Mark smirked and dropped into a fighting stance. Lightning crackled along his body, his pupils dilating. He had never tested this ability before only built it in theory but now was the perfect chance.
Worst case scenario, I just drop the oxygen in here and knock everyone out, he thought as a faint, halo like ring of lightning formed behind him.
He focused, reading the faint impulses of his opponents' bodies, every twitch of muscle and nerve sparking like a map in his mind.
Shadow began laughing manically. "You can't kill us. We're nobles our parents would spare no expense to hunt you down."
That's why I'm not going to kill you, idiot. I'm just going to give you permanent brain damage, Mark thought, masking his intent behind a cold smirk. "You forget the head priest is backing me. He won't allow them anywhere near me."
Shadow's face twisted in rage. "Kill him! Everyone, attack! I want him dead!"
Mark laughed internally. Truth is, the head priest wouldn't cover for a murderer. They'd lock me up and use my family as leverage. But you don't need to know that.
Dozens of spells lit up the room giant fireballs, arcs of lightning, crashing waves of water, and stone bullets. They all came at him at once.
Mark slipped between them with ease, ducking under searing flames, weaving past earth projectiles, and leaping over rushing water. Every movement felt like he was simply stepping into the future he already saw.
He snatched a second year student, yanking him into the path of a stone bullet, then caught a lightning arrow with his, mana coated hand. In the same motion, he rammed it into another attacker's shoulder, dropping him instantly.
Some of the braver second years abandoned magic entirely, rushing in for hand to hand combat only to find themselves hopelessly outmatched.
One second-year charged at Mark with a fist coated in fire, but Mark sidestepped, grabbed the student's wrist, and twisted sharply. The boy cried out as his knees buckled, and Mark sent him crashing into two others who were mid cast, breaking their concentration.
A wind blade sliced toward his neck from behind Mark ducked, feeling the razor air skim past his hair. Without even looking, he swept his leg back, knocking the attacker off balance. A quick jab to the gut sent the boy wheezing to the ground.
The room was chaos shouts, explosions, and scattered debris filled the air but to Mark, everything moved in slow motion. Every twitch of a muscle, every shift of weight, every spark of mana gave away the enemy's next action before they made it.
A girl tried to trap him with vines from the floor. Mark stomped, channeling mana through his foot, shattering the spell's roots before they could bind him. He surged forward, grabbed her collar, and hurled her into a cluster of mages preparing a combined spell.
The impact broke their formation, and the magic circle fizzled out with a violent crack.
Shadow gritted his teeth, his mana flaring wildly. "Enough of this! Everyone together!"
Dozens of spells ignited at once, their power surging into the air like a storm about to burst. The heat, the static, and the pressure were enough to make the stone walls groan.
Mark smirked. "Let's end this."
He exhaled, then moved. To the watching students, he was a blur—sliding past attacks that should have been impossible to dodge, striking throats, twisting arms, sweeping legs. He moved like a phantom between lightning bolts and fire, untouched, relentless.
When the last fireball was spent, the floor was littered with groaning bodies, the air thick with the stench of burnt mana. Only Mark and Shadow remained standing.
Shadow's eyes twitched. "…You really think you've won?"
Mark cracked his knuckles. "No dumbass. I know I have."
Shadow gritted his teeth, then tore open a swirling black portal behind him.
From its depths, a giant porcelain puppet emerged only the upper half pushing through, its head nearly brushing the ceiling. Its eyes were covered in tight white bandages, and in the center of its chest pulsed a crystalline core.
Six massive hands stretched outward. In five of them, raw elemental forces churned water, earth, wind, fire, and lightning each swirling violently as if eager to be unleashed. The sixth, its lower left hand, was wrapped protectively around Shadow, forming a hardened barrier.
Mark chuckled under his breath.
"Really? This is your trump card? I can see the weak point clear as day."
Shadow didn't return the banter. His narrowed eyes burned with irritation.
"Arise."
Mana threads burst from his fingertips, latching onto the bodies of every unconscious student in the room. Their limp forms jerked upright, eyes still closed, faces still slack but their mana cores ignited. Spells began to take shape in their hands, the air around them thick with unstable magic.
Mark's smile faltered slightly.
"…Right. I forgot you could do that."
He glanced down at his footing, centering his breathing, then raised his guard again. He couldn't predict their abilities anymore but at this point, it didn't matter.
Mark shut off Future Sight and activated Enhanced Perception, flooding his nerves with lightning magic. The electrical signals in his brain surged, his reflexes sharpening until every motion around him seemed to crawl in slow motion. It wasn't as perfect as reading people's movement with future sight but it would be enough.
Mana roared through his veins as he unleashed stronger spells. Waves of fire erupted from his hands, colliding with gusts of cutting wind that tore through the crowd of puppet-controlled students. They fell one after another, clearing his path to the towering giant puppet ahead.
The behemoth's mana flared. A barrage of elemental blasts rained down on Mark fireballs, jagged ice, compressed wind blades. He weaved through them with ease, each dodge leaving only a hair's breadth between him and death.
One of the puppet's massive arms swung like a wrecking ball. Mark's feet barely touched the ground before he launched himself upward, the incoming strike exploding into the earth behind him, a shockwave tearing dust and stone into the air.
"Wind Magic: Whirlwind!"
The air howled to life. Mark's gale transformed the rising dust into a raging storm, blinding the giant's vision. Cloaked in the chaos, he sprinted up its arm in a blur, boots pounding against its wooden plates until he reached its chest.
There the crystal heart.
Mana crackled in his hand as he conjured an earthen gauntlet, its movement speed increased with condensed wind magic to amplify the force. He drove his fist forward.
BAM!
BAM!
BAM!
With each blow, spiderweb cracks spread across the crystal's surface.
From below, Shadow's voice broke in panic.
"No, NO!"
The puppet's other hand shot toward him like a falling mountain.
Mark didn't hesitate. He kicked off the puppet's chest, twisting in midair. In his palm, fire condensed into a seething orb, heat distorting the air around it.
"Burn."
The fireball streaked forward
BOOM!
It detonated the moment the puppet's hand slammed into its chest. The blast ripped through the crystal, shards scattering like molten glass as the giant let out a deafening, mechanical roar.
The giant puppet's body crumbled into dust, fragments scattering like ash in the wind.
Shadow's fists trembled with rage.
"I won't let you continue to disrespect me like this!"
From his robes, he pulled out a cube—its surface a swirling tapestry of stars, collapsing galaxies, and black voids. It radiated a mana so alien, so suffocating, that even the air seemed to recoil from it.
Mark's eyes narrowed, instinctively reaching out with his senses. The mana wasn't just strong it filled the entire chamber like an ocean pressing down on his chest. It twisted into a colossal, dragon shaped silhouette… except it bore no scales. Instead, its hide was rough, leather like, and ancient.
Its head was like a sand worn idol of a woman, but its mouth rows upon rows of jagged teeth stretching endlessly down its throat. Above them, a single massive eye glared down, its pupil replaced by a burning red kanji [災] Calamity.
Mark's body moved before his mind did. He stepped back. His pulse spiked. His mana core screamed at him to run, as if every fiber of his being recognized this thing not by name, but by the primal certainty of death.
Shadow saw the fear and grinned like a man who had already won.
"So… you recognize it. Then you know what's coming next."
Mark didn't know what it was. But the presence behind it was like the weight of every grave ever dug, pressing against his soul.
Shadow raised the cube ready to unleash it
SCHKT!
A blade punched clean through his heart. His eyes went wide.
From the shadows behind him, a familiar silhouette emerged the same figure from the girls' dorms. The same one who had commanded those strange humanoid shadows.
The cube was already in his hand.
A suffocating shadowy aura swirled around him, blotting out detail until only one thing was visible his eyes. Blood red, burning through the darkness.
He bowed mockingly slow.
"Forgive my associate for causing you trouble," the voice rasped, warped and inhuman. "Please, accept my… humble apologies."
Then he was gone. The cube vanished with him, leaving only the faint echo of his presence.
Mark stood frozen. Whatever that thing was, its image still lingered in his mind like a brand. His mana core still throbbed, urging him to never cross paths with it again.
But there was still the matter of Shadow sprawled lifeless on the ground, a deep, unhealable wound across his chest. A blood cleaver. No potion could mend that.
Mark couldn't let the blame fall on him.
With a flicker of lightning mana, he sent crackling currents through the room. Each unconscious student's body jerked briefly enough to inflict minor amnesia, leaving their short term memory in tatters.
He pulled a sword from the suit of armor in the adjoining hall and curled one student's fingers around it, dragging the body closer to Shadow's corpse.
"That should be enough to fool them when they wake up…" he muttered.
"Space magic: special tear "
A portal shimmered open at his back, leading to the surface. Without looking back, he stepped through toward Zara, Opal, and Jessie, who were waiting for him.