Just when Lychinus thought he had the Splatterer in a compromised position, a scorching beam unexpectedly struck him from behind, flaying away layers of his flesh suit like a blow torch on an onion. He flinched but didn’t yield, instead turning his upper body to face the source while keeping one hand on his restrained sword. The beam was just coming to an end, but he had turned just in time to see the red glint of a follow-up attack. Raising his free hand, he caught the murderous knife on his forearm, where its supernaturally-sharp point pierced through his flesh and stabbed shallowly into his crystalline core, where it remained with a soft thrumming sound.

The attacker was disappearing out of sight as it happened, so there was no telling whether the attack was deliberate or not. There wasn’t much time to think about it either, because a moment later a city block worth of electrical power surged into him, conducting up through the body of the Splatterer, with his deranged approximation of a grin. This is where being inorganic really pays off. A human would’ve been well and truly fucked, but Lychinus had no muscles to spaz out, no brain or nerves to overload, and no heart to stop. That left the ionizing heat of the current as the primary hazard. Damaging, for sure, but not as debilitating as it could’ve been.

As black Lichtenberg patterns burned their way up his sword, arm and legs, scorching his flesh and rattling his core, he struggled to force a new surge of energy into his wings, propelling him upwards. He let go of the sword and ceased his concentration upon it, causing it to shatter under the electric current and the Splatterer’s iron grip. The Splatterer now had a decision to make: release his psychic grip and be left in the electrified water, or be lifted into the air by the torso. If the Splatterer released, Lychinus would merely fly up further to create distance and recover. If he held on, Lychinus would fly to fifteen foot height before turning his attention downward and firing a scorching energy beam of his own from his eyes, directly at the Splatterer’s disturbing visage.