NOVEL NEXT 127. Instruments of Judgment
Ashley's face twisted through a kaleidoscope of emotions—disgust, frustration, rage—all bleeding together into something ugly and raw. The air around her shimmered like heat rising from scorched pavement as she descended into a full-blown tantrum. "What ARE you?! You keep violating everything we understand about reality itself!"
Her rage reached critical mass, voice climbing to a shriek. "I'll tell you exactly what you are—a freak! A FREAK OF NATURE!"
Angelo looked away, eyes closing as his hands slid into his pockets. Like her words had struck something vulnerable.
Ashley wasn't buying it. Her eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. "What are you scheming?"
Something about him radiated danger now—a predator's stillness before the strike.
Her head snapped toward Neiva when the girl opened her mouth.
"You said the F word." Neiva's voice came flat, matter-of-fact.
"Ooh, the F word," Red echoed internally, practically vibrating with anticipation.
Trinergy began materializing on both sides of Angelo. His eyes opened, expression absolutely lethal. "You shouldn't have said that."
His eyes widened slightly. The Trinergy coalesced, taking shape—gigantic armored arms building from shoulder-height upward, growing larger with each passing second.
Ashley panicked. She launched into flight, circled around him, and fired a plasma beam at his exposed back.
Angelo made the half-formed arm move. The hand finished materializing just in time to intercept her attack. He himself didn't budge an inch. Hands still in pockets. Didn't even look at her—just kept staring straight ahead like she wasn't worth the effort of turning his head.
The other arm slammed its completed palm into the ground, raising a massive dust cloud that rolled across the clearing.
The two gigantic arms flexed their fingers as they towered over Angelo from either side. He stood perfectly still between them, a statue framed by instruments of destruction. "Witness the instruments of your demise. The Angel's Silver Hands."
One massive palm opened. Energy began building within it, coalescing into an enormous Trinergy scythe that reflected moonlight like captured starlight.
Ashley's teeth clenched. Her fists balled. Her aura flickered violently around her form. "Your parlor tricks don't scare me! Whatever this is, there's no way you've bridged the power gap! Unless it's Enlightened Mode, there's no possible way!"
Angelo turned his head lazily toward her. Their eyes locked. "Want to kill me? Avenge your precious master?"
His voice dropped into something ominous, mocking. "Then come and get me."
Ashley let out a wail of pure frustration before rocketing straight at him, the air around her palms twisting with building plasma. Angelo looked away again, attention returning forward as if she'd already ceased to matter.
The gauntlet punched precisely where Ashley was heading.
She stopped dead, pivoting upward and around him in a wide arc. She launched a plasma beam from above—
The scythe intercepted, blocking and bisecting the attack before it could touch Angelo.
"Astonishing..." Blue's voice came strained through their mental link. "In... this... form... you can... control Trinergy... independently!"
Angelo sighed. "Save it, Blue. I need you focused on maintaining your energy flow."
The pattern repeated. Ashley flew around him in increasingly desperate patterns, searching for any opening. Those massive arms kept blocking her path. That scythe kept trying to cleave her in half.
"ENOUGH!"
Her aura flared violently around her. "I'm ending this! Right now!"
She began flying in seemingly random directions, bouncing across the clearing like a pinball. She transformed into an orange streak circling Angelo like an aggressive electron orbiting its nucleus.
The arms stopped moving completely. No way to track something that fast.
Angelo, however, continued staring straight ahead. Hands unmoved from his pockets. Expression approaching boredom.
Ashley began firing stray shots at the ground as she moved, kicking up a massive dust cloud that swallowed Angelo completely. Those gauntlets, though—their glow and immense size made their outlines painfully obvious even through the obscuring haze.
Neiva bit her lip. Ashley's strategy was transparent. Question was: could she land the hit? And if she did, would Angelo survive?
What neither woman noticed were the energy particles Angelo had begun releasing, completely hidden by the dust cloud.
When Ashley felt she'd found an opening, she finally committed. She pushed far beyond her normal limits—her speed nearly doubling as she shot past Angelo's gauntlets, palm wreathed in plasma reaching out to strike.
"DIE!"
She froze in horror.
A Trinergy barrier materialized between her attack and Angelo, who was still looking straight ahead, completely unbothered by the ray of death mere feet from his face.
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"H-how—"
A gauntlet punched her away. She landed hard across the clearing, rolling through dirt and debris.
Dazed, she scrambled upright as footsteps approached. Angelo walked toward her casually, his silver eyes burning into her soul with absolute certainty.
"Time's up." His voice carried the same cold temperature as when he faced common criminals in Novaria's streets—when the scales tipped heavily in his favor. "Judgment is rendered."
"Just... get it over with."
Angelo studied her for a long moment. "Before that, one question."
"What could you possibly want?"
The free gauntleted arm extended, finger pointing at her head. "Your hair. Is your last name Sleeser?"
"Sleeser?" Neiva whispered in confusion.
Ashley let out a cruel laugh. "Why? Looking for a servant?" Venom dripped from every word. "I'd die before I lift a finger for you."
"Very well." Angelo's voice carried no emotion. "You may die now."
His hand finally left his pocket. He raised his arm. The gauntleted arm with the scythe mirrored the movement. The massive blade lifted high into the air, drinking moonlight until it seemed carved from captured stars.
Ashley readied herself. She'd failed to avenge her master. Nothing left to live for anyway. She was prepared to accept death. Her aura dimmed around her, though it didn't extinguish completely.
"Die."
His hand and the scythe both descended like a gavel delivering final verdict.
But at the last possible instant, she dodged.
The scythe crashed into the ground with earth-shattering force.
"Why..." Ashley stared at her own hands in confusion. "Why did I dodge?"
Do I have anything left to live for?
Nova and Lavvy surfaced in her mind. Ashley sighed heavily. "You've got to be kidding me..."
She rocketed away toward where Sol and Nova were fighting.
"She's running!" Neiva shouted.
Angelo didn't look impressed. The gauntlets melted back into raw energy—some transforming into Trinergy wings on his back, the rest coalescing around his fist into a single concentrated gauntlet.
He positioned himself, angling his body toward Ashley's trajectory. His wings and gauntlet began glowing brighter, brighter still as he charged them with devastating intent.
"Go, Angie!" Red's voice rang through their consciousness, enthusiastic and bloodthirsty. "Finish this!"
Angelo held position, muscles coiled like a spring wound to breaking point. "You endangered my student's life."
His voice dropped to something absolute. "You will pay for that."
He launched upward like a shooting star, leaving a silver contrail burning across the night sky.
Back where Sol and Nova fought, Nova noticed Ashley approaching. Somehow she just knew something had gone catastrophically wrong.
"Nova!" Ashley called out.
Nova immediately disengaged from Sol, leaping toward her sister.
"What happened?" The question tumbled out as Ashley touched down.
"He..." Ashley didn't know how to begin explaining it. "He's gotten stronger. We need to grab Lavvy and run!"
They noticed Angelo then—a silver comet streaking across the sky, heading straight for their position. Jaws set, they took defensive stances. They knew exactly what was coming.
Plasma began building between Ashley's palms as Nova created dense crimson metal walls around them.
"Trinergy..." Angelo's voice carried across the distance as he approached the twins who'd huddled together like cornered animals.
"Here he comes!"
"BURST!"
He converted his gauntlet into raw energy. A silver beam shot through with colorful veins painted the sky as it screamed toward them.
Ashley launched her own plasma attack. The two beams collided midair, but the difference was painfully, brutally obvious. Her attack only slowed his down—it stood no chance of actually stopping it.
Just as Angelo's attack was about to reach them, Nova closed the metal walls around both sisters. The Trinergy Burst engulfed them completely before detonating in an explosion that lit up the entire clearing like a miniature sun.
The walls emerged completely wrecked—twisted, melted, barely holding together—but they'd survived.
Angelo's eye twitched.
Nova threw aside the ruined walls. Both twins bolted into the forest.
"Lavvy!" They spotted him leaning over Dray's body. Then they noticed—his chest wound was now bandaged, rising and falling with shallow breaths.
"MASTER!" Tears flowed freely down both their faces.
"We have to move!" Lavvy shouted at the twins. "He needs immediate medical attention!"
Nova secured everyone with metal constructs, latching onto herself as Ashely made all of them shot skyward.
Angelo's eyes followed their escape, but for whatever reason, he didn't give chase.
Sol casually joined him, examining his new form with open curiosity. Just as Neiva emerged from the forest, Sol whistled low. "I've got no idea what just happened, but you need to explain everything."
Angelo's aura winked out as he let himself fall backward onto the ground. He swept sweat-soaked hair from his face, but that soft, triumphant smile never faded. "Once Blue recovers, he'll give you the full breakdown."
"But of course!" Blue's voice carried scholarly satisfaction despite the exhaustion.
"For the first time ever, I wasn't pissed about sharing his perspective," Red announced. "That was AWESOME!"
Sol chuckled. "Please tell me there aren't any more people hunting you."
Angelo laughed as well. "Who knows? That prosecutor sounded pretty persistent. Maybe he'll show up eventually."
After a brief pause, they all started laughing together. Even Neiva, despite the searing pain in her chest.
Dray had come back and gone. They'd started strong, but things had gotten dangerously close for a while there. Maybe Nova and Ashley would return someday to avenge him. But if and when that time came, they'd be more than ready.
Meanwhile, Maxwell steered his aircraft through the night sky, pursuing a certain object of interest.
"There—his orange aura." Maxwell noted as they closed distance on their target.
Vera bit her thumbnail. "Taking such a direct approach... I didn't expect we'd reveal ourselves this soon."
"Don't be absurd." Maxwell waved one hand dismissively, the other steady on the controls. "We're simply passing by to confirm it's actually him. He shouldn't grow suspicious. Or at least, not suspect us specifically."
"So he shouldn't turn hostile then—" Sienna started to ask.
"He's firing! DODGE!" Kirren caught the energy signature on screen.
Maxwell saw it and yanked the controls hard. A white beam seared through the air where their ship had been heartbeats before. He changed trajectory immediately, putting distance between them and the attack.
"That wasn't him!"
Kirren stepped to his brother's side, gripping Maxwell's shoulder for support—whether his or Maxwell's, neither could say. "Should we pursue? Figure out why they attacked on sight?"
Maxwell adjusted course, watching the unknown attacker shrink to insignificance in the distance. His expression remained unreadable—jaw set, eyes calculating odds and angles. Finally, he shook his head. "No. Wasting time chasing ghosts won't help us."
His grip tightened on the controls. "We head back. Plan our next move properly."
And with that, Maxwell and his group returned to MountShade. Their meeting with Angelo would have to wait for another day.
Hours later, Angelo finally succumbed to much-needed rest.
But something nagged at his subconscious. A bothersome dream that felt nothing like dreaming. Like floating in a static void—no up, no down, no light, no darkness. Just... nothing, stretching in all directions.
Then a voice spoke. Familiar yet completely foreign simultaneously—like hearing your own voice played back on a recording, wrong in ways you can't quite articulate.
"That was... wow. I have to admit, I'm impressed."
The voice carried weight despite having no source, no direction.
"You managed to show me something new. Bravo! Even if it was partly thanks to me. And your entire state of being—that's new as well."
A pause, like the speaker was savoring the moment.
"Come find me. If you can reach me, we can talk face to face..."
Another pause, this one carrying dark amusement.
"Figuratively speaking, of course."