Compared to when I’d been tailing him on the streets outside, Kider Mill’s skin had taken on a furious shade of red as I joined him inside that cage – the veins on his arms visibly throbbing, and steam rising from him as he kept snarling at the nearby functionaries to hurry up with his next dose of stimulants.
His eyes saw nothing but murder, and every square foot of the cage was tainted by blood. Some of it was his, most of it belonged to his opponents. Soon, mine would be there as well.
My heart thundered in time with the music.
Usually, I would’ve welcomed the rising stress. It made my senses sharper, dulling everything that wasn’t important. Now, however, I did my best to fall into those breathing exercises I’d been teaching myself, trying to calm myself by force. But between the scent of death, the heavy bass, and the adrenaline already coursing through my veins, there was nothing I could do.
Several warnings popped up on my interface.
Warning!
Stress Has Reached Dangerous Levels
Warning!
Safe Thresholds, Exceeded
(Current Level, 4)
Adding Additional Status Condition,
Jumbled Thoughts:
Short Sightedness
Irrationality
Recklessness
Despite the cautioning tones of those warnings, as a fourth condition joined the rest, I smile already tugged at my lips as I let go of that final breath.
In the grand scheme of things, did it really matter?
In The Moment.
Yeah, it’s pointless to pretend…
I’d known this was coming from the beginning, yet I’d still followed Kider here. There was no one to pretend in front of anymore.
There was only me and my opponent, and for over two centuries, this was the exact kind of situation that’d made Yamien Silmund feel alive.
It was a perverted side of me I usually didn’t wish to show, but here, there was no need to hide anymore.
“Training programs: off.” I sighed as I rolled out my shoulders, letting the music wash over me as my muscles relaxed for the first time in months.
I’d nearly forgotten how light I could feel without every fiber in my body constantly contracting and straining against my will. I was practically floating as I waved over that same functionary that I’d handed my gun and knife earlier. Maybe I should’ve kept the knife, but having an easy way out made for lazy habits. I needed to fear actually getting ripped apart to test the limits of my new body — of my new mods.
A part of me kept nagging at me to focus on that brimmed hat figure above, but the last time I checked, they were gone. Kider had been ready to meet me faster than expected and… No, it didn’t matter.
I’d be leaving New Hub tomorrow. There was no time to chase down trails of fledgling rebels. Just knowing that they were here was enough.
Right now, my only concern was surviving long enough to make use of that knowledge. All I had to do now was de-stress, and not get any bloodstain on my shirt. It would only worry Jenna.
“Here,” I said to the functionary, having slipped the fabric over my head to hand it to her. “Could you hold this for me?”
The girl couldn’t have been much older than me. Of my current body, that was. 17, or maybe 18, a half-breed, and from the look she sent me, I could tell that she’d already written me off as dead.
“What about your glasses?” she eagerly asked.
“Still need them.” I shrugged, and the girl’s disappointment was palpable as I turned to face Kider once more.
Of all the ways to earn extra credits in this place, selling the items of dead combatants probably ranked quite high on the list. My glasses were certainly worth more than my shirt, at least.
Not that I planned to die anytime soon, even if my own UI was betting against me.
Threat Level: 33
Kider Mill
Run Battle Simulation (y/n):
Odds Of Winning, 20.7%
20.4%…
21.1%…
19.8%…
That last percentage kept flickering back and forth. It had ever since I saw the man, not that it bothered me.
Over these past months, I’d learned a few things about my Battle Simulations. The first one was that, unfortunately, this reading was bound to be more accurate than whatever it’d made against a Chunky brat nearly half a year ago. Powly Brate it’d only been able to judge from his size and number of henchmen. This was different.
I’d seen Kider’s earlier fights, and everything from his speed, strength, to preferred moves were already stored within my UI, now being analyzed and modeled against my own combat-data.
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Fortunately, even if that percentage meant I lost 8/10 fights against the man, it also meant I won two. My UI knew which two, both of which were dictated by me never waiting for that bell to start the fight.
That would drop my odds of surviving significantly.
As such, without ever letting them finish topping off Kider’s stims, I pushed away from my corner of the cage. There were still functionaries in there with us. They’d survive roughly 5/10 times without any serious injuries.
It was the best odds I could give them.
𐫰 𐫰 𐫰
The first five seconds went exactly as my UI had predicted them.
My sprint began within one of Kider’s blind spots, created by the functionary that was currently fiddling with his stimulants. Something had stalled them, meaning that, to the twitchy Kider – furiously roaring at the nervous functionary – I didn’t exist until my knee was already buried deep into the side of his head.
His left ear was shattered before the fight even began, and it would seriously affect his balance. That was the first step, the second one was getting my feet on the ground as Kider’s furious snarl cut through the heavy music.
He lashed out towards me with that same swipe that’d cracked a grown man’s skull earlier, but now, that functionary was still between us.
The old man took the brunt of the hit and, like a rickety doll, he was flung into the cage wall. The metal rattled from the impact, but whether he’d beaten the odds as he slid down into a lifeless bundle, I never learned.
I was busy spinning around in a heavy palm strike, catching Kider’s chin from below.
Rather than break his neck as intended, however, I merely knocked his head back, causing the man to stagger back with an angered grunt. His furious eyes locked onto me as a new notification popped up on my interface.
Unexpected Muscle Enhancements, Detected
Data, Recalibrating…
Shit.
That was the end of my five good seconds.
The only warning I got before Kider Mill — blood gushing down the side of his head and roaring in anger — charged at me was a blinking light on my interface. I didn’t need it.
I’d already bounced back on my heels, throwing out a jab that Kider never even tried to block. He’d misjudged my size for strength, or maybe he was just too high to care.
Either way, my knuckles ruthlessly cracked him across the nose and, as he tried to change trajectory to follow after me, I simply slipped under his flailing arms.
Another heavy punch straight to his liver, followed by a rapid shot to Kider’s face, and then a third to his kidney, all of it before the heavy man could even turn my way. I was simply faster than he was, lighter, and his furious swipes were telegraphed from a mile away.
Faster than my brain could register those mindless attacks, however, were the blinking lights my UI now filled my vision with.
An x-ray of Kider’s broken eardrum flashed across my eyes — his bleeding nose, aching liver, and straining heart overlapping the real Kider — soon followed by as a dozen glowing lights highlighting his weak spots and gaps in his defense.
It caught me off guard, especially as that blaring red meant to warn me of his incoming tackle completely blinded me. I’d only just managed to brace my side as the heavy man collided with me.
The impact sent me flying, and I crashed into the stiff cage wall just in time for an outline of my own injuries to flicker to life upon my interface.
Four bruised ribs, short of breath, discombobulated.
Another red light outlined Kider’s presence as he suddenly towered over me, and a heavy swipe meant to decapitate me ripped through the air. Only by turning my body with the hit did I manage to keep my head.
Not that it felt like I did.
My ears rung and everything was suddenly swaying before my eyes as I tumbled across the floor.
Light concussion, two loose teeth, injured neck.
Even with the mix of impressions assaulting my senses, however, old instincts found me back on my feet before Kider could reach me for a second time.
Spitting out a mouthful of blood, I regained my balance just in time for the roid-fueled man to come at me with a terrifying bear hug. Once more, I slipped away from his attack — opposite direction from the UI’s recommendation — and sent two rapid punches into Kider’s unprotected side.
Both of them, striking through that red zone that still outlined his liver. The man felt those, I didn’t need the UI to tell me as much. Especially as I followed up with a spinning kick that struck that exact same spot.
He’d be pissing blood for weeks, but just as I’d regained my momentum, another notification had just popped up on my UI:
Warning!
Outside Interference, Imminent
A swift glance to my side, and I could see hurried shadows moving out there. They hadn’t appreciated my early start. Before it’d even begun, the fun was over.
Notice:
Cryak Features, Unused
Recommended Action…
Fuck that.
As Kider staggered to his feet, snarling at me, I simply baited him with a jab, made the man overextend, grabbed his head and drove my knee into his face.
He didn’t even catch himself as he fell to the floor like freshly cut lumber. I won the moment I got him to play at my pace, but now, I was never allowed to gloat over my victory as a new shadow stumbled into the cage behind me.
I unclenched my fist, snapped around, but before I could rip the woman’s face off, she staggered past me, falling over her own feet as she, screaming at the top of her lungs, buried a needle into Kider’s back.
By the time I saw that urgent notification on my Interface to stop her, it was already too late. The glowing liquid had already shot into his pulsating body, turning those popping vein a dangerous black in an instant.
A second later, a furious roar shook the entire building.
Fuck…
𐫰 𐫰 𐫰
The best I could do was tuck my head in as my body ripped through the steel cage at a violent trajectory.
For a moment, there was nothing but pain and weightlessness, but unfurling my body midair, I caught my surroundings in perfect clarity.
Every drugged fighter and functionary within the seedy room was standing up, some of them armed, others running. Rather than stare at me, however, where I twisted in the air, most of them merely stared at a rapidly swelling Kider. Blood was gushing from his every orifice, and concrete and steel were shattered with every step and blind swing he took.
In the interest of not losing a rigged fight, they’d created a monster.
A handful of functionaries tried to calm the hulking man, but after the first three were effortlessly ripped in half, the rest swiftly gave up.
Instead, a couple of the fighters had seemingly decided that taking me — the source of this ugly fight — down was a good idea.
Maybe some functionary had bribed them with extra pay, not that I was about to let them earn it.
Cryak Mutation (Stage 1), Activated
It was an ugly thing, at least for me who had been trying to perfect the Imperial Forms for nearly three centuries, but as I spread my fingers wide, my nails warped into chitinous claws.
Still in the air, I spun around towards that nearest fighter, twisting in the air to impale him like a living javelin.
Both of us tumbled to the floor, but with my claws still hooked into his chest, we never separated until my heels finally found his jaw.
I’m not sure if it was his neck snapping, or if it was his ribcage getting flayed open that killed the man, but the spray of gore that rained over us at least made the other fighters retreat.
Shit. I’ll never be able to show Mikayes this footage now. The divebomb actually worked…
Not that I had long to worry about the fact as another of Kider’s roars made the floor quake beneath us.
Nearly everyone that still could were running for the stairs now which, unfortunately enough, were on the opposite side of the room.
A furious Kider blocked my only way out, ripping people apart left and right as he stormed my way. Drugged out of his mind or not, he finally knew who I was – the person who’d hurt him.
Clicking my tongue to a pulsating interface of red lights and rapid notifications, I set off towards him.
Run Battle Simulation (y/n):
Odds Of Winning, 87.9%
Halfway across the floor, I met him, and following the shadow of my own simulation, I slid between his legs as my claws tore up the engorged veins of his thighs.
An impossible amount of blood suddenly sprayed everywhere, but I was already on my feet and running before the man had tumbled to the floor.
“Thanks,” I said as I hurriedly grabbed my things from the shivering girl that lay pressed up against the edge of the cage, having barely survived being stepped over by Kider.
Another thundering roar shook my ears, and I calmly spun around with my pistol raised to meet the man’s mindless eyes one final time.
Run Battle Simulation (y/n):
Odds Of Winning, 96.5%
My UI recommended three bullets, I fired six before continuing my flight from that place.
I’d wanted a fight. The bloodier the better, but even Yamien Silmund knew when to get the fuck once he’d overstayed his welcome.
My UI was still in its infancy, and not a single fucking calculation it’d made was accurate. I should’ve listened to my sanity and stuck to a simpler brawl.