Zios dashed through the air to join Bruce behind his wall. He placed his good hand against it, pressing energy into it. The Veil covered the closest of the walls in light blue energy. "Whatever that attack is I can't see it, and if I can't see it that's bad." He braced himself in the circumstance that Zelraka's attack was as immaterial as the one Zios had attempted.

After that attack Jeff instantly dove back into the storm where he once more began to build up power and observe what was going on while beginning to make various compressed pockets of wind which circled the arena that Zelraka created with his massive power. Out of curiosity the sage also took a moment to fire a barrage of wind bullets into the center of each of the four spheres that went to the side of the room attempted to see if it was possible to disrupt them.

"Something Nexus' did huh?" Jeff responded back to Bruce mentioning what happened to him. "This just keeps getting more problematic."

Bruce's wall didn't seem to budge as the semi-silent display stood without any followup. Zelraka knelt down and pressed his hands firmly against the platform beneath him. Then it happened. Zios' body suddenly went slack as something brushed by one of his arms. An overbearing pressure weighed him down against the ground, and in the same moment, Zelraka's body came crashing through the wall that Bruce had conjured. He has launched himself through it, arriving just above Zios with his own body spinning counter clockwise. With the momentum of his movement, and the timing of his attack, there may have been a chance to get in and free Zios from the impending pain. But his right fist was glowing in that moment, and the four orbs around the arena began to crackle slightly as well. As Jeff's shots went through them, they didn't budge or react in the slightest. But the more immediate threat, as the imminent impact of the monstrous fusion's fist, headed straight for Zios' chest from above.

Jeff grumbled slightly as his attacks once against seemed to do jack shit against any of the orbs that were obviously part of a super attack ment to most likely trap the entire room and seeing Zios' body go slack from what he could only guess to be an invisible paralyzing shockwave similar to the one he was captured by with his fight against Rajaka earlier, well it could be best said his confidence was beginning to drop once again. Still not one to let his comrades die in front of him quickly shot his hand forward and released a barrage of 20 ultra compressed wind bullets with the first few aiming to strike from behind and others following short after to aim at the fusions arm and legs joints. 'hopefully this will at least hold him back long enough.'
While this attack was going down the sage then formed a platform of wind under Zios and carried him a several platforms back at high speeds aiming to clear him out of the range of any close range attacks meant to strike him down.

Bruce grimaced, catching one of the orbs' lack of response to Jeff's assault out of the corner of his eye.

'No,' he admonished himself. 'He's just another opponent. Learn, adapt, overcome.'

Zelraka's swift dismantling of Bruce's barrier didn't surprise him. The sudden failure in Ki output from Zios, though, was another matter. Zelraka's attack, with Zios in such a state- Bruce didn't know his durability, but even that would be tested to the point of significant damage if he took that directly.

Doing the one thing he could think of without throwing himself into Zelraka's immediate path of destruction, Bruce shot out a boulder to strike Zios outside of the point of impact. Ideally he'd have elected a more gentle method, but without Ki or any magic output, Zios was less fit to fight than Bruce. He trusted that Jeff would take care of moving their fellow further out of harm's way.

An offshoot of earthen material split from the boulder, aimed to attach to Zelraka's leg as rapidly hardening and thickening mud that connected to a different hovering platform. The fused giant's momentum would likely break it quickly, but it could still set him off balance.

Zelraka barely twitched as his leg was clutched and his target was moved. He was too fast, and his approach was out of nowhere. The moment Jeff's bullet reached him, his body reacted immediately and he smiled. The same aura from earlier coated his body, deflecting or destroying the oncoming attacks, with only slightly welts able to soak through his barrier and lightly bruise his limbs. Bruce's attempt saw similar merit, as the aura climbed down his leg and began to push and pulverize the hardened earth that tried to still him. With his momentum, and energetic barrier, Zios was moved only a few feet by the combined efforts of Bruce and Jeff before Zelraka's attack followed through.

His fist scraped by Zios' side, narrowly missing. But that wasn't the volume of his attack. With an audible pop, almost like the sound of a firing gun, his arm locked in place and his entire body went still. In that brief moment, energy erupted from his fist, expanding outwards in all directions, looking to inflict serious damage on Zios, and lesser damage to Bruce who stood nearby, while simultaneously destroying their platform in the process. 'Agony Shockwave' The technique was far more complex than a simple burst of energy. It retained the properties of Zelriane's Agoniki, as well as a lesser stunning property, similar to Rajaka's Cataclysmic power. "Don't think I forgot about you, son."

The four orbs along the edge of the arena suddenly exploded into giant columns that reached all the way to the roof above them, and towards the ocean that the tower was floating above. The clouds themselves parted from the power of the explosive pillars, and the wind the Jeff sought refuge in was not only stopped with sheer force, but drained of its arcane energy. Although the explosions didn't deal any direct damage, Jeff was now out in the open. Each pillar persisted, exploding consecutively, powered to continue for several minutes as they generated an excessive amount of energy. But despite how terribly devastating they looked at a distance, Zelraka's onslaught didn't stop there. "Don't be a coward!"

Zelraka's body hovered in midair after his attack, regardless of the result, and then spun around once as he leveled himself. The Atomic ordinance beams that surrounded the battlefield then began to slowly spin around as they exploded without any sign of stopping. He had no intention of letting Jeff keep himself hidden for long, even if it prevented him from using any more large scale attacks for the duration. Zelraka quickly glared at Jeff as he became visible again, and then looked to find Bruce and Zios with his eyes as his atomic ordinance began to pick up in speed.

Zios tumbled to the side as Bruce's boulder slammed into him. Only a moment after, Zios was knocked clear into the air from a mix of having the ground beneath him completely destroyed, as well as getting pushed by a vile, green shock wave. Luck had him as he skidded across an intact part of the center floor. He sprawled weakly on the ground to keep from sliding further into any of the explosion zones. The only reason he didn't have a hole punched in him right now was the efforts of the Bruce and Jeff.

The current situation didn't favor Zios. His shadowy left arm had failed him, fading away because he was unable to keep it stabilized without control of his power. Agoniki assaulted his senses like fire. His heart beat intensely with his wounds starting to catch up to him with little way to stave them off. Zios pushed himself onto his knees and knelt there thinking. 'Come on Oz. I know you're in there. Where's that fountain of courage? That spring of energy and action?' He started back up on uneasy legs before stumbling against the ground as the tower shifted. 'This one's a bind isn't it? Can't think of a way out?' Zios struggled against the weakness and semi-paralysis inflicted on him, again pushing against the ground and leveraging himself to get up again. 'Are you forgetting what you are? A man? A hero? A god? No none of these.'

The wave-paralysis started to fade and Zios stood back up. 'Titles are labels to help weak men aspire to greatness or folly.' Zios flexed his left shoulder up and snapped it back down. Black fire erupted out, taking the shape of his arm. It burned and fumed into the air yet instead of producing heat it seemed to pull it in, making its vicinity cooler. "I am Zios and this is my star." He announced aloud. He swiped at the air toward Zelraka, producing four long slashes of black energy that spread out. He jumped up, launching himself toward Zelraka while reeling his arm back and straightening his claws into a single point. "You know who your threat is!" Zios shouted with inhuman volume.

There was no way this fight would go on much longer unless the two heroes had something useful against Zelraka.

Bruce flipped while he was airborne, agoniki burning his body while partial paralysis kept him from forming a new platform for himself.

By sheer luck his left arm struck another floating piece of the tower, and he forced his hand into a hook to latch on. The general pain throughout his limbs was like blaring white noise, an obstacle to his focus more than debilitating damage since the attack had been secondhand.

He somehow hauled himself onto solid ground, taking a knee.

'DO NOT LET HIM SEE YOUR BACK.'

Bruce grit his teeth, and manipulating his stone form, re-broke his arm, forcing the pain into a focal point that sharpened his concentration and forced him to his feet. He swiveled around to face Zelraka. He mended the self-imposed damage to his right arm. In actuality, it might have been beneficial to make the break complete and clean. It almost felt natural once he'd asserted his Sage state fully again.

"Two minutes," he murmured, guessing the rough time that had elapsed since he made his initial estimate. That left eight at least, if he understood how Nexus had damaged him as well as he believed. 'That means I've got four.'

Bruce watched Zios throw himself straight back into the fight. He listened to the pulse of the earth he felt, discerning it apart from the agoniki and the paralysis that was steadily leaving.

'Make it two and a half.'

"Terran Colossus"

Bruce brought a massive amount of the sand he'd spread earlier to himself, shifting it into a huge, hulking form with hands as big as Zelraka. A mouth came up from the platform Bruce had stood on and closed around him, stone hardening between the crack that had been an opening until it was gone. Without any base, the creature couldn't stand, but its reach let it bring one hand up beneath the fusion of the two Order members, the other arcing down to meet it from above.

Zelraka chuckled to himself and rose his left hand towards the encroaching black blades that Zios launched. His aura surfaces from his fist, and he slammed through them width-wise, protecting the rest of his body with the same magic. As Zios grew closer, he smirked and waited to meet his attempt with a little present of his own. The earth above and below him slammed shut around his body a few moments before Zios could reach him however, spreading dust. As it clear though, Zelraka could be seen standing between the two hands, while holding the upper patch of earth back with his right hand straightened above him.

"Give it your best shot."

Zios drew in closer, arcing his whole body weight behind his arm. The fingers of the flaming arm came to a sharpened point as he thrust it forward with the intent to impale Zelraka.

"Oh" Jeff muttered as he stared blankly at Zelraka as the ordinance attack manged to completely cut off the storm he was drawing power from and revealed him back to everyone. In most situations this would have probably annoyed him, but considering the situation and the status of his allies he had begun to consider other options. "Hey Bruce, I hate to admit this, but we might have to resort to that trump of ours..."
The sage muttered using the wind once more to make it so only his allies could hear his words.

The sage floated down closing in towards Bruce slowly while keeping his eyes on the fusion. "I know the plan was to save it for helping Jenso with Yziera, but I'm worried we might not be able to pull out of this otherwise. At least not in time."

Atomic ordinance continued to spiral faster and faster, circling out of control quicker than even Zelraka could have predicted. The tower beneath them was being torn apart as a result. The middle of what remained began to trail behind at the tower rose even further, into the outer atmosphere of the planet. Zelraka, meanwhile, was waiting for Zios' attack to connect. The clash between them let out of flash of darkened green energy, creating a shock wave that blew Bruce's earth away and pushed Zelraka back slightly. But rather than impaling him like Zios had planned, Zelraka had caught the dark blade in his free hand, coated in lime green energy.

"You're pretty strong. But unfortunately it's not enough, son." Zelraka squeezed the black blade, sending cracks down its length towards the base. He smiled and softened his eyebrows. "No hard feelings. I'm sure you gave it your all.." The cracks ran even further down Zios' blade until they reached his arm and began to worm their way towards his body. Zelraka was trying to inject Zios directly with his energy, right through his blade. "But hey, if it makes you feel any better, it's not like there was ever any point to this fight..." Zelraka backed up slightly and raised his other hand behind his body, charging a sphere of energy in the center of his palm. "...You never stood a chance."

In one swift motion, Zios' blade shattered to pieces and Zelraka swung his other hand around, planting the sphere of energy that he'd conjured smack dab in the center of Zios' chest. "This is what a real star looks like!" Zios was pushed back for quite a ways by the energy pushed into his chest, unable to react to the intense weight pushing him down. He collided with several of the black stone platforms, crashing through them as he made his way lower and lower down the splintering debris. But before he could get too far away, Zelraka snapped his fingers and chuckled.



The orb at Zios' center expanded rapidly, and then stopped as soon as it encompassed all of his body. The resulting orb began to eat away as his energy, and his body. He remained frozen in midair, absolutely contained by Zelraka's untamed Meta energy. Zelraka closed his eyes and shrugged, ignoring both Jeff and Bruce for a few seconds.

"If he wasn't your trump..." He started, revealing that he'd been able to listen in on what they were saying somehow, "I really have to wonder what you've got left."

Bruce's concentrated frown deepened, seeing Zios' effort nullified and turned against him.

He heard Jeff's suggestion. The Wild Card had a point. There wasn't time to leave anything in reserve. That wasn't how heroes, as they called themselves, worked.

"Oh, nothing much." Bruce said in answer to Zelraka's comment.

A semi-inebriated Luke blocked Bruce and Jeff's path to the training chamber. Bruce could empathize with the desire to drink, but the amount of alcohol required to get him drunk had reached a quantity more expensive than the experience was worth years ago.

"Luke," Bruce said. "We need to pass."

"Do you guys know what makes you heroes?" Luke asked, leaning on a wall for a bit of support. "Why you are the ones who will fight the Order and save the world?"

Bruce blinked and glanced at Jeff. The machinist Wind Sage shrugged without an answer. Bruce sighed.

"Because we have the ability-"

"NO!" Luke shouted, pounding on the wall with such force that Bruce angled his body back a bit at the outburst. "Your powers make you the ideal choices, not champions!"

Luke took a deep breath and gripped Bruce's shoulder.

"I don't know jack about magic next to Mikey, or Ross, or any of you, but I know how heroes are made, and it's the work that you put in to get back up even when you fall down that sets you apart!"

Luke thumped his chest with his other hand.

"Because when you strip away all the fancy stuff- the Ki, the magic, the superhuman talent, what's left is your training! Your effort to hone and take command of your souls is ingrained in your bones, in your very BLOOD!"

Luke grabbed Jeff by the shoulder and pulled him closer, chuckling a little and swaying back.

"And, heh, my son- My son is right, the fact that you're a team- the culmination of that same effort in each of you, focused into one against those arrogant sons'a bitches- you're in sync, on the same wavelength, down to that blood that's gonna take you down the path of doing the impossible."

Luke stared at both of them intensely before he clapped their shoulders and shoved past them, muttering about getting ready for his next session of instruction.

"I suppose he's right," Bruce said. "Still, I hope he can collect himself soon."

Jeff had gone silent, his gaze faraway and looking at something not present in the guild halls.

"What are you thinking?" Bruce asked.

Jeff slowly turned his head toward him with a cautious, yet determined smile. The kind he got right before announcing his latest successful creation.

"Just... everything.

Bruce rescinded his Sage state again, calling up a jagged, sharp-edged rock on his platform. He pressed his palm on it, and ripped it across the stone, cutting himself just enough to draw blood.

"A simple exchange, of the foundational material of our beings, and it won't matter if our elements are as different as Earth and Sky or our Ki as opposite as 'Evil' and 'Heroic'."

Bruce still had the knot in his soul to contend with. But he'd fix it, repair the flow, regain his fullest strength in the time it took for his blood, which he calcified with his magic and sent through the toward Jeff, to make the trade. Not because it was possible.

Because he had to.

"Yeah pretty much everything...." Jeff responded, following the line Bruce said to Zelraka earlier as he closed in to Bruce and drew his blade once more.

He then proceeded to stab his left hand with the blade and draw blood from it in much a similar fashion that Bruce had done and then place his hand outwards to meet Bruce's as his magical energy flowed through the blood and prepared to make contact with Bruce. ".. and then some."

As the two made contact with there hands clasping together, there blood began to form a magical connection between the two, one which would envelope them both in a bright light as the wind surged around them and all the platforms shook for a brief moment.

Then out of nowhere a blade shot out of the light shot of the glowing sphere that enveloped the two sages, flying out several yards away and almost effortlessly pierced through one of the tower platforms and kept going several yards further till it stopped suddenly.
"Whoops."
It then in a split second shifted though the air slicing the platform like it was made out of paper as it went for Zios and within a couple seconds sent a flurry of strikes at the orb that contained him while making sure to avoid slashing into his friend as he did so. The resulting flurry would either disperse the attack or at the very least weaken it enough for the Zios to break free the rest of the way. A platform of wind once more formed under Zios ready to catch him.

"So this is the power to cut anything..." The being muttered. The light then dispersed with an outward expulsion of wind that came back in on itself as the new figure stood. Long hair, silver tinted blue, hung down to his back and sat up in short spikes at the crest of his forehead.

His figure, while firm, was lithe and corded with muscle rather than bulk. His posture, the sheer determination he exuded denoted his reserves of power.

When he opened his eyes to reveal white irises that absorbed everything calmly, anyone who looked at him knew- his was a confidence founded on the knowledge he'd been born from a fusion of elements that nature had not intended to inhabit one body.

"Gideon." He said simply, christening himself. "He who cuts."

He looks toward Zelraka.

"That is who I am."

Zelraka looked at him and smiled as the energy around Zios was slowly chipped away by the slashing attacks.

"Hohoh?"

Yzeira stood unevenly, slightly hunched over with his eyes fixated on Jenso. Several strands of his hair continued to go dark with blood-red hues one after another chaotically before changing back without any delay. He didn't expect this at all. Not for a second.

"Where does it all keep coming from?" Yzeira's eyes went brighter until his chaotic energy was lashing outwards. His entire body followed. "This is unprecedented. Unreal. Remarkable."

Jenso walked forwards, slowly but surely. He glared fiercely at Yzeira, as the strange blue energy seemed to get thicker around his fists than the rest of his body. The gravity orb above him began to suck in large amounts of the fog above him. But then, Jenso closed the palm of his right hand and immediately took aim at one of the Yzeira's with his index and middle finger united, from his left hand. He launched a thin beam of super heated blue energy at one of them at a rapid pace, aimed directly for his heart. The orb above was suddenly surrounded by a blueish barrier of some kind, which served to restrain the orb's pull temporarily.

"Inconceivable. But..." Yzeira's eyes widened as the beam reach his barrier. But on contact, the wall surrounding him glowed even more brilliantly than usual. The blue wall surrounding his gravity orb above them began to crack, shrink and crumple. The barrier around one of his bodies deflected the length of Jenso's beam towards the barrier that he'd created around Yzeira's orb with a new hue, piercing through it and freeing the energy contained within. Yzeira's eyes looked to where the Laser made contact with his barrier. There was a minuscule crack, too small for normal eyes to see, but he repaired it immediately. Jenso's transformation had granted him a leg to stand on, but did little to contend with his opponent's superior control over energy.

"...Perfectly manageable." The clones took a more active stance and began to circle around the tower's roof, along both edges towards where Jenso stood. The gravity well above him on the other hand had grown to twice its original size. With a flick of one of his wrists, it began to careen towards the golden hero relatively fast, while both of Yzeira's bodies fired incredibly fast beams towards him in a sweeping motion from the center of the battlefield. It looked like they cut through each other in the process, but received no damage as a result. When the beams touched, a bright flash erupted from the point of contact, brighter than the flash bangs that Jenso's friend had used in the past. With both lasers heading for his midsection, and the orb of gravity falling from above, Jenso looked to be cornered.

"I'll take this seriously..."
"...Just in case"

As the beams coursed through the fog within the arena, the fog that was within the areas that it moved through, dispersed. It didn't spread out like regular fog would, though. Jenso's body seemed to respond, despite the giant flash blinding him and the high speeds that the lasers were heading for him. The display from earlier taught Yzeira that his power could be bested, but it also helped Jenso. He could not take Yzeira's power lightly, despite the immense power burning through him from within.

He dashed towards the left at incredible speeds as the orb crashed down on his previous location. His speed was on par with his One with Nature form that he had in the past. As he moved, he dove under the right beam that came at him first. But rather than sliding, he straight up flew underneath it, and under the left beam that followed. He took aim at the resulting flash, and charged up energy in his right, launching a blue spear. He closed his palm, and it exploded in a powerful blue shockwave as it reached the center of the flash while spreading blue flames in every direction.

He made sure to keep moving to stay out of range of the orb's pull and away from the flash while heading for the left clone. He stared blankly at the energy surrounding his body for a moment as the energy within his left palm seemed to make a crackling noise. He launched a volley of lasers at the left Yzeira from his left palm. Some were aimed to strike the clone, while others straight up passed by him. They seemed weaker than those from before. It seemed like he was still getting used to his power. He glanced over at the orb briefly, to see what it would do.

The light where the lasers connected suddenly collapsed in on itself, changing its physical makeup until it coalesced into an orb, but Jenso's spear collided with it, and the resulting explosion left it as nothing more than mist. The flames that spread outwards were burst back and put out by a sudden pulse of energy that emitted from both of Yzeira's bodies. They reoriented themselves with seven orbs at their waist, and dropped their hands down heavily, palms facing the floor in front of them. Their bodies were directed towards Jenso, and the lasers he fired were pushed down by an energy that originated from above. Each one collided with the floor, tearing into it before they reached Yzeira's left body. The floor reformed itself immediately and the body that Jenso attacked slammed its hands together.

Suddenly the push turned into a pull, and Jenso was slowly being lifted off of the ground by the growing mass above him. Meanwhile, the other body took an orb into itself and conjured another beam, similar to the one from earlier, except twice as thick and bright. As soon as Jenso's feet left the ground, it swiped at him, aiming to hit his back.