User blog:Seieireppa/God Eater:Universitas, chapter 46: No Other Choice, part 2

At once, the three of them sprang into action.

Lyrr fired off two rounds in quick succession, but Sigma blocked them effortlessly with his shield, the bullets stopping dead in their tracks the instant they came into contact with the spatial distortion that protected Sigma in front.

In that instant, however, Blake and Jack leapt at Sigma from either side, brandishing their God Arcs as if to sever Sigma in half in a scissor-like motion. However, Sigma was ready for them, and just before they struck, he activated his time erasure, moving out of the way of the trajectory of their blades—

—only to be met with a third bullet, which just barely grazed his cheek. As the time erasure ended and the blood dripped down his face, there stood Lyrr, gun trained on Sigma’s current location.

“That was pretty good,” muttered Sigma, wiping away the trail of blood with the back of his hand. “How’d you accomplish that? You can’t… perceive me, can you?”

“Simple, really,” came Lyrr’s reply. “You’re right, I can’t perceive you during the erased time, but when taking into account the locations of Blake and Jack and the positioning of their God Arcs at the moment of their attack, all I had to do was aim where you would be in five seconds and pull the trigger… very, very slowly.”

Sigma grinned. Finally, someone smart enough to give him trouble.

“By the way…” Lyrr continued. “Are you sure it’s wise to be talking like this?”

In that instant, Sigma leapt backwards, right as a hail of bullets bombarded him from above and Blake slashed at him from the front, from just outside his sphere of awareness.

“I see,” exclaimed Sigma. “You distracted me while the other two got into position… you truly do have a mind for strate—”

Sigma’s words were interrupted once more as Lyrr, faster than the eye could see, fired another bullet directly at Sigma, once more grazing the side of his face.

“How…?!” was all Sigma could say. Was he truly being driven into a corner?

“I’ve heard from the others,” stated Lyrr plainly. “You yourself probably don’t even know this, since you’ve never encountered a situation where it would even apply, but you apparently have a limit to the number of times you can use time erasure within a given period of time. I don’t know how long it takes to ‘recharge’… but at any rate, it would appear your trump card has been sealed for now.”

Sigma greeted Lyrr’s words with a swift forward charge, followed instantly by a change of direction, Sigma dodging backwards once more as two simultaneous volleys of bullets assailed him from the sides. Blake and Jack were there, God Arcs still smoking as they prepared for further assault.

“Additionally,” continued Lyrr, “it would appear that overuse of your Horizon powers strains your concentrative abilities. Having deployed that shield and used time erasure in so short an interval like that, I’d reckon that your reaction time is mostly shot right now. All we need to do is keep up the attack and you’ll fall before too long.”

Sigma grinned once more. He was the most powerful person… no, the most powerful existence he knew of, but never before had he fought someone or something as smart and clever as Lyrr. This man… he truly had a mind for strategy, a superlative analytic ability capable of grasping an opponent’s shortcomings with minimal effort.

“You really are good,” spoke Sigma, “but have you forgotten?”

With those words, Sigma drew his God Arc, forming an impossibly sharp blade from his hand.

“I’ve got another weapon besides my Horizon powers,” Sigma continued, blocking two more shots from Blake and Jack with deft swings of his blade, “and with this, I won’t need to use my Horizon powers at all to kill you!”

Lyrr thought for a moment, albeit a very brief one. True… Sigma’s weapons didn’t consist solely of his Horizon powers. He was still mostly Aragami, and his augmented physical capabilities combined with his battle experience were enough to make him a formidable threat on his own…

Still, there was no way they could fall here. Readying his God Arc, Lyrr steeled himself—

—and fired.

“Hmph,” exclaimed Sigma, deflecting the bullet without a second thought. “Did you really think something so simple could—”

But then, a metallic clang, and a second bullet found its home in Sigma’s shoulder.

“What…?!” shouted Sigma, turning towards the source of the sound to find Jack standing there, blade-form God Arc in hand as he displayed a fierce grin.

“You…” Sigma began. “You deflected the bullet… back at me?”

“Bingo,” came Lyrr’s reply. “I knew you’d deflect whatever I fired at you, so all I needed to do was count on that and take Blake’s and Jack’s positioning into account. With that… it was child’s play to manipulate you into getting hit by a simple ricochet.”

Sigma grinned once more, the wound in his shoulder healing almost instantly due to Sigma’s Oracle cells as the bullet was spat out.

“Oh, see, I counted on that, too…” Lyrr continued, at the instant Blake and Jack both fired bullets of their own at Sigma, who dodged out of the way.

“…so I took the liberty of reading ahead a bit. Hope you don’t mind.”

In that instant, Lyrr and Blake shifted their God Arcs to their blade forms—

—and before Sigma could react, two more bullets found their marks, one in Sigma’s arm and the other in his side.

Sigma was truly being pushed into a corner… he needed to end it, and quickly.

“Lyrr,” Sigma began, “you might be good at reading people… but so am I.  And what I know is that your reaction times aren’t nearly as good as mine at full strength… and so you won’t be able to avoid this!”

As Sigma spoke those words, he dashed towards Lyrr and lashed out with his God Arc.  The latter merely dodged backwards—

—only to be met with a second blade that came at him from an impossible angle, meeting his neck as he moved.

“Wha…t…?” sputtered Lyrr, as the blade severed through his neck. “How……?”

The instant before his consciousness faded, he saw the answer—from the ground immediately at Lyrr’s feet, a second arm had sprouted, tipped with a blade much like Sigma’s own.

“You… dug your Oracle cells… through the groun…d……”

And with that, Lyrr breathed his last, collapsing to the ground as his life spilled away.

“One down… finally,” Sigma exclaimed, wiping the sweat from his brow with a sigh as he turned to face Blake and Jack. “Now, with him out of the way, the two of you should be child’s play to…”

“Oh?” interjected Jack. “Is that truly so? Because I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”

And as Sigma noticed the telltale flickering of blue flames from behind him…

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