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"Arg-" Was about all Viceroy could get out before pain was sent though his leg. Nor would he get anything else out before Allen tossed him towards the other puppets. Though it wouldn't be quite the effect Allen wanted, before the contact was made Viceroy shifted back into rose petals, and all that remained was a puppet.

A puppet that collided with two others, shattering into multiple pieces.

The petals soon reformed and viceroy was floating above that carnage. Once again he put his hand straight out in front of him, palm glowing with chaotic energy. Then the crystal vines welled with light, before releasing a blinding flash. When the light would see Viceroy was now pointing forward.

And that each piece of the last puppet had formed into its own whole puppet. Three rows of five in all.

They charged towards the champions, not wasting any time this round. The first row wailing their arms in a windmill fashion. The second row doing the same deadly spin as the puppet that attack Athan. The final row looked like they were doing the cancan, only with deadly powerful kicks instead of hot showgirl leg.

Viceroy floated above it all. Charging power it seemed.

Athan was hardly going to stand idly by as Vahn had all the fun. He switched the grip on the mercurial longsword, right hand now moving to serve as the lead grip, with the left moving to support the weight of the weapon.

Athan was already heading forward, rushing directly up Vahn's back, it appeared. Those puppets that had survived the flames were his intended targets.

"Reservations for two?"

Muscles within his legs coiled then sprung, propelling him up and over Vahn as he completed his swing. Athan followed the flames, his sword coming up and over his head, both hands retaining their tight grip.

There was no somersault, but the force with which Athan's sword came down to strike the head of the next row of puppets would more than likely split them in twain before a second's time had passed.

The resultant force of the weapon striking the ground was enough to shake the floor and raise dust from the ground within three yards' radius.

The puppets were getting decimated, period. Either on fire or chopped to bits, at least half of them were out of commission. The other half, full or maimed, were now dog piling on Athan. They were grabbing, pulling, restraining, anything to stop the man with the massive sword.

Except for one puppet jumping off the wall. It seemed it was doing a badass ninja kick to prevent Allen from getting to Viceroy. No it couldn't have been it would be far too late. At most he was going to pass behind Allen's back. Wait no.

Bait and switch.

Allen would find his claws going into a puppet and a rush of rose petals fly by him. Viceroy was suddenly behind him, and suddenly manhandling him. Allen would find his momentum had been switched from forward, to right at Vahn. Throwing allies at each other wasn't a trick exclusively reserved for good guys apparently.

Though Viceroy was a nice guy. He didn't want the two to go flying far once they impacted. Erupting from the ground behind Vahn was a wall of spiked vines.

What? Did you expect pillows?

And then they were all around him. In retrospect, launching himself at the enemy without something to protect himself from those outside of his range was a bad idea.

"Grah!"

He swung his left hand out, his sword acting as a temporary barrier to keep a few puppets off of him, but soon enough he was overwhelmed. The sword didn't have enough space to gain enough momentum to be useful, and the puppets were beginning to pull and claw at his arms.

Soon enough he was swallowed up in the mass of puppets. His right hand managed to fish out the shortsword from its sheathe underneath the pile.

Yet even as he freed the weapon, he noticed something as a puppet's fist sank into his exposed back.

It was growing larger.

Things were about to get very messy for the puppets as he curled into a ball. His swords were crossed beneath him, head tucked in towards his chest. It was a lot of impact to take, but the sword in his right hand continued to grow with each blow he took. His back was easily capable of absorbing the impact of each puppet's strike, but even he had to admit that it was beginning to grate on his nerves.

They were all watching and waiting. It was time to hit them with something hard for the first time this battle. He raised a hand in the air and formed a small orb.

The two paying attention, Allen looking for a weakness especially, would see three basketball sized orbs half emerge from the mess of vines. One blue, the other red and the last purple one completed the triangle. Each pulsed with appropriate colour of energy before firing off a beam of energy. Three beams impacted the orb Viceroy was holding, causing it to grow a proportional size to the beams.

Dramatically, Viceroy pointed at the pile of dolls. On cue the ball zoomed towards the buried Athan, dragging the three powerful beams among with it. On impact dolls, and possibly Athan, would go flying in all directions. Soon after the impact Viceroy changed his point to Allen, and the beams followed until they would knock Allen right in a chest. Hit or miss, Viceroy wanted to make sure his attack made the full route. His last point was towards Vahn, only this time he finished by opening and closing his hand into a fist.

The beams would stop and so would the orb, inches before they hit Vahn. It would be there it exploded in a magical blast.

Fingers tightened their grip on the hilt of either sword, his head still ducked forward. There was a sudden surge of adrenaline into his bloodstream, his eyes widening as he realized that, more than likely, now was the correct time.

He had no idea that there was a ball of energy soaring directly towards him. Then again, it didn't really matter. All he was concerned with was getting out from his current predicament.

"Get..."

He rose both arms, planting his swords against the temple's floor. It would at least help to use his arms when it came to rising up against the pile of puppets that were holding him down. It also helped that, at this stage, both weapons were practically equal in length.

What he didn't count on was the orb coming from above and impacting directly atop the pile of dolls. The sudden rush of energy was enough to nearly take Athan off his feet, but the fact that he was in the process of putting all of his weight forward and holding his swords firmly against the ground with quite a bit of pressure was enough to keep Athan from bouncing off the walls.

"That's it."

Athan rose up to a standing position, the back of his right hand coming to wipe a small amount of blood that was beginning to trail down from his lip. He looked to his right, where his second weapon was. It was a lot lighter than the sword in his left hand. For the time being, he plunged the blade of his first sword into a crack in the temple's flooring. The left hand moved across his body, gripping the bottom of the other sword's hilt.

He was soon treated to the sound of an explosion behind him. His gaze drifted over his shoulder, the light was far too bright to be stared at for more than a second, and he quickly turned his attention back to the Viceroy.

His jaw set, Athan tightened his grip upon the Chaotic Blade as he surged towards the Viceroy's position.

It was an all out sprint, ending only when Athan drew the sword's hilt up over his right shoulder before stabbing straight forward towards the Viceroy's midsection.

Since Athan was heading forward from the blinding flash of light, it would probably offer him some, if not all of, the element of surprise.

Viceroy made no effort to move out of the way of the way of the sword. But some petals did fall to the ground. From the chest up Viceroy was still viceroy, but from below that line there was just a dangling puppet. Athan's sword was as good as stuck. Viceroy smiled, and made a crushing motion with his two hands right in front of Athan's face. On command two vines came from each side of the wall, they would attempt to wrap around Athan and slowly crush him.

Those same three orbs sunk back into the wall, only to emerge moments later on the ceiling above Vahn and Allen. They charged short bursts and rotated around in a circle. Essentially creating an erratic rain of small beams directly above Vahn and Allen. It had a wide range, but it was highly inaccurate.

His arms quickly attempted to free the weapon from its trapped position, but it was stuck pretty well. If he had more time, he just might have been able to yank the sword free.

If only it had been the Viceroy's torso, instead, he wouldn't have to worry about discovering just what the crushing motion meant. Well, he wasn't going to just stand there and wait to find out. He abandoned the stuck sword, instead opting to push off the ground to propel his body in the opposite direction.

As he was sliding against the ground, Athan couldn't have been in better position to notice the vines that were heading towards him.

His right hand stuck out behind him, palm striking against the hilt of his sword as his toes slid along the ground. He stopped about a foot from where the sword rested, bringing the weapon up from the right side, the sharpened edge moving to slice the two vines above him in half.

"Getting pretty sick of these tricks of yours."

Athan held the sword out in front of him, left hand moving to the subordinate position.