I looked and found Nal-Kae being hugged by Laesa. Hesitantly, I went over to them and said "Uhh, thanks for the other day."

I didn't know where to look, and I didn't know what to do. The Blood Assassin seemed to be beating in my chest, my head, the tips of my fingers, itching to get out and kill everyone for seeing him show weakness. My vision went red as he tried to decay everything around him.

The other teams were backing away from me, and even Nal-Kae's team seemed apprehensive. "Nal-Kae", a lightbearer on his team said "Be careful."

Laesa put an arm over Nal-Kae's shoulder and rolled her eyes at the lightbearer "Kryst, I really don't get how you can call me overprotective"

Kryst was about to say something when the blaze wielder on the team conjured up a fiery baang. Kryst shut up.

Looking around, I would hate the Blood Assassin if I had any left, but the Blood Assassin had all of it. I only had sadness and neutrality; the moment I started feeling rage or fear the Blood Assassin would rise. He had all of the rage I didn't, so it was obvious that when I called up rage I called up him. I wanted to hate the Blood Assassin for isolating me like this, for taking away any chance I had of a normal life. For taking away any friends I might have had. That day on the 18th floor when he had destroyed half of a residential sector, I had forever been branded as the Blood Assassin. I suppose that was unfair of them; the Blood Assassin had probably been born the day before Headon paid me a visit.

I shook my head slightly, I knew from experience that those kind of thoughts would just draw him out. I foucsed back on the real world and saw Laesa smiling. "You're welcome", she said.

I wanted to say something, but didn't know what to say. My mind was a complete blank. Alasis came behind me and said "I think what Hanaki's trying to say, is 'can we climb up with you?'"

I spun around, and felt shock and surprise, one of the few emotions I could feel without any danger.

I wasn't the only one, and a frontline scout was convulsing with silent laughter. Kryst was spluttering, and after a couple of seconds said "What in the name of Mazino are you thinking!?" He turned to the scout "Cosmos, shut up!"

He took a step forward to Alasis, and I growled. It was the first time I could remember me and the Blood Assassin acting of the same volition. Alasis put a hand on my shoulder, and I could see her draining away the Blood Assassin's power.

What the hell was going on? How could she do any of these things, she acted like my decaying aura was normal. Kryst laid a hand on my shoulder, and I ran back some steps terrified that his fingers would crack with a flick.

"It's cool, Hanaki." Alasis said "You didn't hurt him."

Kryst raised an eyebrow "Doesn't look like he wanted to hurt me."

"He didn't." Alasis' smile faded, and Kryst seemed to realize she couldn't have been soloing without being powerful.

"I think it's a wonderful idea" Laesa said "I think Nal-Kae wants another playmate, it'll be good for him to have someone around the same age to be with"

Kryst choked on the word playmate while Cosmos started to convulse again. The redheaded blaze wielder stepped forward "How good are you?"

Alasis didn't smile, and seemed absorbed into the game of intimidating the opponent "He's the Blood Assassin, what more proof do you need?"

"And you? I require more than just the fact that you are a soloist."

Alasis grinned "Do you want to fight? That would settle things."

Nathan raised an eyebrow and looked at the other four teammates. Kryst cut in "A pair battle, to see both of them in action. Me and Nathan, you and the Blood Assassin."

"His name's Hanaki." Alasis said. I couldn't tell her how much I appreciated that, the acceptance of my name, my actual name, not just the Blood Assassin. I realised Alasis was waiting for me to accept or reject. I wanted to fight by Alasis' side, but I didn't want to kill anyone, especially not Nal-Kae's friends, so I shook my head

Alasis seemed disappointed at my rejection, and I regretted that; but, I would regret killing everyone here even more.

"I guess it's just me and you, Nathan Blitz." Alasis said

Nathan looked at her sharply, but refrained from asking how Alasis knew. Instead, he said "A fisherman defeating a wave controller isn't much of a feat. You should still try and fight against Kryst and I"

I saw Alasis was about to shrug and just accept, but I cut in "That's not fair. Two versus one, especially someone from a notable clan."

"She should be strong enough to at least yield before we kill her." Nathan said. The Blood Assassin decayed the air around him in anger "Fine then." He spat "I'll fight, and I'll kill both of you."

"If you wish I may authorize a fight for the four of you." Getting the Blood Assassin under control, I then realised the ranker was still here, and even some of the failed regulars had been drawn here at the prospect of a fight. Alasis looked at Nathan and he nodded.

The ranker seemed as if he had arranged fights like this before, because he expertly carved a circle with a radius of 20 metres into the ground, and quickly read of the rules as if by rote. It was a simple one on one fight, you lost if you went out of the circle, said yield, thumped the ground three times, or were rendered unconscious. He put a lot of emphasis on the fact that he would not take any responsibility for deaths. Cold bastard. He just wanted to see a good fight, just like the rest. I wondered if I could kill him, decay the air around him, then stick my hand into his chest when he wasn't suspecting it. I tried to keep the Blood Assassin reined in, but everytime I imagined Alasis dying he wanted to kill everyone on the floor.

The ring was ready, and the fight started. Nathan summoned up a fiery baang, and Kryst got out his lighthouse. I could sense the air inside the baang purifying and strengthening. Alasis walked cautiously towards Nathan and I followed suit.

"Run." It was Alasis, and she dashed faster than I could follow towards Nathan. Belatedly I ran towards Nathan as well, staggering under the pressure field Kryst set up. Nathan fired his baang at me, but I decayed it and swatted it away, feeling only a slight increase in heat. Nathan quickly conjured up another baang and started firing it at Alasis, dodging her first charge only with the help of Kryst's lighthouse.

Nathan had decided to start firing quick and weak baangs in Alasis' direction; he'd finally worked out Alasis was more dangerous than I was. Kryst's lighthouse also made the baangs swerve and attack Alasis on all sides. Drawing in a deep breath, I decayed the air around Alasis, making most of the baangs disappear. The pressure from the control needed was astounding, I'd never felt so much pain in my life. It would be so easy to just let the Blood Assassin take over, to kill everyone. Alasis' warmth came to mind, and the memory of just being with her, and I continued disrupting Nathan and Kryst.

Alasis kept on forcing Nathan back, but now he started conjuring up two baangs at once, and aimed one at me and one at Alasis. Kryst sped them up, and even though I dodged it, I couldn't shield Alasis and she had to fall back quickly to avoid being burnt. The two of them started to go for quantity over quality, and stormed Alasis, but gritting her teeth, she dashed to the side and ran at Kryst. Nathan spun and fired baangs at her but I decayed them all from a distance. Nathan hesitated, not knowing who to try and attack, and in that second Alasis had kicked Kryst out of the circle.

We both spun to face Nathan, but he raised his arms in surrender. "Very well, I suppose I would not mind having you climb with us."

Laesa clapped her hands happily "Kryst, you're outvoted again."

Massaging his stomach, Kryst grumbled something unintelligible, then shrugged. "Fine, I guess we have two new teammates."

I heard the regulars all clapping and remembered that we had an audience. I'm not sure they even knew what we were fighting about. Then Kryst's words hit me. I was in a team. If I couldn't control myself, then what would happen to them. I ran over to Alasis and told her, but she just patted me on the head "Don't be such a worrywart. Why did you fight so hard if you didn't want that, anyways?"

Because they would have killed you and I couldn't bear the thought of losing the one person I can't kill. In an ideal world that's what I would have said, but if it was an ideal world I wouldn't be in this position, so I just shrugged. Alasis smiled knowingly, and led me to our new team. I concentrated hard so I didn't decay anything around me, and the seven of us boarded a suspendiship that took us to the 22nd floor.

A/N: So that's the end of part 2. I didn't realize how short part 2 would be compared to part 1, but I guess that's because part 1 was introducing many more characters. Part 2 was just meant to introduce Hanaki, and Alasis. I'll probably get into Hanaki and Alasis' backstory in part 3 or 4.

This was a longer chapter, and I could have drawn this out into two, but I didn't. The main reason for this is because I'm going somewhere with no wifi for a month, so I won't be updating anything for a while. Really sorry about this. Thanks for supporting me and I'll be back with part 3 in July!