“Do you think just because you achieved a Conditional Override that you can defeat me, boy? I’m a veteran of war and ba–!”

  I sliced the katana forward, and a purple crescent shot from the swing.

  Armor formed on his arms as he raised a guard, but just before it reached him, I dispersed and detonated the particles, creating a blinding light. Using the cover, I jumped and delivered a flying kick to his face. From the point of impact, I made my foot explode with energy, as I could feel his nose crack before he went flying. My detonated foot reformed shortly after, as I watched him fly through multiple trees over 1000 feet away.

  Power boost, limb detonation, hyper-regeneration, energy transference. Interloper, tell me more about what I can do.

  “I don’t know.”

  Huh?

  “Just because I sealed your power doesn’t mean I know what it does; all I know is your limits. All I know is that you shouldn’t regard yourself as a human being; right now, you’re a living battery, pure energy. The more constrained you’re thinking, the less you’ll be able to do.”

  I willed energy to form around my back, and sharp wings made of purple energy shot out from the center of my back. It didn’t hurt, it didn’t even feel strange. It was as if they were always there.

  I assume I can freely change my form with this body.

  I bent my knees, and a gust of air pierced the earth as my wings flapped, propelling me up into the sky. I looked down and saw where Zagra had been knocked to as I held my hand out. Energy formed in my palm as I aimed it at his location.

  “Plasma rain.”

  Countless blasts rained down from where I floated, decimating the surrounding area. Purple explosions danced wildly as if they had a mind of their own, as a small orange ball rose from the destruction.

  With fiery wings of orange splendor, Zagra rose from the ground with a molten barrier protecting him. I put both my hands together and launched several blasts, flying in a spiral. He flew left and spun in the air, using his wings to deflect the blasts.

  Though he avoided my onslaught of blasts, he had flown right where I had wanted him to. As he finished getting rid of the last blast, he hadn’t realized that I was already waiting for him up above.

  “How did you–?!”

  I slashed the katana at his throat, but he quickly guarded it by forming a fiery sword of his own. I could see dangerous energy forming around the sword as I began to get pushed back by his guard.

  But as if a lightbulb had turned on, time suddenly slowed, and I saw the near future. A large explosion would engulf me, and I would go flying toward the ground. Multiple scenarios flashed through my mind, of different ways both he and I could handle this situation.

  Future sight? No…..The energy overload must have supercharged my brain as well; my perception and thought process have sped up significantly!

  As time resumed, I made the choice that would get me out of this situation. I opened my mouth, and energy formed above my tongue.

  “Shit!”

  I let the blast loose as he released the energy of his sword to counter it. We both went flying in opposite directions but quickly recovered. Streaks of light flashed across the sky as we began our aerial battle. Balls of flame and magma circled him and fired off shots of compressed flame at my location. In response, I copied him and did the same thing. Using my intense prediction to avoid his blasts while imitating his attack, we were fighting an even battle. My firepower dwarfed his in comparison, but it didn’t matter if I was getting more hits.

  I pointed her katana up into the sky, and the blade elongated to a humongous length. It reached so high that the dark clouds above us obscured some of it.

  Zagra’s expression was calm as he raised his hand, and a large red shield covered him and the surrounding area.

  “Grand Aegis.”

  “Sky Parter.”

  I brought the sword down, and it clashed with the shield, making energy and flames burst wildly from all directions. For a brief moment, the rain in the area we were fighting completely ceased as the air pressure pushed the clouds away.

  This is a losing battle.

  There were only two scenarios in which I won this clash, and both would lead me to lose the fight in the near future. I quickly retracted the energy until it receded into the katana, but he angled himself to face me with the shield in front of him.

  It shone brighter as I quickly flew back to gain distance from what was about to happen.

  “Grand Aegis: Retribution!”

  An astoundingly large blast erupted from the shield, which appeared to span a mile. Distance wouldn’t help, because it was propelled with so much force that it would catch me no matter how far I flew.

  Furling my wings and using energy to propel my feet, I ascended into the sky before the blast could hit me. I was too slow, though, because the blast took off a part of my feet. For the brief moment where my feet were regenerating, my ascent slowed, and I saw a shadow above me.

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  “Clench your teeth!”

  I crossed my arms in front of my chest, but it didn’t matter. He punched through my guard, and I felt a large amount of energy passing through my arms, going through my chest, and exploding on the other side. Searing pain enveloped my entire body.

  “AAAAGH!”

  So physical attacks don’t work, but energy-based attacks inflict pain and slow my regeneration!

  The force propelled me to the ground within a second, and a large gaping hole had formed in my chest. If the energy nexus weren’t above my head, I would have surely died from that attack.

  He quickly landed and walked closer to my seemingly dead body. He stared down at me as if he were looking at filth from a garbage heap.

  “No matter how many awakenings you kids have, you’re fools if you think you can defeat a veteran of battle like me. Lament your idiocy in the grave.”

  As he began to turn around, spikes of energy rose from the ground and pierced his legs and arms.

  “Wha–!”

  I rose from my position and floated upward until I was eye-to-eye with him. The hole in my chest closed instantly as I thrusted my palm in front of his face.

  “Die.”

  In an instant, his arms broke free from the spikes to protect his face. I blasted with full force, sending him backward, but to my surprise, he remained standing. When his arms dropped, it revealed he hadn’t been able to raise his guard fast enough. His right cheek was heavily charred and was bleeding profusely. Along with the other injuries from the spikes, he was losing blood from multiple sources.

  “How….are you still alive?” He asked with bewilderment.

  I said nothing and walked forward until we were less than 5 feet apart. His wounds were already being superheated and closing; I would need to adopt a different strategy. I put one hand forward and bent my knees, getting into a stance.

  “You wish to enter close combat with me? You truly are a fool.” He said as he closed his fists and reached one out parallel to mine.

  It was silent. The only thing that could be heard was the heavy battering of the rain, but in this moment, it was as if it faded in the background. Time seemed to slow down as I saw countless afterimages of his actions, revealing the possible moves he could make. My mind was moving so fast that I could feel my body vibrating in anticipation. Flames sparked on his hands, and electricity crackled through mine.

  His shoulder lowered, is he-?! No, it’s bait—small movement in the left calf, slightly bent knees. A twitch on his right finger, he’s preparing. His heartbeat… it slowed, a shift in mental state. Slightly twisted side, subconsciously putting force on his left. A pivot? Most likely. His right finger twitched again, more notably this time. It’s a trap. Tightening of his left wrist, increased heartbeat, he’s tense. An attack is coming. I can see it!

  His right finger twitched again, before he quickly brought his left foot forward and shifted his weight to the left side. An attack simultaneously dodging any attack to his right, while delivering a defensive blow with his left. I ducked under his punch and took a step forward while his hand was out.

  “Disruption.”

  I aimed for his lower left side, but he shifted his right arm under his left, blocking my attack with his forearm. I shifted to the left as he tried to backhand me while returning his right arm to its former position, but I grabbed it midway and went for a punch to his stomach.

  “Disruption.”

  I slammed my fist into his stomach, and the armor there completely shattered; I never reached his skin. He brought his left elbow down, aimed at my right shoulder, but I took a quick step back to avoid it. He followed that attack with a kick aimed at my neck that I was forced to block with both arms.

  If his whole body weren’t enflamed, I wouldn’t even need to worry about these hits.

  I tightened two of my fingers and shot a quick blast at his head while in blocking position. He slightly moved his head to avoid it, and using my block as a push-off, he went airborne and changed legs to attack. I quickly ducked and stepped forward in preparation for the kick, but he didn’t. Instead, he stomped on the ground, right where my foot was, keeping me in place.

  In an instant, he shifted his weight and readied a punch with his right arm; it was impossible to avoid in normal circumstances.

  However, right now I’m not human, I’m energy. Meaning I can change my form!

  I detached my upper half from my body and quickly flew around him. From where my lower half was, a trail of energy connected my body to the others.

  “What?!”

  I swung at the back of his head, but he somehow dodged and elbowed me in the chest.

  “Gagh!”

  I flew back a couple of feet and regenerated my lower half in the process, sliding to a halt. He turned to face me before arching his back and screaming in pain. He quickly turned around to see another me behind him, one that I regenerated manually from my old lower half. He had punched Zagra in his lower back.

  “Cloning?!”

  I could tell there were multiple differences between my clone and me. The first is that he didn’t have a nexus over his head, meaning he could be killed. Having the clone up also made me feel significantly weaker than before, as if my overall strength was cut by 25%.

  I charged forward and went for a low sweep. Zagra jumped, but my clone punched him in the side. However, Zagra’s armor didn’t even crack as he retained his focus on me. While he was midair, I pointed my hand up, and an energy blade shot forward toward his chest. It stuck itself in its armor, and I willed it to spike and spread like branches on a tree.

  Sensing imminent danger, his flames burned brighter, and right before they could reach my skin, a small explosion occurred from his body, repelling my clone and me. We quickly recovered and ran on opposite sides to disorient him. I picked up Zero’s katana that had fallen nearby. My clone dove forward and grabbed his left leg as I prepared to slice at his right side, but wings sprouted from his back as he began to rise in the sky, with my clone still holding on to his leg.

  I changed each of my fingers to high-density energy strings and wrapped them around his other leg. Using all my strength, I threw him back to the ground and used my other arm to slice with the katana. A crescent projectile burst forth, but he quickly clenched his fist and swung it, producing a heat blast that canceled my projectile. My clone was now off of him, slowly getting up a couple of feet away. That’s when I heard it, the sound of thundering footsteps in the distance.

  I looked over to the facility and saw dozens of facilitators with battle gear and weapons exiting the back exit.

  No.9 and No.5!

  I made my clone run forward to the recovering Zagra and willed it to detonate. It dove toward him, and its skin cracked, bursting with energy, as it released a blinding light followed by a small explosion, and in the midst of the chaos, I bent down and made a scooping motion with my free hand, and launched a blast near the ground that curved upward right at him.

  “GRAGH!”

  He put his hands forward to stop it, but he couldn’t see where it was coming from. Thanks to the clone, the blast started low and went upward past his guard, carrying him forward and skyward as I turned my attention to No.9’s location.

  “You have one minute until your lifespan starts decreasing. Don’t waste time on those nobodies.”

  “Those ‘nobodies’ are my companions.” I said, taking flight to reach them before it was too late.