[b]“Figured it wouldn’t be so easy.”[/b] As gods in mortal shells sundered civilization with the aftershocks of their divine weaponry, Naoko holstered her handgun, the lead having done nothing more than get her opponent wet…with blood. Definitely just blood. Demonic vines that burst out of one’s flesh was definitely not a pleasing aesthetic to witness, and the grotesque nature of her opponent was only amplified by the sheer amount of power that seemed to be crammed into her form. It was like a damaged propane tank, highly pressurized fuel forced through a single nozzle to burn bright and blue, even though there was a chance of a flat-out explosion at any moment. If she had it her way, Naoko would be booking it until after Berserker’s Master burned out. If she had it her way, she’d still be eating pizza and watching her Netflix backlog. If she had it her way, Rider wouldn’t be stuck in her castle, up against a Berserker in close combat. But life was life, and if she couldn’t even deal with someone so clearly, irritatingly, cartoonishly evil? Well, what even was the point of walking out of the apartment to begin with? She affirmed her path, set her eyes upon her opponent, and breathed out. The world around the two mages slowed. Falling debris accelerated towards the ground at quarter-speed. The blades of the chopper up above spun languidly enough that they could be seen rotating. Smoke and fire bloomed in slow-motion, while fragments of cement spun away from the impact of Katherine’s lunge, the aberrant mage’s facial muscles shifting like a wax sculpture near a flame. She had never perceived the world around her in such clarity before, and she had never felt her emotions melt away so easily, frost on a summer day. This wasn’t exceptional speed, nor exceptional perception. It was simply the bare minimum one needed to become worthy of an empress’s approval. And from there, Naoko struck. Taking one step forward, she swept out with her cane, a flurry of blows that carried exactly the right amount of force to redirect the right amount of tendrils in a way that achieved maximum disruption. A domino effect of tangled greenery occurred, bloodthirsty thorns cannibalizing plantflesh and leaving only a single barbed mass for the costumed hero to dodge instead. She leaned hard to the right, sparing a second to dab on her thorny nemesis, before twisting her entire body and launching a whip-like low kick to Katherine’s knee, hoping to smash it right off. How much of this was skill and how much of this was a blessing? Who knows? Who cares?