"Are we going to die??"
"Looks like it."
"SHIT, MAN!!"
"I DON'T WANNA FUCKING DIE!!!"
"FUUUCKK!!!"
All the personnel outside the Ice Sheet are visibly panicking. As will anyone in that situation. It was like the prologue to the end of the world, two monsters aiming their country-wiping attacks at each other.
Sebastian is still molding the sphere. This is as far as he's ever gotten with this technique. Back in the training room, he was only able to get it as big as a baseball until it spiraled out of control and dispersed.
Crowe is laughing nonstop out of joy and excitement. He was expecting to see something new from the agent, but he wasn't expecting something of this scale.
He didn't have an exact way to measure just how strong Sebastian's potential attack will be, but he knew that it will level the entire area, including the Ice Sheet facility. He can tell just by the distortion it was creating in the space around it. It was the sign of an incredibly large amount of compressed and concentrated void energy. Not even his monster could unleash manipulate and unleash such levels of void energy.
Their standoff continues, both parties still channeling their respective shots.
"Shit"
Sebastian's concentrated void sphere collapses, dispersing into the wind.
"Fuck!" he exclaims.
The Ice Sheet, mission control, Crowe, everyone was surprised. Sebastian's sphere disappears and he is left just standing in the distorted sky.
"Fuck! Fuck! Fucking fuck!!!" he is still unable to perform the technique he has been practicing.
Crowe bursts into laughter again, this time, because he genuinely found what just happened hilarious. Even so, he was still content with what he had witnessed. The agent already had a start, it was just a matter of polishing it.
This only solidified his belief on the agent even more. He was already sold on him, but even more so now.
"It is you, Agent Isaac. YOU are the weapon that I need."
"S-sir!!" a personnel from mission control calls on to Benedict.
"The concentration of void energy from Agent Isaac has disappeared!"
"Looks like it," says Benedict, watching the events unfold.
"God fucking damn it!!!" Sebastian has already spent a considerable amount of both time and energy.
He only has about 25% left on his reserve, 10 of this would be spent on cloaking alone. Trying it out again is completely out of the picture.
Meanwhile, the monster who is channeling probably its strongest attack out of panic is still charging up an attack.
"AARGGHH"
SHHOOM
He warps right in front of the monster, placing both of his palms right inside its large cavity.
The monster was in a daze. Sensing such an amount of concentrated void energy essentially put it into a panic. It was fearing for its own life and its instinct was to try to blast away the threat.
It was only able to snap back into reality when the threat disappeared from the sky as well as the massive concentration of void energy. But it was too late.
BOOM
The monster is blown from the inside. Even if it did survive, there wouldn't be much of it left. A point-blank explosion with both hands and right inside its body. It's as deadly as deadly gets.
SHHOOM
He warps away from the cloud of smoke, not grabbing his swords. He was certain that the monster is finished.
The smoke hasn't dissipated yet, but he hears movement from inside it.
"Okay, you're REALLY starting to piss me off now," he says, grabbing his swords.
Coming out of the cloud is the monster, the entire right side of its body blown off and is just crawling on the snow with its left hand.
All that remains of the hulking monster from before is its head and the left side of its torso. Both of its legs are blown of and what remained of its left limb had severe burn wounds.
Despite this, the persistent monster is still crawling towards him.
SHHOOM
He teleports right behind it, impaling its head to the ground. He proceeds to slice off its last limb. The monster no longer had any gimmicks of any sort. No barrier, no lasers. It was probably focusing all of its energy into sustaining its life.
He flips the maimed monster around and impales it on the chest, pinning it on the floor of ice.
"Now, let's see what you're made of."
"Sir! There is a void energy resurgence north east of the Ice Sheet facility!" one of the mission control personnel reports.
"Crowe!" Benedict mutters.
"Agent Isaac took off his earpiece, there is no way of informing him, sir!"
"Shit! That idiot!"
"Ah, you can have Number 3. It has fulfilled its purpose," says Crowe, one step away from his portal.
"We shall meet again, Agent Isaac," the culprit behind the incident disappears inside the Void.
"The energy signature has disappeared, Sir!"
"He's probably going to retrieve the monster again," says Benedict.
Sebastian looks around first, waiting for the doctor as well. He figured Crowe would want his toy's remains back like last time and is anticipating his arrival.
He looks to his left, right, front, and back. No sign of Crowe and his portal. He looks down at the monster, seemingly still alive, stabs it again just for good measure, then looks around again.
"Where are you, you piece of shit," he mutters.
The doctor is still nowhere in sight.
"Don't you want your broken toy back?"
He reaches into his ear to try to ask HQ for any information but remembers that he threw his earpiece away during the fight.
"Oh, right," an awkward smile.
He looks around one last time before proceeding to mutilate the monster and taking a peek at its insides.
The Ice Sheet personnel look over in confusion as they witness the victor dig in on his opponents' remains.
"Is he... dissecting... that thing??"
"That man is crazy."
"Crazy? He's fucking sick."
"No wonder he was that good. That guy is a psychopath."
The eyewitnesses all exchange comments of disgust and disapproval.
He rips open what's left of the monster's torso, making several cuts, trying to guess where its pumping machine is.
After the third cut, he finds what looks like a glowing chunk of unknown flesh about two or three inches smaller than an American football, covered with a long series of strings and webs of what looked like veins and arteries that all went different ways inside its torso. Pale gray and covered in several black spots, it also had what looked like a small, stitch pattern somewhere in the middle.
It didn't have a specific shape. It looks conical but it has several folds and bumps in all angles. It was just a random, chunk of flesh.
"Huh. You have a heart?" he says before cutting the mass of flesh and taking it in his palm.
The monster stops struggling. Its battery is taken out.
The black glow that the chunk of flesh was emanating before starts fading away as well. It was no longer connected to anything and has ceased its power distribution.
He cuts open the mass of flesh with one, clean and steady cut, like a chef slicing open a fish. Leftover black mist leaks out as he makes the cut.
The flesh's exterior is somewhat thick, but its inside is completely hollow. Its walls are painted black, probably due to the amount of void essence consistently pumping inside it.
Right in the middle, equally converted in webs of fleshy strings is a shining, black gem, about two and a half inches in length and an inch in width — a void fragment. This is the first time he has ever seen a fragment before, either ancient or void.
It wasn't "large" by the definition of the word, but by fragment standards, it was much bigger than usual. For comparison, a fragment imbued on the Transcended is only a couple of centimeters large. His previous theory is correct, Crowe DID imbue the monster with a large fragment which explains its ridiculous reserve.
He didn't mess with the fragment any further. He was content with confirming his assumption and seeing it with his own two eyes.
Still, he wasn't going to put it back inside the corpse and leave it there. He knows that the fragment is what Crowe values, not the actual monster itself. If Crowe were to make a buzzer-beating arrival, he would need to pry it from his cold, dead hands.
He looks around again, one last time, just to make sure before departing.
"No show this time, huh?" he mutters.
SHHOOM
He shows up right in front of the Ice Sheet facility, monster heart in his hand. Everyone is startled and a little on edge. Most of them were a little frightened and anxious about the agent now after what they had just witnessed.
"Any of you have contact with Circle HQ?" he exclaims, his query directed to everyone.
No one is answering and are just looking at one another, also waiting for an answer from themselves.
"Or anyone at all from Circle?"
Still no answer.
"God, you guys are useless."
SHHOOM
He disappears, warping to HQ to inform them himself.
SHHOOM
He appears right in the middle of the mission control room, the monster's fragment-imbued heart still in his grasp.
Everyone personnel in the room turns to him all at the same time, Benedict included.
"Yo," he greets.
"I got a present for you."