Chapter 103 Debt Collector
Despite being at least 100 years old, Fang Shan looked startlingly young, no more than someone in his early 20s. His long, silken hair cascaded down in light blue waves, framing a peerless face that was pale and delicate as fresh snow, with dark blue eyes constantly radiating a sharp and unyielding presence.
In his hand, he carried a sword. A shiny polished blade that gleamed under the dim light, with intricate Chinese incantations curling down its hilt. But what really drew Dante's gaze was the aura-- The feral blue glow from Fang Shan, swirling in dangerous pulses that made the air around him crackle.
Fang Shan moved forward, with every single step measured. His footwork was so smooth he seemed to Dance. He stayed close to Katley, positioning himself as both shield and sword.
Silence blanketed the field as Dante and Fang Shan locked eyes.
Around them, the rest of the Limit Breakers circled, waiting like hyenas; going against the pink demon by themselves would be suicide, perhaps if they came prepared to "Hunt" an Aspect, but Katley had never warned them they'd be going after a high-ranked Aspect today.
Dante faced Fang Shan, feeling the weight of this new player. No words came out of any of them; they didn't need any because actions speak louder. His muscles tensed, coiling like springs as he prepared to lunge. But before he could move, a powerful voice rang out.
"Heavenly Twin Dragons: Red Sundered Reality Thrust!"
Fang Shan's blade flashed forward with blinding speed, cutting through Dante with a force that warped the very air. The world twisted as his body shattered, his limbs, chest, everything severed into neat, impossibly small cubes of meat. Yet Fang's relentless assault did not cease. With another graceful flick of his wrist, the tiny cubes were finely sliced until Dante was no more than dust-- a simple pink mist dissipating in the air.
...
'Was that it...?' came to the mind of everyone except Katley.
The silence hung for only a moment before Fang Shan's prideful voice pierced it again, filled with disappointment. "This simple woman...? had been troubling you for a while to the point of calling the entire team over our main mission? Pathetic-"
But just as his dismissal filled the air, a crackling tension ripped through the space beside him. Fang Shan's eyes suddenly widened as he concentrated more energy onto his sword, forming an ethereal shield beside him.
"DISTANCE! SEQUENCE! DIMENSION!"
Fang Shan was now under Katley's grasp, and just as he was about to angrily yell at her for placing him in a position below him, the world CATastrophically fractured in a blur where he just stood, cracking with a thunderous rumble as a violent purple rift tore open, widening between them.
Across the shattered space, the fragmented pink remains began to slowly form cubes, then the cubes shaped themself and joined, slowly materializing into the pink-haired girl again. The fractured place began to slowly crack more and more until it exploded in a confetti rain and looked normally again.
Fang Shan, seeing how the Aspect was still alive, realized the problem and said, "Oh... You are fighting a meat wall!" His gaze flicked dismissively to Katley, "But why did you erase those other two concepts?"
Katley's voice was breathy under the heavy strain, but she forced the words out between short breaths. "Listen... We had been fighting her for a long time. You are just waltzing in to beat a dead dog, and she simply was about to go all nuclear and kill everyone near her."
Fang took the sentence too literally and, confused, mumbled, "What...? She doesn't seem to posses technological weapons; how can that happen?"
Katley's initial irritation melted away as she spoke, "It's… a metaphor, genius. I just erased the concept of dimensions and sequences to erase all of her actions and change the world to prevent the ability... It cost me 33.33% of my entire mana reserve."
The second Fang Shan entered the fight, the ambiance gave a 360 turn, and now Katley and Fang Shan were comically speaking with each other, "Congrats, do you want me to applaud you for such achievement?"
Katley's frustration boiled over, breaking into a near-scream. "Are you listening?! That's a 1/3 of my mana, simply gone, reduced to ashes!"
Fang Shan, with all the calm in the world, just 'pffed' away her reaction, "Interesting usage... But useless I would have parried it with my Harmony of Nine Realms: Karmic Aegis-"
Katley's eyes narrowed like sharp daggers wanting to stab something, "First of all, here you are, with no clue what you are up against; second of all, by the second you finish your stupid name, the fight is over, and... third of all, It was a toonish effect... It actually would hurt you and everyone."
He shrugged, casting a lazy glance at the battlefield. "Seems like the only thing I'm missing is my symbiont," Fang Shan began scanning the ambient, "Wait..." he began to disassociate from the battle more and more, "Now that I think about it, where is my symbiont?"
Katley bluntly stated back, "Dead."
"..."
Fang Shan said in a slightly angry tone, "Tho I don't need it, it's quite nice because she can do other things that I am too busy to learn-"
A faint hum drew their attention. Across from them, Dante had finished his complete regeneration and emptily murmured, "I will not die, even if my body is erased, obliterated, or eradicated, as long as my goal isn't finished..."
The Aspect didn't seem to be making a threat; no, it rather appeared to be saying a fact, the sky is blue, in winter, there is cold, and, "I don't care who are you, I'm gonna make her pay."
The Aspect's black and white wings unfurled with an unexpected intensity, vibrating with an energy that coursed through the air like electricity. Now, the ambient was impregnated with a heavy sense of love and hate, but this time, there was an unusual purity in these emotions.
Dante's reserves suffered a huge backlash as the action actually detonated in another place; his mind doesn't recall how he shattered through the dimension nor how dangerously close he was to actually dying; he only knew that...
'I'm scrapping the barrel... Fatigue it's slowly clawing, trying to collect what I owe.'
He turned his eyes to see a few shiny holographic numbers.
Fake love 26% (DRAINED)
Artificial love 69% (DRAINED)
Normal Love 1% (DRAINED)
True Love 4% (HALF-WAY DRAINED) (A cute chibi drawing of a pink alicorn smiling, with a message appeared: "Consider this a gift, all your love should be Artificial/Fake. You know where to get more, so here's my number, so call me maybe!")
Fake Hate 6% (DRAINED)
Artificial Hate 17% (DRAINED)
Normal Hate 53% (DRAINED)
True Hate 24% (ALMOST DRAINED)
Even if Dante made that statement, this Fang Shan guy did as much as his entire fight with Katley within just 2 moves, 'I don't have much left in the tank... but I also ran out of money and already spent all my points for even the slightest power-up.'
'Teleporting or running away will result in Katley erasing distance...' Dante's thoughts painfully spiraled down as he tried to find a way out, but he simply couldn't find how to pass this new obstacle, 'Am I really in a dead end...?'
"It's unfair..." he murmured, almost to himself, his gaze flickering into the nothingness with a mix of resignation and defiance. He softly laughed with some bittersweetness inside his mind, "Really… It's almost laughable how unfair this is."
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Authors note:
I just had a 1-hour long discussion about how far my friend can go if he were to reincarnate in this universe and why he can't beat the limit breakers.
Dante is only "surviving" because he has T H I C C plot armor and 3 powers ups (This is the last one). Also, he wasn't instantly jumped by the 10 limit breakers because they only came to kill a small fish, so most of them didn't even come that ready AND KATLEY WANTED DANTE ALIVE, SO SHE ALWAYS CHECKED TO NOT OVERDO IT.