“I—I can’t!”

Caroline was standing in front of Blanket, her weapon scattered in the middle of the floor, Blanket – of whom leaned his back against the wall unmoving and laser rifle at his feet, now Caroline, on the other hand, looked more pissed than a mother dragon who' just missed a squad of egg scavengers, “ You have to! They’re going to take our tower and really fuck us up if we don’t go out there now! Do you really want to be on somebody’s dance team? We’re doing this for you and that serpent, for fuck!”

Reia assessed the situation and knew they had to get moving immediately if there was any chance of winning “Look, Maila and Purah are still out there giving it their all. Blanket, we can’t just abandon them…it isn’t a loss yet!”

“You’re older than me…dude, you’ve been at this school so much longer than me! You’ve played castle way more than me! Boy, Where’s your knight’s honor!” Caroline rebuked him.

“That’s easy for all of you—born with cool affinities and proficient in spells all. I have low mana reserves–I don’t even have an affinity, Just whatever magic works for me, works.! I’m useless!” Blanket tried to slouch into a ball, but Caroline’s smaller form grabbed him by his robe with both hands and pulled him so the two’s faces were mere inches apart, her rose hair tickled his nose

“Lame! You’re freaking lame and if you sit your ass on that ground, so help me the good king, I’ll cave your entire face in!” Caroline held her fist to his nose with her free hand, Blanket looked like his legs were going to fold under the pressure.

No, that was way too much even for Caroline. And after deciding what to do, Reia walked over to the smaller girl and placed her hand on her shoulder “That’s enough, we’re working to get our friend back, no need to rough him up.” Reia then cast Blanket a quick sympathetic glance, but he wasn’t too receptive, his gaze went past her and to the floor.

“More of a reason for him to get himself the freak together! C’mon..”

“Both of you, I know it seemed overwhelming out there, but it's not over yet, Maila and Purah are out there fighting while we’re here squabbling! Blanket, you know you can do this!”

“I—I’ll just embarrass everybody, they’re seasoned, aggressive and I’m—”

“That’s prissy, dishonorable, bullshitery talk. You have to take a stand, we’re freaking knights, Blanket! They’re not unbeatable, I’ve played against much better!”

He glared at Caroline, “It's realistic, screw you. I combine herbs, mix potions and perform alchemy. Sebi did the hard lifting and could sort of fight…”

“Don’t give up like that! So what if this seems too hard? So what? Last year's run through the forest of the shadow people had much higher stakes and, look, you did that! And you can do this!” Reia attempted to encourage him.

“Sebi was there! He saved and kept me on my toes! I’ve only gotten this far by Sebi’s will alone, but y’all don’t know that! You don’t see us when we’re out there fighting! I don’t have him, without him I’m useless!”

Why was he thinking this way? Didn’t Blanket understand his own value as a human?

“No, you’ve got this! And we need to head out there freaking asap! You’re an amazing knight, don't let anyone tell you otherwise, because I know you can be an important part of this win we’re about to pull! You’re not useless!”

Caroline pouted and crossed her arms “If you get your ass out there and give it all that you’ve got, yeeeaah sure, you won’t be useless!”

“You can do this, you’re not only a great alchemist, you're also a great knight.” And with her complete faith resting in her team, including Blanket, Reia smiled “Everything’s gonna be alright, just follow my lead.”

She thought what she was saying could break through to him. But no. Blanket turned his back to his two teammates and snorted“That’s what everyone says: everything’s gonna be alright… and then…everything's never alright.” his head facing the sky “My dad told me the same when I said that I didn’t want to finish my apprenticeship at Decorous Academy….”

She wanted to reply.

She really did!

But how could she?

When she tried to think of anything to say, her mind went to scribble-scrabble.

Reia wasn’t some wise enlightened hermit with all the right answers.

And Reia, still unable to produce the right words or even a proper solution, grabbed turned Blanket around and held him into the warmest embrace she could muster.

Again, she didn’t know what to say.

So she didn’t say much “We’re going to get Sebi back…”

Then she let go of him, his face a mix of shock and hesitation—like he’d trusted someone before and it all went sideways.

Why couldn’t he share her same optimism?

“…and here’s what we’ll do!”

*>x

As much as this was just a game and a total creation of their brains, it most certainly hurt.

Purah was not happy and the scorching sun she was feeling on her face was way worse than any arid day back on her family farm.

But Reia believed in Blanket and if Reia saw something in that clumsy boy, Purah would stand by her.

Now, despite the attempts made by herself and Maila, the Starlights' tower still collapsed into its foundations, from the onslaught of not only the Trenchcoat’s team, but an overwhelming mass of elves that both Purah and Maila found some trouble clearing the wave of elves with the attacks from the Trenchcoats devastating her shields, armor, and just downright doing massive damage to Purah…fuck…and she felt it in her chest. If she didn’t have this armor, certainly she would have been sent back to their castle.

Her friend, Maila seemed to be fairing much better than Purah, both they both were being worn down, Purah’s support-healing ability was only enough to keep them alive as the Trenchcoats made their move down the lane, kicking up sand and upon their castle. The Starlight’s elves, decorated in gray all fell with such ease, Asher walking box canon over his shoulder, with ‘mop dude’ and Graham both eclipsing him—Turner and Kate on the far-off end, not a single sign of strain found on their faces.

The bastards weren’t even taking them seriously.

The firing had stopped at that point and only the mindless elves did battle, the protective line of the castle and it's elongated gatling turret which sat up on tip of the pyramid-like castle, Purah kept shooting a gaze back to the castle. Where the hell was Reia and the rest of the calvery?! Their respawn timers were in no way that long.

What was going on?

Could someone please get her close enough to punch Kate and or Asher right in the face?

“Alright, I already asked you, President Asher, why even waste time with scrubs.” Graham didn’t seem happy, even if his team was winning by a landslide.

“To prove a point.”

“Dude, what point would that be? I mean, n–no, disrespect of course. ” Graham said.

Asher then said “That they can’t compete—Our friends in the Purple Monkeys won’t even have to raise a finger. The Starlights are not competitors here at this school.”

Graham laughed, “I wanna get this over with, got an in class essay next period—need to find someone to help me write it.”

“Tsk… trust me, we kill them again and it's all over and you get to go to class. This next play’s it!”

Graham walked over just outside of their turret’s range and began loudly and aggressively squatting on repeat, with his giant axe acting as workout weights, all while Graham was saying “Starlights, see here, your stupid dream of a club ends before it ever began!” And in a sudden movement Graham slammed his axe parting sanding and shaking the area, Purah cast a shield around Maila and was immediately pounced on by Graham, the Starlights’ castle’s turret began firing at Graham sounding like a thousand fireworks going off all sequentially after the other, but his armor was absorbing most of the damage and as such, Purah was afraid Graham could tank those gatling tower shots for a few more seconds, which would be just enough to take them out.

His axe hit the shield, cracked it, and with a furious growl and a loud heave the shield gave and shattered, though just as this happened Maila with every ounce of strength caught the axe by its blade with her bare hands, blue mana surging through them like electrical currents.

“Huh?” Graham groaned, the towering boy’s face flexed, his veins bulging—even his veins seemed to have veins, every single one of his muscle swollen “Pretty strong…” and he only left the castle’s perimeter line when Purah took her dagger and leaped at him in jabbing motion.

She barely missed, only for Graham to retreat as a combined flurry of lasers, cannon fire, and freaking construction nails pounded into both Purah and Maila, hitting them over and over again, the pain searing and almost unbearable, but there was no time to complain. They kept moving as they ate the attacks, both Purah and Maila’s armor holding out just long enough…

Then light, no not sunlight, physical light in the shape of a sphere, yes, the same photon balls that Reia would produce, they always came in handy when you needed them— and there were dozens of them, her attack letting out victorious screeches in an attempt to terrify her target and Asher looked at least mildly annoyed and with the help of Caroline, they shot at Asher as fast as the wind.

Immediately, ‘mop dude’ blocked these attacks with a quick swish of his… mop… absorbing the photons with the mop's head and looking on as Reia, Caroline and Blanket came running with a hurricane-like wind blowing at their backs and blasting sand into everybody’s eyes. Caroline held up her hand and Caroline then sent an invisible punch of air at Asher as Blanket fired his rifle, clearly, they were now focusing on the team’s leader and Asher took to the air…yet again.

Purah understood.

Kate retaliated by snorting up something in her throat, then spitting out this gooey white poison that when she dodged burned right through the sand, Kate went to choke Purah, poison seeping down her fingernails and her hand like a child who’d dumped syrup all over her hands.

If Purah was fast enough, she could catch Kate.

Even so , she dodged multiple cat swipes from the white-haired poison specialist that seemed to come from every conceivable angle. Purah was being overwhelmed, completely on the defense, Kate confident that she had the upper hand, baring her teeth in a smile. But Purah perceived this, and when Kate went for an uppercut that was significantly slower than any of her other attacks, with a single movement and a stream of a purple flash.

With her jaw clenched Purah cast a barrier around Kate, who at first just blinked and looked all around like she were lost at a carnival or something. Then Kate started to frantically bang, punch and kick the wall of the barrier, all in vain.

Yeah, perfect!!

Purah grinned at Kate and tapped on the barrier “You know, Kate, you don’t hit nearly hard enough to break this thing.”

That definitely was a shot to her pride and proved to make Kate clamp her jaw down on her own lip “Y–ou coward, get me out of here! Long-faced scrub!” Kate shouted, dropping into the literal sand using both her hands as a shovel and trying to dig her way out.

“KATE!” Graham looked over to Kate and was in the process of charging at Purah, but Maila with the fierceness of a charging wrestler crashed into the much taller boy square in the gut, taking him into the sand with her.

“I know you might have some—second thoughts about hitting a pretty girl, but c’mon don’t hold back,” Maila explained sweetly.

But Graham just snorted, a long and loud grumble emanating from his throat “Yeah, but I don’t see any pretty girls around…”

Not taking kindly to his words, Maila proceeded to relentlessly punch him into the dirt like her fists were jackhammers.

But had to stop when Turner’s laser-shot grazed her arm, and Maila then turned around and Turner whose expression only got more horrified as Maila was able to deflect the next round of lasers with her punches.

Reia was there in all her glory, a sword of photons in one and a scythe in the other, Caroline was keeping Asher in the air, and that’s when Reia told Purah “Staircase.”

And Purah immediately looked at her friend, sweat keeping Purah’s long hair stuck to her forehead “If I do that Kate’s gonna break free.”

As if hearing this Caroline fired her cannon multiple times and a wide-eyed Kate exploded and was sent back to their team’s castle.

Both Purah and Reia did an eye flutter at Caroline, before Purah concentrated and these small rectangular platforms manifested, and assembled themselves almost forming a floating staircase, just enough for Reia to climb and in the direction of the trenchcoat President.

Mop dude was confused as Reia began ascending at heroic speeds and was forced to instead dodge a blast of Blanket’s laser, as opposed to saving Asher.

The Trenchcoat leader was angered and began hurdling the remainder of his construction nails.

But Reia was a lady with a mission, when her eyes got like that, narrowed and stubborn there was no changing her mind. Reia was fast and precise, cutting construction nails in half with her photon sword and moving

almost as fast as Purah was stacking more and more of the platforms.

Turner was then suddenly tossed into the bordering walls of the lane and his face had been punched in before being sent right back to spawn.

Graham was running, leaving Asher to palm his face and watch his teammate run down the sandy lane, just as Reia made it to Asher’s height, like at least ten feet above, enough to make someone's stomach flip.

Purah held the final platform with all of her concentration.

“What the hell, my team’s abandoned me!” Asher looked like he wanted to bite someone’s throat.

“Yeah you guys sort of fell apart, and now we’re finishing this game!”

“What?! We still have a towe—”

With no hesitation, Reia slashed Asher’s head off with both her sword and scythe, sending Asher back to spawn, for Reia jumped and landed into the sand and ordered her friends to “End this game!”

And like a roaring steamboat the Starlights charged.

*>x

With the help of their little waves of tiny elves, the Trenchcoat’s first tower went down without a hitch, so Reia and her team did the only logical thing and pressed the Trenchcoat’s castle line hard. Though remembering not to pass the line in fear of being sprayed with machine-gun bullets.

With the entire Trenchcoats back, the Starlights and Trenchcoats lined up for what could possibly be the game’s final battle.

The five players for each team lined up and Reia immediately knew this would be the final turnout, or rather the final showdown.

Asher looked like he was burning up, his eyes like fire, himself and Graham looked as if they were out for blood.

While a wave of the Starlights elves pushed into the castle and was neatly sent back to spawn, Reia knew that the next army of their elves to push would be the Starlights' chance to win.

When Asher began ascending into the sky and Graham began twirling his axe with his single hand, Reia knew her team’s next wave was running right upon the Trenchcoat’s castle, their machine turret was silent and motionless up until one of the line leading elves ran right past the castle line and that’s when Asher attacked.

Mayhem consumed the map.

Asher immediately began firing rockets, and with his telekinesis throwing construction nails from his pockets, bombarding the ground and sending Blanket to the back of their team as nails ripped through his flesh and explosions burnt his face before Purah could properly heal or shield him.

Caroline, whose flying timer was much much shorter was already in the air attempting to take Asher out, but with constant laser fire from Turner below it was hard for her to land a hit and in the end, Caroline had to fall back to the floor, using her winds to extend her flight for only a little while longer.

Looking over to Maila, the two made eye contact and that’s when Maila knew exactly what to do, Maila entered and went past the castle line, immediately taking fire from the turret—her armor absorbing most of the damage and allowing Reia to run inside the castle line and not take turret shots, Reia had to dodge—almost splitting her spine in half, she had to lean so far back and with speed and energy that made Turner’s eyes become like 8-balls, Reia tossed her scythe and decapitated Turner, sending him right back to respawn, her weapon came back like a boomerang and the girl couldn’t help but smile.

“Holy shit!” Graham immediately went after Reia, he kicked up sand, getting it right in Reia’s face, before hacking his axe at what would’ve been her face, but a laser hit him right in the chest, causing the tanky player to stumble.

“Keep your head up and your ass down!” Asher bellowed below, his rage seeming to reach a boiling point.

Thank God for Blanket!

The mop dude immediately went to heal Graham, but they both ended up having to block the swarm of rockets that Caroline felt they thoroughly needed.

Reia and Maila were unaffected by team fire, and Maila was still taking heavy fire from the turret, but somehow Kate had found a way to close the distance between her and Blanket, Reia watched as the horrified boy fired at the other scythe-wielding assassin only for her to constantly dodge, and then reach out with her poison covered hands and she tried to choke him, but before she could Purah was there and grabbed the much taller girl and surrounded a purple bubble of protective energy around Kate, imprisoning her.

Kate stood for a perplexed minute, looking up and down before silently mouthing “Shit...”

“That’s the second time I did that to you, Kate.” Purah bragged and the white-haired girl pouted, then with her arms crossed plopped herself right into the sand and sat angrily in pretzel style.

“Purah, holy crap, Purah, I thought you didn’t like me!” Blanket said.

“You’re tolerable... “

Purah, Caroline, and Blanket began moving into the castle line, Maila and Purah switching out because it was Purah’s turn to tank the turret shots. As Caroline and Blanket shot at the turret all the way on the tippy top of the castle.

Boom!

Asher fired another set of rockets that threw the Starlights around like a bunch of newspapers, Reia was sent face-first into the sand, her mouth filled with dry grain that Reia couldn’t stop spitting up. Asher descended to the ground and kept firing explosive projectiles, Purah would shield all the Starlights, but his attacks, along with Graham's aggressive and brutal axe strikes were enough to force Reia and her friends packing and away from the castle line—with the exception of Caroline.

See, Caroline didn’t aim at any of their foes, instead, she aimed at the turret and unleashed a full round of rockets on their turret.

BANG! !

The turret on the castle’s tip blew up, leaving the castle breachable and allowing the Starlights wave of elves to push hard. Reia knew that Turner would be spawning back soon and she knew it was push-time for the end or to take advantage of trenchcoats' lead dissolving like water.

This sent Graham into a desperate frenzy as he charged at Reia, who was still recovering from damages from multiple explosions, but before his axe could take her back to respawn, Maila with a great reaction time decked Graham right in the face with a loud fist, it only made him stumble, but the red and fire in his eyes did not go unnoticed.

The Starlights' smallest, yet strongest member went up against their largest, the swinging at one another, left and right back and forth, Graham using his axe and Maila simply resorting to her fists. The two refused to back away from their battle, leaving Asher and the mop dude alone to face four Starlights.

Asher seemed to be out of nails and slowly backed away, he fired his box cannon, but by that time, they simply dodged the rockets, becoming familiar with the skillshot and showing the more seasoned players just how skilled they were.

So, they closed in on him, and the Trenchcoat leader tossed his box canon in rage, Blanket shot at Asher, who ducked and the laser traveled off map, the four approaching Starlights then found themselves within the range Asher’s range, and with a weird ballerina-like spin, followed by two hands held out like a mime holding an invisible wall, Reia found her feet forcefully suspended above the ground by like three feet. Panicked she looked all about, Caroline, Blanket,

“You know, you guys almost won there, that’s pretty cool! If I’d let this go on any longer we would’ve thrown this game so hard! But naw…now I’m crushing your windpipes and sending you back to spawn!”

Asher closed his fists and Reia gasped, trying to grab at her throat as it felt like someone had put a rope around her throat and was squeezing any opening closed, she struggled to produce light, and before she knew it a blast of air hit Asher, knocking him on his backside, before moments later Graham’s heavy ass found himself being tossed right on top of Asher.

Everyone looked over to see Maila just calmly admiring her own nails.

And the leader of the Trenchcoats purposely slammed his own head into the sand “Graham, you lost to the freaking former unicorn bender?”

Graham only groaned, before looking up and revealing a face both black and blue, with a tiny bit of blood spilling down the side of his cheek, he stood, “I can’t believe she almost hits as hard as me...”

Maila kept an innocent grin and said “Neither can I, after all, I hit harder.” Then there was the little wink she gave him.

All eyes then went to the mop-wielding knight, who spun the mop in his hand like nunchucks, showing off his skills before daring Reia to attack, but unfortunately for him, Reia held out her hand and blasted him with a photon bomb, that knocked him and herself into the sand and for the nth time she was spitting out sand.

“…Try that…again…” Reia said, recovering herself to her feet.

“We—we’re not gonna lose! We can’t lose to some wannabes!”

To that, Reia didn’t say much, when she walked past Asher as her and her Starlights made way to destroy the castle, she simply looked at Asher with her best smug face yet, he looked away and after they easily destroyed the Trenchcoats’ on coming wave of elves, the Starlights ran off to the inside of their castle, which was an exact replica of theirs despite being black and Reia with both her scythe and photon sword present, slashed right through the large throne, causing it to crumble into pebbles and ash, which immediately caused the castle to wobble, the ground below shaking violently as the floor opened up and the castle began to fall apart from its ceiling, debris and ash spilling from every angle.

The Starlights all looked at one another with gloss in their eyes despite a building collapsing on top of them…

But who could blame them? They finished the struggle, the Trenchcoats were panicking and before she could even celebrate, Reia’s breath was forced out of her lungs like someone had hit her extremely hard from behind, and then there was that familiar tug on her body notified her that not only had they won, but their minds were returning to back to reality and their trip on hubble-potion was coming to a conclusion.

It was a mission success.

Score one for the Starlight Disciples!

Score one for Blanket and Sebi!

*>x