The Supreme Leader moved.Not in one direction, but in all directions at once, shifting from one point to another in a way that made anyone trying to follow him with their eyes always half a second too late.His sword never stopped moving. Each swing caught several people at once, horizontal, vertical, diagonal, with no pattern that could be predicted because no pattern repeated.The Arcturus and Varek soldiers in the center sector had no time to distinguish ally from enemy when it came to this threat. Those in the path of that sword died. No further categorization.A Varek soldier ran in the opposite direction from the Supreme Leader, thinking distance was protection. The Supreme Leader appeared in front of him before he covered ten meters, his sword cutting from the left side, splitting the man in two.A trained Arcturus agent tried to roll behind some rubble to hide. The Supreme Leader stepped over it without slowing, his sword came down, done.Fifty people.A hundred.Two hundred.

The Supreme Leader moved first.He appeared in front of Lein in one blink, his sword already raised and coming down in a vertical slash that split the air between them.Lein had already channeled full spiritual energy into his right hand. An aura blade formed from his palm, thin but dense, and he raised it to hold back the slash.The collision happened.CLANG.Lein's right hand went numb all the way to the shoulder. His feet shifted half a step back from the force that came through, but the attack was held.The Supreme Leader noted that. His eyes widened slightly, then a faint smile formed."You can hold back my attack?" His head tilted slightly. "Then what about this?"He moved faster. Not one attack anymore, but a sequence. The sword coming from the left, right, above, below, diagonal, alternating without enough gap to breathe. Like not one sword but five moving at the same time from every direction.Lein held back what he could. But of course, not all of it.The first cut tore thro

Lein's left fist drove into the Supreme Leader's stomach.SLAM.Not the same punch as before. This was something different. The white spiritual energy exploding from within Lein flowed into that fist and released all at once at the point of contact, like a wave that had nowhere left to be contained.The Supreme Leader was thrown backward.His feet scraped the ground, two long lines gouging the surface for several meters before he managed to stop himself. His posture was half-bent, one hand on the ground to keep himself from falling.Before he could stand straight, Lein was already in front of him.A right fist connected with his left cheek.The Supreme Leader's head snapped sideways. Blood came from the corner of his mouth, a mouthful he spat to the ground before his eyes came back forward.Lein didn't give him another second.Left cheek. Right cheek. Lower jaw from below upward. Stomach with a rotating fist to maximize the turn. Every strike was channeled with white spiritual energy

The Supreme Leader then shot forward like something released from a slingshot, that enlarged body moving at a speed it had no right to have.Lein shot forward too.They met in the middle.BOOM.Two fists connected at the same point. White energy and dark red energy met and exploded outward from that point of impact, a wave large enough to bring down what remained of every standing wall within a thirty-meter radius.Neither of them moved back.Both stood at the same point, hands still locked together, and the Supreme Leader immediately launched the next one.Left fist to the face.Lein took it and answered with one to the stomach.Right fist to the left ribs.Lein answered back to the jaw.No dodging. No defense. Just two men who had decided that the fastest way to end this was to destroy each other directly, every incoming punch answered with one just as hard or harder.SLAM. SLAM. SLAM.Blood from Lein. Blood from the Supreme Leader. Both carrying their wounds into every next exchang

Light came in through one small window on the right side.Lein opened his eyes. At first everything was just a blur, like looking through fogged glass, before the image in front of him slowly took on a clear shape.Not a hospital. A low wooden ceiling, walls that were clean but not sterile, lighting that wasn't bright but was enough. In the corner of the room, an IV stand with a bag that was almost empty, and on the small table beside it, medical equipment that wasn't cheap but wasn't arranged like a professional facility. More like someone who knew how to use it but wasn't used to keeping it tidy.In the chair beside his bed, a man was sitting.He looked to be around fifty. A face that had been through a lot of life, lines that came not just from age but from something heavier. When his eyes met Lein's, they didn't show surprise, more like someone who had been waiting long enough and had just gotten confirmation that the wait wasn't wasted."You're finally awake."Lein tried to sit u