As Wu lured in the eager bounty hunters on the ground into the semi-transparent Bubble Bubble and took them out with his wave power machine guns, Lera and Ver emerged from a Whirlpool Purple right underneath the fleet of chariot before Lera unleashed yet her Rapid Layering onto the air space overhead.
The groups of bounty hunters reacted immediately to the shift in the local wave, and they quickly responded as squads of Channelers leaped out from the chariots onto the ground as Casters went ahead and shielded the individual chariots from the attack.
That was when Ver's soaring presence took over. With the groups distracted by Lera's more visible casts, Ver opened up her Whirlpool Black as the Kraken's tendril easily tore through the hastily set up shields around the chariots, slashing those chariots in half and forcing their passengers to jump down into the forest.
"Oh?" Kaire leaned forward and focused towards excitedly as this is the first time that she has seen Ver's power in full, "That's...very interesting."
"...Scary..." One of the miners swallowed nervously and gripped his fingers around the control of the chariots. As Ver continued to move forward through the chariots behind them with Lera's arrays activating and vines of the Wave reaching out and locking the individual rides in place, Kaire stood up slowly and cracked her knuckles. He was going to swerve away, but Kaire reached out and held onto the control, locking it in place.
"Hang onto your seats." She said, smiling towards the two miners before she jumped backward, somersaulting in the air with jolts of Wave energy pulsating within her body. Then, as Ver swung the Kraken's burning tendril, intending to destroy Kaire's chariot, she rapidly expanded the size of her right arm like a balloon being pumped up in a rush, throwing it towards the tendril.
The burning tendril clashed against the base of Kaire's now massive palm, and the Sky Guardian was able to knock it aside, slamming down into the ground as Ver's body was also sent crashing through the trees. Freed from the grip of Kaire's, the miner piloted the chariot up and away.
Growing her body to the full size, Kaire found herself standing firmly in Lera's Cast array as the tiny vines tried tying her down. However, those individual vines felt nothing more than tickles to her at this point, and the Sky Guardian Corp uniform that she wore should be more than enough to protect her from whatever the attacks the cast array had.
"Ver!" Lera shouted as smoke rose from the place that Ver's body ended up in.
"I wouldn't be worrying about others!" The Channelers that jumped out of the chariots earlier said as they surrounded Lera. She scanned around quickly before rapidly casting Strengthening and Lightening and jumping straight up into the trees.
"Where do you think you are going, little girl?" The Channelers all powered up and chased after Lera when suddenly, their bodies were all tied down by semi-transparent vines that grew out from the trees before the lines of Casts glowed and revealed their nature.
"Enjoy my traps~" Lera smiled, spinning around and landing gracefully in one of the standing points of her Cast array as she stared down at the giant Kaire.
"You can't call this a trap, Lera." Kaire sighed and took a step forward, ramming through the Cast array with her legs and forcing her way through, breaking down everything that Lera had prepared through her Rapid Layering.
"You are wrong." Lera said, "A trap doesn't have to only be physical."
Kaire tilted her head and ignored Lera's idle chatter. Walking right past her, she slammed her fists into the shields of Bubble Bubble. The entire ground rocked as she continued slamming down onto the surface of her shield. Lera wondered how many hits it will take to break through, and as the massive glowing fists of Kaire dunked down onto the surface the second time like an asteroid, her shield had cracked.
Tearing apart the layers, Kaire looked down at Wu as he stood next to a strange-looking wooden machine. She turned her gaze further downwards, and the crowds of bounty hunters that went in were nowhere to be seen.
"All of this was a strategy to divide and conquer." Lera said, hopping onto her own chariot and creating more distance from Kaire as she turned and glared angrily at her, "But we know that won't be enough if you are here!"
"Which is why we prepared this specifically for you!" Wu said, turning up the intensity for his wave-powered machine gun and pulling the trigger.
The entire machine gun array roared into life as massive surges of the Wave were extracted out from the Fuel Rock Prime that sat nearly right beside Wu. When the machine gun was turned on, Kaire immediately sensed the familiar overbearing intensity of the Fuel Rock Prime.
That starkly contrasted against how she didn't sense a single thing out of the Fuel Rock Prime just now. Her eyes widened, and her breaths became heavy as she thought about how that will affect her payment now that Wu has tinkered with the Fuel Rock Prime already.
"What have you done...WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!" Kaire shouted, reaching her hand forward as the machine gun opened fire. Massive orbs of light one-meter in radius formed right at the tip of the machine gun before the countless shots pounded into the flesh of Kaire, knocking her hand aside.
She stumbled backward as the shots of the Wave continued raining down on her body. All of those blasts exploded and dissipated over her skin upon impact as her Sky Guardian Corp uniform immediately kicked into gear to protect her.
"NO!" Kaire said, stomping on the ground as a massive earthquake squeezed the roots of the forest trees out from the ground. Channeling her full strength and letting the near-endless supply of the Wave within her body seep out to the surface, she shielded herself from the impacts of Wu's attacks while dropping into a lunge.
A semi-transparent shield of sorts covered the area in front of her. Then, Kaire marched forward one small step at a time, pushing back against Wu's onslaught of attacks when suddenly, a monstrous roar came from behind her.
Sensing a surge of animistic Wave from behind her, Kaire rapidly spun around as the Kraken sat atop a massive black whirlpool, it's eyes beneath the shells locking onto the giant girl.
It's truly a fight between sky-scraping monsters...a fight between Kaijus...
Wu never would have thought he would be fortunate to see something straight out of Ultraman in real life, and yet here he is.
As the two flaming tendrils of the Kraken whipped through the air, its tips moving so fast that it's leaving behind a track of smoke and shockwaves, Kaire turned and dropped her shield, using Wu's blasts to send her body forward as she dashed towards the Kraken.
"You dare attack me head on?!" The Kraken said with its thunderous voice as it conjured up a massive jet of water and shot it out from its mouth. Seeing the incoming projectile, Kaire kicked one of her foot down, digging onto the ground and using it to change her direction of travel.
Landing in a forward roll that completely flattened part of the forest, Kaire then got back onto her feet and shoulder-tackled the Kraken straight on, getting in far closer than the intended range of attack for the tendrils.
"I could say the same thing about you!" Kaire smiled excitedly, "Finally, someone my own size."
"You are all but a bug." The Kraken said as black fluids seeped out from underneath his shells before all of them were set on fire. Bearing the flames, Kaire then felt her body lifted off the ground as the Kraken threw her up and behind it.
Landing with her feet digging a pair of craters after her body spun through the air, Kaire stood back up to face the Kraken as it slowly turned around. That was when Kaire spotted the motionless body of Ver embedded in the forehead of the Kraken.
"And here I thought we have a Manifester that have reached Perfection Syncrhony." Kaire said, cracking her neck as individual shock waves traveled out with the popping of her joints, "I would like to entertain this fight for longer, but I cannot risk my retirement plans."
"Little one...you still there?" The Kraken asked silently, but there was no response from Ver. When she channeled its power this time, her consciousness was briefly taken over. It appeared that she still hasn't fully recovered from it yet, "Can you...feel this..."
Ver may not have been able to sense the rapidly rising temperature and heaviness in the air, but Lera and the rest of the bounty hunters certainly can. It is as if an invisible hand was placed on the shoulders of everyone in the area, and the weight of the entire world was suddenly forced down onto their back.
"Tsk...shit...to think that..." The bounty hunters that were trapped inside Lera's Trapping Casts were ripped out from within and slammed into the ground as Lera also dropped down to her knees uncontrollably.
It felt as if someone had Casted a spell that tripled her body weight in an instant. As she tried to press her body away and look up, she spotted the unmistakable aura from Kaire.
A darkened aura of the color brown, and it formed a silhouette of a bear around Kaire's body.
"Dominance of the Bear!" Kaire declared, her voice echoing through the entire forest as the aura accompanied with her every movement. She took a step forward towards the Kraken as its eyes squinted together. It tried to fight back and move, but the aura of dominance coming off Kaire made its arms felt as if they were tied down by the chains of the old gods.
"Little one! LITTLE ONE!" The Kraken called, pulling in Ver deep into his body as Kaire reached her finger forward and flicked on its forehead.
The shells immediately cracked and crumbled from within as darkened green blood flooded down from the head of the Kraken, its face caved in and its massive body now motionless. The flick also sent a massive blast wave through the rest of the Kraken's body.
"LITTLE ONE!" The Kraken called.
"Ver...whatever it is you want to do...you can do it... Be the strongest, and come home to become the Head." Her mother said.
"Are you okay? Little one?!" The Kraken asked.
"You might have thought that having to rely on others meant it's no longer your power. But at the end of the day, it's still just you." Wu explained.
"Wake up, Ver Fulgen Vaughan!" The Kraken plead.
"Please. I need your help, in order for this to work out." Wu asked, his voice sounding so close and soft beside her ears.
Ver opened her eyes, and she found herself sitting underneath warm lighting beside Wu at his work station. He had his pistol sitting over the schematics of the Wave-powered machine guns.
Ver reached her fingers up towards the modified eye patch from Wu, and she relished the moment of peace and quiet as the powers of the Kraken was at last contained within.
"Wu. Whatever you need. I am here."
Rapidly opening her eyes, Ver reached for her Sky-Splitting Sword while being surrounded by the flesh of the Kraken, and her fingers hooked tightly around the sword's handle.
"I AM NOT DONE FIGHTING YET!"