The cha was absolutely imnse. The robotic figure must have stood to be at least thirty feet tall, towering over the hall and every life form within it by a substantial degree. Technically the girl who had rushed off in a blur of manna enhanced speed hadn't actually said that we needed to fight this giant construct, but if there were a bunch of squadron leaders already watching us, trying to decide who they were going to pick up for their magical galactic ass-kicking squads, then it was a pretty good bet that taking that thing out would be a good start.
BB snorted.
I rolled my shoulders, tilted my neck from side to side and let it give so satisfying cracks and pops. In my past life, I'd never been much for athletics, sports or fighting. But with the amount of energy sparking across my skin and roiling inside of , barely contained in a corona that had risen a few millitres from my skin, standing still was almost painful.
I took off at a leap. The ground beneath burst into a small crater as I soared across the air, a small trail of debris followed behind in an arc directly toward the giant machine. But it moved quicker than I could have expected. The machine's hand snatched out of the air, closing around into a fist.
The tal was strange, soft, almost like skin. It rippled as if real muscles and ligants were working underneath, it was nothing like I had expected from a thirty-foot tall droid. The fingers closed in and the cha began to squeeze. But the little corona of energy that had flickered out from my skin acted as a kind of natural shield, one that the robot was too weak to squeeze through.
I couldn't stay here forever, waiting for the cha to try and squeeze the life out of . I could slowly see my manna starting to tick down one point every few on my HUD, and while the display claid I had over 10,000 manna points to spend, even that would run out if I let this continue indefinitely.
It was ti to put on a light display, or more accurately, an energy beam display. BB had said we were entering so sort of Synchro Mode, and the AI hadn't said anything since the fight had begun, so I could only assu that our bond had deepened for the duration of the fight. Maybe I just had to think to activate my single ability? I reached down into that well of power that seed to rest inside and pushed it out into my hand, and then let it pulse outward in one schism of raw energy.
The flash of light was blinding, but one thing was for sure, I'd used enough energy to cleanly knock myself free from the robot's grip. It staggered backward, almost teetering over onto its rear end, and let drop back down into the hall to where the rest of the initiates were watching in stunned silence. While I'd managed to knock the machine away, I hadn't actually managed to damage it at all, I'd just done enough to dislodge myself and stun the machine montarily.
I pushed forward and jumped again. I shot through the air like a bullet, streaking forward in a crackling blur of red lightning. The robot reached out its hand again, but this ti I was ready. A short pulse of my energy beam stopped the machine from closing its fist around . I flew between two of the droid's long fingers and landed on its arm. I wasted no ti and sprinted my way up its forearm before launching myself into another jump. As I soared through the air once more and ca to position directly above the chanized man's shoulder, I charged up another energy beam and tried to force as much of my power through it as I could. The beam was thick and heavy, it cut through air and tal as if they were the sa thing, and the robot's arm simply fell away before hitting the ground with a heavy clunk.
Whoever was operating the machine clearly wasn't happy that they had been bested by so random initiate. Before I could react, the other hand ca around and hit down with a colossal open-handed slap. I was sent hurtling back through the hole in the ceiling that the cha had made and into the ground with a colossal crash. I skid across the ground, barrelling through the chairs that had been set up until I crashed into the wall, leaving it with a spiderweb of cracks.
I spat a small amount of blood from between my lips and stretched a crack out of my back. It didn't feel like the hit had done any major damage to , my shield had managed to absorb the brunt of the attack. The only reason I'd been knocked back at all was because of how small I was in relation to my opponent.
I looked up at the robot, its single eye glinted ominously. The cha's one remaining arm reached behind its back and withdrew a heavy long sword from the armoured section and positioned itself defensively. Clearly, the operator had realised I wasn't going to go down that easily.
However, before I could launch myself through the air once again, a trio of attacks rang out through the ceiling hole. I wasn't the only one willing to try my luck against the cha to try and score so points with the squadron leaders early on. From my right, a giant icicle, almost as long as the cha's arm, fired out at near sonic speeds. But the cha was waiting, and with a single slash of its sword, the ice was split in two and sailed harmlessly around it. From my left ca a torrent of swirling wind, but the robot stood strong, seemingly completely unbothered by the barrage of high-pressure air. Last, but certainly not least, a thick green tendril thwipped out and latched onto the robot's sword arm, curling around its fingers and binding it tight. This attack did the most because while it hadn't done any damage to the machine it had held it completely in place. This was my chance.
For the third ti, I leapt. I built up as much energy for my beam as I felt my body could handle. Until my palms were stinging and the little arcs of lightning that had been flickering across all of my skin had condensed into a flickering orb at the tips of my fingers. I wouldn't be aiming for a shoulder this ti, I would be going for a kill shot.
The operator of the robot clearly knew sothing was up, and they weren't willing to let their cha go down without a fight. They levelled the sword so that the tip was pointed at directly, and in an instant, it had split apart into two halves with electricity arcing between each newly ford blade.
We released our beams of energy at the exact sa mont. A pulse of raw power erupted from the gap between the sword's blade and lanced toward , but I t it with my own red manna stream. The two energy beams collided in midair with the force of a thunderclap, the air shimred with the heat of the two powerful energy constructs slamming into one another. But the outco was clear. Inch by inch my own energy was winning out against the cha's, until suddenly, my red power overwheld the energy of my opponent.
The beam of red manna cut through everything in its path. The torso of the robot was engulfed in a hot stream of molten lightning, and within monts, a hole had been bored straight through its core. The robot collapsed into a heap, molten tal dripping from the hole, and I let my energy beam taper off before falling back down to the floor.
[DEFEATED OUTDATED MANNACHOID!]
[LEVEL-UP!]
[YOU HAVE NOW REACHED LEVEL 4!]
[ABILITY UNLOCKED: MANNA PROPULSION - USING YOUR MANNA YOU CAN NOW CREATE LOCALISED AREAS OF FORCE AROUND YOUR HANDS AND FEET FOR UNPARALLELED AGILITY]
I let myself have a mont to breathe, then nonchalantly made my way out of the hall as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened at all. This ti my life was going to an sothing, and if the squadron leaders were watching, I was betting they'd already be pretty impressed.
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