"What use is power for power's sake?" The thing wearing the skin of Alfred Meyer repeated, dodging a beam of pure heat that ignited the atmosphere behind it.

Leila had initially tried to reason with it, believing the creature to be the ex-director to get his vengeance. Obviously, he wasn't right in the head if he was attacking her directly, but she had wanted to ask the man many questions, so she held back from erasing him from existence.

That was a mistake. While the body floating before her was that of Alfred Meyer, the mind that piloted it was entirely alien.

It had intercepted her over Yonkers once the new Director cleared her to go and explore what was causing the dungeon break. Considering her skills, it had been an easy choice to make. She could be very hard to find when she wanted. Unfortunately, the creature wearing Meyer's skin had some unknown way of locating her and quickly engaged her halfway to the location.

The battle unfolded high above the suburbs. They were close enough to inhabited areas that she was severely limited. Leila called upon some of her new powers, her form occasionally splitting into dark duplicates that mirrored her movements, creating a confusing array of targets. Flames wreathed her body, casting eerie light across her fierce expression, her eyes alight with a cold fury. The sight before her eyes was truly disgusting.

Meyer, or the creature that had once been him, matched her ferocity with a disturbing serenity. His new form was grotesquely enhanced, muscles bulging unnaturally and skin patched with scales that shimmered with a metallic sheen under the assault of Leila's flames. Air magic, once skillfully used by the Director, was now a weapon of brute force. Gusts became gales, and breezes sharpened to slicing winds as he countered her fiery assaults with chilling blasts.

The air around them crackled with energy as they clashed, their combat echoing like thunder across the sky. Leila's fire met Meyer's wind in explosive encounters that sent shockwaves rippling through the clouds, distorting the atmosphere and occasionally illuminating the ground below with flashes of their power.

It was evident that whatever process had turned the man’s body into the current monstrosity had granted it incredible power. So much so that Leila found herself evenly matched for the most part.

She could have likely ended the fight already had she resorted to the more destructive skills in her arsenal, but that would have seen hundreds if not thousands, die and would have deprived her of answers.

The problem with aerial battles is that you are just as likely to hit those below you as the guy you are fighting.

"Why persist in this madness, Leila?" the chimera called out, its voice a twisted echo of Meyer’s, yet layered with an echoing depth. "Your strength, boundless as it is, could bring order to chaos, could guide the lost and wayward. Join me. Together, our powers will be used for the greater good. We’ll forge a new world.”

Leila snarled, launching another salvo of shadowy spears that screamed through the air, each aimed with lethal precision. She allowed it to speak, not out of agreement with its proposals but because every word it uttered provided clues. Meyer had been a thorn in her side, a man whose ambition and fear of her power had driven him to orchestrate an assassination attempt that nearly succeeded. But while she harbored no love for the man, the twisted fate that had befallen him was not one she would wish on anyone, and the entity that had overtaken him was clearly a threat that extended beyond personal vendettas.

"You speak of using power for good," Leila retorted as she deftly avoided a slicing gust of wind that cut a cloud behind her in two, only to be forced to expend a significant amount of mana to prevent it from turning back and destroying the houses below them, "yet here you are, wreaking havoc, killing innocents. How does that align with your grand vision?"

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The chimera paused, watching the dense barrier of darkness she had conjured. It smiled then, a grotesque mimicry of human emotion. "Sacrifices are necessary. From chaos arises order. You, who have danced with death so intimately, should understand this more than anyone."

Leila's fury blazed hotter than the flames that enveloped her. "Your twisted logic doesn't justify anything!" she shouted, launching a particularly vicious volley of fire that twisted through the air like dragons. The chimera deflected it with a whirlwind, but the effort was clearly taxing it more than it let on.

"You rely on Meyer's skills, yet you lack his ability. You're nothing more than a shadow of him!" Leila taunted, trying to provoke the creature into making a mistake. While the monster possessed an incredible amount of mana - enough to give pause even to her - it wielded Meyer's powers with a brutish force that lacked the finesse the Director had been known for. His air magic had been about subtlety and manipulation, not the overt destruction the chimera favored.

It was an S-rank being only as far as raw might went. Everything else that made a country-killer was absent. The finesse wasn't there. The variety wasn't there. It was just a mockery of Alfred Meyer with enough mana to spam its skills endlessly.

The creature's posture stiffened, and its eerie purple eyes flared with a malevolent light. “Alfred Meyer was weak!" it hissed. "He failed to see the bigger picture. The new god of humanity has plans far beyond any petty concern he might have had. And once I have dealt with you, I will join him in reshaping this world!"

And there it is. So your creator wants to become a god, huh?

Leila dodged as the creature lunged forward, weaving through the air with shadowy afterimages that confused its senses. "While you're here trying to provoke me, the Association remains unprotected! My creator has already arrived there," the chimera sneered, trying to distract her. "How many will suffer because you chose to fight me here?"

Ignoring the jab, Leila focused on gathering information. "Who is this new god you speak of? What does he want?" she demanded, even as she prepared another series of attacks.

The chimera laughed, a sound that was more disturbing for its lack of genuine amusement. "You think I would reveal our plans to you, Leila Walker? You will see soon enough when everything comes to fruition.”

I don’t think I’m going to get anything else from this. Time to wrap it up.

More than a million mana points merged into a single spot between them. The depthless hunger that made the void between galaxies answered Leila's call, and for the briefest moment, a black hole was born on Earth.

The axis of the entire planet would have been irreparably damaged if the gaping maw that materialized was allowed to run free, and the solar system would have soon become its first meal, but she didn't let it. Of course, it would have run out of mana well before it could stabilize with enough matter, but she wasn’t about to gamble.

This was probably her most dangerous skill, but Leila was not afraid of her own power. She allowed the black hole to affect only what she wanted it to, and the creature that once was Alfred Meyer had no chance of escaping its hungry pull.

In an instant that felt suspended in time, the black hole consumed the chimera, the immense gravitational force pulling it into an inescapable abyss. The event horizon shimmered with a dark radiance, a bright point in the dawn sky, as the creature's form was shredded at a sub-atomic level, disappearing into the void. Leila maintained precise control over the spell, containing the singularity's effect to a pinpoint location to prevent collateral damage.

The release of such a formidable spell left the air vibrating with residual energy, the silence that followed seeming even more profound in its wake.

The black hole dissipated as quickly as it had formed. Leila allowed herself a moment to catch her breath, her heart still racing from the exertion and the sheer power she had wielded.

Carefully, she dismissed the remaining traces of the spell, the fabric of reality settling back into place with a nearly audible sigh of relief.

Turning her attention downwards, Leila swooped toward the ground, her fiery and shadowy wings dissipating as she landed gently among the ruins. Her arrival did not go unnoticed; rescuers and refugees - who had evacuated from the dungeon break into what they had believed to be a safe location - had been forced to turtle down as two titans fought above them. They left their barricades upon noticing her. Fear and admiration painted their faces.

Quickly, she approached a group of Agents that seemed to be in command. "The creature that attacked this area has been dealt with," she announced, her voice carrying clearly over the murmur of the crowd. "But I must leave immediately for New York. The threat may not be isolated to this location."

The rescuers nodded understandingly, still stunned by the display of power they had just witnessed. "Thank you, ma'am," one of them managed, his voice tinged with gratitude and respect. “We should be able to handle things here if nothing else like that comes by."

Leila gave them a curt nod, her mind racing with the implications of the chimera's words. The "new god of humanity" it had mentioned was a threat that could not be ignored, and given its efforts to keep her here, it was likely doing something it wanted no one to interfere with.

She spared one last thought to her students, who she knew were fighting in the surrounding area.

I doubt this is the last surprise they have stashed here, but I cannot ignore what it said. If everything's fine in New York, I'll come back and clean this up, but every moment I use here could have irreparable consequences.