Chapter 27: The Top
Ren sat down next to Lorraine. As he waited for Lorraine to put her number into his contacts, he looked up into the clouds.
"Hey, I'm sorry about hurting you," apologized Ren. "I just felt like this was the fastest way to the top. It was fun too."
"Why did you want my number?" asked Lorraine as she handed back Ren his phone.
"It's good to have powerful allies." replied Ren simply.
She smiled and looked up into the clouds as well as the rain feel on their faces. Ren opened the app that listed the rankings to see if it updated his rank yet. He read the first name that appeared: Ray Lynch Rank 1.
"That was quick," Ren muttered to himself. He scrolled to the last place and sure enough: Lorraine Flanagan Rank 5209.
"Can you stand?" asked Ren.
Lorraine stood, but she faltered as she held her stomach. Ren caught her the supported her with his shoulder. He had to bend over slightly because he was taller than she was, but he dealt with it.
"Let's get you to the infirmary." Lorraine noticed the hole in Ren's stomach had stopped bleeding and already started to close.
After dropping Lorraine off at the infirmary, Ren headed back to the dormitories. He headed right for his room, which only consisted of a bed, television, and a bathroom with a shower. He took off his clothes and stepped into the shower and turned on the hot water.
After his long, relaxing shower, he stepped out and noticed that his stomach had almost completely healed.
"Looks like my core has gotten really good at regenerating my body," observed Ren. "That girl was amazing. If she was just a recruit, I wonder how powerful the top fighters are for the military." Ren shuttered at the thought. "I need to prepare."
Ren began to think of some of the things he needed to do in order to ready himself for the road ahead. Ren put on some underwear then slipped into bed and fell asleep.
Ren slept in since he decided that the classes were basically pointless as well as the training sessions. He woke up, refreshed, as he went for his daily run, ate breakfast, then headed off campus.
Around campus, there were plenty of restaurants and stores. The first stop Ren made was at a Verizon store.
"I need another phone. I'm stupid to think that this phone isn't being traced," Ren reasoned with himself. He bought the phone using cash, which was supplied from his inheritance, and put all things he thought were important onto his new phone. He also bought a couple of more clothes to replace the ones that were ruined during his battle with Lorraine.
After Ren completed these tasks, he headed back towards campus to put his new clothes away. After putting his clothes away in his room, he pulled his new phone and called Lorraine.
"Hello?" she answered.
"Hey this is..." Ren stopped as he remembered he wasn't supposed to use his real name. "This is the guy who stole your rank."
"Oh, it's you. What do you want?"
"Do you feel like getting some payback?"
"I don't understand."
"Just meet me back at the auditorium, I think that's what it's called, where we fought last time in like ten minutes."
Ren needed to experience more magic from an ability user, and no one else was more perfect than Lorraine. He exited his room and headed out of the dormitories.
Outside there was a group of three men and two women.
"Oh look, it's the cheater." sneered the guy with stubbled black hair.
"I did nothing of the sort. Now move, I have somewhere to be," ordered Ren.
"There is no way that the dude in last place shot up to the top. She even surrendered. She must have felt sorry for you and just decided to give it up. Besides she would have no problem getting back into the top five hundred." retorted the black-haired man as he got so close to Ren he could smell him.
"Yeah," agreed the other four.
"So we have come to take that rank of yours and send you back to the bottom where you belong." piped up one of the women.
"Is that a challenge?" Ren questioned. "If it's a challenge, I'll set the condition for the loser. The loser has to put a picture of themselves naked up on the app."
"You could get arrested for that!" pointed out another man with yellow hair.
"I know."
"All right." agreed the black-haired man.
Ren then looked up at him. The black-haired man saw Ren's eyes light up green then...
SMASH!
Ren's hand clasped over the man's face and he slammed his head into the ground. Ren then stood back up and glared at the others.
"Anyone else?"
They all shook their heads and ran away.
Ren continued on his way. "I guess it's only natural for people to jump on an opportunity that looks easy," he thought.
He reached the auditorium and found Lorraine leaning against the entrance. She noticed Ren approaching and straightened up.
"So what's this about payback," asked Lorraine.
"It's like this. You can go all out on me and I won't do anything. I'll just take it."
"That sounds too good to be true."
"Trust me. Oh, and how cold can you make your ice?"
"I could give you frost bite in a couple of minutes that's for sure." Lorraine held out her hand and slowly formed a small sphere of ice. "Touch it."
Ren touched it with end of his finger. The ice was so cold it burned his finger. "This is perfect," Ren thought. "I have plenty of experience with heat, so much that it doesn't even burn me much anymore, but I have no experience with colder conditions."
Ren pulled his shirt off, so that he was only wearing shorts.
'Damn, that is one chiseled body," thought Lorraine. "I can't wait to burn it with my ice, I owe him that much for that humiliating defeat."
Weekly Power Status
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