In the darkness beyond the mountains, lines of destruction spread throughout the confusing landscape of Tokstrom, Continental Fortress of the undead empire, compressed winds split stone and air, like massive detonations rippling through the eternal night, Nosferatu struck those raging winds head-on, dispelling the crushing unseen blade.
Moving in the blink of an eye, Pierre-Ornée thrusted at the vampires face, twisting his weapon after it missed, creating a sudden vortex, cutting into the gravelord's face, the wounds remaining for less than a second, the copper knight could barely even see them appearing.
Swinging again, it was blocked, Nosferatu replied with a jab, the knight evading with a back step, planting his halberd into the ground, the flat roof of a nondescript building, he launched pieces of debris at his opponent, the stone used here much tougher than anything he was used to, his idea went through anyways.
With a clap of his hands, the vampire dispersed everything, the resulting sonic boom, whistling in the living's ears, the mark of a graze was etched upon the side of his helm, the two combatants stood opposite to one another, holding his halberd's handle high up, most of it hidden behind his arm and back.
They had begun fighting for a little while now, the sound of the barrier cracking in the distance served as a reminder that life was on the losing side, by now, each and every heavy hitter of Tamaris had probably gone to face the gravelords, he could not know for certain, all that he knew was that Nosferatu was tough nut to crack, in the very first instants of their confrontation, Pierre-Ornée had managed to blast the undead's head into pieces, a mere feint as even without it he managed to land a strike upon the helm.
Regrowing his head entirely, Nosferatu was wholly unfazed.
At least physically, the vampire lord was elated otherwise, he had not been told bollocks, the halbardier was truly the strongest warrior of Tamaris, without life force and without mana, a pure warrior capable of holding his own against the strongest gravelord.
In fact, as Nosferatu rose both of his hands, the surroundings drowned in the king's darkness, basked in the glorious dark of the black sun, the continental-wide fortress was empty in the surroundings, Luminary Nitok had taken precautions ahead of time, having predicted who would take up the job and challenge his gravelords, his dominion had expended far beyond its previous reaches, Tamaris was but a miniature oasis sitting somewhere in his territory.
An oasis of naught but blasphemy against death.
Stomping the ground with all of his strength, sending a shockwave rolling through the surroundings, launching himself forward, he kicked at the copper knight's neck, his leg sliced apart, no blood coming out before growing when positioning right in front of the living's face, flesh regrew alongside the gravelord's clothes, manufactured from his own blood and flesh, the sole of his foot struck against the tough handle of the halberd, Pierre-Ornée reacting in time to the attack, diverting it from course, hooking the vampire's heel with the curved hook behind the axe blade, picking Nosferatu up with a groan.
Much like Loimos, the one of foetid blood was overwhelmingly heavy, much more than he had any right to be, even Pierre-Ornée had to put his back into it in hope for lifting the gravelord off the ground against his will, throwing him away to no effect.
Controlling the blood within his body, Nosferatu locked himself in place, manifesting two spheres of blood, he bent his knees and whilst standing vertically in mid-air, he jumped back toward the halbardier, punching him across the face, bending the helm inward and sending the man stumbling back for a moment.
Feeling the blood within shaking unnaturally, the knight of copper caught himself, and struck with his weapon, diverting his blade, he instead struck the vampire's temple with the end of his handle, knocking him out of balance for an instant, allowing for him to cleave right through the gravelord, and despite clearly going right through his chest, the upper and lower half were not separated, the regeneration just as fast as Pierre-Ornée's slash.
Nosferatu wore his thoughts upon his ugly mug, and he was clearly wondering about something, indeed, his opponent was incredibly powerful, to take a full powered punch for the strongest gravelord with some momentum to boot was a rather big deal, even the pure living would have had part of his face blown off, the living's armour was not that great to allow for this.
And yet, Nosferatu sensed no energy usage, none at all, and he was confident that he would have noticed when he struck, as his stack technique utilised everything possible to enhance everything possible, so if any energy was in use, he would know as they impacted one another, and in the case of life force, it was rather hard to hide this from him and his attacks would be otherwise harder to heal from had it been the case.
Nosferatu was a gravelord, but before Loimos had officially taken up the mantle, Nosferatu had been an unofficial champion and repressive agent in the name of Nitok, he had slaughtered countless living champions and heroes, of all kinds, from all corners of Viridis and even from other continents, the first war had been difficult, the continent had been wild and rich with strife many years before the rise of the undead empire.
Dragons had still been numerous, there had been a king of monsters, kings of beasts, bloody emperors who only knew strength to rule, he had crushed many skulls like grapes, mages, warriors of all sorts, the diversity in energies had been otherwise more pronounced back then.
Nosferatu knew to recognise any source of any power at a glance, and yet, he was forced to admit that he did not know what had made Pierre-Ornée the man that he was, when striking him, when analysing his movements, he felt no energies, no innate abilities, no traces of the system even.
Nosferatu made himself the strongest by employing everything available and unifying it all, but Pierre-Ornée had made himself the strongest by doing the opposite.
Striking both of his fists together, Nosferatu licked his teeth with a laugh.
"I had heard of the possibility, but I was not quite aware that divesting oneself of everything in exchange of true physical power could be so rewarding" fingers cracking, he clenched his fists.
"You'll make fine food for The Graveyard!" stepping forward with a boom, they clashed once more, a deluge of shredded flesh and heavy blows, ever regenerating, never faltering.
The barrier cracked louder than ever before.