The first sign for Boscha that something was up was the lack of anyone on her field as she came up for practice. If Skalara had convinced them to take the day off again… No. Normally at least one or two of them were too scared of what she’d do to them to run off and that’s how she found out to go say ‘hi’ to her ‘friend’. Besides, she wouldn’t have been able to make the court itself feel off. Literally. She even axe kicked where the singularity trap was supposed to be and nothing happened. Only her, Coach, and Principal Bump were able to activate and deactivate the hazards. Maybe Coach hadn’t told her that they were taking the day off?

“Hello. Your name is Boscha, right?”

Boscha turned around to see some weird demon with a hand on her head looking up at her. The little thing stood up to her hips, at most, and the bully snorted at the sight of the serious little gremlin. “Yeah, Stubs.”

The demon took in a long, slow breath in before saying, “My name is Kikimora, loyal right hand to Emperor Belos himself. I ask that you please show proper respect to me.”

Oh. Shit. “Uh, sorry. Didn’t recognize you. Would have thought you were-”

“Taller? Yes, I get that a lot. I would rather not waste time with such worthless matters. Instead,” she said as she pulled out a folder from seemingly nowhere, “I wished to talk to you about a proposition that Emperor Belos himself has decided to make for you.”

Boscha’s eyes widened at the idea before she tried to discreetly pull out her scroll phone so she’d be ready to take a picture of how awesome she was by getting to hang with this weird demon. She tried to play it cool though as she said, “I guess I’ve got some time before the rest of my team shows up.”

“Yes, indeed.”

======+++++======

Steve slammed the door to the storage shed that he’d led the rest of the team to for ‘Coach’s birthday party’ while his heart hammered in his ears. He hated doing stuff like this. Couldn’t they have just told them that they wanted some time to speak with Boscha about her future? Then again, Kiki’s plan for if Boscha said no would be… problematic then. He groaned at the idea but it’s not like he could do too much about it.

“Steve?”

The poor guardsman jumped at his name before looking to who it was who spoke. That brought him face to face with Luz. Oh no. “Uh, um.” Play it cool Steve! The guard dropped his voice to be much lower than normal and straightened himself up. “I have no idea how you know of my name-”

“Amity said she overheard it last time Kiki bothered her. Though she wouldn’t tell me anything past you two showing up.”

Oh. Steve looked into Luz’s eyes. The eyes of youth. Innocence. Of purity. Of a fellow Azura lover. It was too much for his swollen heart. “Um, Miss Noceda, what are your thoughts on Boscha?”

Luz blinked a few times before groaning. “Please tell me you two aren’t about to try and make me and her a thing. We tolerate each other, at best, because it makes Amity happy. Though I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t sometimes worried about what would happen if me or Amity told her to go…”

The glance away by Luz was the last straw for Steve. “Okay, then I need to warn you about something.”

======+++++======

“Anyways,” Kiki said as she looked to the folder, “with how big Grudgby is in his land, Lord Belos has been considering the idea of forming a team to represent him. However, the Emperor’s Coven and guards aren’t made up of the best people for such rough work, not without someone to whip them into shape. So he looked into someone who could scare them into proper shape as well as being good at the game herself.”

Boscha grinned as she looked to the side. Captain of the Emperor’s Titans sounded pretty good. Though he’d probably want something less blasphemous. “Wow. Sounds great. Couldn’t ever think of who you might be talking about. Little ol’ me isn’t that ruthless after all.”

Kiki nodded lightly. Unlike with Luz and Amity, she expected some snark from the triclops. Even preferred it at the moment as it meant she was enjoying herself. Considering it properly. “But of course. With your impressive, almost spotless winning streak, we thought you may be perfect. Of course, with your age, we would want to see about getting you ready to get our team into shape when you’re older but until then we would see to it that you receive the best training possible in the land, have the freedom to learn strategies unique to your style, and have the resources to do what you saw as required in order to be ready for the job.”

Boscha took in a slightly more tense breath. That was… a lot. Almost as much as when Amity offered her house to her. Heck, she’d theoretically jump over the Blight family in the social hierarchy if she were known to be being groomed by Belos himself for something. Would he pay for her to have a place of her own? She wouldn’t be with Amity as often then but that might not be the absolute worse.

She groaned as she pressed a few fingers into her forehead. “That’s a hell of a deal. What’s the catch?”

Kiki shook her head. “No catch. We even have a place in the castle already for you to live in and are working on collecting the proper tutors for you to be taught by.”

Wow. A place in Belos’- “Wait. What do you mean by a place in the castle?”

Kiki made sure not to show her slight touch of concern. This was the part that Belos and her knew was likely to break the back of this plan. Of course, this girl was wiser than Luz and had ambition. To turn this down for something as petty as a friend would be a mistake anyone would regret making. “Belos would want you close to be able to make sure you are being treated as you deserve and have an environment free of distractions.”

Boscha crossed her arms before she began tapping her foot against the concrete beneath her. “His castle is pretty far away from most neighborhoods. It’d be a little hard for me to make friends, or keep my current ones.”

Kikimora bowed slightly at the criticism. “Yes, we recognize that problem and believe there is a simple solution. After all, while our ranks have many who may make good members of a Grudgby team, we would be all too happy to have input from you on what children around your age you think would make good teammates and bring them into the castle to be trained with you. They could be your friends or, perhaps, even the family you have lacked, with Belos and I as surrogate parents.”

Boscha thought back to her days playing Grudgby beside Amity. Sure, her parents got her to be captain instead of Boscha and Amity had mostly disregarded her advice back then, but that was back then. Now she wouldn’t just be a good teammate but the first one who might be able to have meaningful input on matters. Of course, she had to believe that Amity would seek a professional Grudgby career but with how desperate Belos sounded like he was for her, she might be able to get Amity a loophole that let her leave when the game would get in the way of her dreams. “Like Amity Blight?”

Kiki tapped her nails together as she prepared herself. It was time to hit the main point of this plan now. “Unfortunately, we would have to decline such a request. Miss Blight shows too great an aptitude in other fields for us to simply ignore what she could do for the Isles if she stayed on the paths she’s on.”

Boscha shrugged at getting turned down. She thought it might be a long shot. Fortunately, it left her a pretty easy out too. “Well, I agree. In fact, she’s so good that I think I’m better off continuing to train beside her. When she becomes head of the Emperor’s Coven though, I’d be happy to come lead your team. It’s not like I’m going to get worse after all.” It also meant that she would be able to possibly see Amity more than others because they could get drinks after work. At least whenever covenwork kept Amity at the castle.

Kiki nodded in response but she wasn’t about to give up so easily. “I wish to make it clear that this is your best chance to get this position. Your potential and the time we have to help you meet it is part of why we are poaching you now. It’s similar in fact to why we had Lilith watching your friend. If not for her betrayal, we may have offered a similar place in the castle but right now we’re still working on her replacement.”

Boscha raised an eyebrow at that. “Then why not have Amity join me now? Lets her get used to being at the castle before she has to be under that sort of pressure.”

Finally, Kiki’s eyes narrowed. “Belos believes that her place is better here. Away from you. He wishes to offer you everything you could want in order to see to that. I suggest you take the offer.”

Boscha narrowed her eyes before shifting her stance to something more relaxed and tilted her head to the side. She pulled her hands up and made a frame around Kiki. After a few hums, Kiki finally asked, “What are you doing?”

“Oh, just considering how hard it would be to punt you into a Grudgby goal.”

Well, she tried. “So no is your final answer? We are willing to hear other requests if you have them to make this work.”

Boscha growled before leaning forward and grabbing the collar of Kikimora’s uniform and lifting her up. “If your deal means leaving Amity’s side then not even promising a meeting with Titan himself would make me budge. Now, ask again and I’ll make sure Belos gets to know how you’d look in a purple filter.”

Kikimora breathed in slowly. Well, at least she was going to get to do what she’d been wanting to for a while to one of these idiots. “I’m sorry to hear that. Don’t worry,” she said as she made a small circle in the air, “we’ll make sure that by the time Amity or Luz may think you’re dead, our magics will have made them entirely forget about you.”

Boscha grinned as she felt her field hum with power. “Oh yeah? You and what army?”

“This one.”

Snap!

Boscha looked back as suddenly the sound of stone cracking and opening up filled the air. From the field, the bleachers, the forest in the distance, the trash, just about anywhere possible, Emperor’s guards sprang up like daisies. So many in fact, that they tripped over each other on the field as they tried to find their footing. There was one that was all by himself though, right behind Boscha. He dwarfed her by being three times her height and held an executioner’s axe that was as long as two of the tall girl.

Boscha blinked a few times before looking back at Kikimora. “Alright, let me make toast out of you before I deal with these idiots.”

Kikimora raised an eyebrow before saying, “I’m afraid you may have difficulties with-” She stopped to reach up and smack the underside of Boscha’s wrist. “That.”

Boscha opened her hand to catch one of her fireballs as she summoned it before she felt her heart skip a beat. Something… Something was wrong. She dropped Kikimora as she reached up and clutched her chest. Her heart wasn’t beating right. Not wrong enough to kill her but it felt like she was bleeding magic. She then looked at her wrist and spotted the small cross on it.

Kikimora stood up and brushed herself off before saying, “Don’t worry, it’s only temporary. Though, for you, it’ll last long enough that you never cast again.”

Oh, shit. Boscha was sweating as she started trying to calm down enough to get her heart under control, or at least get used to it to some extent, before she realized that she was suddenly under some shade. She turned around and her eyes widened as she stared at the axe that was raised high above her.

“Watch out!”

The large guard looked back just in time to not get a giant log of twisted together vines slammed into his chest. Said vines then slammed directly in front of Boscha and the bully backpedaled as she shouted, “Willow?”

“Kiyah!”

From the smoke created by the plant, a figure emerged as they went directly towards the large guard’s face. They had a foot extended in a leaping kick that was being thrown at the max velocity that the young girl could manage. That the Thorn Vault could manage. It was a guaranteed knockout!

And then Luz’s foot smacked against the large guard’s face… And just barely knocked his head back. For a brief second the human stayed in the air before her arms flailed at her side as she began to drop. Boscha’s eyes were half closed by the time the idiot hit the ground and she came over to the executioner.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

The large guard roared in what was mostly annoyance more than anything before raising his axe again. Boscha wasn’t nearly as stunned though as she was by the loss of her magic. She brought one arm back and her knuckles cracked as she curled her fingers. Her muscles pressed harder against her uniform as she tensed them up and brought her arm up to be at the same height as her shoulder. She then raised one foot, twisted, and swung.

Crack!

The large guard slid back a few inches from the force of the punch, which would have been enough to wound the large man no matter what. However, being three times as tall as Boscha had also exposed himself to being rather… vulnerable to her haymaker. Luz raised her head at the sound before yelping as the guard dropped his axe and it almost got her leg. She then looked at Boscha and asked, “Is that supposed to make a cracking sound?”

Boscha smirked as she rotated her arm to loosen it up. “Only if you do it right.” She then glanced over and stepped on Luz’s chest before using it as a springboard to knee an oncoming guard in the face and shatter their mask. “Now, scram. If you can’t tell, I’m a bit busy right now.”

Luz spent a second catching her breath before getting up. Most of the guards were keeping a weird sort of distance from the two, though after Boscha grabbed one by the collar and head butted him hard enough to send blood streaming down the front of their uniform, she had some sort of guess as to why. Still, “You know, you could thank me for saving your life.”

The triclops growled slightly before reaching over and yanking Luz out of the way of a guard who was trying to sneak up on the idiot. Her feet slid across the concrete before the athlete bent her knees and extended one of her legs. It seemed almost like she sped up though the lower that she got, like she was losing her footing but using that to her advantage, before Boscha’s extended foot caught the guard’s foot and threw it into the air. The bully then calmly stood up, walked over, and crushed the man’s knee under her sneakers. “We’re even now. Now get out of here! Half a Witch would get in the way, let alone someone who’s not even a witch.”

Luz’s hands immediately curled into fists before she threw back a sigil card while stomping towards Boscha. The card landed on a guardsman’s face before glowing hot. The resulting explosion silhouetted Luz as she put her hands on her hips. “You know perfectly well that I can do magic!”

Boscha rolled her eyes before leaning to the side. Her arms then caught the fist coming her way before it reached Luz and a simple twist snapped the guard’s arm like a twig. Luz slapped a sigil on the man’s hand and there was a moment of muffled screaming before vines went from his arm to his face and quickly subsumed him into a green cocoon. “You’re still a human! You might have your dumb cards but what happens when you run out? Now,” Boscha said as she threw Luz hard enough to send her out of the arena, “get the fuck out of here before you get hurt!”

The second Luz was away from her, five guards leaped at the fit girl. She crouched to let the first punch go over her head, stepped back to avoid a hand the tried to grab her arm, used the momentum from that to elbow a guy in the ribs and crack three of them, before a fourth finally got her by her other arm and yanked her back so she lost balance and hit the ground. She looked up as the our guards who were still standing loomed over her.

Just before a sheet of ice was all she could see. A large flash of light followed up that could be seen clear across campus from how large it was, before finally Luz was back in view. “Oh yeah, and where’s your magic, Little Miss Perfect?”

Boscha scowled at Luz before slamming a fist into the ice wall, breaking off a good sized chunk, and then throwing it at a guard where the sound of his shoulder turning into paste made Luz flinch. “That bitch over there sealed it! I still-” Boscha’s hand had reflexively gone to cast at the thought of what she should be doing and her heart started beating in triple time immediately.

Luz rushed over and placed a hand on the other girl’s chest before whispering, “Whoa, Boscha, you need to lie down. Leave this to me while you go get Amity or something.”

Boscha glared at the human before wrapping her up in her arms. She then spun her around in the hug before weakly kicking back at the most recent assailant. Of course, even Boscha’s weak kicks made the guard grab his wrist at the sudden pain of having one of fingers bent the wrong way. Boscha hit the ground after that as she panted out, “And… Let… You get hurt?”

Luz pouted for a second before mumbling, “I’m guessing that comes with a ‘because Amity will get mad’?”

“Are you-” Boscha growled for a second before yelling, “Aren’t friends supposed to care about each other?”

Luz gasped for a second as she clutched her hands next to her head. Her eyes shone bright enough to make Boscha immediately regret her words, and that was before the human got on her knees and hugged the bully. “Aw, so you admit you do care?”

Boscha’s eye twitched as she looked down at Luz’s arms before almost knocking the human out with a right hook. She then looked at the executioner’s axe for a few moments before dismissing it. If she was going to kill Luz, it was going to be with her bare hands. “Never mind. You can die now.”

Kiki. Was. Done. Her guards were standing back at this point and had stopped charging at the two young girls. Not that they had been enthusiastic about it before but this needed to stop. She was here for a job. Just like she kept coming to Hexide for and she was not one to enjoy failure. Belos kept telling her that ‘failure’ was a relative term in this case but not today. Today, the goal was to kill a child.

So she would kill a child.

She turned to the nearest guard to her and said in an ice cold voice, “Why aren’t you attacking?”

The guard shifted a bit on his feet before whispering, “Well, um, if we’re doing this to help that little brown one get with a Blight, it would be kind of bad if something happened to her, right?”

Luz was still recovering from the hit as the words were said but Boscha’s heart had calmed down enough to catch it. So they’d been holding back? Part of her was relieved since privately she would admit that the numbers had scared her. That she was stunned as that blade hung over her for a reason. On the other hand, the thought that they weren’t taking her seriously made her blood boil as she stood up.

Kikimore raised an eyebrow at the question. “I do suppose you’re right. It would be a shame if something happened to her.” She then made a circle at the guard and one in the direction of Luz. “Let me fix that problem.”

The guard reacted too slowly as a red beam went straight through his heart. Boscha wasn’t as slow as she dashed over and slammed a leg in front of Luz’s face. The triclops met the demon’s eyes as Kiki glared back. The demon knew she couldn’t use too much magic after all. The emperor’s assistant wasn’t supposed to get her hands dirty.

But, even if the beam didn’t pass through Boscha’s knee, it would shatter it taking the blast. Kikimora supposed it was a more favorable outcome than if she had hit her mark, as Belos’ plan could still succeed now, but she had hoped to put an end to this nonsense like she’d stated she would in the past, and how she had stated it back then.

Luz was on her feet almost instantly as Boscha howled in pain and collapsed to the ground. Luz’s eyes turned from her friend, whose knee was pooling blood on the concrete now, and grabbed a set of sigil cards, and released them. The first hit the ground directly in front of her and ice crystals shot out in a vee shape. The ice walls grew until they towered over the bleachers and moved much faster than the slowly growing fireball that soon was almost as tall as the ice pillars. All aimed at Kikimora.

The explosion shook all of Hexide and the flames spread to begin burning half of that side of the bleacher’s support beams in a swathe of fire. Luz panted as for once she began to sweat from the exertion her magic had taken from her. She didn’t even properly register just how strong her spells had been, helped by the fact that the flames and explosion had reduced the ice to nothing. She’d only been focusing on the fact that Kikimora had hurt Boscha as badly as she had, not recognizing that the demon had been aiming to kill her.

Speaking of, said demon stepped out of the steam as she said, “Good try, but your execution needs work. Maybe next time make it so I don’t have to move a foot to the side to make your trap into my barrier?” The demon then giggled for a second, but it wasn’t happy or the like. It was more like the cackle you heard before someone ripped your heart out. Even the guards paled as they instinctively took a step back from their boss. They’d heard rumors of what Kiki was like when someone made her actually have to try but those rumors often came with disappearances after a guard had committed easily proven treason. Something she appeared to be counting inaction on this to be, something she emphasized as she walked to the corpse she’d made. “Now, men, do I need to tell you what to do?”

As the guards finished processing the threat, Luz moved to Bosch’s side. The athlete was pulling out some sort of yellow, glowing potion from a pocket in her uniform. From the sigils on it, Luz doubted that it was as fragile as the glass vial would lead one to think. “Boscha, what’s that?”

“Bo, what is that you’re working on?”

“If I’m going to play Grudgby, especially with Amity, I need a way to make sure y-” the ten year old paused for a second before whispering, “nothing stops me from performing. This will make me be able to ignore anything wrong with my body, at least temporarily. If it works at least.”

“I also hope it can serve a real purpose, like getting you into Advanced Potions.”

“Yes, dad.”

Boscha slammed back the potion before her eyes dilated. There were few times she’d had to take the potion for anything worse than severe bruising and it always was hell at first as it attacked her nerve endings. The energy would buzz so hot in fact that the skin around her knee smoked slightly. The nerves would recover once the effects were over, as the final stage of the potion undid the effects in a more controlled fashion so as to not send the victim into shock but right now she knew she should be in complete agony as her body tried to reset her shattered joint.

She didn’t feel a thing though. Instead, she opened her eyes and grinned like what her opponents knew her as: The Grudgby Demon. She stamped her injured leg onto the ground before pushing herself up. The guards had almost started moving in on the two before they saw that. Luz even blinked a few times at the display before grabbing Boscha’s shoulder. “Whoa, Boscha, you need to lay down! O-Or you need to get out of here while I hold them off! They aren’t after me after all.”

Boscha cracked her knuckles before looking at Luz. she then paused for a second as something in the rush of adrenaline felt… off. Made her chest flutter. Was it the seal mixing with the potion? It didn’t matter. For a split second, her smile turned into one that wasn’t quite as insane as what she normally wore after downing a whole dose of her potion. “Yeah, and let you take my beating? If you’re really that worried about me then watch my back, why don’t you?”

Luz blinked a few times before smirking at her friend. “Oh, and you’re willing to actually trust me that much?”

Boscha laughed a little as she patted Luz’s back. “With how much I know you like my back, I think you might actually pay attention for once.”

Luz’s face turned red before she grumbled out something about wondering why she’d been worried. Her eyes still darted down to Boscha’s leg though and saw as blood continued to ooze from her knee. The human’s eyes hardened, especially as almost a dozen guards began converging on them. This had to end, and now.

She held up one of her cards and this time the light couldn’t just be seen from the other side of campus, but shot skyward like a solar flare. It was to make sure though that this time no one avoided her ultimate attack this time as she slammed her next card onto the ground. The Earth around them shook and trembled as the card glowed a sickly green that almost blotted Luz out. Then, plants as large and thick as any that Willow could summon erupted from the ground and smashed the guards like nails facing a sledgehammer.

When the light cleared, Luz was panting while the entire field had been ravaged by her plants. Not a single guard was still standing as she looked at Kikimora, wrapped an arm around Boscha’s neck, and then yelled, “No one hurts my friends!” She then pointed directly at the one beside her as she added, “Even this one!”

Boscha rolled her eyes as she said, “Thanks for barely counting me.” Her cheeks were weirdly flushed though. Why was this messing with her? She worked with people all the time to take others out. Even if someone debated that this time it was for her life, she had been making jokes about it only a few minutes ago. She was even ready to go another twenty minutes laughing with the idiot next to her as they put down the fools who thought they could take them. Especially after she told Luz what to do.

But all she’d told Luz to do was to run away…

Boscha shook her head a little before looking at Kikimora. “Alright, I think it’s time to-”

“It’s time to get you help! Look at your leg!”

Boscha groaned as she threw back her head. “Look, I’ve already got ten minutes where I’m going to be so high on adrenaline that sitting still is going to be hell. Let me have some fun with this bitch first!”

Luz glared at Boscha as their faces stayed mere inches apart. That gave Kikimora an idea though to give her time to get away. After all, if she didn’t want to cast before, she couldn’t now. Not unless they genuinely threatened her life. The Emperor didn’t have to defend himself though, so neither should she. If they weren’t distracted though, she suspected the more violent of two would chase her down. “I believe you can find your fun if you look at your shoulder.”

Boscha glanced up to where Luz’s arm was. She then turned back to Kiki and said, “I’ll give her this one.”

Luz pumped a fist into the air and shouted, “Progress!”

Well… That was unfortunate. “I will remind you that I am the Emperor’s assistant. Any harm you do to me may be and will be considered as treason and be grounds for possible petrification. While we do not wish to have to do it to someone so y-”

“I was thinking humiliation would be better anyways.”

Luz glanced at Boscha before bluntly saying, “Wait, you’re the one advocating not to kill her?”

Boscha stretched out her back as she felt her adrenaline coming down. She’d need to look into fixing that. She’d just never been in a situation where she wasn’t worried about something while on the potion. “Nah. She’s too fun to watch squirm and she now knows that if she tries this again,” Boscha’s voice suddenly became very cold, “I’ll simply pull the same shit she tried to today.”

Kikimora severely doubted that she was talking about offering a deal to be something greater than she was, not that there was a position she would desire above hers. She enjoyed serving Belos more than she envied his position. “It has been… Noted. If we are in agreement then, I shall go.”

Luz and Boscha glanced at each other before the human asked, “Hey, have you heard of tarring and feathering someone?”

Boscha raised an eyebrow at that. “What?”

Luz giggled as she finally took her arm off of Boscha. “It’s something humans would do in the past where they’d cover someone in sticky tar and feathers. We might not have access to tar but-”

“The art room probably has super glue we can use?”

“Exactly!”

Boscha snickered for a second before patting Luz’s stomach playfully. Of course, when you couldn’t really feel much, it’s a bit harder to control your strength so she managed to knock the wind out of Luz instead, not that that stopped her from saying, “I didn’t think you had that sort of thing in you, human. I’m proud of you.”

Luz gave Boscha a thumbs up from the ground while wheezing out, “Thanks.”

No. No no no. She was the emperor’s assistant. She was not going to be made a fool of!

“Miss Kikimora, I got us coffee…”

Kikimora turned around and gave Steve a look that could kill. She then pointed at Boscha and Luz and hissed out, “Live up to your evaluations and kill them.”

Steve looked at the two of them, then the dented metal tray in his hand that held a dumped out sugar container, the remaining two small cups of milk out of what must have been close to thirty when he’d grabbed them from the cafeteria, and the mangled stirring spoon that he had thought was cute only five minutes ago. He then took one step back to look behind the wall of the bleachers and at twenty guards who had caught him coming in late and hot on the heels of Luz. Twenty guards who, so he couldn’t easily have treason put on him, were on the ground and were going to probably be asking for at least a few rounds at the bar when they woke up. And got out of the hospital.

Steve then looked back at the two kids. Luz was holding two sigil cards but looked conflicted on attacking him while Boscha cracked her knuckles. Finally, he glanced at Kikimora before dropping the tray and grabbing his stomach in ‘agony’. “Oh, no, help. Th-The tremors w-were too much for me. My insides, oh my insides!”

“Good mo-” Boscha blinked a few times as suddenly she felt twinges of pain before collapsing as her leg buckled. For a second she wondered if it was because of a bad batch but then the pain of the wound hit like a dump truck. It was far worse than any dislocated shoulder or, the worse she’d ever used it against, a simple fracture. The tough girl covered her mouth to hold back a scream while Luz dove to her side.

Kikimora, for her part, chuckled a little. “Oh, what a shame. I guess you’ll need to take care of that while I-”

Slap!

Kikimora looked up at the sigil card on her forehead just before her head was replaced by a solid block of ice. That got Steve back onto his feet as he raced over to his boss. “Um, uh, do you need he-” He was cut off by a rather obscene gesture from his boss before he began helping guide Kikimora towards the way back to the palace.

Luz was too busy going to take her shirt off to say bye to her new friend. Boscha waited for right after the girl tore her shirt in half to finally say, “I’m pretty sure if you dress this, I’m going to just lose the leg. Just drag me to the nurse’s office.”

Luz looked at the tatters of her shirt before saying, “You could have told me that a second earlier.”

“But then I wouldn’t get a nice view while I’m in agony.”

The human’s face turned bright red before she grabbed Boscha’s shoulders and did indeed begin the process of moving her friend. “You’re lucky I’m too concerned to get that angry.” Plus side was that ever since Boscha started playing Grudgby, the nurse had been moved much, much closer to the field. She still wished Amity was around so her abominations could help her, even if it was only because Boscha might not be in so much pain from being literally dragged there.

Speaking of, Luz was surprised Amity hadn’t shown up. Where was she?

======+++++======

“Amity and Boscha are probably fighting out there, so what do you mean I can’t leave!?”

The entire Advanced Abominations after school class was staring at Amity as she screamed at their teacher. The short gremlin merely shook his head in time with his abomination. “I’m sorry, Miss Blight, but you know I don’t let any student leave early from class, no matter the reason. Besides, how do you even know that may be the case?”

Amity threw her hands towards the window that looked towards the Grudgby court as she yelled, “You saw the pillar of light! The shaking! What else could it be?”

“Perhaps the team is just trying a new version of the field out. Now,” he said as he pointed to Amity’s seat, “please stop disturbing the class for such silly concerns.”

Amity’s eye twitched as briefly her hands reached out to choke her teacher. Her familiar attempted to sooth her by rubbing the blossom in her ear.

The girl then became very still.

“Miss Bli-”

“Ah!”

When she had to explain to her parents why she wasn’t allowed to attend Advanced Abominations for a week, they were surprisingly understanding, even while she still held a clump of her teacher’s hair and her eye continued to twitch.