Grey felt the electrical pulses the instant it touched his skin. No... he felt them well before that. From the moment it crossed into the barrier of his Resonant Sense, he knew exactly what was coming.

With a flash of his hands, two hammers appeared.

—

Name: A Pairing of Relentless Strokes

—

Yes, Grey had seen the name already. Yes, he had had his jokes. Even now, he couldn’t help but laugh.

These hammers were Raze’s. Though he had to leave the bastard alive, that didn’t mean that he had to stop himself from robbing him clean.

Weapons that could match up to Grey’s strength were his biggest, most important problem. His fang daggers were falling far behind. Forming strong enough blood blades used up too much energy. The last weapon he had had that was decent enough—Frantz’s spear—hadn’t lasted very long.

It might have been a Vanguard Class spear, but its grade was pitiful and barely at the border between Common and Uncommon.

This could be said to be the first time Grey would wield a weapon that could hold up.

—

Name: A Pairing of Relentless Strokes

Rarity: Epic

Class: Vanguard

Accepted Type: N/A

Rejected Type: N/A

Description: A pair of hammers with only the task of dealing and absorbing damage. Withstand the might of battles even into the Command Class. However, be forewarned, this is a weapon that demands as much from its user as it does from itself. It will not dampen any power it takes on. As much as it suffers, you will suffer.

But should your Neural Frame be capable of withstanding its barrage... you will stand undefeatable.

—

Grey held his arms out wide, a wild, savage grin on his face as threads of white energy began to radiate out from him.

And then he saw it.

For a moment, it was hard to tell if it was just a trick of the light, a twinkle in the air. Most humans couldn’t possibly fathom the speed with which a bolt of lightning struck the ground until they managed to survive it by some miracle.

But Grey... he saw it. He saw that jagged streak of blue cutting down and through the skies like it had fractured the clouds into two pieces of broken glass.

And the moment he registered it.

It was already upon him.

"Too bad, pussy."

Grey’s Resonant Sense flared and the arc of lightning followed streaking lines of animated circuits that painted themselves across the air.

The Volthari had every intention of piercing Grey right through, only for its body to be sent in an arc over his head.

It landed heavily with a booming wave that rolled the earth like the currents of the ocean. But as violent as the collision was, the hedges seemed to absorb it with a slight pulse. And soon, the destructive wave that should have leveled everything for miles stopped at a mere few dozen feet.

The Volthari stood, uninjured, its sparking and its armor dancing between the cloud formations that constructed its body. The floating motes of light that formed its eyes looked on in what seemed like shock, but Grey didn’t seem quick to move.

Instead, Grey stood across from the Volthari, one hammer rested on his shoulder, and the other head balancing between the ground and his palm.

Grey grinned. "You know, I did some research and heard that your people are supposed to be quite powerful. High level race or whatever the fuck the official name is. But in my opinion, you fuckers are just glorified light bulbs.

"If your lightning isn’t landing... you’re kinda weak, arentcha?"

Chi.

The Volthari seemed to think it was beneath it to speak to Sylas. It roared and charged, its body flickering and disappearing again in bolts.

But this one seemed to take form in a wider arc.

The tendrils of blue cut across the skies in broken, fragmented lines, zipping about at sharp angles that cut off every path of retreat.

But who the hell said that Grey wanted to retreat.

He took a step forward, streaks of white-gold filling his eyes.

He had no idea what Amunet had been through while he was out cold. But whatever it was... the insights that flooded his mind when he was sharp enough to pay attention to them were on a whole other level.

However... Grey realized that he simply didn’t need them to beat this mildly inconvenient weather phenomenon.

He was the perfect counter to the Volthari.

Raising the hammer from his shoulder and letting the other swing behind him like some sort of counterweight, Grey’s wild grin was printed across his face for the world to see.

BOOM.

In slow motion, it almost looked like the hammer forced the body of the Volthari into being. From a bolt of lightning, its armor was forced into being, constrained and solidified. It was as though Grey had forced it to materialize just to present itself to be boom sticked.

The hammer, as powerful as it was, didn’t even leave a dent on the Volthari’s armor. But that didn’t stop the alien son of a bitch from flying back in an arc as fast as the one he had bolted down from the skies with.

Grey’s knees bent and Wrath Coronation filled his body, amplified by the Bringer of Light gloves.

In that moment, it looked like tendrils of white-gold descended from the Heavens themselves to grant him power.

Chi.

He vanished, moving so fast he overtook the Volthari, appearing to its back and raising his hammer up high.

"Smile for the fucking camera."

BOOM.

A pair of hammers fell.

The world was painted in cold flare, wild currents of wind dispersing the fog for dozens of meters in a single, sweeping current.

And when what was left of the dust finally dispersed along with it, Grey stood over what was not even a corpse any longer. Instead, it was a floating seed.

Without the slightest hesitation, he snatched it out of the air. And this time, he shattered it beneath his teeth, eating it at the behest of his Mechanical Jaw Frame.