My Special Ability is Growing Muscles

The battlefield grew still for the first time since the dome shattered.

The lesser demons were dead. Against all odds, the surviving applicants of the tournament had done the impossible and survived.

Demon corpses littered the cracked stone floor, ichor steaming as it seeped into the ground and yet not a single one of the applicants was among them. Sixteen blood-stained applicants panted in formation, weapons shaking in their hands.

And then the ground trembled.

From the shadows of the collapsing stands emerged the true threat, towering figures, each twice the size of a man, armored in jagged obsidian plates.

Their weapons pulsed with infernal mana; cleavers, glaives, serrated swords dripping with heat. Eyes glowed crimson like burning coals.

The aura they released made the air itself heavier. The applicants staggered under it, hearts pounding, and even Kairo could not help the chill that ran down his spine like a snake constricting around him slowly.

"E… E-Rank," Kael said, terrified. "We can't… we can't fight those!"

Kairo clenched his jaw, his fists instinctively tightening as blood dripped from his knuckles, his bloodshot eyes wild with bloodlust and recklessness.

"It doesn't matter who they send!" He finally said in a snarl. "Whoever they send, we'll hold again. And again, and again, until we break… or they do".

These Demons weren't fodder anymore, they were executioners. But to Kairo, it didn't matter. All that mattered was his survival.

WHOOSH!

The elites charged as one.

One with a war axe swung down, and the shockwave alone shattered the stone floor. Two applicants were thrown into the air like ragdolls.

Another E-Rank Demon elite exhaled molten fire, melting Freyna's Aqua Bind Shield instantly and incinerating the boy who previously took cover behind it.

"AHHH!"

Sienna tried to distract them with illusions but against E Rank Demons, her illusions were like pebble thrown into a sea, inconsequential.

The Demons advanced and the formation buckled.

Barros screamed as an elite's claw punched through his armor, crushing his ribs. He barely survived only because Kairo barreled into the beast, smashing his fist into its jaw with a bone-shattering crack.

The recoil made his own arm spasm in pain, but Kairo didn't even bare attention to the pain.

'Survive, survive!' was all that rang in his head.

Every punch against these monsters hurt him almost as much as them. He kept on moving, dodging, one well-timed hit from them and he would be a dead man. Kairo danced around the ropes of death.

'We're outclassed', Kairo realized grimly. 'A whole rank above us…'

It didn't take a genius to realize, but Kairo was stuck between denial before he fought against these Demons. Now, he was desperate.

'I can't die! I must survive! I must see Leora!'

The pressure was too much.

And then, one noble among the applicants snapped.

"I WON'T DIE HERE!" He shrieked, throwing his weapon aside and bolting for the rear, breaking formation.

"Don't break! HOLD!" Mira shouted, but it was too late. His panic ripped a hole in the formation.

An elite roared and lunged straight through the breach, weapon raised to carve through the healer, Lyra who Kairo designated to support from the back.

Kairo moved on instinct.

"FORMATION!" he bellowed, voice ripping through the chaos.

Monarch's Roar activated, and fueled by his emotions and desperation, the effect of the skill was amplified.

The panic was forcibly suppressed as focus stabilized.

But Kairo? His bloodshot eyes flashed with intense bloodlust and killing intent as he moved, intercepting the fleeing noble, rage blazing in his hollow eyes.

He grabbed him by the throat and without hesitation, slammed him unconscious against the stone to send a message.

Gasps echoed, but none argued. They all knew at this point that anyone breaking formation now doomed them all.

"STAND WITH ME!" Kairo roared again, his muscles bulging as he smashed his fist into the charging elite's chest, stopping it cold.

With his muscle index back to it's peak due to the meat that he consumed, his attacks with Hypermuscle Creation were powerful enough to damage an E-Rank, but not kill them.

On the flank, another elite cleaved two students aside with a single swing, marching for the healer, Lyra.

Mira's heart hammered. Death had never been closer and as the Demon marched, she remembered her sister's face. She remembered being weak, being helpless and always depending on others.

"No more!" She growled.

Wind gathered around her legs, and earth coiled into her dagger.

With eyes narrowing into slits, she blurred forward in a streak of speed, her strike faster, heavier, and sharper than ever before.

SLASH!

The elite staggered back, chest torn open from behind.

"STONE TEMPEST!" Mira screamed as she unleashed a whirlwind of reinforced slashes.

Each strike howled with wind and landed with the crushing force of stone.

The elite tried to raise its weapon, but it was too slow. Mira carved it to pieces, ichor spraying as its hulking body collapsed in ruin.

Mira killed an E-Rank Demon!

The system notification flared in her vision.

DING!

~----~

[Hybrid Skill Unlocked: Stone Tempest!]

>Synergized Wind/Earth technique.

~----~

Panting, eyes blazing, Mira turned back to the others. For the first time since the Demons attacked, there was no hesitation in her gaze, only steel.

The elites pressed harder, six hulking monsters hammering their formation from all sides. Every applicant screamed, most of them now bleeding and battered. Bones cracked and blood soaked the ground, yet they fought.

With a reckless fool who knew no retreat like Kairo leading them, they fought till their lungs hurt and their bones fractured, and even at that, they didn't stop.

Barros and Alric locked their weapons against an elite's glaive, teeth clenched, refusing to give way as they held him in place through sheer willpower.

Draven slammed the ground with Seismic Stomp, shaking one Demon off balance long enough for Veyna to drive a spear into its thigh.

"Hold… HOLD!" Kairo shouted, his voice the anchor of their survival.

Even as his stomach burned, even as his body started shriveling again, even as hunger clawed his mind into madness, he did not fall.

The cycle of hunger and feeding was indeed a curse of his ability.

Above, still embroiled in the reality-bending battle of the S Rank, Malgar's silver eyes narrowed as he watched the happenings below.

"They delay too long," he hissed. "Reinforcements will come!"

Ulfar growled. "Why can't they finish them now?"

The elites roared as if supercharged by the reprimands of their superiors, their strikes growing more vicious and determined to break the children before time ran out.

Under the increased pressure, the line began to splinter.

A boy fell screaming, another collapsed unconscious, blood running. And the first death happened when one of the Demons broke Sienna's illusion, biting her head clean off before she could escape.

"…!"

Shock rippled through the others, but…

"Fight!" Kairo's voice snapped them out of it.

His fists kept on smashing like hammers. They cracked against a demon's skull, his own knuckles splitting open, blood dripping.

His vision blurred, but sheer willpower kept him going.

He swayed on his feet, muscles threatening to collapse, but his grin widened anyway. And then…

HOOOONNNNK!

A war horn blared in the distance. The battlefield shook as the echo rolled through the ruined coliseum, human banners shimmering faintly on the horizon.

The students froze, hope flooding their broken bodies.

Kairo roared, blood spraying from his lip, voice like thunder. "You hear that?! Just a little longer! HOLD! HOLD!"

"Reinforcement is coming!"

The survivors stood again, defiance blazing in their eyes, staring down death itself and refusing to give in to the Reaper.