The silence lasted only an instant, just long enough for the heat and cold to clash in the air like two colliding worlds. Mei floated above the broken ground, her golden eyes fixed on the princess, analyzing every line of defense, every gesture, every detail that might reveal an opening.
She grows with every attack… absorbs, adapts, recalibrates… But all logic has a limit. I just need to find the exact moment when strategy becomes predictable.
The princess smiled, almost as if she could read her thoughts. Every breath was calculated, every movement seemed to measure the distance, the pressure, and the temperature of the environment. The ice around her trembled, cracking, as if matter itself obeyed her will.
— It seems the fire has not yet been extinguished — said the princess, her voice sharp as crystal blades. — But every explosion of yours strengthens me, Empress. The more you burn, the more I grow.
— Then… let's see how long you can resist! — Mei replied, compressing the air around her. A vortex of heat emerged, enveloping her body like an incandescent sun. The air trembled with pressure, every molecule of the space around her distorted by the concentrated heat.
With a sudden gesture, Mei fired a circular blast of flames. But the princess did not retreat. Instead, she raised a wall of translucent ice, absorbing part of the impact. The energy that wasn't absorbed transformed into tiny crystals that spun around, ready to pierce through any opening.
Mei leaped over the crystals, every movement calculated in fractions of a second. She advanced, close-quarters, mixing punches, kicks, and concentrated bursts of heat. Every contact with the ice produced thunderous cracks, a shock of forces that made the ground tremble and the crater walls fragment.
— Improbable… — murmured the princess, dodging a kick that scorched the surrounding air. — You don't just create chaos, you predict it. Fascinating.
— I study chaos! — Mei retorted, her voice laden with laughter and fury. — And today, it will obey me!
The battle became a dance of extremes: heat against cold, pressure against rigidity, movement against absorption. Mei created localized explosions, manipulating the gravity around each attack to increase speed, redirect forces, and create unexpected breaches. Every blow that didn't hit the princess served to tire her defense, break her absorption coordination, and open gaps in the ice.
The princess reacted with cold precision. Every attack from Mei was measured, absorbed, transformed. But the more she absorbed, the slower her adaptation process became—a vulnerability Mei knew how to exploit. Combining heat and pressure explosions, she began to fragment the terrain, creating a lethal choreography of attacks: a punch that melted the ground, followed by a pirouette that launched melted ice crystals as projectiles, and then a kick that displaced the air, pushing the princess back.
— You think you are dominating me — said the princess, while reconstructing a wall of ice that grew almost instantaneously — but you are merely tracing the path I want you to follow.
— Perhaps… but I'm dancing out of the rhythm you control! — Mei responded, spinning in the air and activating her Stellar Core.
This time, the sphere of pressure and heat wasn't for a knockout: it was strategic. Mei increased the gravity around her core, turning every blast of fire into small incandescent meteors, forcing the princess to react constantly, spending energy trying to absorb impacts that, in truth, had no fixed point of attack.
— Impressive… you're reusing and changing old tricks— the princess said, dodging one of the meteors and creating an ice column to contain them — But it's not enough. It never will be.
Mei laughed, even exhausted. — Ah, but I don't need to meet your expectations. I just need an opening!
And she found it. A moment when the princess raised her arms to absorb and redirect a sequence of consecutive attacks. In that instant, Mei concentrated all the pressure of her core on an invisible point: the adversary's spiritual channels. A calculated blow, not visible, but devastating.
— NOW! — Mei shouted, and all the pressure and energy directed at the core turned towards the princess's exposed spiritual transport channels.
Mei knew that during absorption, a vulnerability would have to appear, and Mei aimed for the exposed transport channels, creating her own breach.
The princess staggered, the ice cracking, fragmenting into thousands of shards that flew like mortal blades. Mei advanced, exploiting the vulnerability, every movement more calculated, every blow more cruel, every step a thunderclap of pure force and strategy.
— You… are… better than I expected — said the princess, with a frozen smile, but now with a spark of respect. — But… I… am not finished here!
— Neither am I! — Mei shouted, concentrating everything that remained of her energy and creativity into her body.
The final clash approached. Every technique, every pressure, every fragment of ice and tongue of flame converged on a single point of impact. The air vibrated, the ground cracked, the sky seemed to collapse—and in the middle of this chaos, two living forces, two extraordinary intelligences, were about to decide the battle's fate.
The air seemed to shatter with every breath. Mei floated, body tense, eyes burning like furnaces, every muscle ready to explode. Before her, Princess Seraphyne was not just an enemy: she was an icy mirror, absorbing, adapting, evolving. Every attack from Mei was measured, every movement of hers answered with mathematical precision and growing strength.
And Mei still didn't know if the battle would end with the princess's death; without a doubt, this was the most difficult fight of her life.
— You are captivating... A human slightly larger than the others of your own species. — said the princess, her voice sharp as blades. — You do not tire, Empress. But even the brightest sun is extinguished before absolute cold.
— Perhaps… but my sun burns inside me, and it won't go out as long as I breathe! — Mei responded, and her body erupted in golden flames that danced with a life of their own, reflecting off the ice crystals the princess created in fractions of a second.
The first shock was nearly cataclysmic: Mei fired a wave of concentrated heat, pushing the gravity around her, turning the air into a hammer of pressure that crushed the ice in mini-explosions. The princess partially absorbed it, but each absorption left small fissures in her defense, perceptible only to someone thinking in three dimensions, calculating trajectories and weak points simultaneously.
— You evolve quickly… — murmured Mei, dodging ice spears that emerged from the ground and the air, spinning between them like an incandescent comet. — But I can evolve too.
With an explosive leap, Mei closed in for close combat. Every punch and kick wasn't just brute force, but manipulation of pressure: she pushed, pulled, distorted the space around the point of contact to amplify the impact. The princess reacted with supernatural speed, every defense a dance of ice, absorbing part of the impact and transforming the rest into new offensive structures.
— Fascinating… — said the princess, as a column of ice emerged from the ground and twisted around Mei. — You force your mind and muscles to limits few would dare… but it will tire you.
And I will be standing to subjugate you.
Mei smiled, sweat streaming, but determination burning brighter. — If that's what you want to see… then come!
In a brutal motion, Mei spun, turning every attack into a continuous sequence of heat explosions. The flames became almost tangible, blades of golden light that pierced through the princess's ice. But every movement also drained her mental energy; calculating every trajectory, absorption, pressure, and adaptation began to weigh on her brain. She could feel the limit approaching.
The princess, on the other hand, began to evolve. Not only did she absorb energy, but she learned to anticipate patterns. Every charge from Mei was met with even greater precision: walls of ice arose before the flames even hit the ground, stakes flew to intercept every movement. The Abyssal arsenal grew before Mei like a living entity, and every second made the battle more uneven.
— You feel it… the Abyss strengthening me, don't you? — the princess taunted, floating among stakes and spinning pillars of ice. — Every attack of yours… every explosion… fuels my evolution!
Mei clenched her fists, eyes shining like dying stars. — I… will… not… lose! — she shouted, and her body expanded in an aura of heat so intense it melted the very air. She unleashed a sequence of punches and kicks, each amplified by manipulated gravity, turning the space into a hammer and anvil compressing the princess.
But the princess reacted. With a gesture, she converted the pressure into new ice structures that emerged from every angle, practically surrounding Mei. Every attempt to escape or dodge was preempted, every heat explosion was partially absorbed. Mei felt, for the first time, the limit of her mind and body: calculating every step, every attack and defense simultaneously was draining her endurance.
— I… can… overcome… this… — Mei murmured, blood trickling from the corner of her mouth, flames diminishing in intensity, but her determination remaining intact.
She gathered everything: strength, speed, pressure, and heat concentrated into a single point, a desperate attack. — SUPREME STELLAR CORE!
The core erupted, expanding into a sphere of unimaginable heat and pressure. Every crack of ice exploded into vapor, and the princess was forced to retreat, partially absorbing the impact, but already beginning to show signs of strain. The ground cracked, the ice walls shattered, and the space around them deformed with the collision of titanic forces.
— Impressive… — said the princess, breathing deeply, looking at Mei with respect and a touch of admiration. — But it does not end here… not yet.
— Nor for me! — Mei responded, advancing. Every step was an explosion, every punch a mini-supernova. She was near her limit, yes, but at that limit, her brain burned even faster, her creativity rising to heights few could reach.
The Supreme Stellar Core then dissolved and Mei sighed, a sigh in flames.
Like the breath of a dragon.
The princess merely watched.
Waiting for Mei's next calculations and actions.
The wind blew through the suspended ruins of the floating city. Every cracked stone block, every destroyed tower orbited slowly within the immense crater, as if even gravity was afraid to approach the two figures at the center.
On one side, Mei. Her red hair waved in soft flames, heat radiated from her skin as if it were impossible to contain. Her golden eyes stared at her adversary with contained fury, but there was something more: a spark of excitement, the instinct of a predator that could not be hidden.
On the other, Seraphyne. The cold around her was not an absence of heat—it was the presence of something far more cruel. The ice extended beneath her feet, creating perfect, crystalline forms, as beautiful as they were deadly. Her blue eyes did not blink, analyzing every detail of the Empress as if she were an equation to be solved.
The air between them oscillated: heat and cold colliding, distorting space. Neither advanced, neither yielded.
— What fascinates me about you — said Seraphyne, her voice soft, almost a whisper — is how you keep burning even knowing that fire only consumes itself faster the brighter it shines. You are a suicidal sun.
Mei arched an arrogant smile. — And what fascinates me about you… is that even with all this ice, you still think you can extinguish something that was born to set the world ablaze.
A crack ran across the fractured ground. An ice crystal appeared between them, and in the same instant melted into vapor merely from the pressure of their presences.
— This is going to be fun, Princess — said Mei, rolling her shoulders, her entire body releasing golden flames. — Because today I'm not going to calculate anything. I'm simply going to… crush you.
Seraphyne raised her chin, an icy smile appearing on her lips. — Then come, beast. Show me how wild a sun can be before it is extinguished in the abyss.
Silence fell. The entire city seemed to hold its breath.
It was then that Mei raised her chin, her golden eyes sparking like a miniature sun. — Want a taste of what's to come?
Before Seraphyne could respond, Mei exploded into motion. The ground behind her crumbled, flaming particles exploding in all directions. Without calculation, without the choreography that had always marked her attacks, she launched herself with instinctual brutality—a wild, almost animalistic blow that smashed the ice formed by the princess's defense in a deafening roar.
The impact made the entire city oscillate in the air, the stone platforms shaking like leaves from the pressure wave.
Seraphyne's cold eyes widened for an instant. She abandoned her calculations…? No… she's fighting differently. Instinct. Savagery. This… could render all previous analyses useless.
Mei retreated two steps, flames swirling around her like living veils.
— That was just a preview, Princess. Now… come with me. Let's dance the most primal dance of all.
Seraphyne took a deep breath, and then smiled. A cruel, icy smile, but laden with something that seemed like respect.
And when their auras expanded at the same time—golden fire against abyssal cold—the world trembled.
The city groaned, as if it would shatter. The Tree of Life pulsed with dark energy.
And with it, two more forces made everything quake.
Not the city. Not the crater.
But destiny itself.
Two things made the world waver in that instant: the Tree… and two goddesses.
To be continued…