Shinji, after tanking the attack, struggled to keep afloat. By this point, he had begun to get used to the feeling of extreme pain. Floating, now not far in front of him, was Nebula, revitalised by her holy skill: Recharge. As soon as his vocal chords regenerated, Shinji wasted no time in making himself heard.
"YOU SHOULD BE DEAD" He shouts, at the top of his lungs, despite half of them still healing.
"SO SHOULD YOU, YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE WEAK!" Nebula responds in the same tone, "YOU'RE TOUGHER THAN I IMAGINED, I'LL GIVE YOU THAT"
Nebula closes in on Shinji, who was running low on MP after his onslaught attack. As his upper body heals, Shinji covers his body in dark magic as a form of defence - but when Nebula strikes, it's not enough.
"OMEGA LIGHT SWORD!" Nebula screams with a menacing smile on her face, as she materialises a giant, glowing sword made entirely out of densely concentrated light magic. She strikes through Shinji at a diagonal angle, slicing apart the majority of his lower body from the rest of it, reducing it to ash. Floating there, lacking the knowledge or ability on how to attack back, experiencing the intensity of the pain cause by the attack was what remained of Shinji; his dark magic defence had done absolutely nothing against the sheer power of Nebula in her Recharge boosted state. His now much lighter and smaller body once again struggled to fly due to the damage sustained from Nebula's attack. Despite these outstanding factors, Shinji was not down for the count yet - his rage still hadn't subsided.
"BYE-BYE, MONSTER!" Nebula smirks, readying her next swing.
"Impossible." Shinji muttered.
Nebula paused her attack, "What was that? DID YOU SAY SOMETHING!" She taunted.
"I SAID.." Shinji caught his breath, attempting to overcome his deathly situation, "IMPOSSIBLE!" He yelled, "ITS IMPOSSIBLE TO KILL THE UN-KILLABLE, HAHAHAHA!"
"You call yourself un-killable, eh?" Nebula asks insincerely, extremely annoyed by Shinji's words, "LET'S FIND OUT THEN!" She smiles once more.
Before Nebula can finish making her move, Shinji had already delegated the rest of his MP into a split dark beam pulse attack, aimed at Nebula - but she doesn't make an effort to defend.
"TASTE MY REVENGE, BITCH!" Shinji screams, firing the attack at her whilst his lower body begins to heal. The hope was that the poison would effect Nebula similarly to how it did Shinji, not too long before - but Nebula was too powerful for that . Instead, she just absorbed the attack and converted its energy into her own, before she repeatedly and hastily sliced her sword of light through what remained of Shinji, until there was nothing but his severed head, falling out the sky.
With his nerves severed, Shinji had no issue with the pain, but without a body he was more or less finished. "…!" He tried to scream at Nebula to satisfy his undying rage, but it was no use in his state. Shinji's head, housing his consciousness, splatted in the mud beneath the rubble below, unable to move or do much until he regenerated. His rage intensified more than ever, Demonic Punishment was still well and truly active.
…
Nebula had cremated the remains of Shinji's body ,that still managed to float with his broken wings, as a declaration of victory, seeing no way for Shinji to recover from it.
"AHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!" She laughs in an almost evil manner, "HOW'S THAT, PATHETIC WEAKLING? UN-KILLABLE? YEAH FOR SURE, HAHAHAHA!"
Nebula calms down from her battle aggression and admires the destruction she and her comrades had caused. "I bet Tone will be jealous that I got to have a REAL fight, HAHAHA!" Nebula considers her options, "Where are those two anyways? I should probably collect that brats head now that I think about it, got to rub it in some how." She tries to contact her comrades with her mind connect skill, that each celestial uses for communication, but gets no response, "Oi, Tone, you'll want to hear this, come here, you too Kin, where are you?" She asks, starting to worry ever so slightly. As she tries to contact them once more, Nebula suddenly feels a devastating power looming over her.
"W-WHAT!? IMPOSSIBLE! I WON, I DEFEATED YOU! YOU WERE NEVER THIS… OVERPOWERING!" Nebula turns around to face her opponent, but this time it wasn't who she thought it was.
"Yo, Celestial of Pacifism, where's the boy?" Diablo asks, nonchalantly flaunting his full aura as if it were nothing.
…
Shinji, having regrown his upper body, crawls out from the mud with his arms, gritting his teeth and breathing aggressively.
"You haven't lost yet, Shinji…"
-MASTER, WHAT ELSE CAN I DO? HOW ELSE CAN I KILL THAT CELESTIAL BITCH? SHE'S POWERED UP- .
"You house the skill Absorb, if you are compatible, The Demon Lord of Pride won't need to step in…"
-WHAT IS IT? ILL DO IT, ANYTHING- .
…
Aki and Kasumi frantically search the surface for Shinji, after witnessing Nebula alone in the sky, they assumed the worst - or at least whatever the worst is for an immortal.
"His house, or at least where it was, he might have gone there if he lost" Aki suggests, thinking of the possibilities. Kasumi nods, too distressed thinking of what her friend is going through to respond verbally.
The two approached the site of the remains of the Yuu family home, and sure enough, Shinji was there, hunched over something as his is lower legs regenerated.
"Shinji!? What happened?" Kasumi asked, concerned. Shinji turned around to face his friends, he was sobbing whilst shovelling something into his mouth.
"Hey Kasumi, Aki, glad you're alive." He says, as he continues what he was doing.
"Shinji, what are you… doing exactly?" Aki asks, doubting what he sees out of shock.
"Just… eating my parents ashes, that's all"
"What…. W-why? Why would you-" Kasumi asks, before getting interrupted by Shinji.
"Because I'm compatible."