"A training exercise?" It was clear that Luke didn't see the need to construct an entire training exercise around a few tests that measure physical and mental ability. Yami nodded, turning to write something on the board. "MAGIC."

As he turned back to the class, he held up his hand, and it began to glow, as the energy of mana began to gather around his fingers. "Magic can be used to enhance, as well as de-buff the body greatly. More than ever as you've grown, you've come to rely more and more on magic, even if it's unconsciously. Therefore, it may surprise you to see how much of an effect using no magic has on you." Yami cut the flow of mana away from his arm, causing the glow it had to disappear instantaneously. "Moreover, the lack of magic changes the way you think in certain encounters. Your decision making is very different when you can just summon a wall of fire to solve your problems, as opposed to having nothing but your surroundings to rely on."

Finally, the point of the exercise finally became somewhat clearer. Yami then pointed towards the outside window, in the direction of a warehouse that stood just behind the lunchroom. "That is a facility that has been lying in disuse for the past few years. For pretty obvious reasons as well. I managed to get us permission to use it for our exercise" Most students around the class had started to gain a general idea of what the purpose of this exercise was going to be. Around the class, students began to joke and talk lightheartedly, as they guessed as to what the exact purpose of this drill was going to be.

"I assume that we're going to have some sort of team orientated battle, where our magic is going to be prohibited." Emma stated, as she analyzed the warehouse. It was a building that could pretty easily fall into the background, unnoticed unless you were really looking for it. It was a dark brown color, and seemed to be constructed out of mainly wood. It was also noticeably smaller than any other facility the school had to offer.

"Is it even going to be enough to hold any sort of training exercise?" Kayden stated the main thought going through most students' heads. Even for a warehouse it was considerably small.

"Does it really even matter?" Raiden interrupted. "Whatever it is, I'll win."

That earned him a few glares from students. Mainly Suijin, who looked ready to slice his head off.

As Yami watched the lighthearted discussion the students were having, he smiled inwardly. They're in for so much more than they could have ever expected. Just then, a voice on the intercom called Yami into the teachers lounge.

"When I return, we're going to head straight into the warehouse, where I'll explain the exercise." He left the room then. Lucius leaned back in his seat and yawned. To tell the truth, he was extremely bored, and was already planning ways to get out of this exercise. As he glanced around the room at his different class mates, he noticed Hayato taking a nap. It seemed he had been sleeping since the beginning of class. It didn't help that his seat was in the front row. Yami had definitely noticed him, but decided to do nothing.

"So, you read the new chapter of Fight Club?" Lucius looked in front of him to find Izumi chatting with Suijin.

"Wait, but today isn't Friday?" Suijin seemed completely shocked by the news that a chapter had come out early. It was only Tuesday. "What spurred the author to release the chapter 3 days early?"

Izumi shrugged her shoulders, "Don't know. Apparently, because the company that publishes the manga, A-1, are from Ether , the authors have been facing heavy criticism and backlash from the public.

Suijin nodded, unsurprised. "What else can be expected? So public pressure, threatening to shut down his work-"

"Prompted him to release the next chapter early, just in case it ran into issues." Izumi finished for her. "more importantly, the actual chapter was crazy-" Lucius began to tune out their conversation.

He turned to look around the room once again, and noticed that Akira had finally decided to set down her two guns, and instead, was crumpling up a paper ball. After making it as compact as possible, she turned his eyes to look at Hayato, before tossing-more like pitching-the ball at his head.

Even though it was only a paper ball, it was moving at speeds that surpassed that of sound, and so reasonably, it hurt a lot.

"OWW! Who, the hell!" Hayato raised his head in pain, turning around to see who had just tried to take his head off with a paper ball. Suddenly, he was hit from the side with another one. And another one. Hayato's head seemed to be on a swivel as he tried to turn is head and search for who was assaulting him with paper balls thrown faster than the speed of fucking sound.

One of the thrown paper balls missed, and caught Izumi right across the eye. "ahh!" She instantly grabbed her face, which had begun to turn a bright red color. The area around her eye had already begun to bruise up.

Instantly, Suijin got up from her seat, checking on and hovering around Izumi like a worried mother. "Are you okay? Where did it hit you? Let me see."

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

"I'm fine. It just stings." However it was clear that she was not fine, as her eyes were filled with tears. At the sight of her friend reduced to tears Suijins expression darkened and she turned around, placing the full wrath of her burning gaze upon Akira, who had a paper ball in her hand, mid throw.

Akira looked at Suijin, then at Izumi who was still rubbing her eye with her hand. She returned her eyes back to Suijins, and responded, not even flinching at the dark gaze the other girl cast down on her. "My bad." However there wasn't a hint of apology behind her eyes. In fact, it could be said that there was a challenge hidden in her bright red eyes.

At this point, all other side conversations had come to a complete halt, as all of the eyes turned to the developing conflict between the two girls.

"I got all of my money on Suijin." Luke said jokingly to Jayden.

"Nah, you're tripping. She's strong, but Akira's on another level."

"My bad? Is that all you have to say? She nearly lost her eye!" Suijin took a step forward, until she was standing right by Akira's desk, and looked down at her.

"Nearly lost her eye? Way to overreact. It'll just be a bruise." Akira made no move to stand, or take her feet off of the desk, and instead started defiantly at Suijin over her tall black boots.

"Overreact-" Suijin shook her head. "You know what, you wouldn't be able to understand anyway."

Akira's eyes narrowed. "Wouldn't be able to understand. What do you mean by that?"

"Apologize." Suijin ignored her question.

"Hell no."

At that moment, all of the students in the room could feel the build up of magic as the girls tempers built up to a boiling point. Around Suijin, a bright blue aura began to glow, and her brown curls began to rise into the air, as what seemed like water droplets began to form, as if the air around her was condensation.

Akira's eyes began to glow a bright red, as a dark red aura began to surround her, as she removed her feet from the desk, slamming her boots into the ground and standing up. She didn't even need to pick up her guns, as they levitated, adjusting themselves to be pointed directly at Suijins head.

Both of the girls were around the same height, with Akira beginning an inch or so taller. Their aura clashed as magical energy began to overflow. Neither of the girls seemed anywhere ready to back down. They probably would've started to fight if the door didn't open.

Yami walked in, with a smile on his face. "You guys seem healthily excited. Shall we go?"

* * *

When the students walked inside of the warehouse, one thing became immediately clear. There was a pressing feeling, like someone had put a knee on their chest, and was pressing hard enough that there was an obvious pressure, but not enough to actually impair anything. Despite the fact that they were just as strong as they were on the outside, the feeling put everyone on edge, and there wasn't nearly as much banter and light hearted talking as there was inside the class. It was unsettling, like at any moment the phantom knee on their chest could constrict instantly, crushing their organs.

Despite looking small on the outside, the inside of the warehouse was fairly spacious, with loosely sprinkled boxes and shelves that were mostly empty. As they walked to the center, they noticed two sets of holes in the floor, both with ladders that lead underground, where more of the similar sight of boxes could be seen. However, as opposed to the top floor of the warehouse, these sections were made of metal.

Once all of the students had filled in, Yami turned to them, and pointed to the holes in the floor. "These two holes lead downward into another section of the warehouse, bigger than this top floor. Inside of that, there is another hole, with another slightly bigger section. This goes on for around a thousand meters underground, until you reach the final basement floor."

"A thousand meters down?" This was Touka. "That's pretty deep."

Yami nodded. He then pulled out two flags from seemingly thin air. One red, one blue. "These two flags will be given to two students who will serve as team captains." Then, he tossed the flags into the air and they disappeared, before appearing in the hands of Suijin and Akira respectively. Yami smiled. "Wow, what a coincidence." However no one was buying that. Yami had done it on purpose.

He then began pointing to students, sending them over to one team or another. Team blue consisted of Suijin, Hayato, Lucius, Emma, Izumi, Jayden, and Kayden. Team red consisted of Akira, Raiden, Alice, Touka, Rebecca, Yuka, and Luke. Once the two teams had been created, Yami explained the rules of the exercise.

"Basically, the captain of the team must deliver the flag to the very bottom of the warehouse, where I'll be waiting. Any tactics can be used to speed up your own progress, or slow down the other teams. Combat included." Raiden whistled, and Hayato groaned. "However, the captains are not allowed to engage anyone else but the other captain in combat. They can be attacked by other students who aren't the captain though."

"Ahh, so essentially the captains have the restriction of not being able to defend themselves. Interesting." Rebecca stated, as she twirled her hair.

"That just means they're going to need a pretty competent guard." Alice said.

"Final rule is that only the captains may enter the bottom floor."

Yami laid down the final rule.

"So if both teams are evenly matched, it'll come down to either a race, or a one on one showdown between the two captains." Kayden said. However, one look at the two captains who were staring daggers at each other told the students that a race was completely out of the question. This would be settled mano a mano.

"This exercise is interesting, but what does it have to do with what you were talking about in class?" Alice asked this question. Unlike the others, she wasn't so invested in the explanation of the rules, and the prospect of battle, that she forgot their original purpose for coming down here. "You would give us a whole lesson about how the lack of magic can affect decision making and battles more than we could anticipate, just to not use it in the lesson."

Yami smiled, impressed as always by Alice's insightfulness and memory. "Well that's where the final part of this whole exercise comes in. Planted on every floor of the place, are a steadily increasing amount of mana sealing prisms. Therefore, the deeper you go into the warehouse, the more and more your magic power gets restricted. Until...." Yami held up a hand over his eye, forming an oval. "It hits zero."