The Astral soul system-Chapter 188: Storm beast

Gary glanced at his watch, the massive hammer that was vastly disproportionate with his body doing little to slow him down.

He bashed a few robots away, not slowing to finish them and putting all his effort to get to his destination.

He unconsciously stirred the wind around him as he ran, his abilities being utilized even invisibly.

He couldn’t help but smile.

This was his first major fight since...her. He still wasn’t sure what had happened but he wasn’t one to waste energy on things like that. Right now to him there was only one question that needed to be asked.

Could he hit hard enough?

"Hmm?"

He immediately jumped,a gust of wind shooting from beneath his feet, launching him into the air as he barely dodged a beam, this one being larger, faster and more destructive than the others.

Landing, he looked up to see a robot at least twice the size of the regular ones,twice as wide and at least three times as menacing.

His watch immediately beeped and a message appeared on it.

<Gary storm. Surrender or die>

Gary raised a brow, looking at the robot that had stopping moving and suddenly swung his hammer, releasing a wind blade that struck at the metal frame of the machine. It didn’t do any damage, but it wasn’t supposed to. Gary was simply trying to send a message as they had,and it worked

<Then you will die>

Gary tightened the grip on his hammer

The answer to that question?

He was about to find out.

The robot charged at him. Like many others he’d realized that the ranged attack they had had a cooldown period. The snaller robots had one of a about ten seconds,so he guessed this one would probably be shorter.

He released a barrage of wind blades, firing them all over it’s body but they didn’t have much effect, clanking against the metal without causing visible damage.

Gary clicked his tongue as it entered melee range and swung his hammer as the robot punched, the two pieces of metal clashing into each other and in the end it was Gary that was knocked back.

"Way too strong. Shi-"

He didn’t even have time to curse as he noticed the robot about to blast him again.

Wide eyed, he dropped to the ground, rolling for dear life and barely avoiding getting shot at almost point blank range.

"That’s way shorter than ten seconds"

He muttered, backing away as fast as he could as the robot pursued, almost grabbing him but he used a gust of wind to propel him back

"Way too fast. At least I’m safe up h-"

Almost like it knew what he was about to say and rebuked the thought, the robot jumped, relentlessly pursuing him even in the air.

Gary could only hold up his hammer’s handle across his chest,a narrow barrier that the robot grabbed fiercely before it’s weight and inertia caught up to them both, dragging them back to earth where it slammed gary into the ground, creating visible cracks in the ground.

Gary felt wind being knocked out of his lungs as he spat blood.

He saw a flash of light above him which was probably the ranged attack charging up to finish him.

Gritting his teeth,Gary lightly turned the handle of the hammer and a whirring sound was released from it, almost like it had a will of its own, the hammerhead slammed into the side of the robot and a visible shockwave was released as the robot was sent flying, the attack hitting somewhere random.

Breathing heavily,Gary got up to his feet, spitting out some more blood before wiping it away.

He definitely had some busted ribs and other internal damage.

’I didn’t think it’d be this bad’

He grit his teeth in frustration. He hadn’t told anyone but ever since Zen had freed him from Celia’s control, his ability had been... wrong... weaker. It didn’t even feel like his own ability anymore. It was unfamiliar, which was very disorienting since he’d had it since he was a child.

His gaze fell on the hammer.

’At least i have this ’

The hammer’s active skill was to absorb the kinetic energy he released when it struck something, store it, and release it for an even more powerful attack.

He’d used almost half the kinetic energy he had stored in order to escape in his panic.

He looked at the ground that was stained with his blood and then at the robot.

He noticed that the area he’d hit had been damaged severely. It was sparking constantly and bits metal were falling off.

He looked at his own shaking hands and a smile bloomed on his face.

Now THIS was something familiar

This feeling. He didn’t know why but it felt like he’d lost something important when Celia controlled him, but this... this was something he could never loose.

Maybe Zyro was more right than he thought when he compared Gary and Xavier.

The wind suddenly became more excited and violent, mirroring it’s master’s emotions.

Wind gathered around him, blowing his curly brown hair and clothes, focusing mostly on the weapon, coating the weapon, mostly the head in a faint green energy.

He saw the robot charging another ranged attack and instead of dodging, he charged forward, gripping his hammer at his side before twisting the hammer again, preparing to release all the stored energy.

As the robot released it’s attack, Gary was only an inch away from it, still smiling, he extended one leg, lowering his height before putting all his strength into that one area.

The attack barely misses his head, striking just out of his field of vision.

With one clean pivot, he slammed the hammer into the same place he’d hit before, yelling as he did

"Wind tunnel!"

As the hammer landed, the entire place became eerily quiet for a second before a concentrated gust of wind shot out from the opposite side of its body, followed by the robot itself, launching into the sky before deforming, crumpling up and eventually breaking apart.

Falling onto one knee and using the hammer as a crutch, Gary opened the channel

<General III is... toast>

He closed the channel before getting up. He was about to move when he saw a red liquid drop onto his hand

"What?"

He looked up and was surprised to see more and more of the liquid falling down

"What the -"

**************

Diane leaped and lunged, gracefully dodging between the the robots she had no intention of fighting. They’d all shut down anyway when she found the general,at least she hoped so.

She’d transformed back mostly but her movements still surpassed what a human should be capable of.

She quickly reached where she was supposed to be but strangely nothing was here, not even the regular robots. For some reason they’d all avoided this location and were headed towards all the others.

Her ears suddenly twitched and she looked up, seeing what should be her target standing on one of the higher floors, it’s hands gripping the railing, ripping it off before jumping down , landing in front of her and cracking the ground beneath it.

<Beep! Beep!>

Diane looked at her wrist and saw a message

<Surrender or die>

She looked back at the machine that was no longer moving and suddenly burst out laughing.

"Surrender? I don’t know the meaning of the word, which is bad news for you"

With that she stopped focusing on the watch and immediately jumped out of the way, avoiding the ranged attack of the robot,white fur covering the areas of her legs.

"Fucking hell"

She muttered under her breath. She definitely couldn’t handle one of those hits head on.

She transformed back to normal in mid air, grabbing onto one of the damaged railings and pulling herself up to a higher floor.

"Over here,rust monkey"

She said and immediately started running.

She had no way to close the distance and no ranged attacks so she could only force it to close the distance.

She glanced behind her and the moment she saw the robot charge at her, she immediately turned back to face it and shot forward, striking at it once before retreating.

Stunned, the robot stayed in place for a second before turning around to look at her.

Looking at the claw marks on its body, Diane clicked her tongue. Surface level damage.

’That won’t work a second time. Hit and run it is’

Diane’s body started to shift, returning to the half feline form she was in before and just in time to jump out of the way of another attack.

Running on all fours, Diane began circling round the robot, sizing it up carefully.

The robot stared at her for a few seconds before it started firing blasts at the ground instead of wildly chasing, trying shoot her down but with every attack she managed to leap out of the way in time,her powerful feline body pouncing back and forth.

’Looks like it’s not too different from the other ones. It can’t move while shooting ’

And like clockwork, the next attack started charging up another attack and internally calculating how long it would take, Diane stopped and leaped into the air.

Her eyes widened as she saw the robot seemingly abandon it’s course of action, it’s main weapon powering down as it charged to grab her.

’Fuck!’

She crossed her hands over her heart, hoping to avoid as much critical damage as possible.

The robot’s razor hands grabbed at her waist, digging into into her flesh before slamming down, attempting to slam her into the ground.

Surprisingly she landed on her feet, grabbing at the hands that were trying to crush her waist.

The fur on her body had disappeared and now she seemed to be completely human except for the pitch black scales that ran up her neck and hands.

"Nice try,bitch"

She spat, her voice trembling as she gripped the hands that were trying to crush her. Looking down at the razor sharp claws for hands that the robot had stabbed into her body,her facial expression fell for a second before becoming even more ferocious.

’Fuck,if I didn’t swap the scales in i would’ve been toast’

She suddenly heard a familiar whirring sound and noticed the robot about to blast again. There was no way she could avoid this.

She noticed her watch beeping again with the word surrender flashing on and off on its screen.

Gritting her teeth, Diane ignored it, and instead let go of the robots hands, letting them pierce her scales before grabbing the chest, planting both her feet on it before pulling them both to the ground, rolling on her back, and once it was above her, she transformed her feet and kicked as hard as she could with both feet.

The impact knocked the attack off course and the robot into the air, allowing Diane to roll away, the blast just barely missing her.

As fast as she could, she created some distance, breathing heavily.

She looked at her sides, noticing blood seeping out throughh holes in her uniform.

’Damnit! I’m almost empty,at most i can transform a few more times, and even then i can’t maintain it ’

She suddenly spat out some blood, looking pissed. Wiping her mouth, she growled, pulling something out of her ring. It was a long thick golden...chain?

"I don’t usually do this. My body alone is hardly ever not enough. It guess I just need to put in some extra effort for you"

’Fuck it. Might as well ’

She spun it a few times, wrapping it around her arm before charging at the robot . It immediately started charging another ranged attack and seeing this, Diane immediately threw one end of the chain, wrapping it around its arm before pouncing at it. The beam passed directly in front of her face but she dodged it before landing on the robot, wrapping the other end around its other hand before jumping to the ground, pulling both it’s hands with her. The machine tried to pull both it’s arms back but their strength was evenly matched.

Pulling the chain, Diane watched as the ends she’d wrapped around the robot started moving on their own, further constricting it’s movements and tying it up.

Diane let out a beastly snarl. There was just one more thing to do.

Her body started to transform but a memory suddenly replayed itself in her mind

"Remember. This is very dangerous, especially for you. You could kill yourself,or worse"

Shaking her head, she got rid of that and continued her transformation. It started like every other one but this one was different.

Her hands bulked up and got covered with black fur while black scales appeared from her torso to her neck. Her teeth became canines,grey patches of fur making it to her face and her legs becoming more lean and covered with orange fur. On the inside of her body multiple different mutations were still happening.

Multiple different colors of energy started seeping out of her body uncontrollably as she suddenly pounced ,her eyes having turned completely monstrous.

Her feet slammed into the metal frame, this time doing more clear damage before her claws sunk into its soldiers, punching and ripping violently, she even sunk her teeth into it, trying to bite it to death.

The robot finally broke free from the chains, grabbing and throwing her off.

Easily landing on her feet, Diane charged again faster than it could react, running on all fours before pouncing, knocking it onto the ground before she started clawing at it’s face, the multicolored energy becoming even more intense.

The robot tried to throw her off again but she grabbed it’s hands this time with less effort, knocking them away as she kept digging into it’s chest with her claws.

Attempting to get rid of her,it even started charging it’s ranged attack, but it was pointless. She effortlessly dodged it before going back to mauling it, ripping off an arm , scratching and biting even after it stopped moving.

She finally stopped, reverting back to normal before shakily getting up and taking a few steps away before falling to her knees, spitting out even more blood.

’I almost...lost it’

She opened the channel

<General I is dead meat...or metal>

She suddenly looked back at the scraps of metal,her eyes suddenly widening as she saw a red liquid seeping through the cracks of the destroyed robot onto the ground