Noah dodged again, narrowly avoiding a punch. His reflexes were sharp, his instincts honed. He twisted his body just enough to let the attack sail past him—a clean escape.
Or so he thought.
A heartbeat later, pain erupted in the exact sa spot he had just defended. His ribs burned as if the punch had landed after all.
His eyes widened. What?
Then ca another impact. His jaw snapped sideways, not from a punch he saw, but from one that had already missed him earlier.
Then his gut. Then his shoulder. Then his thigh.
Hits that should have never connected were suddenly crashing into him, one after another, like delayed echoes of a fight he thought he was winning.
[Health Points: 210/320]
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Noah barely heard them over the pounding in his ears.
"Did he really think he stood a chance?"
"1A was right—he's done for."
But Noah had no ti to focus on them.
He was putting the pieces together.
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He fought to steady his breath, ignoring the ache spreading through his body. His mind raced, sifting through everything that had happened so far.
'The first ti it happened, I thought I blocked his strike—but then the sa hit landed anyway.'
It happened again and again. Every ti he dodged or deflected an attack, it ca back.
But then there was sothing even worse.
'His wild swings from earlier… the ones that missed completely… they just started landing all at once.'
Noah's chest tightened. He had been dodging those attacks effortlessly before, but now he was paying for every single one of them, as if ti had caught up and decided they all counted after the fact.
His mind locked onto one terrifying conclusion.
'He isn't just attacking in the present. He's attacking across ti.'
His fists clenched as the realization hit him.
Riku had been playing a different ga from the very start.
Noah took a slow, asured breath, forcing himself to break it down rationally.
'First, there's the ability to replay attacks. That explains why I keep getting hit even when I dodge or block. Every move he makes… happens twice. The first ti is real, the second is inevitable. If I avoid one, I have to be fast enough to react to the duplicate imdiately.'
That alone was a nightmare to deal with. But then there was the other ability.
'Then there's like the attack Vault. He stores every attack he throws—whether they land or not. Then he can release them all at once. aning, the longer this fight drags on, the worse it gets for .'
Noah's stomach twisted. He had been dodging all those wild swings earlier, thinking he was staying safe.
But Riku had never been aiming to hit him just yet.
He had been storing every miss, banking them, waiting until the perfect mont to cash them all in.
And now, Noah was getting buried under an avalanche of his own past mistakes.
[Health Points: 190/320]
He exhaled through his nose, shaking off the pain as best as he could.
'I've been playing this fight wrong from the start. Dodging only delays the inevitable. If I keep moving, I'm just making the next wave even worse.'
He looked up, eting Riku's gaze.
The 1A fighter smirked. "Took you long enough."
Noah didn't react. He simply straightened his posture, rolling his shoulders.
He understood the rules of this fight now.
But that didn't an he had a way to win.
The amazing thing through it all was that the year 2 and year 3 fights were done. Oba had won his fight in a dominant display. The year 2 fight saw Eli Frost victorious yet not many had registered those fights. One, because it ended quickly. And the second reason, everyone wanted to see if the legend of the Zombieboy would live on post this match.
The hate and the love fueled their desire to pay close attention to Noah.
Noah exhaled sharply, shaking off the dull ache spreading through his ribs. His HP flickered in the corner of his vision.
[Health Points: 190/320]
Not great. But not unsalvageable.
'Alright… enough running.'
Noah's eyes locked onto Riku. Now that he had pieced together the chanics behind his opponent's ability, the real fight could begin. He wasn't just going to endure anymore—he was going to take control.
Noah shifted into a defensive stance, raising his guard and focusing solely on reading Riku's movents. No rash actions. No wasted strikes. He needed to observe.
The first punch ca fast—Riku lunged, aiming a right hook toward Noah's temple. Noah moved with it, letting the strike barely graze past his face. He didn't counter. He didn't even try to block. He simply watched.
As expected, the sa punch followed again, an exact duplicate.
'That's the timing window.'
The second strike ca precisely half a second after the first. Too fast for most people to react in ti, but now that Noah knew it was coming, he could start exploiting it.
Riku pressed forward with a rapid combo—jab, jab, cross. Noah weaved through them smoothly, letting them pass within inches of his skin. And just as before, the echoes followed.
But sothing else caught his attention.
'His stance doesn't reset properly when the echoes activate. It's subtle, but… there's a lag.'
Riku had to balance his movent between attacking and managing the automatic replays his power created. And that ant there were small but exploitable gaps in his stance.
Noah's lips curled into a grin.
'There it is.'
Now it was ti to break Riku's flow.
The next ti Riku threw a punch, Noah blocked it. But instead of bracing for the echo, he imdiately pivoted, shifting his weight to the side.
The replayed strike missed completely, punching air where Noah had been just monts ago.
Riku's eyes narrowed.
"Cute trick," he muttered.
Noah didn't answer. He was already moving.
Riku swung again—Noah parried the first strike, but the mont the second one ca, he used a burst of chi to step out of range. Fast enough to be gone before the echo even triggered.
The change in tempo threw Riku off. His pattern of relentless pressure no longer flowed the way it had before.
Noah pressed the advantage, dodging and blocking with erratic timing—never letting Riku get a stable read on his movents.
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