Just as my fist was about to smash the smug grin from his face a buzzing sound pulled my body back.

I burst into a sitting position, groaning, as my muscles screamed at me a second later. A buzzing sound was playing from somewhere, and it and really getting on my nerves. I looked around and found a clock vibrating on my bed stand. I grabbed the clock and fiddled around with it for a second before giving up and throwing it at the wall as hard as I could. It continued to make an annoyingly high-pitched sound. My eye twitched and I cursed Ruther with the vilest word I could come up with.

Ruther hadn’t been there when I woke up, so I made my way to my class myself. It took some asking for directions, but I actually made it into the classroom. As I entered the class, I saw Hisoph standing off to the side talking to some people. I averted my eyes and tried to rush to my seat. My effort was all for naught as he caught my eye. To my surprise, he looked panicked and instantly averted his eyes and turned his back. That was weird, I would have thought he would want revenge.

Not counting on my good fortunes, I rushed to find a seat near the back. I felt uncomfortable in the class, everyone was wearing fine clothes and expensive jewellery. I could feel stares and snickers behind my back, even if none of them said anything to me. I found a seat with a sigh.

A body plopped on the seat next to me. Looking over I found Ash with a grin that lifted some of my disgruntled emotions. My lips slightly lifted up at the edges. Just as she opened her mouth a voice spoke up over her.

“Well, well, well, what do we have here.” A trio of girls with clothing as fine as any in the room approached the two of us. Ash shrank back as they came closer. “Looks like the gold digger has made a new friend. A peasant no less, are you really that desperate?” She sneered at Ash and me. Ash looked down while I just sat there uncomfortable.

The main woman turned to one of her girls and spoke so that the entire class could hear her. “You know that she only got accepted to the academy because her mum fucked the headmaster.” Ash just gritted her teeth at the statement but said nothing. She was obviously upset with what the girl was saying but I couldn’t understand why. People had said way worse things to me while I was on the streets. I couldn’t care less, at long as they didn’t try to stab me, I didn’t care. Though I vaguely remembered that right after my parents died, and I was on the streets I got really offended when someone mentioned them. It was hard for me to remember anything about that time. It was all a haze of hunger and grief.

One of the girls giggled and turned to me. “And how did a peasant make get accepted? You obviously have no money” She smirked and the other two giggled. “Did you also fuck the headmaster to get in?” I just stared at her and shrugged my shoulders. The comment about my wealth made me slightly uncomfortable but her asking if I fucked the headmaster just washed over me. I was more concerned for her, that dude was scary.

Another voice called out from behind the girls, they all jumped and turned. “I see we have the bullies that our protagonist must overcome! You guys should also be careful about who you make comments about. The Burning Wisper used to have a temper when he was young. He once burned half city because they pissed him off.” One of the girls was about to speak before she processed who was talking. Her jaw audibly clicked as she closed it. Daisy just gave a toothy smile before teleporting onto the stage, letting the girls find a seat.

The classroom was about three-quarters full, with a large stage at the front, which Daisy was currently occupying. “You have all joined this class to learn how to fight, let me give you a tip, don’t. Fighting is for people who are out of options, if you can avoid it, then don’t fight. But if you have to fight, don’t fight fair. Stab them in the back, kick em’ in their balls, put your fingers in their eyes. If I see any of you fight fair, I will show how it feels to fight dirty.” Whispering filled the room until one person spoke up.

“What about my honour? I will not steep low enough to stab someone while their back is turned!” I winced and I could see a few of my classmates follow suite. To my surprise, Daisy just shrugged and didn’t smite him for his insolence.

“If you don’t backstop him, he’ll backstab you. Honour is for the dead. I swear there are one of you every class” Daisy muttered. “Enough talk let’s get to seeing how good you are at combat.” With that pronouncement three people teleported onto the stage, falling on their asses from a sitting position.

“You three, attack me as best you can. I promise no one will die or get permanently mutilated.” The three looked at each other questioningly, but Daisy just ignored them, going off stage, dragging a stand with every weapon I had ever heard of and many I did not.

“Pick a weapon and fight”.

Once the three of them grabbed their weapons and huddled together nervously, Daisy attacked without announcement. A fireball came flying at the three, and they all yelped before jumping out the way. One of the students fired a bolt of lightning at Daisy, who casually backhanded the fast-moving lightning into another student, who spasmed for a second, looking a little singed.

The student who shot the lighting winced for a second, looking a little stunned. Daisy didn’t give her a reprieve as she came winging with a sword swipe, which was magically stopped mid-air when it was half a metre from the female student.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

Fireballs, lightning strikes, ice bolts and swings of maces, swords and knives swirled around the arena. Anytime a magic attack was about to reach the audience it was stopped.

The fight continued on, with Daisy blocking or dodging every attack and the students slowly getting more and more exhausted and hurt.

The first student to be taken out was brought unconsciously when his flying screaming body fell onto the floor a dozen metres away. Another student was taken out when Daisy pulled his pants down and he franticly tried pulling them back up. Earning him a bolt of lightning that stunned him long enough for vines coming from the floor to hold him.

That left the one woman who was just staring at Daisy. She took a step back, but her foot slipped on some ice that appeared under her. Daisy came in and cut the straps of her dress. When the girl came to her feet, her dress fell from her shoulders, showing her undergarments to the entire class. She let out a shrill scream trying to pull the dress back up and at the same time trying to run away from the stage with a furiously blushing face.

I stared at her in a totally not creepy way, I was just examining her form, yes, her from, checking for any weak point, or something. I swear I saw Daisy give me a wink as the last student ran off the stage, blushing so red it made a tomato look green.

“Who’s next?” Daisy asked, smiling.

What transpired was a beatdown of legendary proportions. Daisy created a copy of herself so that 6 people could fight at once. She defeated every team without taking any damage, all the while disabling the students in extremely embarrassing ways. I swear one student was moaning at one point, but it didn’t look like she was in pain. When her fight ended, she had a wet spot between her legs. One student even tried to escape before his fight, but he came back 10 seconds later, completely naked.

Then it was my turn. My team was the last to fight. When I appeared on the stage, Ash and Hisoph stood beside me. My eyes instantly fell on Hisoph, but he looked more panicked than me. He turned his head around franticly. “Can I please fight on another team?” Hisoph asked.

Daisy completely ignored him and stared at me. “You should probably stretch; I know you have sore muscles from last night. All that sweaty exercise.” Daisy almost purred and gave me a wink. Ash stared between me and Daisy with raised eyebrows. I groaned. I tried to say something in my defence, but I gave up before I even started, too flustered. I did follow Daisy advice, my muscles hurt.

She turned back to Hisoph. “No, you can’t change teams, there are none left. Grab a weapon and get ready. Don’t think about escaping, your reputation is already bad enough, we wouldn’t want you to be seen running through the streets naked, would we?” Hisoph gave me a furtive glance before going to the rack and grabbing a sword, Ash followed him, grabbing a mace.

When we were all ready Daisy fired the first fireball. I had chosen a dagger to fight with, I would probably just injure myself with anything else, and I didn’t know how to use a wand. As the fireball approached a magical shield martialized absorbed it.

Ash took the few seconds the bolt took to reach us to run full sprint at Ruther, she was surprisingly fast reaching Daisy quickly and swinging one of her axes that were much too large to be held with one hand.

Daisy simply ducked the blow and cuffed the back of her hair, she returned with a backhand swing. Hisoph and I fired magical projectiles when an opening appeared as Ash fought close range. She was surprisingly good at fighting with her dual axes, but she was no match for Daisy, even with support fire.

A feather magically appeared in Daisy's hand and she deflected the fast-moving axes with it and started tickling Ash. The fight continued with Ash’s graceful, powerful swings being blocked by a feather while a rain of projectiles rained down.

My reservoirs were depleting quickly, while the spells in of themselves were not very depleting, casting as many as I had was quickly depleting my reserves. My mana channels were also starting to feel the pain, it took longer to cast each spell. I could Hisoph also struggling, but he looked like he had a lot more in him than I did.

Just as I worried I would need to put my dagger to use, Daisy finally changed the stalemate. Ash’s swings were getting less smooth and looking more rushed, yet at the same time slower as she was getting tortured by a feather. When she let out a growl Daisy acted.

A dagger magical replaced her feather, and she gave one long cut to Ash’s shirt making it fall to the floor. Revealing a strap covering her chest - which she also cut – revealing modest breasts. Daisy did the same to her shorts revealing her underwear and milky thighs. The sight completely froze me, I was so stunned I couldn’t react in time when Daisy grabbed Ash and threw her right at me. ‘

I didn’t even notice the body coming at me until Ash crashed into me. Causing us to tumble onto the floor. When we came out of our role, I was on top of her. Our heads were inches apart. My hand instinctively clenched and I felt something squishy, soft and warm under it. It took me a second to process, but when I did, my body completely shut down, my mind stuttering through quicksand.

Our faces were so close I could smell her panting breath. I was slightly ashamed that my first thought was to squeeze my hand again. My indecision was completely paralysing me, and I just laid on her.

She slowly regained her wits and stared at my face puzzled. Before I knew what was happening, a hand grabbed my collar and threw me off the stage.

I landed in the stands and when I looked back at the fight, Ash was getting put in a dress and Hisoph clothes had changed to that of a particularly poor commoner. The fight didn’t last much longer after that.

My mind played back the fight and I started to grow red. When Ash joined me back on the stands, I couldn’t look her in her eyes. She was sitting in an expensive green dress with her arms crossed, averting her eyes. I would be cursing Ruther if I wasn’t stuck in my own head. Scratch that, fuck you Ruther.

The class was deathly quiet with an almost palpable sense of embarrassment. Everyone was present and uninjured, even the ones that used to be unconscious.

After giving the class a second to process what just happened, Daisy spoke. “You must all learn to remove everything you find embarrassing if you wish to be a proper fighter. You must no have any qualms about fighting naked, or with a naked partner. You must be able to wear any costume, have no embarrassment, do not give in to your fear.” With those parting words of wisdom, Daisy left the arena, leaving a classroom that couldn’t meet any of their classmate’s eyes.

The room emptied in a trickle, with everyone’s heads down. No one commenting on the occasional revealing outfit, or nude person.

The silence followed me to the cafeteria as I sat in a corner, by myself this time. Cringing so hard I physically felt it.