Synthetic Survivor: Machine Age

The artificial storm generated by Lily's spell completely covered the entire arena, One and Hailey had to resort to other means of vision through specially designed cameras and their built-in improved eye enhancers.

The storm was furious and defied all their understandings of weather; the storm was raging as strong as a hurricane with winds measured to be 100kph per hour. Shia has completely vanished from all sensors except for infrared; her heat signature could be seen running behind Vilvintine who has thus far has not been alerted. Gord was nowhere to be seen.

The abominable transformation of Rudelf into a hideous vampiric creature was also an unforeseen outcome in the calculations of the Machines; his transformation was also not noted by any of the minds extracted and thus proved the long-standing theory that magic can be used to alter one's appearance and bioform.

"Amazing" Hailey watched intently using the aforementioned cameras and her infrared capabilities. One was also watching but was more concerned with losing Vilvintine.

Ever since her successful brainwashing, Vilvintine has proven to be a valuable asset in terms of human interactions, magical research, and experimentation. If they were to lose her now, regardless of who they'll probably meet in the future that can replace her, the time wasted by then would be damaging for their plans.

One made a decision; if Vilvintine were near the point of death, he'd intervene. Initially, the two only wanted to test the capabilities of the last remaining adventurer group after acting rather rash on the earlier ones.

But thanks to their memory extraction, the Empire gained more vital information than what was initially presumed to be collected from them.

Now, One and Hailey looked down below as the scene unfolded before them.

Vilvintine was at her peak strength; she's pushed her reserved mana and magic from the surroundings to their limit; if she exerts beyond that limit, she will die.

The vampiric Rudelf suddenly came gliding down with his wings spread and teeth exposed as he opened his now inhuman mouth. Vilvintine raised her fists and punched the air in front of her, creating a shockwave that blew him off course. Rudelf slammed a few meters to the right of Vilvintine as another magic arrow is fired by Lily.

Vilvintine's vision has become poor; her eyes were now clouded as the storm raged on. A thick along with other gas elements began to inhibit her enhanced senses that not even her magic can see through.

Another attack from Lily came, this time it was a barrage of magic arrows carried by a whirlwind. The whirlwind of arrows slammed her before she could react, her ability to detect incoming attacks has been completely side-tracked a plethora of environmental factors.

Nevertheless, she was still going strong. With a powerful side punch using her right fist, she disintegrated the whirlwind in a spectacle of flying magic arrows and debris from the arena itself. The punch produced another shockwave which caused the raindrops to levitate before resuming their course.

In the confusion, Shia lunged at Vilvintine from behind, stabbing her right shoulder with one of her daggers before disappearing yet again. Vilvintine looked aimlessly in the darkness of the storm as the looming threat of Shia posed her a significant disadvantage.

As she was distracted, Rudelf came from the sides and engaged her in melee, Rudelf used his somehow enhanced fists which were almost in equivalence with Vilvintine's magic, the two traded jabs, and blows before finally.

With Shia harassing her with her ambushes, Lily shooting barrage after barrage of magic arrows and Rudelf's almost on par melee, Vilvintine's defense crumbled, and an opening presented itself. Without a second thought, Rudelf, upon seeing this opening, drove a punch through her stomach.

Vilvintine coughed the moment Rudelf's hard fist slammed her stomach; she could not breathe; her vision became blurry. Her yellow glow faded slowly as she fell on her back and into the hard ground, her eyes were open but motionless.

The rain began to pour harder, and the thunder accelerated further, Rudelf walked near Vilvintine's face and smirked. Shia appeared right next to him, holding her two daggers on each hand. She slowly walked towards her and was about to kill her finally.

Until...

Was it a punch? A kick? Did something ram them? What they felt at that time couldn't be adequately described, they felt their bodies shiver for a moment before an unknown force tore through their ears and slammed their bodies.

The slam was powerful enough that it literally broke most of their bones; they were thrown away from Vilvintine and slammed at Lily before landing. The two could not move, they felt numb, their eyes were still open, and they locked onto a single shadow which slowly appeared from the disappearing fog.

The storm was indeed blown away and was slowly s.u.c.k.e.d by the cracks in the arena, slowly but surely, the area was once again clear.

"Who is, that?" Lily stuttered under her breath and pointed her arrow at the shadowy figure which appeared in front of them. The last trickles of rain finally settled, and the puddles became calm. Shia and Rudelf's bodies were all but lost, their magic was about to kill them anyway.

The many broken bones within both of them were too much for their already fully-exerted mana reserves to handle, not even the magic in the surrounding area was enough to compensate. Lily did not know any healing magic; they had no other option.

The shadowy figure was then struck by the white light. His pale skin appeared alongside his non-human part. He purposely once again peeled his face to show once more to his enemies that they were not facing a human, or what they define as a human.

He was neither a pure man.

Nor a pure monster.

He also neither fully made of metal.

Nor was he fully a human.

He is all of them, small things which define him.

Small things that are big in a sense.

He. is. One.

He appeared as a dashing but dangerous, cold man. His black uniform, coupled by his now pitch-black eyes and hair sent shivers down their spine. What frightened them the most was the apparent lack of any magic within him.

He displayed so much power, he defeated the two in just one definitive strike, but he neither glowed nor did they sense the power of the gods within him.

He stood there, staring at them in the distance. His eyes locked on them like an eagle with its prey. Despite lacking facial expressions nor emotion to present in any way or form, he only did what he did to save Vilvintine.

Behind him, Hailey descended along with three other drones, and they retrieved Vilvintine from the battlefield, carrying her up the arena before disappearing at the top.

Now they were alone, One and Lily. The other two were down to the count and would die in five minutes. Lily clenched her bow and thought feriously if she had a chance or not.

Did she have a chance? Her mind was in a state of chaos, was all of this worth it? do her sacrifices make any significance? what can she achieve if she went up against the monster of a human in front of her? she will surely die.

Again, thoughts of her decision years ago came back to haunt her once more. The future she lost due to her hasty and unforesighted, rash decision. The life she left behind and the family whose hearts she crushed under the weight of her misgiving.

Her road was now drawing to a close, the end was near. The path that she took in which she trusted would her to more paths in the future was now at a dead end, an end she did not see, an end she did not expect.

The foolish path she undertook has finally come to show its true colors.

But.

There was a chance.

As she was lost in the dark pools of her mistakes, a new path unfolded in front of her. The path she did not think could be attainable but was.

The path of fielty.

The Metal Men's Path.

The road to her redemption.

To redeem her honor, to redeem the status she lost and the years she wasted with the wrong decision.

Her friends were almost dead.

Speaking of friends, where was Gord?

Gord suddenly appeared from behind her, having concealed himself entirely from all biological sensors and the Empire's instruments. He came running at astonishing speeds directly at One. With his holy sword up high against his shoulders and with the spell of divinity inscribed deep within the blade which he wields, he was more than confident he'd strike down the demon before him.

He was knocked from the battle but he mustered whatever magic he had left to stealth. he observed his friends almost win but fail in the last minute. The monster which leads the entire army which they go up against has descended onto the battlefield himself, but for him, even though two of his friends were at the brink of death, he thought that One had a crucial weakness.

Underestimating them.

Now, with his strength and willpower, he combined all of it to create enough magic to manifest one last spell before he reaches his utmost time limit. He only had 30 seconds left.

The spell was a spell directly from the Blue Goddess, it wielded power beyond anything a human at their level could attain. The power was against demons, demons were known to exert a different magic pattern invisible to humans, he though One was a demon.

Confident, he charged.

Confident, he managed to reach One who, for some reason, did not flinch.

He prepared his sword for the decisive blow which would decide their fate and the kingdom.

The sword struck One and shattered.

"W-what?!" Gord stuttered and fear finally took over him. He began to sweat and wetted his pants before falling onto his knees. He stared at the twilight of his life, he stared at those cold eyes which befell him.

"M-monster!" He shouted.

One smiled. In a blink of an eye, One impaled him with his left hand and pulled out his intestines which spilled on the floor around him, killing him instantly. He then turned his eyes towards the silent Lily who watched the entire debacle.

"It's your turn to decide," He said.