"You guys done?" Blaze said, getting ready to assume a battle stance.
"Yeah. We are," Jake said and stepped forward.
"You knocked one of yours out. What kind of strategic advantage would you get from cutting down your numbers?"
"None, really. Paulina! Move!"
And in a second, she grabbed Zack and was gone.
"I see. A sacrifice to save your friends. How noble," Bolt said solemnly.
"Yet so foolish," Long continued, and flew forward faster than a speeding bullet toward them.
Suddenly, she saw something blue approach her faster.
She stopped herself just a second before Jake's fist collided with her face.
That's what she thought at first.
It turned out she didn't stop on time; it was Blaze who stopped Jake's fist for her with his own. He managed to speed ahead and save her life.
"Blaze!"
"Not very sporting of you, sister," Blaze said, his fist still clashing with Jake's. "Get back!" he shouted and focused his attention on Jake.
She jumped back to join her men and was met with a disapproving eye roll from Bolt.
"Oh, don't say a word," she said, her eyes darting anywhere but his direction.
"I wasn't gonna say anything," Bolt said jokingly. "Right now, my attention is on this current battle. Blaze didn't stand a chance against Red Shadow, and I want to know if he does against the blue. Luckily..."
He suddenly grew silent.
"What? What is it, old man?!"
Bolt ignored her and walked forward. He watched the two separate from their clash and assume different battle stances. Jake covered himself in blue energy on a level he hadn't seen even during the Broker fight.
The more it poured out of him, the more he felt his power growing. That's when he realized it was the explosion that powered him up.
His blue energy must have absorbed the kinetic energy from it to charge up his stats. He could feel he was two...
...No, three times stronger than his normal self. How fitting, Bolt's plan to wipe out his friends would be his undoing.
"Do you remember Dao D?" Blaze said, charging his fists with his blue flames.
"Yeah. I..."
"Killed him?" Blaze finished.
Jake was silent.
"No need to be ashamed. Such is the way of battle. He lost so I would win, so I would take his place as head of the Dragon Clan."
"Seems you've got it all planned out," Jake said with a smirk.
"Yes. I have to thank you, really. Without you, this wouldn't be possible. Your team even got rid of my troublesome brother Wyvern. That deserves a lot of praise. Pity your team had to die the way it did."
Jake frowned.
"If you're so grateful, do me a favor and just shut up."
Blaze nodded and got ready for battle.
Jake did the same as his charging was nearly complete.
As he finished charging, however, he felt a sharp pain in his chest. Once he looked down, he saw a hole.
A gigantic one.
"Bolt!" Blaze shouted as Jake fell to the ground, his power leaving him instantly. As the blue energy faded away, his vision did too. It took all of what he had left to keep himself from fainting from the pain.
Blaze ran up to Bolt and pinned him to what remained of a nearby wall. Bolt had morphed his arm into a giant gun but morphed it back after Blaze attacked him.
"Why do you disarm yourself? Ashamed of what you've done?" Blaze asked, holding Bolt by his scrawny neck in an attempt to strangle him.
"Ashamed for saving your life?" Bolt said so calmly one wouldn't know Blaze was trying to kill him.
"Y...you interrupted my battle! This is the man who killed Dao D! This was my chance for vengeance! My right! And you..."
"Saved you! You would've lost, kid. He had some weird yet powerful energy, none like I've seen before. Probably how he defeated your dad. He would've done you even worse."
"Didn't you say you wanted to test me? Where's the test in killing my enemies?"
"A test is something you're capable of passing. I would never put one through a test they can't pass. I'm telling you right now you had no chance of beating him. That's a fact."
Blaze raised his hand in anger, but Bolt merely stared at him. After a few short moments of silence between the two, Blaze let him go.
"Don't ever do that again. My fight is my fight. My loss is my loss. Do you hear me?"
"Of course, kid. I just..."
"Do. You. Hear. Me?"
Bolt nodded with a smile. Even with how disrespectful he was, he could feel the potential in him and was sure to capitalize on it for his mission.
But first...
"What are you doing?" Blaze said as he watched Bolt reform the gun.
" I'm just putting the poor boy out of his misery."
Blaze raised his hand to stop him but put it down soon after. Long sighed and held her brother's shoulder. He looked at his men, and they all gave reassuring nods.
He nodded back.
"Do it."
Jake finally got enough energy to watch what was happening before him. Bolt had his gun ready and was charging up his ammo. He knew the blast was fast enough to hit him before he could react, even though he was three times stronger than before.
It didn't matter.
In this strategy, he had no chance of survival.
But suddenly it all changed.
Bolt turned his hand back to normal and turned to view something coming at him. Blaze, Long, and the men turned as well but saw nothing.
Bolt then took a step forward and reached out his hand faster than anyone around could see. Then he pounced on something with a speed even faster than that.
That's when she appeared.
Ivy.
Bolt held Ivy's face in his hands as she slowly made herself visible. She managed to make herself undetectable to the naked eye and even Bolt's scanners, something that piqued his interest.
"Hmm, you're an interesting one. Is this your girl or something?" Bolt asked Jake as he slowly realized what was happening.
"She was able to avoid my sensors like nothing. The only thing that allowed me to sense her were my superior senses. It's been a while since I've relied on my own instincts. Seems she's some kind of shadow user, interesting. I'd love to study her, but with powers like those, she's too risky to keep alive."
Jake let out a sound.
He wanted to scream at him, to beg him not to do what he knew he was about to do. All he let out was an awkward gurgle of blood.
He reached out to say something.
Do something.
But he couldn't.
Bolt's free hand turned into the gun, and in an instant, Ivy was no more.
Reduced to a pile of dust.
Jake couldn't even hear her scream.
He couldn't even hear her last words.
Or her last thoughts.
He couldn't have his talk with her.
Clear the air.
Explain his trauma.
And he would never see her again.
All because he was too weak.
Not anymore.
Suddenly, a blue glowing pillar erupted around him.
Jake rose to his feet. His wound slowly started patching itself up. The light emanating from his body was so bright, so powerful, Blaze and his army could barely see him standing before them.
He didn't know where this power came from; maybe the power he gained from the explosion never left, maybe it was all the saved up kinetic energy he never used.
He didn't care.
All that mattered was vengeance.
For his friends...
For the kids...
For Ivy.
The only one who got a grasp of the situation was Bolt. And he saw the figure forming this pillar slowly walk towards him, his body a dark blue with shining blue horns and markings all over it.
He had never seen anything like him before.
Truly a specimen beyond his wildest imagination.
And it was his to kill.
Jake lunged at the man with a ferocity never shown before, fully intent on ripping him apart. If his target was Blaze or his army, they'd have been dead before they even realized.
But it wasn't.
This was Dr. Cornelius Bolt.
And all this was just child's play to him.
He dodged Jake's attack and reformed his gun. Not the first one he used to incapacitate him and kill Ivy, no, this gun was a plasma rifle so powerful it disintegrated all forms of matter. The only one capable of surviving a shot from it was Canman.
Jake was not Canman.
Once he fired, the battle was over.
Jake could barely react to the first shot, and lost his arm because of it.
He couldn't even register the second one cutting through his neck.
And in seconds, the blue light dissipated.
The markings faded to nothingness.
His horns turned back to normal.
The light in his eyes was gone.
It was over.
Jake was dead.
And he couldn't even land a single hit on the bastard.
Bolt stood over Jake's corpse for a brief moment. Blaze and the others approached him and praised his efforts. Despite his old and frail-looking appearance, he was truly a force to be reckoned with.
"Holy shit, old man! That was insane!" Blaze said, grabbing him by the shoulder and pulling him for a hug.
"Yeah, I thought I was gonna die," Long continued.
"Yes, I must admit, he was a fearsome adversary once he got his second wind. Killing that friend of his must've rejuvenated him to an insane degree. This is the first time I've seen someone, not named Canman of course, heal from one of my blasts. This kid would've been in a league of his own given time."
"Well, I'm glad we don't have to deal with him anymore, although I do wish I got to strike the finishing blow."
Bolt professed.
"Something the matter, old-timer?"
"Oh, nothing, nothing. Now let's go find the others..."
"Uh... guys..." Long said, her voice shaking.
"What...?" Blaze said and looked to where Long was pointing.
Then his jaw dropped.
He was still standing.
But different.
This time, everything that was a bright sea blue turned to a dark ink-like color. As if his body had been consumed by some sort of darkness.
Bolt reformed his gun.
"Hey now! Don't shoot!" he shouted, raising his arms as a form of surrender. His voice was different, deeper. Even though his intention wasn't to be more threatening, his voice did a bad job helping him.
"The way you speak... it's not... what is this?" Bolt said, still pointing the gun at him.
"Yeah, it's not how he talks. That's cuz I'm not him. I'm the Abyss. A combination of Blue Shadow's soul and a part of Umbra's..."
"Umbra?! The God of Shadows?!" Bolt shouted and straightened his gun.
"Umbra? Dao D told us about him. The false God the fools of the Lost Light used to worship?" Blaze asked.
"Hey now! Relax with that. I'm not your enemy here. Honestly, I was hoping you'd kill that fool. Gave me a chance to escape. Well, I didn't really know killing him would free me. There was a chance I'd die too."
"So you put it to fate and got lucky?" Long asked.
"Yeah, I guess you can say that."
"Doesn't matter. Give me one good reason I shouldn't blow you to bits right now," Bolt asked, still pointing his gun at him.
Abyss looked at Bolt for a few long seconds and extended his hand towards the pile of dust that used to be Ivy.
"What are you..."
Abyss silenced them with a look.
"Rise," he said, his voice cold and emotionless.
In an instant, Ivy's emerged from the pile of dust.
Well, almost.
The shadow suit that she wore, obtained from the fusing of her body with the hammer she stole from the Bishop of the Lost Light, had returned, but her main body seemingly didn't.
Abyss didn't care.
He got what he wanted.
A partner.
"You haven't answered my question, you... thing," Bolt said, his gun still pointed at him.
"Well, you see, my agenda is completely unrelated to you or this world, so you lose nothing by attacking me. You gain nothing by attacking me too. Well, now that I think about it, that isn't correct."
"What?" Bolt said, his head tilted in confusion.
"You'd gain a pile of corpses," Abyss said, covering himself and the surrounding area in a cloud of blue smoke and disappearing right after.
Once the smoke cleared, Abyss was gone.
So was Ivy...
"He's gone?" Blaze said nervously in spite of himself.
"Seems so. Whatever this agenda of his is, I have a bad feeling..." Long said.
"That it'll affect us? I wouldn't worry about that anytime soon," Blaze said with an annoying level of confidence.
"Still, a force like that... roaming the world..." Long felt uneasy at the thought.
"Will be putty in our hands soon enough. Best not to worry about it and focus. My daughter isn't too far away based on my scans. You'll catch up to her in no time..."
"Well then, let's begin," Blaze said, getting ready to chase the others down.
To be continued...