Chap 157: Eliminated
[Warning: Mature content ahead]
Kie jerked with a startled yell, shoulders snapping up in fright. Tee let out a short, choked laugh.
His eyes wide with disbelief.
“Tee, is that really you?” he asked telepathically.
She stepped closer and pinched him on the arm as she said, “It’s me, old man.”
In the blink of an eye, he got over the pinch and hugged her so her feet came off the ground. He spun her around and buried his face in her neck.
With a shaky voice he said, “I knew you weren’t gone.”
Then he put her down and met her face. He apologized in a rush of breath, voice breaking as he brushed the hair near her ear with trembling, blood-stained fingers.
“It was my fault. I should’ve done more… I should’ve protected you.”
There was a lot from their previous Harbinger mission that she was unclear of. She obviously got knocked out before the game ended. But one thing was clear, the Harbingers did get her and Kie is claiming it was his fault. What a sweetheart.
She doubted it was his fault she got taken, but she was going to make use of the situation.
Tee grabbed his shirt, pulled him in tight, and held him until she felt his breathing steady. Their foreheads met, their noses brushing, the air between them charged and hot.
“There’s one way you can make it up to me,” she whispered, her voice warm enough to melt him from the inside out. Her hands slid down his torso, stopping at his waistband. “I’ve been aching for you.”
She kissed him—slow, claiming—until he stopped her with a strained exhale.
“Not here,” he murmured. “I need to get cleaned up.” He glanced at his bloody knuckles.
They rushed out of the room, hearts pounding, fingers locked together the entire way until they reached his room.
Kie washed up fast, gripping the sink like he was trying to hold himself together. When he stepped out, he didn’t go to her immediately. He walked to the glass wall, opened a drawer, and sat in the chair like he was weighing every decision he’d ever made.
“Having second thoughts?” Tee asked.
Kie exhaled. “Is this too soon? Already?”
In answer, she got off the bed and stripped—slow, confident, deliberate. His eyes followed every movement.
“Crawl to me,” he said.
She did.
And she already knew what came next. She unbuckled his pants, freed his cock, and took him into her mouth while he reached for a condom. He moaned as she sucked him.
“Hey,” he breathed, “I’m supposed to be pampering you.”
He rolled the condom on. She climbed onto his lap, and he immediately buried his mouth against her breasts, kissing her everywhere he could reach, hungry for her. She kissed along his jaw, his throat, tasting the tension he hadn’t let go of.
Soon he guided her back toward the bed. She fell onto it, knowing exactly what that shift meant. He was taking control, and she loved it when he did. He flipped her onto her stomach, hands gripping her hips. One hand slid slowly down her body, tracing her curves before wandering back up to feel how wet she already was.
“Damn,” he muttered, voice thick, “you’re soaked. You need to get done right now.”
She arched her back in perfect form, ready for him. He slid into her, starting slow, then building speed. It felt different that time. The condom made each thrust more concentrated, each stroke smoother and more intense, heightening the pressure inside her. Every push felt precise, deliberate, like he was shaping the pleasure instead of surrendering to it.
When he pushed in deeper, she had to stretch around him, her breath shaking. It felt incredible—like he was claiming every part of her.
He pulled her up and pressed her against the glass wall, her breasts flattening against the cool surface as she moaned and begged him for more.
Kie was mesmerized watching himself slide in and out of her, watching the way her folds clung around him, pulling him in like she didn’t want to let go. He had never seen anything like it—unlike Karen, who always insisted the room be dark.
Afterwards, they showered together, still touching, still kissing, unable to get enough of each other.
In their white robes, they lay curled together in bed, his fingers drifting slowly through her hair.
“I’m so glad you’re back,” he murmured. “But… how?”
Resting her cheek against his chest, Tee said, “Let’s just say I sparked invisibility, slipped through a vortex in the modern world, and Primus—who must’ve been searching for me—found me on the other side. But let’s not talk about it.”
“Invisibility?” he echoed. “That’s… new.” He hesitated, then added, “I should tell you about Saeda’s wild theory that the Harbingers attacked you at the park. And the recent mission… they’re targeting the weakest first.”
Tee lifted her head. “What? Me—weak?”
Kie gave a tiny, guilty laugh. “I know, but… she kind of has a point.”
Tee’s brows knit, her ears giving the smallest twitch as she waited for what else he might say.
“I’m going to stop talking now,” he said quickly.
He wrapped his arms around her and held her close, falling silent. But Tee couldn’t stop thinking about it. How had her quest to become the strongest Sentinel twisted into people seeing her as the weakest?
During separate training, Tee’s mind refused to quiet.
The weakest.
Kie hadn’t even said it cruelly. That was the worst part. It had sounded like an observation—measured, almost apologetic. Like a truth she was supposed to accept.
Every breath she took echoed with it.
Instead of trying to channel her Ultramana powers like she was supposed to, she made a choice. A quiet one. A dangerous one.
She would test just how true that theory really was.
Whatever trial the training grounds threw at her, she overcame it—but never with Ultramana.
She answered everything with darkness. She was going to show the world what weak looked like.
Her metal claws tore through trees that had been given unnatural life, bark splitting like flesh as branches lunged for her throat. Sorcery—deliberate and controlled. Vergants, most likely, watching from somewhere unseen. Tee didn’t bother looking for them.
When the trees bloomed, flowers bursting open to spew venomous smoke, she inhaled deeply. The poison burned for half a second—then she exhaled it like harmless vapor.
Her cheek split open with a wet, violent tear of flesh, and a supersonic scream ripped from her throat.
The shockwave annihilated everything around her—trees exploding, vines shredded, the ground buckling outward.
When the echo faded, her cheek sealed itself shut as if it had never been broken. Tee licked her lips, a slow, satisfied smile spreading across her face.
Dropping towards a river of lava, heat roaring up to meet her—the haunting came again. Images of her teammates laughing while holding blue flaming swords at her made her heart weak. But she was not going to get burnt and ended up in the infirmary again.
Her dark energy force shield snapped into place just before impact, the molten waves slamming uselessly against it.
From all directions, sharp sparks and energy blasts streaked toward her.
She didn’t even raise her guard.
She yawned.
Weak, she thought again. Sure.
The blasts shattered against her barrier. With a sharp whip of her swords, she sent dark energy crackling through the air, frying the blasters one after another.
She stomped through knee-deep snow, boots crunching as the ground fractured beneath her. Water erupted upward in towering columns, bending unnaturally before snapping toward her like living spears.
Kie’s voice again—they kind of have a point.
Her shield flared again.
The water struck and rebounded violently, spraying ice and mist in all directions.
That wasn’t like the first test she’d faced with her teammates. Those streams were controlled—guided by hovering drones circling above. Tee’s eyes narrowed.
She hurled her swords. They spun like dark discs, slicing clean through the drones. One by one, they dropped from the sky, sparking as they hit the snow.
Power thrummed through her—heavy, intoxicating.
It felt good. Too good.
Proof that the idea of her being weak was nothing but a lie.
The ground betrayed her.
Her boot sank in. Then her ankle. Then her leg.
Tee swore and tried to leap free—but the surface turned liquid, dragging her down fast. Darkness pressed in as it swallowed her to the waist, then her ribs.
Panic spiked.
Move, she ordered herself. Power surged—but the ground hardened instantly, locking her in place.
She was trapped.
The pressure tightened around her chest. Her arms were pinned. Her power dulled, smothered, like hands around her throat.
Memory flooded in.
It reminded her of Sade’s sorcery.
“I hate this,” she snarled, thrashing uselessly. The ground didn’t yield. It didn’t even tremble.
Her breathing turned ragged. Her heart hammered.
For the first time in the trial, darkness didn’t answer her. Her eyes flickered black as she tried kicking, wiggling—anything to break free.
The arena held her there long enough to break something.
Finally, shaking, she stopped.
Defeat tasted bitter and hot as she admitted it. She took deep breaths and soon her eyes were back to normal. That defeat proved nothing. She just needed to figure out a way to free herself. If only she knew sorcery.
Dammit!
Far away, the Commander watched from his office, her struggle projected in sharp holographic light. The levers tracking dark energy screamed upward.
He frowned.
Stubborn. Incredibly powerful.
And spiraling.
“She’s proving a point to herself,” he murmured. “Not to us.”
He folded his hands on his desk, eyes narrowing.
He wondered how she would measure up when forced to train alongside her teammates—
with abilities like those.
It felt good to have everyone back—training together again like old times. But that session came with a twist. It was every Sentinel for themselves.
Tee and her comrades stood ready in their full mission gear, each wearing their summoning gloves, though notably without their usual telecoms. The Commander had considered removing the gloves too, but ultimately decided against it.
The Commander’s voice was clipped and clear.
“Today’s training will be different. No simulations. No partners. You fight until one remains standing.”
A heavy silence settled over the five Sentinels.
What Kie told Tee about her being the weakest still echoed in her head. Out of all of them, she was the only one who hadn’t shown any new Ultramana ability. She had lied about developing invisibility. Her glowing hands were unimpressive, and she hadn’t even managed to make them return.
She would rather accept defeat than show the others what she was truly capable of. Those dark powers she had to hide. And for good reason.
Revealing her dark side would only raise questions—questions she wasn’t ready to answer.
“We’re not fighting each other,” Zod muttered. The others nodded—except one.
Kie smirked. “Sure. You’d all lose to me anyway.”
Four spinning swords flew at him in response.
With a flash of his hand, Kie summoned a Ultramana energy shield, a rippling dome of blue that deflected the glowing blades mid-spin. He stepped through the dissipating light, still smiling. His tactic worked.
The Trial began.
The forest surrounding them was vast—tall trees, deep slopes, and the looming skeletons of ancient, moss-covered ruins. A perfect battlefield.
They split off, instincts flaring.
Tee was first.
Saeda found Tee behind the stone pillars of a collapsed archway. She wasn’t hiding—just waiting.
“You’re not fighting?” Saeda asked, cautiously raising her glowing blade.
“I’m not really into fighting today,” Tee whispered, black energy curling at her fingertips before fading.
Saeda frowned. “Fine.”
She formed an energy orb in her palm and expanded it outward. A glowing sphere surrounded Tee, slowly shrinking.
Tee’s breath hitched. It reminded her of that day—the water. Leak’s trap. The choking orb. The scream that tore through time. Her dark power.
Not again.
“I'm out!” she shouted, voice shaking. Her hair veiled her face, hiding the brief glint of pitch-black eyes.
Above, a low BOOM echoed through the sky. A hologram shimmered overhead.
—Tee: ELIMINATED—
That notice in the sky reached them all. Kie wasn’t sure what to feel knowing Tee was the first to go out. It was unacceptable, and he contemplated doing extra training with her.
Looking in the sky, Tee realized they were being closely monitored. A deep feeling rose inside of her.
“I expected more from you,” Saeda told her before rushing off.
Tee held up her middle finger at her back. If only Saeda knew what she was really capable of, she would eat those words. Tee kicked a pebble so hard. Why was she the first one out? Did they think she was weak? She found a spot to sit and the thoughts of being seen as weak consumed her mind.
Miko blurred between trees in streaks of speed she still couldn’t fully control. Appearing and disappearing from how fast she moved. Once, she reappeared mid-air, nearly tumbling before recovering with a wall-kick.
“Whoa,” she breathed, grinning. “That’s new.”
Saeda tried to trap her with another orb, but Miko vanished mid-formation, reappearing behind Saeda with a double slash of glowing blades.
“Not today.”
Kie watched from the ruins, perched atop a floating energy platform—a construct of solidified Ultramana. It took immense focus to expand his energy into such a broad surface, and though stable, its glowing, crystalline form made it painfully easy to spot
His eyes popped when dozens of summoned swords hovered in the air, stabbed into the platform’s edges like jagged wings. He had to leap away, sending the entire platform crashing down toward the forest floor, directly above where Saeda had last been seen.
Whether it hit her or not, she didn’t reappear.
Still suspended in the air, now atop a thinner construct he controlled beneath his feet, Kie looked down over the battlefield.
Far below, Miko skidded to a halt and glared up at him.
From above, he chuckled. “What’s the point of speed if you’ve got no ground to run on?”
Miko darted below, dodging raining swords set ablaze with blue fire. Her movements tightened. She was running out of space.
With a glare, Miko turned and sprinted—vanishing in a blur into the ruins below.
Kie scowled. “Just great.”
He shifted his footing on the floating construct, eyes scanning the forest canopy and crumbling stone corridors below.
“Where is Zod?” he muttered, irritation rising. Something about the quiet was starting to feel wrong.
After Tee surrendered and Kie occupied with Miko, Saeda stayed near the ruins—restless, flicking energy between her fingers.
"Too many tricks… what’s the point if you don’t know which one to use?"
She created a glowing force shield around herself for defense, eyes scanning the tree lines, frustrated that her aura-sensing wasn’t working. A movement in the distance caught her eye.
“Kie,” she muttered.
He stepped out casually, wiping a bit of blood from his lip—the only sign he’d been in any real fight. His swords hovered lazily around him, pulsing with blue flame.
“You done playing with light balls?” he said.
Saeda’s palms ignited with erratic bursts of energy. “Let’s find out.”
She fired an unstable blast—Kie dodged, but she sent another, then another, switching styles quickly. She activated a glowing sword, then pivoted into creating an orb, then threw up a shield mid-dash.
Too much at once.
Kie narrowed his eyes. “You’re juggling too many things.”
He slashed the air—and from behind her, a whip of energy cracked, shattering her half-formed shield, slamming her to the ground.
She groaned, coughing dust. "Damn it..."
He approached, calm. “You’re strong, Saeda. But strength’s not the same as focus.”
She tried to summon a force field again, but it fizzled.
Kie raised his sword. For a second—just a second—he hesitated.
Saeda locked eyes with him and gave a dry smile. “Don’t flatter yourself. I’m not Tee.”
Then she said outloud, “I forfeit.”
A final BOOM. The sky lit up.
—Saeda: ELIMINATED—
Kie blinked, startled.
She smirked up at him from the ground. “I’d rather leave with my pride than be used to sharpen yours.”
He stared for a moment, then turned away in silence.
Later, she rejoined Tee near the sidelines and slumped beside her. “Don’t say it.”
Tee smiled. “Didn’t need to.”
Kie reformed his Ultramana constructs, shaping them into a series of floating steps rising into the sky. He climbed swiftly, each platform solid underfoot, until he reached a height with a clear view of the terrain.
He stopped at the top, eyes narrowing as he focused, expanding the platform beneath him—widening the structure just like before.
Then it hit.
A searing blast of energy screamed through the air and struck just inches from his side.
Kie barely dodged in time, the explosion sending him tumbling off the edge. He crashed onto a lower construct and rolled hard, gritting his teeth.
His vision spun.
He looked toward the distant trees, smoke still curling from the blast point.
“Zod…” he growled.
So that’s what he’d been doing—hiding, charging, and waiting. Zod had to hold his breath to unleash a continuous blast of that magnitude.
Clever. But he had Kie’s full attention.
Miko came out again, clearly working with Zod. Kie thought that was unfair.
Zod took her hand, spun once, then flung her like a spinning disc into the sky. She whirled upward, swords outstretched, glowing bright with Ultramana.
Kie’s eyes widened. “Crap.”
He dismissed the platform, leaping away just in time as Miko tore through his defenses like a buzzsaw. Sparks burst in the air.
Zod blasted upwards to follow.
Kie landed, trying to reform a structure, but Zod sent a pulse of energy from his palms, interrupting the construct before it could stabilize.
Swords rained from above, but Zod conjured a forcefield just in time—blades stabbed into the glowing barrier instead of him. Yet the swords still pulsed with flaming blue energy. Kie was controlling them.
He dropped from above, landing with a thunderous crack that split the ground beneath him. Dust curled around his boots. His eyes locked with Zod’s—no smirk that time, just pure, unflinching focus.
Cracks spidered across Zod’s orb-shaped shield. He realized, too late, what Kie was doing—impaling him with every single sword like a human porcupine. As the forcefield finally shattered, Zod clenched his eyes shut and called for defeat.
Miko burst onto the field, launching blades of energy at Kie—but he swatted them aside effortlessly.
She retaliated with a glowing orb of force from her palm. Kie batted it away like a toy, then hurled a flurry of Ultramana coated swords in her direction. Eyes wide, she vanished in a blink of panic, teleporting out just in time.
Kie whipped around in a blur of blue flame, his energy-lash cracking across Zod’s chest and sending him flying through the remnants of a moss-covered wall.
Zod didn’t get up.
The sky rumbled—then flickered with light. A hologram blinked into view overhead.
—Zod: ELIMINATED—
Miko froze, eyes wide.
"Zod…?"
She saw him stir—barely. Still breathing. But down.
Determination. Fire. Focus.
With a sharp inhale, she raised her blades and charged straight at Kie.
He scoffed. Head-on? Seriously?
His fingers twitched, summoning more swords—
—but she vanished.
A flash-step. So fast it blurred reality.
"Crap," he muttered.
She reappeared behind him, lashing an energy whip across his back. The impact sent him flying, crashing hard and tumbling through the dirt.
Kie tried to rise—gritting his teeth—
—but collapsed again.
—Miko: VICTOR—
Zod pushed himself to his feet, wincing with every step as he made his way over to Miko. He gave her a soft pat on the back—his quiet way of saying thank you.
Miko stepped toward Kie and offered him a hand. He took it.
Later that day, after washing the dishes together, Kie suggested he and Tee go for a stroll on the beach.
“At this time?” Tee asked, knowing it’s past global curfew.
“Yeah,” he said.
Tee had nothing better to do and so took on his offer.
Elsewhere, Saeda sat cross-legged, painting on her digital tab. Her strokes slowed as she scrolled through old photos—and paused on one of Snickers, her lost pet. A familiar ache tugged at her.
Before she knew it, she was between two tall trees, staring down at a stone marked with a carved “S.”
Snickers’s grave.
She sat in the quiet, watching the grave she'd once made, letting the silence speak.