CROSS ZERO
Chapter 10: The Birth of Ego
The Final Minute
TEAM OMEGA: 17 | TEAM BETA: 19
TIME REMAINING: 3:14
Kurasi gritted his teeth, turning sharply toward Suno.
"Idiot!" he snapped. "Why didn't you tell us about Kaoru?!"
Suno threw his hands up defensively. "The guy said his Core was creativity! How the hell did you expect me to fucking know what that means?!"
Kurasi clenched his jaw, breathing hard. His mind was already calculating, analyzing, recalculating.
Time is of the essence.
Oyon stepped forward, cracking his knuckles. "Why don't we go full throttle? We'll end this with one last heart-wrenching play."
Kurasi's eyes flashed. He nodded sharply.
"Everyone," he said, voice cold and commanding. "We're going full throttle."
Suno stepped closer to Team Beta, grinning despite the tension. "Consider it my pleasure to help."
On the other side of the court, Mitsuki wiped the sweat from his forehead, eyes blazing with blue lightning.
"Be ready, Team Omega," he said. "Push for that last point."
Full Throttle
The game resumed.
Kurasi's eyes flashed—a rapid, digital flicker as his mind processed dozens of probability paths simultaneously.
He drove forward, his teammates moving with him in perfect synchronization.
The ball passed fluidly between them—Jin to Haru, Haru to Reo, Reo back to Kurasi—like a machine operating at maximum efficiency.
The sheer outnumbering overwhelmed Team Omega.
Taiga struggled to hold them back, his body a wall, but there were too many angles to cover.
Kaoru darted around frantically, trying to block Suno, but Suno slipped past him with ease.
Mitsuki locked onto Kurasi, shadowing his every move, but Kurasi's teammates created space with surgical precision.
And then—
Kurasi and Oyon broke through.
Team Omega could only watch, helpless, as the two of them charged toward the basket.
Kurasi exhaled slowly, eyes calm.
This is it.
The winning play.
He passed the ball to Oyon.
"Take the point, Oyon," Kurasi said.
Oyon grinned, catching the ball mid-stride, ready to dunk it and end the game—
—and then a binary aura flashed.
Purple and white light flickered like static electricity.
Akira intercepted.
He slid in from the side, mimicking Kurasi's own interception style, and snatched the ball clean from Oyon's hands.
Kurasi's eyes went wide.
"What—?!"
Akira landed, gripping the ball tightly, breathing hard.
"Right here, huh?" Akira muttered, eyes locked on Kurasi. "You could have taken the throw yourself. But right now…"
He grinned.
"We'll win."
Oyon roared. "TEAM BETA, STOP HIM!"
The Final Play
Akira threw the ball to Kaoru.
Kaoru caught it, broke past two defenders with wild, chaotic movements, then turned back to Akira.
"He was the one who inspired us to chase for it!" Kaoru shouted, grinning. "Forcing evolution in us! Take the ball, you genius, and end it, Point Guard!"
He passed.
Akira caught it.
And he ran.
His eyes burned with intensity. His vision tunneled. The world around him faded into static.
Behind him—invisible to everyone else—a ghostly aura manifestation flickered into existence.
A skeletal, robotic endoskeleton of Kurasi, its eyes glowing with digital light.
Kurasi himself sprinted back, cutting off Akira's path.
"Akira Tenma," Kurasi said, breathing hard. "We have the same eyes. But I won't let you—"
Akira's voice cut through the noise.
"I copied your defensive mechanism," Akira said, eyes blazing. "By understanding it, I can… mimic what I understand by breaking down the components."
He shifted his stance.
"Garachi's dribbling style is a swift change of the center of gravity. So…"
Akira moved.
Left.
Then right.
Kurasi bit.
He lunged to the left, overcommitting—
—and Akira broke past him.
"I AM A POINT GUARD!" Akira roared. "I WILL SURVIVE!"
He leapt.
The ball left his hands.
Time slowed.
The court went silent.
The ball sailed through the air, spinning, arcing—
—and dropped through the hoop.
SWISH.
TEAM OMEGA: 20 | TEAM BETA: 19
BUZZER.
TIME REMAINING: 0:00
The court was silent.
And then—
Akira exploded.
He leapt into the air, screaming at the top of his lungs, fists raised.
"YESSSSSS!"
Kaoru tackled him, laughing like a maniac. "YOU ARE INSANE!"
Akira grinned, breathing hard. "I can say the same!"
Taiga crashed into them, wrapping them both in a crushing hug.
Mitsuki stood off to the side, arms crossed, grinning quietly.
The Losers
On the other side of the court, the silence was deafening.
Suno stood frozen, eyes twitching.
"No… no, no, no," he muttered. "This wasn't what I wanted to happen. This wasn't the win I envisioned…"
Oyon stared at the scoreboard, fists clenched.
"We… lost," he whispered.
But the one hit the hardest was Kurasi.
He dropped to his knees, staring at the floor, tears streaming down his face.
"We had it," he choked out. "We had the win…"
Kaoru walked past him, grinning. "Yo, Akira! What did you do right there?!"
Akira turned back, eyes still glowing faintly with binary light.
"That was my Core," he said quietly. "I'll call it… The Prototype."
Without another word, Akira walked across the court.
He passed the other teams—players on their knees, tears streaming down their faces, dreams shattered.
Akira's expression didn't change.
I destroyed the ego of these people, he thought. I crushed their dreams. I destroyed their hope… with just one play.
What is this feeling?
Oyon glared at him as he passed, fists clenched, but said nothing.
Akira stopped in front of Kurasi.
Kurasi looked up, tears still streaming down his face.
"Kurasi Toru," Akira said quietly. "Why did you pass?"
Kurasi's voice cracked. "It was for him to end it. What do you want? To add salt to my wounds?"
Akira's eyes were cold.
"You should have taken the throw," he said. "You should have been egotistical."
Kurasi's fists clenched. "Shut up. We would have won if he'd made it—"
"But I stopped it," Akira interrupted. "If you had taken the throw, I wouldn't have been able to stop it."
He leaned down slightly, eyes burning.
"Your ego is weak."
Kurasi's eyes widened. "Damn you, Akira…"
Akira turned and walked away.
Their dreams… crushed by me.
He smiled faintly.
This feeling… I love it.
This ego… I want to explore it.
Team Omega's Celebration
Back in Room 13, the atmosphere was electric.
Kaoru was singing at the top of his lungs, dancing around the room.
Taiga was grinning, shadowboxing in the corner.
Mitsuki sat on his bed, smiling quietly.
And everyone was roasting Suno.
"Can't believe that piece of shit thought he could screw us over!"
"Karma's a bitch, huh?"
"Should've seen his face when we won!"
The door slid open.
The room went silent.
Suno stepped inside, head down, fists clenched.
Taiga's expression darkened. His fists clenched so hard his knuckles turned white.
"Oi," Taiga said, voice cold as ice. "What are you doing here? I should send you to hell."
Suno looked up, eyes hard.
"I'm still a part of this team," he said flatly. "Even though you don't like it. You qualified. And so did I. So quit acting tough."
Mitsuki stood up, eyes flashing. "That's it. I'll slam this crap—"
Akira raised a hand, stopping him.
"Oi, Mitsuki. Chillax."
He turned to Suno, eyes cold.
"Just like them," Akira said quietly, "we'll make sure your crazy desires sink straight to hell. Just you wait."
Suno grabbed his stuff and walked out, slamming the door behind him.
I'll make them pay, he thought. Every single one of them.
Vox's Delight
In the observation room, Vox replayed the clip of Akira talking to Kurasi.
He watched it once.
Twice.
Three times.
And then he grinned behind his mask.
"The roots have started sprouting," he said quietly. "With this project… ego will be the fertilizer for the growth of gods."
Mika stood beside him, arms crossed.
"This is… something," she said.
Vox leaned back, satisfied.
"Yes," he said. "It is."
Team Gamma
In another room, labeled TEAM GAMMA, a guy with messy white hair sat on a couch, playing a video game with half-lidded eyes.
He yawned.
A guy with spiky orange hair stood beside him, arms crossed, smiling patiently.
"There, there," the orange-haired guy said. "Now let's go and train."
The white-haired guy didn't look up from the screen.
"Training is a hassle," Yuichi Haku muttered. "We'll just crush the other team."
The orange-haired guy—Yuma Haruto—sighed. "I know. But we need to put in some effort."
A third figure sprinted past the other two teammates in the room, moving so fast he was almost a blur.
"TOO SLOW!" he shouted. "It demerits you!"
He skidded to a stop in front of Yuma and Yuichi, grinning.
"Yo, Yuma! Yuichi! We're facing Team Omega next. They're trash."
Yuichi glanced up lazily. "See? Even Zuchi agrees with me. That's why the only difference in our names is the first letter."
Zuchi Tamuera blinked. "Wait… that's true."
Yuma sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"Firstly Idiot It's Two letters Y and an Extra I, Secondly, alright. Yuichi—two more hours of video games. Then we train."
Yuichi yawned again. "What a hassle."
END OF CHAPTER 10