'Party can't go on without snacks.....' Miss D said, tossing out a piece of gum forward before the contents rapidly mixed and expanded upward into a grotesque formation of foam and pores. Then, the entire thing blew, sending puffs of smoke particles around the small moon that the are standing on. The cloud of particles obscured most of the light, cutting off the visual fields between the two sides.
Without waiting for a moment longer, Miss D dashed around the battle field in a circle with artifact enhancements at her feet as she approached the Bearers quickly from the sides. In the mean time, Jozzor brought a hand onto Brakagi's shoulders and immediately slung the two of them directly into the backsides of their enemy in an impromptu yet perfectly executed pincer maneuver.
The Rockies are immediately going for the one shot completion at the beginning of the fight, and all of this is per the instructions given by Hong Fu. With eight combatants on the battlefield including Zel who is popping in and out of existence, it becomes harder and harder for Hong Fu to keep track of all of the paths of probabilities. So instead, he just focused on the most relevant paths in trying to help Brakagi end this fight as quickly as possible.
He foresaw clashes on various fronts, and when you gamble like this, you win some and you lose some.
What's most important is that you win more than you lose.
'HERE THEY COME!' Lady Lily warned, as she slammed her pen onto the ground as the landscape around the three bearers morphed and came into life with a flash of light. Alrith turned towards the approaching Miss D with Lightning Knife in hand while Rydel grasped on a huge chunk of material and prepared for the ambush.
Then, he felt the tug and pull of spacetime behind him, as he spun around to see Jozzor and Brakagi emerge.
A massive clash of lightning and light came from behind him, but Rydel focused his total attention forward, releasing the giant chunk of rock directly over Jozzor and Brakagi, as the latter prepared to take all three of them out at once. Instead, Brakagi stepped forward and punched through the chunk before his Ring of Instability shattered Rydel's attack into millions of smaller pieces.
As the rocks rained down on the ground, Jozzor slung shot himself behind Rydel and kicked him forward towards Brakagi as the leader of the One Rock government prepared to deliver his finishing blow.
'This is the end.' Brakagi declared, his hand glowing and fingers stretched.
'Not quite.' Rydel smiled, turning his left palm to face backwards as he grabbed onto Jozzor with a blind pick, feeling the small angry rocky in his palms, he then sends it forward.
Jozzor reappeared as a meat shield between Brakagi and Rydel, as the Rocky president hurried to deactivate his artifact and catch his companion directly in the chest before Rydel also smashed into them. Rolling away after the impact, Lady Lily gave Rydel a hand as she created a stone column from the ground up and sent him back towards her side.
In the meanwhile, Alrith waged war with her lightning knife with Miss D. To her surprise, the assassin's durability is way above what she had imagined. Zel had told both Rydel and Alrith the suspected powers of Miss D, and yet nobody expected her to be taking on strikes from Lightning Knife with her bare hand.
The two exchanged various blows, and Alrith is able to deflect a handful of Miss D's blows, even landing a few of the counter strikes on her body with blasts of lightning. However, all Miss D had to do was to amplify the durability of various parts of her body and be done with the defense.
Finally, a punch slipped through and landed on Alrith's chest. Miss D's fist glowed at the last moment before the impact is amplified, sending Alrith flying backwards and almost knocking the wind out of her. Then, she followed up with a kick to send Alrith flying, causing her to drop the Lightning Knife on the ground as a result.
Lady Lily created barrages of her walls once again out of the moon underneath their feet, but Miss D simply continued walking forward as if she is passing through layers of smoke instead. The materials crumbled and collapsed upon her royal arrival, and all that could stand in her way are direct attacks from artifacts.
'Artifact Avatar mode...ACTIVATE!'
Alrith declared, as balls of lightning exploded from the Lightning Knife that she dropped around Miss D's feet. The bright light immediately envelops the white haired human girl before chains of lightning closes in the remaining gaps and traps her in the prison of intense energy and attacks.
From the bright light emerged an unwavering figure still, and Miss D continued walking forward.
'Get out of here!' Lady Lily ordered, as she picked up her Brush Pen and charged towards Miss D.
With a smile creeping up her face, Miss D kicked into the ground, bringing up a chunk of earth material to around waist level before she launched it towards Lady Lily. With a single swipe, the material is reorganized into two individual chunks.
'I heard you are the strongest here.' Miss D said, clapping her hand together excitedly, 'Entertain me!'
'You are biting off more than you can chew.....' Lady Lily said, spinning around in a circle as her Pen of Rearrangement collected all of the floating pieces of rock and reformed it into a sword around her artifact. Sending it forward, Lady Lily prepared to strike down her opponents just like all those times before.
'You are as cool as you are beautiful!' Miss D giggled, sending a palm forward and shattering Lady Lily's sword. However, the shattered pieces appeared to have come to life as it twirled around like a serpent and clawed onto Miss D's arm, locking her temporarily in place.
'This is the end.' Yanking Miss D towards her, Lady Lily reached her brush pen until it is about to make contact with Miss D. Similarly to Brakagi, she can also knock out others nearly instantaneously upon physical contact. As she prepared to activate the same sequence that she has used all those times before, she see Miss D's mouth move before her entire body is bathed in a bright flash.
'No you don't!' Alrith screamed from behind, sending an electric dragon and striking Miss D in the back.
'You BRAT!' Miss D grabbed onto a piece of floating rock and sent it flying towards Alrith like a bullet. It struck her on the forehead as the impact cocked her head backwards as if she had been tackled by a three hundred pound man. She was instantly knocked out, but that fraction of time bought by her desperate attack gave Lady Lily the opening that she needed.
Channeling the power of the Pen of Rearrangement through her entire body, she reached out and exchanged a punch with Miss D.
Her fingers are snapped upon impact, her wrist strained as tendons sprung up like guitar strings. Her battle suit did next to nothing to protect her right hand, but in exchange, she was able to unleash her devastating sequence of rearrangement onto Miss D.
The light from the Amplifier's owner diminished as quickly as it came up before Lady Lily sent her flying with a kick.
She should be out for good while now...Lady Lily thought, as she tried to ignore the fleshy mess that was her right hand. Pulling out the Pen from its entanglement with her left hand, she gave herself a zap and restored her right hand to normal again.
'Rydel!' Lady Lily called for the name of her old enemy, and she turned to see Rydel facing off against Brakagi with Jozzor nowhere to be seen.
Compared to the constancy of action on her end, Rydel and Brakagi appeared to have entered into an early stalemate, and that is to be expected with Brakagi's best friend and right hand man being held as hostage in Rydel's left hand.
Like trying to catch a pesty fly with bare hand, Rydel managed to caught onto Jozzor once again as he tried to set Brakagi up for a finishing blow. Trapping Jozzor with the bubble space created with the Glove of Summoning, Rydel used it as leverage against Brakagi making any moves.
However, this also meant that Rydel cannot use his artifacts any more. In order to deter Brakagi for attacking him, Rydel puts his left hand in front at all times as he prepared to release it should Brakagi even lights up his artifact for a nanosecond.
'Alrith's down, but so is the assassin!' Lady Lily said as she ran towards Rydel when Brakagi suddenly turned his projection attack towards her.
'WATCH OUT!' Rydel turned his fist and tossed Jozzor towards the intersection of Brakagi's line of attack to Lady Lily. The small rocky immediately slung shot himself out of the way upon release as Lady Lily was frozen in place by Brakagi's attack.
'No!' Rydel reached towards Lady Lily and tried to save here when Jozzor appeared in front of him and punched through his gut, sending him flying backwards.
'Guess this is a 2 V 1 after all.' Brakagi said lightly, shaking off his hand and started walking towards Rydel with Jozzor by his side, 'Unlike your cowardly leader. We Rockies fight as one.'
'Then you may lose as one too.'
A sphere of mass is projected in between Brakagi and Jozzor when their bodies are smashed into each other before a jolt of lightning surrounded the two of them.
'LEADER!' Jozzor screamed out in pain and reached out to grab onto Brakagi when all of his motion suddenly froze up. Brakagi turned to see Jozzor like a statue besides him.
'Ahhhhh!' Brakagi cried out in pain and looked through squinted eye.
Suddenly, there were two more people on the battle field.
One was a heavily augmented human male, while the other is a young looking man dressed in formal wear. Surrounding him is an array of various scientific devices.
'Zero.....you are here...?' Rydel pressed himself up from the ground with the help of Zel, as Zero stepped forward.
'I will take care of this.' Zero said, before sending one of the machines forward.
'You think mere machines can stop the power of the artifacts?!' Brakagi reached out and projected his hand forward towards the device and the damned senator.
'No. Artifacts can stop artifacts.' Zero said, as his body glowed up in the distinct glow of the artifacts when the device in front of him is fully activated as a shield bubble deflected away Brakagi's attack. At the same time, another machine made contact with Jozzor and knocked him out right away.
'What...is going on...?' Rydel asked, as he watches on as Zero easily took care of Jozzor and now prepared to face off against Brakagi himself.
'Can you believe it...How far the pseudo-artifacts have come...'
'Wait.....you meant the plot point in the first book?!' Rydel looked on with surprise as Zero strung together attacks with pseudo-artifacts of Mass Projector, Lock Down, Pen of Rearrangement, Shield and Lightning Rod, pressing Brakagi further and further back with his miscellaneous attacks.
As Brakagi was forced back time and time again with lightning blasting throughout his body, he began to approach his physical limit. With him being slammed into the ground once more by pseudo-Mass Projector, he decided that it was finally enough.
There is no more holding back now.
It is now or never. His dream either ends here, or this is where he truly rose above everybody else.
'You have forced my hand here...' Brakagi growled lowly before he ran his finger through the Ring of Instability.
'Artifact Avatar mode...ACTIVATE! BE WITH ME, CHAOS!'