CHAPTER 44 - TRAINING MONTAGE II

Davis watched in shock as the behemoth and the man with a jewel on his head pummeled their way into each other, trading blow for blow with deranged grins on their faces.

Though there was no blood, the picture of devastation they painted sent a chill down the spine of the unfortunate watchers. 

If not for Pietro's quick thinking, they would have turned casualties of a friendly spar, at least one of them would. 

It must have been his eyes playing tricks on him or maybe because of the far distance, but he could swear that the Hulk had grown larger than he was before during the start of the fight. 

"Oh. My. God. How can they fight like that?" Davis exclaimed as he saw them wantonly destroying everything that was unfortunate to be in their immediate environment. 

"I don't know, man. I never knew he was this strong." Pietro said in awe as he watched Vision gave a literal backhand to the Hulk. 

The Hulk flew for a bit before pausing midair as if held by an invisible wall, and was drawn back from whence he came as if he was put in reverse. 

They were stunned as Vision's hands grew to a large proportion and slammed the incoming Hulk resulting in an earth shattering roar of rage, causing both fighters to switch tempo. 

In his insurmountable rage, the Hulk looked more jacked up than his previous appearances since forever and his body was emitting steam as well as veins that creeped all over his strained muscles. 

He stomped hard on the ground and everything in a 5km range sank as if drained through a funnel but Vision remained unfazed as the sands went against the flow and formed a platform for him to stand on, and surprisingly the same also happened with the Hulk. 

Everything fell silent as the two of them stared at each other only for the Hulk's eyes to betray confusion as multiple Visions started appearing, each identical to the last. 

"Vision… Annoying." Followed by a shout and then a dive towards the nearest iteration of Vision who surprisingly defended himself for a few seconds before dissipating. 

"Hulk hate Vision's trick." The multitude of Visions chuckled at the simplistic brute monster, still having more than enough breathing space despite how close to mutual annihilation their battle had been. "Well how about we wrap it up soon?"

Hulk said nothing except blitzing in the direction of the Vision who said that and ran through him unobstructed. 

He shifted his body just the split moment before he touched the ground, changing the direction of his rebound. He grunted in annoyance as he felt the annoying pull from the earth but his pride would not let him succumb to something as simple as an increased gravitational pull. 

Vision was simply uncontested when it came to manipulating energy to bring about different effects. 

He wasn't behind the Hulk in terms of physical strength either; absorbing, redirecting, amplifying, boosting and altering density opened up myriads of ways to contend against the green beast of might. 

Hulk, finally having enough, brought his hands together in a booming clap that destroyed some of Vision's hard light illusion, emphasis on the hard, and pushed the others back. 

Vision's true body fizzled into his material form from nothingness taking the Hulk by surprise as he appeared too close to him but Vision didn't think too much of it and just placed his hands on the head of the Hulk and said, "Sleep," followed by an upsurge of telepathic wave that immediately assaulted the Hulk and effectively knocking him out. 

[Battle effectiveness against the Hulk – 92%] 

Throughout the fight, the number had been fluctuating between the lower ends of 80 and the upper level of 90 and before the end of their fight it had started dropping steadily into the 70s after engaging him in a prolonged bout of physical strength, so it was no wonder why it kept on lowering. 

He had switched to energy manipulation, his specialty, and that was enough for him to level the playing field and started toying around with the Hulk, much to the latter's irritation and anger. 

"I'd admit, that was as much as a workout anyone can get." He said as Hulk's form shifted back to a quivering Banner. "Pietro, get over here."

Pietro ran over in a gust of wind carrying a stunned Davis who looked as if he couldn't decide whether to be amazed or fearful. 

Vision's pristine appearance and his earlier savagery painted quite the contrasting picture left the two young men how to exactly feel. 

"We're going back." He said before taking off with Bruce and leaving the two of them there to follow after. 

The two of them stood there watching Vision disappear into the horizon until they could no longer see him. 

"He's that strong? Both him and Hulk?" Davis asked, still in disbelief of the fight he had just witnessed. 

Pietro looked at him for a second and said, "I don't know, man. I mean, I've always known Vis was strong and I've seen the Hulk fight but that's just…" He too was speechless about how they could pulverize the other and still come out unscathed. "Come on, let's go."

He grabbed Davis and ran a straight line towards Compound. 

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Thirty minutes after they left, a huge sleek black jet landed in the middle of the desert and from it alighted a few people dressed in specialized suits. 

"Oh damn. You're not going to believe this, Chuck." Logan whistled as he scanned the area of destruction that spanned a few tens of kilometers along with a few members of the X-men. 

His nose twitched for a few moments and so did Hank, but unlike the former, Hank outright growled before snapping himself out of it. 

"What was that?" Ororo asked, noticing the odd behavior of the two of them. 

Hank frowned as he felt an animalistic sense of danger that still wafted in the air and also the mind numbing feeling of unwarranted anger. 

"Something fought here. Something incredibly angry, Charles. Whatever telepathic signature you picked up when using Cerebro probably already left."

"Yeah," Ororo nodded, "And if it's a mutant capable of surviving a destruction of this capacity, and also a telepath, he's going to be an absurdly powerful one. Let's just hope whoever he is not of the troublesome ilk."

~If you can't find anything there, come back. We have more pressing issues to worry about.~

Charles' voice resounded in their heads, prompting them to give up on their impromptu search and return back to the mansion to figure out a way to tide over the coming storms. 

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