Ram's heart was pounding. She could hear it in her ears it was so loud. Every step she took was one step closer to her potential demise — one step away from the safety of the shadows. If she couldn't turn this situation around, she might as well give up here and now.

But she had to go on.

She wouldn't let her sister's sacrifice be in vain.

Rom... Rom had given up everything for her... They had set out on this mission together, but even in the best of circumstances... Only one of them could possibly return now.

With trembling hands, she looked at her weapon. A top of the line gun, fresh off the assembly line. In the proper hands, this would have been the end of anyone she ever went up against. In hers... It was almost out of ammunition and she was outnumbered.

Swallowing, Ram took another step. She did her best to calm her breathing. She knew she had to take this carefully, or everything she had done up until now would be for nothing. Everything would be lost, and nothing would have been gained! Besides, slow and steady won the race, right?

Only if the bunny decided to go easy on the turtle or look down on it... But what if there was more than one bunny, and they were both taking beating the turtle seriously...?!

If she was the turtle in that case, then she was doomed!

The young girl grit her teeth. She had to be the bunny... No, if she was up against two bunnies, she had to be better than two bunnies... She had to be something that could grab a lot of things at once... Something like...

"I think she's around here somewhere..."

"Are you sure? I can't believe she isn't gone by now..."

Ram's thoughts halted immediately as the heard the voices of the two hunters. Just around the corner? That was all? She could do it... She could pull off the greatest surprise attack ever from her position, couldn't she? From her angle, she could even see their shadows on the ground, while they couldn't possibly have any idea that she was so close — they had just admitted that they didn't know where she was for sure!

The brunette found herself starting to grin.

She was going to avenge Rom after all.

It was now or never.

She knew now was the time to strike. If they realized that she was this close, they would pounce on her.

She looked down at her weapon. What it lacked in ammo it would make up for in power and accuracy. She could do this. She was going to avenge Rom... She was going to take back everything that had been taken from them...!

Letting out a battle cry, Ram readied her gun and leapt out from the shadows-!

"Take this!"

Only to be immediately struck down.

Too late did Ram realize that it had been a trap. They had been much closer than their voices and shadows had let on. She couldn't figure out how they had done it, but by the time she could take in her surroundings, their weapons had already been fired at point blank range. Not even someone with superhuman speed could have avoided such a cruel, merciless assault.

In that moment, the only survivor of Lowee's royal family was gone. Defeated without even having the chance to make her last stand, struck down in battle without even having the chance to pull the trigger once... Lowee's last hope was silenced once and for all.

From that moment on, the world would know only tha-

"Blegh! Yuck! Pbbt! Ewww, it's in my mouth! Eww eww ewwwwwww! You guys are jerks! Get me something to drink! Pbbbt!"

Sitting up, the black and purple blob formerly known as Ram began spitting and wiping desperately at her face and mouth as her cries of disgust began to rapidly increase in volume. When it became apparent that the taste of whatever had penetrated her mouth wasn't going to be going away any time soon, she looked to the two people that had struck her down, anger and desperation clear in her expression.

"Oh goodness...! Hold on one moment, Ram, I'll go get something... Rom must be done with the lemonade by now..." One of those two "hunters," Nepgear, tossed her oversized paint gun to the ground to dash off towards the other end of abandoned facility they had been playing in. "Hold on Ram, I'll be back soon!"

Wiping her paint covered eyes, Ram could only groan as Nepgear ran away. In the time it took

Nepgear to find her way out of the maze, find Rom, get some drinks, and find her way all the way back, Ram could have transformed and flown there herself...!

"Jeez... Stupid Nepgear..." It wasn't like Ram didn't appreciate it... But it was Nepgear's dumb fault that she was covered from head to toe like this in the first place! Spitting on the ground and grimacing as a mixture of purple and black liquid — courtesy of Nepgear and Uni — came out with her spit, Ram propped herself up using her gun and stood up before glaring at the remaining "hunter" defiantly. "You guys are gonna get it next time! Me an' Rom are gonna kick your — ptew! yuck! why is there more!? — butts!"

Uni had been watching the other CPU Candidate quietly since she had been beaten. She had been planning on gloating — Ram had given all of them an earful about what she would do once she won this little splatdown between the two teams of Candidates — yet seeing Ram like this... Seeing Ram like this...!

Seeing Ram so covered in purple and black that she didn't even look human anymore, spitting out paint as she talked, and now slipping on the paint on the ground like this...!

"P... Pff..."

Uni cracked a smile. She couldn't help it! Any second now, she was going to laugh!

Seeing the state of her nemesis, Ram narrowed her eyes. She shot a glance to her side. Uni, on the brink of bursting into hysterical laughter, gasped when she realized what Ram was intended. It was all the funnier seeing Ram dripping with paint, but that didn't mean she would let it slide!

"You... You wouldn't...!"

Ram's eyes glinted, looking all the more dangerous considering they the only part of her seemingly not dripping with paint at the moment.

"I would!"

Ram and Uni both dove for their guns.

It wasn't over yet!

When Nepgear and Rom found Uni and Ram, nothing could have prepared them for the state they found their fellow CPU Candidates in. The battle was over, after all — what more could have possibly happened in just a few minutes? Certainly not much... Right?

As it turns out, quite a bit could actually happen in that short an amount of time.

On one side of the narrow path, Uni was covered in white paint, torn between laughter and angry cries as she emptied the last of her ammunition at her for. Across from her, there was a blob — a blob known as Ram. The purple Nepgear had left behind on Ram in addition to Uni's black was now almost completely covered with fresh black paint from Uni that she was still adding to — but as Uni's current condition made clear, Ram refused to take it lying down.

"Not so fast! I still have a paint grenade!"

"W-Well I've got one too!"

"Take this...!"

Nepgear and Rom exchanged looks as Ram and Uni's furious battle raged on... before, after a moment of consideration, they slowly backed away, breaking out into a mad dash, full of laughter, as soon as they were sure they were out of sight.

Uni and Ram could do whatever they wanted, but they weren't going to let themselves get covered again.