marlowemuses | It's getting hard to bear, watching you all alone

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It's getting hard to bear, watching you all alone

They set up camp in the shadow of the place so that Griffith could watch it.

Though the walls were sound and the castle looked whole, even luxurious, no one suggested that they camp inside. There was something about it, a coldness, and the local villagers spoke of ghosts and demons and monsters in the haunted castle. Conflicting stories too outrageous to be real.
Griffith wanted to explore. But even he hesitated at the sight of the dark gate. Perhaps in the morning. Once they were rested.

In the morning, he took the lead with Guts. They left their horses down in camp with most of the band, and took only a small raiding party to investigate.

The castle’s gates were wide open, as if for a festival, and there were even garlands of wilted white flowers and scraps of fluttering white silk festooned around the courtyard. Griffith entered warily, hand on his sword. He kept Guts by his side, though they went a few paces ahead of the others. If they faced down anything supernatural, Griffith wanted to meet it first.

Somehow it wasn’t a surprise when the gates slammed shut behind them. Griffith glanced back, expression tight as they were cut off from the rest of their party, and drew his sword.

“Welcome, my love.”

A figure seemed to melt up out of the rocks, solidifying as if from wax and drawing itself up to a height of more than seven feet, not including the curving horns that grew from its brow. It had dark brown skin with gray and mossy hues distinctly reminiscent of grave pallor and loam. Both the face and the figure had a striking sort of beauty, as if they had been carved from wax and cast in bronze by a master sculptor, though there was something unnatural and unnerving about it. The body was perfect and bare, with no clothing to conceal the heavy phallus that hung between its legs.

It had eyes only for Griffith, who stared at it in stunned shock as it approached, not even lifting his sword to stop it as it reached for him as if to draw him into a lover’s embrace.

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Guts didn’t believe a word of what they heard. He had enough real things trying to kill him on a daily basis to let himself get all worked up over some stupid village fairy tale. Ghosts this, demons that. Ridiculous, all of it. He honestly expected their trip through this creaky old fortress to be pretty boring, as far as days heading the Raiders went. Maybe some guy was out there scaring away some peasants and farmers. Interesting story, but nothing he considered worth the concern.

‘What’s the big deal? If ghosts are what we're worried about, this'll be the easiest castle we've ever taken.’

That’s what he had said when gathered with the other captains and unit commanders. In all honesty, he probably wouldn’t have gone to scout if Griffith himself hadn’t chosen to head the party. If their leader saw some value in it, he’ll join him.

One can imagine the look on his face when the figure seems to materialize out of the moss and mud of the garden itself. Did he care about its inhuman size and clear supernatural origins? Well, it seemed pretty damn impossible, and the sexually charged nature of it really got under his skin, but Griffith was in the thing's reach and that makes that part of his brain shut off rather quick. Eyes growing cold, he grabs Griffith's arm and yanks him away to safety by his side, over-sized sword already drawn in his other hand.

He doesn't know if this weird thing is hostile, so he doesn't attack, but he does keep his sword in between it and them.

"Gettin' a little ahead of yourself, aren't you?"

Griffith stumbles back, startled back to his senses, and he tucks close by Guts’ side, out of the way of his sword as much as possible. His own hesitation makes him uncomfortable. Whatever this thing is, it clouded Griffith’s mind for a moment. He would have let it embrace him. That idea terrifies him—becoming some creature’s pawn or plaything.

Guts clearly isn’t having the same problem. Either the thing didn’t cast its spell against Guts, or Guts is just too damn stubborn to be lured by a siren spell. Griffith trusts that stubbornness.

“You are unnecessary,” the demon says to Guts, waving a dismissive hand at him. “He is mine.”

“I am my own,” Griffith counters, but he stays behind Guts, trusting to his captain’s sword and broad shoulders. He thinks about what he can offer, for a moment, and what the demon would give in return. He’s sold his body before. But the demon isn’t offering anything. He’s just claiming. “Open the gates, and perhaps we can discuss a bargain. Otherwise we will fight.”

“I will kill your valet,” the demon says, “and then I will take you as mine.”

“Looks like we’re fighting for my virtue,” Griffith says to Guts, voice light because he can’t help but find the humor in this situation. Especially after Guts being called his valet. He takes up a fighting stance to Guts’ left, letting Guts have the lead in the fight while Griffith covered him. Taking his eyes off the demon, Griffith scanned the rest of the courtyard, pressing his back against Guts’ when he saw a monster crawling toward them from a dark doorway. “Crab-thing, southwest,” he told Guts, feeling his skin crawl with fear in the face of these creatures. “I’ll take it. Keep your focus on horns.”

"Do I look like a servant to you? You must not leave your dusty castle much, pal."

Don't get him wrong, there is definitely the fear of the unknown undoubtedly rising up his heels as more monsters emerge. Guts isn't entirely sure what he's up against, here. But with Griffith by his side and in need of protection, he shoves that all down and lets his eyes grow sharp with focus. This is no different from any other battle, he figures. Just need cut that thing to pieces so that it shuts its damn mouth.

When Griffith gives his orders, he simply nods and gives him a grunt of confirmation.

Grip shifting on his sword, the blade glides into position to charge forward, quicker on his feet than his size would suggest. The heavy greatsword is a silvery blur through the air as he makes a powerful vertical stroke right for its face. It had a height advantage, but the reach of his weapon more than made up for it. His attacks have long since been able to cleave through steel armor, so when his edge finds the muddy soil, it slices through the thick substance with barely any resistance. It didn't take much strength on his end to gut their host like a fish down the belly.

Levering his sword with a masterful turn of the blade, he finishes the job by lopping its head clean off in one stroke. But this was easy - far too easy. This is supposed to be some legendary supernatural being, right? At the end of his attack, he still has his sword at the ready, watching the pieces of sculpted mud collapse on the ground.

In his periphery, Griffith notices the mud collapsing into pieces and then melting into the ground, and it strikes him as wrong, and important, but he has other things to focus on right now. Like the scuttling thing moving toward them, with pincers and hard shell armor, like an enormous centipede crossed with a crab.

Griffith's sword won't cut through bone or metal, so he has to assume that it won't cut through the monster's shell. He'll have to make targeted attacks instead. The eyes look weak, and the joints. The eyes are the higher value target, but they have the risk of those massive pincers. If those catch him, he's done. If those catch his sword, they could probably snap it without any difficulty. So he's going to have to be careful, dancing around it to get an opening.

As it approaches, Griffith moves to one side, expecting it to pivot to follow him, but it doesn't. It ignores him entirely, heading for Guts.

Griffith is very slightly insulted by this, as if he's not even a threat to it, but he's not going to sulk over being given an opportunity. He spots a gap where two sections of the body fit together, and he stabs his sword into it. The thing shrieks, turning enough to swat at him like a fly, but its primary attention and attack remains focused on Guts.

That crab monster doesn't give him a lot of time to dwell on their host. Guts glances back as he hears the sound of its armor plates scraping against each other, and narrowly misses the pinch of a claw at his greaves. He whirls to bring his blade around to his new opponent, eyes cold with the same battle focus he uses to mow down a Tudor vanguard. He can be shocked about its existence after it's dead.

Griffith's strike gives him a few seconds of an opening, and he takes it. He recklessly rushes well within the reach of its claws, striking one away the manner one may deflect a sword strike. The first blow sends a crack through its shell, but it isn't the main attack. Using his momentum, he runs the length of his large blade through an eye, sending it deep into its head until the other end breaks out between two plates.

He grimaces as the thing shrieks in pain right in front of him, gushing pale blue blood onto his forearms. Its reaction is more wild thrashing rather than a proper counterattack, but with his sword embedded that deep, he's going to be dragged around with it.

Guts has got the thing mostly pinned, but Griffith isn't sure if he's going to be getting his sword back out of it easily. It doesn't seem to have any interest in Griffith, turning its back on him almost completely, so Griffith takes the opportunity to swing up onto one of its legs and climb from there onto its back, stabbing the other eye with one careful strike. It shrieks again, blinded, but instead of attacking or trying to knock him off, it seems to subside, folding down to the ground, even though Griffith doesn't think they've killed it yet.

The whole thing makes Griffith uneasy. Two opponents, both far too quickly dispatched. He hops down gracefully from the creature, leaving Guts to retrieve his sword and finish putting the thing out of its misery, and goes over to inspect the spot where the demon was. He's dissolved completely, leaving no trace on the bare dirt of the courtyard.

Also strange is that Griffith can't hear the Hawks. He knows that they should be loudly clamoring on the other side of the gates, calling out and trying to break down the barrier, but he hears nothing. Only an eerie silence.

"Let's go," Griffith says, as soon as Guts has retrieved his sword.

The fastest way will be over the wall, so Griffith picks a stairwell that looks like it leads up onto the parapet. But at the top of the stairs is only a little stone room with no doors onto the parapet and no windows to shoot arrows from. Griffith touches the walls where they should be, frowning, and turns back to Guts, frown turning a bit more impatient as he realizes that the stairs are too narrow to get past Guts, and he'll have to wait for Guts to go back down first. "We'll try the next one," Griffith says, annoyed about being imprisoned in this castle.

With some effort, Guts works his blade out of its flesh and forcefully severs its head from its body. He didn't know what it was, but surely it wouldn't get up after that. He takes a moment to clean some of the blood off his sword and his forearms before wordlessly following after Griffith.

He also found it rather bizarre that the other members of the scouting party were inaudible from here. It's as if they stepped into another dimension when they entered the courtyard.

No time to think about that, though, they had to find a way out either way. He follows Griffith up a narrow staircase, his own sword's pommel scraping against a wall every once in a while. It felt claustrophobic as all hell, that's for sure. How did that naked demon thing fit in here, anyway?

When they make it up to the top, and find nothing, he looks pretty annoyed himself. Guess it couldn't just be a mystical castle. Had to be a mystical labyrinth of a damn castle.

"Didn't one of those old men say somethin' about this? 'Bout it being impossible to leave," his voice is a bit teasing as he turns around to make his way back down the stairs.

“If they did, then it’s not,” Griffith argued. “If it truly is impossible to leave, then who would carry out the rumors? If people went in and never returned, most likely they were killed by the monsters.” Most people aren’t the two of them. Griffith doesn’t have high expectations for the survival of most the other Hawks in a situation like this. Better that they’re safe outside. Griffith and Guts can handle this.

He tries the next parapet access, and the next. The empty courtyard whistles with wind.

“Take the next one,” he commands, annoyed by going up short staircase after short staircase without result. No other threats have appeared, so Griffith sees no reason not to split up and search more efficiently.

But when he returns from another dead end, he finds a blank wall where the courtyard door had been. It chills him, because he’s made a mistake and separated himself from Guts. He strikes the wall, but the solid stone is unyielding.

The steps continue down where there were no steps before. Confident that his mind and his sword will protect him, Griffith descends on down the dark stairway.

Guts dutifully follows, none too interested in seriously debating the truthfulness of some old peasant’s fairy tale. The repetition was a bit annoying, but he seems pretty level-headed about the idea of being trapped in a cursed castle. Griffith could probably figure it out, if there’s some long-winded way to get out of here.

“You sure we should split up?” he asks, but ultimately follows Griffith’s order and goes up the other staircase. When he reaches the end of the stairs, he finds a large room that couldn’t have possibly fit within the parapet outside. It looked more like some kind of cathedral nave built deep underground. The tall, open room, interspersed with thin columns, yawned open before him like a beast’s maw. The few pinpoints of orange flames did little to light the room, and Guts can’t help but feel a prickle of tension up his spine, like he was being watched.

He pauses, and when he looks back, what is behind him is a stone wall. Guts’ face creases with irritation, directed to no one in particular. So this thing wants to play games with him, does it? Fine then. He keeps walking forward, eyes and ears pricked in case anything was haunting the dark corners.

Another creature slithers from the shadows near Guts, something black and oozing, with a long, serpentine body and spearlike limbs, chittering as it considers its prey.

~

Meanwhile, Griffith follows the stairway to a long, regal hall, hung with shadowed tapestries that he can't quite decipher. Torches with cold flames burn along the length of the hall, and Griffith has to fight the instinct to retreat. This is a puzzle. A trap. He just has to outthink it. He just has to find Guts.

"My love," says the demon, stepping from a doorway. This time, his body is made up of a slick black substance, and his movements ripple like water. "How shall I court you?"

"I want my valet," Griffith says, leveling his sword toward the creature. "You can't expect me to go into a courtship without my own valet."

"He's irrelevant," the demon says, sneering. "Forget him."

"He's mine."

When Griffith attacked, the demon splashed into a puddle at his feet, dissolving as though he'd never been. Griffith continued down the hall, thinking of Guts and trying not to think of the dangers he might be facing.

~

Minutes or hours passed, hall after hall. Griffith started to feel as if he'd slipped out of reality into some endless void, all stairs and hallways and cold luxury. He didn't want this castle after all, he was sure of that. It wasn't worth the trouble.

He felt exhausted, and he was starting to feel true panic that he was never going to find Guts. This thing could simply raise walls between them and throw an endless number of horrors at his captain, and Guts might be fighting for his life now, bloody and desperate.

But then he turned a corner just as Guts walked out of a doorway, looking only minimally bloody and covered in blue-black gore. Griffith stopped for a moment in pure relief, running to him before any more walls could separate them. "Guts."

"You're unhurt," Guts said, looking similarly relieved. He sheathed his massive sword, grasping Griffith by the shoulders to look him over and make sure he was safe.

Griffith blinked in surprise, startled to be touched, that Guts was so glad to see him whole that he would reach out. And then Guts pulled him close, lifting Griffith's chin.

"You're not--" Griffith murmured, even as the demon wearing Guts' face claimed his lips. Guts was kissing him. Griffith's hand came up, resting softly alongside Guts' throat, sword hanging limply from his other hand.

Deep into the nave, Guts spots a door on the other end, but is interrupted by a creature slithering in the darkness between the columns. His sword is drawn the moment he glimpses it, but the visibility keeps it cloaked and out of sight. He has to rely on his hearing - the click, clack of thin legs scuttling just out of the corner of his eye.

When it strikes, he’s ready - but not quite. His blade lashes out, slicing off a limb, but the serpent-like creature simply grows another one in its place. A drop of real terror enters him, he’s never fought against monsters like this. How is he supposed to beat it, now?

Precious time passes while he battles it as best he can, matching each strike of a spear-like leg with the blade of his sword, bisecting it more than once to no avail. Black slime splatters on the ground only to reform again. Some of the spears break past his defense and manage to pierce skin and scratch armor. If he doesn’t change up something fast, he’d really be dead.

The creature manages to pinch its limbs around his body, digging insect-like spines into the flesh of his arms as he’s pinned up against a column. Damnit, he was trapped - ! Its body begins to wrap around him and squeeze him in place, forcing the air out of his lungs.

As he looks directly into the blue-black maw, he gets a glimpse of something, some kind of pulsating red-organ its jaws as it rears up to bite. Raking scratches up his right arm, he wrenches it free as the maw launches forward to sink in its fangs. Guts raises his sword in time - barely - so that it impales itself on the blade, piercing its fleshy core. With a long and high-pitched shriek, the monster goes limp around him, and Guts does nothing in turn except tremble slightly and fall to his knee as he catches his breath.

He looks up, gaining his senses, and sees the fluid body sink into the cracks of stone beneath his feet. What was that about?

Weary and now stained with both blue and deep red blood, Guts exits through the heavy door of the dungeon and begins to wander down the hallway. One single monster isn’t going to keep him from finding Griffith. Far from it. He keeps going and going and going, until he sees the familiar glimpse of silvery hair down the hall.

It’s him! What is he-- ?

He could feel a jolt of furious lightning race up his limbs, creasing his brow and pulling his lips back to bare teeth. The demon preying on Griffith like that, with something so physically intimate, with his own image - it steamed him off in ways a straightforward attack never could have. Trying to kill him is just business, this was personal. He would never take advantage of his friend like that! Never!

"Griffith!"

He was in danger - he was right in that thing's grasp. Without giving so much as a second thought, Guts tackles and wrestles his other 'self' to the ground, and then proceeds to punch the ever loving shit out of it with unrestrained, ferocious abandon.

Guts calls his name, and then there are two of them. It’s instantly obvious which one is real, though Griffith had known even before the kiss. He’d known, and he’d still let it kiss him, and Guts had seen.

The impostor dissolves beneath Guts, turning to lumpy goo and then melting entirely.

“Guts,” Griffith says, soft but firm, to reclaim Guts’ attention where it belongs. On him, or on approaching threats, if any.

A treacherous part of his mind regrets the loss, wanting Guts’ hands on him and Guts lifting his chin for a kiss. But that was never real, and can never be real, because Guts is never going to realize and never going to want him in that way.

Griffith’s hand disobeys him, resting very lightly on Guts’ shoulder. He doesn’t want to be separated from him ever again.

Tension knots his shoulders as the doppelganger melts beneath his fists. Its disappearance doesn't do much to soothe the snarl on his face. Demon bastard won't even let him beat it up properly. Fists clenched, he twitches slightly at the touch, and glances back at Griffith.

"You alright?"

There's no softness in his face, or in the way his body held that familiar residual tremble of anger. They were the same aftershocks that run through him after a particularly vicious plunge into the enemy line - only this time, the outlet for it disappeared in his hands. If there were more enemies around them, he would have surely cut down a legion more. But through it all, there is a genuine and heartfelt concern for Griffith himself. He wasn't so worried about the kiss as much as whatever the demon planned to do after.

Griffith nods, taking his hand back but staying close to Guts. He looks past him down the corridor, watching for their opponent to appear. "I underestimated it. We stay very close from now on. Don't leave my side. Not even to attack."

Now that they have a moment to breathe, Griffith looks Guts over more closely, smiling a little at the sight of all that gore. "Here I was trying to find you again and you went finger-painting," he teases. "So festive."

He's grateful that Guts is unharmed. He'd feared the worst, but as usual, Guts has come through and devastated his enemies.

The residual anger fades as Griffith smiles at him, despite their situation. He is okay and in good spirits, and for a moment, that's all that matters. Guts seems to notice for the first time the mix of the monstrous blood and black sludge with the deep red of the puncture wounds on his arms. It looked like he'd been pelted with berries by a feisty crowd, if the stench of metal didn't give it a more disgusting connotation.

"Uh. Yeah..."

He didn't think to bring any field equipment for treating injuries beyond the antiseptic he always keeps in his pouch. Silently, and a bit clumsily as he stands up straight, he grasps his cape to start to wipe his hands clean, at least.

Griffith's smile softens, fond, as Guts works to try and clean his hands with his cape. The serious look on his face combined with the mess makes him look like a child trying to clean his muddy hands with muddy cloth, and it makes Griffith's heart tighten with affection.

Taking his kerchief out of his pocket, a delicate white lacy thing, he reaches for Guts. "Come here," he commands, voice coaxing, and places light fingertips on Guts' jaw, holding him in place as Griffith wipes away the worst of the grime from his face.

The delicate kerchief is wrecked by the time Griffith is done, and he lets it fall. There's no salvaging that. He has others. Precious though they are to him, and careful though Griffith is with his things, he's not going to waste sentiment on something that is used and done.

"We'll find somewhere to clean you up once we're out of here," Griffith promises, strictly disallowing his mind from wandering to thoughts of Guts naked in a lake. "Come on."

He doesn't know where they're going, but Griffith hopes that if they keep moving they'll either find their way out or find the core of this place. "I think we're probably going to have to use me as bait," he comments.

He tries to keep a methodical pattern of choosing paths, but some of them loop through and connect, and they already know that their host can change the very walls to suit his whim. As they walk, he stays close by Guts' side, keeping to his left side so that Guts has the unobstructed attack, and Griffith's sword is secondary, ready to protect their rear.

"I can give you anything you want," the demon's voice echoed from one of the dark archways to their left.

Griffith shuddered, reaching instantly for Guts and curling light fingers around his elbow. "How could I take a bridegroom when I haven't even seen your real face?" he called back, lighter than he felt.

"I could be him for you, if you like," the demon promised, voice curling with mirth or mockery.

Griffith's grip tightened on Guts' arm. "No thanks," he said, continuing to walk, and pressing Guts to keep moving the same way they'd been going, ignoring the taunting. "I'd rather have the real thing."

Guts is quiet as Griffith wipes his face. It is an oddly gentle gesture from his commander, who seemed so far away and distant in their battles as of late. For someone who had only recently accepted peoples' touch, the soft cotton felt nice, a rare little luxury for mercenaries like them. Despite how often he gets covered in gore, Guts did like to keep himself clean and dry when he could.

He doesn't quite say Thanks, but there is a warmer, appreciative look in his eye before they move out. Sword at the ready, he ventures through the winding and impossible stone hallways with Griffith at his side. Vaulted arch after vaulted arch passes by him overhead, with no indication of stopping. It really was a labyrinth. Maybe he should be more concerned, but being together with his leader assuaged some of the fiery frustration that may have nipped at him.

Guts stops when he hears the voice, sword pointed at the darkness. He isn't so nervous this time around, now that he's faced three of those monsters. He doesn't move when Griffith nudges him, instead fixing a fierce look at the direction the demon's voice came from.

"Why hide? We're both right here if you want to fight. Come and get him."

He seems to have temporarily forgotten the whole 'bait' thing in favor of something a little more straightforward.

“Don’t bother, Guts,” Griffith says to him. Guts’ approach is certainly one take on the ‘bait’ idea, but Griffith would prefer not to be here all day fighting monsters. “It’s just a simulacrum again. Not exactly one of my fantasies, being fucked by a clay golem.” That hand stays on Guts’ arm. Coaxing. Soothing.

“A ghost of some empty castle pretending to be a demon?” He called, challenging. “Come and court me in flesh and blood, and tell me how you will give me a kingdom, then I’ll listen.”

There was a weighty silence.

Griffith turned to Guts, shaking his head. “He can’t. We shouldn’t have bothered. I’d rather enjoy a demon consort if it gave me my kingdom.”

His grip tightens on Guts, trying to speak with his eyes. This is a gambit. Heel.

A door materializes in the wall near them. Griffith glances at it but stays put, holding Guts. “Will you be best man at my wedding?” he asks, flirting up at his swordsman.

Guts reads his expression to heel, and slowly lowers his sword. He doesn't know what Griffith's gambit is exactly, but he was the commander, so Guts would follow the silent order. Griffith didn't need to tell him his whole plan for Guts to trust that he knew what he was doing. The faster they can get the real demon in front of his blade, the better.

He sees the door materialize out of nothing, then gives Griffith a slightly confused face at his question. He was clinging awfully tight to his arm when all this talk about fucking and marrying began. Was he okay? This is the White Hawk, after all. He is always so cool-headed in battle and distant from everyone. Even with the supernatural, he wasn't expecting the man to need any sort of consolation. Yet here he is, locking arms. Guts isn't sure what to make of it.

"Sure. Don't think that demon's giving us another option," he says, deciding now isn't the time to wonder about that. He moves to open the door and see what is waiting for them.

Griffith's hand tightened on his arm again, holding him there. He didn't trust the materialized door and wasn't about to walk right through it. The demon had made perfectly clear that its goals included killing Guts and claiming Griffith.

He waited, breath coming in heavy, shaky pants in an otherwise calm exterior, but the trembling hand and breath betrayed him to Guts, and Griffith knew it.

His suitor could damn well come to them. Griffith could wait.

The door opened and the demon stepped through. Tall and horned, still dark-skinned but seemingly made of flesh and blood this time.

"You are handsome," Griffith flattered him. "But how do I know this is really you this time, and not another of your courtship tricks?"

Courtship tricks. As though this had all been a flirtation.

"My beloved," said the demon, extending a hand.

Griffith took a step forward, fingers sliding from Guts' bicep down to his wrist and catching there. "I want a kingdom," Griffith said. "And I must have a consort who can rule beside me. Can you even leave this place?"

"Easily," the demon said. He flicked his fingers and sunlight spilled in from the upper windows. The impossible corridor they were in suddenly looked more like a dusty and neglected storeroom. "We can make this your castle. Under your command, my beasts can subdue the local peasantry."

"Excellent. And here you were being so demanding," Griffith flirts. Another step, and his touch drops to Guts' hand, so that they're connected only where Griffith's right index finger is hooked around Guts' left. Still so careful to leave Guts' sword arm free. "I'd be more than delighted to stay, if I can have the things I want. A kingdom. My valet--he's very loyal, and I'd be honor-bound to revenge his death if you were to do anything unpleasant."

His finger tightened a moment on Guts', and then he let go and took another step forward, trusting that he knew what his dog would do when released from the leash.

"Is this your true form, then?" Griffith asked, feeling unmoored without his hand on Guts, as if the floor could drop out from under him at any moment. "You're so... beautifully formed."

He reached his hand for the demon's cock, thinking that surely there could be no better distraction from Guts' attack than a sweet caress and an affectionate smile.

Guts can’t help but feel his hackles rise as the thing appears through the doorway. Yeah, it is definitely in the flesh now. There's an aura about it that sent ice through his blood in a way none of the other monsters did. The tension in his body is almost palpable - Griffith could probably feel the twitch of his fingers and sword arm gripping onto him like that.

If there was time for anything but preparing to attack, he would have protested Griffith letting himself get so close. It's all he can do to not instinctively drag him back and stand between them. He was the vanguard, damnit, he didn't like seeing his friends put themselves in harm's way. There are a lot of things he wants to do to that demon that stepped through the door, but standing around and listening to them talk isn't one of them.

Still, he does stay put, putting tenuous trust in Griffith's plan. If the demon makes any sudden moves, he's ready to attack. But it looks like he won't need to react defensively, because the monster looks awfully pleased about Griffith going down to touch him. Disgust. A visceral disgust is what he feels as his hands tighten around his sword. It wasn't at Griffith for doing what he did, but at this slathering demon for making him go there. Despite all this talk about courting, Guts knew what it really wanted: a pretty little play-thing for itself, a toy for its own pleasure.

Well, he’s not going to let that happen. Guts takes that opening and moves, bathing his sword in its blood as he runs it through the chest. The force of the charge nearly topples them both over and away from Griffith. An unearthly scream escapes the demon’s throat. A decisive blow - but was it lethal?

As the demon recovers from the shock, a hand reaches up to grasp the sword plunged through its body, blood gushing from the wound. Its voice is still calm, though its face is contorting into an icy snarl,”So this is how it shall be?”

And then its body begins to shift. The beautiful and youthful form of the demon quickly swells into something monstrous, something reflecting the writhing anger coursing through its body. Its face extends into the long and toothy maw not unlike an ibex, but filled with rows and rows of grinding teeth. Bone and muscle pop and squelch as its body rearranges into a powerful feline form, clawed and flexible. Extra limbs grow from its ribcage, tipped with human hands. A spiny tail whips to and fro, tipped with a stinger at the end. It's far larger than a mere seven feet; even crawling on four legs, it nearly towers to the top of the ceiling. But at the end of the transformation, the demon's wound remains in its chest, spilling blood, having scaled up with its body.

And Guts - he can do nothing but stumble backwards as his sword slides out, looking up in mute terror. Impossible - it is impossible. How the hell was he supposed to fight this?

As the thing grows, Griffith draws his sword. It's such a relief to have something to fight, to have finally flushed it out in flesh and blood so that Griffith can stop flirting with all its damned simulacra.

He assesses the situation in a flash, searching for weak spots, considering his own skills and Guts' strengths. That tail concerns him most, with the spikes and the stinger, and Griffith is just going to go ahead and assume that it's poison and should be avoided accordingly.

"Cut off its tail," he murmurs to Guts, and then moves in front of him, drawing the demon's attention, hacking and piercing at massive claws, but mostly just trying to stay back out of the way, drawing it to chase him as he goaded it.

Guts moves, thinking nothing beyond the fact that he needs to duck under a massive lion-like paw or have his skull cleaved right off. Somewhere in his head, Griffith’s order registers, and he watches as his commander darts off to attempt to make himself a distraction. Tail. Right. The tail.

He shifts his sword and charges for the back end of the beast, slamming his blade down near the base of the tail. Even with a weapon his size, Guts can only make it halfway through in his first strike. His sword gets wedged into the exoskeleton, and with the demon swinging to and fro, he is unable to keep his footing as he rips the blade free of its flesh.

He stumbles back, and it is only the helmet clipped to his cape that saves him when the stinger nearly impales him right through the back of the neck. It wouldn’t need to be venomous to be fatal. Sparks fly as the spines scrape against steel, pulling the helmet free as it rears back for another attack. In the milliseconds of a pause, Guts spots a crack in his sword.

Through spines and swipes and powerful strikes, hesees the wound he left, lazily oozing demonic blood. Gritting his teeth, he gathers all he can of his strength to leap forward one more time. With a great roar from his own lungs, he brings his sword down with enough force to cleave the massive beast’s limb right off. He stumbles forward as the flesh gives and comes free of its body, wrenching an earth-shattering sound from the monster around them. The tail collapses like a great clump of vines severed from an ancient tree, twitching with residual shocked muscle fibers.

Guts doesn’t have much time to celebrate the small victory, because after he is doused in blood he notices his sword had snapped in two with its exoskeleton. Fuck - He gets ready to move away when a rear leg grazes him and slams him into an opposing stone wall. The impact knocks the wind out of him, and he can taste his own blood in his mouth as he collapses onto his own four, trembling limbs. Still, he refuses to let go of the stump of his sword.

Griffith was an expert fighter on any battlefield, fearsome in melee on foot or from horseback. But he truly shone one on one, in duels where he could showcase his skill. This was neither. Griffith’s slender, pinpoint sword was useless against exoskeleton, and the hide was thick enough that even the gaps in exoskeleton were unwise targets. If he caught his sword in hide or tendon, it would snap. His only possible targets were the soft, exposed spots like eyes and throat.

He slashed at its forearms as it swatted at him, drawing thin lines along the underside like paper cuts. In order to keep it distracted, Griffith had to stay in front of its face, which was too high off the ground for him to hit. Twice, he ran up a column, leapt off, and slashed it across the cheeks, narrowly missing its eyes. Dodged as he landed, did it again.

It roared and swiveled as Guts hit its tail, turning to strike him while his sword was stuck. Griffith snatched up a fist-sized chunk of rock and threw.

The rock hit the demon on the side white of its eye. Not enough to do any damage, but enough to swing its attention back to Griffith. He pulled his boot knife into his left hand, panting for a moment, and when it swung, Griffith moved with it, stabbing his knife between the calloused pads of its feet and into the tender nerves within. He moved forward with the strike, curving his trajectory along the sweep of its attack and coming up inside its guard, close against its chest where neither of them could properly attack.

Guts did something, and it roared again, shrieking with pain. It reared up to strike Guts, knocking Griffith over in the process. He scrambled up again, seeing a new target dangling in front of his face, and swung for it, slashing a cut along the length of its phallus. Not enough to render it useless, which Griffith would have preferred, but slicing one of the thick, pulsating veins along the side. It spewed blood, and the demon’s attention snapped back to Griffith. It swatted, knocking him off his feet and driving the breath out of him as he hit the ground. A massive, clawed mitt closed over him, claws bracketing him in like a cage.

“You,” it hissed, as Griffith gasped for breath. His hand was still locked around his sword, but he couldn’t move it, wrist trapped tight between two of the monster’s claws. “I’ll take care of you.”

Guts coughs, spitting flecks of blood on the ground. Just one good hit from the beast was enough to break a rib, lancing pain up his chest. Shakily, he gets to his feet, blurry vision recovering from the impact of his head on stone. As the monster sharpens in his eyes and comes back into view, Guts' face contorts in a mix of panic and rage.

Griffith had been caught in its claws, and it was starting to squeeze. No, no no no. If he didn't act fast, Griffith would be crushed like a ripe fruit. Dead. Guts forgets how much his body hurts and how he only has half a weapon now. Hands clamp around the hilt of his sword. The panicked thumping of his heart and deep ache of his muscles is all he can hear and feel as he runs towards the beast with wild abandon. Fiercely grabbing a fistful of fur in his hand, he starts to climb up its back.

The demon isn't ignorant to him, delaying the inevitable crushing as it attempts to shake him off like a great beast might swat at a particularly annoying pest. Unfortunately for it, Guts is quite stubborn, and claws his way up to its neck behind its large horns. He anchors his legs around its throat, locking himself in place even as the steel of his backplate gets beaten in with its other paw. Its head turns to get a glimpse of him as he grasps a base of one massive horn. With the edge of that broken sword, Guts plunges it deep into its eye socket, as deep as it can go, wrenching the loudest shriek of all from the demon.

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