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Mercurial spikes erupted from Melchor’s body, skewering Diego through the eye socket and finally throwing him off. Bloody and full of holes, Diego managed to catch himself on the bookshelf in the middle of the room, sliding across the top and freezing it with the residual liquid nitrogen still present in his arms. By the time his feet touched the floor again, his wounds had already healed, even the one that had undoubtedly pierced his brain.

Diego didn’t have to dive back into the fight. Melchor came for him first, which Dimas found quite telling as to which opponent the Lord Blackburn was most concerned about. Surely, if Diego managed to freeze enough of Melchor’s body at once, it would be problematic for the man, but even with Diego’s soul-empowered liquid nitrogen, the freezing process would require more than just a few seconds. Melchor’s passive soul defense was not something to be overlooked. Diego wasn’t going to get that much time unless Dimas and Joana provided it for him.

Dimas pointed a single index finger at Melchor. Much as he would have liked to, he couldn’t simply crush the man with overwhelming gravitational pressure. Melchor’s passive soul resilience and field density were both too powerful for such a tactic. However, Dimas could still reverse the gravity around Melchor in order to disorient him. So he did.

In an instant, Melchor was flung toward the ceiling, splattering against it briefly before recovering and crawling around like some kind of hideous liquid spider.

Joana took the opportunity to launch a flurry of thick chromium spears, all barbed and razor sharp. They pelted Melchor, some bouncing off, some sticking in, and his body shuddered and morphed before it could expel the chromium back out again.

Dimas didn’t let up either. With one hand, he kept intensifying the gravity around Melchor in order to slow him down, and with the other, he fired off a series of gravity bullets--invisible pockets of supercondensed pressure that carried enough speed to pierce steel at fifty meters.

Mercury splashed violently with each impact, but Melchor weathered that assault, too, though not quite so effortlessly as before. His liquid body contorted and swirled as he moved out of the way.

Diego, in the meantime, had been prepping three of his fingers. No doubt, he feared using any more than that in the presence of his allies. Dimas knew what he was crafting. He’d seen him do it before. Soul-strengthened nitroglycerin, it would be.