Inside the attic of Nunac’s base of operations, the mastermind was covering his ears. Any moment now, guts would start flying and screeches of horror would assault his senses.

Nunac had no problem with guts or with bodies. Dissections were part of the trade, but the noise… ‘The damn noise… Only Butcher can tolerate it.’

A floor below his feet, the zombies were approaching the loudest of his three victims, perhaps to rip their masters' suffering short. Some of the corpses were charred from top to bottom, while others had gaping holes in their chests. One was missing a head, and another was dragging its entrails as it moved.

With a mix of panic and disgust, Reina ran backwards, but she was going nowhere. From the outside, it looked like she was doing some kind of dance.

When the zombies were six feet away, one of them reached out to grab her. The arm stretched out through the twisted space and appeared right in front of the little girl’s face.

Immediately, she let out a sharp scream the likes of which even a banshee would applaud. Nunac muttered “Sorry,” from upstairs, and Finn threw one of his knives towards the corpse.

“No need,” Annie smiled.

Reina’s earrings suddenly burst into light and a wave of mud covered her body. It spun round and round like a tornado with her at the center, smashing the zombie’s arm apart. Then, it settled on her like a suit of armor, forming a golem even taller than Finn.

“Stay away! Stay away! Stay away!” The golem yelled while flailing its oversized arms. When one of them accidentally swatted a zombie, the girl shrieked, and the golem fell on its bum. The zombie, on the other hand, flew straight into a beam and splashed upon contact.

“Anniee, help mee! I don’t want to open my eeyes.”

“It's fine.” Annie walked forward. “You know I'm strong.”

After extensive research into the nature of the array, Annie now needed three steps to cover the distance of one. Still, a three to one ratio was plenty.

She extended her arm and summoned a wall of flames in front of Reina and Finn. She then pushed the wall forward while adapting it to the room. The flames moved almost in slow motion, but they eventually hit every last zombie and set them ablaze.

"Iiiieeaaaaa!!!"

“God-freaking-damnit! Kill her already!”

Nunac’s order did little to revitalize his troops. While covering Reina's mouth, Annie sent flying spheres of stone to smash them to bits.

However, a moment too late, she realized some of these bodies were Finn’s colleagues. As she turned towards him, her mouth fell agape.

The boy was looking at the shattered corpses with a face devoid of expression. His eyes were cold and he barely held onto his knives.

He slowly made his way towards a dismembered head and kneeled in front of it. He then closed the teen’s eyes and watched him in silence.

“Finn?”

“The room below was like pouring rain. This one’s like walking at the bottom of a lake.”

“Are you ok?”

“Oh…” Finn lifted his head. “This one’s name is Legolas. He was a total prick, but he didn’t have to die this way.”

“I’m sorry.”

If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

“Don’t be.” The boy stood up and walked towards the ladder at the end of the room. “You’re not the one who did this.”

While Annie followed, Reina asked “Can I open my eyes?”

“Yes!” the two answered in unison. “Let’s go up.”

Reina and Nunac opened their eyes at the same time. To the mage’s utter shock, the teens were walking through another one of his arrays like it was some kind of a playground.

“This doesn’t make any sense. I can believe one of you has an array canceling crystal, but all three? Who sent you? Does the academy know? Have they been tipped off? Speak, damnit!”

Instead of answering, Finn climbed into his attic. As soon as their eyes met, he threw a knife towards the mage’s forehead.

Nunac crushed the knife with a spatial distortion but remained in his seat. He was at the other end of the attic, so there was nowhere to go anyways.

The structure’s ceiling was low, and the walls were claustrophobic. Nunac was sitting on a tiny chair while the teens had to crouch.

Below his feet, there was a circle of light, an array of sorts that was sucking the chair and his legs as if it were a puddle. The more Nunac fell inside it, the brighter the circle became, covering him and the entire room in light.

“Tic toc, I’d say you have five more minutes to catch me.”

Nunac leaned back in his chair while Finn stared him down and Annie observed the magical circle. After giving each other a look, they walked forward, and just four steps in, both of them froze on the spot.

“Fascinating,” Nunac muttered. “You two are way too overconfident.”

He extended his palm and zapped the two with five bolts of electricity. Finn and Annie’s bodies convulsed uncontrollably while Reina shouted at him to stop.

Inside a frozen world...

‘...What. Is happening? How long. Has it been?’

Finn tried to blink and it took an eternity.

‘Where. Am I?’

He could only distinguish blurry light. Noise came in beeps and boops, like distinct radio waves splashing one by one into his eardrums.

‘Mana. Won’t move… Wait... I Can. Feel... Mana.’

Although he didn’t realize it, his body was moving quite a lot, spasming uncontrollably as he collapsed to the ground. Suddenly, a ball of mud fell on top of him and Annie, hardening right away and protecting them from the lightning.

While resting his head on his palm, Nunac gave Reina a look that could best be described by the word "Really? I’d say it was a smart move, except… If you were smart, you insufferable banshee, you’d have left already.”

Nunac shot lightning towards her, but Reina's golem activated just in time. He sent tiny spatial distortions next, and the golem swung its arm. The mud got caught inside the time-warp and half the golem’s palm got dislodged from the rest. As the distortions approached, Reina let out an ear splitting scream and pushed herself out of the golem’s ribs.

“Would you please shut the hell up!? Goddamn it, it’s like Butcher’s victims came to haunt ME of all people. So what if I gave him a silencing array? You think you’re better than me just cause your hands are clean? Not everyone can afford magical jewelry, honey. However, I can take it.”

Nunac opened his palm wide and electricity zapped between the rings around his fingers. In the middle of the strings, a spatial distortion formed, sucking them all in like a starving beast. The distortion twisted and turned, compressing its mana until it released lightning of such magnitude it charred the walls and ceiling and threatened to break the entire building apart.

“This house is reinforced with magic,” said Nunac. “Are you?”

He flicked his wrist and the ball of destruction went flying towards Reina. In a hurry, the girl raised mud walls to protect her. She summoned several three feet tall golems which flung themselves into the frozen space along the distorted lightning's trajectory. As a last resort, Reina curled into a ball, closed her eyes, covered her ears, and cried “Mommy... Help!”

The sound of thunder made her shake like a leaf. The roaring impact of the distortion smashing and swallowing her golems shook her to her very core.

Then, she heard a slap. Nunac had smacked the armrests of his seat as he finally got up from his chair.

“Impossible! That’s a grade one magic shield, it can’t block that attack.”

“Oh, so shields have grades. What does a grade two look like? Can you show me?”

Upon hearing the female voice, Reina dared to look up. Resting her arm on one of the suspended golems, Annie was healing from her wounds while casually chatting with the enemy.

“To be honest, I liked your other arrays better. This one is dangerous for sure, but the way out is so simple, so basic.”

She then turned towards Finn who was a charred mess and changed her tone. "I didn't think it would take me this long to figure it out though."

"How did you stop my distorted lightning?"

"You don't get to ask questions." Annie showed him her orange crystal before tossing it in Reina's palms. "You've hurt my friend, so I will hurt you."