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The Asuran's aura-clad fist impacted Max's chest with such force that it sent him hurtling backward. His back slammed into jagged rock, only his composite armor preventing his spine from snapping like a twig.

He rose to all fours and wheezed in a breath. The Asuran approached unhurriedly, his four-armed figure wreathed in energies cultivated for centuries. *Help*, Max pleaded for the umpteenth time, but the message in the right corner of his vision remained unchanged.

*Request pending*.

"I don't understand how your puny kind hasn't been eradicated," the Asuran thundered, kicking away the rifle Max had dropped. "Take your toys away, and you're nothing."

Max tried to scamper away, but the Asuran caught up, grabbed him by the neck, and yanked him upright with nary an effort. Max held onto the bear-like arm and struggled to draw breath, reaching for the knife at his belt. *Help help help*.

*Request pending.*

The Asuran sneered. "Look at you. The weakest creatures in the galaxy, yet you persist like cockroaches. It boggles the mind."

"Fuck... you," Max gritted out, and stabbed the Asuran's forearm with the knife. Compressed gas shot out of the blade's tip at 1,000psi, bursting skin and flesh in a spray of gore.

The Asuran roared and tossed him aside. The energies surrounding him flared, creating a wind so strong that Max had to shield his eyes. Cradling his torn arm, the Asuran drew his sword and glared at him. Max raised his knife, but it looked laughable in comparison. *For fuck's sake*, *what's the holdup*—

*Request approved. Intervention in progress.*

Max's mouth opened in a silent scream as terabytes of knowledge flooded his mind. Dozens of digital presences flowed into his cybernetics, revitalizing his body and optimizing its functions.

The Asuran blitzed forward and stabbed at his head. Without Max's conscious volition, his body jerked sideways just enough so that the tip of the blade sank into the rock. Grabbing onto it for leverage, Max sprang forward and slashed at the Asuran's throat.

The Asuran jumped back, felt the scratch on his neck, and stared at the blood. Some other emotion besides fury entered his eyes. "*How*? You're no martial artist."

"You're not fighting me anymore," Max said, adjusting the grip on his knife. "You're fighting humanity."

He sprang forth, driven by impulses his organic brain was too slow to process. *Duck under a slash*. *Score at the ribs*. *Too shallow*; *adjust*. He received a blow on the cheek but only spat out a tooth and grinned, the cybernetics neutralizing his pain. The vents of his armor howled to dissipate the heat of his enhanced muscles and processors until a haze of heated air surrounded him like an aura of his own. Each attack he avoided by a hair's breadth, each opening he exploited without mercy or hesitation.

The Asuran's face twisted in disbelief, then anger, then desperation. Sweat poured from his brow, and blood oozed from dozens of cuts left by Max's knife, yet he fought on. The pride of a cultivator would never allow him to retreat from a *human*.

*Warning*. *Heat levels critical*.

Max thought furiously even as his body contorted to avoid a thrust of the sword and retaliated from an unpredictable angle. He allowed blood to pool in his mouth, waited for an opportune moment, and spat into the Asuran's eyes.

The Asuran flinched for a split-second. Max's hand shot up to drive the knife under his chin and into the skull. The Asuran's enormous body convulsed and toppled onto the rock, the sword clanging down beside him. Max collapsed on his knees and panted as his limbs became his again.

*Registering new strategy: Bloodspit.*

He wiped his lips with the back of his hand—the armored glove had shattered at some point—and laughed tiredly. "C'mon, at least give it a better name."

The wind picked up abruptly, shrieking through the rocky valley. Max raised his head, and the laughter died in his throat. A dozen of Asurans stood at the valley's edges, peering at the scene below with hatred and disbelief. He swore inwardly and rose to his feet. The digital minds inside him stirred once more.

*Estimated chances of survival at 0.094%.*

"So there was more of you wreaking havoc in our territory," Max drawled, strolling toward his fallen rifle. "I hope you'll give me a better challenge than that guy. He begged for mercy in the end."

The outcry from the Asurans made the ground tremble and pebbles roll down the valley's slopes. Max lunged for his rifle, rolled upright, and trained the sights on the nearest enemy. "Eat plasma," he snarled, and opened fire.

*Estimated chances of survival at 0.007%.*

The burst of relativistic rounds tore the Asuran's torso apart. Max whirled onto another target, only to gasp as a sword entered through his back and emerged from his chest. His left hand found his knife and stabbed backward blindly, eliciting a cry.

*Fatal injury detected. Activating Last Protocol.*

Another Asuran slashed at his left arm, cleaving through armor and muscle. Max turned, stumbled, and squeezed the trigger, sending a series of rounds into the ground. His arm holding the knife spasmed uselessly, so damaged even the cybernetics couldn't move it. A second sword pierced his chest, then a third, feeling like little more than dull impacts. Yet even as his vision faded, his lips twisted into a bloody grin.

*Cessation of bodily functions confirmed*. *Starting upload.*

Power surged through his cybernetics a final time as they beamed his mind toward the center of human space, where his experience and skills would contribute to the whole. If a consciousness in transit could laugh, Max would have done so. When humans next faced the Asurans, they would be just a little bit stronger. And one day, it would prove enough.

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Submitted by andrius-b on Wed, Mar 30, 2022 to /r/WritingPrompts/

The prompt

Civilizations in the galaxy all use magic, biomanipulation, psionics, runes, faith, or cultivation. Humanity's god chose the hardest path for us - technology. But technology has some surprises the others do not.