Call it precognition or common bloody sense, but Psylocke came at me the second she appeared.
My world turned purple as Psylocke's Omega-level psychokinesis came crashing down on me. My armor lit up like a rainbow as my modified Ancient Defensive Array clicked into place, hovering centimeters above my skin. Rapidly shifting waves of psychokinesis, density, gravity, Anathema fire, and space rippled outward, barely holding back the tremendous pressure of a freshly raised Ascendant.
It was barely enough—until my cloak tripled that output, and with a timely activation of Parry, I reversed the pressure, twisting reality itself and hurling the psychokinetic assault right back at her.
She staggered, visibly shocked.
"Didn't really think it'd be that easy, did you?"
I tried not to pant with every telepathic word.
"Any chance I can convince you not to throw your life away?"
I could breathe now—barely. After factoring in the constant soul damage, it was a miracle I was even conscious at all, but I pushed through it. I had come too far to die.
Her eyes flashed purple, and fifty psychic bolts shot out, identical to the ones she had used to cripple me back on Earth.
Still healing from those injuries, I was determined not to get hit again. I triggered one of the many runes inscribed on my armor—Density Amp.
The rune functioned exactly as you would expect. It provided a one-hundred percent amplification to my raw Density Manipulation. It was based on a stripped-down version of my Ancient Density Array, trading versatility for much-needed power.
All of my affinities had accompanying Amp runes.
Density Amp let me go light—so light that I was nearly intangible, though not invulnerable to the dozens of spears racing toward me. What it did grant me, however, was speed.
I triggered my Ancient Enhancement Array, boosting all of my physical stats by over a thousand points. My Ancient array didn't rely on any of the foundational runes from Arcane Runesmithing, only the discoveries I had made after visiting my parents' temple.
And just like that, I was back in the same weight class I used to be…comparatively.
With an explosive flap of my wings, I shot forward and slipped through the minefield with an acrobat's grace.
I cleared it before she could blink, twisting and slashing out, unleashing a pair of runes inscribed into the massive blade I carried.
Staggered End. Dimensional Slash.
It was child's play turning my skill into an enchantment. The real challenge had been refitting it to accept both energy types.
The blow carved itself into reality the instant it left my blade—and that was what saved her. She dodged preemptively, losing a bit of hair instead of her head.
Shit.
She triggered her Demon Cloak immediately. A pair of ethereal horns burst from the crown of her head, and her body was encased in a thin layer of psychic plate armor. I struck before she could complete her magic girl transformation, chaining together Anathema Fire Amp, Staggered Carnage, and Density Amp as I thrust my blade.
A beam the size of a small Mack truck screamed from the tip, slicing through the side of her armor and erasing part of her midsection as she flickered away. I swung outward, trying to chase her with the beam, only to be cut off by a punch from Vulcan.
It slammed into my Defensive Array hard enough to send me crashing onto the surface of the closest planet, where Vulcan was already waiting with a beam that could split a mountain in half. I accelerated, feigning a direct clash, only to teleport beside him and bring my blade down, triggering Density Amp, Gravity Amp, and Staggered Carnage.
He reacted in time, raising a shield—and that turned out to be a mistake. The weight of my sword increased with every centimeter it descended. By the time it struck his shield, it was heavier than the moon. It would have broken him if she hadn't intervened.
Lauren appeared, wreathed in a cloak of shadow and eldritch power. She had unleashed her version of Devil Trigger, infusing her layered prismatic shields with black, wispy eldritch magic.
Her avatar did not survive, nor did the planet, but she managed to ferry Vulcan away from the devastation with a timely teleport, much to his shock and frustration.
Satisfied that my would-be killers were close enough to the system's suns, I detonated the explosives and teleported to the edge of the system.
Another one of Lauren's clones followed immediately, wreathed in black, her blade screaming toward my neck. Darkness trailed behind it. I twisted—unnaturally fast—and slashed out with a runed dagger. I parried the strike at the last possible moment using Phantom Riposte.
I messed up the timing, and the feedback dislocated my shoulder, fractured the bones in my wrist and forearm, but Lauren's clone got the worst of it. She lost a hand.
I flashed her a ruthless grin as I coaxed Promethean Body to repair the damage to my hand and body. My breaths were shallow and ragged, but I held my ground, staring her down.
"You shouldn't have been able to stop that without your true form."
"It's all in the wrist," I said, flourishing my blades, despite the pain. Lauren hesitated. "Come on. Don't tell me you're afraid."
"It's that armor," she scowled. "It's only prolonging the inevitable. You'll run out of energy eventually—if you don't tear your soul apart first."
"Maybe," I conceded, "but if I have to die, I'll do it on my own terms."
The entire system shook.
The light from the explosion nearly blinded us. The sun went supernova, and the five inner planets were vaporized instantly, flooding the system with more energy than it would have produced in its lifetime. The remaining planets were torn apart by the shockwave—radiation and Anathema-laced plasma racing outward at hundreds of thousands of kilometers per second.
I used the chaos as cover and shifted into my True Form for the first time since Thanos's fight. I was immediately struck by soul pain so deep and overwhelming that, for a moment, I almost wished I had been caught in the blast instead.
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