Ayumu glanced at the darkening sky, the green haze turning a sickly shade of bruised purple as evening approached. His lungs were a furnace now, the lack of oxygen making his vision pulse at the edges.
(It's getting late. Let's get this over with,) he thought, his gaze locking onto the mountain of flesh that was the 1000-foot maggot.
Suddenly, a glob of corrosive venom hissed through the air. The spider mutation, desperate for its "Food," puked a concentrated stream at the lamppost. Ayumu flickered out of the way, landing lightly on the unstable, shifting mud of the street. Behind him, the metal lamppost dissolved into a steaming puddle of slag within seconds.
He didn't even look back. His focus remained entirely on the gargantuan larva. (Not all of its body has resurfaced yet. If that thing fully emerges in Oborozaki, this entire district will be nothing but rubble.)
Ayumu charged.
The maggot let out a bone-shaking roar, a primal command that echoed through the ruined village. Instantly, the twenty soldier insects swarmed into a defensive wall, clicking their mandibles and brandishing their scythe-like limbs to block his path.
Ayumu didn't slow down. He skidded across the sludge, his heels kicking up dust. He raised the dead tree branch vertically above his head, the wood glowing with an ethereal, dark light that seemed to swallow the surrounding fog.
"Eclipse Reaver!"
He brought the branch down in a violent, vertical arc. A massive hurricane of pressurized wind and Orvex slashes erupted from the wood, tearing through the air. The shockwave sent all twenty-one insect monsters flying like autumn leaves in a storm, their carapaces shattering as they were slammed into the surrounding buildings. The edge of the blast caught the maggot's flank, carving a deep, oozing trench into its side.
The titan roared in agony, but before Ayumu could deliver the killing blow, a thick, sticky cable of webbing latched onto his shoulder.
Ayumu spun around, his eyes narrowing. The spider monster was back, its spinnerets working overtime as it tethered him. "FOOD!!" it screeched, rotating its body to whip Ayumu across the floor like a ragdoll, dragging him toward its open, dripping maw.
(You again...) Ayumu thought, a flicker of genuine annoyance crossing his face.
As he was dragged into the spider's strike range, it lunged to swallow him whole. Ayumu didn't resist the momentum; instead, he used it. He flipped mid-air, planting a heavy boot into the spider's lower jaw, snapping it shut with a sickening *crack* that sent the beast tumbling backward.
The spider recovered with a frantic, chittering fury, rushing him again. As it lunged, Ayumu shoved the dead branch vertically into the monster's mouth, propping its jaws wide open.
*(I don't have time for this.)*
He gripped the end of the branch and twisted his body, his grip intensifying. With one clean, vertical motion, he sliced the spider completely in half, from head to abdomen. The two halves slumped into the mud, twitching as they died.
But the victory was short-lived.
The 1000-foot maggot moved with a burst of speed that defied its massive size. Before Ayumu could recover his stance, the titan slammed its head into him like a runaway freight train. The impact sent Ayumu hurtling through three brick buildings, a trail of dust and shattered masonry following his path.
Ayumu stood up amidst the ruins, calmly brushing the white plaster dust off his dark suit. His breathing was heavy, and his grip on the tree branch tightened.
(Something that big... can move that fast?),
The air didn't just feel toxic anymore—it felt heavy with the stench of death that refused to stay dead.
Suddenly, a high-pitched hum vibrated through the fog. The butterfly monster Ayumu had decapitated earlier whooped down from the sky like a ghost. Its razor-sharp wings, glowing with a sickly green radiation, slammed into Ayumu's waist with enough force to shear a tank in half.
**CLANG.**
The wings made contact, but instead of slicing through him, they sparked against Ayumu's Orvex-dense skin. The impact threw him upward, his body forcefully pinned against the creature's wing as it ascended. Ayumu stared at the monster's reattached head in genuine confusion.
(I thought I killed you...) He didn't wait for an answer. Ayumu delivered a heavy, localized kick to the butterfly's thorax, blasting it away and sending himself into a freefall.
Before he could even touch the mud, the grasshopper monster he had previously "burst" sprang from the shadows. It met Ayumu mid-air, its massive fists blurring in a desperate boxing flurry. Ayumu danced through the air, dodging every punch with millimeter precision before snapping the branch across the grasshopper's neck, slicing the head clean off for the second time.
Without looking, Ayumu snatched the falling head out of the air and hurled it like a kinetic railgun slug at the butterfly flying in the distance. The head whistled through the air, punching a hole straight through the butterfly's core and killing it mid-flight once again.
Ayumu positioned the grasshopper's falling headless body beneath him, using it as a biological shock absorber to take the impact as he landed safely in the sludge.
His lungs were screaming now. The fire in his chest was becoming a white-hot agony, his vision blurring as his oxygen levels hit the critical zone. But that wasn't the worst part.
As he looked ahead, the nightmare truly began.
Through the shifting green fog, the bodies of the monsters he had dismantled began to twitch. The cockroach, the spider, the twenty soldier insects—even the butterfly he had just sniped—were pulling themselves back together. He watched in grim fascination as the thick, radioactive gas in the air surged into their wounds like living stitches, forming new limbs and sealing heads back onto shoulders in seconds.
The grasshopper behind him finished its regeneration, its new head snapping into place as it swung a massive arm at Ayumu's skull.
Ayumu ducked the blow and delivered a counter-kick that caved in the monster's face, creating a gaping hole. He watched closely this time. The green radiation rushed into the cavity, knitting the flesh and bone back together instantly.
(Great. The gas prevents me from breathing, and now it grants these freaks immortality,) he thought, his jaw tightening.
He was trapped in a loop. He couldn't breathe, and his enemies couldn't die. He looked at the 1,000-foot maggot—the source of the vibration—and then at the glowing, toxic atmosphere.
Suddenly, a sharp, dangerous grin spread across Ayumu's face behind his missing mask.
(Why didn't I think of this sooner?).
The Maggot Queen lunged with terrifying velocity, crushing her own soldiers just to reach the Rank 1 Elite. But this time, Ayumu was ready. He braced the dead branch, catching the impact of her massive skull. The force launched him hundreds of feet into the air, but mid-flight, Ayumu swung the branch with a sharp, concentrated flick, completely bursting the Maggot's head like a rotted fruit.
He backflipped onto the edge of a crumbling roof, closed his eyes, and took a leap of faith into a freefall.
Below him, a dozen monsters unhinged their jaws, waiting for "Food" to fall into their mouths. But Ayumu wasn't looking at them. He was focused on the very air itself.
[Narrator: Let me explain. Wasted Orvex is when energy leaves the body without being channeled. But when that energy is forced to obey the user's will to dominate the environment, it is no longer Called "wasted Orvex"—it's Called Or Becomes: AURA.]
Ayumu released a dense, suffocating wave of **Aura** that swept across Oborozaki like a purple tidal wave. It collided with the toxic green fog, neutralizing the radiation and scrubbing the atmosphere clean. The Maggot Queen, halfway through regenerating her head, suddenly stopped. Without the radiation to fuel her, the flesh stayed raw and unhealed.
Mid-air, Ayumu finally opened his mouth and took a deep, glorious breath of fresh air. He giggled in pure joy, his lungs finally cooling down.
"Whispering Tornado!"
With a casual swing of the branch, he unleashed a localized cyclone that ground every remaining monster into a stain on the village floor. He landed softly, twitching his finger. "That attack was weak. My full strength hasn't returned yet. Oh well, I'll get it back soon enough."
He turned his cold, predatory gaze toward the shivering, injured Maggot Queen. For the first time, the 1,000-foot beast felt fear. It tried to slither back into the earth, but Ayumu tilted his head.
"Oh, so now you want to leave?"
He brought the branch down one final time. The wood acted like a guillotine of pure energy, splitting the Queen wide open from head to tail. He tossed the branch aside, letting it clatter on the floor. "Okay, thank God that's over. I need a shower."
He started to walk away, but a sudden, choking weight hit the air. It was a dark, oily pressure that made Ayumu's heart skip a beat.
(What the hell is that?!)
He spun around. From the steaming womb of the dead Maggot Queen, a **Beetle Monster** erupted. It was small compared to its mother, covered in sticky, black slime. It knelt beside the Queen's carcass, hugging the dead flesh.
"Mother dead... Mother good... Mother no..." it rasped in a voice that sounded like grinding stones.
A bead of sweat rolled down Ayumu's forehead. His instincts—the instincts of the world's strongest—were screaming at him. (Whatever this is, it's bad. I have to kill it. Now.)
Ayumu lunged, snatching the branch off the floor and blitzing the distance. He delivered a critical, Orvex-loaded strike to the Beetle's shoulder.
THUD.
The impact released a cloud of hot steam, but there wasn't even a dent.
(Not even a scratch...) Ayumu's eyes widened.
The Beetle turned, its gaze meeting Ayumu's with a void-like intensity. "You... killed... Mother."
It stood up and threw a simple, straight punch toward Ayumu's gut. Ayumu crossed the branch to block, but the moment the Beetle's fist touched the wood, the branch—the same branch that had sliced a 1,000-foot titan—shattered into a million splinters.
The fist buried itself into Ayumu's stomach, sending him flying backward through three concrete walls. He landed on his knees, coughing and wiping a trail of blood from his mouth.
"I clearly underestimated him," Ayumu muttered, trying to stand. But his legs gave way. A strange sensation, like a high-frequency vibration in his bones For a Second, dropped him back to his knees.
The Beetle Monster didn't walk; it **blitzed**, closing the distance in a heartbeat. It towered over the Rank 1 Elite, its fist cocked back as it roared a chilling declaration:
"YOUR LIGHT IS MY SHADOW!!!"