192 Chapter 99: Death Minute (Part 2)
Dyne: "It seems not much time is left until my death. So, let's begin, shall we?"
He has merely 20 seconds left to win the battle.
And yet, he shows no sign of impatience or worrying at all.
Considering the current situation from a purely statistical standpoint, one would think that Abgere and Gabriel are at a major advantage. After all, if they just hold out for 20 more seconds, they would win the battle and permanently at that.
But, a terror still creeps up in their hearts, causing the Hellfire among them to put up a barrier made of pure and incredibly resilient Psychic Energy on all sides.
And then, in the next fraction of a second of it being put up, it is removed.
Broken, dispersed and completely neutralized, as if it didn't even exist in the first place. The strongest barrier Gabriel Washington could put up suffers that fate.
The Hellfire immediately tries to jump away to save himself from whatever is coming but his legs don't move. In fact, when he tries to pull them with force, they bend and crack like a toy made of soft plastic.
The pain only comes a second after his legs are already turned into butter.
And, in that second, Abgere, who tries his best to attack the artificial ghost attacking Gabriel, finds his arms flying in the air as soon as he takes the first step towards his opponent.
At this moment, pain, fear and anger in their hearts are easily triumphed by the one emotion neither of them knew the true meaning of until now - defeat. Utter and absolute defeat.
They know already that no matter what happens, the remaining 17 seconds are not going to turn the tables in their favour.
They know already they have lost and nothing they do can change that.
And, as if someone is whispering this realization into their ears, again and again, they heads start to burst.
What stops that sensation of their heads bursting in the next second is a simple punch by their opponent, which throws both of them to two different ends of the crater they have been fighting in.
Dyne: "That should do it."
Says the leader of the Spectres as he finishes the fight within a mere 5 seconds.
And laying on the ground, defeated, the two opponents of his return to not being on the same side.
At this moment, having been defeated, Gabriel Washington has absolutely no feeling except that of the pain of having his legs crushed.
But, on the other hand, Abgere feels something more dangerous, something more painful, something more human.
This human pain he feels right now is something that neither Gabriel nor Dyne or any other Spectre can understand. After all, those who were born on the sky can never feel the pain of those on the land, much less feel the pain of those who tried to climb up to the sky and fell short just when they thought they had succeeded.
That is the pain he feels.
Unlike his reluctant ally in this battle, this isn't the first time Abgere has seen a defeat so big. It isn't the first time where winning literally looked impossible.
Back when he saw his mother's corpse, he felt the same.
Back when he saw the murderer of his mother, he felt the same.
Back when he saw the Phoenix for the first time, he felt the same.
He felt that no matter what he did, there could never be a reality where he would be capable of turning the situation around even by a bit. There could never be a reality where he defeats them.
After all, he was a mere human, and they were the strongest supernaturals in the world.
But, then something happened.
Dyne: "What the-"
A voice called.
Was it the voice of God or the Devil? He has no idea. But, it called and asked a question.
Gabriel: "N-no … way!"
It asked, "How much are you willing to give up to gain the power you seek?"
Such a cliche question, as Ethan might say. And yet, at that moment, it was the most important question in the world.
And so, he had answered.
Abgere: "Everything!"
Dyne: "!!!"
Such a cliche answer too, as Ethan might say. But, it was, by no means, a dishonest reply.
That boy was willing to give up everything for that power.
At that moment of despair, he was willing to kill innocents to gain that power, he was willing to make the entire world burn to gain that power.
And, he would have done it too.
If the opportunity hadn't presented itself, he would have removed Ro Garland from his life so the shackle holding him back from his rampage is removed.
If the need had risen, he would have removed Trisha from his life as well to let this rampage continue.
No one and nothing was so important that he wouldn't have given it up to gain that power and unleash upon the greatest Psychics of the world a rage that would change the entire world, for better or for worse.
And so, the voice gave it the power equivalent to his resolve.
Just like nothing was good enough to break his resolve, nothing should be good enough to stop his rampage either.
So, the power he was given - it wasn't Psychic, it wasn't Vampiric, it wasn't Aural, and it wasn't anything else either. It was merely a power to do whatever needed to be done.
There was simply one principle the ability followed: When once faced with the need for some particular ability, that ability would emerge from within him, given time.
Some might even call it the most dangerous ability in the world.
After all, one only needs to face the need for teleportation and they would become capable of teleportation in some time.
One only needs to face the need for Aura Manipulation and they would become capable of manipulating aura in some time.
One only needs to face the need for Omnipotence and they would become capable of-
Abgere: "DIE!"
Dyne: "Stay down, damn it!"
They would become capable of coming back from complete defeat to land a punch of their opponent so strong that no matter who it was, they would be beheaded.
If Dyne had been just a little careless before, if he had not removed his arms completely but just broken them or something, then this moment of Omnipotence would have surely killed the leader of the Spectres.
Fortunately for him, his opponent had lost himself to the shadows of his past and attacked him without realizing that he didn't have an arm he could use to unleash the power of that punch.
And so, with a combination of his unusual luck and his opponent's carelessness, he survived, and his opponent fell on the ground face-first, losing conscious after having exhausted his strength completely.
Spectres: "..."
5
4
Gabriel: "..."
3
2
Dyne: "..."
1
Death Minute ends.
With one ally having completely given up and the other lying unconscious next to him, he wins - technically.
And so, he survives.
But, he can't deny that in that one moment when Abgere charged at him like a beast out for vengeance, the thoughts in his mind weren't of losing his life by being unable to defeat him, but of losing his life by being defeated by him.
Dyne: "... Tsk!"
Only Walter Schmidt had ever overpowered him so much before, only he had shown this extraordinary level of strength before.
Who could this man be?
This man who has no known history and was no one of value before his attack on the Hellfires, how could this man be capable of something like this?
Dyne: "Could … he be … the one?"
Wonders the leader of the Spectres.
Could he be the one he saw in Barry's fiery nightmare, the one who was standing even after the war was over and even after all the powers in the world had fallen, the one who kept hitting Dyne's empty head with lifeless eyes after having won the war?
Dyne: "No."
It seems possible.
It seems the most likely in fact.
But, he's not the one.
Dyne can tell because he knows that the nightmare he was shown was a future his own mind had predicted and shown him, it was the creation of his own subconscious.
And, he knows for a fact that his own mind can not come up with such a ridiculous show of Omnipotence. The programming needed to be able to think something so ridiculous just doesn't exist in him.
Dyne: "Even so,"
That all being said though, what he has seen here still is terrifying. Or perhaps now that he knows that there's another force out there with this kind of power, it's more terrifying.
Dyne: "I guess, we'll be keeping an eye on you, Abgere."
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