A groan left her lips, feeling a pain so overwhelming that the world around her darkened, but in the next moment, she was awakened when

BAAAAAAAAAAAAANG!

Another devastating pain cracked through her, bringing her back from the depths of unconsciousness.

For the next ten seconds, all that came from the abyss was the sickening sound of a body being smashed into the ground, before it finally quieted down after a particularly heavy slam.

Everlearn slowly tore her out from the crater she had been embedded in.

Her form was completely unrecognisable.

Both hands had been blown apart, the same for her legs.

It left just her torso, the end of it dripping with corrosive bionic fluids that had long replaced her blood from excessive machine fusion.

He released her from his grasp, and as she fell to the ground, his knee smashed out, slamming right into her face and blowing her deep through the abyss.

She slammed into the wall, the machine that had formed her face blown apart, leaving circuitry sparking and completely deformed.

She slid down the wall, managing to land upright, though that posture was twisted for what she was now.

Everlearn felt the rage in his heart settle, and in the next moment, he stepped toward her, eyes fixed on her figure.

Though her eyes were filled with shock, disbelief, and pain, everything changed when she looked at him, and in the next moment, a tinkling laughter escaped her lips.

"Judging from your rage, you must be one of the failures I have brought pain to…" she whispered, a prideful, evil grin twisting what remained of her face.

"I do wonder how much of a failure you must have been to bear such rage, though?"

"Is it that I murdered your entire family, and you were so pathetic that you couldn't save them?"

She asked, and Everlearn's gaze remained quiet.

"As if beating me up ever gets rid of the fact that you failed to protect what matters, hahaha,"

Her voice echoed, but in the next moment, the sound of bones cracking rang out, and Everlearn's body began to lessen, eventually standing at just 2 meters.

The sight brought her shock.

He was a young man, far younger than she was, and he had fully reverted to a complete human form.

His monstrous transformation wasn't an extreme fusion like hers or like she originally assumed.

Everlearn sat down quietly, looking at what remained of her body.

There were still the sparking electricity currents from the tech on her, and in the next moment, he turned to look into her remaining eyes, saying,

"The Mecha X-Core is an Anomalous Grade creation."

"It boosts humanoid stats to over ten times the base while embedding combat modules… and enables Nanoremodulation to form an implanted weapon module just like the scythe you wield now."

He spoke it all in one breath, and her eyes trembled as the words reverberated through her soul.

She had heard these words once before.

"All of this comes with side effects. Metal overstimulation that can fry the user's brain, with early symptoms being over-glitching."

" If you keep using it, it will destroy you."

"But I can correct the flaws. With personalised coding for your genes, I can make the Mecha X-Core feel as natural as I am."

"All I need is a lab and a week. What do you say?"

He asked, and it finally dawned on her.

It was back then.

A mission she had done back in Elosius City, fusing with her first mech while also rounding up members of the scientists who had been responsible for the Mecha creation.

While she slaughtered them all, there was one who fought desperately for his life with intelligence.

She could remember him.

It was the blue-haired boy with dark hair, the one without whom the Mech Module would never have been a success.

"E… Everlearn Snowfall!?"

She shouted in shock, and Everlearn smiled.

"You remember now…"

He said, watching the disbelief fill her eyes.

She had remembered those exact wordings.

Those were his last words before she cut through his brain with the scythe.

She had watched both halves of his head split apart under her attacks, his brain reduced to mush, yet here he was, just six months later, sitting before her.

She could not understand it.

He was supposed to be dead!

"You… You…" she tried to say, but the shock hit her so deeply, the only word she could force out was:

"Monster."

"Monster?" Everlearn asked, confused.

"I wanted so desperately to live."

"I was filled with so much hope for a brighter future, and I put everything I had into making that Anomalous X-Core, believing that after you fuse with it, I could further my education."

"In a way, you were my only hope. Hope of a brighter future."

He whispered, his blood-drenched palms widening as the light of what could have been flickered in his blue irises.

But quickly, that widened fist clenched hard, the hopeful light dispersing to be replaced by a cold gaze.

"But what did you do?" He asked, and without any more words rose to his feet.

"I'd be foolish to think you have any remorse within you."

"Not when you killed two orphanage girls at eight years old, and slaughtered many helpless lives during your thug days."

His hands reached out and grabbed the scythe that had fallen to the side.

"And what does killing me fulfil?" Mecha Eva asked with a mocking grin.

"In the end, you'll just be exactly what I am. A cold-hearted murderer!"

She mocked wickedly.

"Peace," Everlearn replied.

"To the countless souls you've slaughtered… hanging around, begging for vengeance."

"With your death, I will give them the peace they deserve, putting their souls to true rest…"

He said with a smile as the scythe was raised high.

The sight of his smile shook Eva more than ever.

Many times, she had faced death, the thug fights, the surgeries, and the revenge attempts from others.

She had had countless encounters with death, making her almost completely unfazed by it.

Especially when everyone who had desired her life had worn those angry, resentful faces.

The same expression she had once carried, one that had dragged her into this cold path.

Yet, with that halo of death looming over her, and that big smile of relief on his face…

Something stirred within her.

A desire to live, driving her to do something she never thought she were capable of.

"Please… let me… live!"

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