~VWUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMMMMM!~
Right before Ana's eyes, her black hole kept expanding until it had taken on the size of an entire city… sucking in any and everything in its path.
"Time elapsed: two minutes, fifty seconds…" She murmured, her gaze resting on the adversaries that kept being decimated no matter how hard they tried.
"... Enemies eliminated: two thousand, eight hundred and three."
She simply stood there, watching the automated carnage as her white lab coat fluttered. She didn't need to do anything more but enjoy the show.
Frankly, it was a little boring.
"Anabelle, what is the scan progress?" She finally blurted out, most likely tired of doing nothing.
"[All Purpose Scan is complete, and just as you theorized, there are several elements that match]."
"Percentage?"
"[83 Percent]."
"I see. So its either those others were contaminated with other elements and this one is purer, or vice versa, hence the 17 percent difference."
"[That is a valid position]."
"Have you identified the properties of the previous ones? Any matches found?"
"[Not quite. Perhaps it is a new element caused by mutation]."
"Ah, that's true. How could I overlook that? If Nether interacts with properties here, its possible it'll create new elements. That'll make it difficult to isolate the variables…" Ana bit her lip slightly, and a clouded expression began to take over her demeanor.
"[I am not done with the cross-referencing. Perhaps new information will be found once it is over]."
Hearing her Automaton comfort her made Ana feel a tinge of satisfaction. It almost felt like she was speaking to herself.
"That is my hope too." She smiled.
Her experiment wasn't particularly a secret one, but not many people had the interests and skills to assist her. Only Beruel was her ally in this, but his expertise wasn't on energy manipulation, but technology.
As a result, field activities like these fell on her. Analysis and in-depth cross referencing were his forte. Still, since she was using this mission as an excuse to gather more data, Ana felt like their current actions here would lead to a breakthrough in their research.
'We will soon be able to harness—'
"[This is a tangent, but I can sense energy spiking at an unbelievable rate in one of the zones that my part is observing]." Anabelle's robotic voice suddenly interrupted Ana's thoughts.
"H-huh? Spiking energy, huh? Well, it's probably someone going all-out or something."
Ana could feel so many of her comrades and their respective energies clashing with Nether. This was a battlefield, so this much should be expected.
Why had Anabelle deemed this to be an occurence worthy of mention?
"[The level of climbing energy is catastrophic. I estimate it will be powerful enough to destroy the entire Hive in a few seconds]."
Upon hearing this, all of Ana's senses shot up.
"The entire Hive?"
"[Confirmed. It has reached that threshold. It is passing that threshold now]."
Sweat covered Ana's face as she considered the possibility that one of them had enough power to do that.
"I can already guess who it is, but tell me… which zone is this occuring in, and who is the person doing this?" Ana asked, a wry smile forming on her face.
"[It is—]."
~BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!~
The explosion deafened Ana for a moment, preventing her from hearing anything the Automaton had uttered.
Not only were her ears out of comission, but her eyes and mind were all distracted by the marvelous sight before her—the destruction of the entire Hive in mere seconds.
The way the giant mass burned bright crimson, every particle of condensed Nether consumed and reduced to nothingness… even her Black Hole was swallowed in the chaos, completely dossolving uner the pressure of a higher power…
"Amazing…" Ana knew she could never possess such power, at least not with her strength alone.
As such, she could only marvel at the sheer beauty of it all.
"Anabelle, who did this? It's her, isn't it?" Ana mumbled, her blue eyes still reflecting the fiery destruction that consumed all in its path.
There was no doubt in her mind any longer.
Only one person was capable of doing this… and it was—
"[If you mean Serah Crimson, then yes. She is the perpetrator of this event]."
Ana's grin broadened as she took in the devastation one final time. It was a shame she couldn't obtain a sample, but that probably didn't matter since she now had an epiphany.
"Are you done cross referencing?"
"[Correct. The data is ready. Do you wish to look at them now?]"
"No… let's save that for later. Transfer the data to Beruel so he can also have a look at a later time."
"[Understood]." As Anabelle's response rang in her head, Ana could feel her heart thumping harder and harder.
'I can't wait to begin studying all of this.' She grinned, now comfortably heading back to the rest of the group.
The mission was pretty much over at this point.
All because of one person.
"Serah, you monster. You couldn't share this time…?"
******
[Moments Earlier]
Serah Crimson's hands were folded as she absentmindedly stared at the Hive.
Even though her body was present, it seemed like she was not completely focused on the task at hand. A distracted expression played on her face, and it didn't seem like she had noticed the approaching Nether Beasts at all.
'Neron…' Her thoughts trailed. '... You bastard.'
A frown began to form on her face the more she thought of her husband, who couldn't even leave a farewell message explaining himself or the situation to her.
Her chest hurt. Her heart burned. Her mind churned.
It was a maddening experience.
Serah only wanted it to end. She desired to silence everything. She merely wanted to shut her eyes and forget… but also to vent.
She was tired of keeping all of these feelings in, suffering in silence as she bottled everything in order not to do something she would regret.
No more.
Serah couldn't control herself any longer.
Finally surrendering herself to the primal emotions that consumed her, Serah took a step forward, focusing not on the imminent foes, or the overall danger of the mass before her.
No… she only had one thought.
To release it all.
*
*
*
[A/N]
Thanks for reading.
Now we know who the culprit is. How many of you already guessed it?
Haha…
