She bit down on the inner lining of her cheek and winced as the blood seeped into her mouth. She swirled the blood around with her tongue, mixing in her saliva and readying her next poison attack.
She had been badly beaten by team 25 so far. The tender muscle between her neck and shoulders had been slashed a dangerous number of times. The red-headed teleporter on team 25 had been repeatedly teleporting behind her and stabbing her trapezius muscles with his hand knife. His teleportation speed was frighteningly fast, so he appeared and disappeared anywhere in the pit in an instant. The pressure to stay vigilant and avoid his attacks had taken a toll on her entire team. All of them except her had panicked and raced around the room in fear trying not to get stabbed in the back by his unpredictable attacks. By himself, the teleporter could have been the ace of any other team, yet on team 25 he wouldn't be considered anywhere near the most powerful member, not when Connor was part of their group.
Her good instincts had been keeping her alive so far, but the dangerous amount of blood staining her grey shirt told her that she needed to act quickly. She knew what she could do, however, this attack was not meant to be used when she was working in a team. Overall her poison ability was its best when she fought alone.
"Blurrgh!" She belched as the huge fist of her opponent slammed into her stomach. He was so powerful that she was lifted off the floor and thrown backwards by the impact of his punch. Without a doubt this guy wasn't a normal strengthener, he definitely had the physiology ability, probably a manifestation of a large powerful creature like a bear or large cat. When he breathed it came out gravelly and throaty and the way his eyes simmered reminded her of some of the animals she had seen in the eugenics labs.
The twinging pain from deep in her gut made her acutely aware of how much trouble her body was in. She needed medical attention as soon as possible, but before that, she needed to turn this match around without killing her last remaining teammate.
"Kyaa!" The wind manipulator on team 25 had an annoying habit of shouting out whenever she made an attack. She thrust her palm forward into the space in front of her.
Like a rag doll, her last teammate was thrown against the orange barrier and fell to the floor with a thud.
She was all alone now, all her teammates were lying on the ground defeated and unable to get back up.
"Finally."
She gurgled the blood in her mouth as a relieved smile spread across her face. Now that her teammate was no longer in her way, she didn't have to worry about killing him any more. Now she had the chance to really get into this fight.
The wind manipulator, the red-headed teleporter, and the huge bear guy all looked down at her confidently. To them, the match was already won. All they had to do was take the flag from her and they could successfully waltz to the next stage of the evaluation. little did they know she was about to change all of that.
She pulled herself up from the floor and gripped her metallic flute.
"Oh, she still has some fight in her." The red headed teleporter snickered as he raised his knife that was stained with her blood. "Don't worry guys, I'll take care of her."
"Don't mess around with her, just get the flag so we can end this." The wind manipulator barked at her teammate. After only knowing the red headed teleporter for a few hours, she was already irritated by him.
They were a team of exceptionally strong opponents who were working well together despite only knowing each other for a short while. But still, they were not quite on her level yet. Aria slid her finger passed her lips, coating it in the liquid under her tongue. It was time for revenge.
Just as she predicted, the red headed guy teleported behind her, eager to slash her shoulders again with his knife, but her hand was raised and ready for him. She slapped his face making sure to swipe her coated finger across his eyes.
The effect was immediate. The red head screeched and stumbled backwards while clutching his face.
"Fuck! My eyes!" The horrible sizzling that was eating away at his face was unbearable. He could not hold in the pain and completely forgot about the match.
"Help! Someone help. That bitch did something to my eyes. Gah! It burns help." He screamed, however the medical staff waiting outside did not budge, they would not attempt to help anyone that was still inside a game.
Before he could cry out anymore, her boot smashed into the side of his face, dislocating his jaw and knocking him to the ground with a thud. It was a small revenge that would have to do for now.
The wind manipulator and the bear guy on team 25 stared at the gross rotting purple flesh on their teammate's eyes and cheeks. It was like some kind of acid had been poured on his face.
Their horrified faces brought Aria back to when she had successfully infused with the poison generation core. She vividly remembered kissing the cute little laboratory rabbit she had been keeping as a pet, and then watching in terror as its body slowly rotted and died in her arms.
When she was first brought to the eugenics lab, the doctors and researchers had let her keep her name. Aria, her name was Aria Francis. However after all the experiments and clinical trials had turned out to be a success, and she had miraculously survived what was equal parts torture and experimentation, they decided to give her a new name.
Without consulting her the head researcher adopted his great success story and renamed her Achlys, after the goddess of poison and the mist of death. Although the name had a somewhat accurate meaning as to the nature of her ability, she hated it. She hated every bit of being renamed and rebranded. She hated every bit of what she had gone through to get this ability and hated the consequences that came with it. Nevertheless, she would use it to survive. She had made it out of that hellish eugenics lab and arrived at the military academy. This place was by no means a haven, but it was much better than where she came from.
She looked to the opposite side of the circle where Connor was casually leaning against the barrier. When their match had started, he had walked to the edge of the circle and leaned against the barrier. As if nothing important was going on, he simply slumped against the edge and lowered his head. He did not participate at all, he didn't even watch. He simply closed his eyes and dozed off. Aria was not easily provoked but that got to her. She never thought of herself as prideful, but being deemed unworthy to even stay vigilant of during a match was a blow to her self-esteem.
He was watching now though. Eyes that were drowsy and disinterested were now locked on her. She had gained his focus and she was planning on keeping it, right up until the moment she took the flag from him.
Aria took in a deep breath through her nose and collected the air in her belly. And with all the rage and frustration that was lurking underneath her surface she let out a harrowing scream, only she didn't make a sound. Instead, the liquid and blood she had been collecting in her mouth sprayed out into the air like a sprinkler. A technique the scientists had helped her achieve by running electric pulses through her cheeks and tongue to create a vibration in her muscle memory powerful enough to project her poisonous venom into the air like a spray.
Because of the blood mixed in with the poison, she secreted in her saliva, the liquid poison had a red color that tinged the air light red.
The bear coughed violently and clasped at his throat. His eyes stung and his windpipe burned as soon as he breathed in the light red air. His eyes watered to the point that he couldn't see anymore and he wildly flailed his arms around, panicking at not being able to see his surroundings.
She ran at him and stabbed the sharp edge of her flute into his neck and cracked the body of the metal rod against his head.
The wind manipulator began to cough and wheeze as well, however, she had a plan. She used her skill and manipulated the wind to flow away from herself. She quickly regretted her actions. Because of the orange barrier, the poisonous particles in the air could not escape from the match pit, so all her attack did was spread the poison more evenly around the room. The wind girl continued to cough and her chest sounded much more aggravated. She soon tumbled forward and blood splattered out from her mouth.
"H-help!" She frantically rolled around on the floor and pleadingly reached towards Connor, who was still slumped against the barrier.
There was no sense of worry or concern on his face. If there was anything, Aria thought it looked like irritation.
The wind girl lost consciousness still reaching for Connor while blood oozed out from the corners of her nose.
"And then there were two." Aria straightened herself up ignoring the pain in her gut and shoulders. Even If she was in her best condition she doubted that she could defeat this guy, let alone now that she was wounded.
Connor narrowed his eyes at the petite curly-haired girl in front of him. She didn't look like much because of her small stature, but she had still managed to take out all his team members in a few minutes. Connor ticked his head thinking that it really was true that power came in many shapes and sizes.
"If you'd used this attack earlier, you wouldn't be such a mess right now. I might have even enjoyed having a go at you, but you had to wait until you looked like shit to do anything good. Why?"
Aria was taken aback by his straightforward way of speaking. He had seemed so distant and uninvolved in the match, so it was strange to hear him talking like he had been paying attention the whole time.
"I wasn't going to use my attack when my teammates were in the way..." The poison was produced in her body so she was not affected by it, but everyone else was. If she used her mist attack, her teammates would have been poisoned alongside team 25. And she would never do that intentionally.
"But you were still fine with waiting until they were knocked unconscious to do anything..." He raised a slick eyebrow and eyed her amused. "Isn't that just as cruel?"
Aria scoffed at his question. The light pink air had not reached him yet, the air around him was still clear, but when he breathed it in she knew he would understand.
"Trust me, it's much better to be knocked out by some blows than to inhale my poison."
Small crackles of electric energy zapped around Connor's body and his eyes lit up with predatory mischief. Aria sucked in a fearful breath. For a long time, there were no people her age who could measure up to her core ability, in that time she had grown used to being 'the best' among the other test subjects. So to stare at Connor and feel intimidated by his power was a feeling she had forgotten. An exhilarating but terrifying experience.
Connor purposely sucked in a large breath, inhaling the pink-poisoned air. He immediately coughed and grunted as his airways reacted to the venom. It was like he had breathed in acid that was as slowly eating away at his chest.
"Ugh..." The veins in his eyes bulged but he kept eye contact with Aria. "You're right, you were being kind. This stings."
Just like that, a blinding surge of white electric energy exploded from Connor's body and encapsulated the entire pit. It only lasted for a few seconds, and when the electricity was gone, Aria was laying on the floor unconscious while Connor stood over her. Her team flag was in his hand.
"The match team 18 vs team 25 is over. Teams 25 wins."
The orange barrier was lifted and the medical team immediately rushed in to take care of the trainees. Aria had handed them a vile of the antidote for her poison before the match started so that if she was incapacitated by the end of the match, the medical team could treat whoever she poisoned. Since her particular poison was acidic and would dissolve flesh, the medics would still have more work to do than just administer the antidote.
After a few injections and healing, most of Connor's team were back on their feet and begrudgingly hobbling out of the pit. Aria however needed some special treatment because of her internal injuries, so she was wheeled into the infirmary.
______________________
"Seriously I'm fine, can I go yet?" Rhys snatched his arm away from the nurse who had been relentlessly poking at him.
"Young man, people don't just have seizures." She huffed. "It's not like a sneeze or cough. If you lose control of your body for that long and have such violent convulsions, it means something is very wrong with you. And if you'd just be a bit more cooperative, I would find out what it is!"
"But I'm fine!" Rhys's eyes rolled to the back of his head. This conversation had been going around in loops for a while now. He couldn't seem to convince her to let him go.
"Tell that to your six-minute-long seizure!" The older woman shouted while waving a clipboard in his face.
Rhys's head was about to explode. Even if he couldn't give her an explanation as to why he had such a severe seizure, all the checks she had done proved he was perfectly healthy. Surely that was enough to let him go. Rhys was about to storm out when the door opened and a new stretcher was wheeled into the infirmary.
"Nurse, we have another patient." A bored voice announced. Another nurse wheeled in the poison generation girl whom Rhys had noticed during the initiation.
"We already finished with her shoulders, we just need some extra treatment for her abdominal area, we suspect internal bleeding, possibly some damaged organs."
The nurse nodded with a sigh before turning back to Rhys. "If you really think you're okay you can go, but at least take a break between your matches. Just rest here until you have to go out again." Her tone was much softer than before and it felt as though she was genuinely worried for Rhys.
Rhys nodded. The nurse then turned towards the poison generation girl on the table and seeped her green aura into her stomach area.
Rhys watched as the girl's damaged dark purple aura regained its original volume and color. Slowly blowing up like a balloon. It was the most relaxing thing he had ever seen.
"Hey."
Rhys's eyes snapped to her face. She had turned her head to face him and was staring up at him intently.
"You're that guy..." She murmured softly. "You're that guy on the team with that asshole."
Sampson's face immediately popped up into Rhys's head. He winced and hoped that she was not still too mad about how Sampson callously insulted her a while ago.
"Yeah. Sorry about that." Rhys pressed his fingers to his temple trying to think of words that would make the situation better. She was a powerful person after all. Someone he wanted to be on good terms with. "It's just... His personality."
She chuckled softly before placing her head back against the stretcher.
"Anyways, how was your match?" Rhys had been deathly curious about it since he had been rolled past their match pit. Connor had been the only one who was unharmed, while the others had all been covered in electric burns. He wanted to learn as much about that match as possible, specifically anything to do with Connor and his ability.
"I saw that everyone besides Connor had been electrocuted. He must have actively used his skill during your match?"
['You obviously sound desperate for information. She will see right through you.'] The teacher snickered in his head.
"Everyone?" She frowned.
"Yeah, everyone." Rhys squinted down at her confused face.
Rhys watched curiously as the poison girl's eyes widened momentarily, before her expression sunk back into neutral. She definitely knew something or had figured something out. Something to do with Connor.
"What is it?" He urged her, leaning forward.
Her eyes shifted to him and she stared at him for a long moment.
"Nothing." She resolutely turned away from Rhys and focused on the nurse healing her belly.
'Dammit.'
He clenched his fists anxiously. She definitely knew something but would not tell him. To her, he was just another trainee hungry for a win, and to top it off he was on a team with the guy she disliked.
['You know....?']
'What?'
['You could just torture it out of her.'] Rhys froze at the familiar cruel tone in the teacher's voice.
[Attention! New Quest]
[Quest:
Extract the information from the human female in front of you. ]
[Rewards: + 100 Exp]
[Penalty: None]
Rhys couldn't believe his eyes when he saw the reward of 100 Exp. If he got this reward he would be more than halfway to level 5 and his prized Aura manipulation skill. This was way too good to pass up, on top of that when else would the system be so generous? Best of all, the system did not specify how he was allowed to extract information. He wouldn't have to torture her at all if he got her to tell him naturally.
[Does the user accept the quest? Y/N]
'Yes, I accept.' Rhys sucked in a breath and hoped this worked out.
"Umm... I'm Rhys by the way. What's your name?"
Yes, starting with a light introduction was a good idea. Rhys didn't actually have any friends during school because of his status as a coreless person, so the process of making friends was unfamiliar to him. But wasn't this how people usually got to know each other?
She turned her head to look back up at him and emotionlessly replied. "It's Aria."
"Well. That's a pretty name..."
Silence. A long awkward silence ate away at Rhys's confidence. Just as he was about to try again, the door flew open and Sampson stood there wide-eyed.
"Hey!" The nurse turned to the boy who had just barged in. "This is the infirmary. You can't just walk in here."
"Rhys." Sampson huffed, looking more agitated than Rhys had ever seen him.
"The pairings for the next round are up. We'll be fighting against Connor's team."
Rhys shut his eyes for a moment and clenched his fists. He turned back to look down into Aria's cold brown eyes.
"I want to survive. No... scratch that, I want to win." Rhys's chest tightened as he blurted out his truth.
"I'm sure that's how you felt before your match too, maybe you even felt that way while you were fighting. Whatever you felt, you had your chance against him but you lost, now it's my turn. You can't win but my group and I still have a chance, and if you have any desire, any inkling of a wish to see us defeat him at all please tell me what you know. Please."
Rhys turned to Sampson and sternly looked at him. From that look and the plea Rhys had just made, Sampson knew the girl knew something, something probably vital to them winning the next match.
Sampson bit down his pride and did what Rhys wanted him to do.
"Please, tell us what you know." He pleaded.
The pathetically submissive words felt revolting in his mouth. He only did it because Rhys had asked him to. He hated to admit it, but without Rhys, he would not have made it past the first round. For now, he needed to listen to Rhys.
Aria sighed as her resolution crumbled. She wasn't trying to be a bitch, but the knowledge was power, and giving it up for nothing was stupid. But then again she was out of the tournament, so she had lost her opportunity to use what she knew.
"I hope you didn't get your hopes up too high. I don't know the secret to his ultimate weakness or anything that useful. Just what you said earlier about everyone from my match pit having electric burns..." She looked back up at Rhys.
"He didn't participate in the match until the very end. His three teammates were strong enough to take care of my team by themselves. He just leaned again the wall like he didn't care while the others engaged in the fight."
It still upset her that Connor thought so little of her strength. She bit her lip to calm herself.
"Only once I made a comeback and knocked down his teammates did he even start to focus. We were the only people standing. Everyone else was laying unconscious on the floor, they weren't in the way of our fight at all. But somehow everyone ended up with electric burns..."
Rhys cocked his head wondering why Connor would've used his electricity on everyone including his own teammates. Why not just attack Aria?
"Huh? That's all you've got? I'll tell you why he attacked everyone; because he is a sadist freak."
Aria rolled his eyes. "A sadist is someone who gets pleasure from inflicting pain on others. If everyone was unconscious already they wouldn't have been awake to feel the pain, so he wouldn't have gotten any pleasure from doing that." She snapped back at him.
"Oh. Right." Sampson scratched the back of his neck sheepishly.
"It's just a hunch, but I think that guy has trouble controlling his power."
Rhys's eyes widened as he thought back to the initiation ceremony. Connor had done the exact same thing. Instead of small concentrated attacks, his power surged out of his body in different directions, completely engulfing the space around him. What if he didn't do that on purpose, what if he did that because that's the only way he knows how to use his power? He came from a juvenile detention center in district 20, they sure as hell would not have helped him hone his abilities. If anything they would have put restrictors on him to block his power. Maybe that is why his attacks are so explosive. Maybe he is used to wearing suppressors and thus he only knows how to use his ability by surging to the max and creating electricity beyond the capacity of what a suppressor would be capable of holding back.
Rhys's heart was racing thinking that he had found a weakness in the mighty Connor. However, he deadpanned when a thought back to the incident in front of the cafeteria with Gunn.
"No, that can't be it." He sighed "I saw him shoot a line of electric energy straight at someone before. There was this guy blocking the entrance to the cafeteria a few days ago, and Connor directly sent his electricity to him. It was a pinpoint attack."
"No, you're remembering it incorrectly." Aria interrupted. "It wasn't pinpointed. I was there that day and saw what happened. Connor's Attack did hit that guy with the big eyebrows, but the electric burns sinjed a large portion of the door behind the guy, as well quite a few people who were standing close to Connor."
Hope flooded back into Rhys. "Then, that might mean that Connor doesn't have control over the intensity of his attacks. He might have a bit more control over the direction but it's still not near perfect..."
If you thought about it, it wasn't a very exploitable weakness, but at this point any weakness of that guy was important.
"And before he electrocuted me during our match, he inhaled some of my poison. His eyes were watering and his throat was probably burning too. He would definitely have lost some of his concentration and lost control of his power. If he loses concentration, he probably loses whatever control he has gained of his power as well." Rhys nodded deep in thought as Aria put all the pieces of this puzzle together.
"If we can distract him or just make sure he can't concentrate, we might be able to do well in this match." Rhys rubbed his temple, the game plan was already forming in his head.
"What do you mean 'do well'?" Sampson scoffed sarcastically. "If he concentrates he can make more precise attacks, if he doesn't concentrate, he showers the room in electric energy. It doesn't fucking make a difference."
Sampson angrily kicked the trash can next to him, sending it bashing into the cabinet.
"Hey!" The nurse shouted. "I'm still here. You pick that right back up young man!" She growled from over Aria's stomach. The three teenagers stared at her wide-eyed, all of them had forgotten that she was there, including Aria, even though the nurse was treating her.
"Any weakness in Connor, even if it's a small one can help us beat him. We've just got to find the best way to exploit it. I've got a plan." Rhys jumped down from his bed and walked towards the door.
"Thanks, Aria, I owe you one." He smiled brightly before exiting the infirmary with Sampson.
"Don't think I won't come and collect on that." Rhys chuckled when he heard her call after him.
[Congratulations!]
[Quest completed]
[Rewards: + 100 Exp]
[Penalty: None]
[Name: Rhys Anson]
[Race: Enlightened Human]
[Level 4]
[Exp: 203/400]
[HP: 25/40]
He was now a little over halfway to his goal, thanks to Aria.
['I still think you could have tortured her.'] The teacher huffed.
"You've really got a plan?"
"Sort of." Rhys squinted. "Sampson, how much electricity can you take before you pass out?"
"Me getting electrocuted better not be part of the fucking plan." Sampson growled.