Inside the house, the knight loomed directly before Raizal.
Blood seeped from the savage gash in his left shoulder. Raizal braced himself against the wall, legs quivering, yet forced his body upright. He had to escape immediately—his earlier scream had draw the attention of others and soon they all will be here at any movement. His gaze locked onto the knight's blade.
In a swift motion, his hand seized a nearby earthen pitcher and hurled it at the armored figure. The pitcher shattered against the helmet with a crack sound, but the impact proved futile against the thick plate of helmet.
In the span of a heartbeat, the knight vanished from sight. The sword move past Raizal's arm, missing by a hair's breadth. He twisted and dropped to the floor to evade the strike, but the sudden jolt sending fresh pain through his wounded shoulder.
The blade embedded itself in the wall with a heavy thud. Before Raizal could rise, the knight wrenched it free in one fluid pull.
With his back exposed, Raizal sensed the descending strike that would cleave him in two. His eyes darted forward to a broken door handle lying nearby. He snatched it, spun, and shoot the metal upward. The improvised guard deflected the sword just enough to make it slamming into the ground instead.
Seizing the opening, Raizal strike the handle hard into the knight's knee. The impact disbalanced the armored leg, making the knight fall on the ground. Without hesitation, Raizal hurled the handle at the knight's helm, then ran toward the rear door of the house, which had many small cracks.
Raizal seized the one of many crack of the door and pull it open. Behind him, the knight had nearly stood on his feet.
As Raizal step outside, his heart beat stoped for a movement, directly in front of him stood a man, he was holding a hoe in his hand and singing that same lines.
"Lay down the self—let mercy turn to stone,
"Unmake the will that calls the fragile known."
"To face the dark, become the dark in part—"
"For only dark can pierce a darkened heart."
That man swing the hoe viciously at Raizal's head. Raizal twisted aside at the last instant and drove his boot into that man's chest, sending him staggering backward.
Raizal broke into a desperate sprint.
"Damn it, I'm losing too much blood. Why are they so intent on killing me?"
He thought to himself, his breath growing more ragged.
Raizal clamped his good hand over the gaping wound in his shoulder, yet blood continued to drip through his fingers. The singing voices was coming from every direction, mamy were distant, some were alarmingly close.
Suddenly, a door burst open to his left. A woman hurled herself at him with terrifying speed. Raizal had no time to react. Their bodies collided violently, slamming onto the hard ground. The impact sent a brutal jolt through his wounded shoulder again, on the top of it his wrist feels like as if the bones themselves had shifted out of place.
For a fleeting moment, the pain consumed him so completely that he forgot about the woman. She crawled atop him, still singing those lines. Only then did Raizal register that — she had no head. Blood poured steadily from the severed stump of her neck, splattering across his face.
She rained down punch after brutal punch. Raizal managed to dodge a few, but many connected with devastating force. Each strike landed like a heavy weight blow, sending shockwaves of crushing pain through his skull. He felt like his facial bones creak and fracture under the assault. Desperately, he raised both arms to shield his head, but the headless woman still throwing punches. Her fists continued to hammer down.
"It hurts."
"I can't keep up..."
These words came into his mind, for a second, before they slip.
Then another thought slipped into his mind. he remembered that once, he had said to someone:
"If I ever get a chance to come back to life, I will fight with everything I have."
Raizal eyes were shut, but he forced them open just enough to see the next movement before it landed.
His hand caught her wrist.
He pushed against her, shifting her weight off his abdomen, his one leg slipped free, dragging out from beneath her.
He drove his foot into her abdomen, not clean, not strong, but timed well enough. The impact forced her back as she lost balance and dropped away from him.
The headless woman rose too quickly.
It was not the natural motion of her body, without a head, her voice continued, repeating the same lines again and again.
Then it stopped, for a brief moment, then she shouted, her voice rising sharply.
"Unmake the will that calls the fragile known."
Raizal couldn't hear what she shouted. The pain inside his body was too intense, spreading through him and drowning everything else.
His vision was getting worse, his eyes filling with blood until everything turned blurry and unclear. Seeing no reaction from him, the headless woman lifted her leg and swung a kick toward his neck.
Before it could land, an arrow shot in from behind her. It pierced through her chest and kept going, striking the front wall of the house. Her body dropped to the ground.
Blood began to flow from the wound.
Raizal slowly turned his head in that direction, his vision was almost gone now, too blurred to make out anything clearly.
He could only see a few figures moving toward him.
One of them spoke to the others.
"Looks like we've got a refugee here."