A greenish-blue light illuminated a certain high yet hidden place. It wasn't that bright of a light, especially in the daytime, but it exuded a certain feeling of power and omnipotence.

“ 'Maintain her body'...” Rena wondered, her hand placed on Rin's abdomen while she used her singularity. “Now, I think I understand what she meant.”

In no way was the little sister trying to heal her bigger sibling, in fact since Rin had the 'nano mask' on, all Rena could feel was only a faint feeling of familiarity. And even without that, her psychokinesis, strong as it may have appeared, didn't possess a healing ability.

All she was doing was covering Rin's body with her power, tracing every of the girl's curves trying to find any anomalies to keep them in check—Yeah, in retrospect, she may have been healing Rin, in a way.

However, her main objective was to maintain the older teen's body from bursting. In other words, Rena was expanding Rin's limit temporarily. For an outsider, it may have appeared like Rin herself was using her Aura to cover her body while in actuality it was Rena's singularity.

The flaw was that if the little sister ran out of power and deactivate her singularity, Rin would probably die and disperse into thousands of dust particles in a matter of seconds. No, even before that, if Rin exerted herself too much, and you can be sure she will, even with Rena's singularity, there is a high chance she would be crippled for life.

Power comes at a price, after all.

What power, you ask?

A second upgrade.

Aiden may not have been present, but Winter was the perfect replacement for him. Thanks to her particular singularity, the singularity of power up's effect was perfectly replicated without a problem.

Well, in this case, the fact that it was replicated was the problem.

“How can this girl even fight with those conditions?!” Rena asked, shocked at the absurd thing Rin had decided to endure. “...more than that, this feeling...”

The deal was already done, and she doubted she could convince Winter to outdo it, so all Rena could do right now was to assure this stranger, in her point of view, wouldn't die in vain.

However, them being sisters and having lived most of their life together, the obvious natural thing was bound to happen.

Rena turned her head toward Rin's and fixated it for along while. The mask hid the face only, not the silhouette. Doubt arose in the little sister's mind along with a warm feeling.

Her heart began to beat loudly as time seemed to enter into slow motion.

‘There's no way... right?’

Curiosity reigning over, Rena extended a hand.

Slowly, oh so very slowly, she moved it toward Rin's head.

Her heartbeat grew louder and faster, time passing at a nail's pace.

Then, when her finger finally touched the mask, the younger girl hesitated even more.

She would be happy to meet her Sis again.

Yet, with how the situation was and with what she had already seen, she wasn't sure she wanted this masked girl to be her sibling.

Gulping down, Rena remained completely motionless.

Seconds and minutes might have passed before Rena resumed her movement again.

Alas, time was up.

Rin's eyelid opened— with deep red eyes.

◇

Another ray of shockwave blasted through the area, bringing a cloud of dust and rubble in its wake. Lia, being the perpetrator, had her hand extended onward, trembling after having released her singularity.

Blood was raining from her forehead, bruise and injury covered her body, and batted breath came out of her mouth. The blue-haired girl was already at her last rope, struggling to maintain her posture.

Yet the fight was far from over.

[This is your limit, humans.] The monster stated with a childish yet intimidating voice.

He walked through the cloud of dust with calm steps, making Lia all the more desperate. Unfortunately, by the time she managed to take a step back, the humanoid dragon was already standing in front of her.

‘...damn.’ She couldn't help but curse.

Her opponent was way shorter than her right now, yet she felt like she was an ant in front of him.

Since the beginning of the fight, there were three notable injuries the Elite managed to land on the Red-level monster. First was the right eye Rin had pierced. The second was the tail Lia had ripped off. And the last one was the wing Rena and Raven had slashed.

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And among those three potentially fatal damage, two had already healed. The right eye and, although still not completely, the missing wing.

Lia desperately cried ‘Unfair’ in her mind since none of the Elite presents had any self-healing ability.

[I told you right, none of you will escape alive.]

Lia engaged her Aura, expecting a powerful attack. But, to her horror, no energy came out to protect her. That is to say, her Aura didn't activate. ‘...Did it run out? Now of all times?’ A bitter smile formed on her face as she realized she was in a real pinch.

Without Aura, she was no different from your average high school girl. No super strength, no super speed, and nothing to protect her body. She couldn't do anything else than just watch the lizard-like hand approaching to take her life.

Though, not unexpectedly, someone appeared and stood in front of her. Needless to say, it was Winter, and she had every intention to protect Lia. Unfortunately, force of will didn't help her current bad status. Nor did give the white-haired girl any new hidden power.

What's more, her Aura too was rapidly thinning out, reducing her to no more than an average sixteen years old girl. To make it worse, since she was already using her singularity on Rin, she couldn't use it anymore.

In conclusion, besides standing in front of Lia to stall the inevitable, she couldn't do anything else. The short monster in her eyes, she stood her ground as though saying ‘You'll have to kill me first’.

Lia wanted to say something but eventually couldn't while the monster inadvertently stopped his hand from attacking.

[Hmph!] The dragon let out, clenching his hand again, and resumed his attack. In a deep corner of his mind, he thought the human was impressive, though that was something he would never admit.

He wasted too much time, though.

As though comedy show, the third and last decent fighter entered the fray and served as the last ray of hope. Just before the lizard hand could transpierce Winter's abdomen, shadow engulfed it and stopped it dead on its track.

[This is getting old and annoying!] The humanoid shouted, outraged by the fact he was always interrupted in crucial moments. This ought to be the nth time this day he was interrupted from killing. [Though, I guess I should kill the biggest risk first, huh!]

Raven, being the last one who could fight, was the only person in the entire city left who could injure the dragon. And you bet that was what she intended to do. One big tendril black spear, floated around above her, ready to butcher the dragon.

Yet, since she has, from the beginning, a weak Aura, a short target with imperceptible speed like the dragon was her worst enemy. When she had fought against Flame, it was fairly easy since she could still follow his movement, but here...

[Die!]

In one fraction of a second, the dragon appeared right behind Raven in a terrifying display of speed.

The little girl's eyes widened slightly without making a noise. Her concentration cut off, the shadow spear began to shake and lose its shape, threatening to disappear. Her black short hair fluttered, and in a last-ditch effort, she used what few Aura she had to jump away from the monster.

Alas, luck had run out.

Blood gushed out of the little girl's body, painting the air and ground alike. Calm and quiet as she was, Raven still couldn't suppress the scream of pain coming out of her mouth. Her vision grew blurry, her consciousness began to fade, and soon, her life was going to be snuffed out.

At the same time, a delicate, slender, and feeble arm fell on the ground, among the pool of blood. It was Raven's hand. Her dominant one.

Past the girl's right shoulder, there was no longer anything except for the red liquid that gushed out. From blood loss, the little girl's face began to grow pale. Her knee gave out and soon joined the messy soil.

Watching that horrifying scene, Lia and Winter had their expression filled with despair and grief. Their lips opened and seemed to let out screams of concern, but, at this point, Raven couldn't hear them anymore.

“Listen, Raven,” Instead, what she did hear was a distant yet familiar voice. A calm and soothing yet firm voice. “I trained you so that you would obey me.”

Slowly, the little black-haired girl became numb to the pain. Her sensation began to disappear little by little as was her consciousness. Her strength left her but she could barely feel her head crashing on the ground.

“Understood? My orders are absolute.”

Then, when her world returned to complete darkness, a faint memory rang in her head. A memory she didn't put that much importance on. A vague one even. Still, somehow she felt like she wanted to remember it.

“But...”

The voice continued, as though accompanying Raven, hand in hand to her death. Strangely, the little girl found a little peace in that. A peace that separated her from the outside world.

“...if possible, don't die.”

Unable to do anything else against the harsh reality, Raven succumbed.

—Or so she thought.

A slight feeling of pain returned to her. To be specific, she felt a small sensation on her forehead, like someone had just flicked her head with a finger. Then, she heard a certain voice.

“Come on,” A charming and confident voice. “Not this again.”

Against all expectation, Raven's eyes tried their best to open again, as though something was prompting her. An unknown surge of power filled her chest and she began to feel her heart beating again.

“You can use shadow, right?” The voice continued to speak, reattaching Raven to the living world. “Use that to stop your blood loss.”

Slowly, the little girl could make out the figure of the one talking to her. Black hair and a certain, special mask covering their face. Strangely, as Raven realized she was in Rin's arm, she felt at ease.

“I'll beat that dragon quickly and take you to the hospital, so please...” The voice entered her ears and etched itself on her soul. “Survive so that we can play chess again sometime.”

With those words, a small part of Rin's mask deactivated showing to Raven bright scarlet eyes.

The little girl couldn't help but smile.

Shadow began to shook around the ruined city and gathered around the severed shoulder. Slowly, covered in an improvised bandage of shadow, the blood stopped gushing out.

Raven's complexion didn't change much but, without a doubt, she was still alive.

[You are...?] Among a growl of warning, the humanoid dragon asked the newcomer.

Standing a few meters away from him, Raven's body at her feet, Rin slowly stood up.

Lia and especially Winter also looked at her with surprised eyes.

Something had changed.

Winter knew that Rin should be exponentially stronger than she was before due to her upgrade. However, something was out of place. Firstly, Rin shouldn't have been able to wake up this quickly, and in fact, the possibility of her never waking up was higher. And secondly, even if her stat were higher right now, her movements shouldn't have been so fluid.

Being a genius and a quick learner aside, Rin should be experiencing an unbelievable amount of pain right about now. And even if she could somehow endure that, something should have betrayed her state in her movement.

Yet, as Winter looked at Rin, it was as though the girl was completely fine.

More than all of that, the air around the long-haired teen had changed. Winter couldn't quite guess why, but a strange feeling of worry budded in her chest. Since it was mortal, she knew giving Rin a second upgrade was a bad idea. However, right now, she felt it was bad for another reason.

Then, she heard a small chuckle.

“Me?” Rin asked, with a playful tone she had never used before. She slowly turned toward the dragon, a deep smile hidden behind her mask. “I'm the strongest.”