The red beam crashed against the blade of the golden sword, the raw power exploding outwards and blasting the ground to the side.

The next second Luna swapped positions with the sword again, appearing in front of Allen.

"Thanks," Allen replied.

"I'm just paying back the favor," Luna replied before dashing forward toward the man in the silver armor, kicking up dust behind her.

She moved fast while avoiding and dodging the multiple laser beams fired by him which exploded around her.

Reaching him she wasted no time and quickly engaged him in close combat. With her fists glowing with a golden hue she attacked the man from every angle she could see.

He was constantly blocking her attacks but still could not afford to take this lightly. After all, this time there was no barrier there to protect him.

Therefore he was taking this seriously.

Allen saw his chance. Something like this was exactly what he was looking for. Hence he quickly got into position and aimed at the man through the MP5's ironsight.

He couldn't use full auto since it produced too much recoil and the chances of hitting Luna were high, so he decided to go with the other option.

His thumb flicked the fire selector switch on the MP5 up one notch. Burst fire.

He took a steadying breath. The drone feed in his mind gave him a perfect top-down view of the fight, giving him a much better awareness of his surroundings.

He saw the man sidestep Luna's thrust and for a split second, the man's right shoulder was exposed.

Allen instantly squeezed the trigger.

Three bullets ripped through the air in a tight and precise group.

The man who was busy blocking another of Luna's strikes had to twist his body at a weird angle to avoid the shots. The bullets flew past his head, missing only by an inch.

He glared at Allen but couldn't afford to for much longer since Luna was constantly attacking him.

Luna then vanished from his field of view, appearing behind him as she switched with her sword and punched him right in the back, causing the man to stumble forward.

Allen fired again.

Another three-round burst. This time the man had to raise an arm to knock them away with the bullets striking at an angle and sparking off his silver armor.

But it wasn't as if that had put him out of danger.

He was focused on the bullets. He was focused on Luna and her sword. He was trying to fight a war on two fronts at the same time, and both of them were high-speed battles.

The bullets moved faster than the speed of sound and Luna's speed was also much more than what any normal human would be capable of, even with using magic.

She was one of the best knights humanity had ever seen.

And thus for a single, fatal moment, the man's focus broke.

He was a fraction of a second too slow in bringing his arm back down to defend himself.

Luna saw it.

She dropped her stance and put all her weight and power into a single and devastating punch. Her right fist glowing with the same intense golden light as her sword shot forward.

There was no invisible shield to stop it this time.

Her glowing fist slammed directly into the man's face.

His head snapped back with a spray of blood jittering from his mouth. For the first time, the man had taken a direct hit to his face, a raw punch that made his head buzz.

But it wasn't over yet.

At the exact same instant her punch landed, a golden streak shot out from behind him.

It was Luna's sword. It had flown back on its own like a silent missile.

With a wet and tearing sound, the golden blade plunged deep into the man's back, right between his shoulder blades as the tip burst out through the front of his chest in a spray of red.

Allen saw his opening and instantly raised the MP5, with the iron sights already locked onto the man's unmoving form he squeezed the trigger.

There was a deafening crash that broke the air once more. The gun jerked in his hands as it spat out an unforgiving stream of bullets.

They hit the man's body one after another like a lead storm that ripped through his already battered silver armor.

Piles of metal and flesh went airborne. The body of the man jerked and twisted with each blow but he didn't drop. The golden sword that was protruding from his back supported him upright as if it were a morbid pin.

The final magazine bullet struck him and the gun eventually stopped. An immediate and thick silence descended over the crater as a wispy trail of smoke rose from the red-hot barrel of Allen's MP5.

For an instant the man simply stood there with his head bent and body a puny wreck. Blood, dark and heavy, dripped from a dozen fresh holes in his chest and belly as it accumulated at his feet on the smooth black stone.

Then slowly he stood up straight.

He looked down at the sword piercing his body then at the bullet holes that covered his front.

Luna stood with her face pale and her breath coming in ragged gasps as she raised her hand. With a soft, wet, and tearing sound her sword pulled itself out of the man's back.

It dragged through his insides as it came free with a fresh gush of blood following it before it flew through the air and landed perfectly in her waiting hand.

The man didn't even flinch. He just calmly placed his hand over the gaping and bloody hole in his chest where the sword had been. He looked at the blood on his fingers, his expression unreadable.

"I see," he said, his voice quiet while looking at Luna. "I think I get why you are the talk of the town."

He paused with a strange, almost analytical look in his eyes.

"But they are heavily mistaken, it seems," he continued, his voice laced with a cold disappointment. "You are not a threat on your own. Truthfully speaking, you are not a threat at all."

His gaze then shifted, moving past Luna and toward Allen.

"You on the other hand," the man said, a new and dangerous intensity appearing in his voice.

"You are different. You cannot be left alive in this world. Not only are you an anomaly, but you are also strong as well. Therefore, you are a threat to—"

As he spoke, Allen was already moving. He didn't wait for the speech to end. He started walking forward with his steps slow and quiet.

The MP5 in his hands dissolved into light and in its place a small and heavy object materialized in his right hand.

The man continued talking with his focus entirely on the threat Allen represented, not on his slow advance.

"This matter has grown into something big. It is against my protocols to deal with this alone. I must report about you."

As he spoke these last words his body began to change. He started to turn translucent, like a fading ghost. His silver armor became see-through and the edges of his form blurring into the air around him.

He was escaping.

"No, you're not!" Allen shouted, breaking into a full sprint.

The object in his hand was a small, dull green can, about the size of a pear. A metal ring and pin were attached to the top.

A simple fragmentation grenade.

Allen's thumb hooked through the ring. He pulled the pin. The metal scraped as it came free and he heard a soft click from the handle in his palm.

He held the lever down as his arm cocked back.

The man's body was almost completely transparent now, a shimmering distortion in the air. He was seconds away from vanishing completely.

Allen planted his foot and threw.

His arm snapped forward in a powerful and practiced motion, as if he was used to this. The green grenade flew through the air end over end in a high arc. It sailed across the crater and headed directly toward the fading man.

The man saw it coming but he was already in the middle of his escape. He couldn't stop it. All he could do was watch as the small and strange rock reached the peak of its arc and began to fall.

It didn't hit him. It fell to a spot in the air right next to his almost-invisible face.

For a split second, there was silence.

Then, the world around him exploded.

There was no fire. No big or flashy blast. Just a single, deafening BANG that was so loud it felt like the world was cracking in half.

At the same time, an impossibly bright white light flashed, turning the entire area around him into a stark, overexposed photograph.

A wave of pure and concussive force, invisible but powerful, ripped outwards from the blast kicking up a massive cloud of black dust.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.