It was time. Round four. Rime got her wishes in before we left and Benny started on taking his elixirs (all for Might this time and set to bring him up to one hundred and sixty four Might) and we all made our way to the arena while he did, with Rime coming along just in case, since she was our bodyguard. Surprisingly, the four made another appearance and followed behind us too, which I supposed made sense, since Alexander was bound to want to keep Callie safe.

I could feel from the Impact difference between them and Rime (I wasn't as good as gauging the differences in F-rankers, but I could get a general feel for it) that they weren't on her level, but they would be solid backup, and with Rime intervening they would have an excuse to jump in and protect us from any F-ranked threats without starting a war, which was the more important part.

Everyone got set up in the stands and the four of us headed down to the prep room under the stadium before to wait to be deployed. When we got down there, we found the guy waiting to send us in and finally had a chance to ask him about our opponents. He smirked at us when he heard the question. "Well at least some of you little bastards are in the dark. last round only one of my teams asked who they were facing. I think it's more exciting this way though, don't you? No chances to prepare for your opponent. The first rounds were a bit to predictable, so they wanted to shake things up."

He looked at us suspiciously for a bit, as if it had only just occurred to him that we hadn't asked him last time, but eventually rolled his eyes. "Oh well. Too late for any last minute planning anyway. Fine. Let me see." He walked over to a desk and pulled out a clipboard, flipping through it. "Ah. You're up against the Seven Seas Armada. C-rank faction. Pretty good results so far."

There was no further elaboration, which was annoying, but at least we had some kind of idea now. Probably some kind of water based force? He walked back over and sat down in an old wooden chair, ignoring us and closing his eyes as he waited for it to be time to dispatch us to the sand pit. After a few minutes of looking around the cramped, moist stone space, his eyes snapped open and he looked over at us. "Alright. Go on out. Good luck."

We nodded to him and the four of us walked out into the arena. The sun was beating down but as usual it was silent despite the cheering crowd because of the sound barrier around the combat area. When we came out and saw the other team...we all stopped.

Pirates. We were fighting fucking pirates. Long leather coats, tricorn hats, pistols, swords, the works. I wasn't sure what was up with the pistols since aside from that Master Candidate I heard not many people used them, but the rest of their gear gave the impression of brutal efficiency and LOTS of practice. My heard started pounding in excitement as I grinned at them. I got the distinct impression this would be a fun fight.

"Well now!" Said the leader cockily. "If it isn't our opponents. You certainly don't look like much, but then again, I suppose looks aren't everything."

I snickered at the comment. "It's ok, I'm sure plenty of people will like you for your personality." Callie rolled her eyes and Abel chuckled while Mel just shook her head. The enemy...er, captain smiled wolfishly, seemingly unbothered by the comment.

He opened his mouth to speak, but before he could I got a...feeling. Whether it was my fate sense, my diviner instincts, or just luck, I got a strong impression I needed to MOVE, so I did. The sand rippled like lapping waves and one of the pirates (the shortest, who had his whole face wrapped in bandages under his hat) broke apart into shards of glass as an exact copy of him emerged from the ground, wickedly sharp blade aimed right at my fucking eye.

Callie reached out and grabbed my coat, casually pulling me the rest of the way clear, she'd already been moving when I had, since our bond made it easy enough for her to see something like that coming if I did. The form of the pirate dropped back toward the sand, but as he fell Abel's fist lashed out like a speeding car, about to smash into him.

The captain crossed the distance within a blink, his sword coming free at the same time as his pistol and chopping down roughly at Abel's hand while his gun came up at Mel and fired. Rather than a musket ball or something, which I'd have expected to come out of the barrel, a cannonball of green smoke erupted from the gun, and Mel's eyes widened as she called a wall of flamed to stop it from reaching her.

Abel, who was about to follow up, jerked his head toward her and bellowed "NO!" Before vanishing in a swirling line of shifting space as he tackled his girlfriend out of the way before the gas made contact with her flame defense, barely getting them clear of the huge gas explosion. The captain had already spun on us to attack, but I wasn't giving him a shot, I got a dangerous feeling from him. I unleashed a blast of flame of my own I had stored up from Cark, releasing it through my cane which I'd already coated in poison fire.

The scruffy blonde man snarled but stepped back into the watery sand, falling beneath the 'waves' and vanishing to reappear next to the others alongside the bandaged one. The closest to them, a tall red haired woman with piercing green eyes, stepped over to put a hand on them and...fuck, healed them. We hadn't fought a team with a healer yet, but as I watched the soothing water wash away their wounds I realized this would be even tougher than expected.

Abel stormed back over, slightly singed and looking as genuinely annoyed as I had seen him in one of these fights. Stripping off his jacket he shoved it into my hands. "Stay here." He said with a snarl and started stalking toward the other team.

I looked at Mel uncertainly and she just snorted and shook her head. "Stay on alert. We'll jump in if we're needed, but I doubt we will be. That other team isn't bad, but they aren't on the same level as some of the ones we've fought so far. Let him work it out."

Shrugging I sat and watched, waiting for my mentor to do his thing. I was kind of curious to see how this would go for the pirates. I hadn't met anyone who could really push Abel. The closest was the Master Candidate with the Mop Skill, but even he'd mostly given the man a light workout. As he stalked forward, the captain, flicked a hand, and the bandage guy and captain both vanished into a ripple of waves on the sand. At the same time, the redheaded woman stepped back and the last man, and absolutely massive guy with bulging biceps showing through a sleeveless leather vest, hurled himself forward.

He shot forward like a cannonball, curling his legs and arms as he turned to steel midair. Abel hauled back and smashed his fist headlong into the flying man, and I saw a slight ripple in the air of a fist image between them just long enough to crush the big man into the sand before Abel's elbow caught a previously unseen slipstream of warped space and his body CONTORTED like a fucking spinning top, his elbow smashing into the face of the now emerging bandage guy.

As that happened the captain emerged from the sand cutlass shopping up at Abel's throat. My mentor's spare hand waved in the air, creating another spatial slipstream and guiding the sword harmlessly by him, but before he could press the attack the pistol came up and a roaring wolf head made of blue flames erupted from the barrel.

Abel shifted his whole body back and to the side, his physical form jerking in several rapid directional changes I don't think I'd be capable of with years of practice, before the wolf head caught up. When it did, it smashed into him headlong, only to hit sand as his form blurred, revealing that to have been a fucking AFTERIMAGE as he appeared behind the now open captain.

The blonde man snarled and yanked his hand from the pocked it slipped into after holstering his gun, hurling out a cloud of black dust that Abel prevented from immobilizing him by guiding it away from his face with spatial lubrication. The redhead had been sneaking over to heal bandage guy as the steel guy dug himself out, and they swarmed him, all of them together converging to attack from all sides.

I moved to go help but Mel stuck out a hand and put it on my shoulder, shaking her head. I supposed it was fine, he'd already showed off everything he could do, he'd just done it VERY casually. He wasn't giving away any new abilities here, just proving he was way fucking stronger than most of the people here. If anything this would hide some of our own possible trump cards.

I have to give them credit. The four of them together were scary. Not the same level of cohesion that Callie and I or Abel and Mel had, but a different kind of teamwork. Where our cooperation was a perfect melding of our styles, theirs was almost the opposite. They were so perfectly out of sync that it made properly reacting to them at the same time nearly impossible. It was so discordant it was almost beautiful, and if it had been me I'd have been screwed.

The captain drew and fired, a massive cloud of red smoke in the shape of a bear trap snapping towards Abel while the big guy hurled himself at my mentor's legs and the redhead fired some kind of blowdart at him, covering the bandage guy who leapt toward his back. They knew exactly what the others would do, and instead of fitting their attacks together, they made them so wildly different that there was no way to counter both.

Except if you were Abel. With barely a thought, he dropped to a knee, swinging a hand up behind him to create a slide of spatial energy over his back. The metal guy hit the slipstream and changed direction arcing up over Abel's back to take his place. The red energy trap closed around the metallic pirate and he screamed in agony, the metal fading from his skin. Bandage guy landed on him as the red trap was closing, and the smaller pirate stiffened but made no sound as blood welled from the injury.

Abel slid forward through space, leaving them to drop onto the sand, the dart from the healer having hit the big guy head on as my teacher engaged the captain alone. A series of short, sharp punches launched from outside the captain's range that hit despite being too far away disabled the pirate leader before Abel knocked him out with a brutal smashing blow to his chin.

Turning to the redhead slowly, Abel glared at her emotionlessly, and the pirate girl dropped to her knees, hands behind her head to show the people outside the dome she surrendered. Abel snorted and turned to walk away in disgust, and she breathed a sigh of relief before scrambling over to treat her friends. Fingers crossed she had an antidote to whatever was in that dart, because metal guy was turning purple. As I watched Abel walk back toward us though, I swallowed audibly. Note to self, never mess with Apollyon. After this display, I doubted I was the only person thinking that either.