The screech of two hundred tons of sliding reinforced steel was not just a sound; it was a physical force that vibrated through the concrete platform and rattled the teeth in Eric's jaw.
Down on the dark tracks, Bishop Eric stared into the blinding double high-beams of the approaching cargo train. The emergency magnetic brakes were throwing off rooster-tails of white-hot sparks against the dead rails, but the sheer momentum of two hundred tons of industrial freight moving at terminal velocity didn't care about a short-circuited power grid.
It was sliding straight toward him at sixty miles per hour.
"Insolent... low-tier... worm!" Eric roared, his cultured prelate composure vanishing completely into a scream of raw, panicked rage.
Driven by pure survival instinct, Eric didn't bother trying to repair his fried internal interface. He bit down through his own tongue, using the sudden spike of bio-chemical adrenaline to forcibly override his burned-out battery pack.
[Warning: Emergency Power Bypass Active]
[System Strain: 180% — Critical Core Overheat Imminent]
A violent, jagged burst of purple spatial energy erupted from Eric's smoking midnight-blue coat. It wasn't the clean, precise gravity sphere he usually favored; it was a desperate, uncalibrated shockwave of raw kinetic pressure.
BOOM!
The purple shockwave slammed into the dirt beneath his boots, detonating like a subterranean landmine. The recoil launched Eric backward and upward, throwing his body out of the train's kill-path just a fraction of a second before the massive steel nose of the lead engine thundered through the exact coordinate he had been standing on.
The cargo train slid past the platform with a deafening, metallic roar, the wind displacement tearing through the pass and whipping Itachi's black tunic against his frame.
Eric slammed hard onto the gravel embankment forty yards away, rolling three times before crashing into the base of a rusted signal tower. His midnight-blue coat was shredded, his expensive silk collar torn and caked in black grease, and his silver-framed monocle lay crushed beneath his left knee.
He pushed himself up to one knee, coughing up a spatter of dark, blood-laced fluid. The five glowing crystal nodes along his spine were flickering erratically, casting sickly, irregular green shadows across his bruised face.
[Target Status: Bishop Eric (Level 36)]
[Condition: Severe Internal Data Shock / Structural Core Integrity: 38%]
[Movement Speed: Reduced by 64%]
"You... you leveraged... a corporate freight train..." Eric rasped, his eyes wide, bloodshot, and fixed on the elevated concrete edge above. "You sacrificed the sector's supply line... just to force a position..."
Up on the clean, elevated platform, Itachi didn't move. He stood with his carbon-steel rod resting loosely at his side, his golden eyes scanning the battered prelate with the cold, unbothered detachment of a master reviewing an entry-level puzzle.
"A sacrifice implies a loss of material," Itachi deadpanned, his voice cutting through the dying hiss of the train's cooling brakes. "I lost nothing. The train stopped where I calculated it would stop. The sector supply line is delayed by four minutes. You, however, have expended eighty percent of your internal reserve and lost your positional advantage."
He stepped off the platform, landing in the dirt with a soft, barely audible tap.
"You are playing with borrowed time, Eric," Itachi continued, taking a slow, measured step forward. "And your interest rate just went up."
Eric's jaw clenched so hard a muscle twitched violently under his skin. He reached into his shredded coat, his trembling, blood-stained fingers closing around a small, ivory-and-gold cylinder—a Tier-3 Board Re-calibration Syringe.
"I am a Bishop of the Upper Orthodoxy!" Eric snarled, driving the pneumatic needle straight into his own neck. "I do not lose to a Pawn!"
HISSSS.
A glowing, translucent blue liquid flooded his bio-network. The four flickering crystal nodes along his spine suddenly flared with an unnatural, blinding violet glare, forcing his broken posture straight as forced neural stimulation flooded his muscles.
[Alert: Target Initiating Unstable System Overclock]
[Target Power Output: Temporarily Doubled]
[Warning: Core Collapse Imminent in 60 Seconds]
"I will tear your core out with my bare hands!" Eric shrieked, the air around him distorting as a massive, unstable gravity field began to expand violently outward from his frame, shattering the gravel beneath his feet into fine powder.
Itachi stopped ten paces away. He didn't raise his rod. He didn't activate a defensive skill. He simply adjusted his cuffs, his golden eyes reflecting the frantic, blinding violet glare of the dying Bishop.
"You have sixty seconds of operational life remaining," Itachi noted smoothly. "I believe that is called a forced endgame."