Chapter 96 - Xyrus Attack II: No Good Day

[Kathyln Glayder POV]

We were walking calmly through the fields, when out of nowhere my beloved received a kind of message through a crystal-shaped artifact. Claire and I watched the scene, as we weren't sure what was being said.

"What kind of problems?" He answered that to whoever was on the other end of the artifact's call.

"Problems?" Claire and I ended up saying at the same time, my companion clearly showing a look of concern.

He didn't answer us, he just continued talking to the person on the other end. In the midst of that, he looked deep into my eyes and seemed to make some kind of hand movements, creating 3 small snowballs and around them what looked like a ring that extended, turning into a cylinder. He pointed at the little snowballs and then at us.

I didn't know why he was asking this, but I managed to understand a little and I took my wand, making a smooth movement from bottom to top, raising a Snow Dome around us. I wasn't paying that much attention to what he was saying, because I was very concentrated, but I was able to break out of my trance when I heard a big explosion around us.

"We have to attack these nobles with nerves, now! Girls, go full force!" He said that, pulling his greatsword out of the dimensional ring, but soon the artifact in his other hand was thrown away. An arrow shot had managed to pierce through my magic, and hit him in the shoulder...

They hit him...

They hit... His beautiful body... blood started to flow...

I couldn't take it... I couldn't take it...

Feeling my body violently moving against the direction the arrow came from, raising my wand and screaming with strength and hatred. "Freezing Road!!"

A large path of ice was forming, with countless thorns emerging from it as I started to run in the same direction, seeing a person with a dark cloak and a bow in hand...

Was that the bastard?

Initially I could hear my beloved and our friend talking and shouting their spells, but slowly their voices became muffled as I focused on the enemy in front of me. He aimed a dark arrow at me and fired, but the spikes on the ice path I created served as a wall to protect me.

I saw him trying to run away, so I pointed my wand at him, swinging it wildly. "ICE PRISON!"

The ice floor beneath him tried to hold his legs, but he somehow managed to leap high into the air. It wasn't a bother for me, now swinging upwards, my spell seemed to move, ice started to rise towards my enemy, trapping him in the waist area to throw him hard against the ground, his bow had been thrown aside due to the impact.

I saw my ice encircling his entire body, pinning his arms and legs to the floor with no way out. I could see his mouth moving, as if he was screaming with rage and venting hate at me, but it was all muffled, almost silent, my anger for him hitting my beloved was greater...

Almost instinctively, I directed my wand towards him, aiming at the head, and, without any word of a spell, ice needles appeared and hit my enemy with precision. My heart was pounding and seemed to speed up with such adrenaline, I could feel my face twisting a little in the mouth area. But soon I felt a tap on my shoulder, coming with a muffled voice that gradually emerged more clearly.

Slowly, the environment became visible to me again, the sounds became easier to understand, and I could see part of my uniform appearing with splashes of red... I felt that liquid running down my face...

"Kathyln! Wake up!" The voice became perfectly identifiable now, I didn't have to turn my face to know it was him. "We need to find the others! Get out of this and go with Claire. I'll clean up this mess so they don't find out we already know about them..." He said, as he slowly appeared to wipe my face with a white cloth.

I saw that cloth, equally dirty of that red color...

"Claire, take her with you to the lab first to look for Elijah. And if anyone asks why she is with blood, say nothing and keep searching for him, understand?" He said again, helping me to my feet as I felt another hand pulling me, it was our captain.

My body began to be carried away by her, while I just looked back, seeing Luz approaching the enemy that I ended up defeating. He formed dark and frightening claws in one of his hands, and plunged it into the enemy's stomach...

The images of the corpse's face, the blood on my face, and those claws, stayed in my thoughts for a while, until I was woken up again. This time, it was a very strong slap on the right side of my head, Claire who was there with me. I looked at my surroundings, realizing that we were now inside a classroom filled with shelves of glass vials and research equipment.

"Hello? Are you there?" The voice was from a completely different person, and when I turned to see who it was, I noticed those greenish hair, it was the girl that Elijah always appeared with, inside our meeting room.

"Yes...?" I replied, confused by the change of environment.

"Looks like she woke up, my god, what the fuck happened to make her look like a doll staring into nothing?" This other voice was more recognizable, being that of the only person that wears glasses in our group.

"We were attacked on the way here... And please don't be aggressive towards her out of nowhere, Elijah! Seriously... I already told you how the situation went, it's understandable she's in a state of shock." Claire raised her voice to defend me.

"Says the person who slapped her right in the face." Elijah snapped, and that even I agreed with.

Leaving the subject, Claire again looked at the nerd. "So what are we going to do now? I really am feeling more tired than usual and we can't afford to go to the training room without a way to truly defend ourselves..."

"What are you talking about?..." I asked confused, slowly returning to the real world.

"Apparently those supremacist bastards did something to the ambient mana, neither Claire nor I are managing to absorb mana at an acceptable rate as usual." When Elijah said that, I tried to absorb the mana in the same way I had been taught... But strangely, the amount was too small, I just nodded my head confirming that this was the case for me as well.

Soon he returned to chatting with our captain, looking like he was going through a closet. "And to answer your question, Me, Luz, and Gideon have been creating artifacts for non-mages. We can use them to not use so much of our internal mana." He opened a kind of false part in that closet, showing things that... I recognized...

"Shotguns...?" I tried to remember the name of the artifact. Elijah looked at me, with a slightly creepy smile and a strange red in his eyes behind his thick glasses, while Claire looked even more confused as why I knew about something like that.

"Exactly... looks like he talked to you about it." He picked up the artifacts and took them to a table next to us. "It works exactly like a crossbow, but it has an extremely intense attack force, almost explosive, if the target is very close to you, with the normal range limit being 10 meters. In the case of this model, it uses mana as ammunition, having an artificial mana core inside, that is, if you are really desperate, you can use the mana inside the artificial core as an extra source. Do any of you know how to use a crossbow?"

I shook my head negatively, the girl with green hair did the same, only Claire confirmed that she has some knowledge about similar equipment. That way, she was the only one to take the item, while Elijah took another and kept the rest inside his dimensional ring. "Claire, make sure you have one with an artificial core charged with the fire element."

"It glows a bright red inside, so it must be..." Elijah nodded in agreement with Claire's statement.

"Aren't there... more of these cores?" I asked, with a vague memory, that all the artifacts Luz had shown me needed to have that, so it wouldn't be weird to make several then.

"Unfortunately we have very few, after all our customers ordered our stock yesterday for field testing, so we only have the shotguns, a very limited number of artificial cores, and one or two hoverboards." Elijah said, soon seeing Claire having a questioning face as to what this last spoken item would be, but he didn't even try to explain.

"And who would these clients be that you, a young prodigious professor, and a scientist professor, have in common?" The girl next to him asked, one eyebrow raised.

"The Council." He said super proud of himself and soon putted our reserve source of mana inside his dimensional ring as well. "Now, come on, you know how that guy hates when people take too long."

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[Doradrea Oreguard POV]

Today was supposed to be a quiet and peaceful day, Fey and I decided to go out together for a bit to train, or so I had thought.

To begin with, the only word to describe our moment together was "cute", because when we got there, there was a lovely little table waiting for us, with flowers around it in different colors. They were flowers that I would imagine seeing in a place of royalty, but maybe they were too normal in his kingdom.

"Well, I had a friend of mine do it for us, if you don't mind, of course." He said with a slight smile at me.

"Hm... and why did you call me saying we were going to train a little?" I asked, curious, even with my customs, I knew the customs of elves and humans to understand what maybe was going on.

"It was an excuse I told everyone... and I didn't want you to know it either, until now." His face reddened slightly at the cheeks and ears. "I just, I wanted you to feel better... and..."

I sighed, watching him once more. "It was because of that, wasn't it?"

"Eh? What are you talking abo-?"

"The accident... you've been like this with me since after the accident in the Trinity Hall... I'm here, okay? I'm not a ghost..." I said holding his hand, he seemed to get redder in the face, but I continued to speak. "I noticed that between everyone, you were the most worried and emotional about what happened with me... You started being excessively kind to me... as if I were some injured animal..."

"I-I didn't want to give that impression! I jus—" I cut him off again, gripping his shoulder tightly.

"Relax, I'm not saying this in a bad way... but know that I'm still a DC officer, just like you, I'm strong, but I'm not afraid to ask for help... so you don't have to be afraid to hide how you feel, you understand?" I saw his face turning redder than a tomato, and it made me chuckle a little.

"I got it, Dora... Thanks... I think... If you want we can really train a little... and then we can rest and eat the picnic I made..."

"Oh! You even had a picnic... Trying to conquer a girl by her stomach like that friend of yours, eh skinny?" I commented to tease him a little, and it worked, due to how his body locked up and he couldn't answer me. I couldn't help myself and started to laugh out loud, patting him lightly on the shoulder.

With that, we started training. He used some water spells that ended up almost freezing due to the temperature, while I just used some fortification spells, causing my feet to be covered by earth repeatedly. It didn't seem like a big deal, until I suddenly heard him let out a small groan of pain, and I looked at him closely, confused but still in a good mood.

"Hey, are you okay there, skinny? Finally got tired of training with water?" I even gave a light laugh again.

"I... I don't know, I felt a strange pain in my neck..." he was talking tiredly and after touching the back of his neck, he seemed to have pulled out a... needle?

"Eh?" We both expressed confusion about it, and soon I felt a pain in my neck as well. When I lightly touched that part, I saw the same needle.

"What the-" Before I could say anything, I saw someone approaching in the distance, wearing a stupid, but ominous black robe, and beside this person, there were two more.

"You can take them." The man in front of them said, and the two were approaching us, with their hands raised and a glow appeared under their sleeves.

I could feel the surrounding earth mana being shifted, and because of that, I instinctively jumped back. Feyrith on the other hand, couldn't do the same, and so I could see two pillars appearing, one where I was, and another trapping my elf friend, who couldn't seem to get out of his own due to fatigue.

"Oh... someone can take the potion quite a bit. Interesting..." Said the person who seemed to be the leader of that trio. "Swoon her out... Remember, we want everyone alive for the final show~"

I could barely think straight about what he was saying as I saw those other two lunge at me. One of them formed fists made of rocks and tried to hit me with them, even with that strange fatigue, I managed to dodge the blows, and counterattack with pushes and Earth Stomps, thus creating small earthquakes that made him lose balance, but the other it started shooting sharp black projectiles at me, as if creating them in mid-air.

It was getting complicated for me, especially with my emotions, seeing Feyrith passed out in that earthen prison. The hooded guy from before was putting some kind of handcuff on him and taking him away without any difficulty...

"Fey!!" I tried to get his attention, scream to see if he would wake up from that, but it didn't happen the way I wanted.

I tried to run towards him, but again those other two created another kind of pillar, both to stop me and to trap me there. "What do you think you are doing, shorty~" Said one of those crazy people in the black cloak, with a bizarre smile on his face, he seemed to be enjoying it.

I continued to fight them, it was really hard for me, but it was also a miracle to manage to dodge their capture attempts the more I tried to run away. It seems that even though they both used a conjurer spell, only one of them was really one, while the other was an augmenter, they kept using the same spells, as if they only knew how to do that one trick. I thought I was doing just fine in an emergency situation like that, until something strange happened...

"Earth Stomp!" I shouted my spell once more, trying to unbalance the enemy augmenter, but this time, the earthquake caused was weaker. Did it have something to do with the drug they injected through the needles? No, if it was something like that, I would be feeling more tired...

Instead I felt weaker, not physically or mentally, but magically. The mana around me seemed to slow down and didn't enter my body at an acceptable speed, as the Leywin brothers had taught me in some of our training sessions together.

"Hehehehe... apparently it's working now..."

"Running out your mana, short wild one? Ooh what a pity~"

They spoke as a form of provocation, I felt irritated by it and I tried again to use my magic, but it came out weaker than before. The smile on them only grew and finally, the enemy conjurer managed to erect a pillar around my body, trapping me. The augmenter was approaching, trying to put that earth fist close to me as if he was thinking of putting me to sleep using his punches, but before he managed to launch the attack he wanted to...

His head was hit by something...

He fell to the ground, not screaming, with what looked like a longsword stuck in the side of his head...

"Drakeein!?" The conjurer shouted what I thought was that augmenter's name, and so I could see something in front of me.

A black fog appeared covering a little of my vision, but that was short-lived, as soon I could see someone with the uniform of the disciplinary committee, having boots and gauntlets minimally bizarre, as if they were made of magma, but the orange and hot color was replaced by a gray fire that felt cold. His eyes were glowing a very strong yellow, in the middle of a very black background that normally should be white...

And the most bizarre part... protrusions on the forehead that resembled horns, besides a dirty mouth with something reddish, like dirty blood...

"Dora... Where is Fey?" The figure asked me, making me sure who it was.

"Luz...? He was taken... We need to go after hi-"

"No." He cut me off. "I'm going to finish off this idiot in front of us and go after him, you go straight to my training room... I asked the others to gather there, it's safer."

"No! I must rescue him!" I exclaimed, a little distressed and irritated that he wanted to do this to himself.

During our little conversation, the conjurer seemed to throw those projectiles again, but this time, Luz seemed to manage to catch them with his gauntlet of dark magma, and break them into pieces. I watched my capitain putting two fingers in his forehead, then he made a sudden movement of the same fingers pointing downwards. Somehow that undid the pillar that held me into place.

"You bastard! How dare you undo my ultimate magic!?" Said the conjurer, now clearly showing tremendous irritation, perhaps because before I had just dodged that spell, and never actually destroyed it.

"I'll finish him off, now go..." My vice-captain's voice sounded more authoritative and I started running towards what I knew was the tower with the training rooms.

"You will not!" The conjurer tried to shoot me again, but Luz seemed to have created a wall of some extremely black metal, protecting me from that.

I know he's strong enough, he survived so much already from what I've heard... He's strong... very strong...

That was my thought as I ran as fast as I could. Luckily, in terms of physical body, I had enough stamina to keep running along the way.

Arriving at that tower, I started to hear some screams and noises of attacks coming from inside, while a woman dressed in employee clothes ran out, almost pushing me. Taking a few steps inside, I noticed Theodore and Elijah, both with a kind of crossbow in hand, pointing directly at someone who was being pressed against the wall, the body looked like it had a burn on the right arm.

"What's going on here...?"

I noticed the student council there as well as I got closer, with their secretary answering me. "Let's go inside... I think it will be better for us to breathe first..."

As I was taken to where the Leywins' training room was, I saw a trail of blood going inside, and upon entering, I was immediately attacked by a strong hug from Claire. That took me quite by surprise.

"Dora... I'm glad you could be here... that was... complete nonsense..." She said in a tired voice and I just patted her on the shoulder.

"Luz didn't come with you... ?" Kathyln's voice came through, as Claire guided me closer to the central fountain in the room.

I could see Arthur talking to the elf Lance that I had seen this morning, but not only that... there seemed to be someone lying on the ground, with a white cloth completely covering it...

"No... Feyrith was taken by some crazy guys and Luz said he would try to rescue him before coming here..." I answered that 'porcelain girl', who just sighed.

"Shit... So we still don't know anything about Curtis..." Theodore breathed heavily, as he seemed to tie up that person who seemed to have attacked them, leaving a yellow bag on his head, as if forcing it to pass out through the lack of air, and well, Theo seems to have succeeded.

"Wait... there are people missing here... Of the student council people, I haven't seen that snooty vice president yet, and nobody here seems to have mentioned Kai." I ended up raising those questions and everyone seemed to look directly at me, as if they were tired, irritated, frustrated...

Theodore threw the passed out body of the person with the bag over his head next to me, and said. "See this outfit?" Looking closely, it was a white outfit with gold and blue accents, with the Xyrus Academy symbol on it... wait...

"Was he with them?... Did he betray us?" I externalized my confuse thoughts and the elf princess seemed to be super pissed off about all of this.

"You might have arrived later... but this idiot really went too far... If Elijah and Claire hadn't arrived in time, or even me and Art hadn't listened and opened the door... it's quite possible that we'd have other losses..." She said while caressing a fluffy white ball, Arthur's bond if I remember correctly.

"Other losses...? Wait, you guys didn't answer the other thing... what about Kai?..." I asked once more when I realized that everyone was silent.

The elf Lance looked at me with pity, while the other members of my group seemed to clench their fists tightly. That's when a morbid thought popped into my mind...

If the one with the bag over the head and passed out is Clive... who is the person under that towel?...

I got closer to it and stood up a little, ending up with a red face, my blood flowing to my head, from the shock and extreme anger arising...

There was Kai, on his face he had a mask broken in some parts, he seemed to be wearing some kind of hunter's clothing, but most importantly... there was a hole in the side of his head...

It didn't take me long to figure out what really happened while I was with Feyrith. I just walked towards Clive, seeing even Elijah and Theodore giving me space to be there...

And I kicked him...

I kicked...

I kicked...

Over and over, until I felt some kind of tiredness...

I kicked until he was smeared with blood where I was striking. Another blood stain appeared on the yellow cloth covering his head, possibly he had spit blood even though he was passed out...

"Better stop now, we need some of them alive for when this hell is over..." Arthur said, while Theodore seemed to see if that traitorous bastard had some sign of not being dead.

I just decided to sit next to Tessia and Kathyln over there by the water fountain, while I took deep breaths, trying to calm myself down, hands in my head. It wasn't long before someone else opened the door, and because they did by themselves, it was clearly the black haired Leywin, but he had arrived alone, without Curtis...

Without Feyrith...

"Where are Curtis and Fey?" Claire asked before me.

"Curtis was taken by the supremacists, but according to my informants, he's fine, as for Feyrith, his mana signature has unfortunately disappeared, and that's what I want to talk about... another thing I've been tol-" Luz was analyzing the room as he spoke, but suddenly stopped when he saw Kai's body, and his jaw was showing signs of force, if it weren't for this small detail, I wouldn't be able to know that he was angry.

He even tried to speak again, but he took a long breath, stroking a little between his eyes. "... I received an information that a barrier was created a little beyond the limits of Xyrus Academy. I assume that everyone here is low on mana, or cannot use spells with normal effectiveness... Am I right?" We all shook our heads. "Well, I don't know what other things this barrier does, but clearly one of those is absorbing a specific type of mana, the type that isn't controlled by spellrunes."

"So you're saying they managed to simply weaken us while still being able to attack easily?" Theodore was the one to ask, and the boy just nodded.

"However, I have developed some things together with Elijah and Professor Gideon, things that are equipment for non-mage adventurers, so it would be good for you to get these items while we can breathe a little..." He spoke, watching Claire who seemed to be with such equipment. But he continued to talk "Elijah, what did you have here?"

We approached the center of the training room, while that Lance seemed to be sitting in one of the corners, on guard for the situation of Clive waking up. Once everyone was there, Elijah took out, from his dimensional ring, some artifacts that looked like those crossbows, in addition to glowing cubes.

"Perfect... Does anyone here know how to use a crossbow?" Luz asked, I myself didn't know so well how to use it, so I left my hand down, while Theodore got up and received one of those items. "The name of this is Shotgun, just imagine a shot of elemental mana, now imagine that the closer the target is, the more intense and destructive the attack will be... that's literally it. Ammo can be refilled with this here, but given the situation we're in, there's a chance it's more essential to use as a mana recovery for us." He was pointing at those glowing cubes.

"One more thing... for the augmenters among us, do you have your default weapons within your dimensional rings?"

When he said that, I ended up taking my axe out, while Arthur took that black staff that turned out to be a sword with a translucent blade. Theodore and Claire already had their weapons outside their dimensional rings, being respectively gauntlets and a rapier. Then that same Leywin took a black and strange stone, it seemed to be quite expensive, but without caring about the price, he broke it up a little, handing a piece to each of the 4 of us.

"I don't have that much of this, yet... but, you better have some now... it's an 'Activation Stone', when rubbed on your weapons, it will give an intense black fire attribute... Each time you use it, the smaller this shard will become, and if they turn a very dead and faded gray color, they are no longer useful." As he said this, he also handed a piece to Lance Aureate and Princess Tessia.

"Sorry, but where did you get something I've never heard of before? They seem very natural and you say that as if you know very well that you'll find more..." I ended up asking out of curiosity, but he shook his head.

"I won't talk now, as it's not important at the moment, I can even talk about when this is all over, but not right now..." His voice sounded serious, way more serious than usual, it made me feel a shiver all over my body.

"Anyway, you received information from people who are infiltrated on the enemy side, as I understand it..." One of the student council members spoke, I think his name is Jarrod. Either way, Luz nodded and he soon continued. "Then why don't we go after the other committee members, or even the leader of this attack?"

"There are a number of factors that make this impossible at the moment... The most obvious being that Curtis and Feyrith are being taken somewhere, still within Xyrus Academy, so it would be more effective to rescue them when we know they are together... And second, they want to capture all of us, from DC and SC, in order to kill us in front of everyone due to their insane pride... that is... they are well prepared if they are having the courage for a plan like this, so we must take as much time as possible to have a better plan than theirs, both defensive and offensive..."

"Unfortunately, I have to agree with my brother. We need to be absolutely sure of our current situation and take advantage of what we learn from the informants... Attacking in a hasty way, can cause more destruction for our side than anything..." Arthur entered the conversation, holding tight to his sword. "Mainly because obviously they will have hostages, so we also need to be sure who we can attack. We must not forget that our enemies are not only people who invaded the Academy, but also students and teachers who decided to betray us as a community that accepted all the races. An obvious situation to occur is that they have some fake hostages that will attack us after being saved."

I just sighed hearing his words, and I could see Jarrod's look becoming more frustrated with the Leywins brothers' explanation. There really was the whole situation they said, we had to really be prepared...

"Anyway, since the student council has almost no one with enough offensive power, aside from Tess and the shitty traitor who's unconscious, you'll need to either stay inside for the entirety of the operation, or, if the barrier is passable, stay with the role of—" Again, our strategist's voice was interrupted, this time by a slightly irritating noise coming from a crystal-like artifact on his belt. "... Just a minute guys..." He put the artifact close to his ear and seemed to start talking to someone else. He just said straight things, basic answers like yes and no, until...

"How did you say the situation in the east area is? Hm... hmmm... Yeah, okay... thanks for saying that Code:FireHell, see you later." And finally he turned off the artifact.

"Who is this FireHell? What message did you get?" Kathyln, Jarrod and Lilia seemed to ask out of instinctive curiosity, and in response, Luz just gave a wide and bizarre smile.

"Apparently they've already captured the entire east side... having some professors who are still fighting them, but it looks like they've gone into hiding for the time being due to lack of mana... That is... we have an option as a first step in our plan of attack..." All were silent, just listening attentively to him.

"Some of us go there, help the professors who are on our side, if some of them need medical help, we'll bring them straight here. Meanwhile, we'll try to capture as many enemies as we can, and if that's not possible, you can kill them at will..."

"I know they're evil and want to destroy us...but kill them? Won't it be a problem?"

"No. Unfortunately, Cynthia seems not to be here, as I tried to look for her too when I was looking for Curtis and Feyfey, and I didn't feel her mana signature anywhere near... This means that I am officially The Director, bureaucratically speaking... I don't care if the situation gets really bad for me later... I have my ways of getting around the great possible wrath of the specific supremacist nobles, who decided not to participate in the attack. Therefore, what I want to say..." A big bizarre smile appeared on his face, as I could see the sclera of his eyes turn black like that time.

"Kill these motherfuckers... and only I will pay the consequences of this..."