Chapter 167
Don't move
IAM rolled out from the mini car, his body hitting the dirt with a rough thud. The violent crash of metal against stone echoed in his ears. Dust bloomed around him in thick, choking clouds, carried by the gust of wind that followed the force of impact.
Behind him, he could hear the groan of twisted steel and the crumbling of the wall Blaze had been slammed into. It all rang in his skull like an alarm bell.
He stayed crouched for a moment, chest heaving, adrenaline pounding in his ears. Then, slowly, he pushed himself up into a defensive stance—ready to react, just in case Blaze had somehow survived the impact.
But… there was nothing.
Just silence.
IAM's breath came out in shallow gasps. Sweat trickled down his face, mixing with the dry grit from the dirt road. His chest heaved once, then he exhaled long and hard.
A hand suddenly clamped around his shoulder.
He tensed immediately, instincts flaring—
—until he turned and saw the familiar face.
"Holy shit—YES!"
It was Reuel.
IAM turned his head and saw him beaming with a type of punch-drunk joy. His lip was busted. There was blood on his cheek, and his shirt was torn at the collar, hanging awkwardly off one shoulder. But the smile on his face was the widest IAM had ever seen.
"We fucking did it, bro!" Reuel shouted, practically shaking IAM by the shoulders. "Look at me—look at my face! It's fucked up! But we did it! Take that, you bastard!" His laughter cracked out like a maniac.
IAM's first thought was that he better not be raising some damn red flag.
Yohan appeared beside them, his presence calmer but still buzzing with adrenaline. He wrapped an arm around IAM's other shoulder.
His breathing was uneven, and there was a fresh scrape across his jaw, but he wore a calm, knowing smile, his mismatched eyes gleaming.
"I gotta say," he murmured, glancing back at the wreckage of the wall and car, "I like what you've done with the place."
IAM didn't reply. His expression remained unreadable, but He finally allowed his shoulders to drop just slightly under the weight of the arms around him.
They turned then, the three of them, all eyes landing on the fourth.
Henry.
He was walking toward them slowly, there was a limp in his step, like something in his leg had twisted somewhere in the fight.
He stopped just short of IAM, close enough that the smell of sweat, blood, and kicked-up dirt hung thick in the air between them. His eyes locked with IAM's.
Then Henry's lips twitched.
He broke into a tired, bloodstained grin and raised a hand.
"I guess I can trust you, huh," he said, voice hoarse.
IAM looked at him. His expression deadpan.
"Eh… maybe."
He raised his own hand, and the two dapped up...
As Reuel was still lost in hysterical celebration—IAM had turned away.
His eyes were fixed on the car.
The vehicle sat still, its hood crumpled, pressed tight against Blaze's body like a steel coffin. The wall it had crashed into was surprisingly intact—just a faint, dark stain smearing the brickwork where Blaze's blood had splattered on impact.
IAM stood there, his eyes like deep obsidian pools—still and bottomless. Then he spoke.
"…Now," he murmured slowly, each word laced with foreboding, "I'm sure… he should wake up soon."
That cut straight through Reuel's victory high.
He froze mid-gesture and turned. "Wait, wait—what? Wake up soon?! What if he's mad as hell and tries to get his get-back on us!?"
IAM didn't even blink. "Well… I'm sure it should be fine."
Reuel gawked. "How do you know that?!"
"I don't."
"You are so annoying," Reuel hissed, dragging a hand down his bruised face.
IAM ignored him, already taking a step forward.
"Anyway," he added coolly, "he seems to be waking up… I have a little present for him."
"A what now?" Henry asked, frowning. His eyebrow arched, a cautious edge entering his voice as he watched IAM move with calm toward the mangled wreck. "What kind of present?"
IAM didn't answer right away.
His pace didn't change either.
He just walked forward, the sounds of crunching debris under his feet the only reply.
IAM was approaching Blaze.
And whatever he had in mind…
...
A sharp ringing noise buzzed incessantly in Blaze's ears, like a stubborn insect refusing to die. It crawled through his skull, pressing against the inside of his head as he slowly came to. His vision was a blur, smeared with motionless light and shadow. His head throbbed. His body felt heavy—numb, yet aching.
Somewhere outside his dazed bubble, he could hear voices. Distant. Muffled. Like they were underwater, but drawing closer with every second.
His thoughts came back in fragments.
I… I lost...
Blaze… lost...
No…
Impossible.
To them…
Even without using my path methods…
This… is… humiliating.
A sense of shame crept down his spine like cold sweat, crawling between muscle and bone, burning hotter than the wounds on his skin.
His breath caught as he felt something—someone—approaching.
He tried to lift his head. His neck screamed in protest. His eyes were still too hazy to make out clear features, only the vague silhouette of a figure moving toward him.
And then—he saw it.
The figure raised something, and for a moment Blaze couldn't quite register what it was.
Until clarity slammed back into his senses like a hammer. The blur around his vision snapped into focus. The sound of his heartbeat returned in sharp thuds. The iron tang of blood filled his nose. He could taste it pooling in his mouth.
Blaze blinked once.
He was staring down the barrel of a weapon. The mouth of it looked like a void—it was a dark quiet place and a bullet lived in there.
Awaiting the world outside.
And for the first time since the fight began, Blaze didn't grin. Confusion flickered through his expression.
A gun?
A mech...?
Why?
As Blaze slowly raised his head, he looked past the barrel—past the cold metal and the threat it carried—and his gaze met the eyes of the one holding the gun.
His pupils contracted sharply.
For a moment, he forgot how to breathe.
Those eyes…
They weren't just dark.
They were endless.
Twin voids—black holes embedded into the face of a human, yet so far from anything human. They weren't angry or cruel, weren't even focused with intensity. They were simply there—empty and bottomless, like the absence of light itself. And as Blaze stared into them, he felt an inexplicable pull, as though they were drawing him in… piece by piece.
A strange silence rang in his ears again. It wasn't the physical disorientation from the crash—it was something else. An unnatural stillness.
He was so startled by the sight, so shaken by the weight of that stare, that only now did he realise—
His mouth was moving.
Words were being spoken around him, not by him—but to him.
The ringing ebbed.
And then he heard it.
"Don't move."
The voice was deep.
A pause. Then—
"Or I put a bullet through your skull."
That was it.
A moment passed—long enough for Blaze's scattered thoughts to catch up with him.
Then—
"Ka… ka ka ka…"
It came out strained at first, like he had to cough it up from the pit of his lungs. But the sound grew louder, steadier, more manic—until his familiar, high-pitched cackle returned, and his bloodied lips split into a wide, defiant grin.
"Come on," he barked. "Who are you fooling, huh?!"
He spat a line of blood to the side, chest heaving.
"You? A first year? You're just a worm that got lucky! Do you even hear yourself? Kill me? Me? Blaze?! Ka ka ka ka—don't make me laugh!"
He leaned slightly forward, as far as the pain in his ribs would allow, the barrel of the gun brushing against his forehead.
"You're still wet behind the ears! You've never even killed anyone before, have you?! You don't have the guts. You don't have what it takes! Huh? Say something!"
Blaze grinned wide enough to bare teeth, trying to intimidate the boy. That had to be all this was—just a bluff. A last-ditch scare tactic to make sure Blaze wouldn't come after them again. But that was the problem—Blaze wasn't afraid of anyone.
There was no way this kid would actually—
His thoughts stopped.
Because IAM didn't move.
He didn't even react.
He simply stared—his gaze locked and as cold and unmoved as a corpse's.
And that—that—was what made Blaze's grin falter. Just slightly.
Because usually, when someone made a threat like this… there was something in their eyes. Anger. Hesitation. Hatred. Something.
But IAM's eyes had... Nothing.
Just a void.
They were completely dead.
And that's when Blaze finally felt it—something crawling up the back of his neck.
Fear.
Not fear of the gun.
But of the boy holding it.
"You… you little bastard… would you actually dare to shoot? To kill me?!" Blaze's voice cracked, rising in pitch, almost as if he were arguing with himself as much as with IAM. "There's no way a child like you could muster the courage! You wouldn't dare!"
He stopped as he realised something... Fear?
Fear?... Fear?
Something he had only ever felt once before in his entire life now surged through him, and it was paralyzing.
And it came from this… novice. A first-year student, not even attending the academy for a month. And yet… the presence of this child, standing there, was enough to make Blaze feel terror.
Not because the kid looked terrifying. Not because he threatened him with words. Not because of his silence.
No.
It was the lack of it.
It was Nothing at all.
The absence of hesitation. The absence of emotion. The absence of fear.
The absence of everything.
As Blaze stared, a sinking, cold realization began to claw at him. IAM could end it all with the mere pull of a trigger. He could erase Blaze from the world in an instant—and it would mean nothing. To the boy, it would be as if Blaze had never existed.
Blaze's teeth clenched, his jaw trembling and mind spinning. Through all the insults, all the mocking, all the threats, IAM had not moved a muscle, not flinched, not even altered slightly.
What was this? Was this even normal?
Instinctively, almost against his better judgment, Blaze reached for a path method—one of his trump methods. He had to. He needed to kill him, to prove his dominance, to reclaim his control. Now… this was no ordinary kid. This was not one of us, this could not be a human being. This… this was impossible.
"Aaaaaargh!" he roared, voice cracking, fury spilling out—and then pain exploded across his skull.
A hand, firm and sudden, gripped the top of his head, stopping him cold.
A soft, clear voice, that belonged to a female, cut through:
"Okay, that's enough, Blaze… Not only did you lose, but you were actually planning on using your path methods too? I have to say… this is not the Blaze I know. To go back on a promise…"
Blaze blinked, slowly looking up, eyes widening as if seeing the world for the first time in days. He drew in deep, ragged breaths, as though each one pulled him back from some abyss.
A quiet giggle followed.
"Okay… now," the voice continued, "be a good boy and… don't move."