A sound like a thunderclap split the mountainside as the demon's fist collided with Erevos' chestplate. There was no wind-up, no telegraph, no readable motion. Just force. Pure, unfiltered, rage-amplified force.
Erevos didn't get knocked back.
It got launched.
The punch cratered the entire chest cavity inward, armor warping like tin. Karl felt the pressure spike, alarms screaming, readings flashing in wild patterns.
The sound it made wasn't a punch.
It was an impact so violent it swallowed all other noise—like someone dropped a mountain into another mountain.
The demon's fist crashed into the mech's torso, metal crumpling like cheap tin.
Karl's body jolted violently in the cockpit, vision going white as pain shot through him before Yggdrasil could buffer it.
The world flipped sideways.
A crater formed instantly beneath them — not just cracked earth, but pulverized stone, a bowl thirty meters deep created in a single instant.
The world blinked white.Then the world spun.
Mountain. Sky. Ground. Rock. Sky again.
Erevos flew.
Not backwards—not sideways—but every direction at once.
The armor warped inward, plates bending and caving as nanites sparked out like shrapnel. Karl's organs lurched inside him. His ribs cracked. His spine felt like it snapped and reformed in the same second.
Then another hit.
Not from the demon.
From the mountain.
Erevos slammed into the cliff face with enough force to make gravel spray like shrapnel. The armor plating on the chest was smashed inward — fully caved in — exposing sparking nanite mesh and fractured internal ribs of the mech.
Then—
BOOM.
Erevos slammed into the mountainside so hard the entire slope cracked like an eggshell. Rock avalanched around them. Car-sized boulders shattered on impact with the mech's back.
Karl felt his ribs crack.
Pain, sharp and blinding, shot through him.
Agnes' voice cut in, panicked and glitching:
"KARL—HULL INTEGRITY 22%—VITAL SIGNS DROPPING—EJECT—EJECT—EJE—"
Her voice cut out.
The cliffside exploded.
Erevos carved into the rock like a meteor drill, burrowing meters deep before finally stopping against solid stone.
Agnes went silent.
The internal UI flickered.
Karl couldn't breathe.
Warm blood trickled into his throat.
Karl tasted iron.
Everything went black for a moment.
Agnes' voice cracked:
"Karl, TALK TO ME—!!"
Nothing but the sound of his heartbeat.
Slowing.
Skipping.
Then—
A glow.
A warm, verdant, ancient glow.
Yggdrasil engaged.
Soul-link regeneration activated.
Then—
Yggdrasil ignited.
A surge tore through him like a second heartbeat waking up.
Every broken bone rearranged itself.
Torn muscles rewove.
Crushed nerves lit back up like glowing circuits.
Karl gasped, lungs refilling as if someone had poured new life into them.
His bones pulled themselves back into alignment.
His bruised organs reknitted.
Blood rewound.
Agnes rebooted in a cascade of icons.
"Karl—Karl—Karl, stay conscious! Yggdrasil's reconstruction is active but you absorbed catastrophic trauma. Erevos armor is at 32%. Shield plating breached in six regions. You need to MOVE—"
Karl groaned, coughing blood that evaporated into blue nanite dust.
He forced his arm to move.
Erevos responded sluggishly, armor scraping like metal lungs trying to breathe.
Agnes flickered back online, full-form, wings bright again.
"Karl!" she shouted. "Are you conscious?!"
"Barely…" he groaned.
"Yggdrasil healed you but the armor is severely compromised. Erevos cannot withstand another hit of that magnitude."
Through the cracked visor, Karl saw the demon approaching—slowly, savoring each step, like a predator walking toward prey that struggled to rise.
Outside, the demon's footsteps shook the ground like a giant approaching.
But it wasn't a giant.
It was simply furious.
The footfalls accelerated.
Thud.
Thud.
THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD—
It was sprinting.
The demon landed in front of them, legs bending gracefully under its monstrous weight.
Its eyes were brighter now.
Bloodlust radiated from it like toxic heat.
It looked down at the smashed Erevos, smiled, and rasped:
"More… rage.
More… speed."
The crater Karl had made vibrated as loose stones rattled down.
Agnes whispered:
"…Karl… he's faster now."
Karl pushed himself against the rock wall, eyes narrowing.
"So am I."
The nanites surged around him, stabilizing the breached plates and forming temporary skeletal scaffolding within Erevos.
The demon appeared at the mouth of the crater, breathing raggedly, shaking with rage and excitement.Its grin was back.
"NAME…"
It growled.
"GIVE… NAME…"
Karl spat blood that wasn't even his anymore—Yggdrasil's healing had overwritten the damage so fast the blood was already old.
"Agnes…" he whispered.
"Re-route all remaining energy… to mobility."
Agnes blinked. "Karl—are you insane? You can't fight it."
"I'm not trying to fight."
Karl pushed Erevos up to one knee, metal screeching.
"I'm trying to survive long enough… to kill it."
Energy conduits brightened.
Overdrive coils hummed.
The demon crouched.
Ready to leap.
Ready to tear.
It raised one trembling finger at Karl.
"…NAME…"
Its voice warbled.
"Want… NAME…
before… I—
BREAK.
YOU."
Karl cracked his neck, blood steaming off him.
He activated the overdrive lattice under his skin—muscles tightening, nanites aligning into attack rails.
Agnes overclocked systems.
Erevos' leg boosters vibrated from stress.
"Karl," she said softly. "When it hit you… I thought you died."
Karl wiped his mouth, eyes burning with fury.
"Then let's make sure that bastard never gets to try that again."
The demon growled, muscles inflating with another surge of rage.
Agnes warned: "Its passive is escalating. Estimated speed… Karl… it's faster now than when it hit you."
Karl didn't answer.
He simply stood.
Erevos rose fully, battered, armor caved in, internal plating exposed—but standing.
The demon laughed, a horrific sound that echoed across the cliffs.
"NAME…" it bellowed again.
"GIVE… before… DIE…"
He stepped forward, the ground fracturing under Erevos' feet.
"You want my name?"
Karl stepped forward.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Defiant.
And pointed at the demon.
"You don't get my name."
The demon's eyes flared with hatred so intense it physically distorted the air.
Karl finished:
"But when I kill you… you'll remember my silhouette instead."
The demon let out a roar—pure, mindless rage breaking from its throat.
For a moment, the demon went silent.
Then it screamed.
Not in pain.
In joy.
In the pure ecstasy of a predator who finally found prey worth killing.
It tapped its chest again.
"You… make me… happy."
Then its smile widened. Bones cracked as its jaw shifted.
"Round… two."
The mountain groaned as it stepped closer, the ground bowing beneath its weight.
Karl exhaled, blood still drying on his tongue.
Agnes whispered, terrified:
"Karl… this thing is… FAST.
You— we— we have to rethink everything. That fist moved faster than my sensors could track—"
The demon's claws scraped the ground like a predator preparing to pounce.
Then its broken voice rumbled:
"Chosen…
Choose… how you die."
It blurred—no, teleported—forward, fist cocked back with enough force to split a hill.
And it charged.
Everything trembled.
Agnes whispered:
"Brace for impact—!"
Karl braced.
Agnes fed power into the legs.
Nanite rails roared.
The moment the demon's fist traveled forward—
Karl moved.
The shockwave ripped outward like two storms colliding.
The fight had officially become something else.
Not a battle.
Not a clash.
But a death match where both sides could no longer hold back.
And it was only just beginning.
The fight had officially changed.
This was no longer evasion.
No longer rail dashing.
No longer testing.
This was survival.
A demon with a passive that increased speed with rage…
And Karl had just made it angrier than it had ever been in its life.