Chapter 34: You’re the Challenger

Chapter 34: You’re the Challenger

At the harbor’s exit gate—

Tachibana crossed her arms, watching as Tendou and Caroline finally strolled over several minutes late.

Her expression was calm, but her voice carried that gentle tone only seniors used when they were about to scold someone.

“Tendou, Caroline… what took you two so long?”

Without missing a beat, Tendou straightened his back and replied with the confidence of a man who had absolutely done nothing wrong.

“Ah, Yume-nee, you wouldn’t believe it! It’s all Caroline’s fault. She’s never seen sights like these before, and she just had to drag me over to admire that big jellyfish tower up close. Otherwise, I’d have been out ages ago.”

“Oh? Really now?”

Tachibana gave him a look—half amusement, half disbelief.

She’d known Tendou long enough to understand a simple truth: if he told ten stories, maybe one had any basis in reality.

Caroline, meanwhile, didn’t even bother arguing.

She just rolled her eyes, her cat ears twitching in pure exasperation.

Honestly. Arguing with a child like him? Not worth the effort. She’d lose IQ points.

At the same moment, the real-time comments on the Advanced Screening stream were going wild.

“Caught in 4K lying again, huh? Hakiten, you scoundrel!”

“Masamune Tendou—a man who’s perfect in every way except for his personality and his mouth.”

“Men lie. That’s just physics.”

Tendou could see the barrage of teasing comments flashing beside his vision, but he didn’t so much as flinch.

“Alright,” Tachibana sighed, putting an end to their nonsense.

“Since everyone’s finally here, let’s go. Our client’s waiting—we shouldn’t keep them.”

Dropping the matter, she turned on her heel.

Tendou and Caroline exchanged a quick glance, grabbed their luggage, and followed her toward the open-air parking lot outside the port.

Because this was an Advanced Screening episode, the VIP viewers had already seen the previous one—and thus, they knew exactly what this trip was about.

In the last episode, the Doctor had explained the mission in detail.

This time, Tendou’s team was tasked with protecting a young heiress named Isabelle for one month.

On paper, Tendou and the others were the “main protection unit.”

But in truth, their job was more like that of an early warning system.

The real bodyguards were Tachibana herself, and Isabelle’s personal protector—William Cromwell, nicknamed the Coral Knight, a second-order Starbearer under Isabelle’s father’s direct command.

The fact that Isabelle warranted the combined protection of two second-order Starbearers and several first-orders said everything about her importance.

After all—her father was none other than Dorian, the wealthiest man in Deep Blue Metropolis.

And Dorian had good reason to call for the aid of the Ember Organization.

His company, BluEther Group, was in the middle of a dangerous internal power struggle—a brewing corporate coup, sparked by greed and fanned by unseen hands moving in the dark.

In the shadows, certain factions had quietly united, preparing to strike at the critical moment and strip him—the president of the BluEther Group—of all real power.

And Dorian, who had ruled over the vast BluEther Group for so many years, was certainly no fool.

After uncovering their secret maneuvers, he didn’t lash out immediately.

Instead, he decided to turn their schemes to his own advantage—using this opportunity to purge them completely and seize full control of the group once and for all.

But doing so meant he had to stay alert, in case those cornered rats chose a desperate, reckless move.

Like kidnapping his only daughter, Isabelle, to force him to hand over his shares.

That was precisely why Tendou and his team had been brought in—to prevent such a situation.

Although the entire incident began with Dorian, the wealthiest man in Deep Blue Metropolis, the true eye of the storm was his daughter, Isabelle.

And Tendou, who had already read the original story, knew perfectly well that no matter how dangerous or chaotic things might look this time, it was all just a scripted performance.

Every “crisis,” every “attack,” was nothing but a play orchestrated by Dorian himself to flush out the traitors within his company.

So from the very beginning, Tendou hadn’t taken this so-called “bodyguard mission” seriously.

To him, it was basically an all-expenses-paid vacation.

If he remembered correctly, though—once they reached the parking lot, they were about to encounter the first “crisis” of the Deep Blue Metropolis Arc.

At that thought, a glint of excitement flickered beneath Tendou’s sunglasses.

After resting for so long, it was finally time for him to step back into the spotlight.

And soon enough, his stagnant popularity points would surge once again!

. . .

At the harbor’s open-air parking lot.

The moment Caroline and the others stepped into the space, a strange fog rolled in out of nowhere.

Not only was its appearance bizarre, but its speed was terrifyingly fast.

In just a blink, visibility dropped to less than three meters.

“Tendou?”

Caroline stared at the suddenly fog-covered parking lot, instinctively sensing something was off.

She had checked the weather before disembarking—it had been a perfectly clear, sunny day.

There was absolutely no reason for fog to appear like this.

And yet here it was, thick and unnatural.

If she couldn’t tell by now that something was wrong, her reputation as a top-tier Machina Type Starbearer would be a complete joke.

But what truly unsettled her was that even though she had called out to Tendou, there was no answer.

She whipped her head around, only to find that within the thick white haze, the parking lot was completely empty.

The Tendou who had been right beside her—along with everyone else—had vanished without a trace!

At the same time, a similar phenomenon was happening to Chen Xing and Chen Kong.

Seeing the “main cast” forcibly split apart, the viewers watching the live feed instantly realized that something was definitely happening.

[Live Chat / Bullet Comments]

“They barely left the harbor and already hit a crisis? The production team’s really going all in!”

“To summon a fog this dense—and completely bypass Tachibana’s second-order Starbearer senses—whoever’s behind this isn’t ordinary!”

“Wait, hold on! Why are we only seeing shots of Chen Kong, Chen Xing, and Caroline? Where’s Tendou?”

As confusion rippled across the chat, a familiar voice suddenly echoed from deep within the mist.

“Yume-nee, starting off this big already? Aren’t you afraid you’ll accidentally get Chen Kong and the others killed?”

The camera zoomed in—and the audience finally saw Tendou emerge from the dense white fog.

He wore his trademark sunglasses, hands in his pockets, a relaxed smile on his face—as if he were on vacation, completely unfazed.

In sharp contrast, the others hidden in the fog wore expressions of high alert, braced for danger.

“Miss Yun, I assume this is the famed Peak of the Stars, Masamune Tendou, the one that you’re always praising?”

Tachibana nodded, pride gleaming in her eyes as she looked toward the figure walking out of the mist.

“Well? Didn’t I tell you this whole ‘test’ of yours is unnecessary?” she said, her tone confident and amused.

“Every one of the 36 children in the Stellaris Program could be considered a monster compared to normal standards—and Tendou is a monster among monsters.”

“So frankly, I think this so-called test is meaningless. There’s no way any of this could challenge him.”

“Oh? Is that so?”

Cromwell turned toward Tendou, curiosity flashing beneath the helmet’s visor.

“Miss Yun, would you mind if I tested him myself? Don’t misunderstand—I just want to see if he’s truly as exceptional as you claim.”

“Someone capable of protecting the young mistress within the academy... all by himself.”

Tachibana waved a hand dismissively.

“Go ahead.”

“Then forgive my rudeness.”

Hearing their exchange, Tendou slowly reached up and removed his sunglasses.

Then, with a casual sweep of his hand, he brushed back his bangs—transforming his messy hair into a clean, slicked-back style in one smooth motion.

He glanced at the approaching Coral Knight and smiled faintly.

“Heh~ looks like someone’s underestimating me again. But…”

In the next instant, the easygoing air around him vanished completely.

What replaced it was a suffocating, tangible pressure—a force so oppressive it seemed to distort the very air.

The scene on screen suddenly shifted to stark black and white—except for Tendou himself, whose colors remained vivid and alive, as though he alone stood outside the laws of this world.

“Just so there is no misunderstanding.”

“You are the challenger here.”

The moment Tendou’s domineering declaration echoed out—the entire dimensional livestream exploded with comments!

“HOLY—this is PEAK Tendou energy!!”

“That transition! The black-and-white frame! The color isolation! Absolute god-tier direction!!”

“BRO JUST SAID ‘YOU’RE THE CHALLENGER’ LIKE A FINAL BOSS—LET’S GOOOO!!!”

<+>

Note:

The ‘you’re the challenger’ scene is a JJK scene (Gojo vs Sukuna) that Tendou chooses to imitate.

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