Anna's Story

The school, Dicenview academy, was now desolate and some buildings had been broken – possibly from attacks during different battles nearby.

Anna had been using it to train a few students who still wanted to learn how to fight and defend themselves against the werts.

Although the choice to shut down the schools was a great one because lots of students being in one place makes them an easy target.

Currently standing in the large field of Dicenview academy which once contained bleachers, Kyle, Smith, Violet, Louisa, Nikki, Ayo and Diane were waiting for Anna to arrive along with the others.

"I really thought Sasha would join us eventually." Ayo said, her brown skin basking in the sunlight and her former black curly hair was now very straight, reaching lower than her shoulders.

"Maybe she thinks she doesn't need more training." Louisa said, toying with her braided dirty blonde hair and her black eyes staring up at the sky. "She's already very strong."

"Yeah she's strong, but she can't be stronger than Kyle." Nikki argued. "And he's here isn't he?"

"You never know to be honest." Violet said. "I don't really know Sasha but I could probably take Kyle on."

"You want to test that theory?" Kyle said with a light smile. He already had a bulky stature but it seemed as though he grew in size a little. The muscles in his biceps and triceps were very visible with the way the short-sleeved shirt he wore held onto his body.

Roughing up Kyle's orange hair from behind, Kevin had just arrived and jumped into the conversation. "You don't really plan on fighting a pretty lady now, do you?"

Violet had pretty much stayed home with her family when the war had started. She could not do what she planned on doing after graduating as a third year student but when she heard that a teacher from the school she went to – Dicenview academy – was training students, she decided to join and learn more than she already knew.

Walking to join the others, Sky, Duke and Anna had also just arrived and now the training could begin.

Duke, although infamous for being a bully, was not stupid. His thinking was that it was only a matter of time before almost everyone had to participate in the war and when that time came, he needed to fight and survive until the war was over. Anna was giving out free training so what did he have to lose? Nothing.

"Oh look who's here." Kevin said when he saw Duke heading towards them. "The mama's boy who thinks it's okay to pick on people smaller than him."

"Shut your mouth Kevin." Duke replied. "You'll get what's coming to you one day. I promise you that."

"Let's go then." Kevin said, moving closer to him. "Right here, right now."

"No problem." Duke said and was already curling his fingers into fists.

"That's enough of that." Anna said, her authority oozing out of her in a supreme manner.

"Yes ma'am." Kevin replied with his eyes taking in one quick glance of Anna's whole body. "I love it when she uses her authority over us." he whispered to Smith.

"So you're a submissive sissy then." Nikki said.

"Whoa!" Louisa exclaimed while chuckling a bit. "Let's calm down. We don't want to say anything too hurtful."

"Just like last time." Anna started saying. "The first thirty minutes is for focusing on your magic and improving it. That way the senses of your body are heightened to an extent and you can push yourselves to do even better than before."

"I've got a question to ask." Sky said as he sat on the grass the way they usually did.

"Okay what is it?"

"How did you become so powerful?" Sky asked.

"What do you mean?" Anna replied, a little bit surprised by the question.

"Yeah he's right." Smith chimed in. "If I was to guess I would say you're in your mid-twenties. But you already have the capability to take on a five-tailed wert. How?"

"Because she's the daughter of a monarch. No offense." Ayo said.

"None taken. But in a way you're not wrong." Anna replied. "I didn't inherit my father's power or anything. I'll tell you what happened but it's not really that much of a story."

"We're all ears." Kevin said. "And eyes."

"When I had just finished my third year, I immediately joined the academy for upcoming soldiers. My father was a monarch so it wasn't very surprising. Apart from the fact that I was a monarch's daughter, I was a normal kid."

"I went through the academy and became an actual soldier in the Vedan army. The military was always looking for new ways to increase the strength of the soldiers, always trying new methods and techniques."

"One day, an announcement was made that they were trying something new. A method recently developed by one of the world's most brilliant minds. They needed volunteers from amongst the soldiers so that they could test it out."

"The higher ups would not risk putting the lives of civilians at stake and if the method did in fact work, they wanted it to be a soldier it worked on. Plus everything was kept within the walls of the barracks, never reaching the ears of a civilian."

At this point, everyone was sitting and listening with a keen interest in what Anna was telling them. It was somewhat like a trip down memory lane for her because she had stopped thinking about what happened to her.

It was not exactly traumatizing for her but it wasn't something anyone wanted to blindly go through either.

"Of course every soldier was skeptical about volunteering." she continued. "You could say I was naive at the time. I believed in the military, the soldiers, everything. My dad was a monarch for crying out loud so yeah when he suggested I volunteer for the test, I agreed."

"Dumb choice." Duke mumbled under his breath.

"I'm sorry, did you say something?" Kevin asked, ready to lunge at Duke anytime.

"Do you guys want to hear me complete it or what?" Anna interfered.

"Be quiet boys." Diane said. "Continue miss Anna."

"I volunteered for them to test the method on me but I wasn't the only one. There were five of us. The method was like nothing we could have ever expected. Severe pain for weeks, it felt like our bones were being broken and repaired right in our bodies."

"We were barely given any food. 'It was all part of the process' they said. Sometimes we could practically see the magic we already had being sucked out of our body. They put us with different beasts to see how we responded in life-threatening situations."

"Is that even legal?" Smith asked. "Are they allowed to do that?"

"Technically, yes." Anna responded. "We signed some papers before we started and we also weren't allowed to tell anyone about what happened."

"So why are you telling us now?" Kyle asked.

"We're in the middle of a war." Anna answered. "What's the worst anyone's going to do? And now I have the power to stop most people if they try anything. And I'm still getting stronger."

"What they did to you guys was worth it then." Sky said.

"You could say that. If you think weeks of torture and torment based on the probability of something happening is worth it."

"What happened to the other people who volunteered with you?" Sky asked.

"Only two of us survived." Anna answered.

"Out of five?" Smith asked in shock.

"Yes."

"So the test was a failure?" Louisa asked.

"At least the majority of people saw it as a failure. That's why it was stopped immediately and never tested on others."

"So if we wanted to, could we still do it?" Kyle asked.

"No. Why would you even want to? You think I enjoyed those weeks of my life I spent as a lab rat. I left the military after that but I kept growing stronger way faster than others, whether I wanted to or not."

"But look at you now," Kevin said, "you're powerful. Where's the other person who survived?"

"She remained in the military. Getting stronger at an unprecedented rate. Maybe even faster than me. Her name's Caitlin."

Turning to look at Ayo and Louisa, Nikki had a confused look on her face. So did Ayo and Louisa.

"Isn't that the name of Cat's sister?" Nikki asked them.

"Catherine has a sister?" Kevin asked, surprised.