I'm seeing a lack of stones....Throw them at me like you throw your responsibilities away!
----------------------------------
"Feast your eyes on my most powerful form!" I announced, committing fully to the anime protagonist bit. "In its fully evolved glory! Fusion!"
Blue and orange light swirled around me and the dragon, forming the distinctive Polymerization symbol as our bodies began to merge and energy built to a blinding crescendo.
Everyone on the battlefield had to squint and cover their eyes from the brilliant flash.
When the light faded and they looked back up, they witnessed my new form.
[Image Here]
I was flying under my own power now, feeling the lift and pull of large wings on my back, massive draconic appendages that caught the air with each powerful stroke.
Looking down at myself, my entire body was covered in stylish medieval armor from head to toe, white and blue plating that gleamed like polished steel with draconic motifs etched into every surface. Gauntlets covered my hands, ending in razor-sharp claws.
But the most surprising thing was the senses.
I could hear for miles in every direction, individual conversations, screams and the hum of energy weapons charging. I could see in nearly every spectrum, infrared, ultraviolet and most importantly, I could see the flow of electrical current through every living thing below, their bioelectric signatures painting the battlefield in my enhanced vision.
'Thank god for the Temperance card,' I thought distantly. 'Otherwise I'd be freaking out from all these new senses flooding my brain at once.'
But as my power grew, so did the energy requirements to maintain this form.
I was burning through my reserves too fast, the battery in my hand already drained completely empty. I could feel the hunger starting to gnaw again.
I needed more fuel
I looked around with my enhanced vision and spotted another Robot drone coordinating rescue efforts about two hundred feet away.
With a single tug of my draconic wings, I appeared behind the drone in an instant.
"Sorry about this," I said.
And bisected the poor thing with a single slash of my new claws.
The metal shrieked as I tore through its chassis, yanking out the battery reactor before the pieces had even hit the ground.
I broke apart the casing with my armored fingers, extracted the radium core, and ate it.
The radiation flooded my system immediately.
"Ahh, that's more like it," I said in satisfaction as my energy reserves suddenly replenished to maximum capacity.
Now I could move and expend power freely for at least a few more attacks before I'd need to refuel again.
Atom Eve sent a pink energy blast toward me from below, her face twisted in anger.
I deflected it casually with the armor on my hand, the construct shattering against draconic scales, and watched as the deflected shot veered off course and hit a Flaxan tank instead.
"Stop destroying Robot's drones!" she screamed up at me, launching another volley of attacks.
I deflected most of them, letting a few slip past deliberately so they'd hit Flaxan targets instead of wasting energy.
"Shut it, potential girl!" I called back. "It's wartime and I'm just rationing supplies!"
I flew higher above the battlefield, and now with my new senses and energy problems temporarily solved, I formed energy daggers in the air above me.
The Summoner trait with my Fusion made everything easier to control.
Dozens of them, each one crackling with electrical current from my draconic power.
I sent them down as a volley, targeting individual Flaxans even when they were mixed in with human crowds, my enhanced senses letting me pick out their alien bioelectric signatures with perfect clarity.
The daggers flew true this time, no more amateur throwing, just perfect guidance through my connection to the blades.
They stabbed down with lightning-enhanced piercing power, destroying Flaxan soldiers whose bodies were already aging and decaying from the timestream effect.
Feeling a bit chuunibyou from the sheer spectacle of it all, I let my inner Gilgamesh come out to play.
"Rejoice, green mongrels!" I announced to the battlefield below. "Witness my glory and begone from this realm!"
The lightning-infused daggers rained down like divine judgment, stabbing and electrocuting the invaders whose withered bodies couldn't withstand the assault.
The injured Flaxan leader finally gave the order to retreat, his voice cracking with age and defeat.
I didn't let up, increasing the intensity of my attacks as the Teen Team and GDA agents followed suit, ramping up their own assault to maximize the damage and force the aliens into full retreat.
'Nakime,' I reached out through our mental connection. 'It's time!'
As the aliens started retreating toward their red dimensional portal on withered legs, a golden tatami door suddenly materialized directly in front of the portal.
The heroes immediately went on guard; weapons raised toward this new unknown threat.
I prepared to pour everything I had left into one final attack.
I drained all remaining energy from the reactor core's radiation and fully channeled the Blue-Eyes White Dragon's draconic lightning power through my Blademaster ability.
It all condensed into a single straight longsword that formed in my hands, crackling with white-blue electricity.
The blade crackled with white-blue electricity, power building to critical mass.
I pulled it behind my head in a classic overhead slashing stance, every muscle tensed for the strike.
The tatami door finally slid open.
And Omni-Man himself stumbled through, still heavily wounded from his fight in the Infinity Castle.
His iconic costume was shredded and burned, more red than white now from all the blood. His skin showed exposed muscle and bone in places, covered in dust and debris like he'd been smashing through walls for days. The wound on his ribs was still bleeding, refusing to close. His own exhaustion clear in every movement, barely standing.
Below me, I heard Mark's voice crack with desperate hope.
"DAD!!"
But Omni-Man didn't even notice his son.
Those blood-red eyes were focused solely on me with hatred so intense I could feel it physically, the Mortal Enemy curse radiating off him like heat.
Even through the Temperance card, something cold slithered down my spine.
Primal fear. The look of a predator that had found its prey.
My mind snapped back to that room and suddenly Nolan's hand was around my throat again, crushing my windpipe until I couldn't breathe. The pressure built and built, his fingers digging into my neck like I was made of clay, and all I could think was that I was going to die again, right here, right now while he looked at me like I was nothing. Tears started forming in my eyes fear and helplessness in that moment.
Yeah, I needed to get rid of him right fucking now before he recovered enough to kill me.
"Get fucked, you Inbred Viltrum! And that's a promise from John Kaisen!"
So, I put everything I had and everything beyond into this final attack.
"DRACONIC EXCALIBUR!!!"
A dragon's roar filled the air, drowning out every other sound on the battlefield as I brought the blade down.
The slash attack tore through the air, a crescent of pure blue draconic energy that carved a glowing arc toward Omni-Man.
It struck his already-burned skin and cut a line across his chest, the edge biting through Viltrumite flesh that was too weakened to fully resist.
But more importantly, the massive electrical charge stunned him completely, his muscles seizing up from the lightning coursing through his body, preventing him from dodging or flying away.
The sheer kinetic force of the attack launched him backward through the air like a ragdoll.
Straight into the red Flaxan portal.
My attack followed him in, the energy blade continuing its destructive path into the dimensional rift.
There was a sound like reality tearing.
The portal collapsed from the inside out. My attack overloaded whatever machinery the Flaxans were using to maintain the bridge between worlds.
Dimensional energies imploded as the rift sealed itself violently.
Then, absurd silence followed.
Everyone on the battlefield was either too confused or too awestruck to speak.
The attack had carved a massive valley into the road itself, the pavement gouged out in a gaping maw-like trench that was easily fifteen feet deep and stretched for two city blocks.
Buildings on either side showed stress fractures, damage from the shockwave.
I'd just carved a scar into downtown Chicago that would take months to repair.
I was completely spent, my energy levels bottomed out, every muscle trembling from exertion.
The fusion was dissolving. I could feel it coming apart, the connection to Blue-Eyes severing as Polymerization's effect ended.
I saw Nakime's tatami gate still open below me.
I let myself fall toward it, the armor starting to crack and dissolve into motes of light.
Right before the gate closed above me, I heard a shrill roar of anguish.
"WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM?!"
I looked to my side and saw Mark, bruised and bloody from his evacuation efforts, launching at me at full speed with tears streaming down his face and fury in his eyes.
Our eyes met through my dissolving helmet.
I could only mouth one word.
'Sorry.'
The gate slammed shut above me.
Mark was left attacking nothing but empty air, his fists passing through the space where I'd just been, screaming his rage and grief at a target that was already gone.
I hit the wooden floor of the Infinity Castle and the impact drove the air from my lungs. The fusion dissolved completely, armor shattering into blue sparks that faded into nothing.
Blue-Eyes White Dragon reappeared beside me in a flash of light, the temporary fusion ended. It settled down, clearly exhausted.
I went to my knees, gasping for breath, every nerve in my body screaming from energy depletion.
Nakime's voice came from nearby, soft and respectful as always, but the exhaustion was clear in her tone.
"Welcome back, Master."
Right.
I was finally home.
[A/N]: Support my work and get early access to advance chapters, exclusive content, and bonus material at my P@treon - Max_Striker.
If you wanna hang out, join my Discord server- https://discord.gg/XxGEYk2PM5