*
Without a word, we started fighting. None of that guilt or performative acting like the first time we met. We wanted to kill each other, we didn't have to do it for any particular reason. It was a war, strictly business, no place for personal feelings. We merely stood in each other's way, nothing else to it... Right? Eterna.
My greaves and boots shone a cold black gleam, no doubt meant to destroy flesh and bones. My gloves stretch around my palms like smooth silk, reflecting light at different angles as I tested my grip. My magical girl identity seems to always be facing a crisis. Am I a close combat specialist? Or a long range attacker? At this point my skill served both functions, there isn't much of a comparison. I just prefer to get up close and personal where I can see her face.
I bring my fists up, the first punch is easy to see through. Eterna prefers to finish the fight quick, so she aims for the head. An A grade can survive decapitation a couple times, beyond that and even the soul would need eradication to make sure someone stays dead. Truthfully if there were methods to revive someone, like the sentinel array used on me, there was no real way to keep someone dead unless they made the whole world forget they exists. Perhaps what Eterna was trying to do here, preventing my birth, did serve that exact function.
There's no way back, might as well win. My arm shatters from the attack, but it gave me room to shift my head away. In quick succession, Eterna had already thrown her other arm before the first on hit. I raise my other arm, and ended up getting it shattered too. The bones couldn't withstand the force and snapped like biscuits, the flesh around the wrists explode into insignificant chunks as half my forearms vanished. No doubt, she's stronger than me.
No matter how much I assimilate her data, it doesn't feel like I'll catch up. How does one finite number catch up to infinity? Even if it could keep growing larger... She can keep growing stronger, faster, harder. The gap would never shrink. I take half a step back before a foot was planted firmly into my abdomen. With a quick flex, her kick smashes me through the hospital walls. No one seems to notice, people went on with their lives as per normal. No one can see us. No one can interfere, I am on my own as usual...
Now that I'm in the past, the sentinel array isn't connected to me. I might remain dead this time. Naturally, I refuse to accept it. Before I noticed, a large impact struck my flesh and my head was blown up... {Envy} will not work here, assimilation will not close the gap between a mortal and a deity. I chose this path, this was the only way to move forward. She easily destroys my flesh faster than I can regenerate. No immortality will work when every cell was annihilated and the soul is punctured like a balloon.
End of the line, head destroyed, limbs ruptured. She knew I could never beat her, and I knew I could never beat her. You see, if I came here to die... If I didn't have to resolve the rebel against destiny in the first place, I would never have arrived here, chasing after an unidentified light house. I can't expect that light house to save me, after all it could also have been a trap set by Eterna. Because here, I can die. There's no salvaging the situation, this is as worse as it gets.
I won't assimilate. {Envy}, grant me a new possibility. The sentinel array keeping me alive depended on inverted laws and a connection to the mirror. There's no such connection now, nothing for me to assimilate. The only way forward is on a different branch.
The head, hair, limbs, everything grows back... At a different location. I must surpass infinity, so I offer up everything to {Envy}. I assimilate my own body and recreate in multiple different locations. I will defy death in a different way. Rushing in with multiple copies. Continuation? Cloning? I don't know. My conscious switched instantaneously, whether I am the original Lastia doesn't matter. All that matters is killing her. They assimilate her data and attempt to close the gap, but she simply grows stronger.
Eterna plunges her foot into one of the clones, splitting apart their lungs and bursting her heart. Her arms grab onto the incoming great sword with bare palms, and swings it at another clone, causing their bones to collide. With one leap, she tears all of their heads of. Another clone jumps in, then another. Soon the sky is filled with countless copies. She can tear the heavens in half with her might, but the other half will strike at her.
Finally, one of them from the horde lands a hit. Her blade pierces bare skin, barely a milimetre in, she might not have even felt it. However, it was hope. Hope that burned passionately in all of my hearts. Countless heartbeats, numerous mindscapes communicate to one another. A network surpassing the computation of the Yggdrasil of old.
"Something... This pointless. You will stall me for eternity? At the end of time, you will lose your mortal mind first!" (Eterna)
"I will defy fate at the cost of everything, even if all I can do is stall. Giselle gave this universe hope by stalling without an end in sight. If I can do the same, I can face with my head held high." (Lastia)
"You bastardddd!!!!" (Eterna)
One after the other, great swords plunged into her like missiles, ravaging the earth's atmosphere like a fresh wound across the blue star. Large expanses of air devoid of clouds split over its surface. The swords all shatter at once, and a wide ranging annihilation magic spreads forth, turning all the clones to ash.
New clones from space rush down towards the light of destruction. If possible, I don't want the residential zone of 2A's past to be destroyed. So I push in with all of my might, assimilating the energy contained within. One clone will burn into ashes, but countless will absorb the blast like a sponge. More and more clones appear, like an endless sea. Gradually, the dome of light starts to dim. It only stretched as far as the hospital's roof top. With assimilation, the next clone will always be stronger.
She grabs the incoming sword with bare hands, smashing the other into the clones skull with practiced ease. Eterna herself was also getting more used to killing me.