The silence. The intermittent crackling of embers and loosed debris. Clouds of dust kicked up and kept airborne by a resurgent heat. That orange barrier dissipating its coverage so all could know it. A solar wind that denied its previous incarnations. The red menace they had come to destroy lost in its own gravity. The black hole at its center enslaved by a new mass deeper still. Whatever Seth had done had turned that star neutron. The air buzzing and raising every hair, prickling everything with sheer density of electricity. Yet denied ionization, denied aurora proximus. Just grey and black clouds left against a sea of colors and motifs. And glares transitioning the wrong way round.

The explosive destruction of his suit still recoiling those hardened lines, but something in those stares refused to see any change. Aegis watching like all the others. A kindred burned in fear finding its out, while inquisition fought for the truth of what she was seeing. Because nothing made sense anymore. Seth had fought and dared to retrieve that thing, risked and burned everything to get it, but now it was scattered all over the battlefield like discarded training weights. What the hell was going on? But the en masse hesitation that surrounded her filled this void of understanding quickly.

No one here feared the power displayed, they'd seen greater outpourings before. Felt the heat of real stars brought too damn close for comfort. No, what they all feared was the silhouette that stood shaking off what was left of its armor. Restored horns arcing excess power upward. Tousled hair seemingly set free. Claws flexing open like they'd always been there. And… and that tail skimming the ground behind it despite its plates shattering to scrap.

"Heh…"

Hothead, of course, broke what silence had solidified.

"You… You think losing a few pounds is gonna-"

His vain attempts at denying what he was seeing, what he was feeling, were lost in Erdwut's demanding hand put before him. All denial. All fear.

His eyes were locked on like a wolf to a much bigger predator. Refusing to look away. Refusing to close for even the millisecond it took to keep them. His stoicism was cracking, the dread under that mask was seeping through and pulling his own nightmares up with it. The grip on Eschenwald was boiling, the air around him fighting for its stature against the outpouring from that silhouette. But it held, hesitated his break, kept the volcano down just enough to rumble in place. Waiting for the moment, that those cloud of dust held their last.

Because Seth could scarcely deny what he felt as well.

The heat was everywhere, but it felt little more than a comfortable day. The dust scraped its infinitesimal paths upward against his skin. But all Seth could feel was it outline the char he'd been left with after one death too many. Skin hardened to much smaller plates all their own. He flexed a hand, those bony protrusions sticking into his palm, running over set patterns in this returned existence. Failing to break what now denied so much more.

The dust pitilessly caressed his body as he shut his eyes, an outline in his head clear against its flow. A foot dug into the softened baking ground, feeling a gait shifted upward without a thought spared for its difference. And that grotesque weight, that thought horrid melt of skin and connector suit, shifting behind him less eliciting. More an unconscious organ, and telling symptom. The feelings were strange yet comforting, different yet completely normal. But the true expression of what this was like. Was that he couldn't feel…

All that weight keeping him down.

The glares of all joined as one, staring shared fear down at that clouded silhouette. All waiting for, dreading for it to dissipate and render truth to some waking nightmare permeating. Whimpers almost broke their standing, but they were all lost in the demanded rally. In that broiling, scrutinizing volcano following every contour, every slight movement, every inch of offending form come free of its apparent mold.

Aegis could feel the last vestiges of Erd's mask, of the cap holding back the true eruption, crack and reveal the horror beneath. Every twitch he could not control another spike on the Richter scale. But another mask behind her was failing in a different direction. Maglev was falling, fighting hyperventilation as best he could. His eyes were dinner plates and she could only guess he was shaking beneath his cape. Training and simulations could only work out so much of one's pain, but what was before them now was proving too extreme a possibility for even their progress.

And yet all of it was overshadowed and lost. As the eyes of that mind flaying silhouette opened yet again, blue lights dimmed and expanded by the dust. Dimming further as the last traces swirled away and the baking ground cooled…

As that collective terror found its physical form.

The cloud parted and all perceptions lit a flame, driven by fear made true and callous jests made refuted with nuclear fire. An armor of greyed scales rendered glossy by their fresh revealing. Claws that gleamed with blades made to rend all. Talons that carried considerable weight above far more devastating edges. A tail matched and countering every small movement. And a maw set with teeth seeking the flesh of everything. Those glares recoiled in orders of magnitude too slow, roiled and reeled with something even tension could not suffice. Every metaphorical fiber of every mundane being fighting to reconcile, to go back to denying, to hope beyond hope that they weren't seeing what they were seeing. To reassure that they were all dead! That they defeated them all and left them as dust! That all of their terror was over and done with!

But there in the center of their chosen battlefield, there where their target stood and burned away his façade, there where one enemy once laid torn between itself. All that stood now…

Was a laceroid beyond their reckoning.

Seth felt the sun replace the heat as cloud cover receded, or more aptly felt the full brunt of the consequences of accepted truth. The abject fear washing over him, all those hardened eyes losing their edge.

He'd overdone it… as always.

But who gave a shit!

This was the eventuality that the Garkah had feared, a truth that needed hiding beneath armor and conduction, a truth he'd feared in the back of his mind but knew all too well to be his real curse. That he was not spared. But Seth was tired of hiding it, tired of letting his truth be dictated by others who knew nothing of who or what he was. Of where he came from. So, why not answer those questions in grand. Even if it costs him more than it was worth, it sure felt worth it to him.

His body felt unimaginably light, not just because it was no longer anchored by nearly a ton of metal and lies. He lifted a claw up to see it for himself, feeling it glide through the air and nearly blinded his extra senses. The electron threads in him were indecipherable from his material body, what used to be separate cords that splayed out deep within were now just straight up encompassed everything. Their luminosity was narrowly visible, but may as well make him a walking star to those with ability enough to see it. Looking down, he understood why his hair was gone before, nothing but a sea of scales contouring nicely to muscle buried beneath all the way down his-

'…*sigh*'

He'd run his new found claw over his head, seeking the horn he'd broken off before and instead skimmed the thick hair still shocked on his head.

'Of course it's still there. And let me guess… still white.'

He let that sigh escape his maw, almost expecting a hiss to be toned to it, but instincts and anatomy denied that. He wasn't some dollar store lizard, he was a Garkah without question.

Well… at least to his questions.

To everyone else…

Para was right…

No proper evidence, no standing to call from, no right to be! But he was right. Seth was a laceroid. A how and why and question upon questions that all blotted out any bright hope held deep. Because Para was right!

Seth was a monster! That had escaped its rightful death. And this offense was awakening that stoic thermoclastic annihilator. Aegis braced for dear life as the closer concerns overshadowed even this horrific truth. As the heat exploded out, as that mask shattered into fiery ejecta, and as that majestic mountain was fully denied by the Earth's wanton fury!!

Erdwut's face contorted to teeth shattering, excessive black hair getting blown high by the raging furnace he'd become. All eyes recoiling from their horror found yet more fright in the burning fury that they'd followed here. As all were torn between true terror and that molten sword rippling and tearing itself to slag.

Emotion and will manifested roiling as both failed their stay. Slowly solidifying as that will turned tainted. That blinding metal ripping to the surface, but with greater vicious form than any condemnation. The molten slag spiking to edge and turning to gleam in gradient hardening. The blade becoming a serrated bastard of pure denied closure. Its length increased and ending with the last gust of exuded hatred hooking it vicious. Grit turned to purpose and blade its instrument. A total meltdown that threatened to break any risen determination in twain.

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Because Erdwut had lost all control, and his warpath had but one accepted end.

But that end seemed to be lost to the goings on. The heat just another comforting ray, as he felt through and dimmed his brilliance with an equal dose of control. Threads were bundled tight, cords wound even tighter. Artificial muscle of inscrutable size rendered every movement barely an effort, let alone delayed. His scales felt heavier than his old skin, at least relatively, but presented an almost perfect slate he could mold with. Not quite programmable, but just as good as the metals in his suit. If not wholly better.

Certainly a more agreeable thing to alter, all things considered. Speaker was right, this was something to behold. He drowned down the outside world as it recoiled, his heartbeat a better listen. Not too dissimilar from the old, but fairly continuous. Like a machine of clockwork going round and round. The pump hitting four beats in symmetrical succession. His lungs filled around it, cushioned it on all sides. His gut a bit lower, and a bit empty. But he didn't feel hungry, so that was good. He didn't need to look any lower than that right now, definitely not the right time for it. His legs felt springy, toes bearing all his weight, and adding some height.

'Neat. Suck on that stunted growth.'

Those toes though flexed through the ground like it was butter, talons spiking through without resistance. He would need to be careful about those. Lastly… this tail. Some direct control told him it was all his, but outside of that it swished all its own.

'Heh, great. As if it wasn't hard enough hiding emotions, now I have a traitor wagging behind me.'

He smirked that toothy maw, opening his eyes back to the outpouring of volcanic vengeance staring down on him with none of its stoicism spared.

Aegis had only seen this side of Erdwut when her simulation had proved too much, so knew full well there was nothing stopping him now. As that serrated Eschenwald rose to parity with that contorted darkened grit. All she and everyone else could do was watch and brace as that shining personification of the Earth's mantle locked in on his shoulder, and another outpouring of heat pressed against them.

His eyes were nearly alight, his strain audible, the lip of the crater beneath his feet boiling to glowing slag. Those standing behind in hopes of supporting shifted for their lives, the Elite backing up inch by inch to not end up collateral damage, even Para all the way at the back was wincing away at the heat. Something had to snap, the ground was glassing all around him, the air was lighting on fire, and anymore held back tension was going to-

*cracKKKAAAAASSHHHHH*

The lip, the ground, the surviving asphalt behind exploding back in molten eruption. A trench of whited melt left in the wake of that once majestic mountain taking flight with catastrophic lateral direction. Erdwut burst into the crater with none of the care or control the face of the Elite should have, all of it burned away by the fires of overriding vengeance! Gravity forcing him down, but his speed only increasing as his feet glassed a path toward their only goal. The gleam of Eschenwald peaking as every ounce of power he had and could burn was put into an almighty swing to lop off this reborn terror's head and end this hell again and for good!

But expectation…

…Are always thwarted.

A flash against that peeking condemning gleam. A claw shot line and matched to the teeth of that blade. And all the force torrential cracked nothing but the air and ground. An almighty perception turning that unrepentant to a manageable scale. Seth parried and that blade recoiled, along with all the air in that crater. That wrathful stare that had never looked away was face to face with him, an open fissure leading straight to the molten core of the Earth, threatening to light this world on fire if need be. Yet Seth saw it wince, Erdwut feeling the rebuke through all of his over expressing rage.

No… not rage. Too misplaced and far from kindred. More like simple wrath left to fester too long. Never given a closing out. Stemming deeper than need, facing outward and in, all-consuming sure, but selfishly perpetrated. Not true, not righteous, nothing like his.

'No wonder he hid it.'

But it still held sway, and refused to give up after just one rebuke. Erdwut yelling for all this wrath was worth, perception desperate to close the gap between. Pulling his new inertia around like swordsmanship still lived, Eschenwald's gleam rounding for an opposing strike. No. As many strikes as he could muster! This stagnant pool of emotion boiling to the surface ran too deep to bottom out. But it opposed an ocean as yet unfathomable.

That gleam turned to incomprehensible glare as it tried to carve lightning fast through anything denying it. A blur too vicious to discern by the better part of massed percentiles. An equal blur matching it at every beating crack, serrated teeth dulling against claws rendered harder by pure direction. A heat wake splattering with every contact, force washing the strikes farther than the gleam. The dusted crater gashed and glassed in redirected cuts, chewing through the already destroyed battlefield with callous abandon. As each strike and defeat rent more than just the ground.

Spalling, white hot from gleam and friction, sprayed and expanded the atmosphere of oppression. Serrated teeth of malicious vengeance whittling down to nubs. To show their disparity with earnest. But Erdwut refused to abate, refused to see, wild stare still locked on Seth's blue haloed eyes. Eyes that still bore his mother's hazel, and could see Erdwut's grip slipping.

The next strike swinging away, perception slowed like all the rest. Eschenwald's new teeth now but carved up crevasse, cracks extending into its perfect surface. The claw set to match it once again moving without limit, skimming the dulled edge through its wanton heat distortion, to find its pivot point just before the washed out guard. A softened spike upward shooting that blade from Erdwut's grip, the slightest imperfection enough to cut him off. Grip flung open, abused handle freed, and the tortured blade launched upward away from its out of control wielder.

Erdwut's last swing followed through unlike the rest, empty force pushing an empty hand through the motion. The sudden realization breaking his fugue, disarmed and little left but to break his stare. And look down at his empty hand. A flash of comprehension cracking through the fury, a dose of the fear fueling it flooding out the engine. Rendered defenseless in a matter of milliseconds, overextended. He tried to push his momentum back, fight his own input and back up. But all it won him was his stare returning to those hazel eyes. As a talon toed foot was locked in on his chest, and set about shattering that blinding wrath.

Impact shot him into the dusty incline behind, armor absorbing and will fighting. Yet ricochet he did end over end. Through the lip he'd glassed with his overly dramatic breaking, careening into the trench of his own making. The force cut, and sense returned by liberal removal of the air in his lungs, Erdwut smashed a foot back to rip this tumble with the asphalt beyond. The road broken as his inertia rutted short, a mixed stare of anger and fear flaring back up between recoiling heroes all. As that gleaming, loosed, cracked apart beacon came down from its fall...

Right into a waiting claw.

Eschenwald's shining and distorted brilliance was there for all to see. Wrath mutated teeth mutilated and cracked, perfect surface scarred by fissure and uneven ripple. Erdwut had pushed his blade beyond its ability, beyond his own. An extension of himself, an extension of whatever was still buried within him. The heat sizzling Seth's new scales, a rejection or just too much energy put in to contain. The leather and handle staying strong in spite of its burning aura. Unbreakable… But not quite by normal means.

Seth swiped the blade down to the side despite its rejecting burn across his palm. The weight was negligible to him but it almost sloshed in tandem with his move. Extra force to impart with every swing. The cracks on its surface widening, its malicious brilliance was unstable and terminal. A slow pivot brought it up in front of him, a hand cupping the edge. Seeking through its form.

Threads extended into it yet again, but with less input will and more purposeful intent. Yet nothing of permanence melded within the blade. Just raw energy made solid and mutable. An artifact, hard to describe and even harder to calculate. The handle though was more than just a bearer of this molten sword. A tethering more paracausal.

'What is this, fucking magic?'

There was purpose, thought, the sword had a will all its own, but it was a lot more discerning than Buster's. Seth could feel its ire in the burn across his scaly palm. Whether it was purely the sword or a leftover of Erdwut's wrath was even more difficult to decipher, its being shut tight and denying him as… unworthy. But he didn't really care for wielding it, only setting it free of the cancer it had taken in.

The burn was defied in kind to the will's surprise. Both hands clamped down on their grips, a claw digging into the gleaming imperfect surface. Maw contorting into sinister smile, and flexing a talon loose of the ground. The will tried to burn through him, to show fear through its malignant turmoil, but it found no flinch and no reprieve. Sometimes you have to just cut out the cancer by any means necessary!

The ground atomized, a knee flashed upward, and that gleam was broken for all its held wrath was worth. A geyser of shards, a true eruption for the entire damn city to see, a pillar of gleaming pure malignance shattering to the nothing it meant in truth. The broken blade exploding up, shining pieces lighting the air, igniting like shrapnel, melting back to their molten states and fizzling away to trailing smoke and slag. A dazzling eruption stretching far above the meager buildings that surrounded the battlefield. A display to all that this is not a fight won with strength against strength. This was no normal laceroid they were faced with. And this wasn't going to end the way they wanted it to.

The bare handle, will inside reeling from its needed amputation, twirled in Seth's palm. Threads found purchase amid the reeling, information, something at least to tell him a bit of its own truth. The blade really did pull power from the Earth's mantle, oddly. A marginal piece that wouldn't be missed, but enough to show that Earth had a champion that bore its fury. Though it was not purely this, its caveats for worthiness seeming… broader than Seth expected. It still rejected him, he still didn't care, but it had something about it that he couldn't quite reconcile.

It held someone else above Erdwut.

'That… certainly explains a lot.'

But for some reason it refused to let Seth see, refused him a deeper look, more definition to its plight.

'Eh… Fine. You'll probably find your chance someday. Who knows, maybe I can help with that as well.'

The will recoiled, but found no opening to retort as it suddenly whipped around and found itself thrown back to where it belonged. The recoiling Elite braced as the ballistic projectile hurtled straight toward them. But the streaking handle impacted right into Erdwut's waiting hand, a reignited wrath burning in the glare staring back down its trajectory.

Because one bout was not a fight made.

Picking himself back up into his melted and crashed through position, he did all he could to deny his loss of face. But the withering, toothy smirk staring back up at him denied his denial. Erd couldn't stand alone in this. His façade was broken open, and even his full might proved insufficient. The side eyed horror from his fellow Elite brought fractured ego back in line, this wasn't just his fight. And Seth wasn't going anywhere.

All eyes turned back to that revived terror, this telling opening display setting the tone. Hardened stares got harder as the dust settled. That fear once overwhelming now waning even as reality was proven. This wasn't a mindless beast, this wasn't their nightmare in pure, but they all wanted a piece of him. All wanted their pound of flesh for the hell they'd experienced. This was singular, a sole expression, someone to blame for the loss they'd felt. Or just something to finally prove some amount of worth in comparison to those who still bore those scars.

Whatever their reasons, whatever their fueling drive, the League's best were staring down and waiting for a slip up. For intelligence to falter, for will to be broken. Waiting for the grand go ahead to show this fallible thing the error of its existence. But all Seth could feel, all he could show in return, was a smirk that said all it needed to.

"I'd like to see you try."

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