CHAPTER THIRTEEN

To my surprise, and to that of my team, our mentor didn’t pop a blood vessel after witnessing the mess we’d caused. In fact, he was real chill about it. We tousled his front yard and broke the east wall of his meeting room, and the only grief he gave us was cleaning up the mess. I had a hard time understanding the man’s temperament, though, when I focused on his gait more, I realized that he might have been drunk….

When he stepped inside, Felix confirmed it, his team in a good fucking mood. They didn’t do great in their evaluation either, but Ash managed to change his mind after a round of drinks. Gun mentioned him operating like a cheap date—get him in a good mood when you liquor ‘em up. I hadn't had the experience, but it was a good tip nevertheless. Clearly, it saved their asses, and ours….

Felix, Gun, and Ash helped us fix our mess. I kept referring to the chaos as our mess because I felt in part responsible for it. I had a feeling that our mentor wanted me to be the leader, so I took the blame. When Felix mentioned Hayashi using his portal to get them here faster, he also mentioned that our next evaluations would get progressively harder, despite our passing or not. Which meant that I had to get both Naomi and Reina on the same page, or our next test could very well be our last.

Collectively, it took us over seven hours to clean everything up and tarp the gaping hole in the meeting room wall. After that, it was dinner time, where Ash and I sat on the front steps, flipping through a few menus she’d collected for take-out. There was a sweet noodle spot she wanted to try, volunteering to come with me to pick up the food. But she said that Felix arranged a meeting for his team in a couple minutes, and the noodle shop closed in an hour. After that, they were going to head off to the market to pick up groceries.

“Here’s our half,” Ash said, giving me some cash and a list with her order for her team on it. “Extra spicy for mine, don’t forget!”

I snickered. “I won’t.”

“You sure you want to go by yourself?”

“Egh, I might change my mind. We’ll see.”

“You never told the big boss what went down today, or us.”

“It’s not important. We messed up, that’s all. And don’t worry, we’ll do better.”

She gave me a funny look. “Those girls went at it, huh?”

I snorted, scratching the back of my head. “Man, was it that obvious?”

“The structure is different for your team. Wasn’t hard to figure out. Know what I mean?” She winked.

I looked at her confused. “No, not really.”

She giggled. “You can be so innocent sometimes, you know that, Nero?” She got up off the stairs and walked back inside, threatening me to come back home safely from my food run. I rushed after her and offered her some yen for our half of the groceries. That way, we could at least have some breakfast in the morning. She promised me she wouldn’t use my money on snacks, even though I didn’t bring the topic up. Now I was worried, but when I saw Naomi walking up from the corner of the dojo, my conversation with Ash magically disappeared from my head.

When we’d been cleaning up, Reina admitted to trying to harm her, but not to trying to kill her. From where I was standing, it looked like the both of them were out for blood. Despite that, I knew Naomi was the stronger girl, and if she landed a hit, it would stick. It may have come off as favoritism, but there was no way Reina was on top of my favorite person list. I was just terrified of the idea of Naomi overdoing it like she had in our eval….

I rushed to her, calling out her name. She stopped immediately, looking over to me with that mellow uncaring expression on her face.

“Hey! Where have you been? I’ve looked for you everywhere,” I asked concerningly.

“What do you want?”

I looked down at her fist carrying something red inside of it and asked, “What you got there?”

“Reina’s heart,” she said, my chest tanking at her dark joke. For a moment, my brain had taken her seriously, even though that face of hers said otherwise. “If you’re wondering where I was, I was beyond the estate lines, digging her a six foot grave.”

“Heh, you gotta stop saying shit like that. I can’t tell when you’re kidding…. You are kidding though, right?”

She opened her hand up to show me what she had, and I swear I was about to be an accomplice to a murder. Until I realized that what she had was shinier—a ruby with a huge diamond stud on it.

“Hold on, where the hell did you get that?”

“Where do you think?”

I dreaded the thought, but I knew where she was going with this!

“Naomi, you stole that from Reina?!”

“For leverage.”

“Leverage?!”

“You didn’t want me harming a hair on her head, but I needed something to satisfy my rage. And this is it. I’m sure it’s worth more than the both of us combined. If she crosses me again, I will pawn it.”

I wanted to keel over.

“You do know that she will figure out it’s missing, right?”

“I’m sure it’s only one necklace of many in her collection. I doubt it.”

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I sighed defeatedly. “Well, at least it’s better than you trying to kill each other. Even though she’ll figure one of us took it.”

“Probably you more than me.”

I chuckled. “I can deal with her when the time comes. Your dirty little secret is safe with me.”

“Perfect,” she said, proceeding to walk away until I took her by her shoulder and offered her an invitation.

“Hey, I’m heading to the noodle shop for dinner. Ash loves the spicy pork dish.” I smiled.

“Sounds fascinating…” she said in a painfully sarcastic yet comical voice.

“Come on, let’s go on a food run together.”

She looked at me slightly shocked and commented, “You sure you don’t want to ask Reina?”

“What? No. You seem to be forgetting she hates my guts.”

“The feeling doesn’t seem to be mutual, if that is actually the case.”

“You could be my muscle. It isn’t safe out in these streets. I need my bodyguard.”

“Are you admitting to me being stronger than you?”

“Well, if you absolutely must emasculate me by rephrasing it, then yes!” I teased, the girl breaking out in a slight smile. It was the first time I’d seen her do one of those! What a small sense of accomplishment—and that smile, it looked great on her. I’d like to see it more often.

“Fine, but only because I can’t let someone as weak as you wander the streets alone.”

Aww, that’s cute…

The ride to the noodle shop was long, but Naomi seemed to relax a bit, her shoulders not as rigid and her temperament lighter. Perhaps my company wasn’t as bothersome to her as she wanted me to believe, even though she’d shoot down much of the small talk I was trying to engage her in. After we ordered dinner, we hailed a designated cab, and I insisted we take Hayashi’s advice to drop off at least two miles from the dojo.

“Too bad we don’t have our own private limo service, huh?”

“Limousines make me uncomfortable,” she refused. “I’d rather walk.”

“Hopefully not in total silence. That’d be boring….”

She craned her eyes to me. “Are you calling me boring?”

I laughed. “I hope that’s not your defensive voice,” I played. “I’ve been trying to get you to talk to me for our entire trip. I thought for someone who wanted to be in my team so badly, you’d learn to open up to me.”

She paused, turning her head back around before she admitted, “I’m not very good at those….”

“Those what?”

“Kinds of things. Just… talking… openly.”

“It’s not as hard as you’re making it out to be. We can start from the obvious topic, your meta. You seem to have a real handle on your talent.”

“I’ve had practice. Hunting monsters helps you get better.”

“Wait, you’ve hunted before?!”

“Thought it was obvious from my stats.”

“Well, yea, but, no, not really. If you’ve hunted before, where are your fame points?”

“I hunted on the side, for private clients. And that’s about all I am willing to admit in the matter.”

“Damn… I have a real pro in my team.” I smiled. “Sweet.”

“You’re giving me too much credit,” she said modestly, then turned her eyes up to me. “What about you?”

“Hmm? What about me?”

“Your meta ability. Or should I say, abilities…”

“Huh? How do you know I have more than one? Have you been checking me out?”

“No, but our com units are advanced in a sense that they pick up meta signatures when they are first utilized. As long as the device is equipped. Usually, that is the case, although sometimes, there’s a delay.”

I smiled at her. “Doesn’t explain how you know I have many.”

“I don’t. Which is why I’m asking. It’s only a speculation, seeing as you are already a special case….”

“Well, the super strength you already know about. I also have mental immunity and a more recently discovered physical invulnerability.”

“What? Mental immunity?”

“Yeah. Pretty crazy, right? I haven’t heard too much of that special power moving around. It helped big time on the flight to Utoro. There was a sleep-inducing demon roach on board, and he couldn’t touch me.”

She didn’t comment, Naomi turning around almost as if she were disappointed. Until she said, “A triple threat. Having three abilities is rare. What else could you do?”

“Don’t know. Kinda’ figuring all of this out as I go.”

“How do you feel?” she asked a bit ominously.

Truthfully, I had no idea what she meant by that, so I gave her a simple answer. “I feel fine. Great, actually.”

She stopped short, triggering me to do the same. The look on her face was different again, but instead of a smile, she hit me with a worried look. “You need to be careful.”

I raised an eyebrow at her. “What do you mean?”

“Having three gifts will naturally make you not only a target for creatures, but a focal point for Organization VII.”

“What? Organization VII is already monitoring our every move. We are in their system as hunters, aren’t we?”

“There’s more to it than that….”

“Then, what do you mean?”

“I am just telling you to be careful out there.”

“You’re not being very specific, Naomi. What am I supposed to be worried about?”

She answered me with silence before she confirmed, “Never mind. Forget I mentioned it.”

I snorted. “Has anyone ever told you that you’re too damn mysterious?” Just as I said that I heard a strange chuckling noise, Naomi and I turned toward the direction it was coming from. The noise stopped, and then we heard shuffling along the forest’s shadows.

“We have company,” Naomi said unfazed. “Sounds like a shadow walker.” She went on to investigate, my hand impulsively flying over her shoulder to stop her.

“Hey, maybe we should find another route,” I suggested, not having realized where my words were coming from before I made the connection in my head. A part of me was afraid of going in there. The area looked similar to where I’d died, the memory bolting my legs to the ground. I didn’t want Naomi thinking I was fucking shaking in my boots, but I was. This hunt was different, and as much as it bothered me, I couldn’t break out of being genuinely petrified.

“This way is faster,” Naomi said. “There’s nothing to be scared of.”

I laughed sheepishly. “Scared? No one said anything about being scared!”

“The shell of your ears get red when you lie,” Naomi pointed out, my hands flinging over them embarrassed. “I am here with you. So quit being afraid and investigate with me.”

She turned back around and led the way. I watched as her figure blended with the shadows, fading until only her voice echoed back. “You coming or not?” I hesitated, before I settled our food under a tree and followed her.

My heart pounded, my skin prickled and my palms were sweaty. I tried to buckle down and keep it together, but this time, I wanted to listen to my human instincts and keep away. Far far away. “S-sh-hit…” I hissed under my breath. Why did it have to be a goddamn forest in the middle of the night in some creepy isolated neck of nowhere?