-Chapter 19-

Kick It or Lose It

My right leg collided with Mercury's own right leg. My teammates, whom were dangling on the hook of a crane, watched and even awed at me for just fighting with my own legs.

Even Cinder, Emerald, and Neo looked a bit surprised. Above all, Mercury was enjoying himself with that smudge smirk of his.

"Aahhhh, well, well, you know how to kick it." Mercury said before he kicked and shot with his leg at me, but I dodged quickly and countered with each of my leg, colliding with his legs. "You really know how to fight with your legs."

I smirked a bit. "Like I said, I trained hard last year. Fighting with sword is not the only I can do."

"Well, then I can't wait to see what else you can do." He said, smirking before we resumed our fight. He somersaulted away before he starts spinning himself. He shot several fireballs from his feet.

I quickly reacted; I spun myself to summon winds out of my feet, creating a tornado around myself to evade the fireballs.

Mercury looked shock as he gritted.

"Woah, never expected that." Emerald thought aloud.

"Hm-hm. Ellix has improved, hasn't he?" Cinder giggled.

"Woah." Ruby awed as the girls watched my fight.

I stop spinning and got my feet back on the ground, returning back to my battle pose. Mercury strike me back with a kick, but I dodged to the side and kicked back at him, but he blocked it with his other leg. The impact caused him to fly and hit a pile of trash.

He got up, realizing a cut on his face. He licked the blood, which I found it to be disgusting.

"Eew, that was very unnecessary!" I joked. "But, just to warn you, I might going to hurt you…a lot."

"Don't count on it. I will do the same to you, of course, but not killing you in the process, like I promise." He said before he jumped forward with one foot out. I jumped high to evade from the attack with myself flying.

I took this as a chance to fly up to my teammates' aide, but Cinder shot a fireball at me as I dodged away from it.

"Don't you think you can just save your friend during the fight? Remember, you made the deal!" She reminded me.

"Hmph! Of course, Cinder. I did not forget it." I replied as I flew down back to grounds.

I continued fighting Mercury. He shot me with some bullets as he kicked at me, but I countered it with my legs. I somersaulted few feet away from him, and then strike back with a wave of fire shot from my leg when I swung it.

Mercury used his own weapon to shoot himself up in the air, dodging from the wave of fire. I quickly teleported and appeared in front of him, performing another kick, but he blocked it with his arm. He struck back with a swung of his left leg as I blocked it with my left arm. We just stayed in mid-air until gravity took hold on Merc, dragging him down. I stayed up in the air momentarily and performed a high jump kick at him.

However, he evaded my attack as I created a big impact on the ground, resulted a crater which I was in the center.

"At this rate, I'll run out of Dust cartridges for my boots." I thought as I jumped out of the crater that I made.

Mercury took a second or two to catch some breaths before he fought back. "Yee-aaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwhh!" He screamed.

I noticed he paced up his speed in his attacks as he unleashed a barrage of kicks at me, but I quickly dodged them all with my arms crossed as he continued to kick at me at rapid speed.

I teleported again and appeared behind him and then I quickly spun myself with leg out. When he realized I was behind him, my foot landed on his face as the impact caused him to fly to the side, making him skid on the dirt ground.

I watched with a serious, calm facial expression. "Damn you…damn you!" He mumbled as he slowly gets back up.

"If I were you, Mercury, I would just give up and you can ask one of your friends to tag in." I spoke. "This fight is over since the beginning, even before it begun."

Mercury stood up, chuckling until he laughed out like maniac. I looked at him, finding something suspicious about it.

"OK, dude, you're seriously creeping me out." I said with a dead-tone voice.

"Heh! It is just that I am really enjoying this fight and I hope it will last long, but…of course we don't have all the time in the world exactly, so I think I will start fighting more seriously now!" He stated.

"Hmm!?"

Suddenly, I sensed something from him. My heart beeped strongly like if my entire body just reacted to something when I looked at Mercury. He jumped forward, using his boots to speed up. I reacted as I dodged to the side, but then he swung his leg so quickly that his feet landed on my stomach.

"Gah!" I gasped before the impact caused me to fly over and hit through a tower of trash. The tower of trashes collided along me in the rumble.

"E..Ellixxxxxxxxxxxxx!" Yang screamed as the other girls jaw dropped.

Mercury smirked slyly. "I guess I won."

"It looks his new bionic legs worked on him." Emerald said.

"It is not over yet." Cinder spoke as she glared at the rumble of the trashes, with Emerald reacting to her as she looked perplexed.

Suddenly, I burst out of the rumble of trashes in my full armor. Everyone watched me as black aura emanated around my body, but disappeared as the armor faded away.

"Phew! That was close!" I said as I wiped the sweats from my forehead.

"Tch!" Mercury spitted. "You are tougher than you look."

"And I underestimated you, Mercury. I didn't realize it at first, but I guess you improved too or rather…your legs are replaced with better, improved prosthetic legs with bionic technology. Same goes for your boots. Most likely it is the works of the White Fang, given as a gift from your new master."

"So what if it is. I am going to use it to kick your ass." Mercury answered with a smirk, yet looked a bit upset.

"What is Ellix talking about?" Ruby asked. "Who is this master?"

"Hey Blake, do you know who he is talking about?" Weiss asked.

Blake stayed silent, not answering back as she watched the fight below, but specifically more on me.

He struck back as he used his dancing move with a mix of kick fighting style. I countered and dodged the move gracefully, but he did few numbers of hit on me as I jumped back away from him, but he kept coming at me.

He swung one foot at me, but I blocked it my arm, but struck his other leg at my right abdomen.

"Gah!" I gasped in pain. My arm loosened and he took the chance to push the leg strongly to make me hit on the ground hard.

The strength overwhelmed as he kicked me to the side with my back laid on the ground, and then he stomped on my chest as I gasped again painfully. Ruby cringed as she closed her eyes, not wanting to see me in pain since she was in the front. Weiss watched in horror as she cringed a bit, too. Even though Blake couldn't see because she was at the back, she could picture the situation, but she really didn't like it and felt it to be uncomfortable. Yang didn't like what I was going through as her hair flared and her eyes flashed in red, but at the same time, feeling helpless.

"Look at you now! You started out strong at first, but when I started fighting a bit more serious and show off my power, you fall so easily! Like a glass-canon! How lame!" Mercury mocked at me as he pressed his feet harder. I felt my rib-cage breaking as I screamed in pain.

I slowly smirked and laughed weakly. He looked at me with a serious face. "What is so funny, little boy?"

"Y..yyou…are…right for one thing. I….am…like a glass canon…" I admitted. "But…it does..nnn..not mean…I…won't….LOSE!"

I burst my aura out, causing him to fly off before he skidded a bit away from me. He got back on his feet. I slowly got up with my eyes now in dark purple aura with the alpha symbol glowing in blue in both eyes.

I quickly ran up to Mercury, catching him off guard as I began kicking him on the abdomen area.

"Gah!" I gasped painfully as I gave him a barrage of kicking. As I just had the thought of defeating him, I kicked him at a rapid speed with one foot like a Gatling gun. He was trapped in my attack as he couldn't even move an inch away to either side in order to evade. He was completely trapped in my attack.

I kicked him so hard that I even lost track of how many times I'm kicking at him. At my last kick, I stopped for brief moment, and then finally gave him one more kick as I battle cried as loud as possible, finishing him off.

If this was a Mortal Combat game, the game would say "Fatality" at that moment. Mercury was kicked and flied to a tower of trashes, but it didn't cause it to fall, but rather shook it strongly.

His eyes were almost completely white. "Aaahh." He jaw dropped before he dropped down to the ground, exhausted in defeat.

My team looked at me silently as I turned around to face them, and then I gave an assured grin and thumb up. They cheered in response.

"Yeah, Ellix! You did it!" Ruby cheered.

"You showed him what Team RWBYE can do!" Weiss cheered.

"Ellix, you had me worry there, but you did it!" Blake cheered.

"Woohoo! You go, boyfriend!" Yang cheered.

"Enough!" Cinder yelled as my teammates silent and I turned my attention to her.

"Remember." She said in her calm, sinister tone. "There are three more to fight. Mercury is just a warm-up."

"Hmph!" I huffed. "So, you basically used him to see how I can fight. You just don't care what happens to your comrade when he or she lose."

"Sometimes, you have to make sacrifices, but enough about that. Let's see who goes first." She said before she said her fighter of choice. "How about you, Emerald? Go and break a leg."

"Did she just made a pun there?" Ruby asked.

"If it is, then that was not very cool." Yang said.

"Yes, maim." She obeyed as she walked forward, but stopped at a foot away from me.

"You will pay for what you did to Mercury, but to be honest, I…kind of knew he would not defeat you." She said with one eyebrow raised and sly smirk.

"Well, that sounds disappointing. You are as cruel as Cinder." I said.

"Naw." She disagreed. "Mercury is just an idiot, but at least I can say that I thank him, now I know what to expect when I am going to fight you right now."

She took out her weapon, ready to fight. This time, I summoned both my gauntlets with my right one with the sword.

"Let's see about that." I replied.