"ARG!!" Crying out in shock, blood poured out of Rialin's mouth as she tried to turn her head back to see her a.s.sailant.

However, before she could even see her face, s.h.i.+ro quickly ducked down and kicked the handle of the sword with her heel.

*PUs.h.i.+!

Tearing out a chunk of her neck and some bone, Rialin's head was barely attached to her body thanks to the remaining skin and flesh.

Seeing as how her regeneration doesn't seem to heal the wound, s.h.i.+ro knew that Rialin was going to die but wasn't going to take any chances.

Grabbing her spear from the portal, she twisted her body and pierced her skull, ripping the head from the body.

As blood dripped onto the floor, s.h.i.+ro quickly grabbed Rialin's body and pulled it further into the tent. Making herself two orbs, she sent one of them flying out of the camp as she made sure that no one had spotted the flying object.

It didn't take too long for the orb to make its way out of the base as she teleported out before anyone could enter the tent and find out what had happened.

Sliding along the ground slightly, she looked back at the base and saw that a few of the soldiers seemed to be panicking.

'Good job I got out of there quickly.' s.h.i.+ro thought to herself as she looked down at Rialin's decapitated head and body.

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Noticing a golden marking on her hand that seemed to glow with Celestial Energy, s.h.i.+ro traced her fingers along the marking with curiosity.

Just as she did this, the marking jumped from Rialin's hand onto her own as she gritted her teeth from the searing pain she could feel. It was as if someone had grabbed a hot piece of iron and just stabbed it through her hand.

'd.a.m.n, the Celestial Gauntlets is a pain in the a.s.s to fight against and it's also a pain in the a.s.s to have.' She thought with a frown.

Taking a deep breath, s.h.i.+ro tried to ignore the pain while checking for anything else that could be useful on Rialin's corpse.

Unfortunately, Rialin didn't hold much else aside from a few encoded notes. Storing them in her pocket, she was going to decode them later with Kuromi.

"Now then, what to do with this head of hers." s.h.i.+ro muttered while swinging the head around as if it was a bola.

Thinking about it for a moment, she had a great idea as it would no doubt push the battle forward. However, she'd only see the results of her idea tomorrow morning when they all see what she had done.

Chuckling softly, she made her way back towards Teriu since her job here is now done. She wasn't going to examine the gauntlets just yet because she was a little too close to the enemy base for her liking. If they suddenly surrounded her and stopped her from leaving, she would be done for.

As for Rialin's corpse, she left the headless body where she had teleported and took the head with her.

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On her way back to Teriu, she noticed the pain in her hand fade as a connection of sorts was made from the gauntlets to her reservoir.

Much like how her pseudo strand acted, this connection could tap into her reservoir despite her having only one soul strand.

Realising that this meant that she could use her energy without worry of running out too quickly, as long as it was through the gauntlet, s.h.i.+ro couldn't help but grin when she imagined the kind of chaos she could create with this kind of power.

'I'll do some testing with this gauntlet before the battle if I can. It would be quite awkward if I didn't know how to use this weapon once the fighting begins.' s.h.i.+ro thought to herself as she increased her speed.

Once she arrived at Teriu, she sneaked past the guards and entered the base closest to the wall.

"I'm home~" s.h.i.+ro called out with a grin as Kuromi popped her head out from the corner.

"Welcome back. Considering your tone of voice, I'd say the mission was pretty successful." Kuromi smiled.

"Yup. I've also brought a souvenir." s.h.i.+ro grinned while pointing at the severed head.

"Peachy. Any reason as to why you've brought it back?" Kuromi asked.

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"Basically, I'm thinking of hanging this head just outside the main gates once night settles. When morning arrives, sh*t will go down." s.h.i.+ro replied with a grin.

"I see… Delightful. Setting that aside for now, I can a.s.sume you've also retrieved the Celestial gauntlets since you've killed her right?"

"Sure did. I haven't brought the gauntlets out yet since I don't know how to do that. All I know is that it has something to do with this tattoo of sorts that I now have on the back of my hand." s.h.i.+ro replied while showing Kuromi the mark.

Taking a moment to examine the mark, Kuromi couldn't help but raise her eyebrow and ask s.h.i.+ro about what she felt.

Taking a moment to explain everything she knew, s.h.i.+ro waited for Kuromi's response.

"Hmm… If that's the case, then things should work normally if you activate Celestial Raiment with the gauntlets acting as the 'pseudo strand'. With this, I think your energy consumption would return back to normal." Kuromi smiled.

"Yup. And you know what that means." s.h.i.+ro grinned.

"Yes, I do. You can fight to your heart's content without worrying about running out of energy too soon." Kuromi chuckled.

"Bingo."

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"But to do that, you'll need to make sure that you can actually use the gauntlet. So, before night falls and you go off and hang the head on the wall, we'll do some experiments to see how you would use the gauntlet." Kuromi suggested as she brought out a brand-new notepad.

"d.a.m.n, you've managed to get another one already!? How many have you gone through now?" s.h.i.+ro raised her eyebrow.

"I think I've gone through 20 notepads or so? I haven't really been keeping track. If you need to know though, I can count them for you now and tell you how many I've filled up." Kuromi replied.

"No that's fine, I was just curious." s.h.i.+ro shook her head.

For the next few hours, they experimented on trying to activate the gauntlet. Much like the Celestial Spear, the gauntlets needed to be 'charged'. Thankfully, the gauntlets weren't damaged so this should have been an easy step.

Unfortunately, it would actually take triple the amount of energy to activate her Celestial Raiment through the gauntlets since it needed her energy to materialise itself. The moment she activates her Celestial Raiment, it'll take all the energy from the gauntlets and forces it to deactivate. And with it being the one to activate her armour, it cancels each other out.

Realising that this meant she could only pick one or the other and not both at the same time, s.h.i.+ro couldn't help but sigh in disappointment.

"Well we have only just begun our experiments. I'm sure that if you give me a few days, I can probably find a way for you to use your armour with the gauntlets at the same time while making sure the energy cost is low." Kuromi comforted after seeing s.h.i.+ro acting 'down'.

"Mn. It's fine, I can probably vent my frustrations in tomorrow's battle when I punch my fist through someone's cranium with the gauntlet." s.h.i.+ro shrugged.

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"Grim. But when were you not grim?" Kuromi chuckled.

"Very true. Anyways, it's pretty late now so I think it's a perfect chance for me to hang this head on the city wall now." s.h.i.+ro smiled while gesturing to the head sitting on the table.

"Mn, I know you probably know already but be careful to not be spotted and don't force it if things are unfavourable."

"Well I suppose it's nice to hear you say it as well. I'll be right back." s.h.i.+ro waved her hand slightly before taking the head.

"Take care."

Leaving the base, s.h.i.+ro started to sneak towards the main gates while vision was low in the dead of night. Making sure that she avoided the patrols carefully, she soon arrived at the city walls.

'Right then, I'll probably need to make sure that I hide the head on the wall until sunrise since there's a chance that they spot it too early. The best way is probably to hide the head using my shadows. Since it's night, I have natural resources to help me so I wouldn't need to use too much energy.' She thought to herself before following the plan. Hanging the head so that it was easy to spot, she flicked her wrist and controlled the shadows so that it would hide the head.

Unless one brought a torch directly beside the head, they wouldn't see it in this kind of darkness.

Giggling softly, she couldn't wait to see their reactions when the sun rises. 

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