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Fear and paranoia gripped his mind, threatening him with terrible familiarity. Dredging up ancient history. Assaulting him with that most deadly of weapons. Himself.

It was almost enough to make him lose track of his body. Of the pain surging through it.

These feldeaths had a way with that, he’d learned. They frequently found a way to override numbness, either by circumventing it and inflicting psychic pain instead or, even more terrifyingly, simply undoing it. As in, getting into the brain and deactivating the numbness that a reaper had previously activated. Almost like they could take over the reaper’s role.

Thankfully, this was not the first time Morgunov had experience such an attack from Kallmakk. He knew what to expect. Knew to brace not just his body but also his mind.

It didn’t make it hurt any less, but it allowed him to regain control of his faculties more quickly. Like bouncing back from a punch instead of getting floored by it.

He activated both Demon’s Grips simultaneously to increase his weight. Double, triple, quintuple. Ten times, fifty times, a hundred times. Needed the extra inertia here, as his strength rose in correspondence with it.

Not enough. He was still stuck fast. Kallmakk’s hold was ridiculous. Agh, had it gotten even stronger since the last time?

Five hundred times.

A thousand.

His arms twitched, then burst free, grabbing onto a chunk of physical darkness as if it were solid rock and ripping through it.

This did not help the pain one bit. His mind whited out for a second as he resorted to an ancient trick, trying to cope with the sheer, maddening degree of it, which left his body to stumble aimlessly through the blackness. He was moving, but it took him a while to even realize it.

Then he was in the air, still unsure why. Taken another hit? Probably.

He crashed into the ceiling and broke straight through, flying out of the cave and up into daylight. Quite the welcome sight, actually. Kallmakk would be much less threatening up here. Unless--

The sky darkened as the sun turned black.

Uh-oh.

Another dark beam came for him, and toppling through the air, he wasn’t able to dodge this time. It hit him like a train, sending him even higher into the air.

Now stuff was missing. Clothes in tatters. Left arm? Side of his face? Both missing. Not good. That meant he’d lost a glove, too.

No time to fuss over it. Another beam was coming for him. Bastard was trying to juggle him until he was completely vaporized.