"How unnecessary…" the man said with indifference. "Even though I told him I didn't need to see such a spectacle…" He sighed as he watched on.

In summary, the exchange was incredibly one sided. Although there were cases when his subordinates slipped up, they were still manageable. The biggest surprise the man had gotten was when two of them suddenly evolved their weapons.

"I was worried that they were hiding their powers, but it was just a survival struggle…"

Hisao was confused as to why they would injure themselves so much if they had more power. He thought it was to catch them off guard, but it turned out that they themselves didn't know. Meaning, they had just awakened them due to being pushed too far.

"Although I'd like to know how two of them managed to simultaneously become stronger, ultimately, it all came down to this…"

While people unlocking new heights when cornered wasn't unusual, not one, but two people doing so at the same time was a little too odd. It could've been just a coincidence, but it was still unpleasant nonetheless.

Even if that was the case, they still couldn't match Geralt. It would've ended eventually but the girl backstabbing the silver haired boy truly signaled the end.

There was one thing Hisao regretted however. If only he hadn't been hasty in attacking this Plasma Guardian as soon as he got news of the other woman's absence. Then perhaps this trouble could've been avoided. If only he waited for Geralt, Splinter and Tanran to emerge before attacking. Then it might've been easier for them to handle the situation.

"No…" he muttered. "If the old man was sent right from the beginning, then Geralt wouldn't even have needed to lay a finger!"

Regardless, there was no use crying over spilt milk. His plans weren't ruined. He had to take a slight detour, but he got what he needed.

One after another, his allies gathered back towards the ropes and ascended. Mission completed.

"Foolish…" he disappointingly scoffed and turned around, heading further in to greet the victors.

Badum!

His heart shook.

Something was amiss.

He didn't know what or why but he felt the urge to look back down.

Badum badum!!!

He hurried back to the edge and knitted his eyebrows.

"UUUWWWAAAHHH!!!" a hoarse, beastly scream was heard.

He was so far up, yet he could see it clearly.

The source of the sound, the silver haired boy, Diavolo, was gushing out an immense amount of energy. So much so, that the shockwave had launched the bodies of Hannah and Arashi behind him away, forcing the weary Randolf to push himself a little to make sure the unconscious duo didn't get injured.

"A dying struggle. It's his last breath…" he told himself and raised an eyebrow.

And yet, the uneasiness didn't fade.

Diavolo on the other hand was assaulted with a myriad of feelings.

The heat from his power, the coldness of his body. The pain of his body being strained after the injury, and the exhilarating pleasure of the power coursing through him. The sorrow and and regret of not being able to protect Suzume, and… the raging urge to burn that airship down.

Fwoop!

He stretched out his right arm.

Shiiing! Blublublub!

As if resonating with his very soul, the utterly burnt, charred and molten Blood Burner that lay at the same place of his initial loss, was being aggravated; from a faint heat glow to gradually glowing brighter and brighter; as if it was on its way to becoming a miniature sun.

"GUAAAHHH!!!"

Fwoop!

It was taking too long. With every passing second, his enemies got closer and closer to their vehicle. As such, before the sword could reach its peak brightness, whatever that was, Diavolo swung his outstretched arm up and back.

Boom!

Immediately responding to him, the sword ignited itself as well as the ground around it as it completely liquefied and flew towards him like a whip.

"Give… her… back!!!" he grunted as the glowing, liquefied sword circled around him.

"Start the engines! NOW!" Hisao ordered.

"GHWAAAHHH!!!" He swung his arm forward and—

Voosh!

The stream of liquefied metal that wasn't completely streamline and looked like it had tumours and bubbles on its surface, beat on the air around it, making a dull deep sound.

Ftap!

It cracked the air like a whip at its end as it could no longer keep going ahead.

There wasn't enough material for it to reach all the way up there. He needed to make the stream thinner.

"GrrraaaAAAHHH!!!" He retracted it back and poured it more energy, forcing it to become thinner. As an additional effect, it made a wider circle around him and orbited much faster.

Fyufyufyu!

The sharp sound could be heard as he saw the airship beginning to move away.

Ping!

His eyes glowed more fiercely as he flexed all of the muscles in his body and swung the metal upwards.

FTOOSH!

It broke the sound barrier and headed straight for the man in the cloak.

"!!!"

Boom!

It struck the edge and completely obliterated it. The metal stream was around as thin as a finger, yet the hole it created wider than the average human body.

Thankfully, Hisao had retracted himself back on the nick of time, he thought. He could even hear anything until the stream had approached very close. He saw it coming ridiculously fast, but didn't know just how fast. It was then that he realized it had shot towards him faster than the speed of sound!

As the stream continued some further distance upwards, he could feel the immense heat emanating from the dense glowing fluid. His pupils shrank as he stared at it, his body hair standing on ends.

"Master!" "Master Hisao!"

The group had finally arrived.

"I apologize! I didn't think another one would evolve his weapon!" Geralt knelt.

"What the fuck is that brat?! Wasn't his weapon destroyed?! How the fuck does someone… do that?!" Splinter shrieked.

"No, his weapon was already evolved," spoke the old man, calmly stroking his beard. "And I could clearly feel him using non-Naturous energy, so my guess is that the lad's weapon is a first generation."

"Then why the fuck is it changing again?!"

"The connection shared between a first generation weapon and its user cannot be charted nor categorized. I've heard of some changing into various forms if the user desires. But what this lad is doing… is probably a completely different stage of evolution."

The stream lost some of its light and retracted back down to Diavolo.

"No…" Hisao regained his calm and said. "That evolution isn't complete. It's responding to him but I can still feel some dissonance. It's a premature evolution."

Everyone looked down towards Diavolo. What used to be a glowing stream of metal circling around him was now condensing into a particular shape into his hand.

"No way… Is it… completing?"

Pssshhh!

As Diavolo grabbed onto what seemed like the handle of incomplete shape, steam started to arise from the place he grabbed onto.

"Kuh!"

He twitched but instantly got used to the sizzling pain of his skin and flesh being roasted. Eventually the shape it took was that of its previous self. It was back to the old Blood Burner, except now, nobody would be able to make out any of its details other than its shape as it looked like a weapon that was freshly taken out of a smith's furnace.

"Drop dead…" he cursed hoarsely. "『Bestial Talon Lance』!!!!!!"

Diavolo tossed aside any control of the output as he discarded the full announcement of his attack. He didn't care. That last attack wasn't enough. And although the compressed metal stream was devastating it was being a bother to control under such circumstances. He'd rather send an energy wave that he didn't need to control once it left him.

But couldn't just shoot any kind of energy wave. Otherwise it'd be too weak and merely be enough to boil water on their ship. He needed to give out his all. The densest form of fire he could imagine and feel. It needed to be dense enough to pierce through even without the effect of the heat melting the metal of the ship.

Although that was wishful thinking, it served as a framework for a devastating attack he himself would stare at with fear and awe once completed in the future.

And thus, he thrusted his arm forward.

VOOOOM!

It didn't sound like an explosion, but it still felt like countless specks of dust and cracks were melting and exploding due to the heat.

The heat wave that shot out was indeed devastating, but if one looked at Diavolo compared to his past, this was a groundbreaking achievement.

That attack was no longer mere fire. That had, in all essence, entered the realm of being a completely pure plasma wave.

In the scientific community, traditional fire was not considered true plasma, since it was caused by 'burning' or combustion, there are various impurities mixed in. But this 'fire' that Diavolo shot out could actually be considered proper plasma. That was because… Diavolo had actually reached the stage of creating matter out of Raze!

As the Razal energy emerged from the gaps of space, rather than entering existing matter and manipulating them, they clumped together and formed the basic constituents of all matter. And it was all happening in the order of attoseconds!

The center of the beam was so dense, and the movements were so fast that distinct and large electric currents flowed and circulated within it, cracking on occasion like the prominence of the Sun. And as the beam went further away, the electromagnetic repulsion forced like-charged particles and ions away from each other.

"Not… good enough!!"

Diavolo subconsciously extended his domain of influence some distance along the attack and forced the beam to stay decently converge before it struck the ship.

"GET BACK!"

Boom!

BOOM!!

A pair of explosions resounded, one from the scattered beam and the other from the slightly converged beam that followed.

Lucky for Hisao's group, there were a number of factors that played to make the attack only graze the ship. The beam being a collection of light ions rather than a dense stream of metal, was easily bent and swayed by the breeze. The moist, humid and salty air served to weaken the beam with impurities. But most of all, Hisao's airship had picked up speed.

It is difficult to explain just how much focus and attention needs to be given to an attack of this scale. Determining how much and of what kind of energy needs to be called forth, accurately figuring out where the energy needs to be channeled, maintaining the structure of the attack, especially when the nature of the attack itself is such that it will break apart, and many other factors needed to be properly balanced out for successful execution. Even if the attack was as simple as 'go forward and destroy', Diavolo could not allow a single slip of attention, or else either his attack would break apart or his mind.

And yet that was exactly the kind of mistake Diavolo did.

It was confirmed that the beam could pierce through. Now all that was left was to slice, or rather 'burn', the ship across.

He whipped the beam as he swung his arm down.

But this motion having required some of his attention, diverted the latter away from converging the beam. Rather than being a sizzling hot stream of plasma that could melt through cold metal, it became a mere hot 'brush' of air that was 'dusting off' the ship. And this occurrence simply helped the ship move away faster.

Realizing his dreadful mistake, Diavolo gritted his teeth and tried to forcefully control the beam once again as he swung his arm upwards. And that was exactly when he had reached his limit, in both body and mind.

Voop!

The attack vanished and Diavolo lost his grip on Blood Burner. He fell on his front and his sword cooled down to its former state, as if brand new.

Both Randolf and Hisao's group stared dumbfoundedly, as the latter heaved a sigh of relief.

"Finally… the little shit is dead!"

"I wonder…" Hisao muttered squinting at the unconscious and limp speck that had caught him off guard now.

"Let's go," he declared and went back into the quarters inside the ship.

The confrontation thus concluded in an utter defeat, leaving behind a single conscious individual who had to help bring back the bodies one after another while staggering.