I won’t lose. I’ll slash this thing apart just like every other slime I’ve encountered.

It has a big glowing weak spot like the rest. I just need one good cut through its head.

Then it’ll be over. Victory fanfare and plenty of juicy experience points for me.

Lightning didn’t phase it before. So I’ll get a bit more creative with my approach.

Swirling. Twisting. Smashing and slicing.

Get off. Stay away. Rip apart.

I breathe in deeply and then exhale sharply.

That air leaving my lungs and releasing from my lips is the catalyst.

The lighting of the fuse. The air begins to warp around me and slowly but surely I can see my surroundings begin to shake. Dust and gravel begin to float and be chucked from place to place.

The winds hear my call and head to my position.

They begin to dance around me like mischievous children.

They begin to sing and with each rotation, they grow louder.

The whimsical whistling slowly turns into a sonic screech that longs to abandon rationality.

“Are you ready to dance? Are you ready to scream?”

I ask the metal slime which had no sign of reacting at all despite the mana I was building up.

That’s fine. I’m used to being ignored. To having my inputs rejected.

I’ll show it the meaning of regret. Personally and painfully.

What air is to me… The sound of shouting. Heard and unheard. Whispered in the wind.

It begins to revolve around me. Things I have said. Things which I did not say.

Things I regret saying and things I regret never having said.

The weight of my words. Released into the wild and wondrous world.

My name is Hibiki. Sound. Echo.

This is the name given to me by my parents.

A wish to listen and be heard. To not make the same mistakes they did.

I look up as I conjure the gales and focus them into my left hand.

My sky. The view I see. My voice. Listen to it... !

I throw.

“Grazing Gale: Turbulent Tornado!”

The metal slime is now surrounded on all sides by a sudden and powerful tornado that traps it in place.

Its fangs sink into the area around it and creates a vacuum that attempts to swallow the prey within the hunting grounds. The mannequin suddenly changes stances.

It’s trying to stand upright and keep its feet on the ground.

“You can’t ignore me! Here I come!”

It cannot escape me! I charge forward and focus. It can’t dodge. Not like this.

One good slash! That’s all I need!

I swing. Ting. The sound of metal meeting metal.

Despite being forced to stand almost completely still the monster blocked my attack with its left fist as if it was nothing. I reel back a bit. Right, so far I haven’t really had to fight anything humanoid or with intelligence.

Being countered and predicted like this…

I feel uncomfortable but I need to embrace the challenge.

There’s no point to strength if it can’t be used properly. If I was just a person who only knew how to dominate those weaker than me… I grit my teeth and click my tongue in frustration.

“Alright, how about this then!?”

I draw the blade back and then slash forward once again aiming for the head.

“Explosive Edge!” Light my soul and my sword on fire!

BOOM!

The tornado catches fire as my attack is launched with far greater speed and power than the previous slash.

It has to take some sort of damage from all this!

I see my iron about to touch its silver face and the cut is cleanly lined up.

In a second it would sever its red core in two!

The slime moves its right arm downwards. It then starts bringing it to the skies.

It all changes so fast. The blazing storm I had conjured and my attack were flipped and turned on its head. Its fist finds my chin and carries my whole body up with a single shocking impact.

The gales turned their ire towards me.

I was being carried by my own tornado that had been made to go in reverse.

I fly and then the gales that had betrayed their master abandon me and this world completely.

I feel weightless. I can see the abyss below me.

I begin to fall. I crash. I fall back on the platform linked to the bridge I had came from.

My body trembles from the force of the blow. I begin twitching like a bug exposed to aerosol.

That one punch was heavier than my magic.

It stings. My pride. My pain. It was rejected with a single punch.

Like it was nothing. Was that all the weight my life had?

So much it could be denied with a lazy uppercut from some mindless metal blob?

No. No. No! I refuse! I won’t believe it!

Despite my pain I spring my body back up yet again.

I won’t allow myself to taste such bitter defeat! My rage begins to overtake and suppress my bruises and wounds.

I grip my the hilt of my sword as hard as I possibly can.

To the point it hurts. A warrior’s weapon was a part of their body.

Magic was the expression of the soul. I need to go deeper. Cut. Deeper.

What can I draw upon to get through to this piece of junk?

What type of attack could be effective? Wait… it won’t expect this!

I stretch out my sword as if it were a stick measuring something and begin to make slow circular motions with it, as if I was trying to cut a hole in the wind.

I’ve practiced this before on the normal slimes.

A method to try to extract the core with a single motion.

Completely intact. Maybe this can work better, especially if it intends on standing completely still.

That element of surprise and the sudden nature of this attack… I’ll bet on it!

I begin picking up the pace. Increasing my speed with each spin.

Push the very same winds I just used around my blade.

This time I compress them. Make them sharper. Hone their rage.

Until I can feel it. This growing gust can rip something apart with ease.

I make one last circular-cut and scream at the top of my lungs as I let the beast of its leash.

“Carving Cyclone!”

My attack fires like a bullet.

I developed this to separate a slime from its core completely.

Ideally, it’d leave just one pile of blue mess and an untouched red core in two different piles.

I haven’t had much success with that, to be honest with myself.

Yet if it’s just to kill, then I’m sure of its destructive properties.

I see a splatter of silver across the floor of the bridge.

The smile is wiped from my face instantly.

All expectations I had for the move were kicked to the curb almost instantly. I had failed again.

It was now missing its head but the red core of life now stood in the dead centre of its chest.

The stump of its neck slowly began to bubble and it grew a fresh new head right before my eyes.

It can move its core? What sort of bullshit is this!?

I can’t take this anymore! I’ll just get up and close and spam everything I’ve got at it!

I rush with all my might and begin swinging explosive edge after explosive edge.

My blade begins to dance. Unfortunately, this thing was a master.

It dodged. It sidestepped. Tilted its head. Moved its core.

Denied me from reaching my target with swift jabs targeted just above the hilt of my sword thus knocking its trajectory off balance. I don’t stop though.

I can’t. I won’t!I use even more explosive magic to redirect my attack, again and again, trying to build more speed and strength but…!

It can block perfectly. It can evade everything I dish out.

I fire a bolting blast? It ducks and hooks my ribcage.

I try to tear it apart with a tornado?

It dashes to my side and whams me in the kidney.

I try a point-blank fireball?

It grabs my left hand and redirects the flames into the darkness off the side and below us.

Then it peppers my body with swift strikes.

Each blow is filled with the power of a sledgehammer.

I persist. I struggle to keep on fighting. I swing and swing and swing.

My reward is another barrage of blows. I’m almost brought to my knees.

Nah. I won’t go out like this. I didn’t come this far to die like this!

I slash with my right again aiming for the core. It blocks. That’s when I do it.

I bury my left arm into its right knee and into its gooey mass. It burns.

It’s eating away at my flesh in a way no other slime has done before.

I ignore it. I want to win no matter the cost. There’s too much on the line.

The last year would be worthless if I couldn’t triumph here and now.

I’ll focus all of my life experiences into one single burst! An explosion that’ll rip it apart from the inside!

“Fireball: Detonat-!”

I feel its arms grip my clothes. Like the claws of a lion into a baby gazelle.

It places its left foot against my torso. It kicks while lifting its arms in a perfectly practiced motion.

All the mana I had built up began to disperse and scatter like dust in the wind.

The world spins into the colours of the cave.

I then feel my body slam against the ground again. I swear I could hear bones breaking.

I was laid flat on my back. My magical metal wall dispels as my body can no longer pay the upkeep for it.

I’m staring at the slime with my eyes. Seeing it upside down.

With its back turned to me.

I then notice something. I’m on the other side of the bridge.

This isn’t the ledge I came from.

I spotted a red marking on a wall nearby. The next floor… is right in front of me.

It didn’t care. It had thrown me past the bridge and it didn’t care at all.

It just stood there in the centre as if it was glued to that spot.

I couldn’t understand it at all.

It wasn’t protecting the bridge after all?

Or… something clicks. It was protecting the bridge.

It wasn’t stopping people from crossing it.

The bridge itself was valuable. It couldn’t care less if I headed to the third floor or below.

I couldn’t stand it. I wasn’t worth the trouble to even kill.

This thing didn’t even consider me a threat and it was right.

I wouldn’t destroy the bridge I needed to cross.

I couldn’t defeat it. I wasn’t even in the same league as this monster.

I felt something warm run down my cheeks.

Shit! Don’t you dare look down on me.

I began to howl like the wounded beast I was.

I force myself to try to get up. Everything is shaking. My vision is blurry.

The pain is trying to leave scars on my heart.

I won’t let it. I won’t let it ignore me!

I bring my trembling left hand into my suit’s inner pocket and pulled out another vial.

I opened it by burying my left thumb fingernail into the cork and dragged it out.

To my lips. I let the red liquid course through my veins.

I could run away. Down this flight of stairs where they could very well be weaker slimes.

I could head back up and grind a bit more and try to win later.

If I did that I wouldn’t be able to face myself.

“Are you ready? The real fight begins here and now!”