Flesh Against Flesh & The Demon's Rebirth

Cole didn't wait.

Driven by raw instinct, he launched forward on all fours, leaping across the tarmac like an uncoiled spring.

It was a rookie mistake.

The Doomsday titan simply stepped into his line of motion and snapped a massive forearm across his chest.

━━━【 Ｃ Ｒ Ａ Ｃ Ｋ ! 】━━━

Cole's breath evacuated in a spray of red mist as he was blasted thirty feet backward, smashing into the side of an overturned transport truck.

The beast gave him zero room to breathe.

It closed the distance in two thunderous strides, grabbed Cole by the throat, and slammed him against the steel chassis.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Then, the beast pulled back its massive fist and drove it directly into the center of Cole's face.

━━━【 Ｂ Ｏ Ｏ Ｍ ! 】━━━

The concussive blow sent Cole bouncing across the ground. The world spun in streaks of red and white, his ears ringing with a severe concussion.

The monster pinned him flat to the asphalt, driving blow after blow straight down into his guard.

【 ＢＯＯＭ 】

【 ＣＲＡＣＫ 】

【 ＢＯＯＭ 】

Each hammer strike dug deep craters into the fractured floor. Cole's forearms were going numb, the bone-plating grinding away his defense.

G E T U P .

Pure leverage took over. Cole coiled his legs beneath the beast's hips, planted both heels squarely into the monster's armored midsection, and bridged violently upward.

An explosive kick launched the eight-foot titan completely off him, sending it flying ten feet backward across the courtyard.

Cole rolled through the momentum and rose to his feet.

A whisper cut through the ringing.

「 Chin tucked. Lead foot forward. You don’t fight like a beast, Cole . You fight like an artist. 」

The monster charged forward to deliver an execution stomp.

Cole's eyes snapped open.

The feral panic vanished. In its place settled the ice-cold stillness of a champion.

Cole rolled smoothly across his shoulder, letting the beast’s hammer strike crater the asphalt where his skull had been half a second prior. He sprang back to his feet, bouncing lightly on the balls of his bare soles.

His stance shifted.

Right shoulder back.

Left hand high, hovering near his cheekbone.

Elbows tucked to shield his liver.

Flawless southpaw guard.

The Doomsday Beast threw a wild haymaker that sheared the rain out of the air.

Cole stepped in.

He slipped beneath the arc, pivoted on his lead foot, and snapped an explosive right hook directly into the soft cartilage behind the monster's jaw.

━━【 Ｔ Ｈ Ｗ Ａ Ｃ Ｋ ! 】━━

The titan’s head whipped sideways. Its massive legs wobbled.

Slip.

A sweeping backhand sailed harmlessly over his cropped hair.

Counter.

A crushing liver shot beneath the floating carapace, followed instantly by a lead uppercut that snapped the creature’s jaw shut like an industrial press.

The beast roared, swinging wildly, but Cole was a ghost in the pocket. He broke its balance with low calf kicks, snapped its posture with crisp jabs, and wore down its stamina blow by blow.

Cole closed the distance, stepped deep behind its lead leg, secured an underhook, and leveraged the titan’s immense weight against itself.

━━━【 Ｓ Ｌ Ａ Ｍ ! 】━━━

He threw the eight-foot titan flat onto its back.

Cole dropped his knee into its throat, cocked his fist, and drove twelve consecutive hammerfists directly into the seam of the monster’s skull plate until the armored bone shattered into chalky powder.

The Doomsday Beast went limp. Its red eyes dimmed into gray.

Cole stood up, panting clean breaths through his nose. The martial artist had conquered the monster.

Then, the temperature in the courtyard plummeted to absolute zero.

【 ＣＬＡＰ 】

【 ＣＬＡＰ 】

【 ＣＬＡＰ 】

The slow, sarcastic applause vibrated directly against the base of Cole's brain.

From the sky, lightning split the clouds.

A shadow descended. Enormous leathery wings beat the rain back as the Dracula Demon touched down atop an overturned transport truck.

「 Well, well. The little bird who fell from the sky. You survived the drop, vermin? 」

Cole's breath hitched. The phantom pain in his shoulders flared white-hot.

「 I remember the taste of your throat. This shell... will do nicely. 」

The Dracula Demon collapsed into a cloud of writhing black mist and surged downward, plunging directly into the mouth and nostrils of the dead Doomsday Beast.

For a heartbeat, nothing happened.

Then, the titan’s corpse CONVULSED.

Black veins erupted across the pale bone plating. Two massive leathery wings erupted from the monster's spine, spraying black ichor. Its eyes ignited into twin pits of abyssal fire.

Ten feet tall now.

「 Let us see you slip this. 」

The monster disappeared.

Supersonic speed.

Cole raised a cross-arm guard, but the sheer physical force shattered the radius and ulna in his left arm with a wet snap.

The monster seized Cole by his torso, dragged him airborne, and threw him with catastrophic velocity.

Cole smashed through the reinforced wall of the command building, tore through two support pillars, and crashed into the structural foundation.

Tons of pulverized rebar, steel, and cinderblocks collapsed over him in a deafening landslide, burying Cole beneath a mountain of rubble.

Total, suffocating blackness.

His lungs were crushed. His heart fluttered erratically, starving for fuel.

And inside that pitch-black tomb, something deep within Cole's modified DNA broke its leash.