175 Chapter 165 Shion died
Barely 10 seconds have passed since Mikoto's rejection.
Regardless of how lacking Bryce has control of his powers, he still has the full strength of Veldora, the True Dragon of Storms.
It's kinda ironic since Veldora always went wild so he himself had little control.
But while Veldora had experience, Bryce does not. So Bryce is weaker than Veldora.
Even so, Veldora is a being even Demon Lords and Heroes would find hard to beat and would prefer to avoid.
And now the guy wielding his powers is running around beating the shit out of everyone.
In the middle of the clearing in the forest within the Mirror Dimension, you can see a dark figure. It's Bryce, but right now he looks drastically different.
A humanoid figure made entirely out of black lightning, that's what he looks like right now. His form is constantly shifting as tendrils of lightning and electricity extend from his body and dissipate into the air, the air it passes through becoming erratic and unstable.
You can feel the destruction imbued into that lightning.
The only human feature left remaining about him are his eyes, and even so, they are now pure white. Everything else, his mouth, nose, even his fingers, are obscured in lightning, or perhaps they're not even there anymore in the first place.
He stands there for barely half a second before disappearing into sparks of lightning. Immediately after, he reappears behind Soei with his hands drawn back, ready to attack.
With practised movements, Soei ducks as Bryce's hand sails over his head. Immediately after, Benimaru appears next to him and slashes his katana at Bryce.
*Shing!*
As expected, it was a miss. The blade cut nothing but air as Bryce disappeared into sparks again, reappearing back in the centre.
Surrounding him from all directions are Shuna, Shion, Benimaru, Soei, Treyni, Hakurou, Mikoto and Shizu.
This has been repeating itself. Bryce attempts to take someone out, but they avoid it as someone immediately rushes to cover for them, to which he retreats.
Such high-speed movements are only possible to him who is currently an incarnation of black lightning.
He calls it his "Black Thunder Lightning Dragon Demon God Mode of Heaven and Hell and Earth and Space and Dimensions and Galaxies and Universe". A beautiful name, I know.
It's a rather simple technique. He just "became one" with his lightning. It's only possible for him who has a spiritual body and the Storm Crest. This allows him to move at the speed of lightning and become invulnerable to physical damage.
Despite that, Rimuru's subordinates are pseudo-Demon Lords. Dodging lightning is hard, but not impossible.
And after coating their weapons with magicules or using magic itself, they can damage Bryce… if he let them.
And so this game of cat and mouse continues. In such a high tension situation, these 10 seconds have felt like 10 minutes, Bryce making a move every half a second with everyone else barely keeping up.
Good News, Pikachu made a big brain move and gave everyone some Full Potions it sneaked in from outside the Mirror Dimension while Bryce was distracted with Mikoto's rejection. Everyone is fully recovered disregarding their exhausted mental state.
Bad News, Bryce went REEEEEEE and shut Pikachu out. His Storm Crest can even affect lightning spirits… fuck.
More Bad News, Bryce grew a brain cell.
He disappeared with that familiar residue lightning left behind and reappeared behind Shuna. However, he didn't attack.
Shion lept forward on instinct to defend Shuna, swinging her giant sword at Bryce. With her tired mental state, she couldn't comprehend why Bryce didn't attack quickly enough.
And that costed her.
Bryce- "You fell for it!"
Bryce's excited staticky voice was the first to speak in those 10 seconds. His white eyes turned into crescents at the approaching Shion as he drew his hand back and thrust it forward directly at her chest.
In slow motion as dread set into everyone's mind, his hand slowly entered her chest up to his wrist. Because of his spiritualised state, Shion's skin wasn't pierced and no blood was spilt.
But if it did, that might have been a better fate.
*vvvvVVVOOM!*
A small shockwave erupted.
Bryce set off a small lightning bomb in Shion's heart.
Bryce- "Ahaha!"
He retracts his hand and jumps back, his crescent eyes looking at Shion as if marvelling at his work.
.
.
.
*Thuk*
Shion's weapon dropped to the floor beside her, its blade half-sheathing itself into the dirt below.
Shion's hand hovers over her broken heart as blood leaks out of the side of her lips.
Slowly closing her eyes, her face morphs into not one of pain or anger, but one of calmness with a slight trade of sadness.
Shion- "Stopping here, huh…"
Those words caused more blood to leak from Shion's mouth, but she didn't pay it any mind.
Instead, she opens her eyes that are now filled with determination, defiance and all the wrath she held for this man up to this point.
Grasping the hilt of her weapon, she strains her arm muscles and throws it, all in one smooth motion.
Bryce- "Eh?"
*Shing!*
Bryce, not expecting this at all, finds the blade now embedded into his chest. Now, although his spiritualised state makes it so he can't take any damage from physical attacks, the trace amount of magicules Shion sneaked into her weapon as it left her hand made it so that Bryce could feel it.
And just so you know, getting stabbed doesn't feel nice.
Bryce- "GAAAAAAAAAAH!"
The magicules in the blade dissipates and so the weapon just phases through him, falling onto the floor.
Shion grins, her outstretched hand from throwing her weapon clenches, leaving but one finger showing.
The middle finger.
Shion- "F-Fuck you…"
And with that, she collapsed onto the floor, her breathing gradually stopping, all with a satisfied smile on her face.
Bryce- "Fucking bitch! Gaah! That hurt!"
But no one listened to him.
They all stare at their fallen purple-haired companion. No one said a word.
Shuna begins to leak tears. Shion died while trying to protect her from Bryce, so of course, she took it hard.
And so did Mikoto.
She has experience with losing people she loves with the Level 6 Shift Project back in her old world. Specifically, the Sisters. She's seen records of previous experiments where some of the Sisters died and even had one die in front of her before shutting the project down.
But that doesn't make things any less painful. And right now, Mikoto is feeling a whole lot of pain. Not just pain, but anger, grief, and a whole slew of other emotions all mixed together.
Mikoto- '… I knew it… I can't do anything… I can't save Shion, I can't save myself… how can I be expected to stand beside him…'
A vague image of Rimuru appears in her mind.
Mikoto- 'This is just… just…'
Tears leak from her eyes, mixing with the blood that was already there.
Mikoto- 'These emotions… they hurt… I…'
At this moment, it felt like something snapped.
Not in a bad way like she's going crazy, no.
But it felt like something was… removed. A limit, a lid, something like that.
She doesn't know, but her [Limit Breaker] skill is working on overdrive from the mess of emotions within her.
And because of this, she broke her limits once again. But this limit is different.
It's a limit ingrained into all Espers of her world.
It's the Level limit. All espers have a set Level they can reach before reaching an insurmountable wall, unable to advance past that.
Mikoto's limit was Level 5.
But this limit was just removed.
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Mikoto- "SHIOOOOON!"
With a scream that has her heart and soul into it, with a burst of magicules that create a blueish-white aura around her that reaches the darkened clouds, with desperation for power that is beyond anything she has ever felt before…
Mikoto Misaka...
.
.
.
Began to advance to Level 6.
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Name: Rimuru
Race: Origin Slime
Protection: Crest of Space
Title: Highest Tier Spirit, Leader of the Monsters, Onii-chan, King of Avalon, Master of Headpats, Procrastinator King, The Nutcracker, socially awkward cringe slightly chuuni slime, Dragon Slayer, Sensei
Manas: [Manas: Illyasviel]
Ultimate Skills: [Belzebuth, Lord of Gluttony] [Ahura Mazda, Lord of Creation] [Scathach, Lord of Runes]
Unique Skills: [Spatial Ruler]
Intrinsic Skills: [Infinite Regeneration] [Universal Shapeshift] [Universal Sense] [Enhanced Replication] [Universal Thread]
Extra Skills: [Lord's Ambition] [Thought Communication] [Control Natural Elements] [Control Magic] [Control Gravity]
Resistances: [Cancel Pain] [Resist Melee Attack] [Cancel Natural Elements] [Cancel Ailments] [Cancel Spiritual Attack] [Resist Holy/Demonic Attack] [Natural Attack Resistance]
Equipment: Yamato, Limiter Ring
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A/N: So yeah, Shion died.
Of course, as you expected, she gonna live again.
And now Mikoto gonna get Level 6... but is that a good thing?
Hahaha cliffhanger.
Let me know if I missed anything.
Also consider dropping some power stones!
