Woop, new chapter. Uh, I feel like I got this one out sooner than I thought. Hmm...maybe it's because I have less things to do once swim practice starts again. Oh well. Oh yea, I created a very...simple and basic cover for this story. I made it in like 10 minutes lol. I also got my first profile pic. of one of my favorite game characters. Even if the game is shit now, I still really like Add from Elsword. Primarily Diabolic Esper. Unfortunately I don't necessarily like the wallpapers made for him.

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The next day, Kyte walked out of Branch 4’s housing with everyone else. Their reactions to what Kyte did yesterday were kind of bland. Although a few of them have seen Kyte kill someone, they themselves also killed people during the raid on the AHAD factory. They have always felt a type of evil atmosphere around Kyte. It’s not that Kyte is actually evil per se, but the others have never a felt a good aura from him. It might be the nature of Kyte’s power, as the only thing they know is that Kyte uses blood as his source of power, but they don’t actually know much about Kyte. He’s never shared anything, and no one has asked. Excluding Rose, of course.

As they were walking toward the stadium, Kyte could feel a disconnection with Rose. They didn’t have an argument or anything, but Kyte could just notice that something was off. He thought back to when he hugged Azali the day before and wondered if that was the cause. Since he couldn’t think of anything else, he assumed he was correct. Despite that, he didn’t want to bring it up. Because, Kyte accepted the fact that…

...he did not like Rose. Kyte didn’t know if it was because of Azali’s words the day before or his own sudden deep thinking that led him to this conclusion. However, he knew for a fact that he had no romantic feelings for Rose whatsoever. Rather than romantic, he was filled with lustful feelings for Rose. What made Kyte a little depressed was that he discovered only a small part of him found Rose to be important as a person. To put it in perspective: eighty percent was lust, twenty percent was true feeling.

He didn’t know when it started. He thought it may have started that day on the bed in the apartment, when the two of them shared each other’s past. Kyte believed that his feelings of lust were masked by a feeling of companionship as the feeling of loneliness was no longer present within him.

Because of all this, Kyte was some-what stuck between a rock and a hard place. Should he bring Rose with him to the Core just because of what they’ve done? Should he leave her here? Kyte never expected to have to make this type of decision. Oh how naive and ignorant he felt when he realized he had made a great mistake.

However, he couldn’t do anything about it at the moment. He had his next match that day, so he couldn’t afford to be distracted.

When they reached the stadium entrance, Kyte departed from the others. Rose didn’t want to separate from Kyte, but there was nothing she could do. Only S rankers could enter the waiting room during the S rank tournament. Rose had a slightly dark expression and her eyes were a little out of focus, but she let go of Kyte anyway. While Kyte was walking away, he thought that staying with Rose any longer would lead to unwanted scenarios.

As Kyte was nearing the waiting room entrance, he saw a familiar figure standing near the door.

“...Azali!”

Azali, hearing her name being called by a familiar voice, immediately looked up and saw Kyte quickening his pace.

“Good afternoon~!”

“Good afternoo-”

Kyte replied, though, right at the end of his sentence, Azali suddenly wrapped her arms around his back and rested her head on his shoulder. Of course, he was able to fully feel the the large softness against his chest as Azali pressed up against him. This time he was aware of it, unlike last time when his mind was busy processing his disorganized thoughts.

“Uh…”

After not feeling Kyte reciprocate her hug, Azali slowly released her arms from Kyte and looked at his face. She saw that Kyte was a little shocked but there was more confusion than anything else.

“Oh, sorry...I don’t know what came over me.”

I guess she thought, since I hugged her yesterday, that I’ll hug her everyday? Is that how this works?

“No, it’s fine. I just didn’t expect it, that’s all.”

“Oh.”

“...Right, well, let’s go inside, shall we?”

“We shall!”

Kyte opened the door to the waiting room, letting Azali enter first. He followed behind her and closed the door in an unhurried manner. When Kyte entered, everyone in the room looked toward him. There were different expressions all around however, when they saw Kyte with Azali, there were mostly confused expressions.

Most of them thought that Azali would definitely leave Kyte after what had happened. They never expected Azali to actually stay with Kyte, and the two of them looked to be closer than they were the day before. The person who had the most confused and intense aura was definitely Terris. He wouldn’t have expected Azali to stay with Kyte either, mostly because he’s known Azali since she was young, although not very well. He knows that she isn’t very social, and, at that point, he wondered how the two of them even became acquainted.

However, even with all of that, no one dared to speak up about it. They can’t control Azali even if they wanted to. She was a legit S ranker and the daughter of David Wux. No way they would be willing to throw away their status just because of some words.

Kyte and Azali sat down next to each other and began to silently talk to each other. It was kind of awkward at first because the other S rankers had stopped conversing once Kyte entered the room. However, they eventually began their discussions once again. Although Terris has a naturally good relationship with most of the other S rankers, not all of them have a favorable opinion of him. These S rankers, and a few others, couldn’t care less if Terris and Kyte became enemies. Actually, they liked the fact that they were enemies, because that’s one more addition to their side of the camp.

“Alright, so tell me about these S rankers. I’m curious as to who they are. I’ve actually been meaning to ask you this earlier, haha.”

“Ah, don’t worry about it. Well, it would take too long to go through all of them. They all have their unique traits and interesting stories. Every single one of them is important to the Sector. Losing even one of them would decrease our total strength quite significantly.”

“Really? That much? Alright then, who’s the most powerful?”

“The most powerful S ranker would have to be...John Tael. He became a Gold S ranker before I was born. Although he’s been within Sector 31 for a long time, the last time he participated in this tournament was when he defeated the previous strongest S ranker. After that, he never appeared here again. Some say he got sent to the Core, but people have seen him around Sector 31 multiple times. No one knows what he’s doing.”

“I see. Guys like him usually have important things to take care of. I wouldn’t doubt he’s doing something secret. Who’s the second strongest?”

“Second strongest is Seeker Wux.”

“Seeker is part of the Wux family?”

“...Yes. I don’t know much about it, but he was disowned by my father. Seeker is my eldest brother. I’m pretty sure everyone knows already that my power is mutated. After Seeker was disowned by father, his power mutated as well. Since father isn’t allowed to have rogue Gifted, especially mutated ones that have lots of power, he was forced to bring Seeker back and give him a position.”

“I thought Mutated Gifted were rare?”

“They are. Though, more seem to be appearing for some reason. Aren’t you a Mutated Gifted too?”

“Me? No, I’m not. My power is just...a bit special, that’s all. I’m actually at a very important and difficult part of my progression. I’ve been stuck for at least a month or two now. I think I have the solution, but there’s not enough time to fully concentrate.”

“You do know that you can forfeit the matches, right?”

“Of course I do. However, I don’t want to do that. There’s a possibility for an insight that may help me breakthrough. The only reason I’m participating is for that, and only that. The rewards from the matches, heh, I couldn’t care less. What’s a few measly items going to do against someone that’s far above me in power?”

“Well...I guess you’re right. Depending on how fast you increase in power, these items could be useless. It’s better to have the best equipment you can get, even if you are going to increase in power though.”

“Hmm...I understand that. But, I’d rather have-”

“Next match: Kyte Stone versus Jill Cot.”

“Ah-, that’s me.”

“I’ll walk with you to the elevator.”

Kyte and Azali stood up to walk to the door as one other person got up as well. Kyte didn’t really care about the person as he continued his conversation with Azali. That person, Jill Cot, felt angry over Kyte’s indifferent attitude. She felt like she was given no respect as his opponent which only added to her dislike from his actions the day before.

“Alright, see you when it’s over?” Kyte asked.

“Yup! I’ll be watching~.”

Azali slightly hesitated as she looked at Kyte, but she quickly broke eye contact and passed through the door to the audience.

Haaa….The Hell am I going to do about this? I don’t like Rose, and Azali seems to be too perfect. Am I setting myself up for another failure?...

Kyte calmed down himself before facing the elevator door. He heard someone walk up to the elevator on the other side. He didn’t care much about who he was fighting, but the curiosity was too much for him. He looked to his right and saw a tall woman with her eyes closed.

She had long, dark brown hair and a full set of S ranked robes. The robes were more like regular jeans and a long sleeve shirt, but there were extra layers in certain areas. The robes were red with a black trim instead of a golden trim, which actually didn’t look too bad in Kyte’s opinion. She had a broadsword across her back that looked a bit big for her build, but Kyte knew not to judge by appearances.

Jill felt Kyte looking at her, so she looked back at him.

“...Good luck.” Kyte said as the elevator doors opened.

“G-good luck.”

Jill was surprised by what Kyte had said. She definitely did not expect him to wish her good luck after yesterday. She was so surprised that she stuttered a little as she replied.

Kyte walked into the elevator and waited as he felt himself being brought upward. After a few seconds, the elevator doors opened and the arena was once again presented in-front of him. Kyte stepped out of the elevator onto the rough ground, and the first thing he did was take out Heavy Air.

As Jill stepped out into the arena, Kyte had already activated all of his buffs. A red light shined around him before a large circle of blood was absorbed by his body. A crimson electricity danced around his blade as he activated the formations within his robes, causing his robes to faintly glow.

“-...3...2...1...Fight!”

Just as Kyte lifted Heavy Air, Jill grabbed the hilt of her sword which unclicked from her back. She moved her arm and slashed downward as a large wave of blue energy manifested from her blade. It shot forward so quickly that Kyte barely moved his sword to block in time, even though he had already raised it up halfway.

Kyte’s sword was enveloped by crimson energy and electricity. The blue energy smashed into Kyte’s sword which immediately pushed Kyte back several meters. After a full second, the energy around Heavy Air broke apart, making the energy crash into the blade itself. Cracks spread across it like glass until it shattered under the immense pressure brought forth by the blue energy.

There was just too much power behind the energy. It smashed against Kyte’s robe, completely annihilating the defensive barrier around it. The power quickly diminished as a scratch appeared on the first layer of Kyte’s robes.

However, because of the force that crashed against him, he was flung back straight into the outer wall of the arena. A large, smashed crater appeared as cobweb-like cracks spread out from the epicenter of the impact.

Although his robes weren’t damaged from the impact, Kyte felt like all the bones in his body were shattered. His body had penetrated so far into the wall that it couldn’t even fall out by gravity. Kyte used Internal energy to move his body outside of the crater, where he forcefully used Spirit energy to help heal himself.

As he was doing this, he could feel the trapped power within him. Holding back all of this power by being at the peak Champion stage has become increasingly painful. His bones felt like they were going to burst open and the veins inside his flesh were throbbing in pain. A gush of blood escaped his mouth as even his organs were being injured by the internal struggle of power within him.

I can’t...I’ll die if I keep everything in longer than a day. I need to start trying to forcefully fuse the black light with my Spirit energy!