As the gates of the hunting ground opened, Natalia, now fully reverted to her human form, walked out with Beatriz beside her. The medics rushed in immediately, guiding them both onto benches while quickly checking for injuries.

  One of the staff began wrapping Beatriz’s forearm, where Natalia’s tail had slammed her earlier. Beatriz winced, but her expression was calm… even amused.

  Nikolai approached with arms crossed and an eyebrow raised.

  “You surrendered pretty fast, Beatriz.”

  He wasn’t accusing, just curious.

  Beatriz let out a low chuckle, leaning back as the medic tied off the bandage.

  “I had to. All my offense relies on my active abilities. And since the rules prevent us from using anything but passive traits…”

  She wiggled her clawed fingers, a playful smile forming.

  “These alone aren’t scratching a J?rmungandr.”

  Nikolai snorted. “So, you gave up because she outclassed you?”

  Beatriz shook her head.

  “No.”

  She looked over at Natalia, still catching her breath, but steady, strong, glowing with a quiet confidence.

  “I surrendered because she surpassed my expectations.”

  Her smile widened. “Natalia didn’t just grow stronger, she evolved beyond what a melee fighter like me can safely handle.”

  Nikolai followed Beatriz’s gaze, nodding appreciatively.

  Then he turned toward Anya, who had been talking with her fellow cadets.

  “I hope my student is growing at the same pace,” he said with a teasing edge.

  “Oh, she is,” Beatriz assured him with a smirk.

  “Trust me, Natalia’s not the only one who came out of that training period stronger. Every single one of them surprised us by their growth ever since this mentor vs mentee duel started.”

  Cain announced the next match: Anya versus Nikolai.

  As Anya prepared to step forward, Kael approached her.

  “Good luck,” he said.

  She smirked confidently. “I don’t need luck. I’m going to win. And when I do, you’re treating me to dinner.”

  Kael let out an amused breath. “Alright, deal.”

  Anya and Nikolai then walked toward the front of the Hunting Ground. Nikolai glanced at her and asked, “Where do you want to fight? Pick your terrain.”

  “The city ruins,” Anya replied without hesitation.

  Nikolai nodded, accepting the choice.

  Both raised their Spirit Cards and shouted in unison:

  “SPIRIT DRIVE!”

  A burst of energy flashed between them.

  Anya emerged clad in sleek silver armor with vibrant pink highlights. Pink goggles rested atop her head, the lenses pulsing with scanning overlays. Her armor bore feather-like motifs reminiscent of a sky hawk, the glowing eye emblems bright neon pink. In her hands formed a polished sniper rifle, its silver plating pristine and gleaming.

  Nikolai appeared opposite her, dark green armor shimmering with chameleon-like highlights. A mask covered his lower face, and a hood draped over his head like a silent hunter. His own sniper rifle materialized, dark green, rugged, and built for stealth.

  The two sharpshooters stood poised in the simulated ruins, the air thick with tension.

  The battle was about to begin.

  As they entered the Hunting Ground, Anya pulled her pink lenses down from her forehead, the neon display flickering to life. Without exchanging a word, the two sharpshooters walked toward their chosen terrain, the city ruins. Their steps were silent, their expressions sharpened with focus.

  Just as they crossed into the battered district of collapsed towers and broken streets, Nikolai vanished. One moment he was beside her… the next, nothing but empty air.

  Anya didn’t flinch.

  Her armor responded instantly, pink light flaring as wings unfolded from her back. She kicked off the ground and soared upward, gliding between shattered buildings until she reached the roof of a ruined high-rise. She landed softly, the wings dissolving into light.

  Dropping low, almost flat against the cracked concrete, Anya adjusted her sniper rifle and activated her lenses.

  The display scanned the ruins below in shifting layers of neon overlays.

  She waited, silent, patient, tracking every movement in the city of shadows.

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  Suddenly, a bullet cracked against the rooftop beside Anya, scattering shards of broken concrete. She jerked her head toward the impact point—close. Too close. More shots followed in rapid succession, each one tightening the noose around her position.

  But her lenses were already sweeping the city.

  Layer by layer, neon grids intersected across the ruins until—

  Ping.

  She found him. A faint heat signature tucked inside the skeletal remains of a collapsed building.

  Her perch was compromised.

  With a flash of pink light, her wings burst open again, lifting her off the rooftop just as another bullet pierced the spot where her head had been. She dove downward, landing hard on the street below, dust rolling around her boots.

  Without hesitation, Anya tapped a switch on the side of her sniper rifle.

  Click—shift—lock.

  The weapon folded, reconfigured, and elongated into a sleek assault rifle.

  She sprinted toward the source of the shots, weaving through broken walls and overturned debris, closing the distance one silent step at a time.

  With her lenses detecting every heat signature within range, Anya moved swiftly from building to building, keeping low as she closed in on the origin of the gunfire. The ruined city sprawled before her like a maze of broken stone and twisted steel

  Then she saw it.

  A flicker.

  A shift of heat atop a half-collapsed rooftop.

  Target acquired.

  She raised her assault rifle.

  “Frost Shot.”

  A burst of shimmering, icy rounds sprayed from her rifle. Each bullet that hit a surface instantly froze it over, spreading a thin layer of frost across the concrete and metal.

  Nikolai realized his camouflage was now useless.

  With a sharp motion, he revealed himself. His sniper rifle folded and split apart with a mechanical snap, transforming into two dark-green pistols. He fired immediately, sending a hail of bullets toward Anya as he sprinted for cover.

  Anya dashed sideways, frost bullets ripping from her rifle in controlled bursts. They collided with Nikolai’s cover, freezing the edges of broken walls and abandoned cars as she ran for her own hiding spot.

  They leapt from rooftop to rooftop, exchanging bullets mid-air. Frost rounds, metal slugs, ricochets—each shot whistled through the ruined skyline. Neither gained ground. Neither surrendered an inch.

  Then Anya landed on the rusted frame of a fallen billboard, skidded to a stop, and activated her ability.

  “Heavy Gust.”

  A massive burst of compressed wind exploded from the barrel of her rifle.

  The shockwave slammed into Nikolai with full force.

  “—tch!”

  He was lifted off his feet and thrown several meters backward, crashing onto the cracked rooftop behind him.

  For a moment, silence.

  Then Nikolai stood, brushing dust from his cloak.

  Instead of anger, he smiled beneath his mask.

  “Impressive tactics, Anya.”

  And with that, he activated another layer of his ability—

  Camouflage, now enhanced to erase his heat signature completely.

  Anya’s lenses blinked, scanned, recalibrated.

  Nothing.

  He was gone.

  But the bullets weren’t.

  A rain of shots tore toward her from every angle, walls exploding into dust, metal shattering beside her boots. She ducked, rolled, sprinted, but without a heat signature, she had no anchor to lock onto.

  Fine. Change tactics.

  Anya steadied her breathing.

  Her lenses shined bright pink.

  “Hawk’s Presence”

  The world sharpened.

  Dust drifting.

  A pebble rolling.

  A faint ripple in the air where someone pushed off a wall.

  Even the smallest movement lit up in her vision.

  Her lips curled into a confident grin.

  “Found you.”

  With Hawk’s Presence, Anya no longer hesitated.

  She tracked the slightest twitch behind a cracked window frame—then fired.

  Bang—bang—bang—!

  Her shots struck true.

  Nikolai staggered, a sharp grunt escaping as frost-tipped rounds clipped his arm and side. He retreated immediately, leaping into another building, leaving faint drops of frozen mist in his trail.

  Inside the dim structure, he pressed a hand to his wound.

  “Tch… she’s pushing me harder than expected.”

  Then he noticed it.

  The walls, steel, thick, old, industrial.

  A bold idea sparked.

  Nikolai smirked beneath his mask.

  He made noise on purpose, just enough footstep, just enough motion—to lure Anya closer.

  And she fell right into the setup, wings retracting as she slipped through a gap in the fractured wall.

  The second she stepped inside—

  Bang.

  A single pistol shot rang out.

  It missed her head by inches…

  But it didn’t matter.

  The bullet pinged off the steel wall—

  then pinged again,

  and again,

  accelerating unpredictably until—

  CRACK!

  It slammed into Anya’s shoulder.

  “Ghh—!”

  She dropped behind a broken support pillar, clutching the pain.

  But Nikolai wasn’t done.

  More shots.

  A rain of bullets sang through the room, ricocheting wildly, turning the entire building into a steel pinball machine of death.

  Anya’s teeth gritted as she pressed her back to the wall.

  Think. Move. Survive.

  The ricochet storm chased her mercilessly.

  Fine, if bullets come from everywhere…

  She raised her rifle.

  “Wall of Wind!!”

  A massive barrier of swirling air erupted around her—

  a circular shield of compressed gusts that bent, slowed, and deflected the ricocheting bullets.

  Metal rounds hit the wind wall and spiraled harmlessly to the floor.

  Dust flew in every direction.

  Nikolai’s ricochet strategy was completely nullified.

  Anya exhaled sharply, her eyes sharpening again through her lenses.

  “Nice trick,” she muttered.

  “But you’re not the only sniper with battlefield control.”

  Anya steadied her breathing inside the steel room.

  The ricochet storm had stopped.

  Now it was her turn.

  Using Nikolai’s own trick against him, she aimed not at the doorway—

  but at the far steel wall.

  Bang.

  The bullet whistled across the chamber—

  hit the metal plating—

  PING—!

  —ricocheted with perfect angle—

  TING—!

  —and struck Nikolai square in the thigh.

  “Ghh—!” he hissed, stumbling back.

  His strategy had backfired.

  He had no choice now, he fled upward, sprinting for the rooftop.

  Nikolai burst out onto the ruined roof, breathing hard.

  He rushed to the building’s edge, scanning for an escape route—

  but every rooftop was too far.

  No running this time.

  The rooftop access door creaked.

  Anya arrived.

  Nikolai immediately fired—

  sharp, precise pistol shots slicing through the air.

  Anya ducked behind a shattered concrete vent, each bullet sparking off the rooftop surface.

  She exhaled slowly…

  Click.

  Her weapon shifted, returning from assault rifle to long-barrel sniper configuration.

  She whispered—

  “Air Shot.”

  Wind gathered along the length of her barrel, spiraling into the chambered round.

  She stepped out of cover.

  Nikolai reacted instantly, rolling behind a fallen antenna tower as her shot tore past—

  BOOM—!

  A perfect dodge.

  For half a second, Nikolai smirked—

  Until he heard it.

  A faint, whistling curve in the wind.

  His eyes widened.

  He turned.

  The bullet, no longer moving in a straight line—

  was bending, riding the very currents of air Anya commanded.

  It homed in—

  like a hawk diving on prey—

  and struck him square in the temple.

  THWACK—!

  Nikolai collapsed instantly, unconscious before he hit the rooftop.

  The chime echoed across the hunting ground:

  “Winner: Anya Coupri.”