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BOOM BOOM BOOM!
The explosions crashed against Wayne’s eardrums in wave after relentless wave, and there was nothing he could do about it.
Taking a single Bala head-on was still within Wayne’s limits, but Yammy had pushed his Reiatsu to a level approaching that of an Adjuchas.
Even after the endless chase had worn his Reiryoku down, Yammy was still operating at a level considerably above Wayne’s.
One Bala he could tank.
But right now they were coming in at two or three per second, a relentless barrage practically indistinguishable from a machine gun, and this was after Wayne had already ambushed and seriously wounded him.
“Lord Wayne, if we keep running like this, he’ll catch up to us sooner or later.” Nel called out anxiously as they sprinted.
“I know.” Wayne’s expression was grim.
They’d been running from Yammy for a long time now.
No matter how fast Wayne pushed, he couldn’t shake Yammy by even a single step, theoretically, if firing Bala didn’t cost Yammy half a beat of speed, he would have caught them long ago.
Right now, the two of them were taking turns pushing their speed to keep the escape alive.
If either had tried to run alone, their Reiatsu would have long since run dry.
“Find a forest.
We can’t shake him, so we find one and use the Hollows inside to draw his fire.
Then we hide.” “There’s a forest at the two-o’clock position on our right.” Nel said, her Reiatsu sensing active.
“Go!” No hesitation.
Wayne cut right with Nel, simultaneously raising a hand to bat away a Bala Yammy had just fired from that direction.
“Trying to run?” Yammy’s eyes narrowed.
He saw through Wayne’s destination in an instant, and the next moment he erupted with his full power, because it turned out that throughout the entire chase, the terrifying strength he’d been displaying was not yet his limit.
His massive body, built like a tank, ground to a halt.
Both hands gathered before his chest, and deep crimson Reiatsu condensed between his palms at a ferocious speed.
“Bala: Fury!” The next second, Yammy threw punch after punch with both fists.
Countless dark-red Bala tore forward like a howling storm, bearing down on Wayne and Nel.
“Lord Way—” “Go!
Move now!” The terrifying Reiatsu at his back hit him like a wall.
Wayne hardened himself, leapt down from Nel’s back, shoved her away by dozens of meters, then turned to face the oncoming storm.
His right hand began gathering Reiatsu, wisps of it colliding and crackling against each other like bolts of lightning, a faint rumble building at the edges of his hearing.
The battle had come to this point, and Wayne knew he couldn’t run.
If he abandoned Nel and fled alone, she probably wouldn’t last even three seconds against what Yammy was throwing, she’d be shredded to nothing by that overwhelming torrent of Bala.
And if that happened, he’d have no better chance of surviving Yammy’s pursuit anyway.
Right now, he still had the strength to block one strike.
Enough to buy Nel time.
Maybe, years from now, if the two of them crossed paths again, she would avenge him.
“Lightning Strike!” Against the wall of incoming Bala, Wayne unleashed his most powerful attack.
In an instant, a web of crackling lightning woven from Reiatsu collided with the oncoming wave, the impact detonated with an earth-shaking explosion.
Dozens of Bala were swallowed in the billowing smoke and dust.
But there were far more where those came from.
Even at full power, Wayne had only stopped a portion of them.
Dozens more kept coming, crashing down around him in thunderous blasts.
“Lord Wayne!” Nel, who had completely forgotten to flee, came charging back in a frenzy.
But when the smoke finally cleared, all that greeted her was a stretch of land blasted to rubble, and Wayne, lying at the bottom of a crater, barely clinging to life.
After that single exchange, facing the Bala that kept flying in, Wayne had managed to swat only a few away with his Blade Claws before they hit him dead-on.
The blasts rocked his body, and the relentless bombardment detonated one after another across his now-undefended form.
All he could do was raise both hands to shield himself.
The violent explosions shattered the Bone Blade on his right hand, stripped the hardened keratin from both hands, tore through flesh and skin, and finally, one Bala blew both his hands clean off.
With nothing left to protect him, Wayne could only shield his head, roll onto his stomach, and use his back to absorb the blows.
Wave after wave of searing agony nearly knocked him out cold, yet he kept fighting against it with everything he had, until the brutal assault finally ended.
But he no longer had the strength to stand.
Beyond his hands, one leg had twisted beneath him at a grotesque angle.
His back was a raw mess of blood and mangled flesh.
His internal organs had sustained some damage.
And the Hollow Hole in his chest had been blasted several sizes larger from the impact.
“Urgh—!” His mind already slipping, Wayne coughed up a mouthful of blood.
“Damn it,” he murmured.
“Struck down before I even got started.
Is this really how I die?” The bitterness ran deep, but he didn’t even have the strength to stand.
“Where’s Nel?
Heh…
no way I can look after her now.
I hope she gets away.
After all, this many Bala — even Ira would have burned through a lot of Reiatsu.
At Nel’s speed, she should be able to escape.” As if casting one last look back at this world, Wayne’s consciousness grew dimmer and dimmer.
“Inola, I’m sorry — maybe this is as far as I go.” The memory drifted through him.
He slowly closed his eyes.
The light behind his Hollow Mask began to fade.
His consciousness was on the verge of going out entirely.
…..
“Lord Wayne, Lord Wayne…” In the haze between waking and darkness, a faint voice reached his ears, familiar, unmistakably hers.
Only Nel ever called him that.
“Nel?
That fool, why didn’t she run?
Right, Nel has a healing ability.
But with injuries like mine, there’s no way she can save me.
Just run, get to that forest.
There’s still a chance for you there.
Stay alive.
Then avenge me.” In the blur of semi-consciousness, his thoughts moved in that direction.
But he could no longer force even the words out.
…
gurgle.
A strange sound, and something warm trickled down onto his head.
His consciousness, already on the edge of going dark, caught a faint thread of clarity from that inexplicable warmth.
The warm, smooth liquid spread across his entire body.
The wounds covering him began to slowly close, carried along by that gentle heat.
Slow, but the bleeding was beginning, gradually, to stop.
Sensing the change in himself, Wayne’s eyes opened just slightly.
Dimly, he made out a deep, vivid pink Reiatsu radiating from Nel’s form.
But it lasted only a single moment.
Because just as he tried to see more clearly, a wave of agonizing pain swept away the last thread of his consciousness.
A cold wind moved across the wasteland, lifting a thin veil of dust and sand.
Across this barren stretch of land, countless craters broke the ground into a fractured, unsettling mess, the shattered earth where Wayne had finally lost consciousness.
The sky remained as dark and oppressive as ever.
After lying unconscious for an unknown stretch of time, the gravely wounded Wayne slowly opened his eyes.
“Mmm…” A murmur, like a man waking from a deep sleep.
His consciousness was coming back.
“This is…
I’m still alive.” He opened his eyes.
That hazy, dim sky spread above him, and the memories from just before he lost consciousness came flooding back.
“Right, Nel healed me at the end.
That’s what kept me alive.” The conclusion arrived quickly.
He pushed himself upright out of the blast crater, and only then realized that most of his injuries had already healed.
“This…” Wayne stared at his left hand.
It had completely regenerated.
The wounds across his body had closed as well.
Only the Bone Blade on his right hand hadn’t yet fully formed.
Everything else was essentially healed.
“This…
does that mean I’ve been lying here for a very long time?” Wayne knew what Nel’s healing could do.
It worked well enough on surface wounds, but injuries as severe as his had been…
He stood and began scanning the surroundings.
The fact that he was alive meant Yammy had withdrawn.
But Nel was nowhere to be found.
Had they taken each other out?
Before he lost consciousness, Wayne had already drained a significant portion of Yammy’s Reiatsu.
Worth remembering: Yammy’s ability was the unlimited accumulation of Reiatsu, forcibly elevating his Reiatsu was his greatest weapon.
But if, after the fight with Wayne, Yammy’s Reiatsu had dropped to around the level of a low-rank Gillian, then the possibility of Nel taking him down in a mutual kill was very real.
And if he’d been knocked all the way back to the High Hollow level, it wasn’t out of the question that Nel could have outright defeated him.
Wayne couldn’t think of any other explanation for now.
“They didn’t really both go down together, did they?” His heart sank.
He had only just found an ideal partner, losing her like this…
“Hmm?
What’s that.” Still pacing, Wayne scanned the wreckage of the battlefield, looking for anything that might sharpen his read of what had happened.
Sure enough, a few minutes in, he found something different.
A footprint.
Enormous, so large that Wayne identified it in an instant.
“A Gillian’s footprint…
a breakthrough?
Is it Nel?
Or Yammy?” He turned it over.
“Nel is the more likely possibility.
I remember, just before I lost consciousness, a very powerful Reiatsu was radiating from her.
If she really broke through, then the chance of her defeating Yammy would rise dramatically.” He followed the direction of the footprints, and quickly found another not far away, then another, a whole line of them, still reasonably distinct.
“The prints are still fairly clear.
Left at most a week ago.” He had seen Gillian footprints before and knew exactly how deep and well-preserved an impression that massive frame would leave over time.
“So I was unconscious for at least a week?
But then why did my injuries heal so quickly?
Could Nel’s healing ability have improved when she evolved, if it really was her who broke through?” The questions swirled, but Wayne didn’t dwell on them.
He simply followed the large footprints forward.
Once he found whoever had left them, everything would become clear on its own, even if his guesses turned out to be wrong.
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