World Reset
Chapter 6 – Melting Flames
Grey closed his eyes as he braced for impact from the fall, hoping to land on a platform soon. Grey felt that his body had stopped moving and opened his eyes, finding himself to be standing on a small platform in the middle of a lava field. Grey quickly jumped away from the platform and landed on the bigger platform on his side, seeing as the platform he was on slowly melted from the heat of the lava.
"Ugh…" Grey suddenly fell to his knees, "It's really hot in here…"
"This heat is nothing," Grey weakly turned to direction where the voice came from and saw a woman familiar to him, only with her long hair reaching her shoulders, "If you can't stand this heat, then you're nothing but a weakling!"
"Atlas…" Grey pushed himself back to his feet, "Why are you here…?"
The woman, Atlas, pulled out an orange-colored Biometal from her pocket before she transformed into her Model F form, "This is what Thomas would want us to do. We won't let anyone get in our way of making an ideal world!"
"Ideal world…" Grey saw as Atlas had held her orange-colored knuckle busters in her hands, "But why would he even do that!? Has Thomas taken the evil ways of Albert!?"
Atlas shook her head, "Wrong. Albert may have inspired him about resetting the world to create in ideal one, but Thomas has his own methods of making that ideal world," Atlas pointed both of her knuckle busters at Grey, "But what kinds of methods he's using, I don't care. As long as he kept his promise of having an ideal world without weaklings, I don't mind melting you down into nothing!"
"Just… just try it if you can!" Grey pulled out both of his buster guns, "Even without my past, I still have my friends! As long as I have them, I'm not going to lose to the likes of you!"
"Interesting… A weakling who thought that he's so strong just because he has friends to back him up," Atlas let out an evil smile, "I'll let you know that you're nothing with your weak friends!"
"We'll see who the stronger one here is!" Grey started by releasing a charged shot at Atlas, but she dodged out of the way before the shot could hit her.
Grey morphed into Aeolus and sent out a barrage on cyclones at Atlas, who stayed still on her place before she sent out a firebomb at him. Grey cut the firebomb into half with his shorter pink saber, only to have it exploded on the saber and knocked him back. Atlas slammed her left knuckle buster, cracking the ground open as the lava started flowing into the formed cracks.
Grey put the end of his sabers together and sent a ball of electricity at Atlas, who took the attack head on and got paralyzed. Grey transformed back to his Model A form before releasing a Homing Shot at Atlas, who was still paralyzed by his earlier attack. Atlas wasn't knocked back by the attack and stayed in her place until she recovered from the paralysis seconds later.
Atlas slammed her left knuckle buster and sent out a wave of fire at Grey, who jumped away to dodge and countered with his charged shot. Atlas sidestepped to dodge before slamming her right knuckle buster, sending another wave of fire at Grey. Grey dodged the attack by jumping away, but landed on the cracked ground and almost fell into the lava.
Atlas suddenly appeared behind him, ready to push him into the lava with her left knuckle buster, but Grey had ducked down and knocked Atlas to the ground behind him instead. Atlas got up to her feet before rapidly shooting out fireballs from Grey, who didn't have the time to dodge the entire fireballs and braced for the impact.
The stray shots landed around Grey, but he noticed that not all of the fireballs around him were red in color as fire should normally be. Some black-colored fire was also burning in front of him and some on his arms, which he used to block the incoming fire. Grey waved his arm to put out the fire, but the black-colored fire remained in its place.
"W-What's this?" Grey asked as he stared at the black fire on his left arm, "I can't put it out!"
"Just as I expected," Atlas suddenly spoke up as she walked a little closer to him, "The black fire won't leave the weaklings unless I want it out from the burned bodies."
"Darn it…!" Grey glared at Atlas, but noticed that his vision was starting to get blurry.
"But it won't be much of an entertainment for Thomas anymore if that black fire kills you first," The black fire on Grey's arm went out before Grey fell to his knees, "You're weak, and much weaker than I remember you are. Your strength is no match for mine."
"S-Shut… up…!" Grey forced himself back to his feet before clutching to his buster guns tightly, "I… I can still… fight!"
Atlas let out a smile before getting her knuckle busters ready once more, "If that's true, then you're not going to get killed before you can defeat me!"
Atlas charged at Grey before punching him with her left knuckle buster, sending him flying away from the pool of lava. Grey slowly got back to his feet, panting, not noticing that Atlas had already got behind him. By the time Grey noticed her presence and turned his head around, Atlas had got her right knuckle buster slammed on his head, knocking him towards the pool of lava.
Grey landed a few inches away from the lava and tried getting up again, only to be kicked to the side by Atlas. Grey held his back where Atlas had kicked her before he shakily looked up at her as she glared down at him with her glowing red eyes. Atlas kicked him high, sending him flying above the lava pool, but Grey's body disappeared in a white light before he could fell into the lava pool.
"Pathetic," Atlas spoke up in irritation before she transformed back and teleported away from the area.