Kaito's POV
Kaito didn't sleep. In a game where your neighbor might be a Coder with the power to turn your lungs into glass, closing your eyes was a luxury he couldn't afford. He lay on the hotel bed, staring at the ceiling of room 007, listening to the rhythmic breathing of the woman on the other side of the bed.
Then, the air changed.
It started as a subtle hum, like a heater kicking on, but within seconds, the room felt like a pressurized oven. Kaito's skin began to prickle. He looked down, the white duvet wasn't just warm, it was beginning to char. The polyester fibers hissed, sticking to his arms like molten plastic.
"Damn it!" Kaito hissed, kicking the blanket away. It burst into flames before it even hit the floor.
Across the bed, the woman wasn't sleeping. She was standing, her silhouette framed by the orange glow of the burning bedding. Her eyes weren't filled with the flirtatious spark from the lobby, they were cold, calculating.
"You're a light sleeper, Number 7," she said, her voice distorted by the shimmering heat waves. "I was hoping to cook you in your sleep. It's less messy that way."
Kaito reached for his pocket, the familiar weight of his iron balls. His heart skipped. Empty. "Looking for your iron balls? Too bad, i took them away as safety measures as you were changing earlier" she said with an evil grin "My ability is Temp," she smirked, raising a hand. "And right now, this room is my oven".
She didn't just throw fire, she grabbed a heavy ceramic lamp from the bedside table. In her grip, the ceramic turned white-hot. She hurled it at him. Kaito centered his mind, visualizing the incoming force.
As the glowing lamp neared his face, Kaito flicked his wrist. The vector of the projectile snapped 90 degrees upward, shattering against the ceiling. But she was relentless. She began heating the very air molecules, creating a thermal barrier that made it hard for him to breathe. Even though she couldn't do this to a limitless amount, as that would exhaust or even kill her.
She kicked a chair toward him, he redirected it. She threw her own shoes, now transformed into charcoal slugs, he sent them flying into the wall.
"You can't redirect the heat itself, can you?" she laughed.
Kaito rolled toward the bathroom, his lungs searing. He saw it, the bag of iron balls. She had hidden them in the sink, but the porcelain was cracking under the temperature. He lunged, his hand blistering as he snatched the bag. The metal was so hot it scorched his palm, but he didn't care. He had his ammo.
Kami's POV
Downstairs in room 013, Kami bolted upright. The ceiling was radiating a terrifying warmth. Beside him, Inu was already on her feet, her green eyes wide.
"Kaito," Kami muttered, grabbing his jacket. "The heat... it's just like Asuka's, but different. Drier."
"We have to move," Inu hissed, her fur standing on end.
They sprinted into the hallway. The air near the elevator was shimmering. As they reached room 007, the heavy oak door didn't just open, it disintegrated. A massive thermal expansion blew the door outward in a spray of blackened splinters.
Kaito tumbled out into the hallway, his shirt smoking and his face flushed a deep, painful crimson. He coughed, looking up at Kami and Inu.
"A little... assistance... would be great," he gasped, spitting out a mouthful of dry air.
The woman stepped into the hallway, the carpet curling and turning black under her feet. She looked like a demon birthed from a furnace.
"Inu, go!" Kami shouted.
Inu didn't turn into the panther or a bear this time. Her body buckled and shrank, her bones clicking with a sickening wet sound until a tiny, translucent spider with a bright red mark on its back stood where the cat had been.
"I'll distract her!" Kaito yelled, sending three iron balls whistling through the air. They moved in complex, jagged arcs, forcing the woman to focus all her "Temp" output on melting the projectiles before they hit her eyes.
While the hallway turned into a chaotic storm of whistling metal and searing heat, the spider-Inu skittered along the molding of the wall. She was a shadow, a needle in a haystack of fire.
The woman caught a glimpse of movement. "Pest!" She slammed her hand against the wall, sending a wave of localized heat that acted like a physical shockwave. The force caught Inu, tossing the small spider back through the air.
Kami moved instinctively. He caught the falling spider in his palm.
"Kaito! The ball!" Kami screamed.
Kaito understood instantly. He launched one last iron ball, but instead of aiming for the woman, he sent it hovering in front of Kami.
Kami grabbed it and the sphere flattened into a perfect, razor-thin circular disc. It lacked volume but retained its mass and surface area. Inu hopped onto the flat surface, her many legs gripping the two-dimensional plane.
"Now!"
Kaito applied every ounce of his willpower to the disc's vector.
The flattened disc, now possessing almost zero air resistance due to its two-dimensional profile, sliced through the air like a knife through butter. The woman didn't even have time to raise her temperature.
The disc zipped past her ear, and in that split second, Inu leaped. She landed on the woman's neck, her fangs sinking deep into the jugular.
The heat died instantly.
The woman gasped, her eyes rolling back as the venom hit her system. She slumped against the scorched wallpaper, unconscious before she hit the floor.
"God damn it, can't we catch one minute of rest for once?" Kami gasped.
Inu transformed back into a cat "So, what do we do with her now? I did not kill her, she is just unconcious."
The three exchanged some questioning looks, before the manager of the hotel stepped into the hallway.
His eyes turned into a dark gold with a shade of white, the same colors as the system. "Leave now, I will take care of her" he said with a robotic but still human sounding voice.