Klaus's Bone Sword carved an arc through the air as he charged, the trail of green light painfully glaring.
Jie's Flash had only completed halfway. Before her figure could fully blur, the blade was already upon her.
Green light grazed her left shoulder. Though the wound was not deep, crystallization began spreading the instant it made contact. Dark green crystals spread several inches outward from the edge of the wound at a visible speed.
Jie flashed backward sharply, her expression beneath the mask twisted slightly. She had clearly not expected Klaus to have hidden this for so long.
Klaus did not pursue her, because Nine had already arrived behind him.
Nine's Carapace Arm was still following through on the momentum of his second strike. That strike had begun the instant Klaus charged out, and it was now falling toward Klaus's back.
Klaus's figure flickered, splitting into four offset Afterimages. Nine's blade struck one of them, passed through the phantom, and missed completely.
The Bone Sword swept back the next moment.
The arc of green light slashed across Nine's carapace-covered ribs.
A crack opened in the carapace, and blackish-yellow bodily fluid gushed from it. Yet the fluid froze the moment it reached the edge, and green crystals began growing from the crack, spreading several inches along the surface of the carapace.
Nine was sent flying, his back crashing into the wall of a side alley. Two stone bricks shattered, and fragments scattered across the street.
He lowered his head to glance at the spreading green crystals along his ribs, and his expression changed drastically. He clearly knew how troublesome this thing was.
J reacted with incredible speed. Black liquid surged violently from the ground, coiling around Klaus's lower body from three directions at once.
Klaus's figure flashed repeatedly, but there was