Chapter 166: Academy’s Entrance Final Phase [6]

Chapter 166: Chapter 166: Academy’s Entrance Final Phase [6]

Rei’s kiss lasted five seconds.

Her tongue pushed into my mouth without hesitation, hot and copper-tasting from the blood still running down her collarbone.

The palm she had opened earlier: slick, half-healed, still sticky, tangled in my hair and held on like she was afraid I would pull away the moment the contact started costing her something.

I knew the real reason.

Healing.

Residual transfer through the only method her mutated core trusted at speed.

She was telling herself that right now, the same way she always did when the numbers mattered more than the shape of the moment.

I still cupped her face with both hands and deepened it.

Her eyes went wide against mine.

Surprise first.

Then something sharper that had nothing to do with blood constructs or exam scoring.

I didn’t know whether the override was still steering the motion or whether the part of me that had wanted this since the first dungeon exchange had simply stopped asking permission.

The distinction felt academic while her mouth was open under mine and the secondary channel burned clean and bright between us.

She broke the kiss the instant the cut on her palm sealed.

A thin, almost pleased smile touched her mouth.

"That was unexpected."

I looked at her.

This has to become normal.

That was the only usable thought.

Not a secret or a crisis.

Just another tool the three of us could reach for when the board tried to peel us apart.

Before I could finish selling myself the lie, motion at the edge of the rooftop forced the decision.

My feet moved instantly.

Rei’s head snapped sideways.

Her eyes widened.

Gianna came off the upper floors of a half-collapsed residential block like the building had decided to throw her.

Blood ran from the corner of her mouth.

One arm was already extended, telekinetic markers flaring hard enough to make the air shimmer.

A broken pedestrian bridge: tons of concrete and twisted rail, turned under her will at the last possible second, giving her a platform that lasted just long enough to redirect the fall into something controlled.

I jumped without thinking.

Chains exploded from both wrists, blue and desperate, reaching for the space she would occupy when the bridge finished failing.

Swoosh.

The world went black.

Lain’s palm found my side with the same brutal economy he had used on the avenue.

BAM!

The impact folded me around the strike and launched me off the rooftop in the opposite direction.

"Agh—"

Concrete, open air, then the hard interior of another structure as I punched through a wall and kept going.

"Fuck—no—no—no—"

I hit something solid and stopped.

Dust and rebar and the taste of blood.

The override screamed warnings I didn’t have time to read.

Above and behind me, I heard Rei move, then the sound of two new signatures cutting her off.

Supports. Fresh ones.

Her voice stayed level even through the sudden spike of bloodlust that came across the secondary channel.

"Move, or I open you."

They didn’t move.

Rei’s energy from the two men she had already dropped answered her instead.

Blood that had been cooling on the rooftop lifted, lengthened, and became a swarm of fine, angry needles that filled the lane between her and the blockers.

"The Fuck?!"

Someone else started bleeding in places that made the swearing stop.

I forced myself upright in the wreckage and looked up through the hole I had made.

Gianna wasn’t falling anymore.

She hung in the open air between buildings, locked in a telekinetic hold that was not hers.

Giselle stood on the opposite roof with one pale hand extended, the same clean, absolute control Gianna used when she decided an object belonged to her.

Only now the object was Gianna.

Lain’s boot found my chest before I could take a second step.

He drove me back into the floor hard enough to crater it.

"Look," he said, voice still almost polite.

"You lost."

The three of us were separated.

Rei pinned on her roof by fresh interference.

Me under Lain’s weight with the Hive flickering in and out.

Gianna suspended in Giselle’s grip like a demonstration piece.

The dual channels that had just re-formed began to thin, the distance and the opposing pressure chewing at the links one strand at a time.

I looked at Gianna.

She turned her head toward me even while Giselle held her.

Blood still tracked from her mouth.

Her eyes found mine across the open air and the ruined district and the red portal’s constant pull.

She raised a single finger: index, deliberate, the same gesture she used on the mat when the sequence was about to change.

Giselle didn’t react to the signal.

She simply adjusted her grip and threw her into the portal.

Gianna became a dark shape against the light, body arcing toward the rupture like the exam itself had decided the only remaining score was how far a primary anchor could be made to travel before the gridlock took her.

My vision darkened at the edges for a reason that had nothing to do with Lain.

[Succubus Override — Requesting expansion]

[Current ceiling: 20%]

[Recommended Response Threshold: 50%]

[Anchor critical: Primary trajectory toward rupture]

[Query: Raise override?]

"Fifty."

The system didn’t ask twice.

[Succubus Override: 50%]

[Ocular shift: accelerating]

[Motor prioritisation: Recovery of primary anchor]

[Warning: Cover integrity failing]

[Secondary channel: Reinforced]

[Host baseline: Partially suspended]

The weight on my chest stopped mattering.

Lain’s expression finally changed.

I moved, then brought the chains up and stepped behind Lain in the same breath.

The links closed around his neck with more speed than before.

He tore them apart.

I answered with two.

His hands fought the tension, knuckles white, and still the bindings snapped.

I dropped back.

The world went black as his power took my sight again.

Four new chains formed on their own, already moving with the override’s intent, hunting him through the dark while I kept walking.

Giselle’s eyes flashed with interest.

I sensed where she was and turned to look at her, then gave a creepy smile that had nothing to do with the exam.