His eyes never left Hikari. Not for a second.
KJ studied the changes in her appearance during the adrenaline boost with the clinical precision of a predator cataloging prey. Her eyes burned cyan, twin stars of psychic energy that cast shadows in broad daylight. A visible aura of psychic force coated her body like a second skin, crackling with barely contained power. Her hair whipped around her face as if carried by invisible wind, each strand alive with energy. Most notably, her supernatural pressure had become oppressive, dense, suffocating. The air itself seemed to bend around her, reality warping at the edges of her presence.
So this is the mythical adrenaline boost.
KJ's thoughts were ice-cold despite the spectacle before him.
Very flashy, if I do say so myself. I can definitely feel the increase in her Aura density and supernatural pressure. Not only that...
His eyes drifted toward her arms.
She must have an extraordinarily powerful healing factor. It regrew her arms in only five seconds. Let's see if that healing factor is TRULY STRONG.
In an instant, red energy erupted from his body to match Hikari's cyan storm. The two auras collided in the space between them, creating visible distortions where psychic force met demonic power.
"Feel that, apostle!?" KJ's voice carried across the distance, conversational yet edged with something darker. "That's the supernatural pressure of someone without aura or an aura technique!"
The energy cracked the ground beneath his feet. Fissures spider-webbed outward in geometric patterns. A mini earthquake rippled through the city block. Every civilian within a 250-meter radius collapsed instantly, their consciousness simply shutting down under the weight of his presence.
KJ used his Authority to focus demonic energy into his legs. The concentration was visible, red light pooling in his muscles like liquid fire. He jumped.
The ground exploded.
He rocketed toward Hikari with his fist cocked back, a meteor of demonic force wrapped in human skin.
Hikari didn't move. She raised her left hand, locked eyes with him as he approached, and released a blast of pure psychic energy.
The impact was catastrophic.
KJ flew backward through twenty-five buildings. Some were skyscrapers, their reinforced steel frames offering no more resistance than paper. Some were regular houses that exploded into splinters and dust. Some were apartments where families had been eating dinner, watching television, living their lives until a demonic entity crashed through their walls at supersonic speed.
He covered 120 miles before he looked back and saw a blurry figure glowing cyan.
KJ's eyes widened. "DID SHE GET FASTER!?"
He used demonic energy to redirect his momentum, turning mid-flight to face Hikari. He raised both hands and shot a massive blast of pure demonic energy that lit up the sky like a sunset, painting the clouds crimson and gold.
Hikari raised her right hand and created a massive shield of psychic energy to block the blast. The two forces collided, and the shockwave shattered windows for miles.
Suddenly she heard a voice in her head, clear and commanding: "Rush him. Don't let him recalibrate."
Hikari decided to listen. She de-summoned the shield and used telekinesis on herself to pivot away from the blast, flying toward him with impossible speed. In an instant, she manipulated the matter of the ground beneath them, restructuring molecular bonds, creating a gauntlet reinforced with psychic energy that materialized around her fist.
She punched him in the left liver.
KJ spat blood. The impact folded him in half, his body ragdolling through the air. He crashed into a mountain ninety miles away, covering the distance in ten seconds. The impact created a crater nine meters deep and triggered an avalanche that buried half the mountainside.
"W-What happened... why did she suddenly get so fast..." KJ pulled himself up, blood dripping from his mouth. He looked up.
Hikari floated fifty feet away from the mountain, looking down on him like a goddess of destruction, her cyan aura painting the sky around her.
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KJ simply smiled. "You really are their children~"
He raised his hands in a gesture of surrender. "Listen, you've passed my test. I see you have much room to grow."
"And what exactly is that supposed to mean?" Hikari's voice was sharp, suspicious. "You've been saying weird cryptic shit this entire time and now you expect me to believe you."
"Yes, because if I really wanted to, I could kill you."
"Big talk for the guy who just got his ass handed to him by a schoolgirl~" Hikari said arrogantly, her smirk visible even from this distance.
"Winning or losing, it matters not. What does matter is I wanted to see what you could do. I was a little disappointed. You clearly have much to work on." KJ's tone shifted, becoming almost professorial. "From one Authority user to another, I believe in you."
That made Hikari drop her guard for a split second. But what snapped her back was the tearing noise.
Red fleshy wings erupted from KJ's back. They were grotesque, pulsing with veins of demonic energy, membrane stretched over bone that looked more like weapons than flight apparatus.
"Trust me, apostle. You're gonna need as much belief as you can get."
"Wait, weren't you with the Sect?"
"I was never aligned with them. I just joined to get to you."
"So you knew you'd meet me eventually."
"It was inevitable. You're an apostle in the Known World. You stick out like a lighthouse."
"What do you mean, 'Known World'?"
KJ smiled, the expression carrying centuries of knowledge. "Right, there's so much you don't know. You'll learn soon.”
KJ flapped his wings once, twice, and took off into the sky, disappearing behind the mountain.
Hikari floated there. Motionless. The cyan aura still crackled around her, but the storm inside felt quieter now. Too quiet. Like the eye of something she could not yet name.
Did he actually compliment me?
The question arrived slow and stupid, as if her mind had to drag it up from deep water. She looked down at her arms. New arms. Perfect arms. No scars. No ragged stumps. She flexed her fingers one by one. The joints moved smoothly. Too smoothly. Skin stretched over muscle that had not existed five minutes ago. She stared at her palms as though they belonged to someone else. A stranger’s hands wearing her rings. Lila’s rings.
They were back.
They should not be back.
A faint tremor started in her fingertips. Not shaking. Not yet. Just a subtle buzz under the skin, like static building before lightning. Her chest felt tight. Not painful. Just… constricted. As though someone had wrapped invisible bands around her ribs and pulled them one notch too far. She drew in a breath. It came shallow. She tried again. Still shallow. The air tasted thin. Metallic. Wrong.
Her thoughts scattered like startled birds.
He tore them off.
He tore them off and I screamed until my voice broke.
The girl. The girl in pajamas. Cut in half. Her eyes. Still looking at me. Still alive for those last seconds. Because I crashed through her window. Because I brought him there.
Blood on the floor. Intestines like ropes.
And he said I passed.
Passed.
Like a test.
Like school.
Like I earned something by almost dying. By watching someone else die.
Compliment.
He complimented me.
From one Authority user to another.
I believe in you.
The words looped. Faster. Sharper. Each repetition slicing a little deeper.
Her heartbeat picked up. Not racing. Not yet. Just… insistent. A steady thump-thump-thump that echoed in her ears and drowned out the distant city sounds below. She pressed one new hand to her chest. Felt the rhythm through fabric and skin. Too fast for calm. Too loud for safety.
Everything felt distant. The mountains. The sky. Her own body. She existed somewhere behind her eyes, watching herself float. Watching the cyan light flicker like bad wiring. Watching her own face twist into something confused. Afraid.
What if this is not real?
What if the arms are not real?
What if I am still on the floor in that lobby? Bleeding out? Still armless? Still dying?
The thought hooked into her gut and pulled. A cold wave rolled through her stomach. Nausea bloomed low and sour. She swallowed against it. The swallow caught. Her throat clicked dry.
Lila.
The name cut through the spiral like a blade.
Lila was still in Tokyo. Still fighting. Still waiting. Or hurt. Or worse.
Hikari’s vision sharpened for one clear second. Tokyo. East. She had to go east.
She turned mid-air. The motion felt mechanical. Puppet-like. Her aura flared brighter, leaving a cyan contrail as she accelerated. Wind roared past her ears. She pushed harder. Faster. Trying to outrun the tightness in her chest. The looping words. The tremor spreading from fingers to wrists to elbows.
Trying to outrun the feeling that something inside her had cracked open during the fight. Something that would not close again. Something waiting for a quiet moment to rush in and swallow her whole.
She flew toward the city. Toward Lila. Toward whatever came next.
The footsteps echoed through the city of Shinjuku as she made her way to the battlefield.
"Ugh, I can't believe the Elders got me saving his ass when they made it Naoko's mission to retrieve Sutaro."
The voice was soft and feminine, carrying the lazy drawl of someone perpetually amused by the world's absurdity. The woman it came from was striking and quite attractive. She stood at 5'8" with long blonde hair that falls well past her shoulders, reaching nearly to the small of her back in thick, healthy waves. The blonde is natural, a warm, honey-gold shade that catches light beautifully, but her black roots are always visible, creating a striking two-tone effect that she's never bothered to maintain or correct.
She takes a hit of her THC vape and blows the smoke out, watching it curl in the air.
Misaki's face is striking, beautiful in a way that feels slightly dangerous, like staring at lightning and forgetting that it can kill you. Her features balance delicate and strong: high cheekbones that catch light beautifully, a straight nose with just enough character to keep her from looking generic, and full lips that seem perpetually on the verge of smirking at some private joke the rest of the world isn't in on.
But it's her eyes that truly arrest attention. Bright yellow, not amber, not gold, but pure, vivid yellow like concentrated sunlight or the heart of a flame. They're so unusual that people often do a double-take, wondering if they're seeing correctly or if she's wearing contacts.
"Anyways," she flips her hair, the blonde and black strands catching the neon light, "let's get this shit over with."
Misaki Katsuki, The Gravity Sovereign, has arrived.
To be continued…
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