One of the gorillas hardened its fist, hissing at the smiling girl, while the other clasped its hands, both preparing to reduce Sunshine to nothing but red goop. The very moment she muttered the name of her Mind Break technique, they struck. One slammed her head into the wall, creating a crater that fit only her skull. The other smashed her chest, the two brutal attacks seeming to end her life. But as they turned away, they would soon realize their instincts were wrong.
Sunshine exploded out of the wall, dust and debris filling the air and clouding the vision of the animals. She wrapped her body around one of the gorilla’s skull and began to squeeze, her aura now spiking up. In response to the pain, the animal began beating at and clawing on her back. The girl didn’t let go, nor did she show any discomfort on her face. Her eyes were widened and milky white, her irises gone. Her mouth was open, tongue hanging out, blood from her forehead and rain dripping into it.
On the other hand, stress was clearly taking over the gorilla's mind as it started to make incessant noises, shaking its head in a circle. Its neck was about to snap when both combatants felt an army of little legs crawl on their bodies. Before Sunshine could even turn her head to look, the gorilla started to shake itself erratically. As this was happening, the aura around her body began to diminish as though an outside force was sucking it away. And that outside force turned out to be a swarm of cockroaches, climbing up the giant beast and using their antennas to absorb her energy.
As Sunshine leapt off the gorilla, shaking the bugs off of her, her Energy Sense caused her unconscious body to notice a new energy below her. Elias was on the verge of death, and yet it was during those moments where he would spontaneously awaken a Radius Ability. Lines of green roaches were emerging out of his wounds with a coordination comparable to ants. Despite their size and supposed weaknesses, they weren't just feeding on the aura. They were in the middle of devouring the gorilla as well. The strong winds shooting the rain into the mountain side like bullets didn’t seem to deter their movement.
She could have easily let Elias subconsciously help her by turning that radioactive beast into a meal. Then again, why the hell would she need help to take down some dumb ape? She landed on the ground, and immediately bolted towards the fallen man. That was until an attack on her head from the other gorilla stopped her pursuit. However, Sunshine didn’t move nor did a semblance of pain look to befall her. The gorilla watched in horror as the girl grabbed its hand with the arm that was supposed to be broken.
Using her Mind Trick ability, Sunshine had used the technique “Dead Girl Walking” on herself which caused her brain to view her unconscious body as a corpse. This was something she could have only done in the event that the final blows on her body from the gorillas would knock her out rather than actually kill her. It was a gamble—a possibility that was only made a reality by making the bet that two halves of her aura would be enough to protect her head and torso. Deciding that those two parts of her body would be aimed at was also a bet.
Even though it was through a technicality, Sunshine was deceased, and her body quickly went into the process of Rigor Mortis—the stiffening of the muscles. Though, it wasn’t just her body that went stiff as her aura did as well, giving her the durability of the toughest steel. That would quickly be proven once the gorilla punched her again just to end up hurting itself.
However, while she now had the durability, her strength and speed needed to increase as well. So it was a good thing that in this post-apocalyptic world, any person who was dead would swiftly become a zombie right after. In contrast to Sunshine though, these zombies couldn’t move or do anything. The only reason she was different was because the energy surrounding her body “saw” her as a zombified creature, and treated it like that was fact.
Add in the aura she already had, and Sunshine was now on the level of a Type Two Radion. Luckily, this allowed her to move despite the stiffening of her muscles.
Since that was her temporary identity, Sunshine was capable of effortlessly healing. There were only two organs she couldn’t afford taking significant damage—her heart and her brain. Her heart had stopped beating, which meant that she only had a minute to defeat everyone in the field before she either died or became reduced to a vegetative state. All other damage could be healed.
In other words, in the one minute following Mind Trick: Dead Girl Walking, Sunshine was effectively immortal.
It seemed as though the gorilla sensed Sunshine's newfound power. The moment her distorted face turned toward it, the creature immediately dropped to its knees, bowing its head and moaning apologetically. Sunshine responded to the animal's apology with a quick strike to its skull, sending a wave of green blood exploding out.
Then, she launched herself towards the second gorilla’s head and tore it out from its thick neck before the roaches could eat the beast entirely. Clearly, the army of disgusting critters didn’t take too kindly to that as they began to scuttle towards her in aggressive fashion. Without hesitation, she crouched down, stretched out two fingers, and sent out a barrage of attacks. Each finger that came in contact with the roaches destroyed them completely, painting the ground with their smelly essence.
Yet they just kept coming. No matter how many she eradicated, she needed to eliminate the source to stop even more from coming. Even with her intelligence temporarily gone, a wild animal still had its instincts to rely on. Upon turning her attention to Elias, who was screaming in pain, Sunshine lunged at him. All it took was a mighty stomp for his head to be squashed into a gooey mush.
Her body stopped moving, under the assumption that the battle was finally over. She didn't do anything after that. She simply stood there… with drool dripping from her mouth. There wasn’t any way to stop her from feeling that way. Zombies loved to e-
Suddenly, giant spikes erupted from Elias’ body and pierced through her belly. As they lifted her twitching body into the air, the man’s head began to regenerate.
Although, his head no longer resembled one a human should’ve had. Elias has wide, bulging eyes that made up the majority of his brown, long, downward angled head. Two… Four… Six spindly arms emerged from under his folded, cloak-like wings, attempting to stop the erratic movement of his antennas.
“Wh-What the fuck happened to me!?”, he shouted in distress, feeling up his scrawny body. He then turned his freaky head towards Sunshine, whose body was twitching uncontrollably. “What could I have possibly done to deserve this shit? I have never done anything wrong to anyone!”
To Elias' dismay, Sunshine chopped the spikes apart and proceeded to tackle his body, causing them both to go over the cliff. The roach man unfurled his wings, stabbed through Sunshine’s back with a sharp grip, and threw her off. But she wouldn’t back down so easily as she was able to grab a hold of his left wing, riding Elias while he amateurishly flew around Topside Mountain. Her earlier wounds healed, and yet Elias made sure that more would appear.
He twirled his body in a circle, repeatedly scraping Sunshine’s back on the side of the mountain. She wouldn’t budge, and the only part of her that ripped were the back of her clothes. The second she got a second grip on his wings, he yanked it out of his back. Elias’ roars of pain were met with a hand around his neck that forcefully pulled him up and shoved his body through the mountain walls.
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Sunshine had remained on the mountain side by piercing through the tough rock with her feet, using that chance to gift Elias’ face with a flurry of punches, splattering her face with amber-colored blood. His head regrew and he responded to her punches with a hand through her neck. She tried to strike once more, but Elias clenched her arms with his other hands.
“You did this to me,” he growled, the mandibles near his mouth snapping. “Now, I'll use these new powers to skewer y-”
Before he could finish his threat, Sunshine pulled her neck out of his head and her feet out of the rock. She delivered a ferocious kick forward, sending him deep into the mountain as her neck regenerated at an eerie speed. The echo of the impact reverberated through the rocky insides, a momentary stillness following the chaos.
Then, a faint, pulsing green glow flickered in the darkness like a warning. Elias' antennas began to glow brighter and, before she could react, a swarm of cockroaches flew into the hole Sunshine created. Their wings buzzed in unison, their tiny bodies grouping up to create an emerald tsunami bent on devouring any life it could find. Yet, Sunshine’s attention was still fixed on Elias, eventually shoving his grotesque body out of the mountain.
“What are you stupid bugs good for?”, he yelled, flapping his wings angrily while long spikes shot out of his chest. “Just hurry up and die already!”
That was something Sunshine had planned on not doing as she swiftly caught the spikes, gripping it with a fierce intensity, and threw the roach man upwards. Although, while Elias was able to regain free movement in the air with his wings, she didn’t have that privilege.
Gravity took her hostage, pulling her down. Elias didn’t continue to pursue her, and neither did his cockroaches. Under the assumption that the fall would kill her, they all simply abandoned the battle.
Even without a brain capable of rational thought or emotion, the tiny ember that remained of Sunshine’s will and determination began to burn brighter than ever before. A small part of an ever growing flame that wanted to burst from her zombified body and shout to the heavens, “I'm still not done yet”.
However, that fire would have to be put out temporarily since she had five seconds left before “Dead Girl Walking” would either put an end to her short life or leave her as mindless as the zombies she was imitating. Using those last moments her technique would be active, she aimed a finger gun at the group of roaches above.
“Mind Trick: Obedience!”
A good number of roaches stopped flying, and Sunshine’s heart began to pound. She inhaled and exhaled in rapid bursts, drinking in the oxygen her body had been denied just moments ago. Her descent came to an abrupt halt as the roaches swarmed beneath her, forming a writhing cushion against her back. As they pushed her upward, carrying her toward the mountain’s peak, the fire within her—once nearly extinguished—flared to life.
Once Sunshine was flown back to the original battlefield, she saw that Elias was now holding up Benji in the air by his neck, shouting at him. The teleporter’s leg was broken, and Elias seemed too angry to notice that his own cockroaches had helped her land on the ground.
“You think I can go back home looking like… this?”, hissed Elias, his bony hand twitching in fury. “You’re the one with powers, shithead! You have to tell me how to fix this.”
“How the hell would I know?”, asked Benji, clawing at the roach man’s fingers.
“Fine… If you’re going to be useless, then I’ll just-”
Elias’ words were shattered by a blow to the head from Sunshine, making his grip on Benji loosen a bit. To Sunshine’s dismay, the attack only succeeded in angering Elias even more. He whipped his body towards the girl and attempted to pierce her skull with his claws, but she grabbed his forearms just in time. Her knees buckled a little, gritting her teeth as Elias’ nails inched closer to her eye.
While she was far enough to a point where his four other arms couldn’t reach him, the pain she felt in her hip suggested the man had caught her right before she caught his arms.
Bugs, do your job!
It was like the roaches read her mind. Sunshine was about to lose an eye until the bugs came to her aid, driving themselves into Elias’ eyes. He groaned in annoyance, shaking his head, trying to get them off of his eyes.
Alright…
Her hands clenched even harder, and Elias’ arms popped like a balloon. They both jumped away from each other, fatigue slowly crushing their intense resolve. And yet, their eyes were still fixated on each other, aware of the fact that either one of them was destined to lose this fight.
Sunshine dropped her metal bat somewhere on the mountain, and she had no idea where the hell it was. As for Dante’s orbs, she lost them as well. The only things she was wielding at that moment were Elias’ severed arms—arms that he would regenerate soon after he lost them.
The effects of her Mind Break were slowly going away as she spotted some of the roaches were already flying back to Elias’ side, who took up a battle stance. The cold rainy weather combined with the thin mountain air had to have been taking an effect on his bug body. Despite that, he was still hellbent on killing Sunshine.
You really are a cockroach… A stubborn piece of poo… shit.
She had no room to talk though. She wanted to win just as much as him…
If Jesus was the Devil of the Apocalypse, then until she grew stronger, she’d just have to settle with being one of his four horsemen.
The two of them took one final breath and bolted forward. Sunshine pulled her arm back, intent on stabbing through the man’s eyes while the remaining roaches shielded her vital organs. Elias hardened all his fingers, aiming for any body part he could cut off.
*Clap* *Clap*
In the instant both fighters heard the sound of clapping, Sunshine’s baseball bat and Dante’s orb appeared in her hands, replacing Elias’ arms. Without giving what happened another thought, she struck the man’s head downwards with a destructive force, getting her thigh slashed in the process.
Using her other hand, she slammed the orb into his bowed head. Light erupted in the area and, after a painful struggle, Elias’ body was sucked into it, letting out a horrid scream as all of the roaches faded out of existence.
Sunshine tumbled down the ground till her body was abruptly halted by a group of rocks. Her breaths were heavy, as though she was climbing a mountain with a boulder strapped to her back. Her clothes were wet and tattered, like she had been swimming in an ocean full of sharks. She could taste the blood in her mouth, and feel how wet her hand was, how cold every part of her was. Her leg burned and her hip stung.
And yet… the rain finally cleared.
With a tremendous force, she jumped into the air and unleashed a scream from the depths of her soul. A victory cry that carried the pain of her wounds, the determination to keep fighting, and a newfound formula for winning.
A victory cry that ingrained the moment a girl had awakened.
A victory cry that informed the entire world of the name of the girl who would illuminate every battle went in.
Sunshine Hunter.