My Scumbag System Chapter 524: The Scumbag’s Saints

Silence fell like a hammer blow.

Then Akari started laughing, that bright dangerous sound she made when something genuinely delighted her dark sense of humor. "Holy shit. The cinnamon roll has claws."

Emi’s face turned scarlet, her pale skin flushing from hairline to collarbone. "I’m not a cinnamon roll."

"You literally brought homemade cookies to Satori’s parents."

"That’s just being polite!"

"You bake when you’re nervous and reorganize your medical kit when you’re stressed."

"Everyone has coping mechanisms!"

Natalia found herself smiling despite the tension coiling in her stomach like a living thing. She crossed to Emi and pulled the smaller girl into a brief, tight hug that smelled like vanilla and antiseptic and safety.

Emi squeaked in surprise, her healing aura flaring involuntarily before settling into a warm, comforting glow that made Natalia’s lingering injuries from yesterday’s training session fade entirely.

"Thank you," Natalia murmured against Emi’s blue hair. "For believing we’ll win. For healing us when we break. For being exactly who you are."

She pulled back before Emi could get the wrong idea. Or the right idea. Or whatever complicated feelings were happening between all of them and Satori that nobody wanted to examine too closely. The bonds between them were tangled enough without adding romantic confusion to the mix.

Cel checked something on her phone, her expression going carefully neutral in the way that meant she was delivering bad news. "The bracket updated. You’re fighting in twenty minutes."

Twenty minutes.

Natalia’s hands trembled slightly before she forced them still through sheer willpower. Twenty minutes until she walked into that arena and faced someone who could genuinely kill her if things went wrong. Someone trained by the best, sponsored by the wealthiest, and motivated by the same thing that drove Natalia herself.

Pride.

And underneath that, buried so deep most people missed it entirely—the desperate need to prove she wasn’t just her sister’s shadow. That she existed as something more than an extension of someone else’s legacy.

Natalia understood that motivation intimately. She’d spent seventeen years as Luka’s daughter, the girl with the famous B-Rank father, always introduced as his legacy rather than her own person. Every achievement measured against his, every failure reflecting on his reputation.

Then Satori had looked at her and seen Natalia Kuzmina, telekinetic powerhouse and future S-Rank, without her father’s name attached. He’d seen her power, her potential, her willingness to burn the world down for the people she loved.

It had changed everything.

"I need a minute," she said abruptly, heading toward the door with quick, sharp steps that left frost in her wake.

"Natalia—"

"Alone. Please."

They let her go, which was probably a mistake. Alone meant her brain had time to spiral, to catalog every way this could end badly. Every possible failure cascading through her mind like dominoes falling in perfect, devastating sequence.

She found an empty corridor two levels down from the prep room, nothing but concrete and shadows and the distant vibration of twenty thousand people screaming for blood. She leaned against the wall, concrete cold against her back even through the combat suit.

Closed her eyes.

Breathed.

The Cryo-Lich Ring pulsed against her finger in rhythm with her heartbeat, its cold presence grounding her in reality rather than the spiral of worst-case scenarios. Two months ago, she’d been desperate to buy this ring. Convinced it would make the difference between success and failure at the Academy.

Now she barely noticed it.

Because somewhere between that first Gate run and the cathedral where she’d nearly lost Satori to a death beam, Natalia had discovered something the ring couldn’t teach her. Real power didn’t come from equipment or training or pedigree or any of the things people used to measure worth.

It came from the moment you looked at something impossible and decided you’d force reality to bend before you did.

Footsteps echoed down the corridor, deliberate and unhurried. Natalia opened her eyes to find Skylar approaching with her hands in her pockets, hood up, the picture of studied indifference that couldn’t quite hide the concern in her violet eyes.

"You good?"

"Fine."

"Bullshit." Skylar stopped a few feet away, maintaining respectful distance while still close enough to matter. "Your hands are shaking."

They were. Natalia shoved them into the pockets of her combat suit before the trembling could get worse.

"What do you want, Skylar?"

"To make sure my partner for this death match isn’t about to have a panic attack and get us both fried by an angry Siren."

"I don’t have panic attacks."

"Everyone has panic attacks. Some of us just hide them better." Skylar pulled out a cigarette, the clove-scented kind that made Braxton threaten to confiscate her entire stash. She didn’t light it, just held it between her fingers like a prop in a play only she understood. "Want to know why I agreed to this insane plan?"

"Because Braxton assigned us together."

"Because you and I are the only ones in that entire prep room who actually understand what Satori is."

Natalia’s head snapped up, sudden alertness cutting through the anxiety fog. "What?"

Skylar’s violet eyes held hers without flinching, steady as stone despite the brutal honesty she was about to deliver. "Emi thinks he’s a hero who saves people because he’s fundamentally good underneath all the sarcasm. Cel thinks he’s some tragic figure fighting inner demons who just needs the right person to believe in him. Akari thinks he’s an exciting bad boy with a mysterious past who’ll sweep her off her feet into some romantic adventure."

The words hit like ice water, shocking in their clarity.

"But you and I?" Skylar continued, her voice soft but implacable. "We know he’s a scumbag who weaponizes everything, including us, and we’re still here anyway. We see exactly what kind of monster wears his face, and we chose to stay."

Natalia’s throat went tight, the truth cutting deeper than she’d expected. "I’m not—"

"You absolutely are," Skylar interrupted, her tone gentle despite the brutal assessment. "You’re the one who helped him recruit Emi. Who stood by while he seduced Cel in that death garden with poetry and starlight. Who kissed him publicly in front of twenty thousand people and declared him yours despite knowing exactly what kind of calculating predator lives behind those charming eyes."

The corridor felt smaller suddenly, the walls pressing in with the weight of acknowledgment.

"And you love him anyway," Skylar continued, softer now.