The Fallacy Cover fluttered, its exotic weave dulling her outline, making her a blur at the periphery of senses.
Of course, even with the right technique, the sword was too heavy and too fast to catch safely. And not only that, it was also too heavy for her current body to carry and drag.
But she pushed harder, forcing this sluggish shell to obey.
Veins bulged across her forearms and temples, reddening like rivers of fire under her skin; muscles knotted and screamed, blood pounding in her ears like war drums.
Sweat beaded, mixing with the grit of the battlefield, but she dragged the sword anyway—willing it to feel light, to slice as it once had under divine grace.
The Void Hunters blinked, their eyes sliding past her as the scarf worked its subtle sorcery, registering only a fleeting shadow.
The beast, too, sensed nothing amiss—its heads weaving in predatory arcs, focused on the more tangible prey.
Noirette sprinted then, legs pumping with borrowed fury, the ground blurring beneath her.
Before comprehension could catch up, she was there—beneath the shadow of the central head, its maw unhinging in a venomous yawn.
She coiled like a spring, momentum cresting, and unleashed—body whirling in a full, devastating spin, the moonlight sword arcing in a silver crescent.
The blade bit deep, shearing through scales and sinew with a wet, resonant schink—decapitating the foremost head in a spray of ichor that sizzled on the earth.
The severed neck spasmed, stump gouting void-black essence, while the adjacent head recoiled, slashed across its jaw, fangs shattering like brittle glass.
The battlefield stuttered. Void Hunters gaped, weapons faltering mid-swing; the beast bellowed, a discordant chorus from its remaining throats, entropy rippling outward in shockwaves that warped the air.
Noirette’s existence pierced the veil of the Fallacy Cover, her strike too audacious, too impossible to ignore.
Veins even more throbbed visibly now, a roadmap of strain across her neck and hands, as it branched even more from miniscule hemorrhaging, but her grin never wavered—wild, unyielding.
Rage boiled in the Voidling.
One head lunged, fangs bared in a cavernous maw dripping corrosive slime, aiming to engulf her whole.
Noirette didn’t dodge. She merely planted her feet, roots against the storm, and thrust the sword forward like a spear of judgment.
The blade plunged into the soft palate, impaling the head with a crunch of bone and a hiss of evaporating venom.
Ichor flooded the guard, burning her palms, but she pushed—deeper, harder, twisting with a grunt that tore from her core.
The head thrashed, pinned and gurgling, its weight dragging her forward, but Noirette held, muscles quivering under the assault.
With a savage wrench, she carved sideways, the moonlight edge rending flesh in a brutal evisceration.
Two heads down, their bodies slumping in twitching ruin, essence pooling like oil in the dirt.
The Voidling shrieked—a sound like tearing reality—its remaining trio of heads flailing in blind panic.
It couldn’t comprehend her; the scarf’s pall dulled her aura, making her strength a phantom blow from nowhere. And even if that veil was opened, Noirette’s existence was an anomaly.
An entity with nothing to be gauge with, an empty shell of existence with no Well of the Soul.
It was as if fighting fate itself.
The Voidling’s tails lashed wildly, not in attack but retreat, coiling to flee as entropy bled from its wounds.
Hunters scattered, shields raised against the frenzy, but Noirette was already moving—surging forward in a low sprint, sword raised like an executioner’s tool.
She vaulted a thrashing limb, feet skidding on ichor-slick stone, and drove the blade into the core—the pulsating nexus where necks converged, a throbbing knot of void-veined muscle that served as the beast’s heart.
The impact jarred her to the bones, the sword sinking hilt-deep with a visceral squelch.
The Voidling convulsed, scales fracturing as entropy backlashed, voids yawning wide enough to swallow light.
Noirette twisted—brutally, methodically—dragging the blade in savage arcs, carving through conduits of power, severing the ties that bound heads to core.
Flesh parted in ragged tears, essence erupting in geysers that painted her from crown to toe.
She yanked the weapon free only when the last spasms ebbed, the beast collapsing in a heap of dissolving coils, its form unraveling into wisps of nothingness that the wind scattered like ash.
Silence fell, heavy as the aftermath of a storm.
The Void Hunters stood frozen, weapons limp, faces etched with awe and disbelief.
Blood trickled from Noirette’s eyes—crimson tears born of ruptured vessels—and from her mouth, coppery on her tongue, mingling with the Voidling’s acrid residue.
Veins pulsed angrily across her skin, a lattice of exertion that throbbed with every heartbeat, her body screaming in protest at the abuse she’d inflicted upon it.
Yet she turned, slow and deliberate, and fixed them with a smile—dazed, dazzling, defiant.
The leader approached first—a grizzled woman in reinforced plate, her face scarred like cracked leather, axe still gripped white-knuckled. "Thank you," she rasped, voice thick with the weight of survival. "Didn’t see you coming. Thought we were done for."
Noirette’s grin widened, though it pulled at the split in her lip.
She tossed the sword back with casual precision—it spun hilt-over-pommel to land at the disarmed hunter’s feet.
"Everyone did a good job," Noirette said, striding past the leader, clapping a blood-smeared hand on her shoulder in passing. The touch lingered just a beat, warm and reassuring. "I just happened to be near. Don’t think much of it."
Her voice carried that easy lilt, dismissing heroism as happenstance, even as her frame trembled faintly from the strain.
She wove through the stunned group, eyes seeking Melisya.
The hunter stood apart, crossbow dangling, her blush reignited under the gore-streaked vision before her.
Veins stood out like cords of fire, blood tracing rivulets down her cheeks, but it only sharpened the allure, turning savagery into something... intoxicating.
Noirette stopped before her, close enough to share breath, and smiled—that same playful bewithching curve, now edged with exhaustion’s raw honesty. "I like the scarf so much, Melisya. Can I have it?"
Melisya’s eyes traced her face, lost in the crimson gaze, the half-lidded promise. "Your... your name?" she whispered..
"Noirette."
"Noirette... yes! You can have it!" The hunter beamed, fervent as a convert. "Are you... taken?" The question slipped out, bold in her enamored haze, cheeks flaming.
Noirette pressed a finger to her lips—shushing, teasing—her eyes hooding further.
"That’s a secret."
Words rippled from the group then, tension breaking like a wave, but Noirette was already turning, drawn back to the treeline where Blanchette waited.
The smaller woman leaned against a gnarled root, arms crossed, her pale face split in a grin of pure mischief.
Her white hair framed those crimson eyes, sparkling with amusement as she watched the scene unfold like a play scripted for her delight.
"Acting like a gigolette, are we?" Blanchette teased, voice lilting with mock scandal as Noirette approached. "Strutting in, borrowing trinkets, leaving a trail of blushing women in your wake. And all while you’ve got three beautiful wives waiting at home."
Noirette’s response was swift—a playful hammer of her fist against Blanchette’s crown, light but firm enough to elicit a yelp.
"Whose fault is it that this lonely individual’s been separated from all her wives, hmm?" She loomed, horns casting shadows, but her tone danced casualness.
Blanchette rubbed her head with exaggerated woe, but her grin only sharpened. "Oh, come now—you’ve got your beloved sister right here! Isn’t that enough to stave off the pangs of solitude?"
Noirette snorted, slinging an arm around Blanchette’s shoulders in a loose headlock, pulling her close amid the dispersing hunters’ grateful murmurs. "Quit joking around, you pint-sized menace. Fulfill your promise already—teach me how to get stronger as a Shallow One. Or do I have to charm it out of you like poor Melisya back there?"
"Im sorry to burst your bubble, but I’m not into incest."
"You don’t know if you don’t try," Noirette grinned. "Besides, we aren’t even sisters by blood."
"I didn’t know that you have this freaky side in you..." Blanchette said as she maintained her iconic wide smile.
"Desperation can change a person, you know~"
"So... does this mean that you have some kind of affection for me?"
"Not a single ounce of them."