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As “Necroid 99” gave his response, Olivia’s eyes and mouth seemed to open even wider with each passing second. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“Oh my gosh!”[/color] the astonished bluenette exclaimed once the strange robot had finished. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“Really?! That’s incredible! And also really dangerous!”[/color] she added, adjusting her glasses as her visage took on a serious expression. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“Tsubotica’s super powerful [i]and[/i] super insidious! Her Lagomorphoids can take the appearance of [i]anyone[/i], so they totally could have replaced all those people, and no one would know the difference! So, yeah!”[/color] she declared voice filled with determination. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“You can totally count on us! Oh, but, like, if she’s taken control of all the game’s other characters by infecting them with her corrupted Gearless Arcanetech Code, then how did you manage to escape?”[/color] she asked a moment later. However, by this point the announcer’s voice had drowned out her inquiry, and when the announcement of the next round of matches had concluded, “Necroid 99” was already departing, while telling her to come find him after her next match, regardless of the results. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“O-Okay!”[/color] she called after him. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“See you then! Oh, and good luck!”[/color] she added with a wave.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Wow, this is so exciting!”[/color] Olivia gushed as she and Xolys made their way to their assigned arena.

[color=DodgerBlue][u]“It is certainly intriguing,”[/u][/color] Xolys agreed from where he was nestled in Olivia’s backpack. [color=DodgerBlue][u]“But it is also rather suspicious,”[/u][/color] he added. [color=DodgerBlue][u]“Thus, I believe we should proceed with caution.”[/u][/color]

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“S-Suspicious?”[/color] Olivia echoed, her tone one of confusion. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“What do you mean?”[/color]

[color=DodgerBlue][u]“I do not know for certain, but I have a feeling that ‘Necroid 99’ is not being entirely truthful with us,”[/u][/color] Xolys replied.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Okay, well, you know I trust you more than anyone, so if you think we need to be careful, then that’s just what we’ll do!”[/color] Olivia declared as they entered the arena. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“Anyways,”[/color] she added as she set Xolys down and activated his combat mode. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“I wonder who we’ll be going up against next! Oh my gosh! I just thought of something! What if some of the other characters from Gearmantic Hearts are competing in the tournament?! Going up against the real Finnegan Fabricant or Penny Pinnacle would be so amazing, don’t you think?!”[/color] 

However, before Xolys could respond, a massive blue explosion appeared on the opposite side of the arena. Walking out of it with his hoodie up and his hands in his pockets was Justin Haggar. He walked to where his line in the tournament was, before he raised his head to look at the opponent. In a swift motion Justin threw his hoodie up and dropped into stance. He looked at Xolys.

[color=cornflowerblue]”I get to fight an alien…”[/color] Justin flatly said as he rolled his eyes. [color=cornflowerblue][i]”Oh joy.[/i] Let’s get this over with.”[/color]

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Oh, um, Xolys isn’t an alien,”[/color] Olivia corrected, raising a finger for emphasis. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“He’s actually a non-corporeal, extradimensional entity who inhabits a robot I made! Xolys is also a character in a really cool video game called Gearmantic Hearts, and that character was based off the Xolys in my robot, ‘cause in the universe he’s from, the events of that game really happened! Isn’t that awesome?!”[/color]

[color=cornflowerblue]”You know what an ‘extra dimensional entity is’, right?[/color] Justin added, [color=cornflowerblue]”A fancy way of saying [i]an alien[/i].”[/color]

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Oh, um, well, I thought you meant alien as in ‘extra terrestrial’, a being from a different planet, star system, or galaxy, but still from this universe,”[/color] Olivia replied. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“But if by alien you just meant otherworldly, then I guess Xolys [i]could[/i] be called one!”[/color] she added with a smile and a giggle/snort. 


[color=cornflowerblue]”Hehe… yeah,”[/color] Justin said with a chuckle…

[h1]”.... BEGIN!”[/h1]

Justin maintained his stance and did nothing, waiting to see what Xolys could do.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Oh, um, I should probably head to the stands now,”[/color] Olivia noted. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“I don’t want to be mistaken for a combatant again…”[/color]

[color=cornflowerblue]”Yeah, you do that,”[/color] Justin said as the cybernetics on his arms started glowing, blowing steam. He grabbed his forearm with one hand and slid the sleeves of his hoodie up, showing his cybernetics to the world. Then he did the same thing to the other side. Then the palms of his hands started glowing as he quickly pointed them at Xolys, and then a beam of blue energy went straight for his face as Justin shouted. [b][i][color=cornflowerblue]”Chord!”[/color][/i][/b]


Olivia got to her position in the stands just in time to see Justin reveal his cybernetic nature, causing the bluenette’s eyes to sparkle. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“Oh wow! You’re a cyborg?! That’s so cool!”[/color] Olivia gushed, but her enthusiasm swiftly shifted to panic when he promptly fired off his first attack. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“Oh crap!”[/color] Olivia yelped, even as her fingers rapidly tapped the button combination that activated Xolys’s head-mounted Unreality Beam. A swirling cylinder of crackling, constantly-shifting energy shot forth to impact Justin’s own beam, hopefully before it was able to strike the technomantic terror’s head.

The two beams clashed. Justin’s Chord gaining leeway for a moment then the unreality beam. He quickly pumped more power into it in an attempt to gain leeway.

At Olivia’s instruction, Xolys did the same, the churning cylinder glowing brighter and growing more warped with each passing second. But that wasn’t all. The technomantic terror’s glowing energy wings had begun to reposition themselves around Xolys’s central eye, the same eye that was emitting the Unreality Beam. As they did so, they began to spin, causing the beam to surge with exponentially increased power.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Let’s see if you can handle an APEX Unreality Beam!”[/color] Olivia called with a fierce grin.


The beam quickly overpowered Justin, sending him sliding backward, dragging alongside the ground. [color=cornflowerblue][i]Supers, already!?[/i][/color] He thought to himself as he realized that he was going to get overpowered… and was launched backward but quickly rolled onto his feet. [color=cornflowerblue]”Don’t blow your load just yet, alien-man,”[/color] Justin said with a smarmy grin as he pointed both hands at Xolys and unleashed a barrage of Beat/Pulses, each the size of basketballs and hit like a truck.

Xolys was forced back by the Beat Pulse barrage, sustaining light damage in the process. [color=DodgerBlue][u]“Your durability is most impressive,”[/u][/color] Xolys commended, even as Olivia instructed him to lash out with his technomantic tentacles to ensnare Justin and then reel him in closer. [color=DodgerBlue][u]“Withstanding the power of my APEX Unreality Beam is no small feat.”[/u][/color]

[color=cornflowerblue]”... Or maybe its just weakshit,”[/color] Justin said as he stuck both of his hands out as the tentacles approached him. They glowed a blue color as he shouted, [color=cornflowerblue][b][i]”BASS-DROP!”[/i][/b][/color] A blast of blue energy came out of his hands that slid him backward quite a distance while also getting the tentacles off of him. He slammed his fist on the ground to decelerate, then he looked up at Xolys.

[color=DodgerBlue][u]“Perhaps,”[/u][/color] Xolys conceded, even as he sent several more tendrils darting out with lightning speed to coil around the cyborg. Which wrapped him… with surprisingly little resistance. 

[color=cornflowerblue]”Lemme guess, you’re reeling me in to hit me with some melee attack….”[/color] Justin said as he was dragged across the ground. [color=cornflowerblue]”Well… [i][b]RECORD SPIN![/b][/i][/color]

Justin spun so fast that he appeared like a blue tornado, hoping to knot Xoly’s tendrils.
While Justin did indeed succeed in knotting the technomantic tendrils, he did not break their hold on him, nor did he stop their retraction. Yet, even before the cyborg was brought into range of Xolys’s myriad trans-phasic energy scythes, he had a more immediate problem to contend with. 

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Now we’ve [i]really[/i] got you!”[/color] Olivia declared, even as the tendrils wrapped around Justin began to glow brightly, before sending over a dozen crackling arcs of lightning shooting into his captive body… He convulsed as electricity was the one thing he was explicitly weak against. He loudly yelled before he stopped and grit his teeth… he had one ace in the hole, and both hands started glowing.

[color=DeepSkyBlue][i]Gosh, I hope that didn’t hurt him [b]too[/b] badly…[/i][/color] Olivia couldn’t help but worry as she watched Justin cry out in pain. Still, that pain didn’t seem to be keeping him from charging up another attack… [color=DeepSkyBlue][i]Well, if he’s still in the fight, then I guess we’re just gonna need to use a bit more power![/i][/color]

Even as Justin’s hands continued to glow, so too did Xolys’s central eye, before yet another crackling Unreality Beam lanced out towards the restrained cyborg.


[color=cornflowerblue][i]Well, here goes nothing![/i][/color]

Fighting through the pain and his circuits were getting fried ([color=cornflowerblue][i]That can[/i] NOT [i]be tournament legal![/i][/color]), he got enough slack to point both hands forward. He gritted his teeth, letting out a Bass-Drop that reverberated through the arena and launched him away - just in time to dodge the Unreality Beam. However, he was still restrained, which was what the former MAVERICK Hunter hoped for. He fired another Bass-Drop, trying to launch himself [i]around[/i] Xolys to wrap the robot in his tendrils. 

Olivia gasped as Justin put on a burst of impressive speed, which not only allowed him to dodge Xolys’s attack, but also to begin wrapping the technomantic terror up in his own tendrils. The cyborg was moving far too quickly to be shot at, and, by this point, he had already ensnared most of Xolys’s scythe-tipped limbs, meaning there was only one real option left. Fortunately, it seemed to be an effective one. Pressing a well-known key combo, Olivia instructed Xolys to hit Justin with another pulse of Eldritch Electricity.

[color=DeepSkyBlue][i]Hopefully this time it’ll KO him…[/i][/color]

[color=cornflowerblue]“Son of a bi-”[/color] Justin convulsed in electricity; he wouldn’t be able to take much more even if he wrapped up the robot. He had one last card up his sleeve… He went limp, and the lights illuminating his cybernetics had gone dark.

Not wanting to cause permanent harm to the cyborg, Olivia instructed Xolys to halt the attack.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Nice work, Xolys!”[/color] she called out with a grin. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“Uh, I’m pretty sure he’s KO’d,”[/color] she added, turning to look up at where the announcer was standing nearby, while pointing her thumb at Justin’s limp form. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“That means we win, right?”[/color]

In hopes of catching the two off guard, Justin raised his hands and slammed them. Creating an explosion of blue energy that would hopefully break him free.

With both Olivia and Xolys believing the cyborg to be fully out of action, Justin’s escape attempt was an unopposed success.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“W-What?!”[/color] Olivia stammered. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“B-But I thought…!”[/color]

Justin hopped to his feet,

[color=cornflowerblue]”... You’re new at this, aren’t you?”[/color] Justin said as his hands started glowing brighter and brighter… the ground shook violently as rocks began floating. He continued, [color=cornflowerblue]”You know that you can’t beat [i]everyone[/i] with just one strategy… you gotta think outside the box or else [i]this[/i] will keep happening….”[/color]

He shot his hands forward, as he shouted,

[sup][h1][color=black] [i]CRESECENDO![/i] [/color]
[color=cornflowerblue][i]CRESECENDO![/i][/color][/h1][/sup]

A massive blue beam of energy came out of his hands that went directly towards Xolys.

Olivia barely had time to comprehend what Justin was saying, before the cyborg blasted Xolys with a mighty energy beam. While the technomantic terror had a few means of dealing with such an attack, they all required a bit of charge up time, and it was just that time that he [i]didn’t[/i] have…

Slamming into Xolys with the force of twenty bullet trains, the beam sent the techno horror flying into the arena’s far wall, where his battered and badly-sparking form collapsed onto the floor.

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“XOLYS!!!”[/color] Olivia cried out, her voice filled with panic and her wide eyes filling with tears. 

The light faded, and Justin was frozen… he stood there for several moments before he stood straight up. He looked at Olivia and then at his fists. 

[b][i][h1]”... AAAAAAAAAAAND THE FORMER MAVERICK HUNTER HAS DEFEATED THE MAIDEN AND THE MARVEL!”[/h1][/i][/b]

Justin sighed, thinking to himself: [color=cornflowerblue][i]... This is my revenge?[/i][/color] He sighed yet again, as he turned his head to Olivia and said,

[color=cornflowerblue]”... Look, I should have eased up just a little. Is there [i]anything[/i] I can do to help?”[/color]

Olivia, who by this point had leapt out of the stands and raced over to where Xolys had fallen, turned to look at Justin, her eyes red and cheeks streaked with tears. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“H-He’ll be fine,”[/color] she sniffed, before returning her gaze to her partner. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“H-He’ll just have to be in repair mode for a while,”[/color] the bluenette added, before giving voice to a sullen sigh. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“I-I just… I just can’t help but feel I let him down…”[/color]

[color=DodgerBlue][u]“You did nothing of the kind,”[/u][/color] Xolys replied, the myriad lights scattered across his massive form flickering with each syllable. [color=DodgerBlue][u]“You did your best, as you always do, and that is all that I could ever ask for.”[/u][/color]

[color=DeepSkyBlue]“Oh, Xolys!”[/color] Olivia cried, wrapping her arms around the techno horror in a hug. [color=DeepSkyBlue]“I-I don’t deserve a friend as wonderful as you…”[/color] 

Justin crossed his arms.

[color=cornflowerblue]”... Can I at least help untangle his tentacles?[/color]