A thunderous explosion ripped through the forest, so strong it sent entire flocks of native birds scattering in panic, cutting across the sky in waves of black wings. The air vibrated with the impact, and a colossal tree was sliced into perfect rings, as if an invisible knife were cutting sausages. Silver threads hissed through the air, alive, slithering straight toward their target.
Me.
Only a few hours had passed since I'd enjoyed a hearty lunch, and now I was fighting not to become dinner for two competitors.
My body crackled with electrical discharges, lightning bursting from my skin as I moved at a breakneck speed. Every step was a snap, every dodge ripped the ground apart, every breath kept me hanging by a thread from death.
"Damned slippery worm… stop dodging and fight like a warrior!" a deep, angry voice roared from within the smoke.
"Look who's talking, fighting two-on-one!" I shouted back, teeth clenched as I vaulted over another rain of threads trying to slice me into pieces.
The air reeked of ozone and burning iron, and with every heartbeat, I felt the world closing in tighter.
The battlefield was a dense stretch of rainforest—thick roots, vines, colossal trees. The heavy vegetation hampered movement and vision alike, and that, in a way, favored me. Wagner and Moura together were monsters of synchronization and strength — but here, in the chaos of the jungle, they couldn't enforce the brutal combat rhythm they wanted.
I, on the other hand, remembered Norwenna's words. 'They'll come prepared for your electricity.'
And they had. Deep down, I'd hoped they wouldn't, that they'd underestimate me.
Both were seasoned warriors. Reinforced armor, runes etched to disperse or channel electricity, and disciplined movements. They didn't just fight like warriors — they cast spells in every gap between strikes.
The worst kind of enemy: Overlords.
Wagner manipulated copper wires as if they were murderous serpents. The silvery metal tore through the air, snapped against vegetation, and shredded trees like paper. It was grotesque.
And yet, the strangest thing was the inconsistency: the bastard's affinity was water. Water. How in hell was a water-user controlling metal with such mastery?
Moura, meanwhile, was another kind of nightmare. A living wall, nearly two meters thirty tall, charging with a double-bladed axe that burst into flames with every swing. Each strike made the ground quake, every spin carved flaming craters, and the trees that survived became incandescent shrapnel. Heat built up, the air grew heavy, and with every move of his, the forest seemed ready to collapse into ashes.
And I was in the middle of it.
Before I could breathe, Moura was on me. A monster of flesh and steel, charging with absurd speed for his size, his flaming axe in a rising arc aimed at my torso and head.
Slow. I dodged naturally, pulling back several meters.
His boots crushed the ground with the force of a siege engine, and a wave of fire exploded from his feet, sweeping across the soil in a blazing tongue that tried to swallow my legs.
My body reacted instinctively — electricity detonating through my muscles — I evaded the main strike and retaliated in kind. My feet slammed into the ground and a gravitational shockwave reverberated outward like a subterranean thunderclap, dissipating Moura's wave of flames and blasting him back.
The giant staggered, off balance for a split second. And that fraction was all I needed.
I lunged forward, so close the heat of his body seemed to ignite the air. My hands came together in a dry, powerful clap.
"TAP"
"BOOOOOOOOOOOOOM"
The shockwave reverberated as if space itself had bent.
The gravitational blast catapulted him deep into the forest, spinning through the air with no control over his own body. The giant plowed through trees as if they were brittle stakes, trunks bursting into splinters, roots tearing free, until the impact swallowed him in a cloud of dust and twisted wood.
But I had no time to relax.
The copper wires were already upon me. They had coiled around like silver serpents, sliding through the air with deadly precision, each loop closing in, ready to snare my neck and shred me to pieces.
In the final instant, before the world became wire and blood, I opened a spatial rift right beneath my feet.
I slipped into it, as if diving into a liquid abyss.
A second later, the space behind me was obliterated. The wires clashed and shredded the spot where I'd been, reducing trees, stones, even the very air into metallic dust.
I reappeared two meters ahead, emerging from the void with my body already in motion, not missing a beat. The sound of the rift snapping shut cracked behind me, muffled by my advance.
This time, my target was Wagner.
Five electric orbs flared to life at my back, floating like furious suns. Each one crackled blue, saturated with energy compressed so tightly it warped the air around them.
And then, the barrage began.
But not at Wagner.
The overcharged bolts tore into the environment — trees, ground, leaves, branches, everything within reach of the storm. Each discharge ignited the forest, exploded roots, vaporized vines. The terrain became a hell of fire and smoke, forcing Wagner to fight in a collapsing environment he couldn't control.
Since they had come prepared for this, I had to change strategy and torment them with what the forest itself had to offer.
Before I could close in, Wagner raised a brutal defense. An orb of water, dense as liquid steel, enveloped his whole body, and the storm of lightning I unleashed crumbled against that translucent wall, exploding in waves of vapor. The impact shook the air, like thunder crushed under pressure.
And he didn't stop there.
His wires came alive again, lashing out like starving serpents, every crack splitting the air in my direction. But my electric orbs reacted like hunting dogs, intercepting each strike, shocking the metal with reverberating blasts that deflected the wires.
Behind me, the forest exploded.
The blast made me snap my eyes aside just as Moura erupted from the smoke, no longer walking but floating above the ground. The giant surged toward me with his body ablaze: axe in flames, legs wrapped in fire, each suspended step igniting the space around him.
A warrior demon spat straight from hell.
My body vibrated in response, and I pushed my speed higher. I cut through space like living lightning and finally closed in on Wagner. He didn't back down. On the contrary, he retaliated with a deadly barrage.
Hundreds of pressurized water spears burst from the orb protecting him. Each one whistled through the air with a sharp, deafening sound that mingled with the crackle of my lightning. Wherever they passed, the spears sliced like razors, cleaving trees, piercing rocks, destroying everything.
Before they could tear me apart, I opened a rift and dove into it, the world unraveling behind me.
I emerged at his back.
He was ready.
The wires were already flying, coiling around a tree and yanking him away in a whip-fast motion. A flawless reflex — but useless against the weight I unleashed upon him.
A hundred times gravity detonated in the space around him.
His once-agile body dragged in slow motion, muscles forced under an impossible burden. And then, at the peak of his helplessness, I clapped my hands with violence.
The gravitational wave slammed him.
Wagner's body was hurled to the ground like a meteor, dragging the air with it, and when he struck, the whole forest quaked. The impact carved a monstrous crater, dirt and stones flying in every direction, trees toppling like toys.
And at the center of the chaos, Wagner stood back up.
Nothing but a few dirt marks on his face.
His eyes, though, burned with almost tangible hatred.
"Seriously…" he spat blood, voice heavy with restrained rage. "This guy's like a cockroach. Why don't you just lose already, you bastard?!"
A crooked smile escaped me, involuntary, just to stoke the fury already consuming the pair.
And it worked.
Both of them were biting the bait. Falling into my traps exactly as I'd imagined. I knew, and Norwenna had already warned me, my gravitational attacks weren't devastating — only irritating. And here was the proof: Wagner and Moura charged like maddened beasts, ignoring the impacts they had taken, only growing angrier by the second.
'Come on, little rats. The trap awaits.'
Moura, at last, abandoned all restraint. The flames on his body erupted in violent waves as he hurled himself after me. I floated, toying with gravity, while the giant incinerated everything around him to try to reach me. He wasn't as fast as I was, but fast enough to be a threat.
His double-bladed axe was gone — fire had swallowed it completely, turning it into a colossal weapon nearly four meters long, pure combustion. A thunderous strike came crashing toward me.
My eyes gleamed.
Gravity bent around me, and I slid out of the deadly path. At the same time, the five orbs at my back flared in fury, launching electric lances against the flaming weapon.
"BOOOOOOOOM!"
The clash was brutal. The collision of fire and lightning scorched the air, ripped branches from nearby trees, and hurled us in opposite directions.
Before I even touched the ground, a dense presence erupted at my side.
Wagner.
This time he didn't come from afar. No wires hunting, no cautious maneuvers. His body was wrapped in silver cables, coiled like artificial muscles around his arms.
And the strike came.
A punch. Simple. Fast. Direct.
The impact exploded against my chest, so brutal my electric layer shattered like thin glass. Air fled my lungs instantly. I was hurled through the vegetation like a stone flung by a catapult, breaking branches, tearing trunks, until I smashed against a colossal tree that groaned with the impact before splitting apart.
I fell to my knees, the metallic taste of blood burning my throat.
But there was no time.
The two of them were already there, surging in fury, synchronized strikes, frantic, ravenous for my fall.
"It's time…" I muttered, a smile twisting my blood-stained face.
Moura roared, his flaming axe launched from his hands with the force of a cannon, spinning through the air to impale me against the tree. I didn't move. I only raised my palm.
And space opened.
The colossal blade vanished into the rift and reappeared a heartbeat later — not in front of me, but to Wagner's right.
The poor bastard didn't even have time to react.
The axe slammed into him from the side, the flaming blade tearing his armor as if it were paper, splitting bone and muscle in a grotesque slash. His body was hurled like a doll, crashing through trees until it smashed into the ground with violence.
Silence lasted for a second.
Then Wagner spat. A thick gush of scarlet blood painted the ground beneath him. His eyes, wide with pain and disbelief, stared at me.
"What… the fuck was that?!"