Harrison Argent. Nicholas thought as he left Eva's office. He's an unknown variable, so why would big sis let him fight for her hall? Is she that confident in his ability? Nicholas was panicking slightly.
Eva was no longer being intimidated by Excavre. To make matters worse, she wasn't this calm the last time Nicholas paid her a visit.
He made it a point to unsettle her once in a while, but this time she had been level-headed, unlike before. Must be because of Argent. He stopped in front of an office and rapped on the door lightly.
"Enter." came the simple command. Nicholas entered, closing the door behind him and turned, coming face-to-face with James Excavre. Without looking up, Excavre asked.
"What is it?"
"It's Eva, sir." At this, Excavre raised an eyebrow. "What about her?" "She's gained an absurd amount of confidence. It seems to be because of-" "The boy?" Excavre asked, with almost no interest in his voice.
"Yes." Nicholas said with a frown. "Sir, are you already aware of this?" "Naturally. I engineered this situation." Excavre said casually.
"She treated me like an afterthought." Nicholas almost growled. "Indeed. She probably has a new sense of assurance. Of course, it's only temporary, fleeting."
Excavre leaned back, his relaxed demeanour still intact, as he was assured of his victory already. He would completely crush Eva and would finally be able to perfect it.
Nicholas nodded in satisfaction. Excavre knew what he was doing. Eva would soon have no other choice but to join them.
"In light of that, I have an order for you." Excavre leaned forward, his eyes glowing a dull green. "You will lose to Argent tomorrow." "...Sir?"
"I need him to be on a bigger stage, in order to thoroughly crush Eva this time." "Understood, sir." Nicholas said, before bowing slightly.
***
Klara paced about the room, steadying her nerves, as Harry picked out a tracksuit set that came with a hoodie.
The set featured white trimmings along the sleeves and pants, with the set itself majorly black and the hoodie white with two black strips down the middle.
"Cool. Can I keep it?" Harry asked curtly. "If you win." Eva replied just as curtly. "Deal." They shook hands.
"Aren't you two a bit too carefree about this?" Klara asked. Eva shrugged in response. "You've got this." Klara sighed. "Whatever." She glanced at the clock. "It's almost time. Let's go, Argent."
The pair walked out of their room and were met with a thunderous crowd, nearly robbing Harry of another sense. "Loud." He complained.
"Deal with it." Came Klara's unhelpful reply. From the other side, Nicholas and Elena emerged, with the crowd chanting the name of their hall.
"Avarice! Avarice! Avarice!" "Guess their hall is really popular." Harry observed. "They're the third of the most powerful halls since the institution was established eight years ago."
Harry nodded, absorbing the information. The fifteen second counter began. "Anything else I should know?" "Yes. We're fighting blind. I have no idea what their abilities are."
"Are their abilities kept secret or something?" "That's right, and that's not all. They might know ours." "So, we're at a disadvantage then." "That's right. Get ready." Three, two, one.
Harry rushed forward, and Elena tapped the ground with her foot. Slipslide. The ground underneath Harry's feet became slippery.
That's gotta be an annoying ability for her partner. Harry thought, discarding the thought the next instant as Nicholas dashed forward, as though the ground was perfectly stable.
Without wasting a second, Harry also dashed forward, planning to meet Nicholas halfway. Nicholas' eyes widened slightly, before coming to an abrupt stop and banked right at superhuman speed.
Two questions popped up in Harry's head. Why doesn't her ability work on him? Where is he going? He got an answer to his second question immediately.
Nicholas' new target was Klara, whose mobility had been greatly limited. He's going for the weakest link. Harry realized. Do I rescue her? He immediately shook his head.
It would be better to go for his weak link instead. Klara wasn't weak. She would at least be able to hold out long enough for him to gather enough information on Nicholas' ability.
Besides, if he could shut Elena down, Klara would have a better chance at holding out, and it would be two-on-one. Steeling his resolve, Harry dashed toward Elena.
She spun away, dodging his fist attack. She had higher mobility than he did. However, Harry believed he could knock her out before Nicholas knocked Klara out.
He continued to throw fist after fist, kick after kick, but even his above average speed could barely keep up with Elena who was no longer restricted by friction.
How do I beat her? Harry's brain began to work. He had the constitution to combat mutants, but how exactly did it work? He looked at the ground beneath him. It was solid.
The area my body touches gains immunity to mutant abilities the moment they come into contact. If I could touch her, or get her to touch me, I can win.
Harry took a deep breath and tensed himself, waiting for Elena to initiate. Elena herself had very good instincts, and she knew that his ace in the hole had something to do with his mutant ability.
She guessed he had some kind of barrier protecting him from slipslide, or a direct counter to her ability. Well, it didn't matter much. She just needed to hold out until Nicholas finished off Klara.
Huff, huff, huff. Harry was wearing out. A small smirk crossed Elena's face. I'll keep running circles around him. Complacency had begun to set in. This was Harry's last resort to catch her off guard.
He was telegraphing an exaggerated version of his current physical state to make Elena feel she had won, increasing the number of mistakes she'd make.
As expected, her movements had become a bit careless, not really noticeable, but just enough for Harry to see his winning ticket.
He dashed forward in a burst of speed, meeting her at a point where she couldn't avoid him by dodging. "So, you had one last burst of speed in you?" Elena clicked her tongue.
She had messed up. She tried to make as much distance as possible between the two, but she knew he would catch her anyway.
The best she could do was try to slip out from his grasp after he caught her. "I'm not giving you any leeway." Harry said as he grabbed her by the arm.
Slipslide was now unable to manifest on the part of her body that Harry had come into physical contact with. Did he just turn off my ability on a part of my body?
Try as she might, Elena's body simply refused to create slipslide on the part of her arm Harry was currently touching. "Well, at least I got some useful information." Elena smirked as she said.
"Good game." Harry responded. He flung her out of the ring with all his might. "Nicholas! He can turn off abilities on contact!"
Well, not exactly right, but it doesn't matter. Harry shook the stray thought away. He had to focus on defeating Nicholas. Now, how is Klara faring?
***
"..." Excavre looked on calmly. As he had suspected, the boy was immune to mutant abilities. A small smirk made its way to his face.
"I wonder if this also applies to those ones too." That was highly unlikely.
Excavre leaned back. His plan to break Harry would take a while to come to fruition at this rate.
"No matter. I can wait."