The fluorescent lights of Venos Headquarters hummed softly overhead, casting sterile white reflections on the polished steel floors. The air carried the faint antiseptic scent of medical nanites, mixed with the metallic tang of blood. Sisi knelt beside the medical pod, her fingers trembling slightly as she pressed them against Qin Hong’s wrist. His skin was unnaturally pale, almost translucent under the glow of the healing energy seeping from her palms.
"*Thought... I was a goner...*" Qin Hong’s voice was a dry rasp, his lips cracked and peeling. His chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven breaths.
Sisi didn’t answer. Her emerald aura pulsed in time with his fading heartbeat, tendrils of light weaving through the charred flesh of his forearm. The damage was severe—muscle fibers knitting back together strand by strand, nerve endings flickering like dying embers before reigniting under her touch. A single bead of sweat rolled down her temple, her jaw clenched tight.
Haruko leaned against the wall, arms crossed. The usual pyful lilt in her voice was gone, repced by something heavier. "*You’re not dying today,*" she said, though her fingers tapped an anxious rhythm against her elbow. "*But you were* ***right there*** *when the Death Mist blew. If Falken hadn’t shoved you into the water—*"
"*I know,*" Qin Hong coughed, wincing as the movement tugged at his injuries. "*I felt it—the heat. One second I was against the wall, the next… cold. Then nothing.*" His fingers twitched, as if still trying to grasp at something unseen.
Sisi’s voice was quiet but steady. "*Falken has the Heart of Godspeed. He moves faster than perception. They call him ‘Bck Lightning.’*" Her eyes flicked up for the briefest moment—just long enough to see the dark circles under them. "*He and Guann trained in the same cohort.*"
Wosuo suddenly lurched forward, his boots scuffing against the floor. "*Holy—! Look at his arm!*" He pointed at Qin Hong’s right hand, where the bckened, necrotic flesh was slowly flushing back to pink. The fingers, once twisted and brittle, now flexed with renewed vitality, tendons sliding smoothly beneath the skin.
Merker exhaled sharply, his shoulders sagging in relief. "*Damn. That was close.*"
"*I heard you took Dick down alone,*" Sisi murmured, still not looking up.
Qin Hong’s breath hitched. The memory surged back—
---
### **The Final Moment**
The world had been reduced to white noise.
Dick’s body was a writhing mass of unstable energy, his skin splitting with veins of molten light. The air itself vibrated, warping like a mirage under the sheer heat radiating from him. Qin Hong’s ears rang, his vision tunneling.
*No time.*
He roared, wrenching the *Skyrend Bde* back in a sweeping arc. His heart hammered against his ribs, raw power flooding his veins, surging into his right arm. His left hand cmped around his wrist, fingers spyed toward Dick—
"***Triangur Barrier!***"
A geometric ttice flickered beneath Dick’s feet—translucent, shimmering like fractured gss. Four triangur pnes materialized in the air around him, edges razor-sharp, and with a deafening *CRACK*, they smmed together.
The explosion was instantaneous.
A supernova of force detonated inside the prism, the shockwave rattling Qin Hong’s bones. The barrier held—barely—but the light was unbearable, searing his retinas. He screamed, his fingers curling inward, muscles screaming as he fought to *compress* the energy, to crush it into submission.
The prism’s surface burned red-hot, then white. The heat licked at his skin, blistering his fingertips. His teeth ground together so hard he tasted blood.
*Don’t let go. Don’t let go—*
The pressure was unbearable. His knees buckled. His vision swam. But he held on, even as the prism shuddered violently, even as the energy inside cwed at its confines like a caged beast.
Then—
A wet, metallic cough wracked his chest. Blood sprayed from his lips.
The barrier fractured.
A nce of fire punched through, spearing toward his face—
He barely had time to lift his arm before the fmes swallowed him whole.
---
### **Aftermath**
The room was silent save for the steady beep of the biomonitor.
"*Try moving your hand,*" Sisi said softly, her voice hoarse.
Qin Hong lifted his arm, turning it slowly. The skin was smooth, unblemished—new. He flexed his fingers, watching the tendons shift beneath the surface.
"*It works,*" he said. "*But it still burns. Like holding onto a live wire.*"
Sisi nodded, pushing herself up with a quiet grunt. Her sleeves were damp with sweat. "*That’s normal. Rest now. Your eyes… I’ll fix them tomorrow.*"
She turned away before he could see her expression.
But he didn’t need to. The weight in her steps said enough.
---
### **Sisi’s Quarters**
The door hissed shut behind her.
Sisi stood motionless for a long moment, then let out a shuddering breath. Her hands trembled.
The photograph on her desk was old, the edges slightly curled. Five faces smiled back at her—younger, brighter. Dick was in the center, grinning like an idiot, his arm slung around her shoulders.
Her fingers brushed the gss.
A single tear spshed onto the frame.
---
### **Elsewhere**
The hovercar’s windows were tinted against the neon gre of the city, casting You Hang’s reflection in fractured colors. He hadn’t moved in hours.
The incoming call startled him.
Guann’s face flickered into view, his expression unreadable.
"*Brother! Where the hell have you been?!*" You Hang snapped.
"*Saying goodbye to Apo,*" Guann replied.
You Hang’s jaw tightened. He reyed everything—the ambush, the explosion, the losses.
Guann listened in silence. Then—
"*Even Dick…*" His voice was barely audible. "*I see.*"
The transmission cut.
Somewhere in the static, an old voice whispered:
"***Nothing’s unbreakable. And if it won’t break—blow it to hell.***"
