He was, indeed, a minute late.Nathaniel had relaxed slightly—but not entirely. There was something off about him. Erementaru had noticed it the moment he stepped in. The way he moved… like a scared cat. Goosebumps flared across his arms. His breathing had quickened.
Erementaru's eyes narrowed beneath the weight of his visor.The boy's Uratsu profile was underdeveloped—childlike, even. His aura barely rippled against the air. It didn't add up. According to the files, Nathaniel was in peak condition. Yet the data available to him... was frustratingly incomplete.
Still, the puzzle pieces began to align.Of course. He was the victim of the Expansion Incident biome. The weakest link. That explained the low readings—but not how he passed evaluation. Then again, the raw physical stats didn't lie.
Muscle and bone density far above standard. Dense, almost artificially so. 270 kilograms of pure pressure packed into a physique that mirrored the old-world marble gods. Even without active Uratsu reinforcement, his body had been sculpted into something more.
Erementaru watched carefully as Nathaniel adjusted his stance. A subtle shift. Muscles flexed, clenched, priming for discharge. A micro-charge built from toe to brow. Roughly twenty-five percent of the kinetic energy used in every movement was being absorbed, redirected. Stored.
Then he noticed the gauntlets.
He knew that model. Issued by the Illumine Guild—he could tell from the scaling plates over the fingers. Those were strength-reactive gauntlets, tuned for impact resistance and feedback redirection. But it wasn't just any model.
His gaze sharpened.
Arete's gauntlets.He remembered now—she'd once tried to pass them down to her daughter. The girl had refused. Turns out she'd found someone else worthy of them after all.
He nearly blanched when he checked the compatibility ratio.Seventy percent.A perfect click between tool and host. The undersheath and gauntlet locking with unnatural precision. The minor thruster jets on the wrists—those weren't standard. She'd refurbished them.
This wasn't just a transfer of gear.It was a message.
His crop of students in this division was… interesting.Erementaru swept his gaze across the room in a casual glance—but his eyes lingered on George. The boy radiated sheer power. Of them all, George had the highest physical Uratsu output. Without question, a high A-rank candidate, maybe bordering on S if trained right.
Then there was Nathaniel.
He took the last remaining seat directly across from Erementaru—quietly, as if trying to dissect him with nothing but a stare.But there was something Erementaru hadn't noticed.
Nathaniel had.
His senses—raw and still unrefined—flickered, adjusting. Comparing presences, weights, pulses. That's when it hit him.Compared to the others, he didn't register at all.
He was a candle surrounded by bonfires.Faint. Silent. Practically undetectable.
And yet… still burning.
He decided to test the theory.
As Erementaru walked beside him, Nathaniel shifted his oversized armoured gauntlets with a casual motion. A soft clink. Nothing out of place—until ten seconds later, when an alert pinged through Erementaru's suit systems.
Something had changed.
Nathaniel had removed the reserve power block from the back of his inner gauntlet. Silently. Effortlessly.In the span of seconds, he had bathed the entire component in his Uratsu, using it like sonar—conducting a three-dimensional mental scan of the internal structure.
Not just looking—understanding.
Erementaru was rightfully surprised.
The alert shouldn't have gone off—those reserve power blocks were designed for passive storage, hidden across his suit. He'd scattered them like backup hearts, always ready, always dormant. For someone at Nathaniel's apparent level, even noticing one would be a stretch. But to remove it mid-stride, without triggering a single trace of active Uratsu signature?
That was something else.
In a blur of motion, Erementaru appeared in front of him. He plucked the power block from Nathaniel's open palm. A quick scan confirmed it: drained. The Uratsu he'd been storing inside it was gone—emptied without a whisper.
He blinked, feigning calm."Guess I forgot to refill this one," he said lightly, snapping the block back into place.
But Nathaniel caught the flicker in his tone. The edge behind the smile.
He smirked.Then his eyes dropped to his own gauntlets—quiet, still, unassuming. But the thruster ports and ventilation shafts had charged. No light. No hum. No obvious output.
It was like watching a blade unsheathe without a sound.
He spoke with a smile that didn't reach his eyes.
"Welcome to team orientation. You're stuck with each other under me—your overseer, Erementaru Hayate."
There was no warmth in his tone. Just finality.
"You'll come to understand with time… every one of you is defective. Except for Ria, of course."
He gestured to the redhead with a flick of his armored hand. The comment hit harder than expected—Ria blinked, her usual fire stifled for once. Nathaniel caught Shiro grimacing beside him, eyes narrowing faintly. She'd heard those words before.
Erementaru's vibe was… off. Unsettling in a way only men forged in war could be. He carried trauma like a second skin—and worse, he understood how to use it.
He wasn't here to coddle killers.
And make no mistake, four of them already were—George, Alucard, Shiro, and Oliver.
Erementaru knew their histories. And now, he would shape what came next.
"Most of you come from broken pasts," Erementaru said coldly. "You weren't meant to make it into this rotation. I took you flight-risks on as a challenge."
His visor flickered with unreadable data. "So don't disappoint me. Or there'll be hell to pay."
The room thickened with tension.
Gazes locked onto him. One breath too long. One nerve too tight.
Killing intent flared.
Alucard was the first to break. His eye pulsed red as his augment—advanced haemomancy—activated. His canines lengthened, and blood began to swell in the flesh of his arms, churning under the skin like molten iron.
Erementaru smirked.
The air crackled. Ozone stung the nose.
Boom.
His oversized palm snapped across George's jaw before anyone could react. The strike sent the younger man hurtling through a reinforced wall, leaving behind a web of fractured concrete and silence. No buildup. No warning. Nathaniel blinked—he hadn't even seen Erementaru move.
Alucard didn't flinch. He charged, blood bursting from his pores and coiling around the chunk of metal slung over his back. The mass shifted, elongating as it fused with his blood—becoming a warhammer.
He swung.
Too slow.
Tendrils of glowing energy erupted from Erementaru's back, slamming into Alucard mid-motion. The hammer lost shape as he was yanked off his feet and crushed into the floor, a crater forming beneath him.
Nathaniel didn't hesitate.
His eyes blazed cyan as he tapped into the kinetic reserves building inside him. The gauntlets on his arms hissed and pulsed, internal vents glowing bright.
A thunderous armbar shot toward Shiro and Ria.
Nathaniel was there.
He caught the blow mid-swing. The impact was devastating. His body buckled, bones vibrating under the force, but the gauntlets clamped down and redirected 25% of the kinetic energy, his veins surging cyan as he absorbed it.
With a growl, he twisted, grabbing the joint of the prosthetic arm—trying to destabilize Erementaru's stance.
It worked—almost.
A brutal knee slammed into Nathaniel's face. Lights burst behind his eyes. Before he could recover, a follow-up blow sent him slamming into the ground, stone and steel rupturing beneath him.
He skidded across the floor like a ragdoll, just as Shiro and Ria were knocked away by the aftershock.
Ria regained her footing first.
With a sharp breath, she launched twin orbs of blazing red light toward Erementaru. The beams streaked across the space like falling stars.
Erementaru didn't flinch.
His armor shimmered—becoming suddenly reflective. The beams struck him and ricocheted off in wild angles, carving deep molten lines into the floor.
Before Ria could fire again, shadows bloomed beneath Erementaru's feet—Oliver's doing.
The ground swallowed his ankles, dragging him down.
But the moment before he vanished, his suit's thrusters flared to life, launching him forward like a missile.
He disappeared into the shadow.
And then reappeared—clutching Oliver by the neck.
Crack.
One brutal strike rendered Oliver unconscious before his body could dematerialize again.
But Alucard was already there—faster this time. Blood surged from his arms and coiled around his warhammer as he slammed into Erementaru with a roar, forcing him back.
George saw his opening.
He tossed his copper Excerma rods into the air, channeling a pulse of lightning through them. They crackled, arcing between the weapons and his hands as he surged in behind Alucard, lightning bursting from his fingertips.
Then—gravity.
Shirou locked down the entire area.
The air thickened, weight pressing like lead as his augment activated. Gravity intensified tenfold.
George was pinned. The Excerma rods stalled midair, hovering in place as the electrical current magnified.
In Shirou's perception, time slowed. His eyes glowed softly, everything moving like syrup.
Then—Erementaru vanished again.
Only to reappear one hundred meters away—
—and take two fists straight into the spine.
Nathaniel.
His body shimmered with kinetic power, the thrusters in his gauntlets whining from overuse. The impact sent Erementaru rocketing back across the field, hurling him straight into the convergence point.
Right into Alucard's hammer strike.
Into George's electric arc.
Into Shirou's gravity lock.
The combined force exploded into a cascade of light and pressure as Erementaru was buried in the assault. Metal groaned. Energy screamed. The air pulsed.
Nathaniel stood at the center, catching the tail-end of the recoil.
He felt it all—Alucard's raw impact, George's crackling electricity, Shirou's crushing gravitational field. His gauntlets hissed, pressure valves nearly bursting as they struggled to contain the force.
And yet… he stayed standing.
Nathaniel stood smoking, his breath ragged, holding two power blocks stripped from Erementaru's suit.
With a snap of his fingers, he crushed them.
The gauntlets on his arms surged—pulsating violently with stored capacity. His body was bruised and slightly burned from the convergence earlier, but his eyes remained locked on Erementaru… who now stood exactly 100 meters away, watching him with sharp curiosity.
Erementaru cracked a grin.
"Two percent this time. Are you all ready?"
Nathaniel rose, sparking with residual energy. Blue lightning danced across his arms, turning cyan in an instant. His gauntlets hummed as thruster ports reactivated, venting heat and charged vapor.
Then Erementaru struck again—this time aiming straight for George.
But Nathaniel intercepted the hit, arms crossing in a guard just in time.
The impact hurled him backward. He slammed legs-first into the wall, cracking it in a squat-like stance—then launched again, this time defending Alucard as the warhammer came crashing in. The swing connected, sending Erementaru flying into the air.
Shirou didn't hesitate—her hands pulsed as walls of sound blasted upward, stunning Erementaru mid-air.
George dove in from above, a streak of electric fury, Excerma rods humming beside him.
Nathaniel appeared beneath him—arms wide, absorbing the full brunt of the impact. Blood burst from his mouth, but the energy fed directly into his systems. Shirou's gravity field reactivated, amplifying the collision, dragging Erementaru harder into the shock.
The Overseer only smiled, lips bleeding slightly. He was enjoying it.
Nathaniel's body creaked. The gauntlets sparked and hissed, vents opening as veins glowed cyan. His hair shadowed his eyes. Muscles flexed.
Then—
"100% ACCUMULATION."
The system rang out in his mind. Virtual windows flooded his vision.
His eyes turned white.
Every quarter-impact absorbed throughout the fight surged to the surface.
Twenty-five percent of each collision—condensed into one moment.
He smirked.
Alucard rose, his limiter mask shattering. His sclera turned red, irises glowing white as blood tendrils exploded from his back.
George's eye pulsed. Lightning roared across his body. Scrap metal hovered around him, bound in a spiraling magnetic storm.
Oliver reappeared behind Erementaru, portals still flickering, barely visible. He and Alucard launched their assault.
Fist met fist. Hammer met armored plating.
Nathaniel glanced to the side—Ria stood, her hand glowing green. Healing light spread into his back.
He nodded once.
Erementaru jumped to 5%.
Still holding back.
But now they fought with precision. Shirou's gravity targeted Erementaru's limbs, locking movement. Alucard clawed and struck, staggering the man in brief windows. George kept the air volatile with electric pulses. Erementaru's armor scuffed. Blood sprayed. His nervous system spasmed under the stress.
A scream of ozone, static, and fury followed.
Shirou redirected focus as Oliver blinded Erementaru, covering his vision with shadow hands. Her gaze shifted.
Nathaniel was… gone.
His presence—vanished.
His Uratsu? Shut down.
Then… it came.
His muscles flexed, glowing. A white aura burst to life, deepening to dark cyan, then black.
He crouched low. The ground cracked under his weight.
Then—boom.
He shot forward—motion blurred, speed untouchable.
A crater bloomed behind him from pure kinetic backlash. Each movement increased his expenditure percentage.
And then—he peaked.
Right in front of Erementaru, airborne.
Nathaniel's body twisted.
Both feet sparked with flame and plasma. They burned the air.
Then—impact.
A shockwave ruptured as the sound barrier shattered.
"CRITICAL IMPACT."
The system's voice roared in his skull.
Gauntlet thrusters ignited as he punched Erementaru in the chest, directly into the armor plating. Metal buckled. They were both launched—slammed into the open sparring area across the broken briefing room.
A blast of air pressure followed—rubble, heat, smoke—everything vaporized in the wake.
Then—
Silence.
Nathaniel collapsed.
His body steamed, arms trembling, muscles torn but still locked in tension. He gasped, vision flickering.
In the crater below, Erementaru groaned. His chestplate split and fell away, revealing a blackened undersheath and a massive purple bruise blooming across his sternum. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth.
Nathaniel pushed himself up with a grimace.
The gauntlets decoupled from his arms with a hiss, tumbling to the ground as smoke wafted off them. They were undamaged—but his hands weren't. Blisters bubbled across his palms. Skin peeled. The friction burns glowed raw and red.
He hissed, pain shooting through his arms.
Fractured bones. Internal bleeding. Swelling. Bloodshot vision.
He exhaled sharply.
Every limb hurt.
Then—his silver eyes reignited. A white glow returned to them, and cyan arcs of power traced across his body, flickering like veins of lightning.
[MAX REGEN: ACTIVE]
The interface hovered in his mind—its soft glow unnoticed by anyone else.
Segments of his skin turned dark silver, the damaged tissue repairing itself in real-time. Bones realigned. Muscle fibers rewove. His arms flexed as sensation returned.
He stood.
Disheveled. Breathing hard. But still on his feet.
He bent down and picked up the kinetic accumulator gauntlets—now cooled, humming faintly. He tightened his grip around them, feeling the power latent inside.
From across the crater, Erementaru stepped forward, emerging from a cloud of drifting smoke. His armor was cracked, his chestplate gone. Blood trailed from the corner of his mouth—but he was smiling.
Still smiling.
He let out a low laugh as he walked toward Nathaniel, boots crunching through rubble.
He glanced at each member of Squad Four—at George, still sparking with residual voltage; at Shiro, standing firm with a pulse of gravity coiled beneath her feet; at Alucard, mask gone, chest heaving with blood tendrils retreating; at Oliver, warping in and out of the flickering shadows behind him.
And then finally—back to Nathaniel.
"Damn," Erementaru chuckled. "You all really are something."
He spoke uttering a simple well done.
Erementaru stopped a few feet from Nathaniel, the smirk never leaving his face despite the bruising across his ribs and the cracked plating over his core.
He wiped a trickle of blood from his lip and looked around at the battered unit before him.
"Welcome to Squad Four."
His voice carried the weight of both warning and pride.
"You're all defective, broken, violent... and perfectly mine now."
Ria blinked, still holding her glowing green hand as she leaned against a fractured pillar. "What the hell kind of orientation was that?"
Shirou coughed out a sharp exhale beside her, brushing ash from her shoulders. Her gravity field dimmed.
George was on one knee, breathing hard, his hands sparking faintly with unstable electricity as he steadied himself. "Heh... thought I was gonna die for a sec."
"Almost did," Alucard muttered, pushing himself up with a grunt. The blood armor around his fists peeled away like steam. His sclera were still red.
Oliver reappeared beside a ruined column, rubbing his neck where he'd been choked earlier, portals flickering nervously beside him.
Nathaniel cracked his neck and slotted the gauntlets back into place, their latches clicking shut. His silver eyes still glowed faintly. The Max Regen wasn't fully done—but he was standing again.
Erementaru took one last look at the six of them.
"I don't take in strays. I take in weapons. You all aren't just here to survive—you're here to be sharpened. Together."
He turned his back on them, starting toward the fractured remains of the sparring zone.
"Eat. Heal. Sleep if you need to. Because tomorrow... we start actual drills."
He paused, then added over his shoulder with a wolfish grin:
"And next time—I might go up to ten percent."
The air fell silent. The tension lingered—but underneath it, something else had sparked.
Respect.
And something that tasted dangerously like unity.