Caeden's stomach roiled, and his fingers twitched. The armory was surrounded. He had spent the last hours getting constantly shot at and watching Cat's army slowly dwindle. At this point, he was pretty pissed. Now, there was a perfectly viable target in front of him, and Caeden was looking forward to letting loose.

By some miracle, or more likely a severe oversight from the Revolution, the ones in front of his team didn't seem to know they were coming. The revolutionaries attacking them must not have told the ones up ahead. It was a mistake that Caeden was going to absolutely exploit. He had been patient. When the enemy had held every advantage, and they all had been off-kilter from losing access to their auras. Now, he had a group of revolutionaries in front of him that didn't know he was there and weren't prepared if he attacked.

"Lily, take left. I'll go right. Sweep and clear around the armory. Cat, charge the middle, scare the shit out of them. Erik, piss them off and annoy the crap out of them. Ready, Go!" Everyone split off, moving toward their own objective. Cat urged her forces forward, the Undead Soldiers pushing their weaker cousins out of the way to charge forward in formation. They triggered more traps since the Revolution seemed to have covered every square inch of campus with them, but their armor and superior construction limited their losses.

Erik was whooping and running with them, yelling insults and generally being obnoxious in a very Erik way. The response from the revolutionaries attacking the armory was immediate. They freaked out. Understandable when a seemingly insane man comes running in accompanied by legions of corpses in pitch-black armor. Their focus instantly shifted. All the shots and explosives aimed at the small building shifted completely toward the advancing undead.

Caeden knew Lily would be moving around the armory, silently running down every shooter she could find. Luckily, they were in a relatively open part of campus. It was forested, except for the path, but there were no other buildings the revolutionaries could use for cover. The only thing keeping them out of sight were the trees and the strange gloom of the suppression dome.

Following suit, Caeden charged right, jumping into the air and shifting into his Speed Form with a whispered mnemonic and a puff of purple and gold smoke. He used the trees as a springboard, bouncing from trunk to trunk and quickly traversing the forest. Currently wielding 004, the spear, Caeden had all the range he needed to strike below him. It only took a moment for Caeden to follow the trajectory of the shots aimed at Cat and Erik to find his first target.

With his enhanced senses, Caeden's perception of time was faster than everyone else. He took a moment to look at the man beneath him. He looked confused and surprised, which Caeden had expected. He was shooting while tapping a piece of ethertech affixed over his ear. Something seemed to be wrong with what was obviously a piece of communication equipment.

Not knowing what had malfunctioned and not really caring at the moment, Caeden simply thanked their good luck. Taking the enemy by surprise was a massive boon in such a chaotic situation. A single thrust split the man's head open like a ripe melon. For once, Caeden felt no lingering sense of self-loathing at killing another person. They were here, on a school campus, attacking kids barely into adulthood after removing their best way to defend themselves.

In the hours it had taken to get here, Caeden and his team had cleared several buildings along the way to make sure they weren't ambushed from behind. They stopped after the effort didn't keep that from happening anyway. But those few buildings had been more than enough to remove any sympathy from him. The revolutionaries were long gone, but the buildings were by no means empty.

The Academy had lost more than a few students already.

So Caeden moved on, blitzing between the trees and carving a path through every revolutionary he found. They were just humans without any kind of protection. Caeden's shrouded weapon passed through them with hardly more effort than it took him to swat a fly. Once the threat of a prepared enemy was removed, Caeden could attack with impunity.

And Caeden wasn't the only one.

The armory doors burst open, and dozens of Forged charged out, clad in infused armor and carrying weapons of every kind. All of Caeden's efforts in the forge were on display. Many of his people were formshifted, taking on a myriad of shapes as they ran through the forest yelling war cries full of anger and determination.

Needless to say, the revolutionaries devolved into chaos. They now had their original targets, plus an unknown new force, and their communication equipment was failing. More than that, anyone paying a single iota of attention would notice that the amount of fire was steadily dropping off at an alarming rate. Even when the revolutionaries that had been pursuing Caeden's team joined in, they didn't stand a chance. The Forged were raring to go. The second they saw a gap in the ceaseless barrage hammering their bunker, they threw everything into an offensive that crushed the Revolution.

Caeden couldn't begin to express how proud he was. Only a few short months ago, these people didn't have a clue how to fight. They were being shoved around by any and every student that took the time to do so. Now, they were armed and armored, charging a group of terrorists with half their shrouds locked away. The difference was stark and gratifying. Caeden felt his heart swell, seeing their efforts paying off. Now more than ever, he was certain that listening to Lily was the right choice. He could have sat back and watched this school continue along as it had for thousands of years, but instead, he decided to interfere, and everyone was better for it.

"FORGED! TO ME!" He shouted, enhancing his vocal cords to ensure his voice reached every faction member. A cheer rose up as those present recognized the sound. They fought harder, pushing further. The Revolution broke, and their people started to run in ones and twos before they all left en masse.

Caeden let them go. If he'd learned anything over the last few hours, it was that charging blindly across campus would get him killed. The revolutionaries had some way of detecting their own traps, Caeden assumed since they never set them off accidentally. They had a better chance of surviving further exploration if they had a chance to search the dead revolutionaries and see if their equipment would help.

Moving in front of the armory, Caeden waited for his people to gather. Cat had her Undead Soldiers form a perimeter so that they wouldn't be easy targets. Erik and Lily joined him moments later, and the other members formed up quickly.

One stepped forward to speak. Caeden vaguely recognized him as Tracey Loxodonta's, the Forged leader for the Core Seat, right-hand man. He had been in a few of Caeden and Lily's meetings with the four Seat leaders.

"Man, are we glad to see you, boss! Everything has gone to fucking unshrouded hell. You and all the other leadership were out on that expedition, so we weren't sure who to turn to when everything collapsed. Plus, like half the teachers went with you guys." He sighed. "It's been a real shit show. I hope you've got a plan."

Caeden looked around, seeing tired but hopeful faces. They still had that anger with them, but it was tempered now that the immediate threat was gone. It also struck Caeden why this attack was happening now. It was more than just the suppression device being complete and the power source connected. The Revolution had picked a moment when most of the strongest people in the school would be gone. This meant they truly were here to kill as many of the weakest people as possible.

It was cowardly. Caeden could also admit that it was effective. If the Revolution aimed to make the Central Authority pay attention to them, they would succeed with this. Too many important children of important people would die here for the CA to ignore them anymore.

But that didn't make sense. The Revolution's stated goal was literal genocide. They wanted to kill all shrouded, flat out. Something like this was more of a political stunt than anything else. An attack like this sent a message and showed the power of the Revolution. But it did nothing to actually help their cause beyond killing some shrouded. In fact, it would almost certainly hurt them, drawing more attention than they could handle. It made no sense.

But that wasn't and couldn't be Caeden's main concern right now. He had people to protect and enemies to drive out. That was the important part right now. To that end, Caeden called all the Forged together and, with Lily's help, explained all that they knew about what was currently going on. After he had everyone caught up on the particulars of the suppression field, the people present had a surprise of their own for him.

"...For some reason, their communication equipment was malfunctioning. I don't think that's something we can rely on, but it's worth noting-yes?" Caeden smiled; one of the Forged had raised their hand like they were in class.

"Uh, I think that might have been me, actually." The guy looked nervous. Especially since Caeden and Lily immediately focused on him.

"Explain, please?"

He held up one of the ethertech headsets the revolutionaries were using. "My buddy caught one from behind when the dome first went up. He was already in the Entropy Seat at the time, waiting in the hallways. We came out to see if anyone knew why our auras shut down, and at first, we thought he was just a janitor or something. But you told us revolutionaries could be in the school, and we saw he had all this weird ethertech. So Johnny here clocked him on the head, and we took his shit." He patted a guy standing next to him on the back. His friend was thickly built and carried a massive metal bat. He smirked and slapped the thick piece of metal into the palm of his hand.

"Right, so how did you use it to stop their communication?" Lily asked.

"Y-yeah," He stuttered and shifted his feet, seemingly pressured by Lily's attention. "Well, the guy was tapping the side of the thing and talking, so I started messing with it as we left the Seat. We knew we needed to head to the armory since we figured that's what everyone else would do. But anyway, I put the thing on and could hear other revolutionaries talking. Whenever I pressed the button, though, they stopped. So when we got here, and they started to surround the building, I held the button down. I think only one person can talk at a time with these."

"Ah, so since you were the one 'talking' none of the revolutionaries could communicate. Smart." Caeden smiled.

"Thanks!"

"Can I?" Caeden asked.

"Oh, right. Sorry." He handed over the headset.

"Great. Everyone, we need to collect as many of these as we can. I'm assuming they have a limited range, so just one isn't going to cover the whole campus. The next step is to form groups and start clearing the surrounding area. Any other ethertech we can find should be tested to see if they have a tool for detecting all the traps they have laid out. They have a way of avoiding them, and we need it." Caeden focused, thinking about what the next step needed to be.

"We need to reconnect with the staff and other factions. Old grudges need to be set aside. Right now, the entire school is under attack, and we are at a heavy disadvantage. Every person we can add to a response force is important. The ultimate goal is shutting down the field. After that, the teachers will be able to clear the campus in minutes." Lily picked up.

Caeden nodded, "Right. And that's our job. We strongly suspect that the ethertech creating the field is being powered off the generators for the Core Seat. It's the building with the most power out of the entire school, even the Mess. So besides connecting with and rescuing as many other students‒Forged or otherwise‒as we can, we need to clear a path to the Core Seat. If we can cut off the power, the field comes down, and we win. Everyone clear?"

Nodding all around.

"Great. Start breaking down into groups. Someone start stripping all the ethertech off the revolutionaries. Let's go! The more time we waste, the more students are in danger!" Lily started barking out orders, getting everyone moving. Instantly, the mass of students formed up, falling into place with a word or gesture. Lily excelled at putting people where they needed to be.

Meanwhile, Caeden started looking into the ethertech, trying to parse all its functions. He wasn't sure it was just a communication device. If this tech was anywhere near the level of Kevin's abomination form, he was expecting more from it.

"Uh, Cae, you got a moment?" Caeden looked up to find Erik looking about nervously.

He set the tech aside. "What's up?"

"Well, I don't know what you want me to do. Pretty much all my skills are shut down. I can't even run my danger sense. It's…" He twitched. "I'm kinda not paying attention to it, but I really, really hate it. I just…" He clenched his hands. His face shifted into an uncomfortably large smile, and he started giggling.

Caeden realized that Erik was having his equivalent of a nervous breakdown. Normally that only happened if he was close to dying. But it seemed a prolonged time without his danger sense active was fraying his nerves. "How many times have you almost died today?"

"Honestly, I lost count after fifty. Most of those weren't even bad luck! I think. People keep shooting me." Erik laughed.

Oh, shit. Caeden's eyes widened. Erik never lost track of his death count. Caeden had figured out a while back that it was one of his coping mechanisms. Erik lived in constant danger due to his 'bad luck' which defied all explanation. Counting near-misses was a way for him to quantify the danger and control his perception. He turned it into a game of sorts, making it easier to live with.

Caeden wanted to kick himself. He hadn't thought about how bad being in this field would be for Erik's sanity. It was essentially his friend's worst nightmare made manifest. "Erik, I need you to go in the bunker and get a clear count of all the wea-" He stopped himself. Sending Erik into a small, underground, enclosed space with piles of sharp objects? A bad idea.

"Actually." He looked around, trying to find what he needed. A passing group of Forged was holding some kind of dial or compass. "Hey, is that the trap detector?"

"Oh! Yeah, it is. We just checked it out. It points toward traps and beeps more the closer you get."

"Great, can you give me that one and get another? I need it." Caeden asked.

Wordlessly, they handed it over.

"Erik, I need you to use this and get out of the dome. Give it to the military there and explain what it is. They should have someone on hand who can figure out how to make more. After that, get Sauma working on enclosing the entire Academy in a giant cocoon. We can't let the revolutionaries get away." He handed over the detector.

Erik relaxed, his smile fading to a more normal expression. "Right, thanks, Cae. I'm getting a little loopy being in here. I'll hold the backline. Kick the shit out of some revolutionaries for me, alright?"

Caeden smiled, "Of course, buddy. Now get out of here. Honestly, You can't do much in this field, and we're going to be headed for even worse."

"Yeah, I kinda just stood around and got shot, didn't I?" Erik shook his head. "Well, better luck next time."

Caeden didn't mention the irony of that statement.