The clearing encircled them like a colosseum would, its boundaries defined by luminescent flowers and markings holding back the encroaching dusk of night. Above their heads, clouds continued to gather unnaturally —far too low, far too organized to label them as a mere meteorological occurrence.
Neon would’ve loved to examine them further, or to map better the positions of their newly arrived opponents, but the redhead sharing the center stage with him demanded more immediate focus.
“Hey, buddy! I’m talking to you!” CC’s flames continued to swirl threateningly in frustrated spurts around her arms. She was dressed in a prison outfit akin to Gnaw’s, though hers had been cropped and knotted into something more stylish. Grr, this wasn’t the time to be appreciating any fashion statements. “Think you can just walk into our turf and then ignore me?”
“My bad.” Her brazen attitude robbed a mocking laugh out of Neon. Awfully entitled for someone who had jumped at them without as much as a warning. “Must’ve missed the Beware of Dog signs.”
“Oooh, fighting words! Wanna see me shove the smartass attitude right up your—”
“CC. That’s more than enough.” A new voice cut through their bickering with quiet authority, carried by one of the figures descending from the ridge with calm but firm steps.
[Contestant 190, Teitai.] <>
[She/Her. Team Ashen Bloom. Rookie. Respawned.]
Neon quickly catalogued the information emerging near her, but his eyes were already discerning that which the system couldn’t tell him.
Teitai carried herself with the ironclad discipline of someone who had learnt it through hardship rather than etiquette training. Heavy, yet still somehow graceful in execution. Like a war-worn shield still bearing ceremonial engravings. Her ash-silver hair shimmered in white following the pulse of Light Infection, styled into severe bangs and pulled into a rigid ponytail.
She wore a faded blue jumpsuit that Neon recognized from construction side workers. While the trousers fell in loose folds that extended to steel-toed boots, the upper half hung from her waist, revealing a sleeveless white shirt beneath. Or perhaps it had been white some lifetime ago. Now it depicted a history of toil similar to the one her sullied clothes carried.
Yet despite the bulk of her muscles and fabric, and the severity of her eyes, Neon calculated she couldn’t be all that much older than him or Nomine.
“But Tei…”
“We don’t know how dangerous they are yet.” Teitai kept a leveled but commanding voice, even as her stare locked with Nomine’s in a silent standoff. “I’ll do the veteran. CC, do your part by checking on the rookie.”
>> “Mr. Whisper, if you could please begin?”
A third figure shuffled forward after being called, brimming with nervous, reluctant energy.
[Contestant 177, Whisper.] <>
[He/Him. Team Hushhouse. Rookie. Respawned.]
Neon’s chest tightened as he took in the old man. Whisper looked like he belonged in a library reading to children, not some hunting game in a fabricated jungle. Brown corduroy blazer worn soft at the elbows, slacks that clung to his belly, and balding gray hair that refused to stay combed in place.
Through the gentle concern of Whisper’s green eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses, Neon recognized his nature almost immediately. This old man was someone who’d spent his entire life trying to be kind and helpful. Someone whom other people reached whenever they needed comfort. Someone who had never in his life thrown a punch, let alone participate in something like this.
What wasn’t clear yet was the reason for Whisper to assist a different team. Was he being forced to? Blackmailed for the safety of his teammate?
None of those considerations mattered to Nomine. He moved like death itself, without any wasted moment or statement to telegraph his intentions. Neon could barely track his movements, taking him only seconds to cross the clearing and becoming a tangible, unavoidable threat to their opponents.
His trajectory painted a very clear picture. Nomine wasn’t going for Teitai. He was targeting Whisper.
Whether it was because Nomine had somehow decided the old man presented the greatest threat, or if he simply saw him as the weakest link in the enemy lines, his blade now sang towards Whisper with the ruthless efficiency of an execution order. Neon had to force himself to not look away from the impending violence.
A quick reaction came next. One to defy his previous assumptions. In an astonishing display of reflexes, Teitai recklessly threw herself between Nomine and Whisper, her boots digging furrows in the jungle floor as she shielded the older man. The body language in her posture spoke volumes —it was as if she freely offered her flesh in sacrifice for his safety.
Of course, she didn’t just take the hit. Her retaliation truly began once Nomine had no obvious paths to a Whisper who didn’t look like a hostage any longer.
After an understated gesture of her hand, an explosion erupted along Black Metal’s edge, detonating the seven-pointed sigil in a cascade of searing white radiance. The blast forced Nomine to stagger, breaking his offensive as light-fire consumed the air around his weapon.
Light Infection. She had the ability to detonate them.
Teitai exploited the opening created by the explosion, fists blazing with fresh new sigils as she lunged them towards Nomine’s ribs. The veteran recovered with frightening speed, repositioning Black Metal to intercept her strikes.
Those new lotus marks wrapped around the places where steel met hands. One, two, three ticking bombs accumulating on Nomine’s blade. She retreated back to Whisper the instant his feet finished stabilizing, denying him the opportunity to counter-attack.
“I had expected the explosion to destroy the blade. Or at least to disarm you.” Teitai’s voice carried the same calm she used to reprimand CC, knuckles popping with the casual confidence of someone who knew they had the upper hand. Still, her expression remained severe and stern throughout. “You’re certainly impressive, if not a bit stubborn.”
>> “Only one trait, though? I find that hard to believe, for a veteran. There’s more to you, am I wrong?”
Nomine answered none of her questions. He simply extended his blade with an unascertainable expression, checking the marks now consolidating across Black Metal. The katana was a loaded weapon by now. One against him. His only other alternative was discarding it and risk getting a Light Infection on his own body.
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Instinct overrode caution, leading Neon to step towards him. She wasn’t a good matchup for Nomine… But he wanted to see how Teitai would manage against fire. If I’m Burning was already igniting in his fingers as he—
“Oh no, you don’t!”
Neon barely managed to back off from the wall of fire that quickly rose to devour him whole, fading away for a CC that bounced in to block his path. She wore the grin of someone who genuinely enjoyed the chaos.
“Well, it doesn’t matter what powerful augment you’re hiding.” Teitai’s voice carried across the clearing, addressing Nomine’s continued silence. “You won’t get the chance to use them.”
Thunder growled overhead as the storm clouds pressed even lower, rolling like the walls of an oppressive skybox in descent. Whisper’s concentration only deepened despite the skirmish unfolding before him, his hands firmly clasped together.
And without any courtesy of soft drizzle to serve as a warning, a monsoon broke loose and swept down the clearing.
It fell in heavy curtains of azure rain, catching and refracting any stray light until the clearing transformed into a spectacle of liquid sapphire. The precipitation struck Neon’s skin with a surprising weight, soaking through his clothes in seconds and leaving him blinking in confusion at the strange blue liquid coursing down his raised hands.
CC sent a mocking chuckle his way, though her flames hissed and died just the same under the downpour.
“Hate to break it to you, but you’ve already lost.”
The pop-up materialized in his interface like a verdict.
[Skill: Stormy Weather Lvl 1]
War waits for the storm to pass.
Yet he felt… Nothing. No immediate change, pain, nor any rush of sensations. Something had changed, that much was certain. He could tell by how the atmosphere itself felt heavy, pressing against his senses without revealing its nature.
Then he saw Nomine’s hand tremble.
Black Metal wavered anomalously out of character, Nomine’s arms spasming as if his own muscles had turned mutinous. His perfect combat stance fractured, turning stilted and incomplete. A hairline cracked in the veteran’s arctic features. One of frustration.
Meanwhile, Teitai’s posture relaxed considerably. She sighed, her shoulders dropping with an almost leisurely relief, stepping closer to Nomine as if he’d suddenly stopped posing any danger.
“I will explain this to you both.” She began, darting a glance to Neon as well. “Mr. Whisper’s Stormy Weather prevents any hostile actions from anyone its rain touches. You can’t attack us, but neither can we.”
So a pacification effect? That was easy enough to understand, but it wasn’t the same with all the implications Teitai’s word carried. What was her endgame here? Why was she explaining her strategy so openly?
It could only be she was just that confident.
“Of course…” Teitai continued, circling Nomine like a predator studying a trapped prey. “This only applies to offensive augments. Ones that can cause direct harm to others. I can’t detonate Light Infection right now, for example.”
She reached out with deliberate casualness, patting Nomine’s shoulder with stiff, mock camaraderie.
“But it won’t keep me from placing more of them.” Confirmation came immediately after, another lotus sigil blooming across the black fabric of his undersuit. “The system doesn’t register my marking as an attack.”
So that was her checkmate. Teitai wasn’t monologuing out of arrogance or cruelty like a villain detailing their dastardly plot. She was demonstrating the absolute control they would soon hold over them both.
Did she want them to give up? To acknowledge that resistance was hopeless? Was it to drive them away, or… A means to subjugate them into compliance like how she had probably done with Whisper?
Perhaps it was pride that kept Nomine from moving away, only narrowing his eyes with spite as Teitai patted him repeatedly, each touch spreading yet another Light Infection —one in each shoulder, two more to the sides of his torso, and a final one at the center of his back. His muscles coiled under an unresolved strain, but whether that was a result of disgust at her touch or fury at his own helplessness, Neon couldn’t tell.
It wasn’t like he had lost all faith in Nomine’s ability to take care of himself, yet the moment Teitai stepped away he simply… Exhaled. A long, controlled breath that drained all the tension from his frame. Black Metal dissolved into nothingness to leave his hands empty, and he just crossed his arms in resignation. Only his eyes kept an inkling of his focused fierceness, making Whisper tremble under his uninterrupted glare.
Teitai’s focus then swiveled towards Neon like a loaded gun taking aim, making his pulse race inside his chest. Was this it? Game Over? Each step she took across the rain-slicked clearing felt like a countdown, bringing her closer to marking him with her inescapable sigils.
The blue rain made his messy hair fall flat across his eyes, its drumming a reminder of his lack of ability and power. It should have felt like defeat, and yet… It made his teeth grind themselves together.
Lack of power? Really? Since when did he roll over and accept what others told him without a fight?
His mind raced through the schematics of Teitai’s explanation, dissecting it like a potentially exploitable glitch in a broken game. Stormy Weather enacted a clause on hostile actions. On Attacks. She’d been plenty clear about that distinction. So then…
“Know what?” Neon’s voice steadied under the monsoon’s percussion, carrying his own signature brand of amused defiance. “I think I’ll pass on that whole stand-there-and-get-branded thing.”
If I’m Burning roared to life once more in his fingers, flames racing across his descending arms like banners of rebellion. Not towards Teitai. That would be an attack. But the ground beneath their feet? That was fair game.
A compact geyser of superheated soil exploded between them, launching Neon backwards in an unsteady but effective vault that built him some precious distance. Chunks of displaced jungle floor joined the falling rain, forcing both CC and Teitai to also move away in order to dodge.
“What the… Shit!” The redhead cursed as dirt and debris cascaded over her. Had she just jumped to shield her surprised leader like a little lemming bodyguard? “You fucker!”
>> “How is that possible!? Shouldn’t augments have been—”
“I’m not trying to hurt you. Very sorry if it happened anyway.” Neon called out as he landed, adrenaline making him grin through the ache in his legs. “Only thing I want is to keep you the hell away. Seems like the system doesn’t exactly register that as an attack either.”
Victory blazed both in his chest and his fingertips, though uncertainty remained the dominant force. Neon had bought himself some breathing room, sure, but for how long could he prolong this twisted game of tag?
And Nomine… He couldn’t exactly carry his partner out bridal-style, could he? The veteran seemed to have made his choice already, but Neon refused to accept surrender as their only option.
His eyes darted between the three opponents, reading their positions like pieces on a board. CC looked ready to incinerate him out of pure spite, rain be damned —Which was good! It meant she wouldn’t be able to do anything against him. Whisper maintained his trembling focus near Nomine, and so the downpour wouldn’t be going anywhere anytime soon, probably. And Teitai…
Teitai’s expression had softened again after the shock. She straightened her posture as she backpedaled from the crater Neon had carved, brushing mud from her faded jumpsuit with movements that spoke of neither anger nor ill will.
“You’re funny. I like you, Neon.” Her words emerged with startling warmth, the commanding tone peeling away like an armor that no longer had any use. “A bloodthirsty person would’ve never been able to carry out that silly line of logic.”
>> “Their hostility and rage would’ve triumphed, but none of that stopped you from using that augment. Even CC can’t manage that.”
She sighed as if to calm herself just the same, resting a hand against her chest as severity melted from her dark indigo eyes into something almost vulnerable.
“Please forgive me if I scared you. I never meant to hurt you two or to mark you into submission.” Her voice quickly regained its steel, even when it was clear she was still navigating unclear waters. “I would like it if all of us could work together. To help each other survive through all this madness.”
Neon’s brain stuttered to a halt, his defensive flames guttering out in pure confusion. The clearing fell silent aside from the steady drum of artificial rain and a subdued, bitter puff from CC.
Wait, what?
What did she just say?