Within the facility, Campbell reached down, picking up pieces of metal from the data center, which now lay ruin. Years of research-backed up now gone to waste, though his expression was far from livid. Merely sad, yet he still had high hopes, this would only alter his plans slightly. After all, he still had Byte.

“Hmph… And this is why some of your kind should be thrown away.” His eyes now peering over towards Pearl/

“Only some, but do seethe thy hate. You don’t seem that troubled despite your facility being wrecked.” Pearl scanned the room, noticing a few guards knocked out but still alive.

“Ha ha~! Quite right! For my lovely daughter is still kicking even now! Her defense of this facility proves that she is the future~!”

“Your ‘daughter’ didn’t quite catch the intruder.”

“It matters not, so long as everyone is safe.” Reaching into his pocket, Campbell took out his trusty tablet viewing the live feed. “It would seem even my invited guest has managed to get rid of the other intruder. And your disciple.”

“Have they now? Why are they in the city?” Pearl glanced at the tablet also.

“The fighting likely took place there. Though, with what I’ve seen that little champion can do, I doubt a building or two is standing. Who knows, maybe hundreds are dead.” Campbell played it off as a joke, but the two of them knew that would be the worst-case scenario. Luckily, reports only indicated a few injuries to citizens in the area.

Despite Campbell's lousy joke, Pearl couldn’t help but take notice of the numbers she saw on the intruder’s body. Only recalling a few conversations about singularity users with specific numbers styled like a dragon on their body. While it wasn’t out of the ordinary for anyone to have a tattoo in this day and age. She only knew of specific people going by the name of ‘Dragons.’ Even in the professional league, a few fighters knew the identity of some. Still, they were a small group of individuals that dealt with many of the more unsavory topics.

Reynolds informed Pearl of these dragons since she started her professional career; she’s never met one face to face but only heard the stories. A few dozen or more warriors acting together, in truth, it sounded like the start of a conspiracy theory. Yet, Pearl kept this to herself. After all, a part of her knew Campbell already knew something along those lines.

All in all, the day was finally starting to come to a close. The cops rounded up each suspect, despite the real instigators being long gone. At first, Alexia and Adelle were going to be charged for using their abilities in public. An offense that could get them up to 10 or more years in prison. But, after negotiations with Campbell’s company and a bit of notoriety from the Singularity Foundation. The charges were dropped just like that.

A bullet dodged. The consequences for fighting in public were stacked. Alexia knew those cops she met wanted to just throw charges at the two of them to pay for the damages and then partake in clean-up duties. Doing that would take up all their time for the nationals.

“You’re quite lucky, Lexi. Well...We are lucky. If the foundation didn’t take notice of us, I'd be stuck in America, and you’d be stuck here doing clean up.” Adelle tried to poke a bit of fun at their little mess up.

Alexia grimaced the thought of doing clean up duty and paying more than 10,000 dollars in damage. She’d be ruined for a while, and her deal with her own mother would go down the drain in an instant.

“Y-Yeah. Honestly, this might have been different if I didn’t win the state championship.”

“Not like the cops recognized you anyway. Not a popular team…” Adelle let out an exhausted breath of air upon opening her parasol as they made it outside. She was ready to return to France and clean up her own issues there. Despite only being here for a short time, the protege of Pearl managed to at least make a friend and rival while here. Though, their rapid progress in adapting to a situation made them stand out. To Adelle, Alexia was far more than any monster she’s seen in Europe. To her, European fighters were more predictable and easy to gauge. Not that they weren’t powerful, but the routines of each match were the same as always. Same matchups and the same people fighting. The American fighters hardly followed the rules and generally were unpredictable; it really emphasized their old nature.

To all of Europe, it has been some time since America even participated in world tournaments. Absent for almost 10 years, it was quite a breath of fresh air coming here, despite being in one of the least populated states. If their nation ever decided to take to the world stage again, Adelle would pray that it will be with this new generation. Just as she was France's next-generation, knowing it would culminate into something special.

The two finally met up with the others. Safe to say they were roughed up themselves. In particular, Maria had several bandages around her body, bruised in a few areas as well. Heidi and Angela were better off only having a few scratches.

“So. Next time, let’s not do this… Agreed?” Alexia asked.

“Agreed!” They all commented. Despite the rough day, Maria and Angela both said their goodbyes to the others and departed while officers in the background watched. Some with concerned looks started to chatter among themselves.

“If any of them kept fighting, half the city would be gone.”

“Yeah, I don’t like these users one bit.” Another cop spoke up.

“Did you see the one in blonde hair with the blue highlights? Nearly destroyed an entire building. I saw that bright light from far away. I know they’re kids, but none of this body armor is protecting us from that.”

“Not to mention not many of us around, the bigger departments have it easy.”

The officers continued chattering about today's events, and sadly the citizens involved weren’t happy either. While the cops weren’t delighted with culprits getting off scot-free, they could not stop it. On the other hand, the citizens were disgruntled at the suspects not being caught and more disdain for singularity users ushered in. Flinging their powers willy nilly outside of designated zones would stir anyone into a frenzy.

Unfortunately for the citizens, the case on this matter would be closed just as quickly as it occurred, with hardly any major news outlets picking up on the subject in America.

All in all, life returned to normal in Idaho as the temperature started to drop, ushering in snow upon the northwestern state. With the incident in the back of everyone's head gone and an additional month of training passing along. December finally reared its head as the National Tournament in America was about to begin.