Supreme Mystic: Obsessed By The Strongest Alpha

The main concourse of the Imperial Starport was a roaring sea of noise and flashing light. Massive holographic billboards suspended from the vaulted ceiling replayed high-intensity combat footage from the previous Beast Tournament, bathing the crowds in pulses of neon blue and crimson.

Kieran stood near a transit pillar, glancing at the glowing screen on his wrist.

Squad B-1313. Assembly Point: F-7.

Because he had publicly rejected Gage and missed the standard open-draft window, the academy's automated system had officially dumped him into the lowest tier. The campus commonly called it the "Scrap Heap."

Fitting, Kieran mused cheerfully. I’ve survived millennia of cosmic void-storms, but navigating a terminal full of teenage hormones might actually be my greatest challenge.

He stepped into the surging stream of travelers. His heightened spatial awareness allowed him to slip effortlessly past two burly upperclassmen without brushing a single thread of their coats. As he glided past, the two men shivered, a sudden, inexplicable dread freezing them in place for a fraction of a second.

When he reached Sector F-7, a young man with messy blond hair was pacing back and forth, frantically chewing his thumbnail.

"Kieran! Over here!" Leo Foster yelled, waving both arms like a stranded castaway.

Kieran walked over, offering a slight, amused nod to his roommate.

"I thought you weren't going to show up," Leo blurted out, out of breath. "Word on the forum is that you absolutely destroyed Gage in the hallway! Man, that was insane!"

News travels fast when people have literally nothing better to do, Kieran thought, though he just offered a polite smile.

The deafening roar of a modified repulsor engine shattered their conversation. A sleek, fire-engine-red military hover-bike drifted violently across the polished tiles, stopping inches from their boots and kicking up an entirely unnecessary swirl of dust.

A tall young man with crimson hair swung his leg over the chassis. He wore custom combat leathers and a lazy, arrogant smirk.

"Lateness comes with a price, rookies," Mace Sterling said. He pulled off his tinted visor, pumping a faint ripple of third-rank intimidation into the air.

Kieran stood perfectly relaxed, his hands resting loosely in his pockets. His passive energy field devoured the hostile intent before it even touched his clothes.

Red hair, custom leather jacket, flashy bike, and completely unearned confidence, Kieran noted internally. Did he buy the 'Arrogant Squad Leader Starter Pack' off the holonet? What a walking cliché.

Mace scoffed at their lack of reaction and turned toward a heavy armored personnel carrier parked nearby. Leaning against the hull was a massive, dark-haired beastman nearly seven feet tall.

"Is this the trash Command dumped on us?" Kade Tucker's voice sounded like gravel grinding in a broken engine.

Kieran's gaze lingered on Kade. To his expanded perception, the giant's chest was transparent. A turbulent brown energy surged inside like magma trapped beneath thin rock. Three fractured energy pathways, Kieran analyzed in an instant. If he pushes past eighty percent output, his own heart will detonate like a cheap firecracker.

"Keep staring, F-rank," Kade growled, baring blunt canine teeth. "You're nothing but monster bait. The second you slow me down, I'll snap your legs and leave you for the iron-horned bulls."

"Oh." Kieran blinked.

The calm, utterly unimpressed single-syllable response made the vein on Kade's temple throb. He took a heavy, aggressive step forward, intending to grab the boy by the throat.

But suddenly, the giant gasped. His massive frame locked up completely. For a fleeting millisecond, Kieran let a microscopic sliver of his ancient aura slip. Kade's beast instincts screamed at him to drop to his knees, a cold sweat instantly breaking out across his thick neck.

Careful now, big guy, Kieran advised silently, his golden eyes flashing with quiet amusement. With those blocked arteries, you're three angry stomps away from a massive cardiac arrest. I don't even need to fight you; I just need to ask you to do jumping jacks.

The sharp click of high heels broke the tense silence.

A pair of silver-haired twins approached. The male walked with his shoulders hunched, while the female wore an immaculate, perfectly tailored field-medic uniform, her face twisted in a look of profound disgust.

"Mace, why are we breathing the same air as these gutter rats?" Talia Reynolds complained, waving a manicured hand in front of her nose. "It smells like cheap engine oil and failure."

I literally showered twenty minutes ago, but okay, Kieran sighed inwardly.

Her brother, Cillian, murmured a soft, pathetic plea for her to lower her voice.

Mace walked over to Talia, flashing a charming smile. "My apologies, my lady. Mandatory assignment. I had no say in it."

Talia lifted her chin, her eyes sweeping over Kieran. She took in his sharp bone structure and pale skin, her lips tightening with pure malice.

"So this is the famous reject," Talia sneered, her voice carrying clearly over the ambient noise of the concourse. "A genetic dead-end. No wonder your engagement was broken. You were thrown away like garbage—just a pathetic, broken toy. Honestly, you should have done us all a favor and jumped off the academy bridge instead of dragging our squad rating down."

The surrounding crowd quieted instantly. A few travelers waiting at nearby gates exchanged uncomfortable glances.

"Damn, that's way out of line," a passing mercenary muttered to his partner.

"Right? Bringing up the broken engagement is one thing, but telling him to kill himself? These noble kids are psycho," a woman whispered back, casting a highly sympathetic look at Kieran.

Through the vicious verbal assault and the murmurs of the crowd, Kieran's expression remained entirely placid.

Wow. Going straight for the 'go kill yourself' monologue within fifteen seconds of introductions? Kieran mused, genuinely impressed by her audacity. Ten out of ten for aggressive pacing, but her dialogue writing is incredibly unoriginal.

Leo, however, didn't share Kieran's detached humor. His face flushed beet-red with anger, his fists clenching as he took a furious step toward the silver-haired girl.

Before Leo could speak, Kieran's palm came down firmly on his shoulder. His fingers tapped twice against the boy's collarbone, sending a microscopic pulse of absolute-zero energy into Leo's nervous system. It instantly neutralized the boy's adrenaline, forcing his tense muscles to relax.

Don't engage, Leo, Kieran thought, offering his friend a mild, calming smile. Toxic stupidity might be airborne.

To an ancient mystic who had crushed empires, the political posturing of these low-dimensional children was nothing more than the squirming of bacteria in a petri dish. It was actually quite entertaining.

"Everyone's here. Board the shuttle," Mace ordered, clapping his hands together and entirely ignoring Talia's outburst.

Kieran kept his hands buried lazily in his pockets, trailing behind the group at a leisurely pace. Kade threw a hesitant, profoundly fearful look over his shoulder before practically sprinting up the ramp to get away from the F-rank cadet.

Just as Kieran reached the gate, the automated starport announcer chimed again. Its cheerful tone was suddenly replaced by a blaring, urgent amber alert:

"Warning. Boarding for the fourth-tier hunting zones has commenced. Unstable spatial rifts and anomalous Grade-S energy signatures detected in Sector 4. Survival protocols are now in effect."

Kieran paused on the ramp. A sudden, suffocating spike in atmospheric pressure made his eyes narrow.

Just as Kieran reached the gate, a sudden, suffocating spike in atmospheric pressure made his eyes narrow. It wasn't just a shift in the crowd's movement drawing every eye toward the adjacent VIP corridor.