Page 2763 -- CCXLVII.

Chapter Two Hundred Forty-Seven: 'The hand that needs grasping...'
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A string of explosions rocked the night sky, but Lord Abbas Saqqaf couldn't let that deter him. The suit could take it, and so could he. He soared through the onslaught head on and clobbered one of the Abolish bastards in midair.

Unable to stand up to the force of the impact, the enemy's body simply exploded into a cloud of blood.

That was one down, but there were plenty more left. Dozens of them--and all flying, too. Only some of them seemed to be flying under their own power. His visor was picking up several identical high-energy readings among the group of hostiles. The speed of combat made it difficult to be certain, but he was fairly certain that he caught sight of machinery on their arms and backs.

More toys of the Mad Demon, Abbas figured.

But that was fine. He was mainly just glad there weren't any more of those hulking monstrosities here. He'd been forced to fend off two of those damn things back in Sair, and while he'd emerged victorious, the suit hadn't quite been the same since.

It was still mostly functional, thankfully, but it wasn't regenerating like it was supposed to. He would've like to run full system diagnostics to figure out what the problem was, but he would need at least eight uninterrupted hours to do so. That obviously wasn't possible when, for the past three days, he'd had to be combat ready at all times.

Even without diagnostics, though, he had an unsettling suspicion about what the problem might be. There weren't many things that could hamper regeneration for a sustained period of time, after all.

He had more pressing matters on his mind at the moment, however.

Abolish flies buzzed all around him, a veritable swarm. No doubt, they all hoped to be the one to deliver his head to their bosses, but none of them were going to succeed.

Apart, perhaps, from that one with the birds. The Man of Crows.