Chapter 900: Are You Ready Director?
Chapter 900: Are You Ready Director?
Michael felt it too.
The excitement had been building from the moment Director Lin made her offer, and now that the first exchange had passed with no real consequence, it settled into something cleaner. He too wanted to know. He had been awake for a while now and still had no actual measure of what he was working with.
This was the opportunity to find out.
He activated Berserk.
The effect hit immediately. His body temperature spiked, the burn spreading across his muscles as his strength climbed past its baseline. The air around him warped slightly from the output. His vision sharpened until the individual grains of sand beneath Director Lin’s feet were distinct.
He moved again.
What followed was not a spar. Director Lin had been right to call it a fight, though even that word didn’t quite capture the next stretch of time. Michael came at her with everything his body could currently produce and Director Lin handled it. That was the honest summary. But her expression was changing with every exchange, each collision leaving a slightly deeper impression on her face than the last.
The desert around them had stopped looking like a desert. The ground was fractured in long radiating lines, sections of it upturned or fused from heat, the horizon obscured by dust and dispersed energy.
"Is that all?"
Her voice cut through the noise between one exchange and the next.
Michael had pulled back to reassess. His breathing had elevated.
"You’re only using your body," Director Lin continued, her gaze direct. "You ascended to Rank 3. You have abilities you haven’t touched." Her eyes narrowed slightly. "Stop fighting like a brawler and show me what you actually are now."
Michael looked at her for a moment. She wasn’t wrong. He had been testing his physical ceiling because that was the most immediate unknown. But physical strength was one layer of what he could bring to a fight, and not the deepest one.
His hand moved to his back without fully thinking about it, fingers brushing the space between his shoulder blades where the tattoo sat.
The familiar surge began at his spine and spread outward immediately, and this time Michael didn’t fight it or try to stop it before it completed. He let it come, and the desert received what the manor had not been large enough to contain.
Fifteen meters of green-furred wolf stood where Michael had been, dragon wings spreading wide, the oppressive weight of the form pressing against the air in every direction.
Director Lin looked up at him. For the first time since they had entered the space, she said nothing. She exhaled slowly through her nose, her gaze traveling from the base of his paws to the tips of his wings. In front of Michael her size was so small it looked like a single sneeze could carry her away. The pressure radiating off her was a different story entirely.
"...Now we’re getting somewhere."
She hadn’t even finished the words when her eyes widened as Michael’s body began to grow.
Twenty meters.
Thirty.
Forty.
Michael had activated his law. He didn’t know if it was possible in this state, but there was nothing to lose in trying. Cautious about the attempt, he chose one of the less complicated states his law could replicate. He chose to copy Beginning’s traits.
The air changed. The pressure radiating from Michael spiked sharply.
The desert beneath him began to sink as his weight increased, sand compressing and cracking outward in expanding rings.
Director Lin’s eyes widened slightly. "...What—"
Fifty meters.
Then sixty.
Michael’s massive frame towered over the entire battlefield, his shadow swallowing the land beneath him. His wings expanded alongside his growth, stretching wide enough to blot out the sky of the alternate space.
This was beyond Lucky’s original form. Even beyond Beginning’s peak size.
And yet Michael felt something strange. His eyes narrowed slightly.
"...No boost?"
There should have been one from his title. For a brief moment confusion flickered through his mind. "...Is it because of this space?"
The thought passed quickly because something else replaced it.
His attention shifted inward. This power surged through him like an endless current. Vast. Overwhelming.
"...What is this..."
He had grown stronger before, especially during the periods when he evolved himself through his talent. But this was different. For the first time, Michael felt what it actually meant to possess power rather than just wield it.
His claws flexed. The ground beneath them split. The air trembled from the movement alone.
Michael slowly lowered his massive head, his gaze locking onto Director Lin. From this height she looked small. Almost insignificant. But the pressure radiating from her did not match her size. The ground around her remained steady and unbroken, a point of stability in the middle of chaos.
Michael leaned down further. The movement alone caused the desert to quake, wind pressure rolling outward in waves.
"...I’m ready."
His voice was deeper. The air itself vibrated as the sound spread outward and the ground trembled beneath the force of it.
Director Lin looked up at him. For a moment she said nothing, her eyes tracing his form once more.
Sixty meters.
A somewhat strained smile formed on her face. Was this what Rank 3 youngsters were capable of nowadays?
Outside the sealed training facility the gathered crowd felt nothing from within. That alone spoke volumes about the quality of the space. Everything happening inside was completely contained.
The only reason anyone knew what was occurring at all was because of the viewing tools embedded into the building itself. Floating panels of light hovered above the central area, displaying a distorted but clear feed of the battle within.
And right now every single eye was locked onto them.
Silence spread through the crowd.
Because what they were seeing did not make sense.
"...That..."
One of the elite students took an unconscious step backward.
"...Is that him?"
*
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