The pair stared at one another for a second longer, neither moving, both sizing up the other’s weapons.

Bob made the first move, once his AI had adjusted for the weapons in Captain Sildeth’s hands.

He leaned forward and vanished.

CLANG!

He reappeared in front of Captain Sildeth, extending out his glaive. Captain Sildeth knocked the glaive aside with his mace and swung his sword towards Bob.

Bob took a step back, swinging the Black Blade to parry the blow. He lifted the Avenger’s Crescent Blade into the air, spinning it around in a green disk before bringing it down in an overhead swing.

Captain Sildeth stepped to the side and focused his psionic power onto his opponent’s movements, activating his combat precognition.

And he grimaced.

Bob was not moving on his own, but rather allowing the combat suit to execute on automated maneuvers. It was one thing to read a person’s actions in the immediate short term, their own thoughts and decision making would limit the number of future possibilities. When trying to predict the actions of a machine, however, he had to just read the future outright, the physical world itself. It was hard to separate the electricity moving through the machine’s wires from the static in the air, as from a psychic perspective there was no difference between the two. So there was so much data and variables even the most powerful Vophrae could have trouble isolating useful information. Moreover, the suit had the psychic jammers Kanna had been working on to interfere with his psychic powers more directly. Not much of a barrier to a focused Vophae but enough to contribute additional noise.

All in all, he simply wouldn’t get useful data unless he focused all his efforts there. And his focus was much better spent dodging that deadly sword on approach. He could outwit a machine, after all…

The Black Blade scratched his left shoulder.

He immediately leapt to the right, blasting his own arm away, the heavy mace cracking the stone as it fell from his grip. He grabbed the weapon with his psionic powers, sending it flying at Bob from behind. Bob was forced to abandon his attack as Captain Sildeth caught the mace in his newly regrown arm.

“You’ve been studying, I see. But I can learn on the fly too, you know. I wonder which is faster, me or your machine?”

The two continued to clash, sparks flying as sword and mace and glaive collided over and over. Twice more Captain Sildeth was nicked, dismembering himself to stop the drain.

But then…

Captain Sildeth knocked a thrust from the glaive aside once more with his mace. He stepped forward, catching an overhead strike from the Black Blade with his sword.

And then he kicked Bob right in his chest.

Bob flew back and crashed into the mountain, one of his last few protection enchantments flickering away. He grimaced as Captain Sildeth grinned.

“Looks like I win. Your machine can’t keep up with me after all. It will never strike me again.”

Bob switched back to manual control and rushed forward.

“Profile Loaded: Kiyosuke. Activating Phantom Sword Slash.”

Green and black arcs of light started to appear all around Captain Sildeth. But the alien could read Bob once more. He tuned his focus to the rifts in space, twisting and dancing around, avoiding each of the strikes. He leapt into the air over the Black Blade as Bob rushed forward swinging.

But that was what Bob was waiting for.

He pulled the Avenger’s Crescent Blade back, holding it in a throwing position.

He thought once more of Xiong Huang, of what this man did to her.

Qi roared around him. He focused it on the blade.

The glaive began to glow with a green aura.

The Avenger’s Crescent Blade.

The weapon used by Cao Xinya to avenge his father on Xiong Zhen.

The weapon then used by Xiong Huang to avenge Old Wei on Cao Xinya.

These powerful cultivators had used their qi to engrave a story, an affinity into the blade.

A singular purpose.

And now Bob sought to use it to avenge Xiong Huang, the next in the chain of vengeance.

Though he was not a cultivator, though he was a cheater not worthy of the weapon…the blade acknowledged his intent.

As long as his purpose matched its own, it would allow him to wield it.

No, it would go beyond that. It would help him to do so, to fulfill its purpose.

Bob found the words coming to him unprompted.

“The tiger stalks through the night. The predator’s eyes need no light.”

Bob’s eyes glowed flashed green as the blade sent its own intent back to him.

“THE AVENGER’S BLADE SHALL FINALLY STRIKE.”

Captain Sildeth grinned and crossed his weapons in front of him. He filled them with all his psionic might, the weapons exploding with purple fire.

Bob threw the blade. A shining green star drew a line across the air as it blasted into a purple inferno.

And no barrier would stop it from fulfilling its purpose.

A green blade shattered the might of the Imperium’s smiths.

And lodged itself into Captain Sildeth’s chest.

A green flame engulfed him.

The Avenger’s Crescent Blade shattered, weakened by its collision with the alien’s weapons. Green and purple light twisted together in a mighty shockwave as both alien and weapon vanished.

And Bob fell to his knee, the cultivation furnace running dry. Just one round of elixirs left and his stock would be entirely gone.

He quickly dropped the Black Blade at his feet.

For a moment there, qi had cycled through him, thanks to the Avenger’s Crescent Blade.

And that was enough to awaken the Black Blade’s hunger.

Lead shielding only worked to hide a mortal the blade could barely detect anyways. And once it realized he was there, such a thing would prove no barrier to it.

And then there was a flash of light and Captain Sildeth reformed in the air. He let out a hearty laugh.

“Seriously, you’re just full of surprises, aren’t you? For a person like you to kill me this many times?! I wonder if you’re the ‘minor threat’ that one spoke of?”

He heaved a sigh.

“But…all good things come to an end, it seems. Looks like you’re out of steam.”

“...looks that way.”

Captain Sildeth began to walk towards Bob.

“Would you tell me your name? I would like to remember you.”

“...it’s Bob.”

Captain Sildeth nodded.

“Bob. I’ll remember that. Let me tell you, others may have more power, more skill. But in my professional opinion, what you did here today makes you the best warrior on this planet.”

“...I’m just a man doing what he can.”

“Well put. Well then, this is the end. To think you would even destroy my weapons. I didn’t think that was even possible. I’ll thank you too, for providing an excellent replacement though.”

Captain Sildeth reached down for the blade at Bob’s feet, picking it up…

Bob smirked.

“...got you.”

Captain Sildeth let out a scream as black qi burst from the blade, engulfing his body…

He suddenly found himself in his own mental world, an entire planet’s worth of purple flesh that represented his full psionic might.

“Well what do we have here?”

A black stain appeared on a tiny part of his flesh.

“Endless vitality…a powerful mind that can affect the world with its very thoughts…what a perfect vessel. And yet…”

He heard a deep laugh that chilled him to his very core.

“Not a cultivator? Not even a little? Oh, foolish creature, we are going to have a great deal of fun.”

The black stain began to grow across the purple flesh. The flesh began to glow as the Captain fought back.

Inwardly he grinned, even as his heart pounded with fear. He had entered the fight of his life. The one he had been searching for. A true fight against a mighty opponent, to the death.

And this time, the Imperium’s agents were not here to interfere.

And so mighty alien battled with ancient demon…

Bob smirked as he rose to his feet. There was a reason only cultivators of the Seventh Realm or above could wield the Black Blade.

That was because of the demon sealed inside of it.

Xiong Huang had made it abundantly clear to him. Whatever trick he had used to hide himself from the blade, no mortal could ever be allowed to touch it directly. Even a super with bountiful life force or great power was not safe. For the demon within was the very concept of hunger personified. Any sort of unfocused or unattributed energy, anyone who hadn’t embraced and mastered a concept at a similar level would only feed the demon in their attempts to fight it. Even Xiong Huang herself, having used the Blazing Dragon Flower to ascend, did not feel confident she could fight off the demon completely when they last spoke of this.

So what of a psychic alien, who would naturally grow in power, who could rewrite reality with a thought from the birth of their consciousness? What need would such a being have for disciplined meditation and mastery of concepts? What need did they have to restrict themselves to a single aspect of existence when existence itself was malleable for them?

Why would a race born to rule the heavens seek to defy them?

This was a battle between a natural genius with no training at all and an absolute master of the field.

And Captain Sildeth was especially vulnerable, because he was a battle maniac. He was the type to trade blows, to throw all his power at an opponent and take all the opponent’s power in exchange.

And it was a bad idea to throw his power into a hungry maw.

Captain Sildeth…or more accurately his body began to chuckle with a dark voice. His eyes and veins grew black as the sword fused into his hand.

“Finally! How foolish…such power…such vitality…wasted on a child who knows nothing of the struggle against the heavens. But I’m grateful…for he has provided me with the perfect vessel. Once again, I will scour the lands and draw all into myself, for my name is…”

Bob nodded to himself.

Yeah.

That was enough of that.

He poured his last elixirs back into the furnace, firing it up once more.

He opened up one last scroll.

His hands flashed in preprogrammed handsigns.

Red and purple magic circles appeared in the air in front of him as he activated the emergency protocol.

Qi empowered seals, the most powerful of the ones recorded in the USB Drive of Demonic Binding, leapt through the magic circles, further strengthened by the reality warping abilities of a genie and the death manipulating powers of a necromancer.

The seals wrapped around the possessed body of Captain Sildeth.

“Hm? What is this? Hah, foolish mortal, such a thing is…WAIT NO...”

The seals wrapped around him and shrunk down…

And then they vanished.

Taking the former Captain Sildeth and the Black Blade with it.

Bob smirked to himself.

It had been a serious gamble to get Captain Sildeth to pick up the Black Blade…but a calculated one. He could not win either a war of attrition or a contest of power against a being who could endure a fight with Xiong Huang, after all. Once the Iesnorium missile failed he knew he needed to get a bit creative…

The USB Drive of Demonic Binding had many applications, but well, its number one most powerful techniques were advertised in the name.

So he couldn’t use it to its full potential against Captain Sildeth, psionic warrior of the Vophae.

But he could very much use it against a sealed demon come back to life, possessing the powerful psychic body of a Vophae.

And so the Vophae Imperium’s most powerful warrior, the one who had hunted the mightiest powers of Earth…fell to a faceless minion.