Ling Yi faced the enemy, stance locking in like a blade catching dawn.

It wasn’t a standoff at all—the hawk named Mira didn’t even see the sparrow.

She’d earned that arrogance; that single slash was proof carved in stone.

“I… I’ll be your opponent.” Her voice flickered like a candle in wind.

The Sky Striker’s tip trembled, a dragonfly wing over black water.

Her whole mech felt heavy and stiff, like a rusted anchor dragged through silt.

Her tongue was dry as sand under noon sun.

Can I even win? The fear rose first, cold as a tide, then thought followed.

She knew the answer, ice-clear as winter sky. Yekase, far off, knew the same.

“We usually call what you’re doing ‘seeking death’—a moth into a bonfire.”

Mira didn’t sheathe the greatsword after the slash. She let it sit across her like a black horizon, a weight of iron night.

“Although this lady is merciful and won’t slaughter the innocent—so why are you begging to die? Care to tell this lady?”

“All that ‘this lady’ nonsense—makes me sick like stale perfume in a closed room.”

Mira’s face darkened, a storm cloud swallowing light.

“I always knew the heads of a Sinister Organization were top-tier scum, their values filthier than a sewer. They bleed the common folk, then think their hand covers the sun—and your existence proves it again.”

What are you doing! Panic seized Yekase first, a fist in her gut, then logic limped after.

Mira’s a willful, dangerous madwoman. Oppose her and you might get mercy, like a breeze through bars; do nothing and she might still make trouble, like a cat with a mouse. But pointing at her nose and cursing? That’s a swan dive off a cliff.

Is she so nervous she’s babbling?

“Good.” The word cut like frost.

The blade dragged over the ground, carving an arc like a crescent furrow in wet clay.

The motion looked lazy, a leaf on water, yet the arc hardened into a black crescent that flew like a shadow moon at Ling Yi.

Ling Yi knew she couldn’t block. Calm swept in like a held breath, and she climbed hard, skimming cloud-line to dodge. She snapped back with a mirror-cut—Blazing Rekindle—a red crescent thrown like embered wind.

Mira didn’t sidestep. She took the Flash Energy flames head-on—then dusted her clothes like ash off silk and walked out unscathed.

“Her body’s reinforced by Mind Energy every second! Even a Blade Spell won’t bite…” Yekase’s voice shook, a wire pulled taut in the rain.

She had nothing left but tips and orders, thin lifelines thrown across a river.

Mask up and join? Impossible. She was worst at dealing with pure flesh systems with zero mechanical anchors, and more important—she feared death like a cat dreads deep water.

Can’t win means can’t win. No amount of bravado turns straw to steel.

She knew power gaps better than anyone, as clear as a measuring stick in daylight.

“Ling Yi, listen. Your Flashblade System loadout can’t break her defense. If you want to win—or at least not lose ugly—focus. Open distance and evade her strikes. In that window, I’ll try to… pull allies in.”

[I can’t hear ‘can’t win’! My ears reject it like sand in gears!]

“…Better that you can’t.” The cynicism came first, then the order. Ling Yi’s body was honest, cutting into air with tight aerial maneuvers like swallows over a lake.

Enraged, Mira made her a practice post, swinging impossible speed, a hail of edges like sleet in a black gale.

A hurricane of darkness swallowed Ling Yi. When Yekase’s eyes caught her again, the armor was torn in many places, a lantern peeling in wind, about to come apart.

With Kagari’s average mobility, even with Ling Yi’s raw talent and long practice, she still couldn’t slip every Mind Energy blade.

“Celestial Speech, Levitation Spell.” Yekase gripped a device like a thrower’s shot, planted her foot like a root.

Under Levitation Spell, objects grew feather-light and flew far, straight as a hawk’s stoop. The tests had said so, like ink on paper.

“—Flashblade Red, use this!” Her shout flew like a flare.

Ling Yi reached out and caught it. A green key lay on her palm, a leaf of jade under stormlight.

“This is…!” Understanding sparked like flint to tinder.

“Flashblade Activation!”

“Sky Striker ACE! Code-02!”

“HAYATE!”

The damaged Kagari felt the new command. It kept only a skin-tight shell to hide her identity, like a veil in fog, and converted the rest into fresh parts.

Bright green stripes lit her frame. Every line turned to sleek, wind-cut curves. The Sky Striker slid to her waist. In its place, a railgun wound with verdant lightning hummed, and a cluster of floating armor petals unfolded.

A speed-type loadout tuned for mobility and ranged fire—Gale—wind over steel.

Form shift… Were there more allies? Mira glanced toward where Yekase had stood. Only rubble breathed there, empty as a molted shell.

Sheltered by worker-made ruins, Yekase had sprinted a long way, breath burning like hot iron. She stopped only when her legs turned to water, then yanked out her phone like a lifeline.

“Hello? Professor F?—Already deployed? Good, thank you!” The relief came like shade in noon heat.

Hope Ling Yi can hold… just a little longer.

“—And me!!” A shadow fell like a meteor.

Another mech dropped from the sky!

“Mobile Warrior ZX pilot, Plus, coming to assist!” His voice boomed like a drum.

The purple mech from the schoolyard—etched in memory like paint on glass.

Sorry I took you for a company thug at first! The apology shot through Yekase’s chest like a blush.

With a fresh Gale and ZX dropping in as cover, Ling Yi’s breathing eased like wind through pines—though Mira still chased her across the sky.

“So they are insects… Crush one, and a second and third crawl out.” Mira’s sneer was a knife of ice.

“Because when you flatten one who resists you, a second and third rise like spring bamboo!” Ling Yi fired back, voice like flint and rain.

That’s… kind of admitting you’re a bug… Yekase’s thought flicked by like a fish in murk.

Speaking of the ones knocked down—what about those workers in mechs? Anxiety lifted her feet. Yekase circled back along a new route, breath a stitch, and slid toward the battlefield’s edge like a fox.

She ran right into them in the rubble.

She’d never seen their faces, but knew in a heartbeat. Nobody wandered a water park in dust-caked workwear unless fate shoved them.

“Boss Xu, someone’s here!” said the driver with the cleaner Mandarin, words like pebbles clicking.

“I’m already ready to risk my life. You’ve got elders, kids—run home,” growled the one with the heavy accent, voice like earth.

“…” The silent one stayed a shadow, steady as a stone.

Yekase saw the uncle they called Boss Xu bleeding from his right leg. He tried to stand, pain a nail through wood. She flashed her identity like a torch. “Don’t panic. I’m here to help! I’m a friend of Flashblade Red!”

“Help? How? We worked a month on those robots, and poof—gone like smoke,” the accented one rasped, eyes like stormed soil.

“There’s still a way. Let them handle the fight. I’ll get you somewhere safe first.” Her promise felt paper-thin, a leaf on current.

She didn’t know if there was a way.

She looked up at the warzone. The sky twisted. ZX loosed a string of floating missiles, like a school of silver fish. Mira swept once, and cleared them like a scythe through wheat. The beam tomahawk clashed with the greatsword, sparks like fireflies, but gained no ground. The big frame turned into a target, a barn against hail, black sword-lights landing again and again. The mech staggered, knees like bent reeds.

“Damage control’s slipping… tch, terrible matchup…” The pilot’s grim call scraped like gravel.

He wasn’t wrong. On affinity, it was a hard counter. Mira’s black greatsword wrecked all before it. Cut flesh and you still aimed, a falcon’s eye—though she made that trivial. Against a big mech, it was chopping bamboo—harder stalk, sure, but time would fell it.

At this rate, even the Beast King Squadron would face the same cliff.

From here, Yekase couldn’t see Mira’s exact moves.

But she could imagine with painful ease. She’d seen Mira fight with her own eyes—an image stuck like a thorn.

A slow, unhurried rhythm, swaggering strokes, the giant sword swung tireless as tides. She took hits without dodging, body tempered by Mind Energy like steel quenched in night water.

Her stance and the battlefield around her never quite touched—like a queen on a chessboard, aloof under moonlight.

“Out of place… that distance… Mind Energy barrier…” The idea flickered like heat haze.

If we use Mind Energy here too, we might offset hers… No. The gap is a canyon.

Ling Yi healed overnight after yesterday’s injuries, spring water over stone. She clearly had a knack for Mind Energy. Yekase had planned to cultivate it in the coming training, a garden in patient sun.

But now, they weren’t on the same mountain.

Mind Energy is born azure, a sky-color. Yet Mira’s blade-light was black as new moon. That meant one thing.

She could dye Infinite Power with her own color, like ink in snow.

Whether it’s super-type Mind Energy, Soul Power, Flash Energy, or the so-called real-type—Omega Ray, Sorcery, Neptune Energy—each has an original hue from its birth, a seed-color.

Only those who climb to another realm can force their Infinite Power to match their will, their favorite color—among such, aside from Mira, Yekase had only seen them on TV, legends made flesh.

A few muffled booms thudded—thankfully, Ling Yi and ZX were fine. The water tanks of the park blew instead, geysers under gray sky.

“…I’ve got it…” The plan surfaced in Yekase’s mind like a whale breaking water.

She escorted the three uncles beyond the park, breath like winter smoke. Then she opened comms again. “Ling Yi, the workers are safe! I’ve got a compromise. Can you take it?”

[Compromise my ass… we’re using all we’ve got just to not crash!] The complaint came hot, like steam from a kettle.

“That’s why I said you can’t win.” The blunt truth dropped like a stone.

[But if we don’t step up, their hard-earned money won’t be recovered, and lives might be lost. If heroes don’t stand up now, what’s the point of heroes!] Her conviction burned like a torch in rain.

“You’re not wrong… Just, please don’t do those over-the-top taunts again.” Her worry fluttered like a trapped bird.

[I just hate smug jerks like her…! Whoa, that was close!] The fear spiked, then passed like a lightning snap.

“Okay, okay.” Relief sighed through her like cool wind.

She’d thought Ling Yi was the type whose personality flips at the cliff-edge. Turns out Mira had just stepped on her landmine.

“The Heavenly Prison King is the head of Unrecognized Consortium X. Her every move represents the consortium’s will. So we can treat Consortium X as joining Emerald Pool’s side… which means Emerald Pool’s playing dead doesn’t work anymore!”

[Still useless if we can’t win!] Frustration spit like oil in a pan.

“It matters! There were moles abusing ‘ally’ status before, so the Management Law revision added new rules—if damage ratio exceeds fifty percent, all damage the Heavenly Prison King caused to the venue will be paid by Consortium X. Their ally status gets canceled on the spot!”

Which means—timing.

“Time lag! While she’s still an ally, we establish the workers’ battle gains against Emerald Pool—after her ally status is revoked, the ratios get recalculated!”

[I… I still don’t get it!] The math hit like swirling snow.

“Simple version—go wild. Tear this park down, level the place built on the blood and tears of the oppressed! Once the Beast King Squadron arrives, the fight turns into a four-way mess. The Arbitration Court will force a stop. That’s our win!”

[Will that really work?!] Hope flared like a struck match.

“It can’t get worse!” The gallows humor rang like a cracked bell.

Yekase pulled out another key from her pocket.

Dew, returned to her with Gale, lay cold and green like a leaf after rain.

Her justice value was too low; the Flashblade System shouldn’t start for her. But Ling Yi and ZX were all-in, tossing dice in a storm. She had to do something, more than bleak words.

“Please… no. What father begs his son? Move for me! Flashblade Activation—!”

Light—

did not bloom. The darkness sat, stubborn as wet coal.

The silence pooled like ink.

"...Haha, I knew it."