With some curiosity, Daigo disintegrated the dew dripping off the ladder before climbing underground, closing the silo's hatch above him. He walked through a half-mile long hall, entering the main room. Five rows of control panels were arranged across it, and a chair was at the end of the room, sitting at a dim control panel.

As he sat down, he set his right hand to the control panel, feeling his Revenant's tendrils burrow within it, and took some pride at instantly recreating a second beside it. Lack of age had not slowed him. To destroy Russia had been simple, he decided; other countries were more organized -

- a dark-blue beam from behind disintegrated his right hand without a single ash left, and he turned with the speed of light, standing just as two severed heads landed at his ground.

"I knew you were searching for this." said Mia, one hundred feet separating the two and Ryumi's recorder on her wrist. "You learned after last time that having to destroy cities yourself is too dangerous. You're planning to reverse engineer a way to launch nuclear missiles."

Daigo placed his right hand against the panel as it reformed. "Technological advances have only made it easier to bring about its eventual ruin. This principle of adaptation is one that I have always carried with me, and it remains why I am history's most effective killer. The amount of hosts I've killed, indirectly or directly, surpasses the combined count of you, of every host you have ever known, and of every host you have ever killed."

"Then I only need to kill one more."

"Your Revenant's previous host couldn't. Even the scar she put on me has left me. Nine years ago, my right eye reformed in the middle of an African lake, and I saw myself eaten repeatedly. My left arm froze, but never rotted in Europe, and my legs filled with larva in Russia. Nine years, I spent atom by atom, some as a quadruple amputee who grew another limb when I traveled to a new country, feeling my right leg shove itself out of the frost in Katyn Forest. I have never believed that morals are something innate to humans, and they hold no sway over me either. There is only ethics based in reciprocation. The world has always shown me little empathy, and I show it back. My name is Daigo Yashukure, and I am the first or second resurrected man the world has ever known."

She felt a million presences moving within the walls, and in the next instant -

- a storm of black tendrils rushed out of the walls and towards her -

- but a purple ring of fire burst up around her, and the tendrils burrowed in to the floor; she stomped down and a swarm of scarabs froze the floor solid, seeing a lake of acid form underneath her -

- but another electrical stomp sent a current through the floor that staggered Daigo for a second -

- just in time for a dark-blue wave of flame to disintegrate him in to two horizontal halves, his torso sliding off of his legs -

- but veins & arteries stitched back the two halves, skin forming as he put himself back together again. His hands disappeared, and she felt something touch her back -

- but didn't turn, knowing the organic manipulation was only direct touch. Scarabs ripped the hand off of her, and she felt something stab them as she glanced back & up the hall -

- just in time to see a hundred knives flying towards her; she swept left to dodge -

- but her shoulder hit the suddenly-shrunk wall -

- and the next scene was instant. A flash of purple disintegrated the floor; in to the lake of acid she fell -

- but a coat of water covered her as she hit the surface, diluting the foul liquid, and another geyser of water blasted her fifty feet forward -

- just in time for another geyser to blast her up; her body burned purple and she burst out of the floor to land in the hall again, glancing forward to see Daigo still standing in his initial position. She saw his face move like he was breathing, and in the next instant -

- a blast of dark-blue burst out of her as she swept forward, feeling Daigo burst out of the walls behind; she turned with 10ft separating the two as a jet of water burst out of her chest -

- but a hole opened in his body to dodge it as he lunged towards her -

- but a wall of ice formed behind him; in to the ice splashed the water -

- and a set of Mizuchi's fangs ripped both of Daigo's arms off in the next instant, disappearing as another jet of water hit his face and blasted Mia fifty feet away. As she flew in to the main room, a swarm of scarabs caught her & bit the hair out of her face, smiling a little before all the ground disappeared from the area -

- but the next scene was instant. A sphere of water burst out of her boots and Mizuchi's maw burst out of it; landing on its head, she started losing her balance -

- but one icicle-spiked stomp sealed its jaw & her balance shut, constant sphere of water forming underneath it to keep their mutual position.

'I hope Mizuchi reflects damage.' she thought, stomping with her other boot.

Ahead, she saw Daigo standing in his own patch of midair hall, tendrils creating new material before it could fall. A scaffold of black tendrils the shape of the silo surrounded her. She kept her position for another ten seconds, and in the next instant -

- the silo reappeared -

- and an earmuff of ice formed over her right ear just in time -

- for her left eardrum to explode in a geyser of blood, and she grunted as she staggered back, half her hearing gone and eyes vibrating from the immense sound she heard reverberating with her left -

- and her left eye exploded in a cloud of blood -

- just in time for a familiar serpent to yank her through a cross-shaped puddle at her feet, and one eye barely opened as she landed in her chair at Timepact, Saya's needle writing on her, Aimee's tendrils in her veins, and the last she heard before she reappeared in Yoshkar-Ola was Charlotte joking that at least she'd been deaf & blind on the same side.

Goggles & earmuffs formed over her eyes & ears, immense sound within the silo still shaking but no direct harm done, Daigo rushing towards her fifty feet away. More speakers burst out of the walls as an electrical swarm surrounded her, and she shouted a muted "Pulse!" as they exploded in to green lightning -

- and the quintillion-volt current ricocheted off of the walls & in to every speaker, light, control panel & bit of metal in the area, bolts reverberating as the entire room burst in to flames -

" - Worldwide!" she shouted, and in the next instant -

- twelve orange beams burst out of her and disintegrated twelve holes through the ceiling, steam shrouding her as Daigo came within range, and as his fingers reached to the silhouette within the cloud -

- a swarm of scarabs froze his hands solid, and he grunted as they shattered.

Aboveground, Mia rushed on the snow-covered road leading out of Yoshkar-Ola's ICBM site, the city miles beyond. She looked back and stopped as she saw the ground parting for Daigo stepping out of the silo.

Two hundred feet separated the two again. Worldwide's scarabs swarmed their queen as all the smutty remarks that she had heard over the years crawled up out of the Russian air, leering faces of Armstrong and Auctioneer and Akira, of Chimera and Kirihara and the Chinese representative, of the men in Japan and the students who said she made a lousy president. She gave the past an ear, letting it fill her with spite & anger & every unholy emotion it could because she knew she would be laughing when she proved them wrong and watched his corpse disappear without a single atom left.

At the end of May, she stood upright and knew that the ressurected man separated by two hundred feet would be the strongest host she would ever fight.