Chapter 36 - Upgrade

"There we are, done with the danger!"

Artemis dusted his hands off and looked around with pride, when Axela emerged in her digital form.

[I have doubts about that, Jeremy.]

"Why? Didn't you see, I just defeated that snake of dusty rusty….whatever it was?"

He expected to hear praise upon bending the air, Jeremy had learned to play with the elements on planet Nrutas. All thanks to Barthes that he got to experiment with all the elements there, and had learned to corrupt the system on his wrist.

Jeremy still had it on himself but it did not give the signals, he blocked the frequencies and waves. Now Jeremy could only operate it with the help of Axela's presence within him.

[Well, you completely haven't killed it.]

"What do you-?"

His question got interrupted by the sound of wind, which seemed no different than hissing. Jeremy immediately turned only to see the rush o the wind coming at him, within one blow he went flying and crashed in the wall.

"Argh...damn!"

He bumped his chin on the ground but stood up somehow, Artemis saw the air forming into the snake once again But this time it was smaller in size as the a visible amount of dust had flew away through the duct.

[Told you such beasts are not easy to defeat. You have to think of something else.]

"But what the heck!? If this beast is made up of dust how can I defeat it?"

He growled while the snake coiled the tail around below its head, it seemed to appear as a bolt now. The only difference was that it could jump as the snake charged at him with its tail.

"Come one, do you think you can dig a hole in me, huh?"

Artemis dodged as the tail collided with the wooden table present behind him.

"Or well, maybe you can, hah!"

He spotted the big hole in the table, and shook his head in panic.

"Are you going to help or not?"

Artemis had been dodging all the attacks narrowly, since the room had been totally destroyed now.

[Maybe you can wet the sand, you know wet dust particles can't form themselves together.]

"But won't it increase the density? What if it somehow managed to form back? Being..."

Artemis slipped down and moved behind the snake, while talking to Axela.

"Being in this state it is causing kinda less damage to me. Increasing its density by wetting the dust will just kill me."

[Well, that is accurate too. Do you have any other idea then?]

"I don't know, I'm not able to think anything here which could work in our favor."

Artemis dodged one last blow which caused the dent in the wall, when Jeremy thought of an idea.

"Hey buddy, is it possible that I can collect this beast in one of my gadgets?"

Artemis sneaked a few moments and went to the bathroom, when he shut the door behind him and it took a few moments for the beast to pass through the cracks.

[I think so, it should be possible. But what gadgets are you talking about?]

Artemis operated his system which he had on the earth, and took out a small blue bead. It was an energy bubble the cops and detectives used to catch the culprit, by throwing at him or her.

As soon as the snake had finally started to formulate in the bathroom, Artemis opened the door and immediately ran out.

"Let's beat your ass! This should work."

The snake charged at him in rage with his swirling body, when Artemis threw the bead at him. And closed his eyes as he fell on the floor in case the snake might injure him if his plan failed.

The room became quiet and Artemis snapped open his eyes, the bead had grown into a bubble while it has engulfed the snake.

'Hah...haha! It worked."

Artemis burst out in laughter as he saw the bead shrinking back to its previous size. The snake trapped into it also decreased in the size.

'Wait, that's not how it's supposed to be. There was not any shrinking feature."

He swiped the screen to see if there was any such feature, and to his surprise a few items in his stock had undergone an upgrade. It happened because of his 'healing' process he had applied on Axela.

"Whoa! This shit is really nice."