Leon wasted no time at all slugging monstra with his susanoo causing it to recoil away from the city. this interrupted the stream of essence coming out of it effectively cutting off the the grim hordes reinforcements and letting atlas make headway into repelling the attack. salem was left with a very big dilemma from inside monstra with her few subordinates that were there. on one hand she didn't want to clash with leon if she could help it but on the other she REALLY wanted atlas to be destroyed. in the end she had to grit her teeth and send cinder out to hold leon off as she pushed monstra's production ability to it's limit.
Cinder was very different than she was originally meant to be with a mask covering her whole face with both her left arm and leg having been replaced with grim parts. cinder had always held a deep hatred for leon after his sneak attack on beacon that left her half dead and nearly cripple and horribly scarred on her face. she wanted to make him suffer ever since however salem forbid her from implementing any of her plans , but it was different now she could exact her vengeance at last.
Leon was about to attack monstra again when a person flew out of it's side covered in deep red flames that struck the susanoo forcing it back. he was beyond surprised by this turn of events since until now he thought that he was the strongest person on the planet and yet her was someone who hit just as hard. susanoo wasn't considered the ultimate defense for nothing however as even that fairly powerful attack only succeeded in pushing it back a bit. leon pushed his eyes a little harder causing a massive energy spear to appear in his susanoo's right hand that he immediately tried to swat the person out of the sky with.
This attack also killed a fair number of grim as well but leon couldn't care less about that as he was fully focused on this new power that had revealed itself. leon could see the mix of two colors within this person similar to qrow but many many times stronger which he found unfortunate since it meant this power was not an innate one for them. still he felt his blood boil at finally having a real challenger as he watched the person dodge his attack and launch one of their own at him.
Leon back handed the huge fiery spear and followed with a spinning slash with the spear obviously catching the person off guard since they had to hastily dodge in an ungraceful manner. cinder was extremely unhappy with how this situation was going as she had to cheat to get the power of a maiden while leon seemed to match and even suppress her. even worse is she knew without any doubt that he wasn't even going all out since the weird silver-black flames he was known for were nowhere to be seen.
Cinder knew she needed to go all out even though it would cause her to be exhausted later since the maiden power was extremely taxing on the body. leon was confused why the person seemed to hesitate after dodging his attack but when he saw the massive cloud of fire erupt from them he chalked it up to the person not wanting to go all out much like himself. he activated his second mangekyou ability kami keshin and condensed his susanoo over his body and shot forward through the flames.
Even with his current defenses leon could feel the heat coming off the flames as he rammed through them in an attempt to catch this person off guard. he succeeded too as cinder had forgotten a lesson salem had taught her about large scale attacks like this blocking your vision. to be fair though she never imagined someone would be crazy enough to dive through her attack to get at her but then again leon was always an anomaly. cinders eyes widened in horror when leon appeared in front of her from the flames with his right arm cocked back for a strong punch.
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