The moment the ball reset, Jax came for me.
There was no strategy. There was no pretense of playing a team game anymore. His eyes were locked on me, burning with a furious, personal hatred. He ignored his teammates, the positions on the court, the very concept of the scrimmage. His world had narrowed to a single, obsessive goal: my utter humiliation.
He didn't even go for the ball. He let one of his teammates pick it up, and then he simply charged, his hands already crackling with orange Aether.
It was a storm. A raw, undisciplined, terrifying storm of pure power.
He unleashed a furious, non-stop volley of attacks, a barrage of energy blasts that filled the space around me. The air hissed and sizzled with released energy. Orange light flashed off every surface. It wasn't a strategic assault designed to score a goal; it was a tantrum, a brute-force attempt to wipe me off the court.
I was immediately thrown onto the back foot, my world shrinking to the next orange bolt, and the one after that. My mind was screaming. There was no time to think, only to react. I fell back on the endless hours of training, the muscle memory burned into me in the lonely silence of Court 7.
Dodge. Block. Weave.
The first shot was a blur aimed at my chest. I twisted, letting it fly past me. The heat of it washed over my face.
Ping. The quiet, beautiful sound was a point of absolute calm in the raging chaos. It was my anchor. [Perfect Dodge Executed. Chain: 1. +1 MP]
Another shot, aimed at my feet. I brought up a shield just in time, absorbing the impact without giving ground.
Ping.[Perfect Block Executed. Chain: 2. +2 MP]
He roared in frustration, the sounds of his attacks becoming a continuous, deafening barrage. He wasn't using skill. He was just throwing energy, hoping to overwhelm me. But his rage made him sloppy. I could see the inefficient flaws in his form that my System had so carefully deconstructed just days ago . He was wasting more than half his energy with every wild shot.
I, on the other hand, was doing the opposite. I was turning his wasted energy into my own personal fuel.
His rage was a gift. Every single one of his furious attacks was another opportunity for me to execute a perfect, high-efficiency action. He was single-handedly filling my Momentum meter.
I moved through the storm of his attacks, a ghost in his machine. My body flowed, never moving more than an inch necessary. To the other players, it must have looked like I was impossibly lucky, the shots just barely missing me every time. But I wasn't lucky. I was efficient.
The notifications were a steady, rising rhythm in my mind, a beautiful song of pure data.
MP: 21/100 MP: 25/100 MP: 30/100
While this personal war was raging, the rest of the scrimmage had fallen into chaos. Jax's team was effectively playing 4-on-5. They were furious, their formations crumbling as their star player ignored them completely to pursue his own vendetta.
"Jax, what the hell are you doing?!" his team captain yelled. "Get back in position!"
Jax didn't even hear him.
My own team was in a state of shock. They had all expected me to be neutralized in the first five seconds. But I was still standing. I was weathering a storm that would have flattened any of them. The whispers of contempt from the locker room had been replaced by a stunned silence. I could feel their eyes on me, their expressions changing from disdain to a grudging, confused respect.
"Hold the line, Kai!" I heard Ren, our team captain, shout. "Just hold him!"
From the sideline, Coach Valerius watched, his face like thunder. But his anger wasn't directed at me. It was aimed squarely at Jax. He saw a player with immense talent acting like a spoiled child, throwing away all strategy and teamwork for the sake of his own ego. He saw the very definition of a player with a low ceiling.
And then he looked at me. He saw the weakest player on the court, with the worst stats, enduring a full-power assault from the strongest player. And I wasn't just surviving. I was holding my ground. I was withstanding the pressure.
Jax's frustration hit a breaking point. He could see his attacks weren't working. He could see the other players staring. He could feel the coach's disapproving gaze. He decided to end it.
He stopped his barrage and floated back, gathering every last bit of his energy for one final, massive attack. The Jax Hammer. The same move he had tried to hit me with in the duel. He was going to pour all his anger and humiliation into this one shot and blast me into the wall.
The air around him crackled, the orange light of the Aetherball growing to the size of a cannonball.
I watched him, my body braced, my mind perfectly calm. The storm had paused. The final, giant wave was coming. My MP meter was climbing with every passing second of his sloppy energy gathering.
MP: 91/100 MP: 95/100 MP: 99/100
As Jax let out a final, furious roar and prepared to unleash the shot, a new, triumphant chime echoed in my mind. It was richer and more powerful than any before.
[Momentum Chain at maximum. MP Meter is Full: 100/100]
[Crucial Feature Unlocked: [Replicate].]
[Target Skill identified: 'Power Shot' (Crude). Replication possible.]
My eyes widened. The world seemed to slow down. Jax was moving in slow motion, his ultimate attack about to fly. And my System, my beautiful, perfect System, was offering me the ultimate irony on a silver platter.
It was giving me the power to catch his hammer and throw it right back in his face.