"Are you sure about this? Are we really going to target them?"
"We already saw how powerful he was during the marathon. We can't possibly..."
"We've been together longer than their team. There's no way we'd lose against them in terms of teamwork." The man grunted. "Besides, I need to get revenge on the humiliation this morning."
The leader of the group of bullies spoke as if he was severely humiliated this morning. When in fact, Satoshi just talked to him and tried to stop him from bullying the guy. Gritting his teeth, he assumed the position of the team captain.
"What are they doing?"
"I have no idea."
"Is that even allowed?"
Bewildered, all groups stared at Satoshi's team as if they were an anomaly in their dimension. And they were right to think about that since their group looked like a large monster instead of a team.
Satoshi assumed the cavalry position and it's just him down there. As for his four other teammates, they were flailing around with tentacles around their waist.
"Let it RIP!" Magnus Carter announced.
"All right, here we go!" Satoshi screamed at the top of his lungs as his tentacles lengthened themselves. Finana, Horatius, Leif, and Lucy zipped through the air, trying to grab as many headbands as they could. With their superior mobility, there was no way they would lose against the other groups.
Fwip~
Fwip~
Fwip!
One thing that Satoshi and his team overlooked was their lack of defense. If they were fighting regular superheroes, it would've been easy to fight back considering that they were Disciples. However, they totally forgot the fact that they were also fighting Disciples themselves.
In terms of offensive capabilities, they were all a match. Satoshi's group might have more mobility but that didn't put them in the slightest advantage whatsoever.
Before anyone in Satoshi's team could grab a headband from the other team, Satoshi felt his connection to the others cut off. Immediately, Satoshi then realized that the orther groups actually aimed for his tentacles instead of aiming at his teammates.
Then again, his teammates could defend himself, but it was an altogether different topic when it came to his tentacles. They may be speedy and they may erratically sway around... but in terms of defense, they have no defense.
With a grunt, Satoshi caught his teammates in the nick of time, thanks to his tentacles which regenerated and darted toward his teammates. Fortunately, none of them touched the ground and they could continue fighting without the loss of a team member.
"Satoshi, thanks for that." Horatius said, forcing a smile on his face as he continued focusing on his given task. This was a new tactic so there were bound to be a lot of drawbacks. If they were a regular team, they would've immediately lost.
But it was Satoshi they were talking about here. If any, they wholly trust him to come up with other insane ideas to solve their current issue.
And Satoshi solved it in an instant. Thanks to their mind connection which was set up by Lucy, Satoshi informed Leif to put up a barrier around them. Since his barrier was near indestructible, it wouldn't be easily cut just like what happened a moment ago.
Adding to that, Satoshi decided to integrate with another familiar, Sera, and he buffed the barrier that Leif put up, basically creating an indestructible barrier around his tentacles.
Fortunately, Leif was skillful enough to put up such an intricate barrier. Thanks to the mind connection they all have, Leif felt like he was creating a barrier around his entire body, that's it.
With this newfound solution, Satoshi's team became even more invincible, and it became evident when Horatius finally grabbed a headband from one team.
Then Finana also grabbed her own, and it forced the others to do a good job so they could contribute to the team as well. Pretty soon, only Satoshi was left, and he was desperate to grab a headband. As a cavalry, though, he had limited opportunities. He was the foundation of the team, and one small misstep would be the end of their team.
That's why he couldn't act haphazardly. He was the combination of gears that made his team work together, he couldn't just act out on his own and jeopardize his team.
Because of that, Satoshi just stuck to what he was doing. It didn't matter if he didn't grab a single headband. What matters is that he could assist his team and ultimately win the entire competition... or so that's what he initially thought.
Now that the entire battlefield was filled with nothing but chaos, Satoshi realized one thing, and it was an eye-opener for him. For one, none of the teams actually used dimensional superpowers. He knew that some of the teams should have this superpower in their arsenal, but no one bothered using it.
Unbeknownst to him, everyone went through great lengths with protecting their headbands. Even though the dimensional portal superpower should have been useful, it had been reduced to being useless in this exercise. Anyone who sneaked up behind someone and try to grab their headbands would only end up in failure.
"I see, so that's how it was."
From afar, Satoshi saw one team captain try to reach out to another team. Since they were at risk of falling behind, he grew desperate and used his dimensional portal.
The portal worked, but the moment he put his hand inside, the portal closed and his arm was cut off. He gritted his teeth as he held the stump which was left after his arm was amputated.
"So that's how it was. I wonder what kind of magic or stuff they have in place." Satoshi asked himself. He wanted to try it out as well since he knew that Ghast's dimensional portal was more sophisticated compared to what the guy put up.
Without further ado, Satoshi put his hand up with Leif's barrier around it. He buffed it a couple more times with Sera. From a distance, everyone saw as Satoshi's halo floated and went around his hand. It gave it a nice yellow glow, almost blinding. Before anyone could wonder what was going on, Satoshi extended his hand and manifested a dimensional portal.
He reached out and grabbed someone's headband. Then he retracted his hand. As soon as he did so, he noticed that one of the halos (there were seven halos in total) disappeared around his wrist, which meant that the defenses they put up were enough to drain one-seventh of Sera's power.
It was really extreme, and this meant that Satoshi could only use it a maximum of seven times. Then again, it was a successful hunt and Satoshi gained another headband in hand. With this, their total finally got to seven headbands, and this put them at an equal ranking with the first place.
However, the fight is not yet over. They still need to gather more headbands to win the entire thing. They couldn't just settle for equal placing. After all, only one team could be deemed the winner. With this in mind, Satoshi decided to aim for the craziest play of all.
With a minute left under the clock, Satoshi began his final preparations. In his mind, he signaled everyone to defend their headbands with their lives, handing them to Horatius and surrounding him like vultures hanging around a cadaver.
There were eight groups left, and the second placer was only missing two more headbands before they could tie with the two groups in the first place. Since Satoshi didn't want his teammates to divulge his plan to the other groups, Satoshi just told them to remain defensive. "Don't worry, I have the plan to win this." He told them, his eyes glistening as the challenge became clearer in his mind.
Once again, the halos above Satoshi's head surrounded Satoshi's arm. He was going to attempt to grab another headband from someone else.
Seeing that Satoshi was bound to do something crazy again, Everyone put their guards up and focused all their attention on Satoshi. They already saw how Satoshi managed to break through their precautionary measures a moment ago. They weren't risking another successful headband grab from Satoshi, not if they could help it.
Little did they know, while they were all focused on Satoshi, one of his team members was actually in the plan as well. The only reason why no one realized this was because they just assumed everyone was surrounding Horatius to defend him. Satoshi actually instructed Horatius to reach out his hand and grab it at the same time.
The moment Satoshi reached out his hand, he gave Horatius the signal and he reached his hand as well. In that instant, Satoshi put up a portal in front of Horatius as well.
While they were busy guarding themselves from Satoshi's sneaky grab, it didn't even occur to them that they'd have to avoid two sneak attacks. When Satoshi's hand came out, trying to grab the a headband from the first placer group, Horatius's hand also grabbed from the other side.
They managed to push off Satoshi's hand, but Horatius's sneak grab was successful, and he managed to get a headband at the last second.
"Whoa, can't believe that worked." Satoshi heaved a sigh of relief as the timer finally ran out.