C57: Standing Each Other

It felt like lava was rushing through my veins. Every muscle shut down; I tried moving my fingers, but it was like an eternity of pain. My internal organs got covered in boiling water.

It hurts! It hurts! It hurts! It hurts! Damn it! Damn it! Damn iiiiittt! It fucking hurts!!

Unimaginable pain wrecked through my body, and it felt like my mind was slipping and I was going to pass out. I couldn't even scream. Ironically, the pain was the only thing that kept me conscious.

I tried to think of something!

It seemed like it wasn't the kind of poison meant to not be noticed. So it was safe to assume the poison would kill me quickly.

I couldn't move either. I had no choice but to test this now!

There had always been a question in the back of my mind. Just how much could I control my body using Perfect Me? I never had the chance to try this safely.

Learning about and training my special ability that I could use only five minutes a week was hard. If I used it for training, what if I needed it for an emergency that week?

With such harsh limitations, my ability was more than just a surface control ability. After all, the risk was enormous. Most days, it was the same as if I had no special ability.

Reiss shoved Delia by the side; with his new strength after metamorphosis, he pushed her away as if she were made of paper.

She was thrown mid-air and tried to balance herself to land feet-first into the wall, but she stumbled and landed on her shoulder. Delia winced and held her bleeding ears. Her eardrums had burst, and she had difficulty keeping her balance.

Reiss ran past her and was in front of me in a split second. He had an exoskeleton, and his power was nothing to laugh at.

He grabbed my forehead, and simultaneously, Delia threw her blades at him.

In an instant, I was in a bright void—a world where I could only see white and was floating in nothingness. There was no smell or taste, and I couldn't hear anything.

Some kind of transportation ability? If that were the case, I would still feel the pain of the poison working through my veins. So it likely wasn't teleportation.

On the opposite side of me, a man in a suit formed. It was Reiss, and he had his missing arm as if Delia had never chopped it off

We were probably in some kind of zone where he could transport someone with only a touch. His ability seemed to stem from Hypnosis Techniques.

What was his special ability? I had no idea; there was no information on it.

How come he worked as a royal guard, and there's no info on his ability? Unless somebody had intentionally hidden it.

Does this guy still have contacts with the higher-ups despite going rogue?

Well, thinking about that was useless. Even trying to guess his ability was useless too. There were unlimited possibilities for what kind of special ability he had.

I must lower the probabilities and go through the process of elimination.

Only one fact was certain; the stronger the ability, the stronger the restrictions.

"What is your ability?" I tested the waters.

***

'Has he already figured out the gist of it?' Reiss kept his cool on the outside. But he still answered. "My ability is called Standing Each Other, allowing my opponent to choose the effect. The first choice is called Buffy Aura. It will allow us to clash our Ord; the one with more Ord and better Ord control will win the game."

Of course, as a royal guard, he had an advantage in this. Since he had high Ord and trained his Ord control to the extreme, he was a Master, so his Ord control was no joke. So in this category, only other Masters could match him.

But at the same time, he wouldn't fight against enemies who had too much Ord. That was why he didn't use his ability on the girl with the mask.

Delia's Ord was cold and filled with maliciousness, but there was a lot of it. So much that even if he had better Ord control, he would likely lose.

"The second option is Wheel of Torture. You can play a game where we will have a battle of wills. The clash will last three minutes at most, which might sound short. But when you're suffering under countless tortures, it feels like an eternity. The one who reacts the most to the pain will lose."

While the second game sounded fair on the surface, as a royal guard, Reiss had trained to handle the torture and pain in case an enemy captured him. So the second option was where he would have the biggest advantage.

"The last option, Lazy Cat, is for you to give up without playing. If you do that, your Ord will be sealed for an hour. By the way, if you lose a game, your Ord will be sealed for a whole day."

No matter what the kid chose, Reiss was confident in winning.

He had manifested his ability when he was only a teen. He had trained around the conditions and made it something where he would win against most people—turning this ability from a fair game to something where he could seal people's Ord with a touch.

Time in here moved about a hundred times faster than outside since they were in a world created by their mental power.

'Though if I lose the game. Those same punishments the opponent would have suffered will turn back on me.' Reiss might have given the illusion that he had explained the ability since it was one of the conditions where he had to explain if the opponent asked.

But he left some of the more dangerous aspects hidden. He did his best to make the kid think this game was fair.

'He will probably choose the first option.' Reiss thought. No one right in their head would pick torture, and only the weak would pick to give up.

The kid was likely a Beast Master. In the worst-case scenario, he might have talent above 70%. But Reiss had more Ord and time to have trained his control over it.

He already had a plan when he got outside. It seemed like the serial killer girl somewhat seemed to care about the brat. A hostage situation was the best. Though it would be a bit dangerous outside, in less than ten seconds, the Judgment bitch would finish reading him his rights.

The plan was to go outside, take the kid hostage, and have the serial killer girl throw the knives at Paris. Though this plan was a bit dodgy since it was weird to think about how someone like Delia had people she cared about.

"I see, so time passes faster here," the brat smirked suddenly, fixing his glasses while staring at him coldly. "Did you come here to get some time to think? Then the best strategy would be to take me hostage."

Bingo! This kid is smart. He had figured out Reiss' plans in less than a minute. Also, his calmness was unnatural, as if he had already won the battle.

But there were always arrogant people like that.

Reiss remembered his Expert Exorcist Exam when a similar guy was like this too. But the arrogance that same guy showed was something earned. He had monstrous Ord and even more monstrous control over his Ord.

That same kid would later grow to become the Demonic Exorcist.

Reiss clenched his fists at the thought of the Demonic Exorcist—the words he said back then still rang in his mind.

'Hey, isn't your ability kinda shitty? What kind of cowardly loser would create something like this?'

No one had ever said that to him! His ability allowed him to defeat people with just a touch!

"Hey, before we do this. Can I ask you something?" The kid stared at him with a strange look in his eyes. "Sorry if this comes off as offensive. But why would you create an ability that only allows you to defeat someone weaker than you?"

"What?" For a second, Reiss felt the brat's figure in front of him overlap with someone else. A chill went down his spine.

"Well, whatever. Who am I to criticize someone else's choices?" The youngster shrugged. "I just have to choose a game."

Reiss was confused. Still, a smile made its way into his face. He didn't know why. But for some reason, the brat reminded him of someone he would love to kill.

'No matter what happens. I have to kill this brat, or I will never be able to sleep easily.'

*******

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