The next moment he was above the Seraphim. Time slowed to a crawl in Adam's perception; barely a thought was needed to perform an action, he was moving as long as the thought of it was registered. Although he had to individually control each action down to what muscles of the body were to perform it, that was actually quite the simplest issue as he could process that information in no time at all.
Molding his telekinesis, he formed it into a spear, invisible but bustling with immense power, its sheer presence distorting the very space around its length. Then he stabbed it at the Seraphim from above.
Boom
The Seraphim was struck deep into the ground; the earth beneath it seemed like mud as it sank into the ground uncontrollably.
Exiting thought speed, Adam lightly panted; the burden that state caused to him was huge. He could not maintain it for longer than three minutes at a go despite the Ethroine's blood boosting his physical body. So he made sure to break the time he spent in that state.
He roamed his gaze across the last known location of his foe. He didn't have to wait for long though as the crater shattered and the Seraphim came out with wings outstretched, fury in its eye. Its eyes released a twin beam of searing heat, burning Adam's last location as he had entered Thought speed again. As he scrutinized his foe with his psychic senses, he noticed that his attack merely only made a tiny puncture wound on the Seraphim's forehead. Barely a minor wound. The next thirty seconds had him evading and counter-attacking with his spear. Multiple puncture wounds dotting the golden chrome skin of the high Seraph.
Exhaustion filled Adam's limbs, but he carried on; he was delaying for time. Realizing the fruitlessness of it's attack pattern, the high Seraph switched up its tactic. It hung midair, wings outstretched, palms cupped together. Heat and light filtered out of its cupped palms, then it expanded into a miniature sun, barely the size of a chicken egg. It floated out of the Seraph's palm, growing bigger as it floated upward. Then more joined it; all birthed from the high Seraph's palm, hot and angry, they gradually grew. Seven in total, they grew up until peaking at the size of a basketball.
Adam watched this process, marveling at the fusion reaction taking place with rapt attention, with his boosted psychic senses, he saw, felt, and grasped the concept behind the Seraph's mini suns. It was pure fusion. He had just birthed a sun in his palms, and even more were joining the first one. Until the first of the suns shot at him, he didn't stir. But when he noticed the inevitable collision, he smiled. Upon collision, it would turn into a supernova because of the instability purposefully designed into it.
He would have no chance to evade beforehand because of the immense gravity exuded by the zooming solar ball. The gravity twisted at the space in its surroundings, locking it down. This was the might of a half-mythical being. But Adam was never planning on an evasion; he smiled crazily, then gently as if plucking an apple, he pinched the sun. Since manifesting his abilities, he had never gestured when using it. And the most important focus to different types of power was gestures; it always narrows down the use of a particular ability to a desired result. He had never gestured even when he had to make do with the Psi bridge. He made it a practice not to depend on a crutch, even if it was his body. But now he did.
The sun paused midair suddenly, disregarding momentum. His consciousness brushed past a link that controls the sun's structure and its activity, a link that traced back to the Seraphim; he severed it and took the sun for himself, then it shrunk in on itself, turning blue like a neutron star and collapsing some more until it was button-sized. Then he activated Thought speed. In less than a microsecond, he was before the shrunken sun. Grabbing it, the hot star reshaped itself into a thin rapier. He dumped every iota of his telekinesis into the weapon of light and heat. His palm was cooked from the intense heat, despite the amount of barriers between his palm and the rapier. But it didn't char off. All in an instant, he was upon the high Seraph, surprised for having its ability wrestled forcefully from its control, shock was frozen on its face. But he had the mind to bring the other suns in a circle around it. It planned on detonating the stars around it. An effective defense and a more effective offense. Their kind are almost immune to the heat and light of stars. But it was still too late.
The rapier crushed space along its length; telekinetic force mixed with fusion energy had combined in an unpredictable way.
Without an ounce of hesitation, he drove the rapier into its chrome skull; its face evaporated due to the passage of the rapier, the Seraph's head disappeared in motes of vicious heat, most of its torso following suit. One of the suns encircling it crumbled, the high Seraph appearing in its place, its golden skin faded and cracked. Then he was again punctured through the chest with a thin white rapier. Melted slag fell down to the earth. Again, another sun disappeared and the same situation occurred again. Adam was stretched to his limit at this point.
The Seraph had a way of reviving itself with its created stars. He didn't go for the stars themselves, fearing a supernova. But he was able to detect disturbances in the energy of the stars themselves, effectively knowing where the Seraph would birth itself. The last sun crumbled, then the Seraph appeared, wings torn in multiple ways, its skull cracked in a not-thin line diagonally. The green flames of its eyes threatened to flicker out any second.
Adam wasn't faring better; his skin was burnt badly, his hair mostly burnt, and a single foot was spared the charring by the heat. The energy coursing through his body was too much; only a strength of will allowed him to continue his assault. But he refused to let go of the rapier; they were not yet out of trouble. The fight had barely been on for two minutes after all. Pop. The last incarnation of the Seraphim shared the fate of its predecessors without preamble.
Adam was still holding unto the rapier midair. His body was failing. He cast his psychic senses to the direction of the darkness imprisoning the desolate fiend. His physical one unable to cross the distance. Adam's battle with the Seraphim had taken them quite a distance away from plain 'Tumult'. The fiend was already escaping it's prison, three of its bony arms gripping the thick darkness, using it to pull itself out. He felt dread at this point. Only a little bit of time and they would be out of here. Time which might not be if it escaped its confines. A mass of shadow coalesced beside him, then Ikar tumbled out. Still in his giant form, his eyes sagged, full of exhaustion. The mystery had taken a lot out of him. His earlier bright golden hair had lost their parlor; they were dim now. His eyes now a full golden color and the halo above him was flickering on and off. They both turned to regard each other.
"I have one last move. I cannot use it, but you can. But I doubt your body can take it, my friend," Ikar said as his eyes inspected the rapier Adam had in his grasp. This thing had felled a high Seraph.
Ikar continued, "I can increase the might of your weapon by fifty times its current strength, but the effect will only last for a second."
"But I doubt anything can be achieved in just a second,"
"Do it then," Adam smiled wearily. "I'll be needing less than that."
Nodding his giant head, Ikar grabbed the flickering tentacled halo above him. It shrank, taking on a physical form. His hair turned gray at the roots, his body shrinking back to its initial state before he ingested the Ethroine's blood.
"Aolo," he spoke, pressing the physical halo onto the surface of the white rapier. Like water, it flowed into the rapier in a thin stream of gold, the proximity scorching Ikar's palm badly. He reflexively backed away, wary of the weapon's destructive capability, by just being close to it, his eyes analyzing Adam. How he was still in one piece was a wonder to him.
As the last of the halo flowed into the rapier, the weapon cooled down, turning from its glowing state to that of an ordinary bronze rapier. But Adam knew better; the sheer pressure of the new form of the weapon cracked the ground around him in concentric circles.
Just then, the desolate fiend escaped from its prison, its eyes burning eerily green with only its left foot still trapped inside the dark enclosure.
"Impressive," it clattered, it's voice laced with annoyance.
"This game ends now." It's focus was on Ikar.
The Torum brat had managed to amuse it, having succeeded quite beautifully. This would earn him a place as a living undead.
"But where is the other one?" It wondered, as Adam was nowhere to be found.
Thought speed
Out of nowhere, the rapier struck the desolate in the chest. Like a contained supernova, it exploded on impact. Shock, rage, and disbelief radiated from the fiend as it was blasted over the horizon in a supersonic boom, its passage like a glorious sunset illuminating the darkness of plain 'Tumult' for an instant before vanishing.
Adam's right arm was broken off and shattered like burnt coal; he crumpled to the ground like a leaf in autumn, close to death, only his will to live keeping him tethered to life.
A minute later, every single member of the caravan, including Adam's battered body, disappeared unceremoniously from plain 'Tumult'.
Another minute passed, and a rage-filled roar echoed across the entirety of the plain.
"Pestssssss," it roared, the whole plain sinking five inches as a massive pressure descended. Its quarry was lost. A single drop of green ichor fell onto the ground.