I walked alongside Waelid, Silas, Ruriel, Zenobia, and Mel down the main corridor of House Anu. Our footsteps echoed against the marble floor, and the stench of smoke from outside, still lingered in the air, clinging to every breath. Behind us, I heard Fan barking orders to a few classmates, ensuring the building was secure.

Just ahead, two upperclassmen dragged the young Mageblood girl, our newest prisoner, maybe sixteen, across the hall. She was even more skinny without her armored clothes. She was stripped down to just a basic tunic, her severed arms were wrapped in gauze and tied behind her back. Her face was red and stained with tears. She hissed under her breath which I couldn’t catch at first. Then her voice rose in defiance.

“You’re all fools,” she repeated, spitting on the ground and glaring her eyes at me. “To follow a demon! That’s what you are, you know. A devil wearing human skin.”

I stopped, locking eyes with her.

“Don’t forget that your kind started all of this. You invaded our home,” I said firmly.

She gave me a hard glare. Behind me, Fan was directing some other upperclassmen to take the body of her older companion deeper into house Anu.

“Jorinmo…” The Mageblood girl said behind a horse voice. Guilt stirred in my gut, but I forced it down. She looked back up at me. “Demon! You are the spitting image of a dark lord in that…form. How long until your self-defense turns into pure destruction across Stylos?”

“You have lost your mind,” I said and continued to walk after the group.

She scoffed, tears still brimming. “The church warned us about you. Voidbloods are pathetic enough, but you—” she jabbed her chin in my direction “—you’re something worse. A real devil that can kill. A monster. He told us to look out for you, green-haired demon.”

Before I could respond, a hulking bear-woman moved in front of me. Ol’ Mumm. “That’s enough out of you.” She stuffed a wad of cloth into the girl’s mouth, earning a muffled protest. The girl frowned as Ol’ Mumm tugged her away.

Ol’ Mumm turned back to me and Waelid. “I’ll lock her in the storage room. She won’t be causing more trouble, not with those ropes on. After that, I’ll fix you both something to eat.”

I frowned. “Thanks, but I don’t think we have time—”

“Nonsense,” Ol’ Mumm interrupted. “You need strength if you’re going to fight more of these Magebloods. I’ve got some of Professor Rennal’s special herbs stowed away. I’ll brew a proper stew. Already got some meat and broth ready.”

Waelid shot me a look that said Don’t bother arguing. Relenting, I gave Ol’ Mumm a curt nod. “All right, just… keep it simple.”

She grinned, showing off slightly elongated canines, then lumbered away, dragging the gagged, squirming girl with her.

A part of me felt the pit in my stomach twist more. In our eyes, they were the monsters, were we really the monsters in theirs? They started all of this.

We continued, eventually descending a flight of narrow stairs leading to the basement level. Normally, these corridors bustled in the mornings with housemates changing into workout gear or heading to practice, but now they felt strangely hollow. Dim lanterns revealed scorched walls and the faint odor of charred wood. Tension hung in the stale air.

“Have we lost anyone? From House Anu?”

Mel stopped in front, and so did the rest. They all turned around but Silas spoke.

“We…lost ten upperclassmen,” He said lowering his head.

Waelid looked stunned. I looked towards the Chapter Master.

“I…I didn’t even think to ask about the others,” Waelid said softly. “What’s wrong with me.” He froze in place and didn’t say anything else. It annoyed me for a brief moment, but I had to remind myself, that everyone handles things differently. Waelid’s strong exterior he showed was breaking. I worried about what was underneath it.

“What about the first years?” I asked them.

“Thankfully we all survived,” Mel said with a smile. “They can’t take out the Veilbreakers.” She clenched a fist and raised it near her chest.

I smiled back and raised a fist.

“That’s right,” I said. I turned to Waelid and slapped his shoulder. “Let’s go, we aren’t going to let them get away with this.”

He looked at me slowly and then nodded. “I’ll have vengeance.”

I nodded and we continued down the hallway.

—‘I feel that you know? You feel the same way as you did towards me when I wanted to fight House Enlil in the first trial,’ Fern said. ‘You’re worried he will go too far and you can’t control him like you can with me.’

—You certainly know how to read my feelings these days. I said to him.

—‘Of course, I’ve lived through your worst memory and we’ve bonded with the spirit of a Chimera. I think I know you pretty well now,’ Fern said with what felt like a smile.

—You’re right I do worry, but for now, I guess it’s okay for him to direct his anger at the clear enemy here. It can be argued that what we are doing is incredibly violent to the Magebloods, but we are left with little choice. I said. Fern was about to answer when we stopped walking.

Zenobia halted at a thick wooden door. “Through here,” she said, voice hushed. The door creaked open onto a broad room with low ceilings, and a row of mismatched lockers pushed against one wall. Three upperclassmen stood near the center, surrounding a figure bound to a chair. A sack hid the prisoner’s head.

My chest tightened at the sight—whoever it was, my classmates meant business. These kids had never seen a Hollywood movie, nor had we been taught about how to capture and hold a prisoner, yet Silas and Ruriel had thought of everything from having multiple guards and bagging the head of the spy. I applauded my two friends in my head. They did a great job figuring this all out while I was gone. Silas stepped forward, gripping the rough cloth and yanking it off in one quick motion.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

I blinked and then tilted my head, confused. Beneath the makeshift hood, Professor Twinges squinted against the lantern light, his graying hair matted to his scalp.

“You? You’re the spy?” I said more confused than shocked. I looked over to Silas. “I don’t understand, I know we have only taken classes for like what…two weeks? Three max? Twinges never seemed sketchy or anything. My money was on the crazy drug dosing Professor Rennal.”

Silas nodded. “You would think that, but after reviewing the files we stole we found some confusing paperwork on him.”

Twinges had been around the Academy for a few years, but he was always an assistant to the Artifact Engineering Department head. Previously, Twinges had dropped out of being a recruit after his fourth year when he couldn’t complete the final trial for students to take to graduate. Instead, he lived in the town of Ash for several years. Over the last two years, he was able to secure an assistant teaching role for first-year recruits. This year he was supposed to still be an assistant teacher but the previous one had met an unfortunate accident and couldn’t make it back from his post in Southern Stylos. Twinges then took over the role. This would make sense why Lotrick said it ‘wasn’t a teacher’ because Twinges technically wasn’t one, not officially.

“But it gets even crazier. I found out he was the most suspicious one after I went to deliver the grapple gauntlets to him. When I told him we weren’t turning them in he gave me a huge fuss about it all,” Silas said.

Twinges looked up at Silas and gave a foul look.

“Turns out, he has a secret compartment installed in each gauntlet that collects a bit of Pillardust. When he told me he needed our gauntlets for his testing and to not tell anyone about the compartments, well, that just set off all sorts of alarms inside my head.” Silas said.

Ruriel stepped forward. “So we followed the paperwork and it turns out his signature has been on every export that the Academy has sent out. When we confronted him he panicked and transformed into his Ferret form. Once we saw that we knew he was the one who attacked us.”

“Luckily, these two were smart enough for once and told us about it, so Fan, Zenobia, and I waited in the dark and ambushed him before he could so much as scratch at Silas,” Mel said.

Waelid let out a low whistle and then stepped forward in front of Waelid.

“So, you think you can just ambush and attack students?” Waelid leaned down over Twinges.

“I…I don’t have to answer to you children.”

“Oh you don’t want to answer a ‘child’s’ questions, but you’ll sick a damn Guardian on them.”

“That…was different. You were all supposed to run. It was just supposed to get him.” Twinges looked up at me and nodded his nose toward me.

“I don’t think you got a good look at what we just did outside, old man!” Mel shouted. She slammed her foot into the side of his shin. Twinges cried out in pain. Mel leaned close. “We killed one of them. Cut the hands off the other. Don’t think we won't cut off anything of yours.”

Twinges looked up at her, and a small bit of fear filled his eyes.

“Why,” I said.

Twinges turned to look at me past Waelid.

“Why do all this? Speak now. I don’t have time to deal with you. As you can see we are under attack so time is a rare thing we have right now. Speak now or lose your tongue.” I stepped forward and Waelid moved aside for me.

“I…I had to. You have to believe me. If I didn’t they would have killed my family, my loved ones!” Twinges shouted.

“Explain. Now.” I said as I pulled out Lightcutter. I didn’t want to torture the man, but time was ticking. Every second here is a second longer that the Magebloods outside could notice four of their group were missing. If what the Villagers of Ash said is true, there are eight more Magebloods here.

“Okay!” Twinges twisted in the tight ropes tying him to the chair. “They threatened my family.”

“Oh, here we go.” Mel groaned. “A likely story bud. Spill the truth!” She grabbed Twinges by the collar and shook him.

“Fine! Fine! Damnit. Damn you girl!” Twinges said. “It’s not like you brats will win anyway.” Twinge's personality shifted dramatically. Now he looked like he was looking down at us.

“Twinges isn’t my real name first of all. What kind of backward town voidblood-ass mother would name their kid Twinges? No, my name is Xavier Mourncrest.” He said with his new obnoxious personality that we had not seen before from the rotund professor.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Waelid said with venom in his mouth. He shifted behind Twinger/Xavier and brandished a hidden blade. He moved the knife against our prisoner’s throat within a breath of a moment.

“Wait!” I held out my hand. “Waelid, calm down. What are you freaking out about?”

“Mourncrest,” Zenobia whispered next to me. I turned toward the blonde-haired girl and raised my eyebrow. “That’s the family name of one of the Princelords of the Royal Court.”

I cocked my head to the side. “Wait, now there’s a Royal Court?”

“My gods man do we have to give you a political lesson every time we talk about the Mages?” Ruriel said.

“Let’s just say, his family, the Mourncrests, are one of the branches of the Royal Magebloods.”

Waelid pressed the blade against Twinges’ neck. “So you see? We’ve got one of our arch-enemy’s leaders in our hands. Let me gut him. For my sister!” He pressed the blade further.

“Waelid, no!” I shouted at him. “Look, I know you are pissed at them but do you think killing him now without extracting any info would benefit us at all?”

“They wouldn’t even care if you did kill me,” Twinges/Xavier said. “Why would they care if their Voidblood son died? That’s what they sent me here for anyway. But then, they saw I could be useful when I sent them my findings on Pillardust capabilities.”

“So you really did all of this for what…approval by Mom and Dad?” I said.

“No, for my honor. To have my dignity restored. To have the curse of the voidblood be forgiven for my service.” He said, twisting in his bondages.

“So you figured out a way to get through the barrier and sent them the materials to do it huh?”

Twinges/Xavier turned his head away from me.

“I’ll take that as a yes. And so? Now what? What is their plan? Why did they send twelve mages here?”

Twinges/Xavier didn’t answer until Waelid tugged the blade against his neck and Twinges/Xavier yelled in pain.

“They don’t need to send an army,” He spat. “The Magelord could take this whole place by himself.”

“Really?” Waelid said with a smile on his face. “Then how come we’ve defeated four of these so-called powerful mage-bloods? They are not as strong as you make them seem.”

“You’ve taken out merely students. Kids younger than you.”

“I don’t know about that. What was that guy's name again? The fat one? Jorinmo? And what about that other older woman I beheaded? She had a witchy voice.” Waelid said with a snarl.

Xavier tensed up. He didn’t know that we had killed two of the magebloods.

“He’s right Twinges…er…Xavier,” I said. “We’ve spared the students.”

“Minus a few hands,” Waelid said laughing. Mel joined in and laughed next to him.

"Are we starting a collection now?" She asked.

Xavier looked more panicked now.

“You don’t know why we were up there, do you?” I said to Xavier while pointing up above. “We reached the third level of our infusions.” I held out three fingers.

His eyes widened. “Impossible, that sort of bullshit meditating to find one's spirit is supposed to take years.”

“Not with the Major’s training.” I smiled.

Xavier twisted his face. “That eccentric old man? A teacher? I don’t believe you.”

“I don’t care if you don't. I just wanted to tell you how we took out four Magebloods so you know that your 'masters' aren't so invincible. You picked the wrong side, Xavier. Now, before we decide if you’re worth keeping alive or not, what is their plan?”

When Xavier didn't answer, Waelid twisted the blade, pointing the tip into his chest.

“Agh! Okay! He…wants to kill all the professors and older cinders. Get rid of the old guard before bringing their people in here. The Magelord will usher in the Royal Magebloods into Baldred's Pillar and under their supervision, they will take over the training of the...voidblood slave army.”

“Kill the professors? How can the Magebloods possibly do that? There were twelve of them, and like what, over a hundred staff members. The professors are stronger than us. Explain pig,” Waelid said tightening the blade against Xavier’s neck again.

“The Magelord that’s how,” Xavier coughed. "He easily overpowered them and sapped them of power and strength. Tied them all up in the Academy.

“Did any of you find out what happened to the professors?” I asked the group.

“When the mages came, it was late at night. None of us have made it to the Academy to check on the professors." Zenobia said. "We heard loud explosions coming from the Academy and the other two houses. It was chaos but we had our own problems to deal with as you saw. We just assumed that was everyone else fighting back too. We were locked into battle for several days before you arrived.” Zenobia said.

"You too? Several days? H-how? And the Magebloods? They kept up with two days?"

"Luckily those bastards are pretty easy to tire out. They would take frequent breaks. But they couldn't break us!" Mel held up a triumphant fist.

I looked around at them closer in the dark light. Everyone, including the three upperclassmen who were guarding Xavier, looked exhausted. They must have fought in shifts to try and keep the Magebloods away. I poked the side of my thumb with my forefinger nail.

—This has gone on long enough! I thought.

I stepped close to Xavier and pressed Lightcutter against his chest.

“What is their plan, out with it!”

Xavier looked up at me with anger in his eyes. He looked at me like the Magebloods in Corello looked at Fern. The same way they had looked at me. Xavier was a Voidblood himself, but he was raised to hate who he was. He still held onto that hate. Would his family ever accept him back?

“They will kill them all, and then open a teleportation portal to the pillar where the rest of the Magelord's army can come in and take over the whole damn place. They already pierced the barrier, they are safe from its effects. It's too late to stop them you know. They will come here, rescue me, and then I will make you all my servants!”

“How long do we have?” I pressed him for an answer.

“He may already have opened it. He did tell everyone to have fun and that tonight was their last night on this mission,” Xavier said shrugging.

“How do you know about that?” I asked him.

Mel spoke up. “We all heard that announcement. The two mage-bloods who were attacking us, had it playing out of their small box they kept on their hips. It’s some sort of communication device.”

“We don’t have much time.” I stood back up and sheathed Lightcutter. I looked down at Xavier and saw anger in his eyes. The moral part of me says to keep him alive. But something deeper inside of me told me to take him out of the picture. Something in my gut, like intuition.

“Well?” Waelid looked at me, the knife still held against Xavier’s neck.

I sighed. This was for the best. If he was left alive, it would come back to bite us in the ass right? That’s how all those good guys in the books and movies get betrayed right?

“Xavier, may you be reincarnated and learn from your past mistakes. You picked the wrong path this time.” I nodded to Waelid and turned around.

“Wait! I—” Xavier blurted out his last word before a gurgling sound came next. I heard the chair topple over and saw Silas out of the corner of my eye cover his mouth.

I shook away any guilt that tried to bubble up.

"Must...stay...strong," I whispered to myself as I walked up the stairs to find what Ol' Mumm had cooked for us.