Her gaze drifted for a moment to the shapeless mass of flesh nearby. Nadir, broken, mutilated. Her husband and sons, amalgamated into a pulsating abomination. Even if she saved them, it was already too late.
"It's one way of looking at things, Ashera…" The Fool replied, his voice distorted, almost mocking.
"I figured if that wasn't enough, I'd pay a visit to your father directly."
"I SWEAR I'LL KILL YOU!"
Fueled by her rage, the ground beneath her feet melted, tongues of lava erupting. The planet's temperature soared.
"Hm… That would be difficult, Ashera," he said calmly, his translucent hair floating in an unstable cosmic aura.
She lunged, swift as lightning. The Fool dodged the punch, grabbed her arm to throw her, but she dislocated her shoulder in an inhuman motion and delivered a roundhouse kick.
Her leg halted abruptly, blocked by an invisible force.
The patterns on her body glowed with a supernatural brilliance.
BOOM
An explosion of silver flames engulfed the area, devouring the air itself. The Fool vanished into the light. Ashera leaped back, breathless. She knew: it wasn't over. It was never over.
She had fought him for decades. Never had she seen him weaken. He defied logic, physical laws, existence itself. He was the embodiment of Evil.
And yet, she had no right to give up. He had sacrificed far too much. She wanted to kill him today.
The flames roared around her, distant forests already ablaze. The planet reached 200 degrees. And this was just the beginning.
Footsteps echoed through the inferno.
The Fool emerged from the flames. Unscathed.
"Superstrength, speed, flight… raw power equivalent to ten neutron stars, and breathtaking beauty…" His tone seemed satisfied.
"It's quite logical, really. You resemble my Goddess immensely. Could you be—"
"YOU'RE INSANE!" Ashera screamed, charging at him, her silver flames transforming into lances of light.
He simply concluded:
"True. The Fool… Major Arcana in flesh and Neon."
Ashera clenched her teeth. She didn't know if he acted deliberately or was simply mad. Her muscles tensed, ready for action, as her eyes analyzed every movement of her opponent.
The Fool remained still, his posture relaxed, as if the fight were a mere formality. His hands stayed buried in his coat pockets, indifferent to the scorching energy emanating from Ashera.
She lunged, a kick sweeping the air with force capable of pulverizing a building. The Fool dodged with a simple tilt of his head, effortlessly. Her silver flames exploded around them, ravaging the terrain, but he suffered no damage.
Ashera pressed on, striking with supersonic speed. Each attack was parried or dodged, as if The Fool anticipated her moves. An opening appeared: she spun and launched a spinning kick toward his temple.
The Fool caught her ankle with one hand. His grip was cold, relentless. Before Ashera could react, he hurled her violently to the ground.
Boom
The impact shook the earth, cracking the ground for dozens of meters. She had no time to catch her breath. The Fool grabbed her arm and sent her flying in a sonic explosion.
She tried to stabilize mid-air, but a knee slammed brutally into her face. The impact staggered her, her vision blurring. The Fool gave her no distance. He grabbed her by the hair, holding her in place, and pounded her sternum with repeated punches.
Each strike resonated like a dull echo, compressing her rib cage, preventing her from breathing. She felt her ribs crack under the relentless force of the blows.
Then, he released her.
Singularity: Space
A black dot appeared at the tip of his finger. A monstrous gravitational force activated, pulling everything around it. Debris, rocks, uprooted trees, even living creatures were sucked toward that tiny point. The matter compressed, forming a dense, massive sphere.
The Fool lowered his finger.
"Aaaaahhhhh!"
Ashera's silver flames exploded, releasing a humanoid figure several hundred meters tall. Her titanic form dominated the landscape, radiating suffocating heat.
"Ohhh... You could do that too?!"
The Fool looked up, impassive. Ashera, in her giant form, grabbed the compact sphere and tore it apart with a brutal motion. She tried to seize The Fool, but he disappeared to reappear right before her face.
"What—"
His hand closed around her throat, squeezing with deadly pressure. He brought their faces closer. Though she couldn't see his features under his hood, she knew he was staring intensely at her.
"Kuh— Why do you do this—" she managed to gasp.
She had hunted him for sixty years, analyzing every trace he had left in the galaxy. She knew his patterns, his psychological weaknesses. But one question remained: why? Why did he massacre? He killed everyone: women, children, adults, poor, rich, all races, plants, livestock, without distinction.
"Why do I do this, you say?"
Silence.
"It's for you."
An even heavier silence.
"I was wrong to think you were capable of reasoning!"
"You know me better than anyone, Ashera. We met at my very beginning. I hadn't even reached ten billion deaths—"
"Shut up!" she spat. "You're just a monster! A psychopath who kills for pleasure!"
"I only feel pleasure when I see you in the sky, your cape billowing in the wind, hatred in your magnificent eyes."
"You—"
"I'm incapable of lying, Ashera."
She fell silent. The Fool never lied. When he promised a massacre, he delivered. When he declared a truce, he honored it. Only the weak needed to lie, he often said.
He released her.
"And right now, I don't want you to die."
He began to turn away.
She grabbed his arm.
"I do!"
"Hmm? What are you doing?"
Chains wrapped around his limbs. It wasn't ordinary metal, but Neorit, an alloy whose strength increased as it absorbed Neon.
"You spent lavishly on this toy, didn't you?"
The Fool shook his head, annoyed. He was about to break his bonds when an object tore through Kepler's atmosphere at dizzying speed.
A supermassive cannon, several kilometers long, positioned itself in the sky. Its energy concentrated, a mixture of Neon and dark energy accumulating in its core.
"Is this supposed to be the Millennium's latest invention?"
"Pulsar 5.03. Be sure it'll kill you." She sneered.
The Fool observed the weapon, calculating.
"I see why you're so confident. But it'll destroy this entire galaxy. I know you well enough to know you won't bear having billions of deaths on your conscience."
The beam charged, ready to strike.
"My soul will be at peace if I know I've eliminated you."
"Wait! You're planning to sacrifice yourself?"
Ashera smiled, sadly, then drew on her last reserves to strengthen the chains.
With a sudden movement, The Fool shattered the Neorit and stepped toward her. The beam was so close that his skin began to burn.
"Little Idiot. As long as I'm here, no one can kill you. So don't even think about it."
Time seemed to slow.
The Fool embraced her.
*Event Horizon*
Ashera felt an invisible force envelop her, protecting her. "So, that's it… the barrier that made all my strikes ineffective." She felt invincible, for a moment.
She turned her eyes to him. For the first time, she saw his face. Impassive. Eyes raised to the sky.
"Handsome…" she murmured, unconscious.
Then, everything went white.