Museum – First Floor

As Othar pointed out the mysterious box with the skull symbol to Sophie, Angelo moved cautiously across the second floor of the museum.

The black-haired man stayed on high alert, ready for any threat. He hadn’t hesitated to break off from the group when wolves descended the stairs after the mantis attack.

Since then, he kept a low profile, avoiding danger when possible.

At first, it was relatively easy; Nova, Xin Hua, and Sven’s recklessness distracted the ice creatures. But his luck ran out when he found himself face-to-face with one of them.

⌠Initiating combat support...

scanning for danger...

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Danger Detected:

Ice Puma

Synchro Materialization

Level 3.

Non-living creature.

Synchro Percentage 0%⌡

A warning screen appeared in his vision.

A towering puma, nearly four feet tall, blocked his path. Its muscles gleamed in the light, exuding an icy menace. The creature crouched, baring sharp teeth as it let out a low growl, preparing to strike.

“Of course it wouldn’t be that easy,” Angelo muttered, his expression tense with a mix of aggression and wariness. “At least now I have something to fight.”

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Museum – Cellar

Things weren’t any better in the museum's wine cellar.

Lucas, Ethan, and Katya faced a powerful creature, the uncontested queen of its ecosystem.

“Near 360° vision, heightened senses, and strength beyond its size... How the hell are we supposed to win?” Katya muttered, her eyes locked on the Mantis. The creature seemed to toy with them, waiting for their next move.

"All right, let's finish this!" Katya began, but Lucas dashed forward before she could finish.

She realized she was back among reckless fighters, each doing things their own way.

The pink-haired boy, charged with Synchro Aura, launched a frontal attack. His left fist struck the mantis' claw with a powerful blow, but the creature blocked it with ease.

“I’m going to finish you!” Lucas roared, ignoring the icy sting as he clutched the claw, trying to hold it down.

“No, wait!” Katya yelled, rushing to assist him. But it was too late—the other claw was already slicing toward him.

In a flash, Ethan appeared beside Lucas, intercepting the attack with a swift side kick (yop chagi).

The impact rang out, a sharp collision of force. The cold from the creature numbed Ethan’s leg, but he stifled a wince and smiled defiantly. “Now we’re even,” he muttered to Lucas.

At that moment, Katya leapt into the fray. Twisting gracefully in the air, she came down with a powerful axe kick. “Don’t let it move!” she commanded, her voice urgent as her leg arced toward the creature.

“Like I’d let it!” Lucas growled, tightening his grip on the claw and using his full strength to keep it immobilized, preventing another devastating strike.

“Sshhhhhhrrrk!”

The mantis let out a high-pitched shriek, its jaws snapping open in a desperate attempt to defend against the blow.

A sharp crack resounded as Katya’s heel struck with precision, the force so powerful that part of the creature's head snapped off and crashed to the ground, leaving it exposed to further attacks.

"Leeeeet's goooooo!" Katya roared, masking the pain shooting through her leg from the impact.

Lucas and Ethan wasted no time. With the mantis dazed, they moved in sync. Lucas gripped the claw he held tighter, while Ethan seized the other. "It’s now or never!" Ethan yelled.

Together, they strained their muscles to the max, lifting the creature off the ground. "Oraaaaaaaa!" They shouted in unison, channeling every ounce of strength as they twisted and slammed the mantis into the ground with earth-shaking force.

The impact sent tremors through the floor, kicking up dust and shards that mixed with the ice.

Katya dropped to the ground, staggering as she grabbed the leg that had struck the creature. The throbbing pain in her heel told her it was badly injured, possibly from the force of the blow against its hard shell.

"If only the fight had lasted a little longer... No, it’s good that it’s over," she muttered, her voice laced with exhaustion.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

"Damn bug..." Lucas growled, standing beside Ethan with a victorious gleam in his eye.

The mantis lay twitching, its legs weak and its movements erratic. It seemed the battle was finally over, the threat neutralized.

Or so they thought.

With a thunderous crack, the mantis suddenly unfurled its wings, unleashing a violent gust of wind that sent the group flying backward.

Before they could react, the creature rose from the ground. Its wings beat furiously, whipping up powerful currents of air that hurled Ethan, Katya, and Lucas into the scattered crates around them.

"Sshhhhrrrk!"

The ice creature screeched in fury, spewing gusts of freezing air as it loomed over its wounded opponents.

"Son of a b..." Lucas cursed, struggling to rise from the rubble.

"It’s too strong... Even after everything, we only managed to break part of its face and a claw," Ethan muttered, eyeing the mantis. Though it was battered, it was still moving, and that made things worse.

Attacking it now seemed impossible. If it had been difficult to fight on the ground, facing it in the air was nearly hopeless.

"How is it still fighting?" Katya thought, trapped in the wreckage of crates. Her body, like her comrades', was nearing its limit.

They had drained their Synchro Aura during this battle, and in all the previous tests with the statuettes. Now, their aura was fading, leaving them vulnerable.

“This is... really bad...” Katya whispered, forcing herself up, just as Ethan and Lucas began to rise.

Exhausted and battered, they refused to give in. Their bodies were on the verge of collapse, but their determination burned fiercely. They couldn’t stop now, not when they were so close to advancing in the exam.

"Sshhhhrrrrrrrk!"

The ice mantis screeched again, swooping down in a furious assault. The battle turned into a frantic struggle to dodge its relentless attacks, the aspiring agents barely managing to stay out of its reach.

As the fight raged, Sophie and Othar climbed over the museum’s relics, scaling a mountain of crates until they reached the large box marked with a skull symbol.

The wooden crate, as large as the mantis itself, was sealed tight with nails on every side.

"Qui, qui, qui, qui!" Othar barked from Sophie’s shoulder before leaping onto the crate, trying to bite it open.

Sophie sighed, shaking her head. "What are you doing? You're too small to open it like that..." she muttered in disappointment. She could hardly believe she had followed a Coonfox’s lead, hoping to help the others.

"Qui, qui, qui!" the little creature growled in frustration, scrambling over the box in a frantic search for an opening.

"It’s impossible... If only I could use the Synchro Aura, maybe I could break it..." Sophie’s unease was clear in her eyes, discouraged by her inability to contribute.

"I'm not like the others... I'm not as brave..."

As she whispered the words, a blast of icy air hit her, making her cling to the crate to avoid being swept away. Her wide eyes fixed on the chaotic scene of the battle.

She watched the three applicants, Lucas, Ethan, and Katya, pushing themselves to the brink, despite their obvious fatigue and wounds. Even so, they continued to fend off the mantis’ relentless attacks with a fierce determination.

It was clear they were nearing their limits, battling something far more powerful. Yet amid their fear, Sophie saw not only bravery but a firm conviction to win.

Awestruck, Sophie loosened her grip on the crate, ignoring the chill creeping over her skin as she focused on the unfolding fight.

"Can I become like them?"

A mix of envy and admiration stirred within her.

"All my life, I’ve avoided conflict. I’ve stayed on the sidelines, and that’s why I’ve always been a target. I can’t even defend myself. Every time something gets hard, I give up, sink into self-pity, and complain about how weak I am without doing anything to change it. If I give up now, I’ll always be that person... I’ll go right back to that same place."

Her expression shifted, her eyes hardening with newfound determination. She pressed her lower lip, thinking of all the times she had chosen avoidance over action.

This was her chance to change, and she knew it. "I can’t give up now... If I do, I’ll never become someone new, and I’ll never find where I truly belong!"

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Three Months Before the Exam

Sophie, brown-skinned and curly-haired, stood on the railing of a bridge, wearing her school uniform. Below her, the deep abyss waited, seeming to invite her fall.

Tears streamed down her face, reflecting her deep anguish as she stood there, unable to bear the feelings consuming her soul, desperately searching for the courage to jump.

"What a great fall that would be, huh?" a voice startled her. She jerked, but before she could slip, a hand grabbed her sweater and pulled her back to safety.

She tumbled to the ground, landing hard on her butt. "Ow, ow, ow!" she groaned, rubbing the spot as she got to her feet, annoyed at being interrupted. Before she could voice her irritation, she noticed the person who had rescued her was handing her a pamphlet.

"Here." The man, with brown hair, black-framed glasses, a white clerical shirt, black pants, and a trench coat, held out the pamphlet.

It was an advertisement for this year’s Terra Nexus agent exam.

"An agent? Why are you giving me this?" Sophie asked, confused.

"I watched for a bit to see if you’d jump, but you hesitated too much. It’s clear you’re not ready to leave this world," the man said with a friendly smile. "It’s not that you want to end things—you just haven’t found your place yet."

"Give this a chance. Maybe you’ll change, and you’ll start to feel like you belong somewhere," he added before walking away. Sophie sat on the bridge, staring at the pamphlet in her hand, contemplating the possibility of becoming one of the few who pass.

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Present

Sophie’s body began to radiate a translucent white aura that enveloped her with intensity. "Even if I don’t know how to fight, I can’t just sit back and watch them struggle like I always do!" With renewed determination, the curly-haired young woman delivered a powerful blow to the crate, shattering the wood into pieces.

The loud crack caught Othar’s attention. Seeing the result, he flashed a wide grin, and Sophie quickly followed suit, realizing what she had just accomplished.

"Did I do it?" she asked in disbelief at first. "Did I really do it?" She repeated, looking to Othar for confirmation. "I did it!" she finally exclaimed, her face lighting up as she jumped for joy, as if she had defeated the mantis herself.

It wasn’t until Othar leapt onto her shoulder and nipped at her cheek that Sophie’s jubilant bouncing stopped.

"You’re right, we need to focus," she said, instantly snapping into focus as if Othar’s bite had become her secret code.

Meanwhile, Katya, Ethan, and Lucas continued to struggle, dodging the mantis’s vicious strikes, with little success.

"Ahhhhhhh! Damn bug fights like a man!" Lucas shouted, frustrated by how ineffective his efforts were. Earlier, he had tried to counterattack one of the mantis’s downward blows but had ended up getting slammed to the ground instead.

"Don’t lose your cool! We’ll find an opening! We just have to think!" Katya called out to him.

Lucas shot her a deadly glare, clearly tired of her barking orders.

"Don’t waste your breath. His social skills are nonexistent," Ethan muttered, never taking his eyes off the mantis hovering above them. His exhaustion was evident in the sweat dripping down his face and the bruises marking his skin.

"Got any ideas?"

Ethan’s question only added to Katya’s frustration.

She was out of ideas. Her injured heel clouded her judgment, and the mantis's relentless attacks left her no time to think.

"Yes, I have a plan, we just need to..." she started to lie, but her body gave out before she could finish. Her strength had reached its limit. Ethan’s wasn’t far behind, and he wasn’t able to stop her from collapsing to the ground.

Katya fell, gasping for breath, cursing her weakness. The mantis, like a predator seizing its chance, dove toward the two downed applicants.

"What are you doing? Move!" Lucas yelled, panicked. He tried to reach them, but the mantis was faster.

It looked like their dreams of becoming agents were about to be crushed.

…

“You won’t, you damned offspring of your parent!”

A thunderous roar echoed from where Sophie and Othar stood. Both wore triumphant smiles as Sophie shouldered what looked like a rocket launcher, its sights perfectly aimed at the mantis.

Inside the crate, they had found an antique arsenal designed to combat the B-Synchro. The weapons, despite their age, appeared remarkably well-preserved and battle-ready.

Without hesitation, Othar had urged Sophie to grab the most imposing weapon in the arsenal. Together, they launched a missile directly at the Ice Mantis.

The projectile sped through the air in an instant, colliding with the mantis mid-flight. Instead of exploding, it slammed into the creature with such force that it sent the mantis careening across the hold, smashing it into the far wall with a deafening crash.

"Take that!" Sophie shouted, jumping with excitement as she hugged Othar.

"Qui qui qui qui!" The Coonfox growled happily while the others stared at them, stunned by what had just transpired.

"Haha, that’s lucky! I thought it would blow up right away, but I guess we timed it perfectly," Sophie said with a grin. Just then, the rocket finally detonated on the other side of the hold.

The explosion shook the museum, reverberating through its very foundations.