Round 2 - Jacogos VS Low-Budget Man - [Judge: Karma]

[.Karma.]

The beautiful site of Machu Pichu graces the eyes of the previously victorious combatants. Their battle to ascend to the highest victory and indeed be triumphant was far from concluded. Now they faced a new opponent, and new challenges awaited them.

It seemed as if everything was perfect, the temperature was a sunny 75F (~24C) and the birds were chirping almost as if welcoming these strangers to their home.

The few clouds that could be seen, seemed close enough to touch and the stone buildings around them seemed to sparkle with the glowing light of the sun. The green grass spread in between the two of them and expanded on as if to go on forever.

If only mother nature knew that crimson was about to be splashed upon her canvas that had seemed so exquisitely created.

One could get so lost in the beauty of the blue sky, the perfect shade to the grass, and the birds flying above, that they miss the very real difficulties of such a wondrous place. At this altitude there could be any number of symptoms, and not to mention if you falter too close to the edge, it may not be your opponent that you need to fear, but the drop as you fly to your impending doom.

With a flip of a coin Jacogos will begin the battle.

(You have 4 posts per person and 48 hours to respond between each post.)

*I will be posting after the second round to update battle conditions*

BEGIN!

[Jacogos]

How calming... How serene...

---

Everything spun, crashing around her, a tumultuous symphony of chaos and rage, threatening to overwhelm her every sense, her very being. She was aware of pain, coursing through her body unlike any time before. She was aware that she could no longer breathe, a pressure on her lungs that craved air they could not receive. Uai opened her mouth to scream, but there was no air to carry the sound. Consciousness left her, and all was blackness...

.....

.........

And then....

Light!

Uai gasped as she existed once more, air filling her lungs and giving her a sense of living again. She was on one knee, one hand braced against grass below her and the other against her other knee that kept her body upright. Uai blinked once. Her body was without blemish, whole and healthy as it was what felt like hours ago.

Uai blinked again. It was bright out. She rose her head, taking in her surroundings. Grassy field, dirt paths, and stone masonry dotted the landscape around her. Much of the area was terraced hilltops; where she knelt was in the middle one of the few pathways that snaked their way through the many crumble stone markers and squares. Upon a more thorough inspection, it would seem that most of these piles of stones were likely ruins of ancient buildings, worn down and scattered by the winds and rains of time.

From the looks of things, Uai was now atop a mountain in the ruins of some ancient town or city. Standing, the yynglyng woman took in a breath and realized that the air was much thinner than before; she was at least a few thousand feet up. Though she was used to the rigors of high-elevation combat and training, suddenly being at such a height after not was going to pose a short-term problem. And in a fight, short-term is all one worries about...

During her scan of the scenery, Uai noticed something out-of-place; a humanoid shape that stood across the almost-plateau from her. It was hard to make out details at this distance, but she judged it to be rather plainly dressed and unassuming... But definitely out of place.

Then I passed... Uai thought proudly, almost in disbelief. This is surely my next opponent... Let us waste no time, then. She began to move forward, down the path, an assured pace to her step. At length, however, she slowed, glancing around and then at her target once more. Such an assuming creature likely hides its weapons if it's in this fight... Furthermore, they survived one match of fighting as well... I shouldn't underestimate it.

With that in mind, Uai took a moment and searched for a suitable projectile. The nearby ruined masonry quickly provided fruit in the form of a half-head-sized rock, easily more than five pounds in weight. Slipping forward on light feet, Uai judged the distance for a moment, then silently hurled the stone at her opponent. If they had been paying any attention, then there was little doubt they'd get hit, but it was still a pretty accurate shot; Uai was quite proud of herself for the arch.

That done, the yynglyng woman focused inward. Her tribal tattoos began to shimmer in a dull glow, and her magic manifested in a visually disorienting way. Uai faded slightly, her body becoming mildly translucent. She took on a bluish tint due to the yynglyng's natural bioluminescence, and within seconds, she was Ghosting.

Let's see if it can deal with what is only half-there... Uai thought with a smirk, breaking out into a paced run towards the upper-half of the ruins, where most of the crumbling buildings still stood half-erect.

[Low-Budget Man]

Puppet’s mechanisms whirred to pump organic fluids throughout his body. Flesh and machine coexisted in an ghastly harmony. Meat was intertwined with metal, forming a superior body. Puppet felt the cold press of steel on his organs and experienced his blood pulse from his beating heart. The icy tubes left a hard impression on his heart as it extracted the unnecessary fluids whilst pumping the necessary ones faster.

Puppet’s form was complete stationary as he took in his environment. The muted mechanisms gave off some sound that allowed him to map out a soft outline, but not enough for him to fully detect the environment. The constant whistle and thrum of machinery gave him a consistent bubble of echolocation. However, it was low in pitch and barely hearable by anyone nearby. Also, the range of the echolocation was quite short. He needed something louder.

The chirping birds gave small bursts of sound allowing him to pinpoint shapes and figures at further distances. Everything was immobile except for one humanoid shape. Due to the bird’s erratic chirping, Puppet was unable to get a consistent read on the figure. Once the birds stopped chirping, the figure would simply disappear from Puppet’s “vision”. The figure would seem to slip in and out of existence through Puppet’s view and then reappear once the birds chirped again. It was like watching a film with a low frame rate. The figure would seem to teleport every few seconds.

Puppet opened his visual sensors and spun his head in a quick three-sixty turn. Data needed to be gathered further on his environment. His eyes took in the sights and colors of the land. The landscape which was previously just shapes and outlines became a colorized portrait. However, at further distances the color seemed to grow mute and fuzz out.

It was an odd stone ruin atop some mountains. Perfect terrain for combat. Vertical combat was Puppet’s specialty with his variety of limbs and grappling arms. The ruin looked like a very strategical place to fight as well. Lots of places to hide and ambush his prey. Also a lot of places to grapple and escape if need be.

His prey was running. Prey always seemed to run. Puppet particularly enjoyed cutting down his previous opponent. It provided a satisfaction. A clean cleansing of weakness. Flesh and steel were the ultimate combination. A ingenuity of a man combined with the strength of a machine. Flesh by itself was frail while machine was stupid. Together, they formed a superior polymerization.

Hunting that prey would prove his strength as the superior being. It brought feeling to Puppets cold metal body when the life was torn apart from his enemies. It felt like the right thing to do. Like giving evidence to an obvious truth However, if the prey proved strong, perhaps Puppet would create another Puppet from the prey’s corpse. A second Puppet to fight along the first.

Keep the brain and most of the organs intact and the prey could be brought to life within a metal shell. However, that was an optional choice. He could easily harvest flesh from other meatbags. He could improve the design, make it more efficient and faster. Make it stronger and more versatile. Turn it into even a deadlier weapon. Together, the two of them could create even more Puppets.

However, he needed test subjects for that. He needed to practice and train his art in creating his own kind. Creating Puppets would be difficult work and would require experimentation. There was only one candidate for testing his arts in his current place.

Puppet was completely still when the rock sailed into his head. It soared into his head unopposed, his echolocation being too slow and limited to catch it before it hit him. Puppet’s head flew straight off its socket and fell off backwards. It was like some giant child flicked the head off an action figure.

The head dangled awkwardly behind his back still connected to the torso by a thick metal chain. The head grew fissures from the assault and a dribble of green liquid dripped out one of the cracks. Only the front portion of the head was cracked however and the rest of the head was fine. He was made out of metal after all.

The chain with a whirr began reeling in Puppet’s head back into its socket. The internal mechanisms easily pulled Puppet’s head back into its original spot. Puppet’s head gave a three-sixty spin as if to cork-screw his head back on and it was good as new. Except for the gargantuan canyon his face of course.

The assault revitalized Puppet and sprang him into action. Puppet dove to the ground and landed on all six limbs. He kept himself as low as possible and then proceeded to scramble forward like a colossal insect. His dead eyes stared straight ahead as he crawled rapidly toward his opponent. Insects and other small critters moved ridiculously fast for their size. Puppet sought to mimic their movements to increase own speed. His legs and arms blurred as he skittered along the grass.

If his opponents had any further ranged attacks, Puppet had just turned himself into a smaller target which meant he was harder to hit. By sticking close to the ground, Puppet would be able to maneuver faster on all six limbs and he wouldn’t be a standing target.

To deter her from trying more tricks, Puppet quickly pointed his second set of arms at the figure, careful not to disrupt the speedy crawl. He flicked both arms to aim at her at a point during his crawl where it wouldn’t interrupt his rhythm. It took only a brief split second for Puppet to aim and calculate distance and speed. A mechanical mind was sound at mathematical matters and hitting his opponent would be a simple task of mathematics.

Two bone shards exploded out from his second set of arms. The arms quickly fell back into the crawling rhythm the second the shots were fired. The bone shards however soared through the air at the speed of a bullet to where Uai stood. The shards were a mere four inches and were skinny as a high lighter. The shards were calculated to hit where Uai would be moving toward at her current speed instead of where she was currently standing. While the shards weren’t completely deadly, they would disable and incapacitate his opponent.

Puppet had oriented himself toward his opponent by echolocation before. However, her blurry outline simply disappeared from existence after a few seconds. A strange occurence that baffled Puppet's scientific mind. The odd figure had apparently vanished into thin air during the chase. It was either that, or she escaped the echolocation’s range.

Puppet found the second scenario to be more likely, and thus continued on his frantic crawl toward her. She was either out of range or some sort of wizard. He took effort to crawl upon hard surfaces and rocks. His limbs would skitter upon the hard surface, creating a loud consistent blur of sound. The metallic hands and feet would bang and spark against the stone to create his own sound.

There, he located her. She had seemingly become a whirling figure of wind instead of a solid form. Her outline was barely discernable from the wind and the air. The only reason he would even noticed her was that she was near her previous location. A tricky piece of prey. She was nearly invisible to his senses. A wizard then.

She would be interest to examine. If Puppet could figure out her inner workings and could duplicate her ability, Puppet would be invincible. Future iterations of Puppet would also be neigh unstoppable.

[Jacogos]

Music later?

---

As Uai closed on her target, she began to get a better picture of what exactly it was she was fighting. At first glance, her opponent looked somewhat similar to a scarecrow, a motionless sack of... something that didn't really have any color or defining features other than being humanoid in shape. Upon further study, she was disturbed to find that it was actually much more like a mannequin; the construct was faceless save for some holes that might pass for eyes and a nose. In fact, the head might as well have been what the Shade had described a 'bowling ball' as, a smooth orb with fingerholes.

She was taking this in even as her thrown rock soared at the thing. Then, with a resounding thunk, the stone struck the scarecrow directly on the head. And subsequently knocked it clean off. Uai was so shocked that she halted in place, watching dumbfounded as the creation's head fell to the ground without so much as a reaction from its owner. The surprise grew more when she realized what was happening next; the head was attached to the body by a chain, and that chain was pulling it back on as if nothing had happened.

Then it is a construct... Uai realized grimly. That made this problematic. Though she had fought and triumphed against constructs before, they were without a doubt her toughest opponents. They were usually naturally armored and/or had no blood, which either made her magic completely useless or limited it to her own supply. Not only that, but they didn't work like other humanoids; they either lacked emotion or worked completely different from normal people, they didn't tire or feel the elements. Meanwhile, Uai was very much mortal, and her limitations showed when against such opponents.

Despite these observations, however, something was off. Even as it fixed itself, the construct was not moving, had not since she began studying it. Unless she had missed something, it might as well be completely inactive, with only a bit of self-preservation intact to activate the chain to its head. Hell, it might not even fight back. Continuing her movement now that she was over her shock, Uai contemplated her options. It could just have been waiting for my first action... Now that it knows something of what to expect, it could act based off that information... Crude, but that might work out for lesser prey.

After fixing itself, the mannequin suddenly animated. Dropping, it suddenly began to crawl across the ground like a massive insect, scrabbling forward on its... six limbs?!

It has two sets of arms?! she thought in surprise, almost tripping over a pile of stones from not paying attention. Luckily, her partial incorporeality allowed her to avoid such a costly mistake. Coming to a stop, Uai stood to face her opponent's disturbing movements. She then quickly tried to ascertain a weak point or perhaps even some opening she could take advantage of.

BOOM! Suddenly, the construct had flung two of its arms upwards and shot something out from them. The movement was so quick and fluid that Uai almost didn't see it coming. In fact, the attack was so quick that Uai barely had enough reaction time to dodge. She dropped to a crouch, but the projectiles still soared through her, piercing her shoulder and face. All that saved her was the fact that she was incorporeal; pain shocked her system as if something had stabbed her, but the shards merely sailed through her as if she was empty space.

Uai didn't have time to recover from the shock of the attack, however. Her opponent wasn't going to give her that luxury, charging forward as it still was. As it approached her, Uai quickly bolted forward towards the mannequin; despite its lack of reaction to the stone from before, it clearly knew where she was and could aim at her. If that was true, then it was intent on combat. It was getting close to melee range, so it probably had preferred methods of attack at that range. Let's see what those methods were...

It took only a heartbeat to get close enough. The mannequin was effectively right on top of her when Uai sprang up, skipping into the air with a quick push off from the earth. It was nearly an identical move to her fight from before, only this time she was certainly not aiming to attack. Instead, her leap merely took her a few feet into the air... Just enough to land squarely on the construct's back, should everything go according to plan. If so, then she would take her momentum and use the creature as a footstool to leap further, pushing down on it to take her another few yards away from it, ducking and tumbling into a clean landing.

There were many ways this could go wrong, of course, but Uai was intending on this being a learning experience; as far as she knew, this creature had no means to seriously harm her while she was Ghosting, which meant she needed to use it to its fullest potential while it still held. Uai could already feel it taxing her energy reserves, but she knew she could hold it for a while longer.

Whether or not the footstool worked, Uai intended to get clear of the construct immediately afterwards. The creature had followed her directly into the crowded 'housing' area of the ruins, where dozens of small stone structures seemed to be falling apart into each other. Wasting no time, Uai ducked into the closest 'house'. Now to see if it would lose track of her without clear vision...

[Low-Budget Man]

Puppet’s metallic palms slammed repeatedly into the dirt ground with every step as he crawled forward toward his opponent. His echolocation detected her is a violent hurricane with no solid mass. It was an obvious feat of a wizard. Two wizards in two fights. It was not an easy time for Puppet. But science and experimentation was not ever easy.

She was undamaged by the bone shards. She truly was the wind and wasn’t a mere odd illusion. Puppet’s intelligent mind pulled out possible scenarios to counter her. The wind wasn’t a foe he could fight. It was a weather condition. It would be as idiotic as fighting the ocean. However, perhaps he could infect the wind? Turn it impure perhaps?

The grey mannequin barreled forward at the girl like a raging bull. A clear plan was ready behind his cracked head. Distract then attack. First he had to get ahold of the girl before he could commence his plan. Just as Puppet was about to reach out to grab her, she dodged.

She was only about a foot away when she skipped atop his dull porcelain frame with her own light frame. Her movements were agile like a ballerina and each maneuver was carefully executed. Her nimbleness reminded Puppet of an stinging bee. No matter how close he got to her, he couldn’t hit her. Waving your hands wildly around to stop a bee was near impossible. However, that’s why you brought a bug spray. Puppet barely felt her mass lightly tapping his torso before it disappeared, she had dodged him before Puppet could even properly react.

Puppet braked hard. His six limbs skid along the grass and stone, scrambling for purchase. Dirt scatter wildly as his limbs were jammed hard into the ground to slow himself down. A distinct trail of missing grass was formed as he slide like a dog on a hardwood surface. The faster something moves, the harder it would be to slow it down.

With all six limbs pushed into the ground to generate friction, Puppet slowed down considerably to make a full one-eighty degree turn. His limbs once again flailed in sync mimicking the movements of an insect in order to stampede after the girl’s fleeing form. More grass and dirt patches flew in the air as he tore up the ground in his run.

If Puppet could somehow institute her magic into another Puppet, then that copy would truly be unstoppable. Magic, flesh, and machine all combined together into a lethal weapon. Many fighters specialized in one or two subjects. Wizards were notorious for being cowardly and weak in close combat. Machines were usually dimwitted and can be destroyed by creativity and ingenuity. Flesh was weak and easily torn apart. Machine can protect flesh. Magic can protect machine. Flesh can think.

The ultimate killing machine. The perfect tool for asserting and creating a superior race. All he needed was the girl to experiment on. Perhaps he would subdue her and keep her alive. Wizards usually ceased their magic usage after death as a general rule. Restrain her, remove a few limbs, mess with the brain a bit, her fighting spirit would quickly disappear.

Puppet darted inside the ruined building after her. His palms smacked loudly on the stone ground and bounced his body upward into a standing position. All four arms pushed upward at the same time and sprang his torso up like dummy after getting hit. Puppet stood slightly hunched over to avoid smacking his head on the ceiling.

Smacking his hands on the ground served a second purpose as well. It generated a blanket of soundwaves to gather an image of the ruin building. A clean map of the building was built and stored in his bran.

Close quarter combat was Puppet’s expertise and she would soon learn that escape inevitable. The building was a simple rectangle with only one entrance, and that meant only one exit. Windows dotted the entire building’s perimeter. Each window was large enough to allow for escape if it meant taking a few seconds to squeeze through.

It was a scanerio Puppet didn’t plan on letting her commence. Puppet rushed forward his arms splayed out like a net. Each arm was four feet long so Puppet’s arm span from hand to hand stretched more than eight feet. It was a colossal width that nearly that let him touch both sides of the building’s wall.

However, that wasn’t Puppet’s entire plan. Distract then attack. Throw sand in the east, then strike from the west. It was like a magician’s show. Use misdirection to confuse your audience, then hit them with the real trick. Puppet’s outstretched arm was the sand. The gas would be the strike.

Puppet’s bottom chest spewed an almost invisible gas he directed her attention to his coming arms. Vague whispers of gas wrapped itself around Puppet and moved to flood the room. The gas was colorless and could only be recognized by a few features. Light was distorted oddly where the gas hit. The bright sun’s ray when shining on the gas was bent and warped like looking at light under water.

The gas would cause headaches that make a stab through the eye seem dull by comparison after a brief movement. Hallucinations would soon follow those headaches. Puppet has seen people say they’ve seen distorted landscapes, ghastly whispers, familiar faces, among other nastiness. Whatever the person may see and feel, they would easily be hindered and distracted.

The light around Puppet twisted and gnarled like in a prism. Most people would be able to tell something was off by looking for a few seconds. However, Puppet planned on giving the wizard girl no time to watch and figure out his plan. She was to either going to get grappled by Puppet’s array of limbs or she would be gassed. Whichever way, Puppet was going to take her down and improve her. Turn her into an unstoppable weapon. A second Puppet to join Puppet’s show.

[.Karma.]

The battle commenced on the beautiful lands that seemed to be mother natures canvas, and the more they destroyed it and attempted to spill blood on her beautiful work of art, the angrier she got.

Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. One moment it seemed there was nothing but beauty and serenity, the next the rumble of her wrath rolled over the beautiful mountains. Clouds formed that were as dark as the mood she was feeling and flashes of her anger lit up the now dark sky.

Her angry tears poured down in rain that pounded against the ground so hard that it would almost sting to the touch and made it difficult to see.

The flashes of lightning struck anything it could, the ground, the buildings. Fires starting to match the burning of her rage. One struck the construct that both combatants had entered, stones rolling off it, only to be struck again. The ground rumbled and shook under their feet as the storm of her anger raged.

They would know her anger at defiling this sacred place, they would rue the day they upset the balance of peace and dared to even attempt to ruin her masterpiece.

[Jacogos]

Let the rain come!

---

Uai slipped into the crumbling abode without difficulty, allowing her a shrinking window of opportunity to catch her breath. Thanks to her Ghosting, she wasn't fully in the physical realm; the needs of the flesh were suppressed to a state comparable to a hibernating animal, allowing her to avoid the problems of high-altitude for the duration. The stress it caused her body from its use could be argued to not be worth the trade, but in the heat of the moment, Uai was fully prepared to defend the worth of her decision.

As she feared, however, the brief respite was truly no more than a few seconds. The scrabbling and thumping sound of her unliving opponent's approach alerted her that she needed to move. Dashing to the opposite side of the barren room, the yynglyng woman watched as the construct entered the structure in its entirety. Its bulk and ability to stretch itself caused it to take up the other half of the space within moments. Outstretching its two sets of arms, it posed a massive threat as it seemed ready to hug her to death.

In the light filtering through the cracks of the stonework and windows made by ancient persons, Uai was now allowed a bit of time to view the creature from a different angle. The rags it draped from its humanoid 'shoulders' didn't seem to be for any modesty reasons; it was clearly non-human and made of some other material. It was hard to tell if the material was organic or not, particularly in the half-light of this building. Wait, was it getting darker outside?

She didn't have much further time to note things as the pace of the fight quickened after that moment. The mannequin approached quickly and provided a large target, but an unfortunately difficult one to avoid for a fully corporeal foe. In the rush of the moment, Uai almost missed to quiet hissing noise that suddenly began to emit from the area. The amount of time she had to register it was too short to figure out a source, but she did have enough to register that hissing from a construct usually was a problem.

Either way, her course of action was clear and already determined. To a corporeal creature, the options were limited... But for her, while she still had the last moments of Ghosting available to her, Uai had all the options in the world, hypothetically. This is the one she chose:

Uai dove forward. Her coiled muscles sprang into action as she streamlined her body as if to plummet into a pool of water like a professional swimmer. By minimizing the amount of vertical space she took up, she was allowing herself room to maneuver between her opponents arms. He was spreading out to maximize his effective threat range, which gave her a bit of wiggle room to use with this...

Still, it was only possible because she was mostly ethereal.

Even as she said that, she felt the feeling of partiality leave her, as if another layer of skin was slipping over her body. It started at the tips of her fingers, travelling down towards her feet, returning Uai to the corporeal realm slowly but surely. Luckily for her, the return didn't happen until she had already phased past her opponent. She felt her very-real hands hit the earth, and she tucked and rolled into her jump once again. The difference between this one and the last one was a matter of feeling; this time, she could feel the pieces of grass, dirt, and rock cling to her skin while in motion. The feeling of being was distinct and wonderful... It reminded her of why she was grateful Ghosting was such a taxing and short-lived experience.

Unfortunately, the feeling was fleeting. She had a fight to win. And this was where she turned it. As she returned to the corporeal realm, Uai was aware of a thick fume that powered itself into her lungs as she breathed in real air once more. Coughing, Uai cursed the improper timing; of course, it was to be expected, but she could at least wish she could've held the form for a few moments longer. Another thing she noted was the stinging pain on her face and shoulder; knots had formed in her skin where the projectiles would've pierced her. Even if Ghosting avoided most of the damage, it couldn't keep her from all of it.

Half-standing after her tumble, Uai braced herself and pressed her shoulder forward in a charge. Of course, she was still facing away from her opponent, without a doubt. Therefore, her target was not it at all. In fact, Uai had decided that a quick way to turn this battle in her favor... Was to squish the insect-like monster.

Shouting defiantly, Uai rammed her body into the stone framework of the doorway to the ancient building. The age-worn mortar gave way in a burst of dust and pebbles. Uai broke through with a pained grunt, landing on her knees just outside of the home; fortunately for her, her idea bore fruit. With a groan, the ancient building gave way under the stress of the centuries combined with this new sudden shift in support. The stonework collapsed. Hopefully, the mannequin would stay buried underneath it. Sadly, Uai wasn't convinced that would do it alone.

It was raining. Uai was surprised to realize that suddenly. The drops felt like they were the size of golf-balls, pelting her as they were. She instinctively held up her arm to shield her eyes, but it really didn't help. If the weather was getting this bad, this fight needed to end soon; otherwise, she might get washed down the mountain and to her death.

[Low-Budget Man]

Now that he had cornered her, Puppet observed her with visual sensors. Her body was that of a young nude woman. Nothing too dramatic if it weren’t for the fact she was somewhat see through. Like murky water, her form was somewhat see through.

Puppet snapped all his arms forward the second the girl charged at him. His arms folded around the area in front of him, expecting the woman to get snared by his array of limbs. The plan was to bear hug the woman and gas her. However, that plan failed spectacularly when she simply phased through his metal frame like a ghost.

She appeared behind him completely unharmed and uncaught by his assault. Puppet’s head spun around one-eighty to track her movements as he his brain struggled to comprehend her actions. From his visual sensors, he watched her form change from an ethereal clearness to a solid naked figure.

The woman coughed as she struggled to escape the confines of the house. Puppet would have been easily distracted by her womanly figure if he was still fully flesh. However, the urgings and emotions of meat were mostly stripped away in exchange for efficient steel. Her long blonde hair trailed behind her as she darted toward the door.

Instead of merely turning himself around like a normal person, Puppet spun his entire torso around one-eighty to follow her escape. He now completely faced her retreating form as if she hadn’t just ghosted past him. Puppet wasted no time continuing the pursuit.

Puppet’s feet slapped against the stone sending waves of sound across the entire room. The entire building was mapped out like a perfectly painted picture. The girl smashed into the doorframe in her escape. It was a clumsy move and easily avoidable move on her part. It greatly slowed her increasing momentum and allowed Puppet to close the distance. Weak and stupid prey. No living being would survive Puppet no matter how much it ran.

However, the building’s fragile frame began to collapse upon her impact. Stone chunks and dust rained down from the ceiling in droves. Puppet realized her plan as the house shook and its instability prompted its demolition. Puppet leaped at the final second out of the door to avoid getting fully crushed by the storm of rocks collapsing

Puppet stood at the lanky height of 7 feet 6 inches from head to toe. While that size usually offered a prominent advantage in most situations, this was not one of them. His height prevented him from fully clearing the destruction and a torrent of rocks cracked down on his legs. His torso and his arms were free, but his legs were trapped underneath a sea of rubble.

Spider webs of crack coated his legs. The green slime sacks within the legs bursts and spilled their content through the visible cracks like yolk out of an egg. Broken machinery jabbed awkwardly into his flesh inside each leg. Slime coated the machinery and slowed down their spin and whirrs.

Using them would be impossible in this state. Puppet didn’t need them. They were merely dead weight at this point. He needed efficiency and the legs would give none currently. He loosened the chain connecting the legs to his torso. While he couldn’t simply remove the chain to be free from his legs, he had an extended reach now.

Fat bullets of water bombarded his sleek armor in droves. His poncho offered protection against the weather, not that it mattered terribly. Machines weren’t often concerned about being comfortable. His exposed pieces shined bright from the torrent of water dripping off him.

The rain hammered him like a woodpecker on wood. However, it provided a powerful benefit. Sound reverberated throughout the arena from the rain droplets impacting the ground. Sound waves bounced off stone, grass, and the combatants. Before, a fuzzy image of the world laid before him.

Now, the world was crystal clear in its form. Every droplet added shapes to his echolocation. Puppet could see the world and feel the world as if it was the back of his hand. Puppet noticed birds fleeing the area. Puppet noticed insects crawling on the ground. Puppet noticed rocks flowing away from the rain. The world was now his oyster.

Puppet laid flat on the ground, his head and torso parallel to the ground. His poncho dirtied from the mud that was forming from the rain. His once porcelain white armor was now stained with filth. Once again, it hardly mattered.
Puppet shoved himself upright to a sitting position. His legs were still firmly wedged underneath the rock collapse; however his torso and arms was free. Puppet’s head spun around to face the girl.

The weather was a minor condition that boosted Puppet while it probably handicapped the girl. Fighting in this sort of terrain usually made it hard for flesh types to fight. Too slippery, too hard to see, to uncomfortable. Puppet once again added another positivity to being a half-machine half-man. He didn’t whine about the weather.

Like all flesh types, she probably relied on her sight. Once a prey lost its sight, it was weakened and defenseless. Puppet had faint memories of when he was fully flesh. He remembered fearing the darkness and the unknown like a coward. All he had to do was give her darkness and she would be a lamb to the slaughter.

Puppet shoved his both sets of arms into the ground wrist deep. With a violent motion, he flicked four handfuls of mushy mud at the downed girl. The filthy mud balls flew at her with astounding speed. The strength of a machine was behind every throw. It was like a baseball had lobbed the projectiles. Each ball was about a bucket’s worth of mud due to the size of Puppet’s hands.

The goal was to distract her and hopefully blind her with the mud balls. Mud splattered messily on impact and would give Puppet a brief chance to move in while she tried to dodge the confusing attack. If it hit somewhere vulnerable like her eyes, it might force her to take a second to wash out her eyes.

All he needed was her to be distracted while Puppet commenced his next attack. Puppet pointed both set of arms aimed snapped themselves at her direction and the arms shot out like four rockets. Chains still connected the arms to Puppet so it was like four grappling hooks just shot out.

While the arms weren’t lethal, they sure packed a punch behind them. Each was four feet long, made of metal, and was traveling at a rapid speed. Force equals mass times acceleration. The force behind the impact would be enough to shatter bone even if they wouldn’t kill. His hands splayed outward in an attempt to grapple her.

Four arms flew at her. Dodging all of them would be unlikely and he only needed a couple to connect if he was to commence the second part of his plan. This was the distraction. Then he would begin the attack.

[.Karma.]

Due to Jacogos not posting, Low-Budget Man wins the battle! Congrats, you did a wonderful job!