Akari trailed Zukan through the library's basement. The massive dragon was surprisingly light on his feet, hardly making a sound as they passed through the shadows. Relia kept pace behind them, while Kalden stayed back with Arturo, acting as his bodyguard while he tinkered with the shields.

Zukan paused at a junction, raising a clawed hand to stop them. He met their eyes, nodded once, then set off on his own.

Akari leaned around the corner and saw two more contestants she didn’t recognize. They’d just emerged from a storage room, turning their backs to Zukan as he crept closer.

She held her breath, half-expecting the dragon to attack with his flaming weapons. Instead, he closed the distance, Cloaked his muscles, and grabbed both men by their throats. Akari didn’t see how they died. Maybe Zukan had pierced their windpipes with his claws. Maybe he’d just squeezed with all his might.

Either way, they faded into clouds of silent white mist.

She’d underestimated Zukan again. Kalden had once described him as “honorable to a fault.” The sort of person who would only attack from the front, and who trusted far too easily. But he’d clearly honed his stealth skills, and he wouldn’t hesitate to use them in battle.

They reached the stairwell a minute later, and Zukan led them up into the library’s main chamber. Tiers of shelves spiraled around the edges of the room, stretching upward for several stories. Morning light filtered in through the stained glass windows, painting the scene in shades of yellow, orange, and blue.

On a typical day, this room was quiet enough to hear the whisper of spacetime mana. Students only spoke in hushed words, and every footstep and rustle of paper seemed to fill the world.

Now, mana soared around them in a dozen colors, slamming into walls, forming craters in the stone. Bookshelves lay on their sides like collapsed dominos, with leather and paper strewn in heaps over the marble floors.

“Get us to the high ground.” Zukan extended a hand toward an upper level where several students fought.

Akari nodded in approval. Several heartbeats passed as she gathered the mana in her palms, then she shot the first Missile between the contestants on the upper floor. She released a second missile in front of them, forming a portal between the two points.

Zukan ducked through, forging a flaming spear in his right hand. Akari and Relia cycled pure mana as they followed.

Akari’s aspect was a game-changer in battle, but things were different with teammates. Now, with Zukan filling the heavy-hitter role, she could conserve her portals for emergencies. As for Relia … well, she’d never liked her death mana, anyway. Besides, this whole alliance hinged on letting Zukan win. Hard to do that with instant-kill techniques.

Their group emerged in the middle of a skirmish: two students from Moon Army against two from Blood Army. So much for the truce. Elise might have riled everyone up, but that wasn’t the same as peace. Sort of the opposite, in fact.

Zukan’s body shone golden as he charged into the fray, slashing his spear in quick arcs. The first strike opened a boy’s throat, then he ducked and brought the weapon around to slice off a girl’s legs.

Akari and Relia focused their attacks on the second pair, aiming to injure rather than kill. One raised a Construct of stone mana, while the other flung metal Missiles around the edges.

Zukan thrust his spear into the ground, leaving a crater in the stone. Then he leapt high into the air, using his spear as a pole to vault over the stone Construct. Three more slashes, and they died like the rest.

This continued over the next few minutes. They made their way around the chamber, combining Akari’s portals with Zukan’s stealth to flank their opponents. Some groups put up a struggle, but Zukan had an answer to everything.

A Stone Artist turned the floor to quicksand, ensnaring their legs. The dragon pressed a palm to the floor and burned the stone itself. Another student struck with a gust of wind that hurled Akari and Relia against the wall. But Zukan’s weapon warped into a massive claw, digging deep into the floor, anchoring his body in place. His spears cut his opponents’ techniques like wet paper, and his fire lent him more speed than any Blade Artist she’d ever seen. Even when someone scored a deep hit, Relia rushed to his defense, sealing the wounds before they bled white mist.

Akari felt like a sidekick after a while, and that rubbed her like a stone in her shoe. Not only was Zukan Kortez at the top of their class, but he had an unbeatable aspect and a perfect dueling record. Meanwhile, she and Relia were filling support roles.

Her peers fought with bursts of raw power, while she had a measly bag of tricks. True, Akari’s aspect was technically more impressive, but it was hard to feel smug in the face of infernos, tidal waves, and tornados. How was she supposed to close this gap? She only had one spacetime technique, while they’d all been refining their aspects for years.

Keep training, she reminded herself. Master by twenty-one. If she’d gone from Bronze to Apprentice in a single year, what could she do with five more?

~~~

Relia fired another pure Missile, hitting her opponent square in his knee. The poor boy collapsed on the floor, and Zukan drove a spear straight through his spine.

Their surviving opponents retreated in two directions. One headed toward the stairwell while the others ran down another aisle.

“Take him,” Zukan said. “We’ll go this way.”

Relia nodded. She didn’t like chasing people down, but she understood her group’s reasons. This whole plan hinged on keeping Arturo safe while he worked on the shields. A few more contestants had already gotten into the basement, and they couldn’t risk them overwhelming Kalden.

But this guy didn’t head for the basement. Instead, he cut behind the staff desk toward the main doors. Relia saw his path in her mind’s eye. and she shot a pure Missile toward the doorway. The technique was as small as a bullet and as sharp as a dagger. And when the boy reached the doorway, the mana dug straight into his spine.

Relia skidded to a halt as her opponent dissolved into white mist. The library’s outer doors hung wide open, and she ducked behind the wall as several pairs of footsteps echoed in the vestibule.

Elise Moonfire strode inside the library, flanked by a pair of stern-looking bodyguards. Her uniform was free of dust, and her hair fell around her face in golden waves. Azul’s ashes, even her makeup looked fresh.

Relia remained hidden behind the door, shrouding her soul as well as she could. Better to wait for her teammates at this point.

A Light Artist appeared a few paces in front of Elise. Short and muscular, she had her brown hair pulled back in a tight braid. Relia thought her name was Aurora, but there were so many first-years, and she struggled to keep them straight in her head.

“Report,” Elise said.

“I got a visual,” Aurora replied. “Zukan Kortez is alive.”

“That’s impossible.” Elises scrunched up her face as if this were a personal insult. “We watched him and Arturo go down.”

Aurora gave a helpless shrug. “Just telling you what I saw. He even fought—”

“Fine,” Elise interrupted. “I believe you. Who’s he with?”

“Dawnfire and Zeller.”

“Damnit.” Elise grabbed a handful of her hair. Despite her polished appearance, her eyes looked weary and sleep deprived. “How’d they even get in here?”

“Zeller can make portals, right?”

“Not through walls,” Elise snapped back.

“These doors are open.” Her bodyguard gestured behind them. “And space mana has no range limit.”

He was half right. Akari could technically shoot a spacetime Missile several miles away, but her accuracy wasn’t good enough to get through an open doorway. She’d been lucky to hit the broad side of a building during their retreat.

“Okay,” Elise said after a short pause. “Pull back our forces and guard the exits. We’ll work out a plan from there.”

The ambush came the second they turned their backs. The ground shook like an earthquake, and two massive arms of stone sprang up around them. One grabbed Aurora, squeezing her with its thick fingers and slamming her hard into the ceiling. The second arm grabbed Elise and knocked her to the floor.

Relia recognized the techniques at once. They belonged to Kohen Grandhall, a Stone Artist from Relia’s class. And if Kohen was here …

The wooden doors sprang to life. Each plank moved like melted plastic, knotting together to bar the exit. At the same time, a dozen green vines slithered in through the gaps. Some reached out and grabbed Elise’s bodyguards. Others grew thorns like razor blades and broke their skin.

That would be Kohen’s girlfriend, Tessa Greenleaf. Those two had been a power couple since they were first-years, especially when they combined their crowd-control techniques.

Elise extended her left arm, raising a pure mana shield against the vines. She continued struggling for breath, Cloaking her body against the pressure of the stone hand.

Kohen stepped around the corner, wearing a smug expression and a full suit of stone body armor. Elise shot him with a dream Missile, but the mana bounced harmlessly off the stone.

Tessa’s vines struck like vipers. One twisted around Elise’s throat while another struck the center of her chest. She tried to cry out, but the first vine blocked her airflow. White light spilled from the wound, and her Cloak dimmed to a pale blue.

Relia had planned to wait for backup, but that plan changed when they wounded her little sister. Despite everything Elise had done, some primal instinct drove Relia to action.

She sprang from her hiding spot, forming a cloud of green life mana around her body.

Her opponents reacted at once. Kohen hurled a flying stone fist toward her shoulder, but Relia flared her Life Cloak, hardening every cell at the point of impact. Stone might be tough, but humans were even tougher when they wanted to be.

Tessa’s vines withered as the cloud of death engulfed them, crumbling to dust as they shrank back to their maker.

Unfortunately, Relia couldn’t break the stone arms that held her sister. She’d tried many times in Raizen’s class, and she’d always failed. Kohen’s Constructs were simply too thick, and her own Cloak was better suited to defense than destruction. To make matters worse, Kohen’s Stone Cloak made him almost invulnerable to pure mana techniques.

But even the strongest Cloaks couldn’t resist healing. Relia interposed her body between him and Elise, pressing a hand to his chest. She’d never used her aspect this way in a school game—not until yesterday. And despite all the rumors, none of her classmates knew enough to be truly afraid of her.

Kohen faded into a cloud of pale mist, and his stone Constructs faded with him. Elise collapsed like a limp doll, and Relia barely caught her. White mist flowed out from her wounds, but she wasn’t dead yet.

Relia cycled life mana as she prepared to heal her sister. Before she could, more footsteps echoed out from the main chamber. Probably a whole stampede fleeing from Zukan.

Without a second thought, Relia threw Elise over her shoulder and fled back through the staff room.