“Fuck.” Kire ducked and rolled out of the way of its swing. She was now glad she’d bothered with the armor; the physical and magical protections it provided would have probably caught the blow and kept it from killing her, but it would’ve hurt like a mother. The monster was shaky on its decaying feet, but still much too lively for her liking. It was even [i]speaking[/i]. Probably just a remnant of whatever words it used to speak when alive, rather than real thought, but Kire didn’t like that it could do that at all. She was trying to scan for some sign of Ikegai’s art on its body when it lunged, swaying a bit. 

Kire kept low, dodging again, and this time she slashed at its leg, seeing an opening. The corpse roared, or would have if it still had a functioning throat, as it sunk on one knee. “Hm.” Kire backed off, wary despite the corpse’s unsteadiness, then tossed the carnelian gem in her hand away, to the opposite direction. The corpse shambled between her and the gem, angry and confused, sensing a trace of the blood magic that called to the one that was animating its dead body. Kire closed the distance and hacked at the sword arm first. 

The monster opened its mouth in a silent scream and swung its other limb around, hitting Kire and sending her flying back against the collapsed wall. “Ugh…fuck you.” She leaped to her feet before the corpse could tear at her, but without an arm and another leg threatening to fall off, she could finish the fight now. Its swings and lunged were wilder now, but each time it almost threw itself off balance. Kire slashed the other leg clean off now, then kicked it square on its back, toppling it over. Finally, she lifted her sword and swung down, chopping off its head. 

The corpse convulsed, and so did the severed head. Kire grimaced, waiting for it to calm down. When, finally, its movements slowed to a halt, she nudged the giant torso with her foot to turn it over. It hadn’t been too difficult to bring the monster down, but it bothered her that, presumably, despite this corpse decaying here for a long time, it still had enough magic in it to move so dynamically. She scanned the body, feeling for Ikegai’s telltale blood art, and her gaze focused on a small mark on its chest. From a distance she had mistaken it for some birthmark or scar, but upon closer inspection it was a rune, [i]Amrian[/i], tattooed on the skin. At the center of it was a gleaming carnelian bead, embedded in the flesh. Kire sheathed her sword and drew out the hunting knife, getting read to carve it out of the skin. 

The headless corpse convulsed and grabbed her with its remaining appendage. An electric shock of pain bolted through her body, starting from her hands, where her fingertips had been touching its chest. Kire gritted her teeth through it and tore out a whole chunk of chest, the rune and carnelian with it, and the corpse was now still. Her lip curled in disgust as she picked out the gem from the corpse skin and tossed the rest of the chunk aside, before spitting at the headless corpse.