“Then today is Lesson 2!”

Professor F faced the four and clapped, crisp as wings snapping in cold air.

Yekase turned toward Dragon God Shark at her side, visor a shadowed lake; she couldn’t see his face, but she could feel he still wore that headset like a hidden wire.

Ling Yi and Crimson Field were already fired up in the front row, heat shimmering; the two rows showed a sharp temperature gap, like sun and shade.

“Lesson 2 is simple. The four of you will spar,” she said, like flint to steel.

...

“Uh… huh? You counted me again?” Yekase’s dismay flickered like a startled sparrow.

“A fight. Don’t you want to try?” The invitation hung like a blade of grass in the wind.

“Not at all! I don’t even have that ability!” Panic beat like a drum in her ribs.

“What a pity.” Professor F’s smile was calm water; she knew asking Yekase to face the squad head‑on was a bridge too far, a passing cloud not worth chasing.

“Then it’s Flashblade Red versus Dragon God Eagle. That’s fine, right?” Her tone was a clean bell.

“No problem!” “We can start anytime!” Sparks danced at their knuckles like fireflies.

The two reds rubbed their fists, embers in human form. Yekase and Dragon God Shark traded a glance and slipped to the edge of the training field like shadows at dusk.

Then, the bout began, like drums rolling before a storm.

How strong were squad members without their robots? Curiosity gnawed at Yekase like a fox at a latch.

Crimson Field made no feints, charging straight as an arrow. Ling Yi too—she kicked her boosters, scarlet jets flaring, and sprinted like a comet.

Two red afterimages collided at center, like banners whipping in a gale.

—Boom!!

Shock hit Yekase like thunder under her skin. Can humans make that sound just by colliding?

Dust peeled away like old bark. Crimson Field snapped a straight punch, his knuckles on the center line catching Sky Striker’s blade like iron against iron.

“So hard!” Ling Yi cried, breath sparking.

He carried no weapon, fighting bare with a battle-suit—silk-tight to the eye, yet in Yekase’s sight it became a woven lattice of Omega Ray and another kind of Infinite Power, like starlight braided with current.

“Soul Power?” Her voice was a pebble dropped in a clear pond.

“As expected of a doctor. You saw through it,” Crimson Field answered, steady as a mountain.

At some point, Professor F drifted over on her little saucer, light as a dragonfly, to watch beside them.

“Can you see Infinite Power’s ripples with the naked eye?” she asked, words like ripples on tea.

Yekase shook her head, cool as moonlight. “I toggled Arcane Sense. I meant to train Sorcery, but I can faintly see other energies flowing too, like mist through reeds.”

On this secret island base, she kept that buff always on, a lantern at dawn; only yesterday’s run had dimmed it for a while. Here, no ambush loomed like a wolf in grass, so she could spend her daily Sorcery flow with ease.

“Learning magic? Nice. That drive to recharge yourself anytime matters, like wind filling sails.”

“Want to learn a bit too? Letting Sorcery idle is a waste, like rain lost to sand. A few handy little spells are easy to pick up.”

“Then I’ll trouble you for guidance this afternoon,” she said, smiling like tea warmed on coals.

While they bantered, Dragon God Shark watched the ring with the focus of a hawk on thermals.

Ling Yi and Crimson Field had traded dozens of straight punches, raw stats against raw stats, like drums beating in even time.

Both wore red, but one was a single‑soldier armor, one a battle‑suit—lone blade versus squad mantle, strengths and flaws clear as black and white.

The Flashblade System was built for solo combat—attack, defense, mobility, all‑round like a balanced scale. Since Ling Yi learned to swap forms mid‑fight, she covered weaknesses, and when she found no edge in pure brawling, she prepped a form switch like a swimmer turning mid‑lane.

The Beast King suit was plainer by design; with teamwork as its spine, each member did what they excelled at, like instruments in an orchestra. So Crimson Field’s attack and defense towered over Ling Yi’s by a ridge, yet he had no special skills, and he couldn’t catch her aerial mobility, a kite dancing on sea wind.

Even so, Ling Yi felt kiting him to death with Gale would be empty training, like chasing leaves. She only used boosters to tweak posture and harden strikes, sparks blooming at each impact.

Thud!

Their fists met at the waist, a stone against a river’s current.

Crimson Field stepped back one pace; Ling Yi took two, retreating like tide.

They closed again. Crimson Field threw a high kick to break her stance, lightning at his heel, but Ling Yi seized the chance—she arched back, hugged his leg, back thrusters roaring like a furnace, and hauled him skyward like a hooked marlin.

“Uwohhh—?!” His cry trailed like smoke.

A 360‑degree Earth down‑throw, the world flipping like a coin.

Boom!!

“Ugh, every time we have to repair the whole arena…” Professor F complained, but her eyes shone like children watching fireworks.

Bad sign. Yekase’s wariness pricked like thorns. Does she actually enjoy this chaos? Hidden maniac?

“Don’t underestimate me!” Crimson Field’s shout rang like steel.

He rose from the crater, legs bent, body springing straight up like a spear. Bright silver power pooled on his right fist, liquid moonlight threading his knuckles.

“Blade Spell—”

Ling Yi didn’t wait. In midair she’d already charged her blade spell like storm‑fire in a cloud. She swung down to smash his rush head‑on, thunder to thunder.

“Blazing Rekindle!”

A scarlet half‑moon wave twisted the air like a mirage and swallowed him whole, a furnace’s breath.

Then he burst from the far side of the flames, a stag through brush.

It didn’t work—no, his suit wore charred scorch marks now, black flowers on red. The sequence had bitten deep.

Crimson Field raised his right hand high— a silver light‑blade flared, clean as ice.

He’d been gathering that energy since his jump. Using Blazing Rekindle’s visual cover, it had stretched to about two meters, a crescent scythe.

“Taste my Zhuo’jin Hand Blade—aaah!!” His cry was a tearing wind.

Ling Yi lifted Sky Striker to block by instinct—then realized it wasn’t something she could hard‑parry. Her posture was wrong; there was no room to dodge, the cliff already underfoot.

She hurled Sky Striker straight at him, a red hawk, reached deep into her chest—

And canceled her armor, petals falling from a flower.

“Wha—” The silver blade hesitated for a heartbeat, a candle sputter.

Earth’s gravity tugged her down like a faithful river, and she slid past the edge of the hand‑blade, skin to ice.

She clutched Crimson Field’s leg—he froze for an instant like a deer in light—then pulled a different key from her pocket. “Flashblade Activation!”

“Sky Striker ACE! Code‑04!”

“SHIZUKU!”

Deep‑blue armor wrapped her like midnight water, and it dragged Crimson Field off‑balance; he couldn’t flip to head‑up in time. They tumbled as one toward the ground, a knot in freefall.

Boom!!

Second slam, like thunder echo.

The earlier chips and dust caught the impact again and went feral, sand devils awakened. A sandstorm smothered the arena; Yekase covered mouth and nose, wind scratching at her eyes.

“Doctor—cough, cough! Talk to her! Cough— canceling in mid‑fight— cough…” Dragon God Shark’s voice rasped like gravel.

“Of course! Pfft— sand in my mouth!” Professor F sputtered, laughter like rain.

“—Blade Spell!” The culprit’s shout cut through the murk like a bell.

“Hindrance Ripples!”

With that blade spell, she meant to disrupt the Beast King suit’s energy flow, lowering Crimson Field’s fight power, like algae in a stream.

An incredibly correct read for a rookie, eerie even, like a child naming stars.

But Dew isn’t like Kagari or Gale. It’s not a form you can drive on raw momentum; it needs calm water.

“Flashblade Activation!”

“Sky Striker ACE! Code‑02!”

“HAYATE!”

As expected—her choice shifted like wind.

Hindrance Ripples did nothing. Not because she failed to cast, but because she never truly invoked it, a phantom in fog.

With dust as a veil, unless you had sensing on like Yekase, you’d miss that, like fish under ice.

“There’s a disruptor skill too?!” Crimson Field bit the lure, surprise flaring.

He bought it. Those four words delivered a clean mislead; in the choking dust, he blamed the low visibility on a spell that never landed, fog wearing a borrowed name.

How would Ling Yi use that misread? The question perched like a kite on the wind.

Only Yekase, who’d foreseen it, noticed a small green glint bloom at the smoky center, like a firefly.

Gale’s extra gear is a floating armor and a railgun. It hits less hard than a direct Sky Striker slash, but it fires far and focuses to a point, a needle of storm.

In short, a sniper cannon, a horizon‑piercer.

“Blade Spell—Explosive Wind Bias!”

Bzz—!!

With that electromagnetic hum, a thick green beam pierced the dust and shot toward open sky, a pillar of jade.

“What caliber is that?!” The question cracked like a whip.

As the dust blew away in a single gust, Ling Yi held the electromagnetic cannon in barrel mode; daylight carved her shadow from the beam, and she looked like a ghost‑god, wrath in human shape.

After the first burst, the beam, over three meters wide, didn’t fade. It kept a terrifying torrent, like a sideways waterfall; the cost was beyond counting, coins into a bottomless well.

And it had already blown past Gale’s power ceiling, redline screaming.

My gut tightened like a fist. Is she trying that new style again? I spent last night on the name ZEROS, and I forgot to warn her—go easy with Mind Energy!

At this rate they’ll both be badly hurt! If needed, cut it now—Yekase’s resolve bristled like frost.

“Zhuo’jin—Rebound—!!” Crimson Field’s roar rang like brass.

The beam was chopped—no, it bounced back, a mirror of heaven!

Crimson Field appeared at the beam’s end, hands braced on a round energy barrier like a shield of azure glass, holding back the evolved Explosive Wind Bias, a river turned aside.

The barrier glowed a deep azure, darker than Mind Energy’s blue—clearly Soul Power, a choir’s note.

The load was brutal; alone, he couldn’t angle the barrier. The beam shuddered like a struck bell, then reflected upward, shattering a passing cloud, white wool torn.

“Soul Power… I recall it’s extremely similar to Mind Energy, but subtly different,” Yekase murmured, thoughts like lanterns.

“Shared will, conviction, minds in harmony— that spark becomes Soul Power,” Professor F said, like a teacher in spring rain. “Call it Mind Energy’s online mode.”

“Then, effect on the body?” Yekase’s curiosity flickered like a candle.

“None. So it can’t buff the flesh,” Professor F replied, clean as snow.

I see. The idea settled like dew on leaves.

Harmony of spirit is a power only members with a common ideal can wield, a rope braided tight.

So the Triple Calamity dev team too… another reason to share notes when we return, bridges to build.

After mauling the Soul Power barrier for nearly half a minute, the cannon finally died, embers cooling.

The next second, the overrun railgun reverted to raw alloy and Flash Energy, folding back into her armor like rain into earth.

Ling Yi dropped to a half‑kneel, stabbing Sky Striker into the floor for support, breath a bellows.

That awe‑striking shot drained her; she couldn’t continue. On the other side, Crimson Field’s arms visibly twitched, nerves crackling like dry twigs.

“That’s it! You both fought great!” Professor F’s voice was a warm wind.

“But we haven’t…” Crimson Field blinked, surprise like a startled bird.

“Must a spar end in a winner?” she asked, calm as lake glass. “Do either of you have a single punch left?”

Both shook their heads, honest as dawn.

“Then this is fine. A‑Chi, good barrier. But you hesitated in several spots and gave openings, holes in your net. Handwrite a 2000‑word combat reflection for me.”

“Uwaaah?! Professor, my arms! They hurt; they won’t move!” His protest fluttered like torn paper.

He was dragged away, a fish in a net.

Dragon God Shark watched them recede, nodded to Yekase like a quiet bow, and followed, steps steady as tide.

And Ling Yi, kneeling in silence on the ground—

—.

The Blade Armor unraveled into red motes, drifting away like scattered embers. With its support gone, the body collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut and hit the ground with a dull thud.