The second round wasn't cleaner, but it was smarter.
Dante stopped thinking in terms of powers.
No more "what can I copy?"
Now it was: How do I make Copybreaker miss?
He baited the mercenary, letting the edge of that ruthless fist graze his arm just enough to draw him in deeper.
But every contact was a lesson.
Every strike absorbed, every failed dodge became raw data, carved into Dante's mind like a brutal tutor.
He felt the rhythm beneath the fury.
Pulse's words echoed inside his head:
"Start learning from the gaps."
Copybreaker moved with military precision—calculated, cold, almost mechanical—but not quite superhuman fast.
His arrogance was the real weakness.
Dante caught the subtle weight shifts, the predictable forward lean of his centre of mass, and the habitual trailing of that right elbow. The mercenary's right jab always telegraphed itself with the same careless overconfidence.
Dante's eyes narrowed.
This was no longer a contest of raw strength or power replication.
It was a war of wits, technique, and timing.
He pivoted.
Shifting his centreline off Copybreaker's axis.
Stopped throwing brute punches.
Started redirecting.
Aikido, Judo, Red Guardian's signature takedown spiral—each move absorbed through echoes of training footage and simulations with Echo's combat modules.
But now, it was different.
Dante didn't need to copy the strength of Red Guardian.
He only needed his technique.
He ducked low, twisting hard, slamming Copybreaker's shoulder into the cracked concrete wall with bone-shattering impact.
Copybreaker grunted—his first sound since the fight began.
A sharp, breathy grunt that signalled cracks forming in the merc's composure.
Dante didn't relent.
Moving in with surgical precision instead of reckless power.
Targeting ligaments and control joints—weak points that would disable, not just hurt.
Copybreaker lashed out blindly.
But Dante kept his distance, slipping past every strike with fluid grace.
He wasn't trying to beat Copybreaker yet.
He was downloading him.
Learning the pattern, the flow.
Then—
Dante felt the subtle shift.
His system kicked in.
[GENETIC FRAME SCANNED]
[MUSCLE MEMORY PATTERNING: ACTIVE]
Copybreaker's eyes went wide.
"You're adapting my body?" the merc asked, disbelief and anger lacing his voice.
Dante smirked, blood trickling down his split lip.
"You don't need powers to be copied," Dante replied, voice low and steady.
The merc's glare hardened.
His attacks became wilder, more vicious, and uncoordinated.
Panic broke the rhythm of the fight.
Dante twisted past a haymaker, then struck back with the merc's brutal strike.
Same angle.
Same elbow.
Crack.
Copybreaker's nose shattered beneath the force.
He staggered.
And from beneath his sleeve, a blade flashed.
Dante's eyes locked on the steel.
He scanned it desperately.
Vibranium-tungsten alloy.
Laced with a synthetic compound Dante couldn't even begin to analyse.
He couldn't copy it.
Couldn't read it.
Copybreaker lunged with deadly precision.
Dante dove aside, the blade slicing through his side with a searing, burning pain.
The injury screamed.
But it focused him.
He pulled every learned motion, every strike, and every reaction into a singular point of resolve.
Then—
He stopped moving entirely.
Still as stone.
Let Copybreaker come.
The mercenary surged forward, blade aimed to rip through.
Dante dropped low, swept both feet with a swift arc, and spun up.
His knee slammed upward under Copybreaker's chin with bone-jarring force.
Copybreaker flew back, crashing to the ground dazed.
Dante limped forward, breath ragged, body aching.
Copybreaker wiped blood from his split lip, voice grim but steady.
"They won't stop sending people like me."
Dante's jaw tightened.
He didn't hesitate.
"You think I'm just reacting? That I'm stuck copying?"
A faint glow sparked beneath Dante's skin—the system flickering to life again.
[ADAPTIVE COMBAT FORM: MIRROR-BREAK]
[SYNTHETIC MEMORY IMPRINT: COPYBREAKER – LIMITED ACCESS GRANTED]
"I'm not copying anymore," Dante said, voice cold as ice.
"I'm becoming the countermeasure."
Before Copybreaker could blink—
Dante struck.
Three precision hits landed with brutal efficiency.
Liver.
Solar plexus.
Left leg tendon.
Copybreaker's body collapsed in on itself, muscles crumpling.
Unconscious.
Dante sank to his knees, vision swimming, every breath a struggle.
⸻
When he woke, the sterile lights of a secure medbay greeted him.
Pulse stood over him, arms crossed, an unimpressed smirk tugging at his lips.
"Dumbest thing I've seen," Pulse muttered.
"And also the most impressive."
Dante managed a weak smile.
"He's not unreadable anymore."
Before Pulse could respond, Voss entered—her usual scowl replaced by something closer to approval.
"You did more than survive," she said, dropping a file on the bed beside him.
"You adapted. To someone designed to kill you."
Dante's eyes scanned the file.
Copybreaker's tech wasn't just mercenary-grade.
It was Echo-made. Black program level.
He wasn't supposed to be active.
"You sent me in knowing this?"
Voss met his gaze, steady and unflinching.
"I needed to know your ceiling."
"And if I had died?"
Voss didn't hesitate.
"Then we'd know your limits."
Dante clenched his fists.
But inside, a spark ignited.
Something fundamental had shifted.
This fight wasn't just physical.
It was evolution.
He hadn't just survived.
He had transcended.
Moved beyond mimicry.
Beyond simple replication.
From mimicry to mastery.
A new path.
Dante's mind replayed every moment.
How he stopped trying to copy every punch and instead learned the why behind each movement.
He decoded arrogance and timing like a cryptic language.
How he turned the battlefield into a data set and a proving ground.
He realised this fight was a threshold, a brutal crucible forging something stronger.
His power wasn't just a tool.
It was a weapon—one that learned, adapted, and evolved.
And now, it was ready to rewrite the rules.
Outside the medbay, the hum of the facility was a low pulse.
Voss and Pulse exchanged a look.
"You think he understands yet?" Pulse asked.
Voss nodded slowly.
"He does. And he's only just begun."
Dante flexed his fingers, still sore but alive.
He wasn't just another soldier anymore.
He was something new.
Something dangerous.
Because now, Dante wasn't copying.
He was creating.
The battlefield had changed.
And Dante was ready to lead the charge.