With her left hand, she took a blade from one of her braids and threw it at Adalbert. Then another, and another; though he managed to dodge two, the third hit him head-on. It smashed into him with enough force to dent his armor, exploding into a million tiny pieces and causing numerous chips of brittle bone to come off of him. At first her attacks had little apparent effect, dents and gouges which they inflicted being mended quite quickly, but that changed when she ran through the pig-iron trash and got to her good-quality ammunition; the point of these first six hadn’t been to injure, but to get a good bead on her target, as she could easily compensate for the differences in weight and center of mass between them and their counterparts of better make.

He was unmoved at first, appearing as if on the verge of breaking out into laughter, only to look down and realize that there was a finger-sized hole in his armor, tar trickling out of it. The hole closed itself up, but it was obvious that he was shaken. Gradually, Zel began closing the distance, confident that she could use Arcline to grab her ammunition from at least thirty meters away.

Von Wickten began firing off one Blaze Schneider after the next, forcing Zel to dodge even in her empowered state and smashing aside her projectiles, though such clashes caused his own to careen off to the side with no hope of striking Zelsys. He, too, made an effort to close the distance, though Zel suspected that he intended to come closer than she did.

She took up a wide stance, continuing to throw with her left arm as she readied her right, opening her mouth and forming an arc from her tongue to the sword attached to the Butcher, coating its edge in a particularly thick coat of lightning. A few moments later, just after she saw Von Wickten fire off his second Blaze Schneider in quick succession and Midnight Wolf’s flames partially obscured his field of view, she whipped her right arm forward, the Arcline stretching out as the sword trailed behind it for a short distance before firing forward.

There came a thunderclap… And Von Wickten’s advance was stopped dead.

Shards of silver mixed with ripped-out chunks of flesh, a geyser of tar-like blood gushing out around the blade now embedded in his chest. He looked down, grasping at it as he realized that the sword was his own.

The armor’s words flashed in Adalbert’s head as he looked down at his own blade, that symbol of station which, despite its lackluster performance, he had treasured so dearly. He hadn’t even realized it had been taken from him until now.

SUGGESTION: PARTIAL SPINDLE RELEASE

EST. OPERATIONAL CAPABILITY INCREASE: 60%

EST. OPERATIONAL TIME LIMIT: 99 SEC

IMMEDIATE RETREAT AND SUBSEQUENT RE-STABILIZATION PERIOD WILL FOLLOW UPON ESTIMATED REMAINING TIME LIMIT REACHING 30 SEC.

“A minute to try again before I have to run and go unconscious…” he thought as he parsed the machine’s strange vernacular, still thrown off-kilter by the exact context of what he was seeing and experiencing. All the surreal, overly-specific pain related to his injuries, the sight of his own broken armor and viscera on the ground as the suit tried to repair itself, all that was… Unreal. Detached. He felt his blade pulling back as she tried to yank it out of him, but he stopped it, grabbing the handle and willing the dragonmaw of his right arm to snap shut around it.

“...ACCEPT,” Von Wickten uttered to no-one in particular. Not quite visible from Zel's perspective, the jade spindles embedded into his body unlocked and retracted halfway.

By this point, Zel knew well enough that him saying that word was a bad sign, and no sooner did he say that word, he ripped the sword from his chest and a great jet of purple flame erupted from the wound; Zel felt her Arcline be severed, the arc simply flickering out. A moment later it had closed and the metal was already growing back into place, four continuous jets of curseflame now continuously bursting from his back and the back of his head.

She realized her own mistake - carelessly using a blade which was still the property of another had allowed its original owner, who had a much stronger bond to the object, to sever her magic’s hold on it by reasserting his ownership. Before he could come charging at her, she’d already pulled another Dragon Knight sword into her grasp, throwing several more blades to keep him occupied alongside Zef’s suppressive fire and Midnight Wolf’s flame. Running out of second-tier blades, she finally began throwing Dragon Knight or equivalent-quality swords, just as he blasted out from his hiding spot and into the open to try and run her down. Midnight Wolf followed, pseudo-flying in his wake, but the construct was visibly running out of steam by this point; it maintained its performance, but Zel could feel that it didn’t have much time left.

With plentiful power output to spare, she filled her second stomach and bit the inside of her own tongue, willing the small wound to bleed freely, her sky-high blood pressure and her tongue’s unique structure causing it to spray her mouth full of blood in moments before she sealed the tiny hole. She swallowed it, directing it into her second stomach. In an instant, she felt the reaction take place and she knew she couldn’t contain the result for long, but she didn’t need long - not to mention that she was certain Adalbert couldn’t keep up this form for longer than she could maintain hers. There was a roughness to his movements, a visible struggle that betrayed the exertion of every second he spent in that state. She took up a stalwart stance, left hand forward grasping a blade and the swords attached to her braids also pointed forwards, broadcasting the intent to meet him in a fair head-on clash…

…And that she did, even though it was not the tactically ideal choice. Midnight Wolf circled in to assist her, but Adalbert smashed it aside with his tail, sending it sliding right past Zelsys.