"Bikes. Just... Sega bikes. That's it. Oh, and a sequel to one of my first long fights"
Shadow the Hedgehog vs Makoto Niijima is the first "What-If?" episode of DEATH BATTLE! by MaverickHunterSilver, and is the first episode of the first season. It features Shadow the Hedgehog from the Sonic the Hedgehog video games and comics, and Makoto Niijima from Persona 5.
Description[]
Sonic the Hedgehog vs Shin Megami Tensei: Persona! Sega and bikes are the theme for today's battle, as the long awaited sequel to Sonic the Hedgehog vs Akira Kurusu is finally ready to roll. Can the Phantom Thief school class president stand a chance against the "Ultimate Life Form"?
Introduction[]
Silver: They're two wheeler wonders, they're loud and open, of course we're talking about the motorcycle.
Maverick: Motorcycles are considered badass and cool, right? Well, what if you gave these bad boys to two characters from different series owned by the same company who's whole purpose was to be a cooler alternative to the mainstream? Yeah, the bikes may not be the biggest part in their arsenal, but those two make them into weapons.
Silver: And while you'd expect this to go to the cocky showoff in said series, in this case it's the more serious type that have this trait. Shadow the Hedgehog, the ultimate life form from Sonic the Hedgehog.
Maverick: And Makoto Niijima, the student class president and secret Phantom Thief from Persona. I'm Maverick and he's Silver.
Silver: And it's our job to analyse their weapons, armour and skills to see who would win a Death Battle.
Shadow[]
Silver: Some fifty years ago, there was a space station orbiting the Earth known as the Space Colony ARK.
Maverick: The ARK, which is in all caps for some reason, was designed to house a government project, one that had a purpose: to find the ultimate life form and find the key to immortality. Because apparently that's not enough for corrupted politicians, but whatever.
Silver: At the head of this development was a scientist known as Professor Gerald Robotnik, the granddad of a certain evil doctor who had a granddaughter named Maria.
Maverick: You might be asking what she had to do with anything. Well, she kinda had a disease which was killing her, and Gerald thought that the blood of this being could be the basis of a potential cure. After all, immortality.
Silver: After gathering a research team and setting up shop in the ARK, Gerald's team finally created the first prototype, which being a prototype... yeah it failed badly.
Maverick: This lizard thing, aka the "Biolizard", was incredibly violent, genocidal, and needed a life support system to survive. So Gerald took the easy way out and got another source to help him out, in this case being Gok... Black Doom! Yeah, Black Doom!
Silver: In return for Gerald's help in fifty years time, Black Doom gave his blood to the second prototype, and this new being ended up being a huge success.
Maverick: Too bad the government said "fuck that" to the alien deal, and decided to shut it down, killing everyone on board including Maria. Who thankfully sent the experiment off into space, where he... later got captured. Oh...
Silver: Luckily for the being though, Gerald's grandson Dr. Eggman, the guy we referred to earlier, freed him from his capture in the government's hidden base. And then he vowed to destroy the world alongside his new ally.
Maverick: But don't worry, he remembered that Maria told him to be a hero to humanity, not to kill it for revenge. Not that he really cared in the end, because he often found himself teaming up with either the heroes or the villains, depending on which one suited his goals best. Because why trust anyone when you have yourself?
Silver: Making himself known as a threat and friend to both sides, this black and red hedgehog was the esteemed Project Shadow, also known as Shadow the Hedgehog!
Maverick: Finding himself at odds with both sides of the Mobian war between Dr. Eggman and Sonic the Hedgehog, it was clear that Shadow really needed a good set of skills to keep his worth as the "ultimate life form". And he actually has it too. Being a Sonic character, Shadow takes advantage of his hedgehog physique to deliver some spiky blows.
Silver: Starting off with the basics, Shadow can perform the Spin Attack and Homing Attack. Both involve Shadow using his quills to drill through enemies, however in the case of the latter Shadow can target individual objects and dash towards them. Plus, he can chain them together repeatedly for multiple foes.
Maverick: For ground enemies, Shadow can also use the Spin Dash, a grounded attack that boosts Shadow at top speeds immediately.
Silver: Speaking off instant acceleration, Shadow can create an aura around himself by increasing his speed to immense heights. This is his Shadow Boost, the alternative to Sonic's Sonic Boost.
Maverick: Wow, that's the most creative name I could imagine! They really put effort into naming that one. Sarcasm aside, at least it gets the point across. What also gets the point across is the Light Speed Attack, which is a... light speed attack. 'Nuff said!
Silver: Alongside that, Shadow also has teleportation and mastery over Chaos Energy, which brings us to a huge part of Shadow's arsenal: his Chaos powers.
Maverick: You name something to do with, oh I dunno, the distortion of space-time itself, then more than likely it's one of Shadow's "Chaos" powers. Not that all of them are like that, so let's get them out of the way first.
Silver: The Chaos Spear is a ranged weapon which Shadow can fire or use as a melee weapon, and even comes in an extended variant in the form of the Chaos Lance. Then there's the Chaos Burst, a small burst of pure energy that Shadow can use much more aggressively in the form of the larger Chaos Blast.
Maverick: Alright, let's get into the space warping ones. With the Roaming Chaos move, Shadow can fire a condensed ball of Chaos Energy that roams around the arena, and with the Chaos Upper, Shadow charges dual blasts of energy in his hands that, you guessed it, act like an uppercut on his opponent. Then we have the Chaos Nightmare. Oooh, spooky. So what's this do, scare ya?
Silver: No, it doesn't actually. The Chaos Nightmare is a small rift in space-time that can damage opponents upon contact, and speaking of rifts, let's talk about the aptly named Chaos Rift.
Maverick: Opening up a disruption in space, Shadow can use the Chaos Rift to remove foes from the battlefield, or outright kill them by using it as a sort of a black hole attack, which is pretty OP ngl.
Silver: Are you going to start talking like that?
Maverick: Nah, not really. Hey, what about Shadow's most known Chaos ability: Chaos Control.
Silver: Don't be fooled by the game's version of this move. Because we're using Archie Shadow, let's look at the Archie version of this time stop.
Maverick: This time stop/teleportation power Shadow has has been stated to warp space and time, and it does far more than just warp space. In this continuity, Chaos Control has been shown through Sonic and for some reason Mega Man to be able to conceptually rewrite the entire multiverse upon full usage. Sure, that's through Super forms, but we'll get into that later. Oh, and for defensive options, Shadow has Shadow Guard and Shadow Heal. Try and guess what they do!
Silver: Not all of Shadow's capabilities come from Chaos, however. Thanks to one of the more... notorious games in the series, Shadow is stocked to the brim with pistols, machine guns, grenade launchers, katana swords, lasers, and even two pretty powerful guns. First is the "Satellite Gun", which is a gun Shadow uses to basically blow up shit with laser nukes.
Maverick: And the second, and my personal favourite, is the Shadow Rifle. A one-shotting laser gun with low ammo but massive firepower. Damn, a four foot tall hedgehog armed with guns and lasers! What were Sega smoking!?
Silver: The main reason for Shadow facing his opponent today though is his bike, the Dark Rider. It may sound like a heavy metal bike, but this bike is nothing more than a motorcycle.
Maverick: That's it? No missiles, guns, rockets, none of that? Aw man, I though it was going to be like Dead Rising.
Silver: Don't get too downhearted, because Shadow can still use whatever gun he has in his hands, even those that require more than two hands, like his grenade launchers for example. He may not pack massive heat like miniguns, but even on a motorcycle Shadow still has raw firepower on his side.
Maverick: Well, depending on the opponent, sometimes guns aren't enough for Shadow to win a fight. And that's where his forms come in. On a good day, Shadow can use the positive side of the Chaos Force within him to activate Hero Shadow, or use the dark side to become Dark Shadow. One's faster and the other's stronger. One specialises speeding through areas, the other is a bloodlusted berserker mode.
Silver: But that's not all, because Shadow has a hidden secret. When he takes off those rings on his wrist, Shadow taps into the pure higher dimensional energy of the Chaos Force itself. Far stronger, far faster and even being as powerful, if not more than his Super form, this transformation is certainly one to watch out for. Speaking of...
Maverick: That brings us to Super Shadow. Activated through the power of the seven Chaos Emeralds, this transformation boosts Shadow's speed and power immensely.
Silver: And don't be deceived by it's similar appearance to the Super Shadow from the games, this Shadow can match Super Sonic in power, whom we brought up before, has no time limit or energy limit, and is completely invulnerable. It's able to tank some pretty powerful attacks, and the form itself can dish out equally strong moves of its own.
Maverick: Again, that brings us nicely to what Shadow can do. He's fought Knuckles the Echidna to a standstill, survived a fall from space, and can match Sonic the Hedgehog himself in speed and strength, all in his base form.
Silver: For reference, this is the same Sonic who crossed the entire multiverse spanning Cosmic Interstate twice in the space of a few moments after getting lost, and the same Sonic who broke through Flash Man's time stop through movement alone.
Maverick: Granted, he was roboticised at the time, but Sonic's robotic self wasn't actually much stronger or faster than regular Sonic. If anything, he was merely bloodlusted and nothing else, sorta like Metal Sonic v3.0 if we had to draw comparisons.
Silver: Sonic has also tanked attacks from and even harmed universal beings such as Ixis Naugus, who created the entire Zone of Silence, and Shadow is physically superior to Omega, who harmed Feist, a...
Maverick: Holy shit is that a panda god!?! Screw Po, this guy is awesome. He reshaped the Zone of Silence into this Special Zone thing where Sonic usually grabs the Chaos Emeralds, and he's even got complete control over it!
Silver: That's impressive, sure, but compared to Super and Chaos Shadow, that's honestly not all that great. As we've mentioned, Shadow has that Chaos Control. While he hasn't used it like Sonic has, given that it is his move and has even been stated to disrupt reality, it makes sense to assume that he uses it or can use it in a similar way.
Maverick: He's also lifted the 900 million ton Black Comet, and in his Chaos Shadow state he even physically overpowered Enerjak. You know, a multiversal powered god!?
Silver: Now yes, while he did indeed get his ass handed to him not long after, Chaos Shadow draws power straight from the Chaos Force and the pure energy in his body itself. It should be reasonable to assume he's just as strong, if not stronger than Super Shadow. However, he may be the ultimate life form, but Shadow isn't the "perfect" life form.
Maverick: To sum it up politely... dude's a cocky little dick. Seriously, Shadow thinks he's superior to those he faces, and often only gets involved with things if it benefits him. Also, while he is immortal, he's not unkillable. Concept rewriting Chaos Control isn't his go to version, often preferring to time stop and teleport instead.
Silver: Not only that, but given that Shadow has guns, it makes sense for him to run out of ammo. And it's not like he carries any spares either. He also has a habit of getting bested by the likes of Sonic and Scourge.
Maverick: I mean, granted they're technically the same guy, but Sonic is the hero. Scourge is evil Sonic, so there's no reason for him to be the one that kicks Shadow's ass. Although he was in his Super form, but whatever.
Silver: Regardless of weaknesses, Shadow the Hedgehog is more than your typical Mobian hedgehog. Being all powerful and nigh-impossible to better in combat, you can bet Shadow deserves the title of the "Ultimate Life Form". No matter what, Shadow will always fight in Maria's name and for her wish.
"You have no control over me, Black Doom. I now understand why I am here. I made a promise and I'm here to keep it. Today, I put my past behind me."
Makoto[]
Silver: Ever since a young age, 17 year old Makoto Niijima was a teenage girl with a strong sense of justice.
Maverick: Yeah, see, her father was a cop, right? Well, given that he worked for the police, the same guys who regularly risk their lives tackling hardcore criminals, it wouldn't be long until he was killed in the line of duty. While this originally didn't have too much of an effect on Makoto's morals, eventuality it did take it's toll.
Silver: Her guardian, Makoto's older sister Sae, often put pressure on her younger sibling to try and reach a certain standard, given that she was pretty high up in law enforcement herself. Alongside having high expectations as class president of her school, Makoto eventually lost her self-worth and confidence, leading her to become submissive to orders from higher ups.
Maverick: Would've been fine with the school principal... if he wasn't supporting the career of a former Olympian turned teacher who was a little... okay, FAR too abusive of his students.
Silver: Suguru Kamoshida was a crazed sociopath of a teacher. Sexually abusing girls, forcing all students to train in what were essentially torture devices, even going so far as to pressure a young girl into killing herself (she survived, fortunately), yeah, overall he was a sick person. However, while everyone wanted Makoto to help put a stop to this, turns out that being submissive meant that even if she wanted to, Makoto couldn't really do much about it. It being both her loss in confidence, and stopping Kamoshida.
Maverick: That all changed though when her school was hit by the calling card of the Phantom Thieves, students of that same school who wanted to "change" Kamoshida's heart. Despite being very suspicious of the Thieves at first, plus Ryuji never shutting his mouth about it, PLUS the principal even forcing her to be questionable of them, Makoto was forced to blackmail the Thieves into helping her when, alongside the Kamoshida issue, there were reports of mafia related shit regarding some of the students.
Silver: Eventually Makoto joined the Phantom Thieves in their heart changing escapades under the name of "Queen", but first she needed one certain thing that they had. First she needed... a Persona.
Maverick: And damn, what a freakin' awesome Persona Makoto has too! This silver Honda NM4 looking bike with a face is Johanna, a regular name for such an awesome cycle.
Silver: As Makoto's Persona, Johanna can be used in combat against shadows and any enemies who challenges her and her team. Specifically, Johanna is resistant to different forms of nuclear attacks, but carries a weakness to psychic attacks.
Maverick: So... it's a bike Stand that can somehow shrug off nuclear powers? Seems unique, I'm sure this has got a lot more to it. Makoto can use Johanna to get around different places, be it pursuing or escaping from a target, or to even get into a race battle. Guess that's someone sorted for Death Race, am I right?
Silver: Alongside Johanna's speedy help, Makoto has access to a few unique tricks that cover certain attacks and defenses. This is an RPG after all. For offensive attacks, Makoto can use Vajra Blast, a medium damage move. And then there's Flash Bomb, which is pretty much the same only this move has a small chance of making a character dizzy.
Maverick: Those two are both physically damaging abilities, but Makoto can use various nuclear attacks such as Frei and Mafrei, both of which are light attacks. Then there's the much stronger ones, such as Freila and Freidyne, which deliver medium and heavy damage respectively. There's even wider ranged versions of these moves too! But wait, there's more!
Silver: When heavy damage nuclear abilities still aren't enough, Makoto can bring out her severely damaging nuclear power, Atomic Flare.
Maverick: This skill is the strongest of the lot, not to mention that Makoto isn't just limited to it's base damage output. With Nuke Boost, Makoto can buff her nuclear abilities up by 25%, and with Nuke Amp she can boost it up by another 50%. Overall, she's damn powerful in terms of nuclear power. She's Homer Simpson's worst nightmare!
Silver: Alongside offense, Makoto also has your typical defence buffs and healing skills, including Mediarama and Mediarahan for the latter, and Marakukaja for the former. They also do the same for her allies too, but given that this is a Death Battle, where we don't allow outside help, that trait becomes pretty pointless. Still, it works for Makoto, who can also awaken a much superior version of Johanna.
Maverick: Yep, this is her ultimate Persona, Anat. Basically Johanna is something like a Transformer as Anat, and not only is she much more powerful, she even has her own blade and is both completely immune to nuclear attacks and more likely to dodge psychic attacks. Damn, Makoto's got some firepower at her disposal.
Silver: Not that Makoto herself is one to be underestimated either. Makoto is skilled in Aikido and knows some hand-to-hand combat skills, which are massively helped by her knuckle dusters.
Maverick: Ooooh, they're spiked and everything!
Silver: Makoto can use these to boost her physical strength, allowing her to deal heavy physical damage on a victim. However, that's not all Makoto has to use when she's without her persona. It may seem mundane at first, but Makoto is a crack shot when using her revolver.
Maverick: Wait, 17 years old, uses a revolver? Sounds an awful lot like a certain gangster who fought that emo symmetry kid a while ago, right?
Silver: Yeah, except Makoto's revolver is in fact a lot more powerful. You remember Joker from that fight that this is a follow up to? Makoto's got similar skills with her firearm, and is just as good at aiming it as Joker is.
Maverick: So does she shoot Murray in the head like Joker... oh wait, wrong Joker. Sorry.
Silver: It may seem like Makoto is just a normal girl without her Persona, but she has some feats to disprove that, like the time she punched a giant building sized mech and took it down with her teammates! Pretty impressive, but not as impressive as her reactions.
Maverick: For being a teenage schoolgirl, Makoto's is really quick to avoid attacks. She is on par with her teammates, who can avoid attacks like Morning Star. Now, these aren't simple light speed attacks, these are attacks that cross light years in only a few moments. With speed like that, we're looking at speeds that reach speeds over 170 million times faster than the speed of light, and Makoto can avoid that with ease!
Silver: And that's not even the half of it. Another attack is pretty much a galaxy wide explosion, and even that can be avoided with ease too. And this isn't just her Persona, this includes Makoto herself.
Maverick: And you thought defeating that Piggytron mech was impressive. Yeah, spoilers for those that haven't seen Persona 5, even though it's literally a four year old game I don't know why you wouldn't have, but Makoto and her team took down and even survived attacks from this god known as... Ummmm...
Silver: Yaldabaoth.
Maverick: That's the one!
Silver: To give off an estimation of Yaldabaoth's power, this godly being was capable of merging both the Metaverse and reality itself together. Like her allies, Makoto was able to tank attacks from Yaldabaoth, and not only that, she also managed to show some resistance to complete existence erasure.
Maverick: Damn! So she's sorta like Medaka Kurokami in a way. The perfect schoolgirl who's also a school council president!
Silver: Ehhhh, not quite. See, alongside the aforementioned weakness to psychic attacks, Makoto also has a lack of experience fighting by herself. She's better alongside the other Phantom Thieves, and isn't so great alone.
Maverick: She's also got quite the temper on her, and she can be quite emotional, because she's a teenage girl and all. Oh, and she's afraid of the dark. Given her opponent today... heh heh, it's actually kinda funny. Also forgot, Joanna, being a bike and all, isn't actually the best for physical attacks. Anat is the Persona for that kinda stuff, though even that has limits.
Silver: However, weaknesses or not, Makoto is one of the better of the Phantom Thieves. Her time with the team actually helped her confidence and self-esteem, and after she aided in the defeat of Sae's shadow...
Maverick: Who's also pretty hot, by the way!
Silver:...Makoto and Sae ended up mending their broken relationship. Even if she was pressured into doubting them, the Phantom Thieves have done a lot for Makoto's life, and without her self-confidence and strong sense of justice, they probably wouldn't have gotten far either. She truly deserves her code name of "Queen".
"This time I'm not seeking anyone's praise, and I'm not trying to show off my intelligence. I simply want to fulfill my own personal goals and dreams."
Interlude[]
Silver: Alright, the combatants are set and we've run the data through all possibilities.
Maverick: It's time for a DEATH BAAAATTTTLLLLEEEE!!!
Death Battle[]
An abandoned city. Buildings were still standing upright and fully intact, yet there were no people and no cars. Everything was silent. Not even s single bird or animal was around either, making the city nothing more than a shell of its former self. However, not all was quiet, the revving sounds of a motorcycle engine roaring through the remains of the city's society.
His black bike reflected the sun's rays, and it's red markings stood out from the sleek, dark design, giving the bike a similar look to it's rider. This was none other than G.U.N's special agent and the "ultimate life form" Shadow the Hedgehog, who was cruising in the city on a search mission: the search for Sonic the Hedgehog.
Reports last saw the blue blur in Green Hill Zone, fighting an unknown assailant until he and the enemy disappeared without a trace. The government didn't have any data on said assailant, giving off the impression that he was either from another world, or he was one of those mysterious "Phantom Thieves" that Shadow had heard directly from Princess Sally Acorn. Whatever the case may have been, no matter how much he didn't give a crap about what happened to his rival, Shadow had no other option but to answer the call for help. However, his thoughts were interrupted as he saw another bike racing along on the road at the other end of the short lanes he was passing.
A top down view showed two parallel lanes with several city blocks separating the two, sort of like a "H" shape, with the connecting lanes being pretty short compared to the bigger stretch of road. Shadow, on the right hand side of said "H", looked across to see that the other bike had matched his pace. "Who's this joker?" Shadow asked himself, proceeding to throw quick glances his adversary's way.
Meanwhile, the racer on the other side did the same. Her short, brown hair was blowing backwards thanks to the wind, and the only protection she had was her metal mask on her face. This was Makoto Niijima, and like Shadow she was on a mission: to find Joker.
Both Shadow and Makoto had lost their allies to an unknown anomaly which had something to do with each other, but the only thing on their minds now were each other. The roads separating the duo were short enough that they could hear one another, even with buildings separating the two on occasion, so it was time to find out what was going on.
"I assume that "joker" is me?" the teenager yelled over to the black and red hedgehog, who focused on the road ahead of him. Makoto, taking this as a "yes", turned her attention back to the road, but not before calling over to Shadow. "You know, I'm looking for a friend. Could use some help from someone who's connected to the reason why he's gone!" she yelled, recognising the person to be a similar appearance to Joker's last reported witness/assailant. Shadow didn't bother looking back, but still replied. "Yeah, could say the same about you!"
Makoto and Shadow raced each other and glanced at one another until they both locked eyes. It was going to be a battle towards the truth. Phantom Thief versus Freedom Fighter, "Queen" versus "Ultimate".
FIGHT!!!
As soon as both fighters reached the final city block, they simultaneously swung their bikes around at a 90 degree angle until they both sat diagonally from each other. The street became filled with revving from Makoto's Johanna and Shadow's Dark Rider, as both motorcycles raced towards each other as if they were jousting, popping a short wheelie as they started accelerating. Both bikes scraped the side of the other, black paint chipping away from Shadow's machine as Johanna had suffered a minor scratch. The duo stopped at the opposite end of where they started, facing each other once more. Again, they raced forward, colliding sides just barely enough to throw both riders slightly off balance. It still wasn't enough to throw the other off their cycle completely, but it came close.
This time around, the bikes were facing down the opposite way of where they came, with both having returned to their original road sides. "How about we settle this backwards?" Shadow asked the girl, who giggled. "Funny, I was about to ask you the same thing!" she returned, both clearly showing that they're having fun doing this (yes, even Shadow believe it or not).
Starting their race back the way they came, it was neck and neck between the two. Makoto and Shadow both locked glances again, only this time both brought out a firearm, namely Shadow's pistol and Makoto's revolver. Every chance they got, after passing the buildings and being able to spot the other again, they fired. First round, both bullets collided with one another, second round they did the same, but in a way which sent both shots sailing past their intended target, and the third ended up missing entirety. However, there was only one round of ammo left in both weapons, prompting the agent and Phantom Thief to stop by the fourth and face each other yet again.
This time however the combatants immediately darted forwards in what was going to be a head on collision, with both pointing their guns at each other. Makoto tried aiming for a direct strike to Shadow's forehead, but the hedgehog easily threw his head to the side as his fired his last bullet at Johanna's front wheel. It connected, as Makoto suddenly started swinging side to side as Shadow slammed his brakes and force the bike to an immediate stop, sending himself flying over the handlebars. Makoto had stood up, and ejected herself from her seat, but right into the path of a roundhouse kick from a catapulted Shadow.
The kick hit her face hard enough to send her flying backwards, crashing to and rolling on the ground. Shadow's bike fell on it's side while the Persona did the same, only sliding thanks to its continuing velocity. Then it stopped upon impact with a building, behind Shadow as he landed on the ground in front of Niijima.
"Alright, who's this "friend" of yours?" Shadow started questioning, walking towards Makoto who started to stand up. Feeling confident, Makoto replied with a quick response. "Like I'm going to tell you!" as she put her hands up in a boxing kind of style. Shadow huffed "Guess I'm going to have to find out myself." as he threw a right fist towards Makoto, who blocked with her left wrist. It was time for a fistfight, so Makoto prepared her Tekko knuckles as she threw a couple of quick jabs at Shadow. Needing to avoid the metal spikes on the dusters, Shadow weaved side to side, avoiding both only to be taken down by a boot to the face. Rolling back as Makoto tried stomping down on his head, Shadow equipped a pair of machine guns and began firing, Makoto performing backflips that the bullets missed entirely.
Throwing them to the side, Shadow disappeared from Makoto's vision. "What?" she asked herself, only to be kicked in the back of the head by a swift kick from Shadow, sending Makoto forwards before he teleported again, this time ending up in front of the Phantom Thief and delivering a Homing Attack to her face. Makoto once again crashed across the ground, but recovered and jumped high into the air, hoping to connect a kick to Shadow's face.
"A healer, huh? Chaos Spear!"
Shadow fired the lance of Chaos energy at Makoto, who left her kicking stance and instead prepared herself to catch the spear of energy, throwing it back at Shadow. "Right back at you!" Shadow, forced into evasive action, dived out of the way as the spear embedded itself into the ground. Being out of her intended reach, Makoto was left to land on the ground, but thankfully she was fast enough to react to a Spin Dash from Shadow, holding the hedgehog in place until he bounced back.
Both looked at one another again, nowhere near exhausted and still bloodlusted towards each other. "What's with the metal? You scared?" Shadow taunted, with Makoto immediately taking off her Tekkos in response to the snarky comment. "Bring it! I'm not afraid of punching a boy!" she told her foe, as the two sped up towards each other, throwing a sharp punch that involved their fists colliding, not once, not twice, but three times over three separate punches. Buildings shook, the ground around them cracked, and there was no clear winner, leaving Shadow to laugh. "Ha, is that so?" he continued taunting, teleporting again and showing up behind Makoto...
Who turned and grabbed Shadow's outstretched leg as it was about to hit her. "Cheap trick, but I can be just as dirty!" she said to the stunned hedgehog, who immediately activated Shadow Guard before Makoto could punch him in the groin. The teenager stumbled back as Shadow rotated himself and landed on his feet, grabbing Makoto's collar and charging up dual blasts of energy in one powerful Chaos Upper, which threw Makoto into the air like a ragdoll. Then she was met by a quick midair roundhouse kick from her opponent, which forced her down into the ground below.
Shadow landed safely next to where Makoto had landed, and started to walk away. "Hmmph, what a pathetic kid." he told himself, clearly not impressed with how easily he took his foe out. Unfortunately, the ultimate life form was wrong to assume, the elbow of a blur slamming into him and sending him flying into the side of a building. Embedded into the wall, Shadow watched as a bleeding Makoto stood up on her two feet, her mask now off her face and in her hands. "I'm not done!" she yelled out, as her upgraded Persona, Anat, had made its way to Makoto's side. "Vajra Blast!" yelled Makoto, as the attack connected with its target.
A gaping hole was left in the skyscraper, as Shadow had been forced into the building itself. Standing up, Shadow tried to boost out, but Makoto stood by the damaged section and blasted Shadow back again. However, this time she drew blood, and thanks to Anat's increased strength, the building collapsed on top of Shadow's beaten body. Despite having stood next to it when it fell, Makoto was barely fazed, turning around and walking away from the debris, her Persona tagging along with her. "How's that for a pathetic kid?" the girl said, smirking in victory.
That was until she heard seven shining sparkles entering the building. She turned around just in time to see that the debris exploded in a flash of light, and out of it came a golden hedgehog with red streaks. Slowly emerging from where the building had fell in on itself, Super Shadow stared Makoto and her Persona down. This was the final straw, he had to win this, he had to find Mobius' hero, as much as he didn't want to. This was ending now.
Makoto rushed over to the Chaos powered hedgehog, and threw several blasts at him. To Makoto's dismay, the shots that hit Shadow didn't do any damage, leaving her saying "How in the hell?". Even her subsequent punches and Atomic Flare didn't do a bit of damage to the golden form, even with its power buffs. To make matters worse, Shadow had suddenly grabbed Makoto by her collar before she could even fathom a thought, and began taking her through the atmosphere, flying higher and higher and higher until they reached the vast reaches of space. Unable to breathe, Makoto was left helpless as Shadow shouted "CHAOS CONTROL!!!", to which time suddenly stopped around him.
Charging a blast of pure Chaos energy in his hand, Shadow yelled "Chaos Lance!", the spear of energy stopping right before impaling Makoto. Then, he snapped his fingers nonchalantly, as the flow of time resumed once more, the Lance striking the Phantom Thief through her chest. Blood flowed in the dark, airless void, as Shadow grabbed Makoto by the leg and started blasting off towards the planet again. As soon as they had passed the clouds, Shadow threw the teen into the ground, creating a massive crater that decimated the entire city block they were fighting in. To finish his assault off, Shadow slammed his red hot re-entry Spin Attack into Makoto's body, now completely destroying the entire city and causing the entire country of Japan to shake immensely after an ensuring "CHAOS... BLAST!!!".
Once the dust had settled, Shadow was revealed standing on the ground, within the massive hole in the ground. Looking back, Shadow saw nothing of Makoto's body, indicating that she was wiped out and that he had won. "Hmmph, didn't even go all out. Whatever." the ultimate life form chuckled, having proven his title. "Now... where on Mobius is that damned "faker"!"
KO!
- Shadow received a call from Rouge, telling him that Sonic had suddenly reappeared in the Green Hill Zone. Huffing in frustration, Shadow readied his bike and drove off.
- In the same area, a crocodile and a young woman in what appeared to be a police uniform had showed up, examining the damaged area. It wouldn't be long until they bumped into each other.
Results[]
Maverick: Aww man, there goes best girl. Well, at least I've still got Kawakami! Hell yeah!
Silver: Blow for blow, on paper it seemed that Shadow and Makoto didn't actually have an advantage over the other. However, the end result was much more obvious than it seems.
Maverick: Of course it was! Shadow had to spend most of the fight not only fighting Makoto, but having to deal with her skills and her Personas at the same time.
Silver: Looking at base form Shadow and Makoto at her peak, we found that there wasn't much separating the two. Anything Makoto could do, Shadow could do too, but neither could really exploit the other's weaknesses. Overall, it seemed pretty evenly matched, with both scaling to universal beings at their highest and both having buffs in power and defence. Both could even heal too. Again, it seemed even.
Maverick: Until we brought in the key decider: speed.
Silver: Makoto's speed feats are impressive. After all, she has avoided Lucifer's Morning Star attack, which we showed could move 170 million times past the speed of light. Unfortunately for her though, that was absolutely pitiful compared to Shadow.
Maverick: Yeah, Shadow always matches Sonic in speed, right? It's always hinted at, outright mentioned and even shown in their every encounter, so it seems reasonable that he should scale. Well, given that we're talking about Archie Sonic here, let's look at two of his greatest speed feats.
Silver: The first we found was the feat where Sonic ran across the entire Cosmic Interstate in mere moments. Thanks to some helpful calculations, we found that at best this feat could be considered as being over 1.6 septillion times faster than the speed of light. That's 24 zeroes long, whereas Makoto's is far, far lower.
Maverick: That's what I call a speed blitz, holy shit. And that's not all, the second feat shows that in his roboticised form, which shouldn't be too far off regular Sonic, the blue blur can move in stopped time, as seen in his fight with Flash Man. While less solid compared to the previous feat, this could be an argument for infinite speed Sonic, and Shadow most definitely scales even if it is or isn't legit.
Silver: Therefore, that brings us down to Super and Chaos Shadow, possibly the confirming factor in this battle.
Maverick: Contributing to the defeat of a universe fusing god like Yaldabaoth seems cool and all, but when you can overpower a multiversal god like Enerjak and even stand up to other, similarly powered Super forms like Super Sonic, who also have immeasurable speed through moving in Solaris' dimensions and outrunning the flow of time itself... yeahhhhh.
Silver: And don't forget, while Makoto has resisted existence erasure before, Shadow's Chaos Control equivalent isn't a basic existence eraser.
Maverick: Yeah, it completely rewrites the concept of your existence, rather than simply erasing. So yeah, she had nothing against an unhinged Super Shadow at the end of the day.
Silver: While Makoto certainly was one of the strongest Phantom Thieves in Persona 5, and certainly can handle herself in a fight, Shadow's experience, power, overwhelmingly better speed and more devastating abilities were definitely more than enough to guarantee an easy victory.
Maverick: Safe to say that Shadow raced away with this victory today. He definitely is the ultimate life form.
Silver: The winner is Shadow the Hedgehog!
Next Time[]
A long awaited rematch...
Between two sadistic killers...
Who's looks can be deceiving.