"Uh shit, did they sense all that energy release?" Jack groaned as Kazetora helped him to his feet.
"I think so. You up for some action?" Kazetora said with an adventurous glint in his eyes.
"Always. Need a coat of armour?" Jack said, opening his item pouch.
"No need," Kazetora said, gently hitting his chest with the back of the katana with a loud clang, showing the presence of a chestplate.
"Here, the blade I'm lending you," Kazetora said, stretching out Kazekiri towards Jack as they took position.
"No need," Jack said with a smug grin before turning toward the approaching revenants, Enak covering his body up, which was wrapped in raging Kana energy.
"All that meditation did pay off after all," Jack said, feeling the surge and smoothness in his Kana capacity and control.
"It was Rick's recommendations after all," Enak said mentally to Jack.
"I dunno how you're gonna take them on without a sword, but try not to have you carried by me. Don't lag behind." Kazetora said with a smirk as he conjoint the hilts of the katanas.
"We'll see about that."
And with that, there was a surge of Kana energy. Kazetora disappeared and appeared behind one of the revenants in the blink of an eye, beheading it before disappearing again and repeating that again and again, taking down a total of 29 revenants in five seconds.
"Impressive kid, he's got some moves," Enak scoffed, as if provoking Jack.
"Yup, so now, let's show him his place," Jack said, cracking his neck. In the blink of an eye, he dashed forward too, reinforcing his body with Kana energy.
"Enak Blades!!" Jack shouted as he rushed into the horde.
The armour modified, elongating the arm pieces into blades brimming with Kana energy.
Jack dashed into the crowd and started beheading revenants one after another. He cut down one, then a second, then a third, and kept on going without a pause.
"Ugh, there is no end to them!" he groaned in frustration.
There was not a significant decrease in the amount of revenants flooding them. They were closing in on him rapidly, and he wasn't able to control it.
"Dammit!" he shouted as he kicked the ground in anger, releasing a massive pulse of Kana energy to push back the revenants around him.
"I've had enough of you noisy bastards," he spat as he withdrew the blades and dashed into the revenants in front.
He grabbed a revenant by the neck and threw it on the ground, crushing its skull. He grabbed all the nearby revenants around him and pulled them towards him, then jumped high into the sky and stood on a Kana slab.
"What are you doing? They will absorb your energy!!" Enak warned, confused at Jack's actions.
"That's exactly what I want."
Jack lifted the gathered revenants, which were on the verge of exploding, and crushed them midair with his Kana energy. There was a nasty crunch of bones, and then he scattered them throughout the battlefield.
The revenants landed all over the place, immobilized and full of energy, and all it took was their passive Kana energy absorption from the atmosphere to overload them.
BOOM!!!
Explosions rang throughout the battlefield as the revenants began exploding one by one, the Kana energy from each explosion charging other revenants around them to explode.
"Are you insane???" Kazetora screamed from below as he tried to dodge the explosions.
"Pfft," Jack sniggered before lifting Kazetora off his feet with a Kana hand and placing him beside himself on another Kana slab.
"Can't handle some fireworks?" Jack teased.
"More like cluster grenades," Kazetora sighed. "How long will this go on?"
"Dunno, we'll just have to wait it out," Jack said before jumping down, gathering more revenants and crushing them to a pulp.
"That was a good plan, young master," Enak complimented.
"I was just conserving energy for the main event," Jack said, yanking an about-to-explode revenant toward the confused Ortho Sapiens.
"You stole my spotlight," Kazetora said as he landed softly beside Jack.
"Or maybe it was never yours," Jack said with a smirk. "Giddy up, those things coming are the real deal."
The terrorists had sent forth their men along with automatons to investigate the source of disturbance, and they were advancing rapidly toward them.
"Okay sure, what's the plan?"
"Your choice. One of us will take care of the force here while the other goes to clear out that train and stragglers," Jack said, drinking a Kana recovery potion and handing Kazetora one.
"I will take the train," Kazetora said before disappearing away.
"He can read my mind, sigh~ alright Enak, ready?" Jack said, shaking his head.
"At your command, young lord."
"Let's show them what it means to mess with Kratians."
The automatons ripped out the trees in one of the places to make a clearing for the team commander to stay. A tall man stood at the centre polishing his blades, smoking a cigar.
He was growing increasingly suspicious at the sudden stopping of explosions from the woods ahead.
Suddenly there was a loud crack from nearby. The officer took out his guns and aimed at the direction of the noise.
"Looking for me?" a voice sounded from above. The man turned on his flashlight to see a man clad in black, high in the sky, and a lot of trees circling around him in the air.
The man took aim and fired. The bullets didn't hit; it was as if they had just vanished midair.
"Who are you?" the man shouted, still firing.
The commotion gathered the attention of the guards that were staying back to protect the base. They rushed to the scene and opened fire at Jack too.
"Just a passerby," Jack said, who was stopping the bullets with a Kana barrier all the time.
CRUNCH!!!
Jack crushed the trees he had with him with Kana arms into large and sharp shards, and then took a last look at the man.
With a gesture of his palm, the shards rained down upon the land as a volley of spears. They pierced through everything, proceeding to destroy all the assets that were present there.
Jack descended, surrounded by the bodies of the men that were now impaled with wooden spears.
"Now then, that leaves us with the ones in the forest," Jack huffed as he shoved the guns and the wristbands from the Ortho Sapiens into his item pouch.
"Your Dantian is almost at its limit though," Enak warned.
"I will try refilling it while walking, was planning to start anyway."
"Not happening. Do it inside the training ground. We don't want you having a backflow here. Sit down and refill it safely."
"Sigh~, fine," Jack said as he gathered some height on a Kana slab and sat down to refill his energy.
Meanwhile, Kazetora was slicing his way through the revenants and the terrorists that were occupying the train. Sounds of clashing metal and stabbing echoed through the compartments, tearing through the empty groans and snarls from the revenants.
"Why are there so many? I lost count after three hundred... Just where were they taking them?" he wondered.
He navigated through the compartments, cutting down Ortho Sapiens and revenants alike. He found many empty automaton hangars, suggesting that a horde of them was advancing to where Jack was.
He informed Jack about this over the Kana network.
"Alright, thanks for the heads-up. Don't worry about me, I will rip them apart," Jack replied confidently.
And so he continued his exploration of the train, ripping his way through to the main engine to find out where the train was headed with all these revenants.
"Killing them while double wielding is hard," he said before merging the swords into a double-edged blade. "Let's get this over with."
He dashed forward, rotating the blade around him with lightning speed, cutting open anything in his path swiftly. In 15 minutes, he had made his way through 20 compartments and was now standing one compartment away from the cockpit.
"I should've sent that Demolisher here instead, would've flattened the train once and for all," he panted as he stopped to chug down a Kana recovery potion.
"Alright, here we go," he said before making his way into the engine.
The cockpit was empty, as expected of an automatized train. Countless buttons and levers lined the walls of the compartment, and a large holographic display showed the route of the train.
He took a picture of the map and any relevant info before he started making his way to the exit.
Suddenly there was a voice transmission on a computer in the third compartment. Its voice echoed through the now silent compartments of the corridor.
"No remaining revenants have been found. You can proceed to the next station when the train and the staff are ready to move again. Do you copy?" the message said.
Kazetora sped to the computer and typed an affirmative reply. The message popup closed, and the display reverted back to the radar it displayed previously.
And right now, it bore bad news.
An Ortho Sapien surveillance helicopter had been tagging along with the train and had been surveilling the area ahead. Right now it was making its way back, hovering dangerously close to the pocket tents and the field where Jack was fighting alone.
"Hey Jack, do you copy? Hello?" he said over the Kana network.
No response.
"Hello? Jack, are you there?" he panicked.
"He is meditating. He is out of Kana energy," Enak informed.
"Oh... alright, I was worried. There is a helic—"
BANG!!!!
"AARGGGHHH!" Jack's loud scream echoed from the other end, and the connection cut.
"Hello? Jack?" he called out, panicking.
"Shit!" he cursed, slamming his fist against the wall.
Which... wasn't a wall at all.
It was a button, which got activated on the impact.
The compartment walls retracted, revealing a space where blue and green-tier revenants were stuffed.
As soon as they spotted Kazetora, they growled at him before moving toward him.
"Ah shit... I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR YOU BASTARDS!" he shouted, getting ready for battle.