The Phoenix's Maiden

The Battle for the Crystal (Part Four)

Arthur did not just trained his stamina for days, and his training is not all about perfecting same moves over and over because enemies will get used to it. He trained his stamina while developing new trump cards up his sleeves, and the goddess, Amaterasu, is very well aware of it. She just lets him be since there is no harm trying new moves.

The young knight is surrounded by a swarm of spider demons under Chigumo’s control who is laughing nonstop upon assuming that Arthur’s defeat and death is inevitable in front of him, while the young knight is thinking the same thing. But who will prove victorious in their duel? I think this is the right time to try my new move, he thought to himself. He raised his sword and Chigumo raised one his eyebrows confused with his actions. The demon smile with his thoughts.

“I don’t that you are this wise,” he said amused with Arthur. “Admitting defeat already?” he asked sarcastically and then Arthur twisted his sword and slammed it to the ground bringing himself on his own knees.

“Oh lord of the skies, bless me with your wrath and defeat those who defy you,” he started to chant his prayers. This is one of his elemental prayers that will change his sword, excalibur’s attribute. “Thunder Excalibur,” the markings on his sword changed and this is the first time that he will use this mode on actual battle. He thought that lightning will be suited in this isolated situation of his.

In the skies where Amaterasu is still dancing and Kamandag is defending her from coming enemies. A swarm of harpies began to appear as soon as they heard a loug growl from below. The ones they slain except for the ones that has been burned to ashes, are resurrected and became stronger than they were before, but this time the goddess is not with her to fight by her side.

She is in her redeemed form and she does not know if she will last longer before the goddess completes her dancing ritual. It seems too important to her as the goddess is taking too long and she is fighting with all her might since she is just one against hundreds of enemies. They attack from all directions which made it harder for her to defend the goddess.

“Remember, when I am interrupted, I will be in my weakened state since I spent most of my energy in that ritual and I will start all over again, you want that to happen?” she remembered the goddess information. She shook her head as if that question is currently asked inside her head.

“I need to be faster than I were before,” she told herself. “I don’t want to fail yet again and be saved by others, no there is no one saving me this time, it’s all up to me,” she reminded herself while fending off harpies that comes for the goddess. “All those training will be in vain; do I want that to happen?” she asked herself and she is unaware that she started a conversation with herself.

“Then let me handle it,” a voice answered inside her head, it’s a different voice a deep female voice. She knows that it’s not the goddess that is talking to her since in that state she cannot be distracted by anything else as she needs to focus on completing the ritual.

“Who are you?” she asked still on action defending the goddess, slashing the harpies with her sharp claws.

“Let’s say that I am a persona of your newfound power,” the voice inside her head replied. “Call me Poison,” she added.

“Yeah right, I think I am crazy,” she assumed that this is the result of her having conversation by herself. “I think I am poisoned right now as my brain is telling me that,” she added.

“No, I am a split personality of you damn it,” the voice sounds enraged and Kamandag was shocked and stopped moving for a second there. A harpy is about to lay its talons on the goddess but Kamandag just slashed it in time.

“Wait!? I am not crazy?” she asked again.

“I am telling the truth, I am a personality that’s been created and born alongside with your power and I want to call myself poison just to be matched with you since Kamandag means venom in other language, right?” she explained and asked the redeemed fairy.

“Well, you could say that venom and poison are a matching name,” Kamandag told herself. “Then why did you tell me that I should let you in control?” she asked herself.

“Well, I know what to do and the unseen potential of this form since I am this form itself,” she answered and the redeemed fairy did not follow clearly.

“Can you repeat that again?” she requested as she cannot process complicated information inside her mind while fighting hundreds of enemies.

“In simpler terms, I am the redeemed form itself,” Poison clarified.

“Oh,” she cheaply said.

“I can’t take over your mind and body with my own will and I can only be given access when you are in your redeemed form,” Poison explained.

“So you are admitting that you plan to take over my body,” she said suspiciously.

“No! That’s not what I meant!” the alternate personality defended itself. “I meant that I can’t help you without your permission even if I wanted to,” she added.

“Okay,” Kamandag is still not convinced on what she said.

“Also, your redeemed is the only time that I can have the privilege to request control,” she added clarifying herself.

“From the looks of it, I think I don’t need your help anymore,” Kamandag told Poison. “I can handle this since I can argue with you while fighting at the same time, don’t you agree on that?” she asked her alternate personality.

“If you say so,” Poison timidly answered and Kamandag just laughs it off.

“You know you are funny; you just appear out of nowhere intimidating and then I learn you are this lame,” she teased and if Poison had a face right now, she is as red as tomatoes because of shame. The alternate personality did not answer anymore since talking to her will just cause her more humiliation. “I think it’s time to end this rampage,” she said to herself slashing the nearest harpy. Their attack is too fast which is favorable to Kamandag since it will take her less time to defend her. Her claws grew longer than it was before radiating bright light from the nails. It grew twice as long of her body and that gave her range to s***h upcoming enemies from afar.

“Divine claws,” Poison was shocked that Kamand knew about this. She underestimated Kamandag too much and she finds it interesting to observe her more, and a small feeling of grudge is inside her thoughts since Kamandag humiliated her pride. She is not even intimidated by her sudden appearance.

Kamandag stopped moving when she saw that enemies have enough distance to peroform her next transformation. Just like her claws, her wings radiated and the feathers became more lighter and brighter, it grew just inches longer. Poison was even more surprised that she knew about this too. Her pride was crushed even more but no matter, she still knows many secrets of her divine form.

This transformation is Kamandag’s divine form and she can just hold it for a little moment so she needs to be quicker and faster and not just that, it also shortens the time of her redeemed form significantly since she spent a lot of energy in that form.

“Whirlwhind,” she spreads her wings and flies towards the upcoming enemies at great amount of speed and sliced all the way through. She circled around to make sure that she attacked all of them. In just a blink of an eye, Kamandag sliced through all of them and even the enemies aren’t aware that they had been sliced in half. Kamandag transformed back into her redeemed form since its just a couple of seconds that she needed clearing them all up and she need to preserve energy, in case anything unexpected happens.

In Poison’s perspective all of these are very impressive that she managed to execute that move very smoothly. She imagined that if this fairy will have a complete mastery on her form, she will be feared across the Mystic Realm and anyone will be afraid of her, just the thought of stopping her, but she has still have a long way to go before she reaches that stage.

“Hey,” Kamandag called onto Poison.

“What is it?” she responded.

“Still ashamed of yourself?” Kamandag just can’t help herself teasing her newfound alternate personality. She does not have a problem having a person within her mind, others might panic and think that they have mental illness. Well it’s considered as mental illness by most of the people in human world. DID or Dissociative identity disorder, also known as multiple personality disorder (MPD), a mental disorder described as by having two or more distinct distant relatively enduring personality states. Memory gaps can be experienced but Kamandag is not experiencing this. The other disorder that can be diagnosed with her if she is human is Schizotypal Personality Disorder, a mental illness where the patients diagnosed appear to talk to themselves to respond to the voices inside their head that is caused by hallucinations, they often believe that the hallucinations are real. Well SPD can be best suited to describe Kamandag’s situation since she is talking to herself but Poison inside her head is not made up or even a hallucination inside her head. She is real than every living being moving around her right now and even clearer as day.

“Curse you!” she shouted and Kamandag felt a little tingling sensation inside her head, and Kamandag tried to hold her laughter but was suddenly interrupted by a rumbling below her. She looks down and that came from the tent below her. She wonders what is happening with Arthur there but she cannot just leave the goddess still performing her dance ritual.

“What do you think is happening down there?” she asked poison but she learned her lesson and did not answer back to Kamandag. “Hey! Don’t be like that, you’re the one appearing out of nowhere trying to look mighty,” she even gave Poison more reason to not respond on her statements. “You’re so lame you know that?” she even gave negative statement to Poison.

“You have your moment, enjoy it while it lasts,” Poison thought to herself but unbeknownst to her, Kamandag can clearly hear her.

“I can hear you,” she stated before a lightning strikes the goddess down. Her eyes widened as the lightning electrocuted the goddess and falls down to the ground. She flew towards her to save her from falling.

"Your karma!" Poison exclaimed.

"SHUT UP!" Kamandag shouted because of panic. "What the heck happened? Oh god why right now? she asked herself. Her hard work was wasted as she looks on the unconscious goddess. 

-The Phoenix’s Maiden-