3:40 p.m. The semifinals of the strength test loomed like a stormbank over the campus. Both Training Fields One and Two would flare at once like twin forges. Tang Coco’s dorm had drawn Field Two, a stage of concrete and heat shimmer. Bad news struck like a cold bell: as an exchange student, Tang Coco had to wait three minutes before using her Anomaly Power.

Reluctance pricked like sand in a shoe, but there was no way around it. For the first three minutes, she could only steer the fight like a helmsman in fog.

“Alright! Heads up. Let’s beat them.” Tang Coco’s voice snapped like a banner in wind.

“Okay!”

Following the staff, the four girls stepped to center field, where a ring of energy devices sat like steel lanterns under the stands. When the match began, an S‑grade shield would dome the arena like hard glass. The further it went, the fiercer the finals would burn.

Tang Coco stood center and swept the stands like a hawk scanning fields. Half the seats lay empty like fallow soil. On the dais, only two faces she knew: her temp homeroom teacher and that teacher, Xue Jing, like two fixed stars in a thin sky.

“Coco, they’re here.” Chen Ying’s warning cut like a reed whistle.

Tang Coco looked across. Four figures in black cloaks filed into the opposite prep zone, like shadows stitched to the ground.

“Huh? What’s with that… trying to be mysterious?” Beibei’s curiosity fluttered like a sparrow.

“So weird. It’s so hot, and they’re wearing that? Not roasting?” Yuan Yuan’s complaint rose like heat haze.

“…” Tang Coco’s gaze held like ice on glass. She didn’t buy that anyone would cosplay chuunibyou under this many eyes. It wasn’t a joke; it smelled wrong, like ozone before lightning. She warned them softly, a leaf rustle before rain. “Stay sharp.”

“Okay.”

The arena speakers crackled like summer cicadas. “Contestants, get ready. The match starts in three minutes.”

Unease pooled in her chest like ink in water. “System, have Skyeye monitor Anomalous Energy signals in and around Yanjing University. Log them. Show me after the match.”

“Understood.”

“Prepare to start. Ten… nine… eight… five… four… three… two… one… Match start!” The referee’s cadence fell like drumbeats. The arena shield flared up, a clear dome hard as ice, and the other side moved like knives slid from sheaths.

“Gate of the Netherworld…” The short boy on their side thrust both hands forward like a priest at an altar. Purple‑black energy welled in his palms like night ink, and a stone door three meters high rose at center field like a tombstone. Its blue‑violet face bore flickering lines like constellations that weren’t from this sky.

Clack—clack‑clack—

The door groaned open like an old glacier. Purple light spilled from within, veiling whatever lay beyond like deep water.

Tap—tap—

High‑heel steps rang out like beads on a tray. A two‑meter silhouette stepped through, its outline womanly as a statue, its presence cold as a grave. In another time, someone might have admired the curves, like dunes under moonlight. Then the rest of it came clear, and any thought of beauty died like a candle in wind.

Blood‑red hair fell to the waist like a river of fire. Its face was a snarl carved wrong, with a clown‑wide mouth slit to the cheeks like torn paper. Cracked eye corners held twin dark‑violet pupils like bruised stars. Its skin wasn’t skin, but plates like scales set into exposed flesh, a fish‑armor in air. Oversized claws, all wrong in proportion, gripped a scythe taller than itself, the blade curved like a winter moon.

“What is that? I’ve never heard of an Abnormal who can summon a thing like this.” Chen Ying’s shock stuck like a bone in the throat.

“Can we even use that kind of monster in a spar?” Fear washed up on Beibei’s face like a pale tide; no girl would look at that and feel nothing but chill.

“Chen Ying, Beibei, focus on defense. Stall it.” Tang Coco’s call landed like a pole driven into the ground.

“Okay! Got it!”

“Wall of Fire!” “Prison of Water!” Their powers rose like twin elements waking.

The monster’s mouth peeled open, slow as a blossom, to a grin that was pure graveyard. “Jie‑jie‑jie‑jie…” It cackled, the sound dry as bones.

Thud—

Its heel stamped, cracking concrete like ice, and it rushed the girls like a gale.

“Ah!!!” Its shriek knifed the air like a siren, and the scythe cleaved down on flame and water like a falling guillotine.

Boom!!!

As expected, the great blade smashed their defenses like pottery, bit deep into the floor, and spat gravel like buckshot across the ring.

“Ah!!!” Chen Ying’s trio covered their faces with forearms, bracing like trees in a squall.

In the stands, the homeroom teacher finally couldn’t sit anymore. He strode to the referee like a stormfront. “Hey! Whose students are these? That summon’s way over the limits, right? This is a test, not a fight to the death.”

“Teacher Yang, please calm down.” The middle‑aged referee’s voice tried for still water. “The school’s aware. If it’s allowed, there’s a reason to allow it.”

“What reason!? Can they really control that thing? The defense wristband only covers three seconds. Once it’s over, what if it attacks again?” Yang’s words hammered like hail.

“This…” The referee’s face tightened like drying clay; this wasn’t what he’d expected either.

A middle‑aged man in a suit walked up, looking like a school leader, smile sharp as a knife’s flat. “Teacher Yang, don’t get excited. We’ve prepared contingencies, of course. Didn’t you see? Our top medical team’s right there.”

He pointed toward the medical zone, where nearly ten healers waited like white cranes on a shore.

“…” Yang Kai fell silent, the sound sucked from him like wind from a sail. With that many healers, as long as it wasn’t instant death, they’d live.

Seeing him hesitate, the man patted his shoulder like a lid on a boiling pot. “It’ll be fine.”

“I’ll report this to Principal Murong.” Yang’s resolve set like frost. The principal was on a trip and absent these days.

“No problem.”

On the field, the fight churned on like a river hitting rocks.

“This is bad. We can’t keep this up…” Helplessness pricked Tang Coco’s chest like needles. She checked the timer, eyes cold as steel. One and a half minutes until she could move.

She looked at the four across. Odd—other than the summon, the four under those black cloaks didn’t move, frozen like crows on a fence. With those hoods, she couldn’t read a face, only feel a wall.

“…” A thought flashed like lightning. She shouted to the girls, voice slicing clean. “Spread out! Hit it from different angles. Trade aggro.”

“Got it!”

Yuan Yuan scooped up small‑framed Beibei and darted behind the monster like a cat. Beibei and Chen Ying blasted it front and back like hammer and anvil, while Yuan Yuan slipped in stabs like a needle.

The monster staggered in a whirl of messy attacks, pinned like a bull under three toreros. It worked, for a beat.

“As I thought, they’re not planning to move…” Tang Coco’s gaze flicked to the timer like a blade. Twenty seconds left.

Across the way, the one in the center turned to the summoner, voice flat as winter rain. “That’s enough.”

“Okay.”

The summoner’s Anomalous Energy spiked like a geyser.

“Ah!!!!!!!” The monster screamed, a spike through glass.

“No!” The warning hit too late.

Thud—

A sudden sweep‑kick took Yuan Yuan mid‑air like a scything wind. Her tiny body flew far like a leaf, hit, then skidded along the floor to the wall under the stands. She went limp on impact, a candle snuffed. Her defense wristband flared just in time, a bubble before the stone.

“Ah!!!” Another rasping cry ripped out as the monster flickered forward with wicked speed, a shadow crossing the moon. Its massive claw closed over Chen Ying’s head like a trap and lifted her clean off the ground.

“Ying!” Beibei’s cry cracked like ice. A water column crashed in, a river thrown by fear.

The monster’s scythe arm snapped up like a catapult. It hurled the scythe, the arc cutting the water in two like silk. Beibei, over‑amped and too close, couldn’t dodge in time.

Thud—

At the last instant, her defense wristband triggered, a pale bubble. The giant blade slammed the shield and blasted Beibei backward like a tossed doll. She hit the floor hard as stone.

“Ugh!!!”

In the monster’s grasp, Chen Ying dangled, legs kicking the air like reeds in wind. Her wristband finally flickered on with a hiss—

Shing—

But the monster’s claw never left her head, its contact like a leech. The shield meant nothing while it touched her. Three seconds died like sparks in rain. The bubble winked out, and the claw still held.

“Ugh!!!!” Her breath hitched, thin as paper.

“Hey! Make it let go!” Yang Kai shouted, fury bright as flame. Students and teachers around the stands joined in, voices a storm of stones. The four cloaked on the dais didn’t move, statues cut from night.

“Damn it! Drop the shield! I’m going in!” Yang bellowed to the referee, a hammer on iron.

Shing—

Splurt—

Everyone in the gym froze, heads snapping to center like weather vanes in wind.

The monster’s forearm had been severed at the elbow in a single instant, the cut clean as glass. Black blood jetted like oil, and the severed arm fell with Chen Ying in a tangle to the floor.

“Ah!!!!!!!” The monster shrieked, but its voice was already dying like embers in snow.

Thmp‑thmp‑thmp‑thmp—

Four slender blue mechanical blades speared it from four angles like lightning forks. The body jerked once, then stilled, impaled and held upright like a pinned moth.

Blood at her lips, Chen Ying still clung to a shred of awareness, the world swimming like heat. As she fell, a soft, faintly fragrant body caught her from behind like night wind.

“Sorry… we couldn’t hold…” Chen Ying’s eyes rimmed red like dawn.

“It’s okay. You did great. Leave the rest to me.” Tang Coco’s voice was steady as a lake at dusk.

“Mm. Beibei’s wish… it’s on you. Be careful.” Chen Ying’s hope glimmered like a lantern.

“Got it~” Tang Coco smiled, a curve cold as moonlight. She lifted Chen Ying and carried her toward their rest area, where homeroom teacher Yang Kai and Teacher Xue Jing stood like anchors.

Medics hurried in to lift Beibei and Yuan Yuan, white coats fluttering like gulls. Across the way, the four in black still didn’t move, their silence thick as tar. All eyes followed Tang Coco like iron to a magnet.

At the edge, staff cracked the shield open like an eggshell. Tang Coco stepped through with Chen Ying, and handed her to Xue Jing.

“Teacher, please take care of them.” Her tone was a winter plain.

“I will. It’s my duty.” Xue Jing’s reply was steady as stone.

Tang Coco nodded once and walked back to center, staring at the four ahead like a drawn bow. Her face showed nothing, a lake without ripples. But if Gu Xin, Meng Yuting, or Hawkeye had been here, they would have felt it—the heat under ice. Tang Coco was angry. Very angry.

“Close‑Combat Armor, deploy…” Her whisper dropped like a seal.

Pale blue particles flared around her like fireflies, then swarmed in a tide that wrapped her like a cocoon. The shell swelled, an egg of light growing to nearly three meters, a chrysalis breathing frost.

Bang—

The particle egg split down the middle like a cracking seed. Light blew away like mist. What remained was a black shape that swallowed the eyes.

Nearly three meters tall, a pitch‑black Mech stood there like a night‑born god. Slender limbs, Armor plates dark as basalt, red points flickering beneath like embers under ash. A purple, rhombus, translucent faceplate masked the head completely, and behind it, two red mechanical eyes glowed like coals. On its back, two black mechanical wings half‑spread, rising and falling with a slow pulse, like a creature that breathed.

Right now, Tang Coco was fully enclosed by the Mech, its plates closing over her like frost sealing a pond.

Since her transformation, this was her first time running full-cover Armor, an iron cocoon from crown to heel.

If not for the single white strand poking from a seam at her back—like moonlight snagged on steel—the crowd would’ve taken it for an unmanned Mech.