In Feng Ye’s mind, Shira and his consciousness form mutter simultaneously. “Perfect Trance!” Shira immediately enters optimal condition as all resources begin to function in its most optimal state. Energy, mental strength, physical strength, decision making, etc. all have precise calculations to provide the peak performance possible within the abilities and limitations of Feng Ye’s current state.

“Particle Blade.” Shira says quietly.

“Bzzt!” An energy blade similar to how a lightsaber is activated appears downwards from her palm which grasps a hilt made with energy. Mito nearby immediately launches an assault with sharpened barrier fragments at the spectre. Multiple barriers of various shapes both sharp and dull form in front of the spectre hoping to slow down, injure, and disrupt the spectre’s charge.

Shira with her increased stats completes three quick forward leaps as agile as a ninja.

Shira’s Stats:

STR 150

SPD 126

INT 195

VIT 180

Her approach to the spectre surprised Mito as each series of movement can be seen to have precise calculations and had was conducted so perfectly as though it were a flawless dance performance. Each jump had perfectly timed Mito’s attacks and avoided any damage from possible friendly fire. This strengths Mito’s confidence as she amps up the frequency and series of attacks.

A stat of 126 SPD (speed) is no joke! Every movement Shira makes leaves behind an after image which is insane in terms of speed. Shira appears in front of the giant enemy spectre and starts to cut the enemy’s right thigh.

As the energy blade makes contact with outer muscle of the enemy, a dark baleful energy pushes Shira back a step. Shira immediately moves to behind the enemy to strike at his back. With a STR of 150, Shira completes a diagonal high strength slash on the spectre’s back. The dark baleful energy which seems to be a protective measure the spectre had placed on himself had appeared once again.

Although this energy was able to disperse some of the strength and momentum of Shira’s slash, Shira was still able to lacerate him. Immediately, a blood red line appears on the back of the enemy. Blood starts to spurt out. The spectre roars out in pain and annoyance.

“Dissolute!” The spectre turns and pounds down the ground where Shira was at. Shira immediately sidesteps avoiding the attack. Realizing that the attack had missed the spectre stomps and pounds the surrounding ground creating an AoE earthquake type attack which causes the ground to be relatively unstable and dangerous.

Shira dashes towards the 10 ft high giant spectre and leaps towards the thigh she had initially attempted to cut and kicks off it, using it to propel herself into the air. She does a backflip and lands on the right shoulder of the spectre. Without enough time to slash again, “Particle Manipulation - !” Shira utilizes the ability and palm strikes downwards onto the spectre’s shoulder. As the spectre tries to react, he cannot catch up to Shira’s 126 SPD attributes. Thus, as soon as the spectre realizes that Shira was on his shoulder, he used his left fist to swipe his right shoulder.

Seeing the left fist approaching, Shira hops off the right shoulder and falls downwards on the side of the right torso. Shira twists her body in a position to allow her to kick the right side of the torso of the spectre.

“Magnetic Field Manipulation - !” As soon as her right foot makes contact with the torso, a large booming sound is heard as Shira is repulsed away from the spectre. The spectre due to their large build wasn’t propelled far, but only merely shifted a few steps to the opposite of Shira.

Shira is repulsed from the body of spectre. Seeing this, the spectre angrily raises his right fist and points it towards Shira. A huge black energy ball forms on his fist and immediately fires in the direction he had pointed it to. This black energy is propelled then immediately, the next energy ball had formed and also was propelled.

Shira who was in midair grasps onto a nearby barrier which Mito had formed to impede the spectre’s movement. This barrier seemed to have an odd blocky structure shape as though it was a pyramid structure on top of a rectangular prism. Shira grasped a side of the pyramid structure and slides downwards to the floor followed by a roll on the ground to break her fall.

The pyramid barrier she was just at immediately shatters as two black energy balls collide into it. As she rolls on the ground, Shira immediately gets onto her feet and darts between the barrier obstacles scattered all about. Her afterimages appear one after the other. Each one appears for a brief split second and then disappears as the black energy balls explode where they were.

***

At this time in Akeno’s office, Akeno sees the scene going in the pool area. Surprised at Feng Ye’s cards in his hand Akeno continues immediately calls over Suzi, Watabi, and Honoka as soon as she knew that Suzi, Watabi, and Honoka had solved the other enemy.

She clenches her fist. “Keep up the good work, backup is coming. Hold on a little longer!”

***

Suzi, Watabi, and Honoka had just finished taking a quick breather after their intense battle and immediately head over to where the swimmers are evacuating. Pushing through the crowd of evacuating swimmers, the three are heading as quick as possible to the entrance of the pool area.

***

Shira avoids the continuous assault for black energy balls being rapidly hurled at her. Each step and leap she takes seems to be in a random unpredictable manner, however, Mito can clearly see that she is nearing the spectre again.

Mito immediately creates large spiked barrier structures to fall from above the spectre. A large barrier with numerous spikes pointed downwards immediately fall on top of the enemy. The spectre has to stop firing at Shira and use both hands to prop up this barrier which is trying to push him down to the ground like the filling of a sandwich.

Using her utmost remaining strength, Mito, despite her mental exhaustion and fatigue continues to apply pressure downwards with her spiked barrier.

Seizing the opportunity, Shira darts towards the front of the spectre and stabs the spectre in the chest with the energy blade. The enemy roars. Immediately, the enemy uses their head, upper back and left hand to prop up the spiked barrier from above. His free right hand immediately pounds to Shira. Leaving this energy blade in the enemy’s body, Shira lets go of the hilt and avoids the attack. The energy blade starts to dissipate as soon as Shira had let go of the hilt.

The spectre angrily covers his right fist with a dark flame and pounds Shira’s position. The position Shira is at is surrounded by flames, thus, Shira had to meet head on toughness with toughness.

Shira holds her ground as she covers her right fist. “Sonic charge.” Her right fist emits a humming noise. She hurls her punch at the incoming large fist.

“BOOM!” A sonic boom erupts. The charged fist of Shira makes contact with the dark flames of the spectre. A competition of strength continues as Shira and the spectre pushes at each other’s fist. Mito seizes the opportunity to immediately press downwards with her spiked barrier as the spectre is distracted slightly.

“ARGH!” The spectre roars and continues to push towards Shira. Shira seeing that she won’t be able to hold up in a competition of strength with this monster, she leans back slightly and uses her left fist to punch towards the fist of the spectre. Using Magnetic Field Manipulation - , she was able to be separated from the spectre by a few metres as she had “repulsed herself away.”

The spectre with his right fist then pounds upwards onto the barrier that he was supporting. The barrier is broken into many pieces.

In a deep voice, the spectre looks at Shira. “I give you that... you are powerful. However, it is not enough!”

The spectre’s wounds slowly recover, however, this time the spectre rips open one of his wounds and with his right hand which is covered in dark flames, he rips some flesh out.

With an agonizing roar, the spectre inserts his fist of dark flames into the wound. The blood in the wound seemed to be absorbed by the dark fire. After 10 seconds of agonizing roaring, the spectre takes out his fist and the wound no longer bleeds.

The flame in his right fist becomes exuberant and starts to dance with life. It is as though it had awakened its own consciousness.

“With a blood offering, a ceremonial dark spirit can be summoned at the cost of a part of one’s lifespan. You have forced my hand.” The spectre mutters.