章 187: Dark Wraith's gonna Wraith.

Ingward hands over the key to the Flood Gates and Reima thanks him, as he's about to walk away he remembers that this guy is actually a Merchant in game... "Oh, by the way, got any Sorcerery scrolls you'd be willing to part with? Not for free of-course."

Ingward nods, "Apologies but I have only one scroll on my person, it's a spell that was used to try and resist the Dark Hand but it didn't end up working... It was however effective at resisting curses, an area of magic I'm quite adept in."

Reima nods and transfers the requested amount of souls before stowing the parchment into his Folded Space, "Thank you, trust that I'll kill the Four Kings." Ingward bows in response and watches Reima leave. "Hopefully he he'll succeed, or I fear that the world will quickly be overtaken by those fiends.

After leaving the roof of the church Reima quickly makes his way across the ruined walls towards the giant lever next to the huge flood gates, using key Seal key to unlock the door to access it he pushes the lever with all his strength. The large metal and stone contraption slowly budges open, only becoming easier as the water seeks to rush through the gates. After fully opening the gates Reima watches the water slowly decrease in height, revealing the lower ruins of the city, the rotten smell only becoming more prominent as he spots various piles of corpses that have just been left there... In the distance he can see Black cloaked figures wearing armour that reminds him of the wild hunt, metal armour resembling bones, skeleton rib cage and skull mask only deepens the comparison. They had seemed to be hibernating, prone on the ground... Once the water washes away they immediately get to their feet and start looking for what Reima assumes is more humanity to steal. Nearby is a staircase that leads into some wooden shacks that seemed to have been haphazardly built for some reason or another... He renews the Chaos Blade enchantment on his Silver Sword as he cautiously walks past the ridiculous number of corpses left scattered amidst the ruined city.

His Observation Haki flares and he quickly dodges right, the glint of black metal passing by his previous location alerting him to his attacker. He backs up and sees the black cloaked figure that'd ambushed him, no visible skin is shown under the metallic skeletal armour. It's weapon is a thick black sword with what seems like small Abyssal tentacles clinging to the blades handle, the Dark Wraith growls under it's mask and straightens it's back while holding the sword pointing down at the floor by it's side... Reima isn't sure what the stance is supposed to do but doesn't argue as he stabs at it's left shoulder, the place furthest away from it's only means of defence, only for the Dark Wraith to raise it's left hand and project a red force field to stop the blow... I thought the Dark Hand only stole souls? How is it able to defend against strikes!?! he mentally screams as the Dark Wraiths sword sweeps upwards in an attempt to cut his overextended arm off. Reima isn't able to pull his arm back fast enough and so he backhands the sword away with his offhand while channelling Armament Haki. The two back off in preparation for another strike but Reima swaps tactics and casts a Crystal Soul spear before blinking to the Dark Wraiths side, luckily it side steps the large blue crystalline spear only to be disarmed, or dis-legged as Reima severs the animalistic warriors leg and arm in a surprise attack.

Even without it's two limbs the Dark Wraith doesn't seem phased as he reaches towards Reima with it's hand glowing dark red, he doesn't risk himself as he severs the creatures remaining hand before piercing it in the neck, finally killing it.

...

This is wrong... How are these creatures so much stronger than the knights in Anor Londo?... Suddenly an idea pops into his head, he drops his fist into his palm, it must be the humanity! His previous experiments had shown Humanities ability to mutate things but one thing he hadn't taken notice of was the increased strength and durability afterwards... He'd assumed it was a result of the mutations but apparently it's just another effect of humanity, this explains why humanity also increases various resistances, especially physical, elemental and curse resistance.

He'll have to experiment further when he finds time but for now he has Four Kings that need killing. The subsequent battles between Reima and the Dark Wraiths allowed him to gain an understanding of their combat style... While their initial stance reminds him of noble duels their attacks and techniques are more reminiscent of a predators attack, meant for a quick kill and disregarding all defence aside from the obvious Dark Hand shield their able to project. A weakness that Reima had happily exploited is their stiff footwork, simply dashing side to side completely throws off their balance, and while this would be easy to counter as all you had to do was ignore the obvious bait attempt, the Dark Wraiths apparently lack the intelligence for this.

Reima walks into a dark room after killing a couple more Dark Wraiths, unfortunately things are never easy as he's surrounded by three Dark Wraiths and a large slime creature?... Crap.