Chapter 88 - 85: A Legend Realized (II)

Deep within a white smoke-like mist.

Contrary to what Dibelle was expecting, she did not hear any sounds of bones cracking after she landed her punch on Nao's nose. A hissing bang resounded instead, causing a huge wave of white smoke to surge outward. Dibelle was still releasing her extreme heat but seeing Nao grab a hold of her so casually shocked her greatly.

Her punch seemed to have little to no effect on his face, as all she saw was a light scratch with a small amount of blood dripping out of his nose. She put quite the amount of force behind this and quite surprised seeing the result. However, immediately following this, she actually saw the boy in front of her only about a foot or two away smile.

It wasn't a smirk or an evil smile, but a smile full of confidence, as though he was enjoying this fight. Seeing this, Dibelle felt as if fate was destined for him to win. Feeling this, at this time Dibelle, or more specifically, Isabella, swore in her heart that she will come to terms on the promise she made to her family, when she first started on the path of a martial artist. As to what this promise was, she wouldn't be able to say until this battle ended.

Even though Dibelle was injured badly at this point, the excitement in her blood was saying something else. She too was enjoying this fight. Deep down, coupled with Dia's support she's been providing in this fused state, Isabella wanted her first match one worthy to be remembered.

Dibelle felt Nao release her two tails, but what he did next shocked her greatly, and immediately following that, a hard crunch resounded in the ring. CRUNCH!

Nao condensed his yellow aura onto his head and struck against Dibelle's head with his. Yes, he had the guts to do a headbutt! After a large crunching sound resounded in the two rings, it sent shivers down the other fighter's spines, and the audience alike. It sounded as if bones became broken, but thankfully none did.

Seeing Nao headbutt her straight on, Dibelle cursed inwardly. Nao's headbutt caused enough of an impact for her body to fly downward. The audience couldn't see well but they still saw two figures shrouded in a white smoke-like mist. Once they saw one figure fly toward the ring's platform, they let out a string of curses as they saw one figure headbutt the other.

Dibelle's figure popped out of the white smoke mist, only to skid into the second ring's tiling. It started to tear up the pink gems clad on her back that were already starting to crack thanks to Nao's previous punches, and she felt another wave of searing pain spread across it. More and more tiles were dug out and she inched closer and closer to the ring's edge.

At this time, Dibelle started to regain her clarity. Her pink Ki burst forth around her body and she clutched hard onto the remaining flooring, trying to stop her body. Her body's speed started to fall, and stopped as soon as her head peaked out over the edge.

Once the audience saw Dibelle's head peak out over the edge out of the white smoke mist, they sounded more cheers at her, telling her to not give up. This gave her enough strength to stand up again, and a wave of shock spread around the audience seeing how bloody her back had become.

A large bruise with blood pouring out of it could also now be seen on her forehead. Dibelle started to pant hard and struggled trying to remain standing. If one were to look closely, tiny pieces of pink crystals gems were constantly peeling off, dropping onto the ground. Dia's conscious spread her worry to Isabella, but Isabella's conscious comforted her. Her attitude remained cheerful as she spoke out to the audience.

"Huff...huff...everyone, I apologize for having you all see me like this! Even if we have fused into one, it appears we may not be a match for Nao. But don't you worry everyone, even if the two of us might not win this time, we will go out with a bang. That's our promise to you guys as the number one idol in the galaxies!"

Hearing this caused a flurry of excitement to resound from the audience once more. This time the audience went as far as to shoot out another string of curses at Nao, as if they were trying to brand him as the bad guy here. At this time, the white smoke mist cleared up, and the audience soon saw Nao hovering in the air looking down at Dibelle.

If the audience looked closely, they could see a scratch on his nose and a large bruise forming on his head with blood pouring down from it. They cheered again seeing this but little did they know this was Dibelle's blood and not his.

Hearing cheers from the audience pumped up Dibelle once again, and she surged her pink Ki forth. She did not fly back up toward Nao this time which confused him, and yet took a stance instead. She immediately crouched down on all fours, even though her hands never touched the ground. With her Ki continuously surging higher and higher, her two tails started to twitch, before locking onto Nao.

On the other side, Nao felt Dibelle's Ki start to skyrocket. He also saw Dibelle's tails lock onto him again. 'Is she repeating the same attack she did earlier?', Nao wondered. Similar to before, pink Ki started to condense at the tips of Dibelle's two tails.

However, this time, it did not stop there. Nao soon saw more pink Ki start to condense in both of Dibelle's hands as well. To top it off, Dibelle's throat started to change color to a hot pink too. After her throat changed color, it slowly started to expand inch by inch as Dibelle continued to condense Ki inside her mouth.

Seeing this, Nao frowned. 'She isn't becoming a human cannon now, is she!?', Nao thought. Even though Nao wanted his assumption to be wrong, it was indeed the truth this time. As Dibelle continued to condense Ki at five points on her body, Nao decided to counter-react, He thought about taking this attack head on, but with Dibelle's fusion, Nao found her power level right an even billion.

With this attack, Dibelle's power level had been skyrocketing as she continued to condense her Ki. At this point in time it was nearly reaching twice her previous level, and Nao didn't want to take any chances. He hadn't tried out any barrier-like skills in the past, but he decided to now.

Nao surged his golden yellow Super Saiyan aura once more. He fluttered his eyes once, and once they re-opened, a golden ring appeared around his emerald irises. A thin golden layer also appeared on his body. However, unlike the last time he did this, this golden layer started to expand as he willed more Space spheres around his body.

Perhaps it was achieving the Super Saiyan state, but Nao felt even more attuned to Space around him now. He might soon reached the last step for this element, which is [Perfect]. He recently thought of a plan for his future, and achieving this was essential to that.

Once the Space element gathered around Nao's body, it created a Spacial Barrier. Every so often, space would distort around his body. Seeing this, Nao nodded and concluded that it was unlikely Dibelle's incoming attack would harm him much now, coupled with his battle power.

A few more moments passed and it was now getting hard to see Dibelle's body. Even some members in the audience had to shield their eyes, as Dibelle's pink I was now radiating very brightly. Nao contemplated for a second, and decided to surge his Ki once more. He previously used two elements at once, and he decided to do so once again.

He used the space element to create a barrier, and now he unleashed his ice element to go on the offensive. Little did he know that his ice element just advanced into [Intermediate], and once he activated this aura, ice crystals started to form around him. It was no longer frost.

Unlike last time however, Nao squared his back and shifted his right leg backward, drawing back his right hand. The Ki that soon started to form in his right hand was no longer a pale white, but it was more a pure white now. Nao looked pretty dazzling, as streaks of white, golden yellow and emerald green streaked across his figure every so often.

Screeching sounds resounded from Nao, and hissing from the heat Dibelle exuded resounded from her. Despite this momentary silence spread throughout the other fighters and the audience alike, as they didn't want to miss the chance of seeing the outcome.

Nao then finished charging up. Ice crystals formed around his hand and even the Ki itself but he was not bothered by this, it actually did not cause him any harm, and instead felt a pleasant feeling. Taking aim at Dibelle, he launched his ice Ki blast, and unsurprisingly, Dibelle returned the response with hers.

"Deep Freeze!"

"Five-Point Blast Cannon!"

Seeing the two people launch their respective attacks, the crowd roared once more, cheering them on, mainly Dibelle. Dibelle's pink beam was very large thanks to the five points she condensed Ki at. Only a few seconds passed until it collided with Nao's freezing ice beam.

Dibelle expected hers to overpower his but once the two collided, a huge hissing sound, much louder than the previous ones, caused everyone to shield their ears, before they were blasted by a huge heat wave, followed by a freezing cold. Thankfully they had a barrier made up of Godly Ki protecting them, so it did not cause any harm.

Surprisingly, Nao's beam wasn't being overtaken, and if one looked closely, Dibelle's beam was being slowly pushed back! The end of her beam also started to lose effect as it slowly became frozen into ice. She tried to surge her Ki again but Nao's beam kept overpowering hers. Feeling inevitable, she poured every last bit of her strength into this attack.

Unfortunately, Dibelle's pink beam Ki blast kept getting frozen over and over, and before long, a long streak of ice made its way toward Dibelle. Even though there was no killing allowed in this tournament, Dibelle closed her eyes and accepted her fate.

At this time, Dibelle felt a strange sensation spread throughout her body and her Potara earrings started to shine. Poof!

Just as Nao's ice beam reached Dibelle, her figure started to shine together with the Potara earrings. One figure immediately split back into two, narrowly escaping oncoming attack. This in turn caused the ice beam to streak forward toward the ground, digging into a good half of the stage, destroying most of it in the process. It reached until the grass on the ground, and kept colliding against it until the Godly Ki barrier dissipated the attack.

The atmosphere soon returned back to normal, despite the massive amounts of ice crystals generated. Isabella knelt on the ground panting heavily with blood dripping down onto the floor, mostly coming from her back. Dia on the other hand laid flat face down on the now destroyed ring on the opposite side, unconscious.

Isabella tried to stand up one final time, getting one last good look at her opponent. She then felt all the energy drain from her body, and she collapsed front first onto the tiles, smiling. She then became unconscious.

Seeing two fighters unresponsive, a momentary silence spread out, before a mixture of cheers and boos resounded. The boos mainly came from the die-hard Isabella fans as they saw her lose the battle. The mushroom announcer Kinoko finally took this time to announce the results.

"Everyone, what a match we have just witnessed! This will definitely go down in the Grand Kai's book of records. These three fighters were the last of this battle royale, eight others have already been eliminated. I hate to say it myself but our dear Isabella and her friend Dia have been knocked out for the count! With ten fighters now eliminated, this concludes the first half of the preliminaries. As for the remaining eight fighters, you may proceed to the rest area or retire back to the dorms. We will take an hour intermission break to fix up the stage for the second half. Until then everyone, stay tuned!"