Unfortunately, barely keeping her alive just isn't going to be good enough for the kind of opponent she is currently facing as it is very easy for her condition to shift to barely alive very soon.
He was stronger than her, faster than her, and could bypass her defenses. She was all but doomed.
He could already defeat her without his new ability. It would just have taken a long time, and it would certainly draw attention. If Purple Cloud and the other gang members had interfered, he would experience a defeat that might end in his death.
But things are different now. Purple Cloud is no more. What is left of her gang are some that barely survived the raid from the Justice League. So they were at their lowest, and he was taking advantage of them.
It didn't look like that, though. It looked like the opposite. Someone new to the scene would think they were the ones bullying him because every member of the gang had literally ganged up on him.
