Demonic Po*nstar System

Chapter 849: Detrimental Kindness

Two new cards materialized in Kaiden’s orbit as the turn began, and the first face he saw made the rest of the match fall into place.

Double March.

’Again?!’

He’d drawn it once before and spent it on setting up Luna’s flanking lane.

Now it was back, and the play it unlocked was the one he’d been building toward since the board expanded.

’Is this random luck or are the cards going to start repeating...?’

The second one was called Empower, a buff card.

He banked both without playing either, and the discipline of holding two extra cards while his girls stood on a board against boss monsters went against every instinct in his body.

’Not yet.’

Column A was open. Luna was already in it. Every enemy piece on the board was pushing forward through columns B to E, which meant none of them could circle back to guard the lane he’d carved three turns ago. Two moves forward and she’d reach Row 1.

Except she couldn’t do that.

The Bladed Stalker, Champion 5, crouched at B3, one diagonal square from Luna’s path, which let it attack her should she try to blitz by due to zone of control. Advancing while within an enemy melee’s striking range gave that enemy the right to initiate combat regardless of whose turn it was. If Luna moved to A3, the Stalker would intercept her.

He looked down at his pieces.

”It’s time to end this.” His voice carried across the board, quiet and heavy.

The girls could immediately read what that tone of his meant.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t think up a strategy where everyone’s safety was ensured.

Calypso broke the silence before it finished forming.

”Darling.” She rolled her neck, tail sweeping in a long arc behind her. ”Just point me at something and stop making that face.”

Nyx studied the board from C5 with pink eyes that had already traced every lane before Kaiden finished speaking.

”You can’t win chess without sacrificing pieces, Kai.” Warm, steady, and so thoroughly at ease with calling herself expendable that it landed harder than if she’d been afraid. ”You’re too good to us. It’s getting in the way.”

”Big brother.”

Alice’s voice sounded, lacking the usual cutesy tone she used when speaking to him.

”I’ll gladly be eliminated for you. You know that, right? Just point me at something and I’ll destroy it. I’ll fight anything. I’ll fight all of them. I don’t care.”

”... I know.”

”Good!” She grinned. ”After we win, I want headpats.”

”...The requests are starting to pile up, ladies...”

”This is absolutely non-negotiable!!!”

Luna planted her Stormblade against the board from A4, lightning spiraling up the blade. ”Can we skip the soap opera? That bastard has been eyeing me up, I want to bash its skull in.”

Aria’s gorgeous eyes landed on Kaiden without the playful warmth she usually wore. She didn’t speak. Moonlight burned at her fingertips, already pooling into combat density, and she shifted her weight toward Luna’s column.

She’d read the board the same way Nyx had, and she’d already chosen where to be.

Kaiden moved.

Calypso. D4 to D3.

The clash notification flared red before she finished crossing the line, arena light wrapping around her and the insectoid crouched at D3.

[Clash initiated: Calypso vs C3 (The Ravager).]

Calypso’s axe appeared in her grip, massive and buzzing with Carnage, and the look she threw up at Kaiden was pure confidence.

”Save those cards for the gremlin, Darling. Her petite little frame needs every bit of it!”

The arena swallowed them both.

The Kaiju’s response was immediate.

A roar tore through the dimension from the creature’s side of the board, deep enough to press against Kaiden’s chest and rattle every constellation on the grid’s surface.

Six burning eyes swept from the arena where Calypso had just disappeared to the open left flank where Luna stood alone at A4, and the creature’s silhouette shifted behind its board with a focused intensity it hadn’t shown since the match began.

It saw her. It saw the lane.

[Claimant Turn.]

[Card Played: Empower. Target: Champion 3 (The Ravager). +30% power.]

[Card Played: Fortify. Target: Champion 3 (The Ravager). +30% defense.]

Both cards into the Ravager. Both into Calypso’s clash.

’You want to crush my Infernal Matriarch, hmm? It won’t be as easy as you seem to think...’ he mused inwardly, eyeing the monster.

While Luna stood on an open lane with nothing between her and Row 1 except one Stalker that was about to die.

[Champion 5 advances to A4. Clash initiated: Champion 5 (The Bladed Stalker) vs Luna.]

The Stalker came from B3, sliding diagonally into Luna’s square with bladed arms already spread and compound eyes locked on her, joints bending the wrong way as it closed the distance in a single fluid motion.

’There it is.’

The Kaiju had seen the threat after all.

[Ranged ally within support distance. Aria (B5) may join this clash.]

Kaiden committed her without hesitation.

[2v1 Clash: Luna + Aria vs C5 (The Bladed Stalker).]

Luna’s grin stretched wide as Aria materialized beside her in the forming arena, moonlight flooding the space silver-white.

”Two on one again, huh?” Luna said, rolling her neck as her Stormblade crackled. ”The viewers will start drawing the two of us in rather compromising ways at this rate. Hope I’ll be on top at least.”

”They can only draw me in such a way with Kai.”

”They have the right to-”

”No.”

”What will you do, sue them?”

”Yes.”

The gremlin broke into laughter as the three pieces vanished from the board.

[Defender Turn.]

Two more cards joined his orbit. Swiftness and Stall. He banked both for Luna’s lane and played the card he’d been holding for the big moment.

[Card Played: Double March. Move up to 2 additional pieces this turn.]

”Alice.”

Sending a ranged piece into a solo clash against a reforged boss monster was, by every reasonable metric, a suicide play.

She had no backup, no melee partner to split the creature’s attention.

But reasonable metrics had never applied to Alice Ashborn.

She liked to cuddle up against his arm and act like the most adorable ball of fluff in the world, all headpat demands and big brother worship, and people who only saw her off the field would never guess what she actually was.

The Light That Destroys. His ferocious little murder machine, the single most dangerous ranged fighter in his arsenal.

’I trust you.’

[Clash initiated from range: Alice vs Champion 4 (Obsidian).]

Golden light erupted from her fingertips in full radiance as the arena formed around her and the multi-limbed creature with the volcanic glass carapace.

The Obsidian creature towered over her, magma bleeding through the cracks in its carapace, heat warping the air between them, and Alice looked up at it with wide blue eyes gone cold and surgical, already sizing up where to place the killing blow.

”I’ll be back, big brother. Keep your palms warm for my headpats. You’re not allowed to headpat anyone else before me, got it?!?!”

She disappeared into the arena.

Now, his second move. Nyx. C5 to C4.

Nyx stepped forward one square without needing to be told, pink eyes already locked on the viewing pane showing Luna and Aria’s arena. The moment she crossed into C4, the notification pulsed.

[Ranged ally within support distance. Nyx (C4) may join this clash.]