BAB3 -Chapter 36

# Chapter 36: Bitterness

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LuLu tore through the streets, her strides long and loping. She cleared entire city blocks in a single bound, only slowing to dodge traffic and civilians.

“Did your mother build this entire thing herself?” Kimi asked, bracing in her seat.

“Mostly,” Lexi replied. “She 3D-printed the parts and had the metals forged by.. well, other robots. It was just something she did for fun. The frame’s made of basic materials, so it’s pretty fragile against anything durable.”

Kimi nodded. “I was wondering why she hadn’t sent it to the frontlines.”

Lexi shook her head. “It might handle the first wave okay, but it’d get taken out before long—or worse, end up in the way.”

Once they reached the city center, LuLu launched into the air, landing on a building before jumping to the next.

It clung to the sides of skyscrapers, leaping from tower to tower as it avoided the crowds below and closed in on Morwen.

The final jump landed them about halfway up the Morwen Building. From there, it began to climb.

Lexi and Kimi unstrapped themselves and readied their weapons.

They were going in hot.

LuLu reached the top floor and punched the glass. It took a few hits, but once it finally broke, Lexi and Kimi vanished from the chest cavity.

Their movement techniques took them directly inside.

What they found was sickening.

Anton and a man who looked like Abraham Donovan stood in the center of a wide office, surrounded by piles of dead bodies.

“You sick fucks!” Lexi shouted.

She immediately fired a *Dark Frost Lance Cannon* at Anton, blasting him through the wall and into the next room.

Without hesitation, Lexi stepped into another *Dark Passage* and followed.

Anton rolled to his feet, his body swelling within a fog of yellow steam.

Lexi hit him again with the same attack, striking him dead in the chest, but this time, he withstood it.

“Alexis Sable,” he growled. “You’re already too late. I’m Level 42, and I’ll reach my third awakening within the hour.”

“Not if I have anything to say about it,” Lexi shot back, marking his chest with *Lingering Darkness*.

“You idiot woman!” he roared. “This could’ve all been yours! But you stuck with that garbage! We’re both better than him!”

Lexi’s face twisted into an even deeper frown. “You’re still hung up on Xay?”

“You should’ve been mine.”

“What? Eww!” Lexi gagged, then rapidly fired five *Frost Shrapnel* bolts.

They struck true, each bolt erupting into jagged frost shards one after another. An instant later, the *Lingering Darkness* mark on his chest ignited and exploded in a storm of darkness.

But Anton powered through it, hurling himself at Lexi. She opened a *Dark Passage* to escape, but he was faster. He grabbed her leg and yanked her back out before she could slip through.

Lexi twisted her body and fired bolt after bolt into his face, but it only seemed to enrage him further.

And as a *Berserker*, the angrier he got, the stronger he became. Anton slammed Lexi into the ground, leaving a crater where she landed.

Clutching her side, a sharp pain flaring from what felt like a broken rib, Lexi unleashed *Frost Geyser*.

A torrent of frost and snow erupted from her, engulfing them both in an icy whiteout.

But Anton didn’t let go.

“I’ll break you and every thing you love!”

He yelled through the cold, his muscles bulging, then hoisted her up again and slammed her down even harder.

Lexi muffled a scream of her own, leveling her Cerulean Long Bow and firing *Penetrating Void* straight into Anton’s face.

He jerked to the side, and the attack caught his giant shoulder, burrowing deep, before finally sputtering out.

Anton howled loud enough to pop her ears, then clutched her leg and hurled her into the wall like a rag doll.

Lexi struggled to her feet, just as a furious Anton came crashing down on her.

***

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Back in the main office, Kimi had squared off against the second man the instant Lexi disappeared.

“Alan, I presume?” she asked.

He tilted his head quizzically, then smiled. “I go by many names, but yes, that is one of them.”

As he spoke, he folded his cuffs and stepped over the bodies of the dead, making his way toward a side room.

“I presume you’ve come here in some foolish attempt to stop this,” he said casually. With a smirk, he entered the empty room. “I welcome the challenge.”

Kimi followed cautiously, her Scarlet Katana raised and *Ignition Slippers* burning on her feet.

Inside, the room appeared empty. The man had completely vanished.

Then a searing pain flared in her side—and she dissolved into swirling lights, reappearing on the far end of the room.

He’d used some kind of camouflage technique and stabbed her with a poison-tipped blade.

But Kimi had *Eternal Ember*. White flame sealed her wound and burned the poison from within.

“How interesting,” his disembodied voice echoed. “A self-healing ability. Let’s see how much it can withstand, shall we?”

Kimi activated *Eclipsing Clone*, summoning four copies of herself. If she couldn’t see him, she’d just attack everything.

He reappeared on the opposite side of the room, his hand resting over his chest. “A woman after my own heart.”

With a snap of his fingers, four clones appeared out of thin air. Each one looked slightly different—random clothes, hairstyles, even facial hair.

But they weren’t made of an element; they looked just as real as he did.

Kimi and her clones activated *Glimmering Grand Pas*, slicing through the room in a dazzling pattern of crisscrossing sword light.

But somehow, all five copies of the man twisted and weaved through the strikes, slithering around the slashes like snakes.

Worse, they lashed out with their knives each time she drew close, nicks, slashes, and jabs stacking faster than she could counter.

Within half a minute, her clones ruptured and disintegrated one by one.

Her *Eternal Ember* struggled to keep up, sealing dozens of cuts across her real body.

She panted as huge chunks of mana rapidly drained from her.

This was the most powerful opponent Kimi had ever faced.

And she was losing.

“Level?” she demanded, steadying herself.

The five variations of the man buffed their nails on their shirts in perfect sync, as if bored.

“48,” he said, then all five of him disappeared.

***

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Tyra, Willow, and the Primal Titan were wreaking havoc across the battlefield.

Fully topped up on mana and stamina, Xay fell back toward the tight formation where Ezra’s resummoned spirits were fighting.

With Shifu Wu near Rox, he didn’t need to watch her so closely.

Xay collapsed his four cognitive threads into one and leaned fully into *Supreme Psychokinesis*, while activating *Martial Burst* Engine at the same time.

During his month-long isolation on the mountain, he’d trained to better control his *Flow State*.

The first time he’d entered it, he’d shut down his conscious thought completely, letting pure reflex take over.

And as an added bonus, with his immature understanding of psychic force no longer in the way, his alignment with the ambient psychic flow had become far stronger.

Now, with greater insight, Xay met the ability halfway.

The single cognitive thread slowed his perception of time while sensing only his immediate surroundings.

*Martial Burst Engine* managed his martial forms, and *Supreme Psychokinesis* guided his reflexes.

He had created a version of *Flow State* that existed in the gap between full conscious control and complete autonomous movement.

Xay called it *Liminal Flow State*.

The edges of Xay’s vision dimmed as his awareness of the battlefield slipped away.

All that remained was him, the martial spirits flanking his sides, and the monsters waiting ahead.

Xay became a whirlwind of motion and strikes. His focus narrowed to pure destruction, his body moving on instinct with barely a thought.

The martial spirits flanking him rallied in support. Their rhythmic blows landed true, knocking wounded monsters into Xay’s path.

As his speed and strength grew, they created perfect setups for him to finish the job.

Anything that came close to him was obliterated by fist, elbow, knee, foot, or Jetnir Orb.

He wasn’t completely untouchable like he had been in full *Flow State*, but he was far closer than without the liminal version.

Also, balancing control of his body with his techniques let him build more speed and damage stacks before needing to vent.

Xay tore through the tide, his body moving in a blur too fast for the naked eye to follow.

Then the ground trembled beneath him, and a series of deep, deafening howls cut through the air.

The second wave bosses had arrived—each of them towering as tall as the Titan.

One after another, the four bosses spawned in a quadrant each, and further enraged the other monsters.

**Taowu Thorin Behemoth (S-Rank) Lv 60**: *Behemoth, armored juggernauts that crush anything between them and what they desire. Touched by Taowu Essence.*

**Taowu Horror Behemoth (S-Rank) Lv 60**: *Silent, masked behemoths that reflect a victim’s darkest urges before striking without warning. Touched by Taowu Essence.*

**Taowu Wretch Behemoth (S-Rank) Lv 60**: *Twisted, twitching behemoths that scream with stolen voices while clawing through steel and bone. Touched by Taowu Essence.*

**Taowu Harnoq Behemoth (S-Rank) Lv 60**: *Barbed-limbed behemoths that shred and disembowel with their razor-like forearms. Touched by Taowu Essence.*

Angered by its mere existence, the Primal Titan bellowed and lowered its antlers, tearing across the battlefield in a thunderous charge straight toward the Thorin Behemoth.

Xay didn’t slow down. He cut a path through the monsters ahead, gradually shifting his angle to clear the immediate area.

As soon as he was done, there was a *Psion Emission Beam* with that behemoth’s name on it.

***

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Once the boss appeared, Rox veered her cyclone toward the outer edge of the quadrant. Not even she could do much against its defenses alone.

She focused on clearing more of the fodder, while Li-Li cleaned up an area out further ahead. Both of them were easing off to give the Vermilion Elites space to focus on the boss.

Once things opened up, they could take a few potshots of their own.

Rox reached a spot free of other Awakened, and activated *Momentum Break*, slamming her axe into the ground to release everything she’d built up.

A hundred-foot crater rippled outward, and the resulting debris shredded the remaining monsters nearby.

She leaned on her axe and took a quick breath as her *Crystal Heart* went on cooldown. Letting go of all that momentum left her a little dizzy.

She still hadn’t quite gotten over almost falling in front of Xay earlier.

But he caught her—and that part felt kind of nice.

*I want to stand by your side.*

That phrase ran through her head more often than she liked to admit.

But he’d stuck to it. She met him right after he awakened, and now he was only ten levels behind her, and closing the gap fast.

She smirked—then immediately leaned back as a dagger of dense golden light shot past her face.

It snapped back on a glowing cord, and Rox knocked it aside with the flat of her axe.

The force behind it made her wince; the pull nearly staggered her.

“Priss,” Rox muttered, turning to face the woods beyond.

Piper Laurent emerged from between the trees, several golden daggers wedged between her fingers.

“You have no idea how long I’ve waited for this, Rowdy Roxana,” Piper sneered. “You’re going to die today.”

She charged, unleashing a fan of golden daggers in a sweeping arc.

Rox swung her axe in a wide defense, knocking most of them out of the air—but three still hit, burying themselves in her arm and shoulder.

Her *Crystal Heart* was still on cooldown, and she hadn’t fully recovered since the last time she used her *Juggernaut Drive*.

Rox was at her most vulnerable right now.

Worse, the daggers were laced with something. She could already feel it burning under her skin.

But Rox would not break. She inhaled deeply, spiraling her vital energy the way Grandma Xiu had taught her—recovery breathing.

Her vitality stopped the poison’s spread, though it didn’t flush it out completely.

Piper yanked back on the dagger cords, tearing through Rox’s flesh as the blades dispersed. She kept hold of two, now reversed in her grip as she lunged forward.

Rox grunted, choking up on her axe before meeting her head-on, the serrated edge sparking off the incoming gold daggers.

“You got a lot stronger,” Rox said, struggling to hold her ground.

“Strong enough to finally kill you.”

Piper cocked back and lashed out, aiming to sever Rox’s jugular with a dagger-laced strike.

But Rox moved with her, grounding her lower body in the dirt while letting her upper half flow like water.

She slipped into World Tortoise Style, absorbed Piper’s momentum into her abdomen, then twisted back, redirecting it with double the force.

The flat side of Rox’s axe slammed into Piper’s head and shoulder, knocking her back.

“What the fuck was that?” Piper spat, already charging in again.

Rox met her the same way, again and again, taking Piper’s raw aggression and turning it against her.

“I’ve tried to help you so many times, Priss,” Rox said solemnly. “But you just won’t change.”

“I’ll change when you’re dead,” Piper growled through gritted teeth. “I’m going to carve you up before your crystal skin comes back.”

Rox sighed.

She only needed to hold Piper off for a few more seconds. Once her cooldown ended, she could put this to rest.

She didn’t want to. But Piper would never stop. Never learn.

And as much as it hurt, Rox had to be strong.

She couldn’t let Piper come after Xay, or anyone else she cared about, ever again.

As her strength returned, Rox stepped forward, shifting from defense to offense.

She drove Piper back with the butt of her axe, then swung it around to build momentum.

But Piper slipped to the side and yanked hard on a golden cord trailing behind her.

From several feet away, a distraught boy was suddenly flung into the path of Rox’s attack.

Rox halted the swing just in time, jerking to a stop—but pain lanced through her an instant later.

Dozens of daggers stabbed into her back, all targeting the same spot, her core.

Rox glanced to the side, somehow catching Xay’s confused expression through the tide of twisted creatures.

She gave him a soft smile, then she closed her eyes.

Rox fell.

***

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“Rox!!!” Xay bellowed, dropping out of his *Liminal Flow State*.

He just barely caught the tail end of her going down, and his heart skipped several beats.

Xay teleported in front of a laughing Piper and roundhouse-kicked her with all the stacked speed and damage he’d been building.

She gasped and flew back over a hundred feet, where Shifu Wu met her with a hurricane of spinning kicks.

She’d seen what happened as well, but couldn’t make it back through the horde in time to help.

Xay immediately dropped beside Rox, casting an *Elemental Force Ward* around the two of them.

“Rox! Can you hear me?”

He tried to push a Restoration Pill into her mouth, but she wasn’t moving.

Her back was gaping and gushing fountains of blood.

Blinking away tears, Xay scanned the battlefield and spotted Ezra still on Dragon’s back. He immediately teleported himself and Rox beside her.

“Resurrection!” he choked, his voice cracking.

Ezra gasped and rushed to place her hands over Rox’s chest.

She activated *Resurrection Rite*, and bands of light coalesced over Rox’s body—then shattered.

Ezra looked up, her eyes brimming with tears. “Her essence has already been cultivated.”

“No,” Xay mouthed, but no sound came out.

*No, no, no, no, no, no, no..*

A crushing weight pressed against Xay’s chest, and his throat clenched tight.

He pulled Rox into his arms, holding her close.

Several memories flooded his mind:

Seeing her red hair and green eyes for the first time in line for the Awakening Stone.

Her call telling him he’d been accepted into Cosmos on probation.

Their first training session in the simulation room.

Dinner at her parents’ house.

The guilt she carried over Piper.

Her dreams of being a lonely planet.

Her drunken laughter at the Grand Nightvale.

Her training in the mountains.

Pain. Grief. An incomprehensible hurt assaulted Xay like never before.

*No!*

Hot tears streamed down his face.

The world around Xay blurred and fell away.

**Bloodline Resonance Attempted.**

White light poured from Xay’s body, and his eyes rolled back.

**Bloodline Manifestation: 50%.**

**Bloodline Synchronization: 50%.**

**Bloodline Resonance Successful (Partial).**

For one moment, the battlefield went utterly still.

Monster and man alike froze beneath an overwhelming pressure that pressed on their cores.

Xay hovered slightly, glowing like the sun. Behind him, a spectral image took shape.

Wreathed in an immaculate white aura that flickered like a dancing flame, the upper half of the most powerful legendary beast emerged.

A single, multi-pointed horn gleamed at the center of its brow.

Its head resembled that of a majestic dragon. Shimmering scales rippled along its neck and shoulders, catching the light in prismatic waves.

The body beneath was broad and powerful, like that of a lion with clawed forelimbs braced to strike.

Its entire presence radiated strength, wisdom, and serenity.

In that moment, levels and ranks meant nothing. Life of all kinds—beast, monster, Awakened—looked skyward, all their instincts whispering the same truth.

Something greater had arrived.

The Blood Moon itself turned its gaze toward Xay, its attention fixed on him as the fighting resumed.

But Xay didn’t care. All he could see was Rox’s lifeless body cradled in his arms.

*You can’t leave me! I refuse!*

Beneath him, Dragon began to glow. Xay hadn’t even noticed when her colors inverted.

Her crystalline body was now opalescent, and her butterfly wings were a twinkling, twilight black.

**Resonance Break Ability Detected: Butterfly Effect.**

***Butterfly Effect** - Pull the strings of fate and alter causality. Change a single event in the immediate past within a specific radius. Temporarily consumes Arsenal Weapon. 1-month cooldown.*

A flicker of worry for Dragon ran through Xay’s mind, but she quickly cleared it up.

~Save, Pretty Strong!~

Xay activated the Resonance Break.

Dragon’s new twilight wings flapped once, then shattered, scattering into thousands of tiny, iridescent black butterflies.

They swarmed in dizzying patterns, encircling Xay, Rox, Dragon, and Ezra.

Before they were completely surrounded, Xay teleported Ezra to the backlines and sent himself and Dragon to the spot where Piper had struck Rox.

Catching her off guard for a second time, he yanked Piper out of her fight with Shifu Wu using *Psychic Blink*, and she immediately lunged at him.

Before the golden dagger could reach him, time stopped around them all.

But something was wrong.

An explosive, all-encompassing pain tore through Xay, shaking his very existence.

Then, his awareness was suddenly drawn inward.