Pathro cracked his knuckles as he glared intensely in the direction of the closest Zunan. Though it was still far beyond his range of sight, he didn't need to see it to know its location.
"This energy... it's got quite a bit of Meta-Energy. Less than my own, but still substantial. And there are about thirty of them now, spread across the planet." He noted their movements with narrowed eyes. The Zunans seemed to be acting without any awareness of him. "Can they not sense me? I'm not exactly masking my energy, but none of them appear to be heading in my direction."
He walked to the pointed end of an ice projection, his boots crunching against the frozen surface. "No, wait... maybe it's because they aren't even looking for me to begin with. There are two ways to sense energy, after all. Either you actively choose to search for other presences, or the other presence releases a burst of its energy. So if I want them to notice me, I must make my presence more known." He paused, weighing the thought. "But I shouldn't do that. I'm not quite sure I can take them all at once."
He let out a smoky sigh and clenched his fist, veins rising along his forearm. "I need to gauge exactly how strong they are on average. Based on what we've learned, amount of energy doesn't equate to output."
He dropped into a runner's stance, his fingertips barely brushing the ground.
Then he launched forward at top speed, the force of his acceleration cracking the ice beneath him and shattering every frozen projection in the immediate area.
"My speed has been quite limited under all this gravity, but I suppose I shouldn't worry much. It's the same for all of them."
Through the snowy fog ahead, the silhouette of the Zunan materialized. Pathro charged his fist, ready to strike, but the creature's red and yellow eyes locked onto him with an unnatural glare.
'Shit.'
A black and red sphere of energy raced toward him. He crossed his arms in a blocking formation just as the blast connected and detonated.
The explosion echoed like a calamity, hurling earth and snow apart and carving a massive crater into the landscape, sixty kilometers wide and ten kilometers deep.
Smoke blanketed the devastation. Scorch marks scarred the exposed bedrock, still radiating heat. At the center of it all stood Pathro, drawing a series of deep breaths. He examined his hands where the blast had struck. Only minor bruises.
His eyes swept across the enormous crater, and he winced.
"That's insane. This crater... that thing could erase Tokyo off the map. Literally. Fighting these creatures on Earth would be catastrophic."
He spat to the ground and wiped his face, correcting his posture. 'Is this why the Flaming Being created the law to forcefully manifest these Zunans in the Primevault realm? Based on what I learned, they were originally manifesting directly on Earth. I have to give him credit for that, I suppose.' He clenched his fists again. 'But that blast only stung at best. Was that its normal output, or its maximum? No... it didn't seem to concentrate that hard to produce it. So that was its normal output. Maybe its maximum could delete an entire country.'
He steadied his breathing. 'I can do this.'
A sensation shot through his head like lightning. The Zunan was charging at top speed, its sickle-like claws slicing toward him. Pathro dropped low, letting the slash swing harmlessly above him. While crouched, he gripped his right fist with his left hand and drove his right elbow into the Zunan's abdomen, the left hand adding extra force to the blow.
The Zunan was hurled backward several meters before it drove its claws into the ground to slow itself, carving deep furrows into the rock.
Now Pathro could finally get a good look at his opponent.
It stood two meters tall, its body slender and encased in a tough outer coating with a slick, shiny surface. The armor was a deep, dark, pale green, covering all sections except the joints, where red fibrous muscles were exposed to allow movement. Its lower canines protruded out of its mouth like jagged tusks. Its eyes were circular and white, featureless except for the piercing yellow at their centers. From its head sprouted spiky, dark blue hair. And its fingers tapered into single jagged claws, shaped to emphasize their ruthlessness in killing.
'I see. Based on its appearance, it's definitely a Rokude species of Zunan. I've seen them in the books, but... seeing one now really drives home how real they are. And it's pretty sturdy, too.'
The Zunan let out a howl, a haunted squeak that echoed across the devastated landscape. Pathro shielded his eyes with his hand as debris and dust blew toward him from the force of the cry.
'Not only that, but it's also quite fast despite the gravity here. Even though Rokude are considered low level among Zunans, the books didn't exaggerate. They could still wipe out humanity, and Earth is absolutely the worst possible battlefield. Which is why we're supposed to kill Zunans in the Primevault before they get the chance to reach Earth. Interesting.'
He settled into his karate stance, bracing himself for combat. The Zunan charged up another blast in its mouth, energy condensing into a sphere of black and red. But Pathro moved faster. In an instant, he appeared directly before the creature and drove an uppercut into its chin, snapping its head upward and cracking the tough skin beneath its jaw. The charged blast shot harmlessly into the sky.
Pathro released his crimson aura and leaped with immense force, the ground splintering beneath him. He caught up to the Zunan in midair. Clasping both hands together, he swung downward and slammed into its abdomen, sending the creature rocketing back to the ground. It crashed into a mountain with a thunderous impact, obliterating the peak and devastating the landscape below. The sound of the collision was matched moments later by the explosion of the Zunan's errant blast, which detonated high above, its shockwave clearing the clouds over a vast area.
The Zunan screeched in agony. The skin on its abdomen had shattered, and blue blood was already spilling from the wound.
Pathro, now beginning his descent as gravity pulled him back down, angled himself headfirst toward the ground. He drew his arms back, preparing a punch, and used his own energy to accelerate himself even further, faster than lightning.
A second impact thundered across the wasteland. The shockwave crumbled the terrain even further, sending fresh fissures racing outward.
As the dust settled, Pathro rose from a one-kneed position, his fist planted against the ground. He exhaled heavily and looked down at his hand, drenched in blue blood that dripped steadily onto the broken earth.
'I actually did it.' He stared at the lifeless body of the Zunan, its head completely crushed. 'I killed my first Zunan.'
But his celebration was cut short.
Multiple presences closed in around him, each one a knot of ominous energy thick with bloodlust. He had been surrounded by Rokude Zunans.
'Damn it. I must have alerted them during the fight with the first one. Way to go, Pathro.'
Yet a smirk crept across his face. He cracked his neck and spoke aloud. "Hey. Watching your buddy eat dirt didn't inspire any fear? I suppose you really are just killing machines."
He settled into his battle stance, his eyes sweeping across the encroaching creatures. "Now that I know how strong you are, there's no need to pull my punches." He straightened his hands into rigid blades and released his aura, crimson energy flaring around him as he charged himself up. "Try to last a little longer."
One Rokude opened its maw, condensing energy for a blast. Pathro closed the distance in an instant and swung a chop across its neck, beheading it cleanly. Blue blood gasped from the severed stump, showering him as the corpse crumpled to the ground.
'If I rely on punches, their sturdy skin forces me to exert more force for lethal damage. But chops increase the pressure of my strikes. Their blasts, too, I can tank them, but they're annoying. They keep stripping my footing. Killing them before they can fire would be ideal.'
Three Zunans rushed him simultaneously. He sidestepped the first by the narrowest margin, seized its outstretched arm, and swung the creature like a flail, slamming it into the second Rokude and sending both tumbling across the broken earth.
The third came from behind, claws slicing toward his back. Pathro bent forward, the slash passing harmlessly overhead, and in the same motion propelled his leg into a spring kick that connected with the Zunan's ribs. The skin cracked with a sound like a small detonation, and the creature was hurled backward by the force.
Then Pathro's eyes went wide. The Zunans that had held back were charging their blasts, energy condensing well beyond normal output.
'Damn. I gave them time to charge up. If all those hit me at once, they could pack a decent punch.'
One by one, the Zunans fired. Pathro wove between the blasts, dodging each one while ensuring none were aimed at the ground where they could destabilize the terrain. He closed in on one Rokude, ducked beneath its slashing claws, and grabbed its arm, twisting it violently. From the corner of his eye, he saw another blast already racing toward him. He hurled the Zunan into its path and braced for impact.
A cosmic boom erupted, repelling everything in its radius. The sky lit up as though the sun had briefly manifested on the planet's surface. The sound followed an instant later, a thunderous roar that carved another massive crater into the world, deeper and wider than the first.
Pathro landed and scanned the devastation. The Zunan that had taken the direct hit was still standing. Its skin had cracked across its entire body, but it remained intact. It remained alive.
'It survived that? That blast carried more energy than the one that barely bruised me earlier. Is it because the Zunans share the same energy type? No... these things are just that durable. Tough enough to survive their own attack. An attack that could wipe several cities off the map.'
He sensed the Zunans that had been scattered by the explosion already regrouping, already closing in once more.
"Oh well. Playtime's over." His hands began to glow, turning red like superheated metal, sparks crackling around his fists. "Time for my own display of firepower."
As the Rokude converged on him from all directions, he aimed not at them but at the ground beneath his feet. He punched downward.
And just before the Zunans reached him, he smirked.
'Try to survive this, you damned Rokude. I call it... Devourer's Fist. You're welcome.'
This planet, twice Earth's radius, cloaked in dense clouds and adorned with a ring like Saturn's, had already been scarred by the craters of their battle. From an aerial view, those wounds had appeared as little more than small indentations on the surface.
What followed was a glow so immense that half the planet's cloud cover vanished in an instant. The explosion roared through the cosmos, devouring the world beneath it. The blast distorted the ring around the planet, sending powerful shockwaves rippling through its structure. It was a cataclysm.
Space itself seemed to warp around the epicenter as the detonation raged on. The planet shook violently, triggering collapses of every natural formation across its surface.
When the light finally died, a cosmic wound remained. As though something had taken a massive bite out of an apple. Thirty percent of the planet was simply gone.
The frozen landscape was now little more than a rumor. No trace of it remained anywhere on the scarred world.
This was the power of the strongest Japanese cadet: Pathro Kitsimoyo.
He stood at the center of the planet's wound, surrounded by a hellscape of glowing red rock and pouring magma. He looked around, taking in the devastation with a long, slow exhale.
"Damn. I might have overdone it."
His eyes struggled to fathom the full scale of the destruction he had just laid upon the planet.
"Is this what Instructor Kamir meant when she said the test would be too easy for me and Kiligaku?" He walked across the chasm carved into the world, trying to grasp the magnitude of what he had done. "These Rokude are quite powerful, but almost everyone in our class is significantly stronger than one. Still, if they were to face four or five at once, that would prove challenging."
He continued across the scarred terrain, his thoughts drifting. 'Devourer's Fist... or should I call it Devouring Fist? I haven't really settled on a name yet. Explosive Fist sounds too lame, even though it accurately describes what it does.'
He stopped at a place where magma bubbled up from the ground, watching it with quiet curiosity.
'Meta-Energy is transformed into potential explosive energy across my fists, turning my hands red like heated iron. And upon strong collision with something, in this case the ground I punched, that energy detonates. Looks like my output was far beyond these Rokude's. Kiligaku and the others should be higher as well.'
He stood there waiting. A few seconds passed.
'Wait. Why am I not being teleported back? They said they were watching. I assumed they would know I completed the test.'
Just then, a portal manifested in the sky above him, lying horizontal against the grey expanse. He stared at it, brow furrowing.
'Why is it so high up if it's meant to get me out of here?'
And then he felt it.
Unlike the energy of the other Zunans, this one was pitch black in its presence. A sense of dread filled him, cold and absolute. At the same moment, Instructor Kamir's words from the Incenero planet resurfaced in his mind.
'The test was never meant for you to pass with flying colors.'
He saw its silhouette as it dropped from the portal and slammed into the ground, a shockwave of dust and debris erupting outward from the impact.
'What Zunan is that? Its presence is so ominous. So intense. And this amount of Meta-Energy I'm sensing... it's greater than my own?!'
The dust began to settle. Through the rubble, the silhouette took shape. A single, massive eye upon its head glowed with baleful light as it gazed directly upon him.