The towering creature didn't slow.
It dove.
Not a leap—
a full collapse of mass and intent, its frame folding forward as gravity was weaponized. The street vanished beneath it, asphalt pulverizing as its weight tore free of restraint.
DOOOOM—!!
The impact should have flattened the block.
The boy moved.
Not away.
Into it.
The moment the creature's shadow swallowed him, he kicked off the ground, body blurring sideways as the street detonated where he'd been standing. Concrete erupted upward in slabs the size of doors, shockwaves tearing through parked cars and throwing them into each other like toys.
The creature's claws bit deep, carving trenches through asphalt as its momentum carried it forward. The ground screamed. Dust swallowed everything.
Rian barely had time to shield his face before the blast wave hit him again, hurling him backward into a pile of debris. His vision went white for a split second, ears ringing like alarms stuck inside his skull.
When he looked back—
The boy was airborne.
He'd used the collapse.
Bounced off a rising slab of concrete, twisting midair, boots skidding against falling debris as he flipped backward—just barely clearing the creature's snapping jaws as they closed with a thunderous KRRRSH—!!
Metal screamed somewhere nearby as a streetlight vanished between its teeth.
The creature surged again, relentless, its massive body flowing unnaturally smoothly for something that size. It didn't pause. Didn't reassess.
It pursued.
Each step collapsed more street. Each movement dragged the air with it, pressure waves rippling outward as it chased the boy through falling debris and shattered space.
Rian's heart slammed against his ribs.
It wasn't attacking blindly.
It was adapting.
The boy hit the ground in a roll, boots skidding, shoulder clipping a flipped car hard enough to dent steel. He came up fast, breath sharp, eyes locked forward—
—and the creature was already there.
Too close.
It lunged, body twisting mid-motion, tail whipping forward like a living battering ram.
WHAM—!!
The boy crossed his arms just in time.
The impact launched him.
He tore through a storefront—glass, metal, and concrete exploding outward as he vanished inside. The building shuddered, upper floors groaning ominously as dust poured into the street.
The creature didn't follow immediately.
It straightened.
Slow.
Dust slid off its frame as it turned its head, tracking the collapse with predatory precision. Its claws flexed once, digging deeper into the street.
Behind it—
The segmented thing shifted.
Not forward.
Not aggressive.
Just a subtle realignment.
Spines along its body rotated by degrees, violet seams pulsing in a new sequence. Invisible lines of tension snapped into place across the ruined street, intersecting where the boy had disappeared… and where the towering creature stood.
Rian felt it again.
That pressure.
That sense of being measured.
The fight wasn't just happening anymore.
It was being observed.
And adjusted.
From within the collapsing storefront, something moved.
A cough.
Then a laugh—short, breathless, almost impressed.
"…Okay," the boy muttered from inside the rubble.
"Yeah. You're definitely trying now."
The creature answered by stepping forward.
And the street began to break again beyond recovery.
It continued to fail.
Rubble kept falling in waves—secondary collapses, delayed deaths. What had been walls minutes ago were now slanted graves. Concrete slabs lay stacked at impossible angles, pinning limbs, crushing torsos. People screamed from beneath the wreckage—some sharp and frantic, others thin and fading, already running out of air.
Rian heard bones snap somewhere to his left.
He didn't look.
He couldn't.
The fight tore forward through the ruins, every exchange sending fresh debris raining down. Each time the towering creature struck, another building lost its argument with gravity. Each time the boy moved, something else broke to make room for him.
Dust turned the street into fog.
Then—
It stopped.
Not the destruction.
The watching.
The segmented creature shifted.
At first, it was subtle. A change in the rhythm of its glow. The violet seams along its body paused their steady pulse, then resumed—faster, tighter, patterns collapsing inward. Spines along its back rotated, locking into a new configuration with a low, harmonic hum that made Rian's teeth ache.
It had finished calculating.
Hooks disengaged from the street.
One by one.
The ground exhaled as pressure lifted from it.
Rian felt it before he saw it—the way the air snapped into alignment, invisible vectors tightening like strings drawn to breaking point. The segmented body angled, no longer parallel to the street but offset, coiled, ready.
It had made up its mind.
Then—
A streak of white heat tore through the dust.
Not a blast. Not an explosion.
A piercing line, screaming as it cut the air apart.
SHRRRRRAAA—!!
It struck the segmented creature square in the back.
The impact didn't erupt outward.
It burned through.
A scorching lance punched into layered plating, carving a molten channel across its spine. Light flared—orange, then white—before collapsing inward as the projectile passed clean through and vanished beyond the ruins.
For the first time—
KRRRRAAA—AAGGHHH—!!
The segmented creature screamed.
The sound was wrong. Raw. Shattered. Not dominance.
Pain.
Its massive frame lurched forward, claws gouging the street as it fought its own momentum. Molten fragments sloughed from its back, hissing violently as they struck concrete. The roar echoed through the ruined blocks—short, sharp, and edged with something unfamiliar.
Shock.
Its head snapped around, abandoning the battlefield mid-motion. Not toward the towering creature. Not toward Rian.
Toward the direction the attack had come from.
There was nothing there.
Only smoke. Dust drifting in slow collapse. And a straight, surgical scar carved through the street, still faintly glowing where the air itself hadn't finished cooling.
The segmented creature went still.
Then it changed.
Its spines flared outward in unison, violet light surging along its body in rapid, ordered cascades. The distortion around it tightened—not spreading, not expanding—but folding inward, lines snapping into sharper, more efficient angles.
This wasn't rage.
It was reprioritization.
Its attention peeled away from the street entirely.
From the towering creature. From the boy. From the ruins.
The body shifted, segments locking and unlocking in a new configuration. The air bent hard around it—then collapsed.
With a sound like tension being severed—
KRRRK—THOOM—
The segmented creature vanished.
Not fleeing.
Not retreating.
Gone—pulled along a path only it could see, drawn toward whatever had dared to strike it from the dark.
The street was left trembling in its wake.
Rian stared at the empty space, breath shallow.
"…That wasn't us," he whispered.
The moment stretched—
Then snapped.
The boy moved first.
He tore an electric pole free from the street with a violent wrench, concrete exploding at its base as cables snapped and whipped like live serpents. Sparks burst in blinding arcs, lighting the dust-choked air in white-blue flashes.
He didn't throw it.
He charged with it.
The pole hit like a spear.
WHAM—!!
Metal met plated flesh, the impact ringing out like a struck bell. The tip punched into the towering creature's chest, skidding across layered armor in a shower of sparks before biting just enough to stagger it a half-step back.
The boy didn't slow.
He twisted the pole, leveraged his weight, and ripped it free—then reversed his grip mid-motion and slashed.
The pole screamed through the air.
KRRSSHH—!!
It carved across the creature's shoulder, tearing loose fragments of plating that spun away glowing faintly before clattering dead against the street. The creature roared, swinging an arm down in a crushing arc—
—but the boy was already gone.
He darted inside the swing, slid under it, and rammed the pole upward like a lance.
DOOOM—!!
The blow lifted the creature's head, snapping it back with enough force to buckle the pavement beneath its feet. Electricity surged down the pole, discharging violently into the armor. Blue-white arcs crawled across the creature's frame, popping and cracking as systems—or nerves, or something between—fired in chaotic response.
Rian shielded his eyes as the street flashed like lightning had struck at ground level.
The boy yanked the pole free again.
It bent.
Not enough.
He grinned through gritted teeth and snapped it in half against the curb—metal shrieking as it broke—leaving him with a long, jagged length in one hand and a shorter, heavier section in the other.
Spear.
Sword.
He went back in.
The long piece stabbed—fast, precise—aiming for joints, seams, places where plates overlapped. The shorter length slashed and hooked, battering exposed edges, cracking already-damaged armor wider with each hit.
The towering creature absorbed the blows at first.
It tried to overwhelm him with mass—wide swings, stomps, shoulder checks that shattered asphalt and sent shockwaves rolling outward. Each miss destroyed more of the street. Each hit it landed clipped air, or dust, or the afterimage of where the boy had been a heartbeat earlier.
But it was learning.
An arm came up—too late at first—taking a spear thrust directly across the forearm.
KRRRAAANG—!!
The plating there held.
Barely.
The boy recoiled, surprised, and the creature capitalized immediately. Its other arm followed, crossing in front of its chest, bracing instead of striking.
Block.
The next slash slammed into reinforced plating instead of flesh.
The impact still thundered—but the creature didn't stagger.
Rian felt the shift even from where he lay.
The towering creature lowered its center of gravity. Its stance widened. Arms rose higher, elbows tucking in, movements tightening from wild destruction into controlled defense.
Not fast.
But deliberate.
The boy clicked his tongue.
"Oh," he muttered. "You're adapting."
He lunged again—harder this time—driving the spear straight at the creature's throat.
The creature caught it.
Its hand closed around the metal mid-thrust, crushing the pole inward with a brutal CRUNCH. Electricity discharged uselessly across its arm as it twisted and yanked.
The boy let go instantly, flipping backward as the mangled pole tore free from his grip and was hurled aside like scrap.
He landed, skidded, rolled—
—and came up with the shorter length held low, blade-like.
The towering creature advanced.
Step.
DOOOM.
Another.
DOOOM.
Arms raised now. Guarded. Blocking angles. Each movement smaller, tighter, less wasteful than before.
It was still taking damage.
But not for long.
And Rian understood, watching through the dust and ruin—
This wasn't a one-sided beating anymore.
This was turning into a real fight.
The shift was sudden.
The towering creature stopped defending.
Its arms lowered—not relaxed, but coiled. Its stance changed again, weight redistributing through its legs, posture tightening into something compact and predatory.
Rian felt it before he understood it.
The pressure changed.
The boy did too.
He darted in, blade flashing, cutting at a seam along the creature's ribs—
—and the creature let it happen.
The slash landed.
Sparks flew.
Armor cracked.
But the creature didn't recoil.
Instead, it moved.
A strike came from the right—wide, obvious, crushing.
Too obvious.
The boy reacted instantly, body blurring as he slipped inside the swing, already twisting for a counter—
—and the other arm moved.
Not swinging.
Grabbing.
The creature's hand snapped out with terrifying precision, fingers closing around the boy's torso mid-motion.
Rian's breath hitched.
"No—!"
The boy's eyes widened—just for a fraction of a second—before the creature slammed him.
DOOOOOOM—!!!
The street detonated.
The impact drove the boy straight into the asphalt, crater forming instantly beneath him as concrete shattered outward in a violent ring. Shockwaves tore through the block, flipping debris and hurling dust skyward.
Rian was thrown back against a wrecked car, ribs screaming as the air was punched from his lungs again.
The creature didn't release.
It lifted—
—and slammed him again.
WHAAAM—!!
Another crater. Deeper. Wider.
The boy's body bounced once, violently, before the creature reversed its grip and brought him down a third time, faster, harder—
KRRRRAAASH—!!!
The asphalt collapsed completely, the street caving in as underground pipes ruptured and steam burst upward in shrieking jets.
The boy went limp in the creature's grasp, limbs hanging loose for a terrifying heartbeat.
Silence followed.
Not peaceful.
Stunned.
Dust rolled outward, settling over broken glass and twisted metal. Fires crackled. Somewhere, a car alarm wheezed and died.
The creature straightened slowly, lifting the boy's broken form higher as if assessing the result of its work.
Rian stared, heart hammering, throat tight.
No way…
The towering creature had learned.
And it had executed the lesson perfectly.