Shock rippled across the face of the man wielding the wooden sword. Nothing had ever disobeyed his time stop like this—not in all his years, not once. Somehow, this monster—this humanoid thing bristling with multiple blades at its shoulders, back, elbows, and hands, its sixteen red eyes gleaming with malevolent intelligence—had managed to do so. His chest tightened with a mixture of disbelief and grudging respect. But he didn't let his mind ponder the impossibility. He lunged forward, instantly changing his wooden sword's property to that of a real blade, feeling the familiar surge of power course through the weapon. The wood sharpened as he cut at the beast. It dodged with unnatural grace, thrusting its bladed hand toward him, but he leaped into the air, his heart pounding as he looked down at the hollows with their black eyes, at Sin, Knocks, and Dice frozen in their strange tableau. Moving like a bullet, he dashed forward and hurled his wooden sword into the monster's eyeball. The wooden blade bounced off instantly, the impact jarring his confidence. He caught it mid-flight, his fingers trembling slightly. *Bounced off? This thing is supposed to cut through anything. How did it—*
He didn't see the beast thrust its bladed hand toward him. The blade connected with his stomach, knocking the wind from his lungs and sending him flying back. His body bounced against the ground, pain exploding through his ribs as he collided with a hollow and knocked it down. Time quickly corrected itself as the hollow teleported back to its feet, the disruption in reality making his head spin. One thing had disrupted his time stop, meaning time wasn't acting as it should—the very foundation of his power was crumbling. That was how the hollow had fallen, even though it should have remained still, frozen like a statue in his temporal prison.
The battle continued with renewed ferocity. The man attacked relentlessly, sweat beading on his forehead, but the monster parried with its own blades, shooting multiple projectiles from its back, spine, elbows, and shoulders all at once. He dodged the swords firing like machine guns toward his face, his muscles screaming in protest as he weaved and cut some in half with his wooden blade.
"All right," he said, breath catching in his throat, a wild grin spreading across his face despite the danger. "I'm starting to get serious now. Yeah, you heard that!"
He mocked the monster, his voice carrying a manic edge that surprised even himself. The beast didn't like that—its eyes flared brighter, crimson rage burning in each one. It leaped forward, shooting multiple blades down in a deadly rain.
The creature charged, firing all its blades toward him with murderous intent. He dodged with precision, actively laughing while he moved, the absurdity of the situation hitting him all at once. "I can't believe you thought this would work! You made me go from calm to serious—it's utterly amusing! In one fight!" He continued laughing, the sound echoing off the buildings around them. "If something didn't work before, why would you try it again?"
Before he could mock the monster further, it struck him in the head with devastating force. Stars exploded across his vision. He flew back, his body hitting the ground, bouncing, his head striking the concrete over and over until the world became a blur of pain and darkness. His wooden sword flew from his hands, falling near the hollows. The hollow wasn't time-stopped, so it noticed what was happening around it, its black eyes tracking the weapon's trajectory.
The man stood, his head throbbing with agony that threatened to split his skull open. Blood trickled down his temple. "All right, I'm done here."
His blade slowly became crimson, the wooden sword turning blood-red as he poured everything he had left into it. Energy crackled around it like lightning, illuminating his determined face. He leaped forward, serious this time, all mockery gone, thrusting the crimson wooden sword toward the monster with a warrior's final resolve. The blade drove halfway through the creature's body before the energy stopped, his reserves completely depleted. The man had passed out from energy exertion, his body going limp.
The monster pulled the wooden sword from its body using one of its bladed appendages, dark ichor dripping from the wound. It thrust the weapon down toward the unconscious man, ready to deliver the killing blow.
Time resumed as the man collapsed, unable to maintain his time stop. All the hollows moved now, their bodies jerking back into motion. Edward and Sam, still atop the building, moved, their eyes widening at the scene below. Sin, Knocks, and Dice moved, their awareness returning like a sudden gasp of air. The monster staggered, a wooden sword nearly speared through its chest, its breathing labored. Its energy reserves were low—the fight had been harder than anticipated, had pushed it to limits it hadn't known existed. Its crimson sixteen eyes slowly faded back to white as it began healing the grave injury, drawing on reserves it could barely afford to spend. Healing consumed energy, leaving it in a weakened, powerless state, vulnerable for the first time.
Suddenly, all the hollows surrounded the monster, their undead bodies moving with fluid rage, a tide of vengeance incarnate. Grief, sadness, all the emotions they had bottled up while dead—the years of torment, the stolen lives, the endless darkness—would now be released on one thing and one thing only. Sin, still in his demon-like state with his uncanny smile, hollow eyes, and spectral armor that seemed to drink in the light, advanced with deliberate steps. Knocks and Dice cornered the beast as well, their faces twisted with righteous fury. No evolution would save it now. No trick would give it an edge. It was done for—dead this time, never to return, its reign of terror finally ending.
But as the hollows closed in, the monster's eyes suddenly blazed crimson once more, brighter than before, burning with an unholy light. A guttural sound erupted from its throat—not a roar, but something far worse, something that spoke of ancient horrors and forbidden knowledge. The ground beneath them began to crack, fissures spreading like spider webs, and from the fissures, a dark mist seeped upward, coiling around the creature's wounds with serpentine intelligence. The wooden sword embedded in its chest pulsed with an eerie light, responding to the darkness.
Sin's smile faltered, uncertainty creeping into his hollow eyes for the first time.
The monster's body convulsed, muscles rippling beneath its skin, and then—silence. The hollows froze mid-step, their bodies locked in place. Time itself seemed to hold its breath, the world suspended in a moment of terrible anticipation.
And in that terrible stillness, the beast's sixteen eyes locked onto Sin, boring into him with an intensity that made his spectral armor flicker, and it whispered a single word that chilled them all to the bone.