As the girls' muscles tensed with superhuman speed, the moment before they began moving seemed to stretch into infinity as my shell-shocked brain processed what they'd just said. Everything that those incredible Saiyan girls had been piling up for years now. They… wanted me to marry both of them. They genuinely believed that I was so strong that I could keep them both happy at once.
But… Could I do that?
The first exchange of our battle flashed through my head. The way Pepper had shot off a Shock Cannon before the clash even began, pretended to be sloppy, wasting energy during our hand-to-hand exchange just to make my ki sense a bit fuzzy, allowing the Shock Cannon to actually hit me, creating an opening for Lynn's 'mist' full of Horizon Discuses, a technique that she called 'Horizon Tempest' after my Sonic Tempest technique, to actually make contact.
…I couldn't hold back here. For my pride's sake, I needed to win this fight. It was the most important fight I'd ever had. Even more so than my battle against Tater back then. A thousand times more important than that one.
So, when the girls started moving, I stopped hesitating. If I was going to beat them, I couldn't hold a single thing back.
My body moved to intercept Pepper before my mind could properly catch up, relying entirely on my rich experience sparring with the girl.
No, this was not Ultra instinct at work. It was the culmination of thousands upon thousands of sparring sessions with the girl, as the closest thing to an equal to my own strength, my subconscious could read the girl's muscle contractions and order my muscles on what to do before my conscious mind ever caught up.
But having to react to Lynn's Horizon Discuses shooting at me in irregular intervals while I fought Pepper was a bit much. Quickly, I was forced to grab Pepper by the wrist and toss her away from me before her technique caught up with my analyses of her techniques. That usually took the girl about a minute, then she'd start changing things up in ways that required time for me to figure out how to predict.
From there, the combat between Pepper and I became more even. Quick, single strikes and instant movements that blew us throughout the desert terrain and the sky above, covering so much ground so quickly that Lynn's ranged attacks felt like they shot toward me at a snail's pace, incredibly easy to dodge mid-motion, even while using the Hyper-Motion technique to exceed my body's natural limits.
All Lynn could do was watch as Pepper and I clashed hundreds of times, completely upending the sandy terrain, which settled down quickly, only to be upended once more.
Pepper instantly realized that this style of combat put her at a disadvantage. It turned our fight into a battle of attrition, one that Lynn couldn't interfere in.
And in our respective forms, I had a lot more stamina than Pepper did. Even after beating her, I'd have more than enough energy left to steamroll over the weaker Lynn.
"Lynn, now! Blitz Explosion!" BOOM!
I softened the blow with an elbow strike that'd originally been headed toward her sternum, but Pepper's combination of precise ki expulsion and the Hyper-Motion Technique was extremely powerful. Unprepared, I couldn't completely absorb the blow and got flung back.
Wait, Lynn?! Why…-
"GAH!"
"LEOPARD KICK!"
Lynn's kick slammed into the perfect center of my back with the precision of someone who'd been instructed by Pepper on precisely where I'd be, before I'd ever been thrown.
Despite the fact that my back hadn't been wholly unprotected, the flying kick that she landed caused me to spit out blood as my body went flying, head over heel.
But the girls weren't satisfied just getting a single good hit in. Before my brain had even processed the sheer force of Lynn's blow, both women had already caught up to me.
Pepper started with a gut punch powerful enough to shatter steel.
Lynn followed up with an elbow to the back of the head that nearly shook my brain straight into reboot mode.
And they didn't stop there. Together, they hammered my body as hard as they could, faster than the eye could see. But I could feel it. Every single blow, without fail, was targeted to send an explosion of pain through my body.
In what seemed like an instant, but felt like an eternity, my body was covered in what would later become purple bruises. The force from their blows, each somehow at least as strong as a full-powered blow from the likes of Tater, slammed into me one after the other.
"I'M NOT DONE YET!" The refusal to lose made the words erupt from my throat in a guttural roar, as my mind subconsciously locked onto Pepper's more familiar pattern.
Grabbing Pepper's ankle with my right hand just before it could land another solid blow to my thigh, I pulled her close to me and slammed my left palm directly into her neck, before flinging her dazed body directly at Lynn, who barely managed to dodge, going in for spinning side-kick with everything that she had using the momentum from her low dodge, while I was stuck in a reaching pose from my throw of Pepper.
Lynn had reacted far and away faster and better than I'd ever have expected.
But I'd already learned something important about this fight. These girls were holding out on me in training.
They'd been practicing those combination moves behind my back for a lot longer than the three days that I recently spent in my lab working on Novem. Months, maybe even a year or longer, they'd been preparing for this single battle against me. They knew my reactions, my moves, how I thought, almost as well as I did.
They also knew that, out of the entire team, Pepper did the most close-combat sparring with me.
I hadn't completely expected Lynn to dodge Pepper, but I'd definitely considered the possibility before I'd ever caught the girl's foot.
Right before Lynn's foot made contact with my chest, I caught it between my elbows.
We stilled for a moment, as Lynn realized that her counter had failed. For an instant, gravity tried to reclaim Lynn's body.
I didn't let it. The force of my push tossed Lynn's body through the air, backwards, like a rag doll.