Kunter turned.
Bear was still standing.
Barely.
Blood ran down his arm, his legs trembled, and every breath sounded like it scraped his lungs raw. Any normal fighter would have collapsed long ago. Yet Bear stayed upright, eyes fixed forward, refusing the ground beneath him.
Kunter stepped back once, rotating his hips—perfect posture. A predator lining up a killing kick.
The back kick came like a cannon.
Bear raised his arm.
The impact detonated through his body. Bone screamed. Blood sprayed. The force drove him backward—yet the kick did not land clean.
Bear had blocked it.
His arm bent at an unnatural angle, muscles tearing under the pressure, but it held.
"I…" Bear rasped, voice broken, breath shaking.
"…won't lose… again."
Kunter's eyes narrowed.
He lunged forward, fist already flying.
Bear moved—barely. His body screamed in protest as he twisted aside, the punch grazing his ribs instead of shattering them. The wind of it still sent him staggering.
Something wrapped around Kunter's neck.
"Chiki?"
Arms locked tight, legs hooked in, teeth clenched as he forced every ounce of strength into the choke. His vision blurred, veins screaming as he tightened further.
Kunter didn't panic.
He reached back and grabbed Chiki by the shoulder.
And slammed him.
Once.
Twice.
The third impact cracked the floor.
Chiki's grip broke. His body bounced and rolled, vision fading as pain flooded everything. He barely heard his own breath before darkness crept in.
Kunter turned back—
—to see Bear still standing.
The punch came.
Bear caught it.
His fingers closed around Kunter's arm, muscles screaming as something deep inside him snapped open.
Energy surged.
A concentrated blast erupted from Bear's grip, white-hot and violent, roaring like compressed thunder.
"SE....VER....ANCE....BLAAAASSSTTTT!"
The beam tore through Kunter's arm.
Flesh burned. Bone split. The blast punched straight through, carving a smoking hole where his forearm had been.
Bear collapsed instantly.
His body hit the ground, unconscious, arm still faintly glowing before the light died out.
Silence.
Kunter stared at his ruined arm.
Then he laughed—low, breathless, stunned.
"…If he wasn't injured," he muttered, eyes drifting toward Bear's fallen form,
"He would have given me a good fight too."
Suddenly the ground started trembling.
Lightning cracked the air.
Kunter looked up.
High above, a figure hovered within the storm—barely visible, wrapped in massive arcs of lightning that tore the sky apart with every movement.
The pressure alone was suffocating.
There was a small cry noise in the air.
Kunter's smile thinned.
"…Just how many prodigies do you people have?"
He turned and ran—one arm gone, the other clenched tight—as thunder chased him toward the skybound figure.