There was not much to talk about after this. Yoshikov knew who his opponent was and what he was capable of. Unlike earlier where Tarkov couldn't utilize his mecha to the full extent. The current Tarkov was different.
He was stronger, faster, and more toxic.
"I truly couldn't escape."
Girisia ran. His speed was fast and the woman he was pursuing, was completely defenseless. He didn't have any support from Yoshikov left and he was just a lamb to be slaughtered by Girisia.
But unlike all the previous times, Girisia didn't become overconfident. He had suffered a lot and these painful lessons have been ingrained in his body.
Dodging the incoming projectiles and even bombs that were thrown at him, Girisia, taking a tree as leverage, lunged at the figure who was trying to run.
*Bang
And in this lunge, he was hit for the first time. A hit that only left some scratched marks on his body. This was not a sniper bullet and more of these bullets showered at Girisia in an attempt to slow him down, by the mech pilot.
She wanted to live, she wanted to escape from this place at this moment. She knew that Yoshikov was done for. He hadn't given any new orders since the last time he uttered "Alwa" on his comms.
So it was up to her to survive here, though the main reason she wanted to escape was her fear of death.
But all her attempts at slowing down Girisia failed. He chose only to dodge when she shot at him with a sniper and other times, he faced the bullet with a wide grin.
And before long, Girisia was upon her.
"NO!… I don't want to die." She cried, making Girisia flinch.
A pause gave her a chance to maintain some more distance as she shot at Girisia's head with a sniper. Which he easily dodges.
'This is not the time for that." Girisia ignored her pleas. He knew that a battlefield was not a place to show mercy and he had already killed and even eaten her partners before. Killing one more will not be hard.
"Please, just let me go… I won't come back." She pleaded. Her cries fell into Girisia's deaf ears.
It would be a lie to say he wasn't affected by her cries as he would have caught the woman by now and killed her.
'Can't be this weak… she had to die.' WIthout breaking a sweat, Girisia shortened the distance with another lunge. And this time he didn't pause.
He can hear her cries, he can feel the dread she may be feeling. But this was something he had to do. Using his jaw, the only thing capable of ripping off the armor of a mech, Girisia started to break apart the helmet of the mech piece by piece while he held all her limbs with his tentacles.
With another bite, he broke open the shell of the armor and saw the face of his victim.
It was a woman, who seemed to be in her mid-thirties. Her looks were average and her hair short. There was nothing that stood out about her besides the emotionless face.
'Wait a minute.' Girisia sensed it, his danger discernment kicked in once again. But due to his tentacles coiling around the woman, he was not able to get away in time as a total of five sniper bullets were shot directly from her body, one of which was shot at Girisia's head.
She had used her whole mecha as a gun. Hiding bullets in all parts of her mech and blasting them all at once.
The impact of this kind could destroy her mecha and leave her defenseless. But it was better than dying anyway.
And it worked too. Her previous cries were a ploy, she wanted to be caught. She had already seen what became of her companion before and she won't repeat the same mistakes.
Her calculations were perfect, her method flawless, and if it was someone else in Girisia's place. They would have already died.
But Girisia was different and special. Ignoring the bullets that were aimed at his heart and other parts of his body. Girisia focused on one thing only. Saving his brain.
So the moment he felt the bullet that targeted his face. Girisia twisted his head to the back as the bullet entered through his chin, then traveled through his jaw, then the nose, and then left from his forehead.
His whole frontal face was brutalized in the wake of the bullet, his heart was shattered and most of his organs were completely ruined by the sniper bullets.
It was all over. She had ended the life of the beast that had trapped and killed most of her companions on his own.
At such close quarters, her bullets have destroyed all the organs of the opponent, including blowing off half his face. Now it was her time to take off her scrapped mecha and leave this place before Tarkov arrived at the scene.
Then she can just go directly to Utena and speak of all the things that happened here. What happened after, she didn't care as she escaped out alive from this trap.
Or that's what she thought.
<...>
[Cost: 150 biomass]
Health: 5… 16… 12….36… 35… 59…
The moment Girisia's face was blown up, he sent the order. An order that saved his life.
Before she had the chance to relish in her victory, she saw it. Girisia's head, which was blown off and now raining blood on her face, started to recover.
And to her horror, the grips on her mecha had not loosened up even now meaning she can't escape what was coming her way.
She also saw how the blown-up face of Girisia slowly reconstructed. From his bones that grew small hexagonal structures and layering on itself like bricks to her muscles as they started to cover the newly grown bones on his face, then came the muscles.
This was not slow, the regeneration happened in front of her eyes at a fast pace.
"No! This is impossible." She screamed for real this time. The thing happening in front of her was completely unheard of, regeneration of this level is impossible to be in the hand of a grade two mutant.
"Nothing… impossible… anymore…!" Girisia said in a broken voice as he without remorse bit the woman's face off and then spit off her skin to the side as she kept crying.
She was not dead yet and Girisia was not going to make her death easy.
"Shit, Uncle is pretty brutal when he wants to," Tara recalled how this uncle of hers had left her for death all those days ago. He hasn't changed one bit to some extent.
*****
The swords clashed with tentacles, the diversion tactics that Yoshikov had used until now were completely useless in front of pure strength. His tentacles were cut with a single swing of Tarkov's magnetic swords, his android helper was barely able to hold back the impacts of Tarkov's chain sword and he was always pushed back by Tarkov's shoulder cannons.
He was completely suppressed; the only way to win was to tire Tarkov out. He had fought Tarkov's kind before, so he knew how long Tarkov could keep up with this awakened form of his. All he needs to do is do a battle of attrition and wait for Tarkov to burn out.
But it seemed, the fate was not on his side, as Girisia, sprinting like a dog, entered the battlefield
"Attack me with all the explosives you have, Tarkov!" Girisia shouted, completely in control. He couldn't take part in the current battle without the support of Buloid tumors.
'Shit!' Yoshikov knew Girisia's ability and had wanted to stop Tarkov. But he was too weak and Tarkov gladly relented to this request.
Girisia took all the bombs that came at him and charge up the new tumors that grew after his recent 'resurrection'. His bones were stronger and denser from before too, so he was not easily thrown off.
But he noticed a slight problem with these bombs, there was radiation poisoning attached to them.
He can feel like the power of entropy was absorbed by his body along with an explosive one. The cells in his body started to die out too. 'Fucking tool!' Though a bit annoyed by this discovery, he was not that scared of it. His high vitality and base recovery speed were able to keep up with the current radiation poisoning in his body.
"Let's end it." Girisia lunged once again. His target was the android that kept acting like a fly to Tarkov.
And same was true for Tarkov, he too attacked the android while he used his magnetic swords to keep Yoshikov at bay.
Girisia threw a tumor with his tail at the metal tentacles that tried to stop him mid-way. He easily jumped above them as the explosion took care of the tentacles and then threw more of his tumors from a height to distract the android.
It worked, Tarkov who was sliding across the battlefield closed in on the android, and used his chain sword to stab at its head. An attack that barely deflected the android.
"Not so fast…" Javelins flew through the air attacking both Tarkov and Girisia. It was Yoshikov's offense to save his android. But it was not enough.
Tarkov completely ignored the javelins, his armor was strong enough and Girisia easily dodged them with his high agility and superhuman senses.
This was a scene Yoshikov expected, his attack was just to give some breathing room for the android, which he succeeded.
But things didn't go as he wanted them to go, Girisia was a lot more agile than Yoshikov expected. He timed his fall directly over the body of the android. Landing on its shoulder from above, causing the android to flinch and fall under the weight of Girisia.
There was no need to delay. He let himself be devoured by the tentacles that the android used in its defense, leaving it completely defenseless against Tarkov's attack.
*Boom
As Tarkov stabbed at the head of the android again. So did Yoshikov shot a total of three javelins in the direction of Girisia. Aimed at all the possible places Girisia can move his head.
An eye for an eye is what Yoshikov was aiming for.
Tarkov's sword, dancing with high radiation and flames stabbed at the head of the android that had fallen to the ground. He had sensed the javelins that came Girisia's way, but it was too late to do anything. He can only look at Girisia's calm face being completely bound under the metallic tentacles as the javelin came toward his head.
Girisia neither panicked nor moved. He just gave assurance to Tarkov to not worry as the javelin met the left side of his skull.
And then nothing happened. Tarkov's chain sword easily cut into the android's shell and destroyed its autonomy and the javelin on Girisia's head also didn't penetrate, instead, it seemed to have been deflected and flew to a different angle.
Leaving Girisia with a large gash on his head exposing the bones under it that seemed to be barely scraped under the impact of the javelin.
"Get fucked!" A blast from where Girisia stood. He had detonated some of the Buloid tumors on his back, destroying the tentacles that were still under the control of Yoshikov.
"How did you… No, I don't wanna know." Tarkov was surprised by the resilience Girisia has shown till now. He alone was responsible for the death of most of their targets.
And to this, Girisia just grimaced. The things he had gone through in this battle. Only he knew.
Then he turned his head to Tarkov and said, "Remember the promise. Don't kill him completely."
"Don't worry about it, I don't want his death to come too early."