As soon as Reeves finished speaking, Inferno stretched out his arm and a beam of white-hot fire shot toward Mateo.
You're really pulling out your strongest moves at the start? Mateo thought as he dove sideways, the heat so intense it felt like breathing molten glass. He kept running while the beam tracked his movement, leaving a molten trench across the rooftop as Inferno forced him toward the edge.
The concrete beneath his feet was already scalding. Steam rose from where his boots touched down. One direct hit and there wouldn't be enough left of him for the medics to scrape up.
Mateo already had a plan. Get close to Inferno, distract him, then fight on his own terms. But Inferno wasn't giving ground—and worse, he was faster than expected.
The beam cut off. Inferno lunged forward with surprising speed, flames wreathing his fists. Mateo barely twisted away as knuckles grazed his shoulder, the suit fabric instantly blackening. The smell of burning polymer hit his nostrils as he stumbled backward.
Too close. Way too close.
Soon he was forced off the roof entirely. He performed a desperate backflip to barely escape another searing blast, landing hard on the scalding deck below. Heat penetrated through his boots, and sweat evaporated instantly through his suit. The air itself felt like breathing through a furnace.
A ball of fire formed above Inferno's palm. Now that his massive opening attack failed, he switched tactics—spawning fireballs, shooting them with military precision. Each one could punch through steel. Mateo could only dodge and weave, the projectiles singing the edges of his suit, leaving char marks across his chest plate.
If he got closer, he'd meet artillery that could vaporize him. He needed proximity for his winning conditions, but Inferno wasn't giving any leeway.
Fine. Mateo thought, his vision already swimming from the heat. If I can't come to him, I'll bring him to me.
The fireballs pursued relentlessly until he was pushed to the rooftop's edge. With no other options, he fell off the building, screaming on his way down.
"Surely it can't be that easy," Inferno muttered as he walked to the edge, his opponent vanishing from view.
He jumped after him, but instead of falling, continuous streams of fire blew from his feet like rocket thrusters, keeping him aloft. He looked down at the fake ruined building below. No sign of the slime freak.
Inferno swiveled his head, searching for where Mateo would have landed. In that instant, two tendrils shot forward, attaching to the building walls and pulling taut with visible tension.
Inferno spun around. Mateo came into view—
He'd never fallen to his death. It had all been a feint. Falling down, generating slime from his feet, sticking to the wall, waiting patiently for Inferno to take the bait.
Mateo's quirk was slime. Inferno's power generated fires that could melt through tank armor. His abilities paled in comparison, which is why he couldn't spam attacks.
But maybe that was the point.
Like a catapult, he shot toward Inferno like a bullet.
The plan was simple. If one of Inferno's strikes connected clean, it was over. So he could only win by overwhelming him—hitting quick, dodging quicker, giving no time to create those devastating attacks.
Speed, tactics, and calculated force.
His helmet-mask connected with Inferno's forehead in a brutal headbutt. Mateo's visor absorbed the impact satisfyingly, while pain lanced through Inferno's face. Without hesitation, a slime tendril snapped from his arm, wrapping around Inferno's shoulder. With a massive twist from his whole torso, he hurled Inferno like a flail, launching him into the mock building's wall.
The impact sent shockwaves through Mateo's body. His inner ear screamed in protest, the world spinning as momentum transferred through his slime connection.
He aimed true. Inferno collided with a plume of dust as gravity started pulling Mateo downward—no purchase or platform to balance on.
I don't need one. Several tendrils shot from different parts of his body, connecting to various wall sections, holding him suspended like a marionette. Each connection sent tremors up his arms. Using this much slime this fast was like sprinting uphill—his muscles already beginning to burn.
Inferno yelled. Fireballs erupted outward, superheating the air around them.
Mateo grunted, sweat streaming down his face inside the helmet. He couldn't forget—never let Inferno recuperate. Pour everything on him before he could react.
Before Inferno could determine his position from the disorienting slam, Mateo's fist connected with his jaw, sending him flying against the building. Mateo's fist stayed pressed against his jaw as he scraped Inferno's face against brick, milking maximum damage from a single hit.
Inferno growled like a rabid dog and shot flames from his mouth directly at Mateo's face. The heat was so intense Mateo's visorplate began to warp. Just when it seemed his face would cook inside his own helmet, he was hurled backward at incredible speed.
Correction: Mateo hurled himself backward.
The sudden change in vector made his vision tunnel. Blood rushed from his head as he fought to stay conscious through the G-forces. His hands shook as he tried to track his slime connections.
He had 'leveled up' from using one or two high-tension slime tendrils as catapults. Now he was laying an intricate web—slings, stops, momentum breakers. A living pulley system that could shoot him off, halt his movement, or pull him back with forces his normal body couldn't generate.
But each maneuver cost him. The constant acceleration changes were making him dizzy.
He wasn't a person with super strength or speed, so he'd unlocked versatility with slime. Turning himself into a fighter jet that could change vectors at a moment's notice. The strings were hard to track, but Mateo managed it, jumping away when Inferno shot fireballs he couldn't avoid.
Then Inferno adapted.
Instead of aiming where Mateo was, he began superheating the wall sections where the slime connected. Mateo's next swing sent him careening as his anchor point melted away. He overshot completely, slamming into a concrete pillar hard enough to see stars.
Get up. Get up!
Inferno was enraged, flames licking his lips as he sent torrents of fire to systematically melt the slime tendrils. But not before Mateo shot forward again—this time more carefully, more desperately—kicking him in the solar plexus.
Without Inferno realizing it, a slime tendril attached to his stomach. When momentum from the kick transferred into tension in the tendril, he was reeled back for another kick—a brutal game of ping pong.
Mateo's vision blurred. Each impact sent feedback through his slime that rattled his teeth. His hands were trembling now, slime production becoming erratic.
Inferno blew another plume of fire, melting the tendril, but his inertia had already built up, sending him flying toward Mateo.
Let's finish this now. Mateo prepared to use the hydraulic function of the special gauntlet Anon had made him.
He forced tons of slime into the gauntlet—a heavy metal glove with cylinders fixed on wrists and knuckles. Mateo clenched his fist extremely tight, just as Anon had instructed, activating the hydrostatic mechanism. Slime accumulated in wrist cylinders was forcibly pushed to bigger cylinders at the knuckles.
Basic physics: pressure times area equals force.
Using remaining slime tendrils, he shot toward Inferno, who was using fire to rise skyward, widening distance so he could launch large-range attacks safely.
Like hell I'll let you do that. Blood rushed from Mateo's brain due to the speed he was rising against gravity. The world spun. For a terrifying moment, he couldn't tell up from down. He raised his fist to initiate the hydraulic punch, hoping it would be as effective as Anon claimed.
Hoping he wouldn't black out before impact.
Inferno hurled his fist back at the incoming attack. Powers collided.
The pump hissed. A deafening boom erupted from the gauntlet.
Mateo felt his ear pop and pain explode in his right forearm—the one he'd used to launch the attack. He didn't have time to examine it, but could instinctively tell it was fractured. Whether a small crack or clean snap, he couldn't check until battle's end. He switched to his other limb, nausea rolling through him in waves.
Inferno wasn't so lucky. The punch sent shockwaves through his arm, breaking bones, leading to his femur snapping—bone shards jutting through skin. Mateo winced momentarily, almost feeling bad, but continued. It was either him or Inferno.
He sent another tendril to Inferno's broken arm, swinging him like a yo-yo onto the roof deck where battle had started. Mateo wondered if even a minute had passed since the fight started as he landed with a thud, iron boot soles hitting concrete. His legs nearly buckled.
As if solid ground invigorated him, Inferno rolled into fighting position, inhaling wildly and shooting another dangerous beam of white fire to incinerate Mateo. For a second, Mateo wondered if that shot would actually kill him if the medic team didn't act fast enough.
The thought never materialized. Mateo acted quicker—or tried to. His slime production sputtered, barely managing to form a volleyball-sized orb that wrapped around Inferno's head. Instead of the beam incinerating Mateo, it was captured by the slime. The ball glowed white for a second before imploding right in Inferno's face as he screamed in pain.
Mateo lunged forward without mercy—his opponent too pained to fight back. Left hook with his working arm, followed by a brutal roundhouse kick that nearly sent him tumbling over from his own momentum. Inferno hit the floor, dazed.
In rage, Inferno threw a final, last-ditch attack. Wide-range, chaotic wildfire that burned everything in its path. Not even Mateo could survive that. He stretched out his arm, continually pouring uncontrolled fire, all tactics and strategy abandoned.
Then he stopped. Fire continued blazing, his opponent seemingly finished.
If it had hit.
A hand passed through the raging flames—not burning red, but green. Dark green smoky flames rose from the arm as fingers grasped Inferno's neck, sending searing pain where hot leather touched skin.
HOW! Inferno thought through hazy concentration as the burning demon with black horns on his visor-helmet emerged from flames.
Mateo.
He did not burn, because he'd realized another useful aspect of his slime. Not only could he grab opponents and swing them like ragdolls, not only catapult himself at incredible speeds...
It could also absorb heat.
Instead of fire burning Mateo's skin, only the surface slime layer burned while the layer beneath cooled his skin. Basic thermodynamics. But the cost was enormous—his remaining slime reserves nearly depleted, his body shaking from exhaustion.
Mateo stood over him, ready to end the battle. His vision kept trying to tunnel. Stay conscious. Just a little longer.
This was the most important phase—the one-second moment that would determine if the fight continued in his favor.
Through his fading consciousness, a flash of memory: Alec's face. The promise he'd made.
He looked down at Inferno—son of a top three hero, trained since birth to be ideal, trained to maximize his powers. He probably didn't even need Atlas Academy to be a hero.
But in that moment, as Inferno hesitated, as doubt flickered across his features, Mateo understood the difference between them.
It wasn't power. It wasn't training.
It was what drove them to keep fighting when everything hurt. Conviction.
Mateo used that moment fully.
As his final resort, he stretched out his working hand. The last of his slime—tons of viscous, thick, gelatinous sludge—erupted like a volcano, completely engulfing Inferno in a mound weighing several tons.
The effort left Mateo hollow, drained. His knees hit concrete as darkness crept at the edges of his vision.
In seconds, Inferno was completely enveloped. Even though he used fire to burn some slime, it was too late. In ten seconds, Inferno was buried under translucent goop.
Unconscious.
Mateo could barely stand anymore. His body felt like a wrung-out towel. He felt he'd black out if he didn't keep standing to relish his victory.
Somewhere in the distance, he knew his other classmates were watching. How would they react? Impressed? Shock?
He looked upwards at the artificial ceiling, hoping his gaze passed through it and beyond. To Alec.
'I'm sure he would be proud.'
He won.
And that was all that mattered.