Silence had vanished. The air itself vibrated, thick with a heavy, unnatural pressure. The monster, kneeling, seemed to waver under the weight of its own fury. But no one dared to rejoice.
Purple blood still oozed from its open wounds. Its skin pulsed in places, as if it were breathing—alive. Its deformed eye trembled, slowly growing. Its muscles bubbled, swelling beneath the flesh.
"He's... changing?" Lima murmured.
"It's not a full transformation," Ezra muttered. "But that's not a good sign."
They were still standing. Four of them, still on their feet despite everything. Each bearing their wounds, their limits, their doubts. But none had fled.
Kohaku, her left arm half-numb, kept her eyes locked on the creature. She still held both her short blades, despite the blood dripping between her fingers. Her breathing was short. Exhausted. But steady.
Lima knelt down briefly, placing a hand on the ground. Small shards of ice slithered across the rubble, ready to strike.
Ezra stared at the monster, fists clenched. His illusions were becoming unstable, blurry, but he held on.
And Keita, slightly apart, watched the scene, panting. His injured ankle throbbed with every step. But in his eyes, there was no fear anymore—only resolve.
The monster raised its head.
Its eye widened further. The pupil stretched, slit-like, reptilian. A dark vapor slowly seeped from its pores. The breath it exhaled made the walls tremble.
"It's starting…" Kohaku whispered.
"We haven't weakened its body enough," Ezra replied. "It's gonna be stronger, faster. We won't last if it shifts to its true form."
Lima closed her eyes.
"Do you think the plan would still work like this?"
Silence.
Then Kohaku, curtly:
"There's no perfect plan. But if we don't use it… we die here."
Ezra nodded slowly. He looked at Keita.
"So what are we waiting for?"
"We wait until it moves," Kohaku whispered. "It's too unstable. One wrong move and we're dead."
The monster stood in one swift motion, as if it had heard them. Its body unfolded. Bigger. Broader. The purple veins throbbed at the surface of its skin.
It roared.
A shockwave burst from its throat, shattering already cracked windows, splitting what remained of the walls.
The four withstood it as best they could. Lima stumbled backward, blood dripping from her right ear. Ezra dropped to one knee. Kohaku staggered, grabbing onto a broken pole. Keita… fell to his knees.
"We're not gonna hold…" Lima whispered.
The monster began to walk.
One step. Two. Slowly. Like a predator confident in its strength.
Kohaku straightened.
"We go now."
Ezra wiped the blood from his forehead, looked at Keita, then at Kohaku. He nodded. Lima did the same, silently.
Keita rose to his feet.
He looked at the monster. Then at his teammates.
He took a deep breath, clenched his fists.
And said calmly:
"I'm going."
The words dropped in the heavy air like a war bell.
Keita slowly stood up, his leg still unstable, jaw clenched.
"We'll only get one chance," he added, without looking away from the monster.
The giant, still on its knees, groaned with a guttural sound. Its back distorted, muscles rippling like waves, and dull cracks accompanied the brutal growth of its arms. The deformed eye now glowed like a pearl of lava. There was no humanity left—not even imitation. This was no longer an ordinary monster. It was a beast on the brink, a titan driven to agony… and rage.
Ezra stepped back slightly, hand over his abdomen, trying to stabilize one last illusion.
"Remind me… the plan?" he murmured.
"We fake a retreat," Kohaku replied. "Keita provokes him, draws him away from us."
Then... we strike. All of us. At once.
Lima nodded silently, frost forming around her arms.
Keita took a deep breath. He felt the weight of their gazes. And the weight of a crazy bet.
He sprinted.
Not fast. Not strong. But enough to make noise.
He purposely hit a car wreck, knocked over a metal panel. The clatter caught the monster's attention.
The deformed eye turned. It saw him.
"Come get me, you freak!" Keita yelled, running out in the open.
The creature screamed. A shriek so sharp even the rubble seemed to tremble. It lunged.
Keita ran. Limping. Dodging. He leaped over a piece of wall, slid between two broken pillars, rolled on the ground, and stood back up.
The monster's fist struck just behind him, carving a crater.
Ezra emerged from the shadows, conjured three copies of Keita running in different directions. The beast roared, confused, and struck one of the fakes, which vanished in a flash of sparks.
Meanwhile, Kohaku opened a portal against a wall, sending Lima through. She reappeared higher, on a metal beam.
There, she created a massive ice spear—the biggest she had ever made. Her fingers were freezing, but she held on.
"Ezra, give her a line of sight," Kohaku whispered through her comm.
Ezra obeyed.
Keita slowed down, slid smoothly beneath the monster's arm, and stood right in front of its eye. The illusion dissolved. It was him, in the flesh.
"NOW!" he shouted.
Lima threw her spear.
It flew like an arrow, slicing through the air charged with static. It struck the monster's secondary eye, piercing the deformed cornea, shattering it with a sound like organic glass.
The monster screamed. A scream beyond human. It reeled back, swinging blindly.
Keita shielded himself behind debris, but a wave sent him tumbling. He crashed, rolled for several meters, and landed near a wreck. He gasped. His arm was bleeding, but he was alive.
Ezra shouted:
"Hit him while he's disoriented!"
But no one moved at first.
The monster's cry wasn't just a scream. It was a signal.
A vibration. An emotional shockwave. As if rage itself had taken form.
Kohaku dropped to her knees, breath caught in her throat.
Lima clenched her teeth, holding her head.
Keita tried to move, but his body wouldn't respond.
A heavy silence fell, broken only by inhuman growls.
The monster, now wounded in its deformed eye, slowly raised its head. The other eye, tiny, was streaked with black. Its breathing sounded like an engine about to explode.
Keita spat blood, then slowly stood up.
"He's… still here…"
Ezra, pale, released one last illusion:
"And he hasn't fallen yet."
The ground still shook. But this time, it wasn't from a footstep. It was the announcement of a disaster.
The monster bled, panted, burned with rage. Its pierced eye leaked violet acid that ate through the stone. Its arms stiffened, its muscles snapped like they wanted to explode. It breathed with such force the air wavered around it.
In front of it, four exhausted figures. Nothing heroic in their stance. Just teenagers standing, out of breath, with too many wounds and too little strength.
Keita, Kohaku, Ezra, Lima.
There was no plan left. No strategy. No luck.
Only raw instinct—to survive one more minute.
"He's going to wipe us out…" Lima whispered.
"Then we fall on our feet," Kohaku replied, without even looking at her.
The monster roared.
It charged.
Not in pain, but in triumph. As if it knew they had nothing left. And it was right.
Ezra tried to create an illusion. The image flickered, then vanished in a burst.
Kohaku opened a portal, but the energy failed her. It collapsed, half-formed.
Lima raised an ice shield, which exploded before the monster's fist even touched it.
They all backed away. Breathless. Trembling. Trapped against scorched ruins.
And the monster arrived.
The first blow struck Kohaku's shoulder. She was hurled against a wall, stayed pinned a moment, then collapsed, unable to rise.
"KOHAKU!" Keita shouted.
But a massive hand then struck Lima, who tried to dodge… too late. She rolled on the ground, blood at her lips. She didn't scream. She couldn't.
Ezra rushed toward them, tried to shield Kohaku, but the monster kicked this time, almost crushing him. Ezra managed to roll aside just in time, but his leg snapped from the impact.
He screamed.
Only Keita remained standing.
A teenager with no powers. No weapon. No plan.
And no solution.
The monster stared at him. Slowly. Its remaining eye gleamed with a sick light.
Keita stepped back, arms raised. He looked at Kohaku, still breathing. At Lima, unconscious but alive. At Ezra, crawling toward debris for cover.
And he clenched his jaw.
"If it's me you want… then come. BUT YOU TAKE ME!"
He ran.
Limping. But straight at the monster.
The colossus answered with a roar. It raised its arm and struck.
The blow sliced the air.
And Keita was lifted from the ground, thrown several meters into the air like a broken doll. He crashed into a truck shell, denting the metal, then hit the ground hard, motionless.
A deathly silence fell over the ruins.
Ezra froze.
Lima opened one eye.
Kohaku, gasping, slowly raised her head.
And they all saw Keita's body, limp, curled in a pool of blood.
"…Keita…" Ezra whispered, voice tight.
"No… no… no…" Lima sobbed.
"You can't… not now…" Kohaku murmured, trembling breath.
The monster, meanwhile, raised its fist again, ready to finish off the survivors.
But something, somewhere, broke.
Kohaku screamed, got to one knee, grabbed a bloodstained blade and threw it with all her strength. It missed.
Lima, bleeding hands, dragged herself forward, summoned one last ice spike.
Ezra, with one hand, projected Keita's image—standing, staring the monster down as if he had never fallen.
And that illusion drew the monster's gaze for just one second.
One second was enough.
Kohaku, in a final burst, leapt and sliced the tendon in its right leg.
Ezra struck with a chunk of white-hot metal.
Lima stabbed a spike into the already-cracked flank of the giant.
And it screamed.
A heart-wrenching cry—more human than any before. A cry of collapse. Of ending. Of despair.
It staggered. Stepped back. Then collapsed, crushing the ruins in one last quake.
Silence.
No cheers. No victory. Just… the fall. And the emptiness.
Lima dropped to her knees. Ezra collapsed beside her. Kohaku, still on her feet, swayed, eyes blank.
Yuna arrived. She ran, saw the bloodied body, and froze.
She dropped.
"No… no… not you… not now…"
She laid a hand on him.
He didn't move.
His heartbeat was faint. But his skin was cold.
"Answer me… ANSWER ME!" she screamed.
No one spoke. Even the wind had stopped.
Then she screamed.
"NO!!!"
A green light burst from her body, burning and gentle at once. The rubble trembled. The sky darkened. A hum filled the air.
Keita's body was struck by an invisible wave.
And the light kept growing.