The vacuum of the upper atmosphere was silent, but the tension was loud enough to crack the stars. Yoru floated with her arms crossed, a mocking, lazy smirk playing on her lips.
"Come on," she said, her voice echoing through the void via pure mana vibration. "Don't be shy. Do you want to attack me first? I'll even give you a head start."
Gudmaro let out a sound like grinding metal. His Second Form muscles bulged, pulsing with a dark, rhythmic light. "You think because you were once 'stronger then me' that you can treat me like this? I am the peak of evolution, woman! TAKE THIS!"
He ignited his thrusters, becoming a blur of obsidian and red light as he charged at her.
Yoru didn't even blink. As Gudmaro's fist came inches from her nose, she tilted her head a fraction of a millimeter. WHOOSH. The force of his miss tore a hole in the clouds below. Before he could recover, Yoru's leg snapped up like a whip.
CRACK!
Her heel connected with his jaw, followed instantly by a brutal kick into his stomach. Gudmaro, the "galaxy eraser," was sent hurtling downward, screaming as he slammed into the earth, creating a crater that shook the tectonic plates.
"You..." Gudmaro snarled, flying back up instantly, his face regenerating in a mess of gore and wires. "How?! How are you doing this?!"
Driven by pure rage, Gudmaro unleashed a frantic barrage. He began punching and kicking Yoru with everything he had. To any observer, Yoru looked like a punching bag, her body being knocked left and right by blows that could shatter moons.
But Yoru didn't move her hands to block. She just let the hits land.
"Is that it?" she asked calmly amidst the storm of fists. "I really thought the 'End of the Multiverse' would have a bit more... kick. Do you have anything more than this?"
"CURSE YOU!" Gudmaro screamed. He grabbed her by her long hair and swung her with enough centrifugal force to throw her back onto the ground. As she hit the dirt, he didn't stop. He hovered in the sky, opening every vent in his body to launch a Massive Energy Attack.
BOOOM!
The explosion turned the battlefield into a sea of white fire. Gudmaro panted, his cooling fans whirring at maximum speed.
As the smoke cleared, Yoru was standing in the center of the flames. Her clothes were slightly singed, but her skin was glowing with a vibrant, golden warmth. She stretched her neck, a satisfied look on her face.
"Thanks for that," she said, looking up at him. "Looks like my blood is finally flowing faster. That last blast really got the circulation going."
She turned her back to him, pointing over her shoulder at a specific spot on her right trapezius muscle. "Actually, I still have a bit of a knot right here. Can you do that one more time? Right here. Aim for the shoulder this time."
Gudmaro hung in the air, his processors screaming with error messages. 'This is impossible,' he thought, his mechanical eyes flickering. 'I can't sense her Mana. It's like she isn't even there... but the weight of her presence is crushing the very air. If I can't sense her, I can't drain her. I can't adapt to what doesn't exist!'
Desperation finally took hold. He cupped his hands, gathering every bit of stolen energy into a single point. "Antimatter Technique: ORANGE!"
The beam of pure decay roared toward her, designed to erase anything it touched at a molecular level.
Yoru didn't move from her spot. She simply extended her arm, her fingers flattening into a rigid line. "Split Blade."
There was no flash of light. No surge of energy. But suddenly, a giant, invisible blade of sheer Physical Pressure manifested from her hand. With a casual downward stroke, she sliced the Antimatter beam clean in half. The two halves of the orange blast sailed past her, exploding harmlessly in the distance.
Gudmaro's jaw literally unhinged. "How?! How can you cut Antimatter?! You don't have Mana! You are breaking the laws of the multiverse!"
Yoru yawned, looking at her fingernails. "Can we continue the fight, please? And really... what made you think you could defeat me using a technique you stole from my friend? It's embarrassing."
[Scene Shift: The Tree of Life]
The massive, glowing roots of the Tree of Life provided a sanctuary for the fallen. Alya landed hard, clutching the unconscious Lapis . Her armor was cracked, and her breath was ragged.
"I'm here!" she gasped. "How... how is the fight going? Is the world still standing?"
Techyon , who had just regained consciousness, was staring at a massive shimmering screen in the center of the grove. "You have to look at this, Alya. She isn't fighting him... she's completely humiliating him."
The Arcon of Life stood with her hands glowing, projecting the battle from the upper atmosphere. "It's as I suspected," she whispered, her voice filled with awe. "Gudmaro is a virus designed to adapt to 'Laws' and 'Abilities.' But Yoru... she is pure, raw Physical Strength. There is no technique to analyze. There is no mana signature to copy. To Gudmaro, she isn't a warrior—she is just a force of nature."
[On the Projection Screen]
The adventurers watched in stunned silence. On the screen, the "galaxy eraser" was being treated like a ragdoll. Yoru was spinning him by his tail, slamming him into imaginary walls in the air, and delivering punches that sent shockwaves across the entire planet.
Gudmaro, the creature that had nearly erased the Arcons, was now nothing more than Yoru's toy.
Yoru landed softly in the center of the devastated wasteland, the dust settling around her feet as if afraid to touch her. She didn't take a fighting stance. She didn't even raise her hands. She simply stood there, looking up at the sky with a bored expression.
"I'm tired of moving," Yoru said, her voice carrying a cold, heavy authority. "I'll stand perfectly still. Do any attack you want. If you can leave so much as a single scratch on my skin... I'll admit that I lost."
The camera angle shifted, focusing on the nightmare that was Gudmaro .
He was a wreck of obsidian and wire. Half of his face had been punched into a pulp of blue sparks and shattered sensors. His lower torso was gone, trailing leaking conduits like intestines, and only his right arm remained attached to his shoulder. He looked less like a God and more like a discarded toy.
"Look... look at what you did to me!" Gudmaro's voice was a glitching, screeching mess as he forced his cells to knit back together. His body hissed, steam rising as he forcefully regenerated his limbs through sheer spite. "You think you are above the universe? You will pay for this humiliation!"
He hovered high above her, his eyes glowing with a terrifying, apocalyptic red light. He pulled his hands back, and the space between them began to scream. The atmosphere turned purple as stars from the surrounding systems seemed to dim, their light being sucked into his palms.
"GALAXY ERASER!"
A giant spear of raw cosmic energy manifested. It wasn't just mana; it was a concentrated needle of universal destruction, vibrating with enough power to wipe every trace of life from a hundred systems.
"DIE!" Gudmaro roared, hurling the spear downward with everything he had left.
The spear descended, a line of white-hot erasure aimed directly at Yoru's forehead. Yoru didn't move. She didn't blink. She just watched it come.