But today was different, today, for the first time, he felt cornered and helpless.
He realized that hiding in the shadows wasn't completely foolproof; there were creatures out there that could detect him no matter what.
Right now, the only thing he could do was run.
Shi You remembered how he had once asked his companions to test what would happen if they were attacked while hiding in the shadows.
They had concluded that a normal attack wouldn't affect them at all, but if special abilities were used, it could cause some damage.
Faced with this rare and violent fluctuation in power, Shi You didn't dare take any chances.
He had a strong feeling he wouldn't be able to withstand it.
He wasn't sure why, but this enemy's attack gave him a deep sense of threat, as if he was facing a natural predator.
No matter what, he couldn't let this attack hit him.
Clenching his teeth, Shi You activated the power within his body.
Like a fish swimming through water, his movements became incredibly agile.
Meanwhile, Porygon Z watched calmly as Shi You fled desperately through the shadows.
The purple-black aura of thought in front of him thickened, swirling as countless dark, strange thoughts floated in the air.
It was as if invisible hands were kneading those thoughts together, forming a massive black sphere filled with wisps of dark aura that glowed faintly.
It looked like a black hole, staring too long made it feel like your soul might be sucked right in.
This was the ghost skill Shadow Ball.
Thanks to Porygon Z's trick, the Shadow Ball's power had been greatly amplified, growing larger than usual.
With a gentle push, the enormous orb shot forward, but strangely, it didn't fly straight.
Instead, it curved through the air, as if it were chasing something, moving at an astonishing speed.
Hidden in the shadows, Shi You kept glancing back repeatedly, anxious to see if his pursuer was still tracking him.
The sight made it hard for him to stay calm.
Aura fluctuations flickered endlessly through the space, chasing Shi You through the shadows.
The gap between them was closing rapidly.
What made things worse for Shi You was that no matter how he tried to escape, the aura trails behind him followed closely, almost like they had eyes.
This only made the distance between them shrink faster.
Suddenly, Shi You felt a sharp pain in his chest, and the next moment, his whole body was struck by a dark shadow ball.
"Boom!"
A loud explosion echoed from the rock wall some distance away from the passage.
The inside of the rock wall shattered, sending fragments and stray thoughts flying out.
Dust and gravel scattered into the air, mixed with smoke, as if the wall had been blasted apart.
The entire rock face crumbled, releasing a thick cloud of dust and smoke.
Shi You's broken body fell to the ground silently.
If you looked closely, you'd notice there was no sound, his premonition had come true.
He simply couldn't withstand that attack.
Like the original 'Ai,' ghost-type abilities also had a strong counter effect on him.
Combined with trickery, this shadow ball was especially deadly for Shi You.
His own defense wasn't strong, and as an assassin, he had never worried about this before thanks to his shadow powers.
But facing Porygon Z, all of that counted for nothing.
Suddenly, a space fluctuation appeared, and Shi You's body was swept into it, preserved for the time being.
Beings like Shi You are rare and valuable, meant to be fed to the big steel snake.
Perhaps then, the snake could swim through the shadows and impersonate Ratina, the Pluto Ryuki.
With such an ability, Shi You should have been the strongest among the three golden giants entrusted with saving his life.
Yet, he was the first to fall.
The other two were following closely behind, just a little slower.
Meanwhile, on the other side, Gardevoir watched the regrouped Shi Qi carefully.
Slowly, he raised his arms, his flawless white hands glowing with a soft pink light.
The aura around his body grew more powerful, rising steadily like bamboo shoots pushing through the earth.
Shi Qi's eyes burned with fierce determination, and he pressed his feet firmly into the ground, sinking deeply as he prepared for what was to come.
Immediately, Shi Qi's body, which was essentially filled with gas, began to change.
Suddenly, a burst of colorful gases shot out all at once.
Facing an opponent like this, relying on just one ability wouldn't be enough, combining powers was necessary.
As this thought crossed his mind, three different colored gases, red, green, and yellow, floated out.
Each gas shifted form and then sped toward Gardevoir.
The red gas transformed into a massive fireball, its intense heat causing the air around it to ripple.
The green gas acted like fuel; it didn't take on a distinct shape but merged with the fireball, making it grow even larger, like pouring gasoline onto a roaring fire to keep it blazing.
Meanwhile, the yellow gas crackled as it turned into streaks of lightning.
Then, something strange happened: the huge fireball streaked forward, surrounded by flashing lightning, creating shockwaves wherever it went.
On the surface, Shi Qi stayed calm, but behind him, several clouds of gas separated, signaling he was preparing a backup plan.
When Gardevoir noticed this, a cold gleam flashed in his beautiful eyes, and soon waves appeared in his hands again.
The surrounding pink aura pulsed in harmony, creating a resonance effect.
Shi Qi recognized the move, it was the same trick as before, but that wasn't the real concern.
The real threat was Gardevoir's ability to control it.
What he was doing now was trying to guard against that unknown control.
Although Shi Qi didn't know exactly how Gardevoir achieved this control, he understood one thing: it involved secretly separating a second self.
As long as the enemy keeps using the same trick and focuses on controlling the front self, the self behind can strike!
Take Shi
You, for example. It's not just any ordinary stone giant.
Sure, it looks like a stone giant, but it can also transform into a gas giant.
It can completely change its body into different gases and even create multiple clones by splitting itself.
However, since each clone consumes part of its body size, it can't make infinite copies.
From the front, the Stone Gas's size seemed unchanged, but in reality, its width had shrunk by almost a third.
Its entire body was moving toward the paper man.
'Keep using that ability!'
The Stone Gas in front wore a calm expression, but the clone forming behind it grinned with a sinister smile.
The surface of this back clone was covered in a layer of black gas, which gave it the confidence to pull off this trick.
This black gas could mask its presence, acting almost like invisibility.
It was also the most aura-consuming gas among all its forms and couldn't last long, but that brief moment was enough to strike at a critical time.