A loud screech, followed by a beam of blue energy, resonated through the air with the sounds of a beast floating and flying through the air. Skyler, upon transforming, had caused a bit of chaos on the battlefield with the help of her new transformation. While Ace and Cherry took out a few at a time, she focused on hindering a large number in their movements while the Granians followed through with the finishing attacks. Her energy breath attacks wouldn’t kill, for they weren’t that strong yet, but they would disorientate, weaken, and damage the flesh and armor of the Ethisians, giving the Granians that followed her an easier time when it came to killing them. Eventually, after she had caused enough damage, Skyler returned to the ground, taking the form of another creature, which was one of her favorites: the Scaled Ones. Remembering her experience with the Scaled Ones during training, the young woman became well-versed with their biology and fighting styles, incorporating that wisdom with her Eneraflux. As soon as she transformed, her skin blended in with the environment so well that it appeared as though she was invisible. Quickly, she used that advantage and blinded the Ethisians. Not bothering to attack them head-on with fist-to-fist combat, she opted to go for the next best thing: taking out their eyes. A set of five sharp claws on both hands and invisibility were the two advantages she had in this fight. Jumping from Ethisian to Ethisian, Skyler became a tactical force to reckon with, causing a lot more damage in this fight than she ever did in her other battles. Thanks to her training with One Horn and astute observations made on the Blood Mutants, she was able to learn what to do, what not to do, and how to do the right thing at the right time in the right place. Also, her training put her in a good enough position, making her Eneraflux levels almost high enough to be partially compared with One Horn’s, even though it wasn’t enough. ’Keep this up for as long as you can, Skyler,’ she self-monologued, knowing that her chances wouldn’t last forever. ’We can’t keep this up for too long. Won’t be long until someone figures us out.’ Now, while training with One Horn had helped her grow stronger, it also helped her incorporate two beast forms at once. For example, she could have the body of the dragon-like beast she had just been while using the invisibility aspect of the Scaled One beast. With that, she’d not only have power but also the element of surprise on her side. This aspect could also be used when still in her human form, but that wasn’t necessary at the moment. Her biggest priority right now was to help weaken the Ethisians as much as she could. Meanwhile, on the other side of the battlefield was Cherry and her Blood Clones, giving the Elites a hard time. The Blood Knight, using fury, vicious behavior, her Coagulant Daggers, as well as her Blood Clones, managed to do what her brother wasn’t doing... yet. Slipping through the Elites’ defenses, the Blood Knight dodged, attacked, defended, and counteracted their moves while inflicting as much damage as she could. So far, all she managed to do was cause some bruises on their bodies and inflict damage on their legs, but it wasn’t enough. If she wanted to win, she needed to at least make them bleed for her to use her Blood Manipulation abilities at their fullest potential. Three axes, nearly the size of her abdomen, came falling in her direction but all missed their target. The Blood Knight, incorporating speed and quick thinking into her fight, would use tactics such as that to confuse and frustrate the Elites, and it was working. Whenever she’d perform those moves, the Elites would abandon their ’fighting styles’ and instead swing around recklessly, forgetting their training methods. "YOUR MOVEMENTS ARE STARTING TO DISORIENT ME!!" One of the eight Elites yelled angrily and attempted to grab her, missing by only an inch which gave Cherry the chance to climb onto its head. Without giving it a second thought, the Blood Knight penetrated her daggers so deep into the Ethisian’s eyes that it bled out uncontrollably, blinding it in the process. It was still alive but it couldn’t see anything around it. "That’s much better," Cherry cheered and then began doing what she was waiting for. Arms raised, fingers arched, and her focus at its peak, she drained as much blood from the Ethisian as she could, wrapping it around her hands and back which created an octopus-like similarity. The Elite dropped to the ground, its body no longer mobile. Some of its blood was used to create more Blood Clones while the rest was collected and turned into tentacles. Now that she had a fresh source of blood, the Blood Knight slit her wrists, adding some of her own blood to the mixture. "HYAHHH!!" Another Ethisian, effortlessly breaking her clones with its weapon while slamming down its foot at her head, missed by a mile and lost sight of its target. The others, already preoccupied with the clones, looked around in search of the Blood Knight. One moment she was surrounded by them, and in the next, she had vanished. "Looking for me?" Cherry laughed, her blood tentacles sharpening at the tips with glowing bits of her blood getting ready to ignite into explosive rounds. Landing on their heads, she stabbed, gouged, and pierced the soft, delicate bits of their heads, mainly going for their eyes and ears. Instead of going for the final kill, she made sure to inflict serious wounds on all of the Ethisians. Doing this also prompted her clones to do the same, putting the Elites between a rock and a hard place. "Let’s end this, Ethisians," a scowl appeared on her face, mimicking her brother whenever he was about to finish off an enemy. Collecting all the blood from the inflicted wounds, Cherry mixed it with her own and set it back to the wounds on the Ethisians while barely dodging and missing their attacks. Left, right, down, up, slide, jump, roll, tackle. Those were the series of her movements that allowed her to narrowly evade their attacks. What made it more impressive for her was that all of this was done without using her Blood Mutant form. Now that all the Ethisians had their lost blood returned to them, the Blood Knight stood still, looking all of them in their eyes. Feeling a bit small compared to their gigantic height, Cherry cackled, snapping her fingers in an instant which caused their upper bodies to implode. It started with their veins, arteries, and capillaries, then their head holes, and finally the delicate muscles between their brains and skulls. Like mighty trees cut down by a woodworker, the Ethisian bodies fell one by one with a great thud. The Blood Knight had done it. She and her Clones killed eight of the Elite Ethisians, but it came at a price. A heavy price that she had to pay. A bit of Cherry’s own blood escaped through her mouth. Her vision started to blur and her breathing grew heavy. The stunts she pulled were mainly dependent on her explosive Blood Technique, an ability that only worked with the user’s own blood. Having used too much of it without accounting for the end results they would have on her, Cherry’s body became anemic, and if she didn’t rest soon, she could end up dying but that’s where the challenging bit came. They were in the middle of a War. Even though she killed eight Elites, she could see more coming her way and they were twice the number than the ones she fought before. Aside from that, there was nowhere else for her to rest unless she scaled the surrounding cold and bitter mountain ranges which would take more energy. Yes, there was the option of her consuming blood to replenish her lost energy, but it would take a few minutes for her body to regenerate more blood. What made matters worse was that her body was getting less oxygen in since blood transported oxygen to various body parts, hence the reason for her weakness and slightly faint and sluggish movements. She needed to think fast. Keeping the Blood Clones active was difficult but didn’t consume much of her already fading strength so that wasn’t anything to worry about. In the meantime, she needed to find somewhere to rest until her body was back to normal. At least thirty minutes would suffice but finding the place was difficult. "Cherry, follow me," coming to her rescue, just like on Earth, was the ’human impersonator’ Chris who had been secretly observing the Blood Knight’s violent but effective fighting tactics. However, he noticed her body growing weak and since it was his duty to protect the Humans, he provided a place for her to rest in the Granian ships until she was back on her feet again. "Very coincidental for me to be helping you again," he laughed but got no response. "Are you alright? I saw you cough up blood and..." "I just need a place to lie down..." she answered, and then her stomach growled. Consuming blood wasn’t going to help her through this one so she needed to feast on something. "...and something to eat..." "Errr, okay," Chris nervously scratched his head. "What would you like? I don’t think we have the foods you guys eat on Earth at the moment..." Official source ıs 𝘯𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭⚑𝓯𝓲𝓻𝓮⚑𝕟𝕖𝕥 "Meat..." Cherry replied, her eyes glowing as red as her brothers’. Her teeth grew into fangs, and her grip on Chris’ body increased almost to the point of piercing through his skin. "...any raw meat will do...and hurry..."