The sleeping Kai curled up in Zalroth's arms as she dropped her dawnite hand fan. Kai let out a meek purr-like noise and pressed her head against Zalroth as her condition mostly stabilized. Zalroth relievedly sighed and sat down on his tails, as if they were a beanbag. Zalroth wiped the tears out of Kai's eyes before he picked up the closed dawnite hand fan, as Chronia climbed down from Zalroth's tails and skipped off.

"That was a close one," Zalroth murmured relievedly as he lightly held his hand over the slightly singed spot on his baggy fighting Gi trousers. Zalroth apologetically looked at Kai's face as it wore a worried-stricken expression. Zalroth rose to his feet, continuing to carry the sleeping Kai in his arms as flames started to form and swirl around him.

Chronia cheerfully hummed as she etched a large cross into the ice dragon golem's chest before she hopped/floated away and watched as a large fire lance raced for the frozen-in-time ice dragon golem. The fire lance plunged into the spot Chronia marked before it obliterated the top half of the ice dragon golem's body and completely ravaged the rest of the golem like a raging inferno, leaving only a black mark on the floor as proof that something was there.

"That was really mean of you to put poor little old Zalka through that, Hubby," Chronia cheekily stated as she floated over to Zalroth and landed on his tails. Zalroth gave Chronia a slightly irritated stare, deciding that responding with a quip wasn't worth the hassle but ultimately couldn’t help himself.

"You say that... but if I remember correctly wasn't this your (mean) idea?" Zalroth asked before he leapt out of the arena. Chronia frowned at Zalroth's response and pouted as she could feel Zalroth cheekily smirking at her, which said pouting was only amplified when she knew Zalroth thought that her pouting was cute. Zalroth landed next to one of the arena entrances and strolled into it, while Chronia undid her time stop. As the effects of Chronia’s time stop ended, the build-up of orange energy from Kai’s outburst exploded like a raging storm as it erupted across the arena area, only being stopped by the magic shield dome that protected the spectators.

A few seconds ago in none time stopped time, Sophia waited on top of her team's constructed tower, with her bow drawn and aimed at the ice dragon golem's forehead, as its ice beam breath wore down Ruby's mana wall. Sophia steadied herself, heightening her senses and focusing the multiple fire mana arrows into the single large light mana arrow. Sophia braced herself to fire but was halted when a huge surge of energy spiked near her.

Sophia, Ruby, and Luna all darted their heads in the direction of the energy surge and were left in shock when they saw the source of the energy surge was Kai, as she was just standing motionlessly. Sophia considered calling out to Kai, but she didn't have the chance to when Kai suddenly disappeared and a tsunami of energy stormed past everyone (including the other team). The surging energy overrided the ice breath, washing it away in time right as Ruby's mana wall finally gave in and crumbled away.

Ruby wiped her forehead, heavily panting, and commented on how close that was as she lent against the tower. Luna popped her head out from the tower next to Ruby and asked Ruby if she was ok.

"Yeah, the tower would've been toasted if Kai hadn't done whatev...," Ruby remarked tiredly, only mid-sentence did she and Luna realise something was off.

"Wait... where is she?" Ruby mentioned as she and Luna looked around while Sophia was rapidly finishing the last section of the tower.

In the announcer booth, Kiki was heavily staring at the, now, Team Kuno(kunoichi)'s side of the challenge area, desperately trying to find the missing Kai with such an unbridled focus that she didn't even notice that Zalina had entered the booth.

"Wait, where did Zalka go?" Kiki asked perplexedly, her question stirring up the spectators into a discussion as they wondered what happened. Kiki heard murmuring to her side but by the time she looked over to the noise she only managed to catch a pink blur jumping out of the booth's window. Kikou tapped his mic, to make sure it was working before he spoke.

"Due to a sudden medical emergency, contestant Zalka had to be removed from the competition and will be replaced by her substitute," Kikou stated over the mic, mentally hoping the spectators and the audiences watching from home won't be too upset about Kai's sudden departure from the tournament. The spectators disappointedly murmured amongst themselves, although it was more sombre than anger filled.

As the spectators continued to murmur, Mimi (In her half-naga form w/ Kunai resting on her snake tail and having a Mana Tether connected to the two) apprehensively stood at the end of the hallway that led to the arena, listening to the words of the spectators as Kunai yawned. Zalina bounced into the hallway out from outside, rebounding against the walls until she arrived in front of Mimi. Zalina popped her head out from her furball and slightly shook her head, with a dazed expression on her face.

"You two have fun... out there for me..., ok," Zalina stated, stammering her words as her head swayed tiredly from side to side. Zalina plopped her head back into her furball before she rolled off. Mimi defeatedly exhaled, letting out lazy muttering, and transformed her snake half into yellow scaled legs with her original snake tail becoming a short tail, that Kunai was hanging onto. Mimi picked up Kunai and placed Kunai on her shoulder before she hurried to the arena.

Inside the viewing booth, Lola and everyone else was scratching their heads as they heard Kikou's announcement.

"Bummer," Scarlett muttered. The group heard someone enter the room, followed by Zalina (in her furball) bouncing over the sofa (Lola and the others were on) before she landed on the back of the sofa next to Vivo (in his crow form). Chronia meandered her way into the room before she sat on the sofa in a stroppy state.

"Mama-mama, where did you and papa go?" Lola asked, she rolled over to Chronia and sat on her lap. Chronia let out a fed-up groan before she wrapped her arms around Lola and petted her head, making Lola's tails energetically wag.

"We went to go get Zalka, but can you believe your father; he said I was a meanie just because it was my idea, but he was the one controlling the golems," Chronia complained, although it was in a language that the others (aside from the egos and visages) couldn't understand.

"It's ok, mama. Papa probably didn't mean it, maybe he was doing that teasing thing," Lola mentioned, as Chronia continued to pat Lola's head. Chronia sighed defeatedly and rested her chin on Lola's head.

"Say, mama, where's papa?" Lola asked.

"Who knows, he said it would be best if he waited until Zalka woke up before he comes back," Chronia mentioned. Lola seemed satisfied with Chronia's answers before she, along with everyone else, looked back at the TV as the challenge recommenced.

Meanwhile, on the flying airship carrier, Callie disappointedly slumped her head as she heard Kai needed to be removed from the tournament, sadly saying she can't believe every time she rooted for someone they had to be removed from the tournament.

"This time it's even worse because she looked like Tango Cat," Callie sulked before eating some popcorn.

"At least it wasn't as bad as, father's guesses," Destiny remarked cheerfully, causing Providence to defeatedly sigh at being outed by his own daughter.

"Yeah, but it still sucks that the prince won the bet for who could guess the outcome of the fights and win the challenges," Pink Hika stated, with the other Hika's agreeing.

"Indeed, he especially seemed to know the outcomes for that purple girl and the spirit weapon wielder," Maroon Hika mentioned, and the Hikas continually murmured between themselves so much that it made Lumios sigh.

"As, for Olivia and Hex they have an advantage over their opponents since Hex was able to warn Olivia of incoming attacks from behind, while not having to worry about herself, since attacking spirits in a tournament is prohibited," Lumios explained, with the Hikas intently listening to his words.

"And what about that Xinia girl?" Pink Hika asked, causing Lumios to go silent for a second. The Hikas slowly crept closer to Lumios with every second he didn't respond until they were all right in his face. Lumios begrudgingly sighed as he reluctantly answered.

"I like the colour purple," Lumios muttered monotonously. All the Hikas simultaneously flinched in shocked disbelief at Lumios' none analytical answer. Kara chimed in and seconded Lumios' reasoning as she also shared the same reason for rooting for Xinia.