More dust eater reeee

Then I was on Carmine again, closing in without a trace of fear. The brief moment of contact before she’d been able to channel her Semblance towards protecting herself had still amounted to an unspeakable amount of force and she’d been sent skidding back, her feet carving a furrow in the street. Without giving her a moment to recover, I struck out at her with a fist as I shed more and more water, suspended within my manifested Aura. Her pure red eyes met mine without a trace of fear, arms already in motion, but I didn’t back down either. Even as I felt myself get torn in half, I reached out with two fluid hand and liquid fangs—

And then I froze. Literally, my tiger Aura turning to ice in an instant as I balance Water and Air to make Ice. A chunk of ice the size of a person smashed into her, but I was already moving a different direction, stepping back into the flood behind me a moment before my Aura changed and standing my ground as it washed over me, remaining stationary with my will alone. A moment after my Aura froze, a second tiger appeared over the first, water forming over ice as the Water Tiger followed me in stepping back and watched as the flood moved on.

Carmine staggered for a moment—a second too late in using her Aura or briefly struggling with the sheer amount she had to vaporize, I wasn’t sure—and I moved again. My physical body merely stepped forward once, but the Tiger moved closer, lunging toward her legs before stopping just a hair short. It retreated a fraction of a step, bobbing up towards her masked face and then striding a step to the left, moving to slam into her from the side and then dancing back. An arm rose towards her face, a leg swept towards the back of her knees, fangs flashed at her eyes, but each time I stopped just a hairs breadth from contact.

And each time, water solidified into ice, the water trailing behind each motion carrying them into their target. Carmine stumbled a pace back ever other attack and my physical body calmly strolled forth, Aura keeping up the pressure. She braced herself against another series of blows before snarling something wordless, eyes focusing on my through the mist. Arms began to move, scything through waves of water, but I sensed the danger coming and the Tiger returned to my feet. As it leapt upwards, I allowed the resulting column of water to carry me into the air above Carmine.

She lifted her head and I knew before I even sensed it that her other arm was in motion, sending vaporizing steel towards me—but I was moving too, an instant before she was. The Water Tiger moved impossibly, crawling down the very stream of water it had created until it stood parallel to me, facing downwards. Instantly, the same limbs that had tread on the water’s surface as if it were solid pierced through, a clawed hand grabbing me and drawing me from the column before tossing me into the air behind it. I’d traveled barely a meter before the tail curled around my ankle snapped my down towards the ground and then the Tiger was leaping back as well.

It passed over me, the water that composed it flowing over me as I passed through it, back to front. I slipped into its wake barely a moment after it first touched me and without even the slightest hint of force or surface tension. It kept moving behind me, fluid body arcing back as it flipped in midair and I flowed through the resulting stream, body swimming after soul without even the slightest motion. The Tiger on the street and I landed within it, the flood that trail us splashing out in every direction.

The Tiger rose, claws reaching towards Carmine as she turned, but I stayed bowed until both arm and sword passed above me before rising calmly. With each step, the Tiger left behind statues of itself in ice, each lasting but a moment before shattering or vaporizing as they smashed into Carmine and kept her one her toes, pushing her back with each attack. Perhaps her arms were fast, each blow blindingly quick even to me—but the rest of her body was no match for my speed. Though close proximity presented its own risks and gave me less time to react, at this range I also had the chance to stay ahead of her, to do something.

The street around us quickly flooded with water as I produced and cast of hundreds, thousands of times my own volume in water, whatever Carmine didn’t vaporize splashing upon the ground around us. I felt the crystal in my heart weakening as the power continued to flow out of me, but didn’t hesitate, didn’t stop—

Until with a final step, my Tiger shed the water one last time and emerged like a snake that had shed its skin. It threw its head back and Roared, the sound causing the earth to shake and windows to break around us, the sheer sound of it so real it was almost a physical thing. Whatever part of Carmine was still alive, could still feel—it felt hesitation. Just for a moment.