Marilyn Althorn and Cecilia Lenore were now in a stand-off against the assassin that had been hunting them since their entry to this academy, Selena Blackthorn.

But even so, Cecilia opted to speak up first, “Why are you hunting us? Who sent you?” Her tone was serious, she's not taking any chances, she wanted answers.

Selena did not need any sort of dialogue with her targets, but she would respond by saying, “None of your business, apes.”

And in the next instant, she disappeared and reappeared behind them, sending a slash at both of their heads, trying to kill the two of them at once.

“-!?”

Cecilia turned around just in time, deflecting the strike with a parry of her sword. Marilyn was caught by surprise, almost dying, but because of her she did not die.

Marilyn backed away temporarily from the fight, as the assassin and the princess briefly duelled it out with their blades. Their battle seemed more even now, despite the advantage still being on Selena.

“This might be Spirit Cultivation in the works. I guess I would have to ask her later about this..."

As that was happening, more and more did Cecilia find it actually easier to fight against the assassin, her skill with the blade amplified as well as her mind, senses, and technique increasingly being honed mid-battle.

The two of them danced with their blades clashing, oftentimes switching to each other's prior positions in the battle, but never losing contact with each other. Winding and binding, slashes and parries, thrusts and feints. They were in such perfect competitive coordination to the point that Marilyn found it too hard to intervene with a spell to help Cecilia.

The showcase of their lethal synergy against each other had also mesmerised her. But even so, the difficulty was there, for—

“Agh-!”

A kick from the assassin sent her backwards, and in turn Marilyn quickly responded to save Cecilia.

“Vis Propulsiva!”

Sending a pushing gravitational force against Selena. But it was not successful, for with a swing of her sword she cut that intangible force, dispelling the effects of the spell and continuing her advance, now targeting Marilyn.

Cecilia managed to recover and sent forth a ranged attack, a blast of flames from her sword against the assassin. It forced the elf to refocus on her, slashing the fire.

They're back in their prior posts again like in the beginning of their second round, but this time there was no stand-off. Selena immediately went after them again.

“Hrgh-!”

Marilyn would then opt to try and tag the assassin as best as she could, throwing spells in the form of any dizzying effects against her advance. From light blasts, gusts of wind, to even sound itself coming from the girl's staff.

But Selena was not having it, she dodged all of them, even slashing some of them to oblivion.

Cecilia tries to help Marilyn in trying to stave her off, unleashing torrents of flame against the elven assailant, but the results were minimal, Selena was pushed back but kept advancing relentlessly.

Despite their coordinated efforts, of flames and other magics, it was proved to be in vain. The assassin managed to close the distance in but a brief moment, leaping into the air, about to cut space itself to unleash an invisible and unavoidable attack—

“-!!”

But she would find that her arm was caught by a whip’s lash, pulled back and slammed into the ground, immediately after her leap. Only the two out of three of them knew who this was.

“Adrian!” Both Cecilia and Marilyn shouted out at the same time.

The person they spoke of, black hair and blue eyes as well as a gentle face, had arrived at the scene. Coiling his whip up again before unsheathing his sword, he would shout out.

“Elysia, now!”

And the second person would appear, leaping with great speed against the about-to-recover assassin, forcing the latter to combat the former.

The elf tried to slash at the dragon girl, only to find herself being parried by her claws and then counterattacked with her own attack. It drew a slight amount of blood.

“Tsk-! You beast!”

“Thanks for the compliment, elf lady!”

Marilyn tried to analyse the situation at hand while Cecilia was still reeling from the surprise. For Elysia to draw blood, could it be…?

Inquiry detected. Answering…

Confirmed. Elysia's Strength level is nearly on par with the assassin's Willpower, level 28 against level 30. Near parity.

“No way…” She wouldn't consider it fate, but she felt that they're all really lucky to actually get someone that strong immediately on their side.

But as the duel between the elf and the dragon-kin continued, Adrian ran over to them, the princess and the mage in training, using the wall as a platform to kick off from in order to avoid the fight.

“You know her?”

“No, but she's the same one that tried to kill both of us during the entrance exam.” Cecilia explained to him.

Adrian however, despite being scared, only smiled. “Right, that means we'll have to pay that act back by punishing her.”

“What's the plan?” Marilyn asked him.

“Not sure, but it would seem that she's too strong to be defeated outright. Even with Elysia and her warning me that there was a threat here before arriving, chances are slim.” He said, replying to her.

Elysia seemed to have a much better time against the assassin. Despite the disadvantage of overall levels, their near perfect parity of Strength versus Willpower was enough to put them on near-equal terms. Dragon-kin were perhaps that strong naturally, Marilyn would think to herself.

Speaking of race however, she does have an idea. “Do we know the weaknesses of an elf?”

“Huh? Are you crazy? They don't have weaknesses!” Cecilia would respond, “Either you have to be stronger or better than them, no in between!”

“No, actually.” Adrian retorted, “Their spiritual bodies allow them to be in perfect shape from the get go with natural affinity for magic and get stronger from there, they're corporeal manifestations of Essence.”

“Meaning…” Marilyn now had realised it. Targeting their Essence is the key here, but, “Rewriting their structure is impossible, isn't it?”

“Unless you're willing to try and understand how they became an elf, that is.” He said, “But Anti-Essence measures should work on them.”

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“Anti-Essence…”

Marilyn would try to remember the lessons as told by her father now, as well as the books she had read. In terms of Anti-Essence, from what she had read and learned there are really only a few options she could execute in this attack plan.

Either she would have to shut down the effects of Essence and render them inert, making any sort of supernatural ability useless barring chosen individuals, or absorbing Essence into one self to the point that the other would be deprived of it.

The most effective would be to go for the second, the same technique that her father used to fight that dragon all those years ago. To deprive things from Essence and render them harmless. It was really not just the weakness of an elf, but ultimately all that possessed a soul.

Her level of control over Essence was relatively small to do such a feat at the level of her father's. But if she could make contact with the elf…

“I should be able to let you guys disarm her.” She would declare, “I don't have much control just yet, but draining her Essence marginally would lower the rest of her strength momentarily, enough to defeat her I hope.”

The path to victory had been forged.

Adrian smiled, “Good then, we’ll create the opening for you.” He would say, before turning to Cecilia, “You're the one to keep the formation together. I’ll support you from behind.”

Cecilia had just been listening to the two of them conversing, but with that realisation in mind… “Don't disappoint.”

Marilyn nodded, and the three of them departed from each other.

————————

Elysia had experienced quite a bit of the entertainment in duelling the elven assassin before her, enough so that she's laughing quite happily. Despite her inherent disadvantage due to being weaker than the elf overall, her senses had allowed her to match her near-perfectly.

“You're fun! We should definitely spar again sometime!” She would yell out.

Selena however was getting increasingly annoyed by her attitude. She had been silent this whole time, but Elysia's constant mockery of her increased her frustrations even further. She's now grunting more and more in anger.

And the lashing whip she sensed would not help at all. Turning around, Selena dodged the strike handily, only to be met with the princess' blade to which she parried and backed away from.

She was now in a 3v1. Their combined strength would not exactly threaten her if she can focus on one of them at a time, but the battle would be more exhausting as a result.

Her position was near the edge of the hallway, she was cornered. Although, that much was not a danger to her.

“Tch-!”

But before she could do anything, Adrian went in and swung his whip towards her neck, forcing her to refocus her efforts on the defence. She managed to dodge the whip—

“Argh-!”

Only for Elysia to deliver a hefty punch against her to the back of her head, and afterwards for Cecilia to send a flaming crescent blade at her to knock her back.

Selena was forced to fall back by jumping over them to the other side and gaining distance from them momentarily, to analyse the situation as the trio stood before her.

The mage was nowhere to be seen in the attack group, in fact she was gone. She couldn't see exactly what their plan to win is here specifically, but the danger was now clearer to her.

The battle plan of the trio was simple enough, but the dynamics of it was the thing that made it hard to go through.

As of now, Elysia remained at the front fighting Selena directly, charging against the elf with her claws against the assassin's blade, for she had remained to be the most powerful in this group in raw potency.

Cecilia would remain in the middle, guarding the cohesiveness of the group by acting as the one to stave her off, unleashing flames against Selena whenever she tries to break the trio’s formation.

Adrian would be the one to be in the back, with his whip making sure to keep the elf on her toes by constantly lashing the cord of the weapon against her position. In no way could she defend against a martial weapon that would make her prone to an opening for another attack, hence his circumstance in opening opportunities.

Forcing her into being the defender was the key, and all of this is possible because the only man here understood their skill sets.

Again and again the group would pressure her on, with simultaneous attacks that would then lead up to another series of them. In the initial assaults she could defend against them handily, but the more the fight went on the better coordinated they were to exploit the chances of attack.

If this were to continue, Selena would have no options but to either retreat or somehow discover a kink in their defences.

“-?!”

She was used to defending against the three of them, to the point she lost focus in tracking down the fourth one. For in the corner of her eye, a girl would flank and tackle her in flight.

She was pushed into the wall, and the mage girl had forced her hand onto her forehead.

“Hrraaaggh-!!” The elf screamed, for her strength was being drained away from her.

Marilyn’s hand glowed due to the absorbing of Essence. But she had yet to fully master the technique, so it was only a few seconds until she was forced to take the hand away from the elf.

Nonetheless, it was enough to leave the assassin dazed and weakened, cornered into a wall. No need for Eyes of Heaven to notify her with that.

As Marilyn would release the absorbed energy into the environment in the form of dissipating light from her palm, a whip would strike at the assassin's blade and take it away from her as she was vulnerable. Adrian would get a hold of it afterwards.

Elysia however, would take responsibility in going behind the elf and pinning her down. “Gotcha! Now you're going to prison!”

Her comment was in fact the signal that ended the fight, causing the others to breathe a sigh of relief.

“It's pretty clear she is a blade dancer judging by how she fought with that kind of technique.” He said, “So the disarm would be the end of her, then.”

“No worries about some kind of elven martial art…?” Marilyn would ask.

“Nope, they do have it but I doubt she can do it, Elysia's pinning her down.” He answered, “You absorbed her Essence and dispersed it into the environment, so her strength would be weaker now, little chance on that idea right now at least.”

They won't have much time though, for she will regain her strength. That was pretty much confirmed by Marilyn, who had yet to master the technique enough in order to not be forced to return the absorbed Essence into the environment, in which an elf like Selena could absorb back.

Cecilia however had yet to unsheathe her sword, as she would then present her blade against the elf’s pinned neck. “Explain yourself. You almost killed the princess of the royal family multiple times, villain.”

“I have no intentions to tell you, human.” She said, her voice slightly muffled by her cheeks planted against the floor.

“I shall assume it's a political enemy of Queen Marigold Lenore?”

She groaned, “Answer it yourself.”

Cecilia blinked and sighed heavily, sheathing her sword. “I’ll have my mother be notified then.”

The four of them would briefly just rest there standing, keeping the elf contained, prepared for if she tried to break out. But, it won't be long until—

“Hm, you guys definitely have my gratitude for catching her like this.” A female voice, from behind Marilyn, who turned around to see her.

“Professor Hilde?” She said, curious. It would make sense though that she's the one that had been trying to track the assassin down.

Hilde nodded, approaching the elf closer, who was now forced to stand up by Elysia. “You're quite the slippery one, evading my capture time and time again.”

Selena just glared at her, so Hilde continued, “Alright then, off to interrogation you go.”

The professor would use two of her fingers to touch the assassin's forehead, and a word would be spoken out by her, “Svefn.”

And almost instantly the elf would be subsequently put to sleep, her body falling limp to the woman’s shoulders. Surprisingly Hilde was carrying her quite easily too, for she had her lifted into her shoulder with just one arm.

“Once again, I thank you for the assistance. Apologies for not intervening sooner.” She said to them.

“It's alright, Professor Hilde. Without you we really don't know what to do with her either, another fight might break out because of it.” Marilyn replied.

Hilde chuckled, “I see.” She then looked at the rest of the group that was here, “Well, there's really nothing that could be done by you now that I wouldn't be able to handle myself here, so I implore you all to return to your dorms. Farewell.”

After Hilde said those parting words, she immediately disappeared into a cloud of dissipating black feathers. It seems teleportation magic had occurred.

Marilyn looked at the group shortly after, “Actually, now I’m wondering, where's Vincent?”

“Currently speaking to the headmaster, with your sister too as your representative. He's getting the karma he deserves.” Adrian responded, crossing his arms. But Marilyn stood quiet. “...no way, you wanted to speak to him? After all that he said?” He said again.

Marilyn shook her head, “I want to slap him for the words he said to me. Sounds like a good response to calling me weak now wouldn't it?”

Adrian blinked, Cecilia laughed, and Elysia would exclaim with a smile in return.

“I’ll be right there with you, Lyn-lyn!”