It was a hard night for Mary. After the realisation hit, she checked for a Braille to normal alphabet translator but gave up after barely a page. It was simply too much, and the method was way too slow to go through the whole tome. Her only hope was skimming, and, well - that simply wasn’t going to work. She barely remembered to “lose” herself in the amulet after that. Fortunately, she was tired enough that a single glance proved to be enough, and upon closing her eyes, the heroine was rewarded with pure darkness, without any creeps or stars.

The alarm blasted her ears only seconds after she went to rest. At least, that was how it felt - the sun kindly disagreed, sending its blaring rays almost straight at Mary’s face, with a little detour to bounce of the bull statue’s backside. Perfect start of the day, wasn’t it?

Mary was tempted to skip breakfast before the hearing, but her stomach, even tightened from the stress as it was, managed to shout the brain into submission. Two skipped meals in a row was not something it would tolerate, and the brain was given a stern warning for even the attempt. At least, unlike some more external pests, it wasn’t going to give her a fine...

So, a tuna sandwich it was. She washed it down her teeth with a cup of tea, which was the miraculous kind you can find only in school cafeterias and their kin - dark as pure coffee, not a trace of taste. It’s not like she was going to enjoy the meal anyway.

Mary walked to the glorified amphitheatre, officially known as the audience hall. With a trusty sword that she only cut her own self with by her side and an annoying pet that was otherwise utterly useless over her shoulder, she was ready to face whatever awaited her. Somehow, she doubted that this would be the one visit to the place she would finally like. But hey, one can always dream, right?

Mary arrived first. It was a surprise, but… well, it made some sense. There wouldn’t really be many others today, as it was her hearing. Hm… either that, or they’d summoned everyone present at the battle, and just about everyone thought that no one would notice them specifically missing. She wasn’t sure at this point.

She looked at the curtain, once again concealing the row of desks. Would she be judged by all Thirteen Established Authorizers? Or was that reserved for more serious stuff? Heck, Mary didn’t even know in just how serious trouble she was. She looked at her watch - five more minutes to the start. Would it start on time? Probably… unless they really summoned half of the academy to bear witness.

She looked around again and almost jumped as she saw a single party in the last row of seats. Or, well, stands. Maybe. Mary wasn’t actually sure what she was supposed to do with whatever they were - the last two times, everyone had to stand in a try to see anything, but… they did look pretty sit-able.

Anyway - up there, in the back, two familiar students stood out like any pair of famous twin towers. One pale and a bit fidgety - the other unmoving, with his eyes closed and surrounded by a swarm of white specks of light. What were they doing here?

Well, actually, them being here was quite logical - it was supposed to be their battle, after all. They silently nodded to her when they noticed her movement, and she nodded back. Was she supposed to go talk to them? There was still a bit of time before the start… but no, if they wanted to talk, they would have come to her - they must have seen her when they came in.

Mary tried to go through everything she managed to read from the tome, but it was neither productive nor pleasant - basically, she hadn’t learned anything useful, and reminding herself of that didn’t do her any good.

Suddenly, Mossie stopped buzzing where it flew, and the curtain started to rise. The time had come.

She was pleasantly surprised that it wasn’t the thirteen whatevers that sat behind the curtain - there were only three clerks, and she recognised two of them. On the left, there was an older gentleman with inch-thick glasses. To the right - a woman barely able to stop herself from overflowing from her chair, and stinking so foul that Mary's eyes filled with water even in the open air of the audience hall. Well, granted, this effect could be the result of many factors, but PE flashbacks sure didn’t help.

Sitting between them was a bored young man with the white, absurd wig. If not for the place he was taking, she could have mistaken him for a student. He didn’t even bother to dress properly for the occasion - either that, or the occasion wasn't nearly as formal as Mary had feared. Unfortunately, a glance at the glee shining from the dark spots on the woman’s face indicated the contrary.

The middle clerk cleared his throat, and all three lifted their cups. It felt unnervingly similar to the last meeting.

“Today, we have gathered to gather the information necessary for the proceedings of the Thirteen Established Authorisers regarding the misbehaviour of Mary Susan Oceanrunner on the xeno-spider battle of the current year. Mary Susan Oceanrunner, please step forward.”

She did, despite wanting to do anything but that.

“Be advised that your words will be taken as your official testimony. You must not lie, withhold, nor misrepresent any fact you know or do not know about. You have the right to remain silent, but doing so will allow the Thirteen to assume the worst intentions and interpretations they can come up with.” He took another sip, concluding that part. “You took part in the battle with Margaret Del and Hans Gren, who at the time formed your party. Do you deny that part?”

Mary didn’t.

“Then please, describe everything you’ve done with excruciating details. Renate will write down the proceedings,” he nodded toward the stack of fat and malice poured into a chair like dirty-pants flavoured ice cream into a cone.

Mary did her best to recount everything. Unfortunately, a few days seemed like a century in her current circumstances, and she was pretty sure she’d messed something up. Surprisingly, the bespectacled man interrupted her a couple of times, asking for clarifications. After each of his interventions, a long scratching noise and a deepening scowl on the other clerk’s face told her that she narrowly missed a disaster.

All things considered, it took Mary almost an hour to go through everything she went through. The central clerk listened patiently. That, or he’d fallen asleep with his eyes still open - Mary wasn’t completely sure.

“So,” he said after the heroine stopped talking, “you admit to having used a shadow beast power, which is classified at a level eight according to Valhallan classification scale, during a battle?”

“Um… yes? I mean, I don’t know the scale you’re talking about, but-” she stopped as the man raised his hand.

“And your party was only serving the battle as a minor support role, is that correct?”

“I… think so, yes.”

The clerk looked left and right at his colleagues. The bespectacled man was unreadable, mostly because the spectacles enlargened his eyes and distorted the overall reception, but the woman was positively radiant. Mary swallowed hard.

“Then, you have clearly violated point two hundred and seventy-eight of the third supplement to the ‘The savoir-vivre of a modern battle for dummies’ code. Therefore, the proceedings of this meeting shall be sent to the Thirteen Established Authorisers to confirm your expulsion from the academy. Does anyone object?”

The man on the left slowly shook his head, and the clerk on the right did the same but much more vigorously. Mary’s lips went dry. Expulsion? She remembered the bleeding flesh of the once nice boy being thrown across the entire academy into the burning sands. At least her powers hadn’t replaced her skin - maybe she’d just die from the final impact? She hoped it would be one of those cases when you lose consciousness before feeling the pain...

Then, a deep, vibrating whisper sent a new wave of shivers down her spine.

“I do,” said the Creep behind her back.