Kaede sat down by a portion of the mountain wall, watching the battle unfold. With the new portals each pumping out dozens of demons every second, Kaede's forces were now the ones outnumbering the Voltoids.
And Becquerel took that personally. He raised his spear high towards the sky, releasing a blast of red lightning.
The sky turned red as the lightning scattered upon detonation creating…
"Wow." Kaede said in awe. "Fire works are so beautiful." She said with a smile. "Along with watching my army fight his army, this would have been the perfect time for popcorn." She pouted. "Alas. Popcorn, I have not."
—
Would you like to purchase a bucket of popcorn? 50Gold
—
"Hm?" Kaede blinked, staring at the screen that appeared before her. "Purchase? As in, from the sho… I am such an idiot. I completely forgot about the shop option."
She chuckled as she scrolled through the screen. "What's this about Gold though? Where am I going to get that? How much do I even have?"
—
Gold: 20,285,000G
—
"Whoa!" She blurted out. "Where did I get all this? When did I get all this?"
She quickly scrolled through the screen until she reached notifications, hoping to find something in the notifications history.
—
You have killed a Magma DragonKin. +30,000G
You have killed a Wendigo. +1000G
You have killed a Wendigo. +1000G.
…×60
You have killed a Wendigo Elite Guard. +5000G
You have killed a Wendigo Elite Guard. +5000G
…×10
You have Killed an Ascended Wendigo. +15,000G
You have killed a Blue Furred Lion. +10,000G
…×2000
You have killed an Alpha Blue Maned Lion. +100,000G
—
"Hahaha." She laughed nervously. "I guess I'm loaded?" She smiled as she clicked on the purchase button. "Purchase one bucket of popcorn. Could use an appetizer before the main course."
A yellow bucket of popcorn appeared in her hands. "Sweet." She declared. "Now where we..?" She blinked.
While Kaede was busy with her system, and seeing how rich she was, the world had moved on.
The numbers advantage, that the demons had momentarily, had shifted yet again. The fire works that Becquerel had shot up in the sky was actually a beacon to signal the rest of the voltoids in the surrounding mountains.
"Why are there so many!?" Kaede cried as the mountain was now the very manifestation of chaos. "I can barely see what's going on. Who's winning!?"
—
Becquerel grinned as he the mountain rumbled. A telltale sign that his soldiers had answered his call to arms.
Voltoids stormed the sides of the mountain in the hundreds, each of them crackling with pure lightning energy.
He looked at the enemy's growing army of predators. "PREDATORS." The word tasted vile in his mouth.
Creatures so so vile that they were shunned by their own people the demons. When the Monarch of White Flame was defeated, he had heard that the demon realm was shattered and lost to the dimension gap.
This creature, that call herself a human apparently had the ability to create portals to the demon realm it would seem. Perhaps she was the next candidate for the Monarch of White Flames.
"NO." He said with a realization as he looked at the glowing chaos shard in his hand. "PERHAPS SHE HAS SOMETHING SIMILAR TO THIS, AND IT ALLOWS HER TO CREATE PORTALS TO A PARTICULAR REALM. THAT WOULD MEAN, THAT SHE NEEDS THIS SHARD TO CREATE PORTALS TO THIS REALM."
His anger flared at the thought of his warriors, his people, conquered, and summoned through portals like the predators. "DESPICABLE HUMAN." He turned his gaze to the human, who was seated at the far end of the growing chaos.
And was stupefied, as he saw the girl retrieve a bowl of some sort, from… somewhere. And start chewing its contents, as she returned her gaze to the battlefield.
"SHE'S EATING." He growled, his eyes glowing furiously. "MY PEOPLE ARE FIGHTING FOR THEIR LIVES, AND SHE'S EATING!!"
The girl looked confused for a moment, seemingly taken back by something, but he could still tell. She wasn't taking this battle seriously.
Burning hot fury blossomed in his chest and he roared as he led his scales crab towards her.
Their gaze momentarily met, and he was expecting to see a look of fear, or shock, or even just slight surprise as he charged her. Instead she looked, eager?
Kreerrr!
Becquerel jerked forward, as two of the larger predators slammed into the crab's skull, throwing powerful punches in an effort to crack it.
At the same time, the massive centipede had wrapped itself around the crab's legs, even as the crab grabbed at it with its claws.
Becquerel didn't have to worry though, as three different coloured figures slammed into the three enemies.
His three generals stood beside him in an instant. Covered in yellow lightning was Darrk, his massive frame slightly smaller than his own.
Covered in blue lightning was Orion, the shortest of the trio, his white hair in constant static.
The third and final general was Nila, she was the tallest of the trio, standing at the same height as him, if not slightly taller. She was also the leanest, that coupled with her height made her very distinctly dangerous, as she moved like a whip.
With a gesture, Becquerel sent the trio after the predators and the centipede. A portion of the mountain collapsed as they rushed at the enemy.
He looked at the girl again, and she finally seemed to understand his intentions, as she stood, and the bowl of *snack* vanished.
While the centipede might have been gone, the crab was still being hounded by hundreds of predators, so she wasn't able to move without making sure to destroy them first.
Becquerel didn't care, as he leaped off her head, turning into a streak of white light that reached the girl in an instant.
He threw a punch.
BOOOM!
His fist slammed against her chest, the very air around them erupting into a chain of explosions that engulfed everything in their wake.
Becquerel felt resistance unlike anything he had ever encountered, it was like striking a scale crab back when he was just a child. Pain lanced through his hands, burning intensely as he pushed forward, desperate for something to give in her seemingly impenetrable defense.
His hand crept forward, inch by agonizing inch. The pain intensified, yet Becquerel grinned as he felt the slightest give, the faintest shift that promised his fist would finally break through.
He pressed harder, his foot driving into the ground as he struggled to take another step. His hand moved another inch. The pain became blinding.
But it didn't matter. No amount of pain would stop him, not if it meant eliminating the threat standing before him, the danger to his people.
He could feel it now. His arm had gone numb, but he could sense the progress. Inch by inch, soon it would be up to his elbow.
And then it was.
He paused. The thunderous explosions of force and lightning finally subsided. The battlefield grew quiet.
As the smoke cleared, Becquerel expected to see his arm buried up to the elbow in the girl's chest.
Instead… he saw a stump.
His severed limb pushed uselessly against the girl's armor. A faint purple glitch flickered where his hand should have been. He felt the same inching progress as before, the same sensation of movement, but now that he could see what was truly happening, horror dawned in his eyes.
His stump was not moving forward.
It was dissolving.
No… it wasn't dissolving. It was being devoured.
The girl looked down at him, one of her eyes blazing with purple flame as she spoke, her voice calm, absolute.
"Do you yield?"
—----------
Kenzo slammed into the ground, spinning with the momentum to avoid the spear that nearly penetrated his eye, instead the spear tore through his cheek.
He released a winded kick at his assailant, sending him flying back for only a moment.
As he stood, he felt the building ache in his face as he faced off against the voltoid commander again. Distantly, from the edge of his gaze, he could make out Akari healing Hunters constantly.
If he could only get to her, then he could get her to heal him, and then he could finally crush this monster. "Hehehe. Now this is the feeling I love. The sense of death, right at the corner."
The commander grinned, almost as if he agreed with the statement as he spun his spear.
The both resumed their clash, fist and spear clashing and parrying at dizzying speeds.
"Let's make things simple!" Kenzo yelled. "No more tricks! Let's just find out who's stronger!" His fists bled as he punched and punched and punched. 'If I can just keep him here, then the others can finish their fights and come help me. Then I can get my healing and win this.'
"How… Naive." The commander of the Voltoids spoke.
He… spoke.
Kenzo paused for an instant. Just an instant, a mere smidgen of hesitation that caused his motion to blink for a moment.
But that instant was enough, as the voltoid, heaved his spear, and threw it.
The spear seemed to cut through space itself, as it moved towards Kenzo who dodged it, before realising. 'He's not aiming at me.'
The spear sailed past him, and towards an A rank hunter.
Korra was barely on her feet as she burned through a dozen more voltoids. To say that Korra was the lynchpin behind the hunters would be an understatement.
Whatever poison Kaede had created with the lake, Korra was happy to use it as it could not be resisted. She already had the highest kills of all the hunters using the lake as ammunition as she bent it like water.
'This must be how S Ranks feel in battle.' She mused as she raised a wave of poison as high as six metres, before pushing it forward. 'The power to just ignore the defenses of weaker opponents. Maybe if I can ask Kaede to make more of these poisons for me, I could maybe enter the realms of an S ranker.'
She didn't notice when a small part of the wave burst open in a ring as a spear pierced through. 'Who am I kidding? S Ranks are probably still stronger. This just happened to be a very advantageous fight for me.'
She barely had a chance to blink as the spear obliterated her heart, the force lifting her off the ground. 'What I wouldn't do to be stronger.'
'Strong enough to stand on my own without needing an S Rank to protect me, or some lions that got miraculously tamed. Strong enough to not need poison to beat my opponents. Now that would be really nice. That would be…'
Her eyes faded as she landed on her back, dead before she hit the ground.
—----
A black blob zoomed across the clouds, streaking past miles in instant.
Searching.
Searching.
It could feel it, calling out to it, or was it a warning? Either way, it was familiar, and it wanted to, no, had to know just what it was.
As it zoomed, the blob began to expand… no. It began to unravel, growing in size, until it was hundred of metres tall.
It resembled a kite, with multiple tendrils trailing behind it. It had red markings all over the flat of its body, and what looked like a single eye marked at the centre.
Found You.