["Rivers in the Desert Extended - Persona 5."]
All of the ground in the area disappeared -
- but reappeared before Mia's footing even fell. A single fire scarab exploded on her recorder, and she checked it with 200ft separating her from her foe.
'One sextillion. Nine zeroes more before Solar Beam.'
She kept her eyes ahead as Daigo's tendrils dug through the snow. 'His disintegration can't last forever. He has to sustain it.'
Another fire scarab detonated on her recorder, and she did not like that its temperature was slightly lower.
'…and so do I.'
No heat to waste, she began walking forward as her sword formed. She felt the ground shift beneath her, and in the next instant -
- a cage of tendrils burst out of the ground and around her, more tendrils shooting for her eyes -
- but a sweep of burning purple went through them and disintegrated them without a single ash left, and in a second sweep on the return -
- another set of tendrils burst up to take the blow -
- and the heat melted them in to a black goo that trapped her sword within it; before she could react, another dozen tendrils shot through her arm, more tendrils coming up from below -
- but an absolute zero current went through her blade and chilled the goop solid, and another frozen bash shattered the cage in to pieces; she swept back outside -
- just in time to avoid the hundreds of tendrils bursting up where she'd just been. She tapped her foot as if expecting something, and in the next instant -
- a geyser of water launched her up, and another hundred tendrils burst out of the ground below -
- but she lashed out with a mid-air dark-blue wave of flame that cleared a wide berth through them; still falling, she saw the field of tendrils beginning to sprout below, and in to the new vacancy she landed -
- and an enormous orb of ice formed over her to act as her temporary home. More tendrils outside were trying to badge in, turning the outer walls in to steam; ice scarabs reinforced it, but her space was shrinking with few ways to stun the outside intruders from the inside.
'Daigo will be closer every second.'
Idea forming, she sliced a slit through her frozen orb -
- and a scorching wind came out of it that decapitated the first field of intruders & left their heads rolling off their necks; she glanced back and saw Daigo's hands breaking through the frozen barrier -
- but another geyser of water launched her up in to the air -
- and another, and another -
- and in to another frozen in midair orb she landed, connected to her first by a frozen pole. No time to waste, she rushed out and a bridge of ice formed underneath her as she ran mid-air, seeing the next barrage of tendrils bursting up to go, miles & miles to go before she'd sleep.
Thousands of tendrils shot up and flanked her frozen bridge, but Worldwide's scarabs ripped them apart before they could tap her platform to steam. Behind, she saw a barrage of tendrils disintegrate the outer wall of her frozen orb -
- releasing the steam she'd implanted within it -
- and when one bolt of lightning hit it the current blasted every new tenant in to pieces, Mia laughing a bit before her frozen bridge collapsed -
- but a swift slide of ice formed, and down she slid until she was back to hitting the ground running. Bits of tendril gore were scattered in the snow, and looked back to find Daigo a hundred feet away from her, his tendrils burrowing underground again -
- and all the ground disappeared from the area -
- then flashed in to re-existence once her boots were trapped within it; a dozen tendrils stabbed through her legs -
- but a swift set of fire scarabs disintegrated her blood before the paralytic could travel; the ground disappeared -
- then reappeared; another stab through -
- and another disintegration, ice scarabs trying to block her open wounds as the ground disappeared -
" - W-Worldwide." she grunted, and an electrical current claimed her body as the tendrils stabbed her again -
- and she felt them cover themselves in insulation before the ground reappeared. She swept back up to the snow, grunting as she disintegrated more blood out of her legs, knowing she'd need a better counter soon. Head reeling, she saw Daigo rushing towards her fifty feet away. Her palms swept forward and a Frozen Ray erupted from her palms, forming a wall of ice ahead of him that blocked him for a few seconds, Mia still staggering away as she heard him break through it.
Frozen scarabs sealing her wounds, she regained her pace as she ran, thinking of her next counter as an enormous slice of hear hit her back; she turned -
- and her eyes melted in to white & red liquid; a Frozen Ray erupted from her palms -
- and all she heard was something shattering before she was back in her seat at Timepact, Saya's needle writing on her, Aimee's tendrils in her veins.
"N-No." she coughed to Akira across the table, sight returning. "N-Not yet."
"You've got this." said Serena beside, streams of fog refilling her blood.
"Time Spiral?" muttered Aimee and Mia shook her head, no need to put the world ten seconds back.
"N-No. S-Second."
Akira felt every drop of water separating her from Russia. A face shoved itself in to the Kolyma River. "I see several drop-off points away from it."
"G-Goggles." coughed Mia.
Yuruko handed her a pair of black goggles, and Mia put them on before nodding to Akira & reappearing in another section of Yoshkar-Ola, 300ft separating her from Daigo and the five suns still scorching above him.
A bit of nausea came over Mia as she glanced in its direction, the immense heat threatening her eyes again -
- but the next scene was instant. A swarm of scarabs dug under the snow, then pulled up a wall of it as she shouted in Daigo's direction -
- and judging by the shout of surprise she heard on the other side, the snow had reflected the light back on to him; she felt the heat disappear as she shoved her face through the snow -
- and laughed as she saw the five suns disappear, Daigo's eyes leaking down his cheeks and his hands clawing at his burnt face. She disintegrated her goggles as his tendrils rushed to form a hallway connecting him & her -
- that soon turned literal, hall of faintly blue & glowing metal trapping the two -
- and Mia knew what element it was as soon as the enormous wave of radiation hit her; she hunched over and a swift spray of purple disintegrated her bile before it could hit the floor, her skin flaking & her eyes bleeding. Another spray of purple disintegrated an exit -
- but another swarm of tendrils refilled it before she could sleep out, and more bile rose in her chest as she staggered forward.
'P-Polonium. I-I have to make *him* not want to b-be here.'
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With the walls beginning to shrink, her palms swept our and three Hydro Jets erupted out of them, turning in to steam as they flew towards Daigo -
- but insulation-coated tendrils rushed out of the walls to block it -
- just in time for a superheated jet of steam to burst right through them like nothing had been there at all; another jet of steam ripped Daigo's right leg off and sent burn marks all over the rest of his body, screaming in pain as it reformed.
Keeping her palms out, another jet of steam erupted from her palms -
- but fell to the floor instantly, and she realized it a second too late -
- her skin became heavy against her skeleton and shoved her to the ground, her organs beginning to fold & her lungs starting to crumple -
" - W-W-"
- but a swarm of ice scarabs chilled the air around her to absolute zero, letting her stand in the pressure even as her skin was recovering. A Tri-Swarm Raid gave her air.
'Temperature and pressure. C-Correlated.' She winced, seeing Daigo barely standing ahead. 'S-So much f-fucking weight outside.'
More ice scarabs formed a coat around her, the pressure lowering as the temperature did, polonium walls starting to crack under the immense weight outside. Daigo's ribs burst out of his chest, and she saw him grunt as the weight folded him to the ground, his fingers crumpling. More bile leaked between her lips, but she knew his organs would last longer than her supply of scarabs.
Cautiously, she swept her palms forward, and a dark-blue beam erupted from her palms and over Daigo's body -
- and the temperature-enhanced pressure crushed him in to a paste of blood & gore & guts that couldn't even explode, weight disappearing as Mia stood unhindered again, still wearing her cloak of ice scarabs to ensure she'd decompress properly. A slash of purple went through the wall and she rushed as fast as she could out, seeing the hallway of polonium disintegrate behind her as she ran in the city's direction.
Daigo's pieces slithered together again. Tissue stitched themselves and formed organs, the pressure having temporarily detached his tendrils. Patches of blood rose out of the snow.
"I suppose that answers the question about God and the stone." she muttered, wondering what that made her. A fire scarab exploded on her recorder. "…one septillion. Six zeroes more."
Trees flanked her as she ran on to another path, and the main city was still miles ahead. She held her sword up and a dark-blue circular wave of flame burst out of it that left nothing.
"I need to keep my temperature up." she muttered, another dark-blue wave. She turned once she was 200ft away from Daigo's nearly-reformed body, tendrils reattaching to drop out of his reforming spine and burrowing underground.
Underground, she felt miles of black shifting underneath her. She slashed down with another wave of flame that disintegrated a slit showing one part of the web of tendrils forming beneath her. One of Worldwide's scarabs nibbled her neck as she kept herself braced, and one finger pet it as it screeched.
She saw the tendrils go taut, and in the next instant -
- thousands of tendrils burst up around her like a field of tall grass -
- and turned literal in the next; she lashed out with another wave of flame to clear her vision, but the tendrils turned white as the heat hit them -
- melting in to clouds of gas descending upon her -
- but a wave of steam burst up from the slit she'd carved and blasted them all up & away. Through the field ahead, she saw his figure moving as hundreds of tendrils shot towards her -
- but a flash of purple disintegrated the ground beneath her, and in to the sudden hole she fell, slide of water slickening her pace as she slid & burrowed underground.
Every few seconds, she formed a three-pronged fork and sent steam down the paths she didn't take. Scarabs burrowed in to her frozen ceiling to alert her if Daigo was nearby, and tendrils tried to grab her but only ate puffs of purple that charred them alive.
Somewhere above her, she felt a scarab explode and Daigo scream in pain, and in the next instant -
- all of the ground disappeared from the area; she fell with a 1000ft drop below -
- but a swarm of scarabs flew underneath their queen and formed a hovering platform, royalty stumbling for a second as their wings readjusted.
The web of tendrils that had been the ground surrounded her, some still chasing after her clouds of steam, and Daigo was above & forward with 300ft separating them in both dimensions. Tendrils formed a bridge underneath him as he moved towards her, and more of them shot towards Mia -
- but more scarabs froze them solid, fire & electrical scarabs forming the bulk of her platform as more tendrils rushed towards her -
- but only caught spiked & frozen walls for their troubles, platform beginning to shrink as more tendrils attempted to breach it. Frozen corpses fell and formed new barriers, ice scarabs nodding from scarabnecks that were stained with water. At the center, Mia slashed through another set of tendrils bursting through the frozen barricades, and above, another storm of tendrils shot above her, then down to her and ripped her sword out of her hands -
- but three maws of Mizuchi burst out of it and ripped the interlopers in to pieces, disappearing as Mia disintegrated the excess water on her blade. Another swarm of scarabs built the ceiling of the corpse-covered orb of ice, but one tendril burst through the southern wall -
- and Mia coughed as the air began to corrode her lungs; a Tri-Swarm Raid gave her air as Daigo burst in from the north wall, and as his hands lurched towards her -
- three pillars of scarabs claimed his body, pincers ripping the skin off from his blood as they screeched, his flesh falling to the ground -
- and she swept to the side just in time for her eyes to turn back and see him reforming five feet away, his hands lurching towards her again -
- but a bolt of lightning burst out of her palms and blasted his chunks of gore all over the walls, another coffin of ice trapping him as she ran as fast as she could out of the frozen orb -
- just as all the ground reappeared in the area.
Corpses of black tendrils covered her path ahead, twitching like a deathless nightmare as she rushed over them. A single fire scarab detonated on her recorder, and she checked it quick.
'One octillion. Three zeroes more.'
A second fire scarab exploded on it, and she enjoyed that it was hotter than the first.
Once again, she turned back with two hundred feet put between them, seeing his tendrils slither back to his body as his organs dripped out of their frozen prison, then reformed to his stature.
A third fire scarab exploded on her recorder, and a few wounds reopened. Rivulets of boiling blood ran on to the snow, disintegrating holes that more drops filled with ice. Before refilling her wounds, she saw another drop leave a scorched ring in the snow.
She watched Daigo's tendrils lift him in to the air, and frowned as they formed a tower that soon shrunk in to a spot of black in the sky. All of his tendrils left the area, and the tower disappeared.
For a moment, she worried he had fled -
- an icy prison formed over her just in time to shield her from the atomic bomb dropping outside, another two following -
- and a flash of purple kept her safe as she swept out of her prison, dark-blue Solar Beam disintegrating the next rain with no sight of her foe she knew was far above -
- just in time for another icy prison to form over her.
'I thought it was going to be a few, not a fucking…' She sighed, hearing twelve nuclear bombs detonate outside with shockwaves that ripped the snow off the dirt and left it bare. '…Ryumi had to deal with this. What did she do?'
More explosions cracked her ice, and she heard buildings become ruins in the distance.
'The radiation'll leak in to the atmosphere.' She looked up. 'He's dropping them all at once.'
Waiting for a pause in the pattern, she swept out of the ice as all of her electrical swarms collected around her plans sweeping skyward & an enormous bolt of green lightning shot out of it, rushing towards the spot of black in the blue -
- and another ten bolts forked off of it as more atomic bombs dropped out of the air -
- and another ten, and another, and another septillion-volt current arcing between their cases & shattering them before they could detonate; more green lightning rushed out of her hands and in to the sky -
" - LIGHTNING STORM!"
- arcs of green lightning rushed between the air and filled the clouds with electricity, more bombs fell in to the leviathan of green but shattered before they could burst. Dozens of atomic explosions burst out of his spot of black, the pressure of the enormous storms pushing each other back. The air became conductive as its clouds melted in to steam and disappeared, and a web of black unfurled to smother the miles-wide current -
- but the next scene was instant.
"WORLDWIDE - SUN RAYS!"
Twelve dark-blue beams burst out of her body, millions of fire scarabs escorting them in to the storm, carving & sweeping through miles & miles of Daigo's tendrils, disintegrating them without a single ash left at the source as they fell in to the storm and disappeared -
- and as she saw his body fall, her sky parted to let him land, rushing in his direction with no time to waste. Sheets of ice upped her pace as she skid & slid, her eyes focused on the locus of the resurrected man descending from air. All of her fire scarabs collected around her body, and one exploded on her recorder as she kept her pace up the road that Daigo's body soon made a dent in to.
One hundred feet separated the two as his bones burst from his body, then instantly reformed as he began rushing towards her; his body disappeared -
- then reformed 10ft closer, and as she swept her palms forward -
" - Worldwide - Absolute Hot."
A dark-blue beam erupted from her palms and pierced through him, and a scar formed over his body that staggered him as the scorching ray peeled his skin off. The remnants of his tendrils left him as he reformed ten feet closer, and millions of fire scarabs surrounded her ray as he ran towards her.
She stood her ground as twenty feet separated the two, Diago disintegrating & rapidly forming ahead of her, burning flesh torn off of bones turning to ash but reforming again. He moved like a man in a deathless nightmare towards her, his arms fell in to the dirt as five feet separated them. He lunged towards her with his body nearly gone, a one-fingered hand crept through her breath, her eyelashes turned gold -
- and her recorder shattered as a flash of purple erupted from her palms, light shining down and covering her ray of orange & white & blue -
- and disintegrating Daigo without a single ash left, trees in the distance shrinking slightly.
Her heart reeled with sickness. Her aim staggered and she cursed as her purple ray faded. Blood ran down her face; her veins filled with fire. A single ice scarab crawled on her neck as all liquid disappeared from the area and an explosion of purple & white & blue & orange burst out of her head as it slammed against the ground.
Worldwide crawled away from her as her back sank in to ground too scorched for even dirt to grow, the solid rock that wrapped around her as she laid. Purple spirals drank away the sky and blue clouds peeled off the white. Russia's Ring was absence - there were no features that grounded her eyes. Avalanches of branches fell off of their homes before fading in to a growing barrier of purple that created nothing. She became sick, and all difference between one mile and five million faded.
The ground disintegrated. Hairs of stone were swallowed by white wisps, then disappeared with no smoke.
As her temperature lowered, her body burned orange away from the crater above her, and her weight detonated an underground scarab of ice.