# Slayers GD: Book 1--The Assassin Strikes

Author: Behemel
Tags: Fantasy, Human, Magic, Plot Development, Werewolf

#1 of Slayers GD series

Zane Cosmon, a student at the Saillune Sorcery Academy, had always thirsted to aspire in sorcery to become a well renown sorcerer like legends before his time. Though powerful in his own right, he is a handful in the classroom. However he is put to the test when a mysterious assassin enters the once assumed impregnable walls of the academy. Dreaming of adventure all his life, Zane gets his wish as the assassin has set his sight on one perticular target. Him. This is a story of the next generation of Slayers! (A fanfic based on the Slayers series)

Slayers  
GD: Generation of the Dragon ©

Book  
1: The Assassin Strikes

A  
fan fiction by Behemel

 

 

           "Aw crud," I said, "Not another D!"

            I hated astral classes. Don't get me wrong. I loved magic, but every time I tried  
to use a spell like Shadow Snap I'd screw up. The test we were taking was for  
the study of using magic upon the astral plane. My worst subject. The written  
part I did well, but when I performed it, I guess I didn't use enough energy or  
focus. The spell was to nail a knife into a shadow and immobilize a person.  
Instead, the knife appeared on my own shadow. The entire class laughed at me!

            _I should have thrown a fireball at them._

            "Why! Why me!"

            "Didn't you practice?" Master Zolis asked. I had stayed after class to discuss my  
grades with him. Even though I wanted to be a full-fledged sorcerer, magic  
school can be a drag at times. "Practice makes perfect, you know."

            "Yeah, yeah," I groaned, slumping forward a bit. "But I got most of the questions  
right on the written test. How could I still get a D just because I failed in  
performance?"

            The old priest scratched his chin for a moment. "To know something is important,  
but testing your knowledge in real-life situations is important as well."

            I grumbled again, holding the knife I conjured from my failed spell. I was more  
skilled in shamanic magic and black magic. I had put a lot of effort in my  
studies; however Shadow Snap was not an easy feat for me.

            "You shouldn't really worry. It was just one test," my teacher reassured.

            "Okay. If you'll excuse me sir," I said and quickly left the room.

            I suppose I should mention where my school was. The sorcerer's academy that I'm  
attending is located near the heart of Saillune, practically next door to the  
royal palace grounds. What made this town a great place for the academy was for  
two reasons. One, the city's layout itself was the shape of a giant hexagram,  
which represented the balance of power and increased White magic spells. Also,  
the royal council greatly supports the school, making it a great place for  
young sorcerers to learn sorcery.

I strolled down the hall for my next class. Alchemy, another brain strainer because of all the  
mathematics involved. Just to be clear, it wasn't as if I was dumb or anything.  
But sometimes my studies can have bad... _side effects_. In my first year, I  
studied like mad. I found every spell I could get my hands on. And then at the  
end of my first year, I kind of did something I sort of regret. I cast a teeny,  
tiny, itty-bitty Dragon Slave spell on the school gymnasium. In my defense, gym  
class was more of a hindrance. They should have thanked me for blowing it up,  
not scold me just because it wasn't my favorite class.

            From time to time as I practiced my spells, I had accidentally caused some property  
damage. Not as big, but still. What's the point of learning magic if you can't  
test your skills?

            _Come on here. Throw me a freakin' bone!_

            As I approached Alchemy class, I heard someone call my name.

            "Oh Zane! _Zaaaannee!_"

            I wished someone had reduced me to a pile of ash just to avoid who it was. The  
overly cheerful voice caused me to stop in my tracks as I turned around. To my  
horror, it was Cassandra. She held her books in her arms as she ran up to me  
with her smug little smile. I bet she loved to torture me this way.

            Cassandra was one of the high ranked students in my class. She was skilled in the white  
magic and was an expert in Alchemy class. I remembered having to gravel at her  
feet to help me with demonic synthesis. Okay, gravel is pushing it a bit. But  
it was not fun having her poke fun at my poor points.

            "Hi Cassandra," I replied slowly.

She had long blond hair and wore a snug white priestess robe that hung off her. She smiled at me with another one of her playful looks. "Another failed spell again? Tee hee!"

            "Oh, sure. What a way to kick me while I'm down!" I grumbled as she walked aside me.  
"Do you like seeing me mess up?"

            "Of course not," she chirped, making me roll my eyes. She then spotted the knife I  
still held in my hands. "Strange though. A Shadow Snap knife usually disappears  
after an hour or so. Its weird how yours doesn't." She almost sounded  
intrigued.

            Truth was, I never really thought of that. It just always happened. I was slightly  
intrigued myself now to listen to her.

            "I bet their trophies of your failed spells. You probably have a lot of them," She  
chirped again in her cheery voice.

            OUCH! Now that hurt! I couldn't believe I actually thought that girl would give me a  
compliment so easily. I bet she loved seeing me steam.

            "Are you trying to get me mad?" I asked in a raised voice.

            She appeared shocked and shook her head. "Oh no. I don't mean to infuriate you,"  
she said.

            _Okay. So she's not mean. Just annoying!_

            No sooner had we entered the Alchemy lab, we got to our seats, Cassandra sitting  
next to me. As soon as all the other students got to their seats, our teacher  
Master Krots entered. To our surprise when we first met, he was a beast-man, a  
brown werewolf. He looked kind of funny all dressed in his red robe with  
glasses on his mussel.

            "Okay class. Today we are going to finish our work on containment artifacts. For you  
non-listeners, they are objects that hold one spell that can be released upon  
contact." The werewolf then took out a small red stone from behind his desk and  
placed it down. "Now everyone get out their stones and cast your spells on it.  
Nothing large, I'll remind you."

            Funny though that professor Krots's eyes came to me as I listened. In case I failed  
to mention, I had a bad track record for small spells. As his gaze went away, I  
took out our stone. It was a brilliant blue flat gem that Cassandra and I had  
made together. Inside was a hexagram, the focus where the spell was to be sent.

            "Okay," Cassandra said as she reviewed her notes of what we did to make the thing. She  
then looked at the hexagram, checking to make sure our work was correct. "I  
think we're finished all the touches of our work. Of course, this is my best  
class and reason I got the high honor roll!"

            _If you get high honor roll for being a know-it-all smarty-pants, then you blew  
them all away._

            "Now all we need is the spell," Cassandra said simply.

            And then boys and girls, I jumped into action. "I'll do it," I answered  
immediately.

            She didn't listen. She just ignored me on purpose. She placed a finger on her chin  
and looked at the ceiling as if in deep thought. I caught the look of dread on  
her face. "Hm, what spell should I put on it?"

            _Okay, now I was pissed._

            "Come on, let me!" I said.

            "Healing... no. Probably lighting..."

            "HEY!" I practically shouted, grabbing her attention. "I said I could do the spell!"

            A sweat drop dripped from her face as she gave a nervous chuckle. "Are you sure?  
I can do it myself."

            "Let me repeat: I'll. Do. It," I spelled out for her.

            Giving a shrug, she pushed the stone before me. As if to silently give her opinion,  
she pushed her chair a small distance away from me as soon as she gave me the  
stone. She was making me feel as if I was some sort of monster or something.

            With a small sour look at her, I placed my hands onto the stone and chanted my  
spell. My hands glowed with a reddish light as I focused my spell into the  
sealed crystal. Cassandra listened as I chanted, recognizing the spell right  
off the bat.

            "Um Zane," she asked to be sure she heard right, "What was that spell?"

            Not looking at her, I removed my hands as the red light disappeared into the stone.  
"Nothing big. Just a fireball."

            "A FIREBALL!?"

            I immediately looked to her and held my finger to my mouth, telling her to hush  
up. "Say it a little louder, why don't ya. I don't think Master Krots heard  
you," I hissed.

            "Actually, I did."

            My gaze narrowed and a nervous sensation shot up my spine. I turned to who said  
that. To my left, standing right next to our table shadowed the beastly  
werewolf, Mater Krots. He had his arms folded across his chest and looked down  
at me, his gaze peering through the corner of his glasses. "A fireball, Zane?"  
he asked in a calm, yet crossed tone.

            _A footnote: Never, **ever** give a werewolf with a grade book a reason to get  
angry with you._  

            I gave a nervous chuckle at my teacher, seeing the unyielding, wolf-like nature  
in his eye. "Is that all you cast?" he asked clearly.

            I nodded vigorously. "Yes sir, I swear," I said simply.

            His  
gaze remained at me for a moment. Then with a huff, he stepped away back to  
check on the other students' work. I turned to Cassandra. She too looked  
uneasy. I couldn't tell weather it was because of our werewolf teacher or me.

            "Are  
you sure you don't want me to do the test run on it?" she asked me wearily.

            That  
answered my question.

            "I  
can do it," I said grumpily.

            Before  
long, everyone was at the back of the lab. Master Krots had put up a barrier  
near the back of the room so any misfires or destructive spells would be  
contained. All of us now waited for the first instructions.

            "Now  
class," Master Krots said strictly, "You are to place your containment stones  
into the field and unleash the spells you've placed in them." He waved for one  
of the students into the field and he stepped in. The kid put the stone onto  
the ground and quickly stepped out of the glow of the barrier.

            "Unlock!"  
he spoke. With a glow, a ball of bright light flashed into existence from the  
charm.

            "Excellent,"  
Krots complimented as the student retrieved his expelled charm. "Next."

            My  
classmates had cast pretty simple spells. Nothing creative though. Most of the  
charms held spells like healing and lighting, and the small fireball or two.  
Then, it was my turn. Cautiously, I stepped into the field and dropped the  
stone onto the floor. As I turned back, I saw that Cassandra had back away to  
the rear of the group. That girl had an unconscious way of ticking me off. As I  
stepped out of the field, everyone as well took a step away except for the  
barrier.

            _What  
am I, a calamity upon humanity!?_

            "Go  
on Zane," Krots said simply, the only one who hadn't backed away. "Unleash the  
spell." At least Master Krots wasn't afraid.

            Acting  
carefully, I held my hands in the direction of the field and focused on the  
charm. "Unlock!" The gem let out a red glow and quickly let lose a small amount  
of flame. Or at least that's what _should_ have happened.

            Upon  
activation, the red glow grew bigger and bigger in size, quickly filling up the  
space within the enclosed field. Truth was I hadn't anticipated the fireball  
spell to be that powerful. It shouldn't have been. A loud hum echoed through  
the room, causing everyone to take a step back including me. Flickers of flame  
could be seen as the light filled up the space of the field and then it  
happened.

            KA-BOOM!!!

            Smoke  
swept through the room, casting everyone into a coughing fit. I remained very,  
very still as if mortified by what I'd done. The smoke soon cleared and to my  
horror. In the back of the room, a large hole had appeared through the wall,  
smoldering smoke from it. The warding field on the ground had been reduced to  
smudges on the floor. And the worse case of all, stood next to me.

I was thankful  
that the warding spell somehow diverted most of the damage to the wall, because  
standing before me was my teacher. Specks of black soot were dotted upon his  
fur and smoke trailed off his robe. His red robe had several burns along it,  
making his overall appearance a complete mess.      His  
teeth showed as he looked at me with crossed eyes. A growl softly escaped his  
lips. I swear I saw him shaking in pent up anger.

            _This is not good,_

_           _ Voicing his growl, he angrily  
pointed to the door. It wasn't a hard guess. I knew exactly where he was  
sending me. And another mark on my track record.

 

 

            The  
elegant room glistened with the sunlight coming through the stain glass  
windows. The delicate decoration of the chamber seemed almost holy. I stood in  
the center before a wooden desk. Sitting behind it was an old lady in a white  
and gold priestess robe with her staff near her side. She appeared harmless at  
the time.

            "NOT  
ANOTHER ONE!" she shouted at me with a booming voice.

            _Okay, almost harmless..._

_           _ Her voice caused me to cringe at  
her tone. She wrote down something on a form, her movements of the pen furious.  
"We had hoped that this time of devastation would be kept to a minimum, Zane.  
And every time, EVERY TIME you have always exceeded our expectations!"

            I  
gave a nervous chuckle, hoping to put my cunning to work and turn my trouble  
around. "Well," I said with a smile, "I'm happy to except your praise,  
ma'am--."

            The  
base of her pen suddenly snapped as she was writing from gripping too hard. She  
banged the table as she quickly stood up. "I'M NOT PRAISING YOU!" she scolded.

            That  
plan backfired. _Where does the old lady  
get all this energy? Geez..._

             I decided then to keep my mouth shut for a  
moment as she steamed. Slowly she sat herself back down at her desk and placed  
her broken pen to the side. "As headmistress of the sorcery academy, you know I  
cannot let such actions go unpunished," she breathed calmly.

            "But  
headmistress," I spoke out to prove my innocence. Okay, innocence probably was  
the wrong image to go with. "It was an accident. All I cast was a fireball and  
it just violently blew up. I didn't mean to blow a hole in the wall."

            "THAT'S  
WHAT FIREBALLS DO!" she shouted again.

            I  
lowered my head to yield to her criticism. I couldn't understand it. The  
barrier in Professor Krots's class was designed to keep spells contained  
inside. Even though it wasn't build to uphold super destructive spells, a  
fireball could only do so much damage. Then again, I the strength of a fireball  
spell differ from the person using it. Even so, _mine_ shouldn't have the  
power to break a warding barrier and cause enough damage to blow up the Alchemy  
lab.

            _I'm  
starting to think I'm a jinks here..._

            Taking  
off her glasses for a moment and rubbing the clean, the headmistress, Ms.  
Magdalene looked at me with her blue eyes and sighed. "Zane," she said calmly,  
"I'm assigning you to help Master Krots clean up the Alchemy lab, starting this  
afternoon. On top of that, you are to report to him for detention for the  
remainder of the week. Do you understand?"

            "Yes  
ma'am."

            I  
turned around and headed for the door. Just as I was about to turn the  
doorknob, I stopped hesitantly. I turned back to Ms. Magdalene, who now looked  
back to the papers on her desk.

            "Headmistress,"  
I asked hesitantly. She drew her gaze towards me. My gaze slightly trembled before  
her. "I just wanted to let you know, that the spell I cast _was indeed_ a  
common fireball. Let alone it was within a warding field. I'm not lying to  
you." I caught a glimmer of, what surprised me concern and sincerity in her  
eyes. "Good day."

            I  
easily left the room and closed the door behind me. As I walked to face the  
music with Master Krots, I couldn't help but think that there was something  
wrong with me. Why did my magic always go array in power and strength. When I  
blew up the gymnasium, I had gotten wind of a couple of people that talked  
about me. That at my age of twelve, I was able to pull off the strongest spell  
a human being could wield. It had taken grown men years to learn it. I couldn't  
explain it.

            _Don't  
get a swelled head there, Zane._

            Then,  
as I moved out of the grand hall into the normal school building, I ran into  
that overly cheerful, scorch from the bowls of hell itself, Cassandra again.  
"Bet she gave you something _baaaad!"_ she teased.

            _Never  
fireball a girl! Never fireball a girl!_

Too bummed and too  
tired to respond, I simply walked past her. I'd given up trying to outwit her  
for one day. She abruptly followed me as I made my way to the Alchemy lab.

            "Let  
me guess," she quipped, "She made you go and rebuild the lab, didn't she?"

            Again,  
I kept quiet.

            She  
tried to look me in the eye as I kept my gaze to the floor.

            "Would  
you like me to help you?" she asked simply. Her words grabbed me by surprise  
and I stopped.

            _Cassandra?  
OFFERING her help?! I'm dreaming! The bane of my sanity is actually helping me  
here!_

_           _ Still  
with the gloomy look on my face, to not give off my surprise, I turned around  
towards her. "What's the catch?" I asked, checking to make sure of her  
sincerity.

            "No  
catch at all. I just want to know if you want any help," she replied.

            I  
was caught off guard. After a moment to think it over, I released a small sigh  
of relief. "Thank you," I said hesitantly, "That's very nice of you."

            Cassandra  
gave a small smile. "Of course, I'm nice," she said cheerfully, "Do I look like  
the sinister type?"

            I  
had to admit, she'd put a smile on my face. It was what I needed after all.  
Walking along side her, we headed back to Master Krots class. She was actually  
kind of nice. I might have been wrong about her after all.

            "So,  
how bad did she say you screwed up their budget? I'd hate for her to cancel any  
clubs to repay the damages."

            I  
fell over.

            _I  
WAS RIGHT! AAUUGH!_

_ _

 

            The  
sunlight of the late afternoon shined through the windows and the gaping hole  
in the wall as Master Krots and I tried to clean up the place. I had shooed  
away Cassandra after she insulted me again. I swear the girl was hardheaded.  
Master Krots did the small work like sweeping and cleaning the soot off his  
desk and left me the grunt work. I was pushing rubble aside and moving the  
desks and chairs to the side of the room. After a while he did help me with the  
heavy lifting. It was actually good at time to have a teacher who wasn't human.

            After  
the two of us hauled a box of heavy equipment to the side of the room, my  
werewolf teacher gave a sigh and wiped some sweat from his furry brow. "Whew,  
this is surely a workout for an afternoon, wouldn't you say?" Krots asked me. I  
just gave a grumbled hum in response.

            I  
had to admit, I admired Master Krots as a teacher. He was always the kind of  
guy you could share a good laugh with. Besides, I always try to keep on my  
teachers' good sides. Don't give me that look. So one or two explosions in  
their class, I'm a nice guy. Really!

            Just  
at that moment, returning to pay my dept to the destruction I caused kind of  
made me gloomy again. As I went to lift another box over to his desk, he gave  
me an almost sympathetic look.

            "Zane,"  
Master Krots said, "Come on, cheer up a little. You're acting as if it's the  
end of the world."

            "I'm  
just tired of getting into trouble because my spells are so strong," I wallowed  
as I heaved up a box from the ground. In my stubborn state, I didn't know it  
was so heavy and at the time I didn't seem to care. "It was an accident, Master  
Krots! I'm sorry!"

            At  
that time, Master Krots ran up to me with his impressive speed and grabbed the  
box from my hands. He took it himself and granted me relief of the heavy load.  
"I know it was Zane," he said kindly, an almost soothing tone of voice. "But  
none the less, you are responsible for your actions. You know that right?"

            I  
rolled my eyes. Of course I knew! I always took responsibility for what  
misdeeds I did. I never tried to wheedle out of a detention or anything. "I do.  
I just want to be a great sorcerer. What's the point of learning these great  
spells if I never get a chance to use them?" I asked.

            "From  
what I know of offensive spells, like the ones you like to show off," Master  
Krots said as he easily placed the heavy box onto his desk. "Is that you know  
them in hopes that you never have to use them. To defend yourself."

            I  
cocked a look at him, his back facing me. "Defend myself from what?" I asked.

            He  
didn't answer right away. In fact, he stood there for a second frozen as if  
he'd stepped on a poisonous scorpion. He then turned around to me, giving me a  
carefree look. "Oh, you know... just bad people... out there," he said cautiously,  
ending with a nervous chuckle.

            _Not  
very convincing, teach._

_           _ I  
cast a suspicious glance at him; not knowing what he insinuated with that  
little comment. Before I could push the envelope any further on the subject,  
Master Krots headed for the door. "Excuse me," he said calmly, "I must use the  
rest room for a moment." Acting quickly, he stepped out of the room and went  
down the hall.

            As  
I heard his footsteps fade away, I stuck my head out of the lab. With a look up  
and down the hall, the coast was now clear, allowing me to do my magic.  
Stepping out into the hall, I turned back to the doorway and the view of the  
ruined room inside.

            Cupping  
my hand as if to hold a ball I chanted a small spell under my breath. As I gave  
a small exhale of focus, a small ball of white light appeared in my hand. It  
was a little white magic trick I used when I was asked to clean my dorm room.  
One of my original spells. With a small toss, the ball of white light fluttered  
into the room as if it was a fairy's soul.

            As  
it reached inside, it released a strong flash and covered the room in its glow.  
The light faded away, and I let out a smile of victory. The spell had worked  
better than I'd hoped. The room was completely spotless. The tables and desks  
were all back in their original places. The shelves were in place and not a  
single scorch mark was left on the walls or floor. What really surprised me was  
that the hole in the wall was completely gone. It was as if nothing had  
happened in there. I felt a little nervous. Obviously, Master Krots would know  
well that I had used magic to clean the room.

            "Zane,"  
I heard his voice.

            _And  
the garbage has hit the fan._

_           _ Walking  
towards me was indeed Krots, back from his bathroom break. "What are you doing  
out here?" he asked as he approached the room. I was about to convince him to  
come back later but he simply walked around me and looked inside.

            A  
gasp of surprise came from him as he observed the clean room. He almost looked  
frightened as he saw it. Slowly he turned to me. Not with a look of scorn, but  
amazement. "Did you do this?" he asked me like a whisper. I nodded slowly. 

            After  
a spooky moment of silence, Master Krots cleared his throat with a small cough.  
"Well then, ahem, I believe then we are done with the clean up here," he said,  
reverting to his kind expression. "Why don't you go up for dinner now? You've  
worked hard enough."

            I had to admit, I was a little  
hesitant to the way he was acting. It was almost suspicious. "Okay," I said  
simply and walked towards the cafeteria, "Goodnight sir." Heading for the  
cafeteria, I couldn't help but think that Master Krots was hiding something  
from me. As soon as I was about to become paranoid about it all, the sound of  
my growling stomach saved me from the headache. I quickly rushed for the dinner  
hall.

 

            After  
dinner, I went strait up to my room in the priest's dorm. Stashing a bag of  
cookies I salvaged from the desert table away, I immediately headed for my  
desk. Under the framework was a thin drawer. I had magically locked the draw.  
It was common among sorcerers to keep their spells and discoveries secret. My  
journal held everything I learned and came up with to aid my magic studies.  
Many go about hoping to steal one another's work. Garbage like that always got  
me steamed.

            Disenchanting  
the lock, I opened the draw to reveal a light-tanned journal with a gold  
engraving on it, supposedly Ceiphied the dragon god. Hastily, I grabbed the  
book and flopped onto my bed. I opened the book to the last of my entries.

            I  
had a dream, a dream that drove me to learn as much about magic as I could and  
beyond. I had read of great sorcerers, like Rei Magnus and Lina Inverse. The  
powers they invoked and accomplished left their marks on history for all time.  
My dream was to one day surpass them all. To be the greatest sorcerer of all  
time.

            I  
wrote into my book like a poet in possession of a hundred muses. Casting a  
lighting spell up towards the ceiling, a sphere of light lit my room. Time  
passed unnoticed to me. The late afternoon quickly turned to night as I  
continued to write and draw diagrams for my spells.

            Taking  
a moment to look back at one of my favorite notes, I found a part with the  
incantations and description of one of the most powerful spells in shamanistic  
magic. It was Rei Magnus's spell called the Blast Bomb. Only three sorcerers in  
history have ever cast this spell. Rei Magnus, who invented the spell, a mysterious  
priest, which had hardly any information about him, not even a name, and Lina  
Inverse. She had existed two hundred years ago, but her adventures are told far  
and wide as a legend.

            Anyway,  
the Blast Bomb was a spell I practiced when I ever got the chance to test it  
(Particularly away from public property). I never got so much of a flicker of  
light from my attempts. I just knew if I could find a way to cast that spell, I  
could at least come close to my idols in magic. It was probably strong enough  
to damage a dragon with a direct hit.

            _Okay, now that's my imagination running away  
from me. Hey! Get back here!_

             According to my research, it required a large  
amount of magic capacity in order for spells like that to work. That always  
brought me down. I'd practice spell casting exercised in order to slowly  
develop a stronger magic capacity, but it hadn't gotten very far yet.  
Nonetheless, the Blast Bomb was my most favorite spell.

            Before  
I knew it, lost in my creative frenzy, I began to feel tired and my eyes felt  
heavy with exhaustion. It had been a trying day. With my book still clutched in  
my hands, I curled up to my pillow and rested my head for a moment. The magic  
light I had cast finally faded out and left the room dark. The only light came  
from the window as the clouds passed over the full moon.

            Too  
comfy on my bed, I closed my book and held it close as I felt myself drift off.  
As I was only seconds from passing out, I imagined myself in the midst of a  
magnificent battle. Looking as dramatic as a superhero, I pictured what I  
imagined Blast Bomb would look like. There I would be, standing high on a cliff  
with a band of bandits below me. With the release of my words, I imagined  
several spheres of light would crash towards the ground on which the thieves stood.  
Upon impact, the spheres released a devastating blast.

            KA-BOOOOOM!!!

            "I  
didn't do it!" I shouted as I shot up from my bed.

            _Sorry, reflex._

            The  
sound of an actual explosion completely woke me, and probably everyone else who  
was smart enough to react to a giant eruption like that. I could hear the  
sounds of shouts from the rooms next to me as I looked around in a panic. At  
first, I thought that I might have actually blown up something as I dreamt the  
Blast Bomb spell but the glow outside my window told me otherwise.

            I  
quickly pulled myself out of my bed and rushed to the window. At the front gate  
of the courtyard, the entrance was engulfed with smoke and flame. I was  
surprised to say the least. It was actually the first time I actually witnessed  
some act of terrorism. But why would anyone attack a school of all things, even  
in the sorcery capital.

            At  
that moment, the headmistress's voice came out of nowhere with an announcement.  
"Attention all students, everyone is to stay within their dormitories until  
further notice! Please remain calm and stay within your rooms! Teachers will  
come to check on you momentary!"

            Remaining  
as calm as I could with such a disaster playing outside, I kept looking at the  
gateway covered in flames. Just then a thought came to me. Why would someone  
try to attack an entranceway of all places? Any idiot would think to go after  
bigger game if they wanted to. They would try to blow up the temple or maybe  
one of the dorms and cause a mass number of deaths in the process. So why did,  
whoever did it, blow up the place of the least importance. I came up with only  
one conclusion.

            A  
distraction!

            Leaning  
closer to the window, I saw several shapes running from and to the place of the  
ruined gate. Just then, I sensed a slight presence close by. It was faint and I  
almost missed it, but just the feel of it sent a chill down my spine. Still  
looking out of the window, the presence continued to creep closer. I might have  
imagined it, but the sensation that crept up on me spelled a sinister nature.  
Unable to ignore the approaching presence, I quickly stepped back from the  
window.

            It  
was a good thing I actually paid attention to sensing presences in gym class,  
because at that moment it saved my life. No sooner had I back away from the window,  
a silver streak of light flashed and shattered the window to pieces. I gave a  
silent shout as the glass hit the ground and saw who stood before me.

            There,  
a black figure stepped onto the windowsill. He stood there, hidden within the  
shade of the black clouds behind him. The figure was completely clothed in  
black, except for his eyes. His eyes glowed with a stern yet feral gleam, as he  
looked right at me. In his hand was an assassin's dagger.

            I  
stood there with gritted teeth and a frightened stare as I was face to face  
with; whom I assumed exploded the gate.

            "Zane  
Cosmon," he said in a deep, almost calm tone of voice. His eyes narrowed at me.  
"I've come for you."

            _I'm screwed! Officially screwed!_

 

 

            Chapter  
2: Practice makes Perfect

 

            You  
know how you wake up from a nightmare? You panic, relieved to know it wasn't  
real and then go back to sleep? _Yeah_,  
none of that happened here.

            Wide-awake,  
I stood in silent horror as a black-shrouded freak stood before me. The  
assassin eyed me with steely eyes. Why in the nine hells my body refused to  
move while my brain told me to run was beyond me. He took a step closer.

            "Do  
not try to resist," he spoke in his cool-as-ice tone, "and be honored to be at  
the mercy of my claws."

            Claws?

            Looking  
closer at the assassin, I noticed his stature looked most peculiar. Then I  
noticed that the shape of his face seemed pointy. But what really tipped me off  
was what I saw next. Sticking from behind his mask were two ears near the top  
of his head and behind him, I caught a glimpse of a bushy tail.

            My  
breathing hitched. He was a beast man, a ninja werewolf.

            "I  
know who you are..." I said in barely a whisper.

            He  
heard me without fail. "You do?" he asked as his eyes narrowed at me. His voice  
gave a small hint of intrigue.

            "You're..."  
A small silence hung between us, as if my words would spur his attack. And  
then, I said it.

            "...The  
Big Bad Wolf!" I proclaimed aloud and pointed at him.

            The  
werewolf assassin almost fell over, taken aback by my words. As he regained his  
stance, he glared back at me. "No," he rasped, perhaps to hold back a growl.  
"My name is Alpha."

            "Sorry,"  
I corrected jokingly, "Alpha the Big Bad Wolf."

            This  
time he _did_ fall over.

            _The guy seriously lacks a sense of humor._

_           _ The werewolf ninja quickly got back  
to his feet. The guy looked as if steam would come out of his ears. "No!" he  
growled angrily, "It's Alpha! Just Alpha!"

            "Okay,  
Just Alpha," I kidded again. I couldn't help it. I loved the idea to see the  
bad guys steam. I'm the _laugh-in-the-face-of-evil_  
kind of guy. "Tell me, were you the one who blew up the main gate?"

            Alpha  
nodded his masked mussel. "It removed the hassle with dealing with the royal  
guards to get here," he said in his calm tone again. "Now, are you going to  
come quietly or..."

            _Like hell I will!_

            Before  
he'd finished talking, I jumped for the door. I sprinted and reached the  
doorknob, but as soon as I turned it, something shot across my right flank.  
Now, lodged in between the door and the wall was a throwing dart, nailing the  
door shut. I pulled at the door but it would not open. After three or four  
frantic tugs, I slowly turned around. There stood Alpha where he was before. In  
one paw he held two more darts and he waved a finger at me with the other,  
acting as if he caught a little kid with his hand in a cookie jar.

            _Okay, time for plan B._

_           _ I quickly began chanting a spell  
under my breath. In a dramatic motion, I crossed my arms across my chest and  
then threw forth my hands as I felt power come to me. A ball of fiery light  
appeared between my palms. "Fireball!" I shouted.

            I  
threw the ball towards the masked werewolf. My aim was right on target. Then,  
like a rotten slot machine when you think you're about to score the jackpot, he  
lunged out of the way with impressive speed. The fireball simply continued  
forward and shot out the broken window.

            Alpha,  
just like any werewolf had surprising inhuman speed. As soon as he dodged the  
fireball, he jumped off a wall and made a sprint towards me. With the  
relatively narrow room, I didn't have many ways to maneuver. Then, with a  
bright idea, I chanted another spell.

            And  
yes, I indeed meant _bright!_

_           _ "Lighting!"

            With  
a shout, I shoved my hand towards Alpha as he shot towards me. A quick,  
blinding flash of light erupted from my hand. A small note here, the lighting  
spell can become brighter in exchange for a shorter duration of time. In this  
case, I used the lighting spell for only one second, producing one hell of a  
flash. It's a good thing to use to cripple an opponent's sight. As I expected,  
I heard the werewolf ninja's shout of surprise as the light flashed.

            When  
I opened my eyes, I found the werewolf had leapt back with a hand clamped over  
his peepers. I knew that it wouldn't last long. No matter what light does to an  
opponent, a flash is a flash. Nothing more. It only bought a little time.

            And  
a little time was all I got. No sooner had he taken that jump back, he removed  
his paw from his eyes and ran at me again, this time with his sword in hand. I  
lunged towards the broken window, but as soon as I tried he darted across the  
room right in front of me. I gave a small gasp. His eyes were still shut,  
barely open at all. Was he following me by sound, or smell? Whatever physical  
abilities this guy had, they were really hard-core.

            Now  
standing before me, I chanted another spell. He now stood in the perfect place  
for me to trap him. With my hands out, I shouted my spell. "Chaos String!"  
Threads of light appeared around the room. Throwing my hands towards Alpha, the  
strings quickly flew through the air. Like lightning, the thin strings of light  
wrapped their way around Alpha's body, arms, and legs. The ends of the strings  
quickly strapped to the floor like bolted chains as I finished throwing my arms  
about to direct the spell's movements. Within seconds, he'd been completely  
tangled in a bind of lighted thread.

            "Ha!"  
I couldn't help but laugh, as he stood wrapped in my spell. "Got you!"

            As  
I gave a small confident smile, Alpha finally opened his eyes. He still had his  
steely gaze placed on me and my smile faded. "You must be joking," he said  
calmly. The guy was really starting to creep me out, to say the least. Then in  
the blink of an eye, three quick, silver flashes cut through the dark room. As  
they ended, Alpha stood with his arm free of the Chaos String's hold with his  
dagger in hand. A few seconds later, the strings of light that had once bound  
him suddenly shattered into shards of light and faded away.

            I  
felt like hitting myself. I'd had forgot one key detail about Chaos String. It  
was a weak, crappy spell. It could be easily broken.

            "Is  
that it?" he said in a dark growl and held his assassin's dagger at me. "Surely  
you can do better than that."

            _Sure... If I wanted to blow the hell of us to  
kingdom come!_

            I  
could have done some heavy-duty spells on my attacker. The problem was that  
they were too dangerous to use in an enclosed space like my room. Plus, the  
other students in the dorms could get hurt in the crossfire. I was running out  
of options fast.

            Just  
then came a rather hard knock at my door. "Zane? Zane!? Are you in there?!"  
Master Zolis called out from behind the door.

            I  
glanced at the door, about to yell for his help. Before I could shout for him,  
Alpha made another sprint for me. I looked at the running werewolf ninja with horror  
as I held out my hands to stop him. I felt energy run through my body as I  
prepared a spell to divert him. "Flare Bit!"

            Several  
balls of light appeared around me, and then shot out at Alpha's path. The balls  
erupted in a blast and hit Alpha hard. Score! With a cloud of smoke, the  
assassin werewolf was thrown to the back of the room and towards the broken  
window. He appeared stunned, but quickly got to his feet.

            At  
that moment after my spell had made a rather loud boom, the door behind me came  
down as Master Zolis broke it down. He stopped a short distance as he caught  
sight of Alpha before him and me. "Who are you? Halt!"

            Just  
then, Alpha glanced at Master Zolis, and then back to me, as if in conflict of  
what to do. Then he gave me a look, as if silently saying 'another time.'

            "Dark  
Mist," Alpha spoke. And then, there was darkness.

            I  
couldn't see a thing. So not only was he a kick-butt ninja, but he could use  
magic too?! That just sucked! As I walked about to find a way out of the inky  
fog, it lifted as quickly as it came. I jerked around to find that Master Zolis  
and I were still in one piece within my trashed room. As the two of us looked  
around, Alpha was nowhere to be seen. He had escaped under the cover of the  
Dark Mist spell.

            Quickly  
rushing over to me, Master Zolis grasped my shoulders with concern. "Zane, are  
you okay? What happened?" he asked with an extremely stressed tone.

            "I'm  
fine," I said a little shaken up. What do you expect I'd feel after getting a  
house call at night from a psycho assassin?

            At  
that moment, Master Krots and the headmistress came running through my ruined  
doorway. Ms. Magdalene looked around the room with utter shock. "What happened  
here?" she gasped as she observed the smash window and blast marks on the floor.  
Soon enough, her gaze came to me. A mix of confusion, worry and slight  
aggravation was on her face.

            "Zane,  
did you do this?" Master Krots asked in slight shock.

            _Thanks for the third-degree, teach!_

_           _ "No! It wasn't me!" I proclaimed  
in almost a shout.

            Master Zolis came from behind me and  
approached the headmistress and Master Krots. "Headmistress, an intruder broke  
into his room," Zolis explained calmly. The gazes of all three teachers came to  
me again. Whatever was happening, I didn't like where it was going one bit.

 

            The  
hour was now past midnight as I now sat back in the headmistress's office. The  
night revealed the true beauty of the stain glass windows as I sat there.  
Around me were several of the teachers, including Master Krots and Master Zolis.  
The headmistress sat behind her desk with her staff close at hand.

            "Master  
Zolis said an intruder had broken into your room," Ms. Magdalene asked with a  
slightly concerned look. "Is this true?"

            I  
nodded meekly. "Yes, ma'am," I held my breath as I looked around me at the  
teachers. I couldn't quite put my finger down on it, but this must have been  
one serious matter, especially if they had dragged me all the way here. "The  
guy said he came for me."

            Silence  
filled the room. The teachers exchanged glances at me then to themselves. The  
headmistress looked the most worried. "Are you sure?" she asked in tone of  
voice that made me uneasy. She was never this concerned for my well being  
before. "Can you tell us what he looked like?"

            I  
lifted my head up a bit to look at her and the other teachers. "I can do more  
than that. The guy gave me a name. He was some sort of werewolf assassin. His  
name was Alpha," I said calmly.

            Small  
gasps filled the room. I glanced over to Master Krots, who looked at me with a troubled  
look. The headmistress's eyes were wide at the sound of the name. "Did you say  
Alpha?" Master Krots asked.

            "Yeah..."  
the whole situation must have been worse than what I thought if the teachers  
were all in a fuss already. "Do you guys know him or something? You all seem a  
little shaken up by the name alone," I asked.

            Just  
then, the headmistress jumped at my question with an almost reflexive answer.  
"Oh, don't worry. It doesn't concern you," she said in a bit of an anxious  
tone.

            I  
couldn't hold back my aggravation any longer. "WHAT?! A ninja bursts into my  
room to do me in and you tell me it doesn't concern me?! I'm twelve, not  
stupid!" I shouted angrily.

            The  
look on the headmistress's face slowly dropped into a calm, yet remorseful  
look. With a sigh, she closed her eyes.

            "Tell  
him," Master Krots added in. The headmistress looked at him with tired eyes,  
seeing the seriousness of the werewolf teacher. "The kid has a right to know  
who attacked him." The looks between the teachers almost gave away another vibe  
that they were hiding something. I was starting to get anxious.

            "Okay,"  
Ms. Magdalene spoke as calmly as possible. "There are very few who had not  
heard of the assassin Alpha outside these walls." The looks of both the  
teachers and the headmistress looked troubled. "He is a famous assassin, known  
for killing over a thousand people in the past six years. His most accomplished  
feat was slaying the king of Gardin. Every single guard included in that castle  
was murdered in a single night."

            My  
heart stopped for a second. A famous assassin? I didn't know what was worse.  
Having a ninja try to get me, or an _expert_ ninja trying to get me.  
Shaking the thoughts of him slaughtering me out of my mind, I leaned forward in  
my chair towards the surrounding teachers. "What is he doing here anyway?" I  
asked.

            Another  
pause of silence filled the room. Master Krots turned his gaze away from me to  
the window. The headmistress closed her eyes again. All of the teachers had  
glanced away from me. Upset, I stood up from my chair.

            "I'm  
sorry Zane," Ms. Magdalene said, "I'm not sure."

            "What  
do you mean you don't know?" I asked aloud. At that moment, Master Krots looked  
back to me with a concerned look.

            "Zane,  
calm down," the werewolf teacher said as I took a step towards the  
headmistress's desk. "We'll find out what going on here, I assure you."

            I  
wasn't convinced. I reached to her desk and placed my hands on it before the  
headmistress. Yes boys and girls, I could be aggressive if I wanted to. I  
wasn't the kind of guy who liked being out of the loop. "What aren't you  
telling me? Why would someone break into a magic school of all places, even if  
it were in Saillune? I know you have an idea what that jerk is after!" I  
shouted.

            "That  
is confidential information, Zane," She spoke as she opened here eyes. She gave  
me a slightly crossed gaze.

            I  
felt like my blood would burst if I didn't get some sort of answer from her. "I  
can't believe this!" I scolded, sparking looks of surprise from the teachers  
around me. "Be that way! If you won't tell me what the hell he wants, then _I'll_ just confront him and ask him _myself_!"

            "YOU  
WILL DO NO SUCH THING!" she boomed at me loudly. Surprised, I backed away from  
her. I swear I could feel the ground tremble with her voice. "I will not have  
one of my students purposely looking for a cold-blooded killer!"

            Master  
Krots then broke in, clearing his throat to do so. "Actually, werewolves are  
warm blooded," he informed. Ms. Magdalene adverted her crossed gaze at my  
Alchemy teacher, who quickly looked away from her with a nervous chuckle. 

            At  
that moment, the door opened as one of the royal guards entered the room. "Ms.  
Magdalene, we had searched the grounds. No sign of the intruder," he said in a  
loud tone.

            Adverting  
from me, the headmistress looked to the guard. "And the walls?" she asked.

            "I  
regret to inform you that we saw no one leave the grounds. Ms. Magdalene, it is  
very possible that the intruder might still be on the campus," the guard said.

            Now  
standing up from her chair, the headmistress faced the guard with the most  
serious of expressions. "I want guards posted at all times and continue to  
search the area. I want that intruder found and captured!"

            "Yes  
madam!" With that, the guard quickly left the room and closed the door.

            As  
I looked back to the headmistress, she looked at me with the same serious  
glare. "Zane, I forbid you to do anything rash to endanger yourself. What would  
have happened if Master Zolis had not made it there in time?" I tried to  
contradict her, but she was in so much of a fuss that she wouldn't let me speak  
a syllable. "You are not to go looking for him! Do I make myself CLEAR?"

            Reluctantly  
backing off from the desk, I cast a crossed look at the floor. I held my fists  
tight to hold back my anger. "Crystal,"  
I grumbled back at her.

            With  
that, she backed away from me and gave me a calm look. "Now go outside and wait  
as I speak to the teachers. Someone will escort you to a spare room for you to  
sleep in until your room is restored," she said.

            "Yes, ma'am," I said and slowly  
walked to the door. As soon as I left, I closed the door behind me and rested  
my back against it. Further down at both ends of the hall stood two guards.  
Security probably was boosted tremendously after word of the attack that had  
happened here. I sighed with grief as I waited, daydreaming aimlessly with no  
goal in mind. This was going to be a bad week.

 

            After  
what felt like half-hour of a meeting, Master Krots led me to one of the royal  
chambers that the main building held for royal guests. I was surprised at  
first. I wasn't stupid at their true reason to put me there. It wasn't that  
they were treating me to a fancy night's stay at one of the finest rooms of the  
academy. They put me there because it was one of the safest places around. The  
whole situation became more and more curious as things progressed.

            The  
next morning as soon as I woke up, I headed to my room, fetched my journal and  
school supplies and headed for breakfast at the cafeteria. The entire lunchroom  
was filled with the chatter of the news that happened last night. Most of their  
rumors ended with imaginative conclusions, like someone tried to attack the  
royal palace next door and made a mistake, or that someone summoned a Brass  
Demon by some sort of wacky experiment late last night. All the hype was enough  
to make me roll my eyes.

            The  
halls were not as loud as they usually were. Instead of the loud discussions  
students had between classes, their voices dimmed a bit as some of the royal  
guards patrolled the halls. Even the teachers were on guard, looking cautious  
as they walked the halls. If what the guards said was true and that Alpha was  
still on the grounds, he wouldn't be sneaking about in broad daylight. I was  
slightly at ease unlike the other people.

            In  
Astral studies and Shamanism class, the teachers wouldn't let students go out  
into the halls even for the bathroom. The entire situation seemed very severe  
if the teachers were keeping their eyes on the students at all times. In  
between classes when I walked the halls, sometimes a teacher would make an  
excuse to accompany me to my next class.

            I  
had just reached my White Magic class and entered when I was confronted by a  
familiar cheery voice. 

            "Zane!"  
Cassandra called out as she entered the class. I turned around. Actually  
surprisingly enough, her cheery tone held a touch of concern in her voice. I  
wondered how long that would last. "Zane, how are you?"

            "Fine,"  
I said simply, "Why wouldn't I be?" Okay, that was a stupid thing to say.  
Still, there was no sense in drawing attention that an assassin had attacked  
me. That would throw the entire school into chaos.

            "I've  
been rather freaked out since what happened last night," Cassandra said as she  
approached her seat in front of me. "I always known there were bad people out  
here, but I always thought of this school as some sort of sanctuary."

            I  
nodded simple as I sat myself down at my desk. She had a very good point.  
Because we were in such an isolated environment, we actually were able to learn  
in safety and explore magic without any danger. It least until now.

            "So,"  
Cassandra asked, "Got any idea what happened last night?"

            I  
froze as I struggled what to tell her. I couldn't say 'Oh, nothing much. Just a  
masked werewolf attacked me in the middle of the night and is hiding somewhere  
on the grounds. No need to worry'.

            "Not  
a clue," I lied simply, keeping a strait face.

            She  
turned to me. To my surprise, she looked rather distressed. "Zane," she said  
with a soft tone. "I'm really worried. I got this bad feeling."

            Now  
she had my attention. To elaborate, priests had a special ability to sense  
certain things. I had yet to discover that talent within me, but I learned that  
many could feel when malicious events were about to come.

            "It's  
like something haunting has taken grip around the school," Cassandra spoke in a  
shallow tone. "I've been shivering every time I felt it. It scares me."

            "When  
did you start having this feeling?" I asked her.

            "About  
late last afternoon," she said softly, now only within my ears reach. "At first  
I thought it was just my imagination, but after the explosion I think  
otherwise."

            I  
leaned closer to her. "Did anyone else say they sensed anything malevolent  
around?"

            "No.  
And well... there's something else too..."

            At  
that moment, our teacher came inside, Priestess Lauria. "Okay class, to your  
seats."

            The  
class lasted for an hour. As we focused on the use of a resurrection spell, the  
strongest healing spell in White Magic, I couldn't help but lose focus once and  
awhile. As helpful as White magic was, it wouldn't really save me if Alpha  
attacked me again. As soon as the class ended, I grabbed my books and headed  
for the door... that is until, Cassandra stopped me again.

            "Zane  
wait," she shouted and I pulled myself to the side of the doorway in the hall.  
As she turned to me, she gave me the same uneasy look.

            "Hey,"  
I asked, "what was it you were trying to tell me?"

            She  
hesitated a bit. Keeping her voice down, she took a step closer and spoke  
softly. "Well, as those feelings got stronger, I sensed something else too,"  
she said. I focused on her with wide eyes. "You see, it felt like it's after  
something...or someone."

            "Who  
do you think it is?" I asked

            "That's  
just it Zane," Cassandra answered, "This evil, seems drawn... around you."

            I  
gasped. Okay, I knew I was already in the middle of something, but I didn't  
expect that Cassandra would catch on. She was a great priestess, but even she  
couldn't predict something that grand, could she?

            "I  
just want to ask you one thing, Zane," Cassandra asked hesitantly.

            I  
hitched my breath. Was she on to me? "What is it?" I asked.

            She  
was quite, and then...

            "When  
you die, can I have your stuff?" She asked in her cheery voice.

             "I'M NOT DEAD YET, YA PILL!" I shouted. Hey,  
you too would get mad if people waited for you to kick the bucket. Still seeing  
a trace of her perky smirk, I marched away from her. As everyone was bent on  
lunch, I had other plans.

 

            My  
luck was impeccable. With everyone at lunch, the schools training building was  
not in use. The training room was the size of a large gymnasium. During the  
day, students were allowed to practice their attack spells inside the building.  
Inside was a special magic field that contained spells inside the building. It  
was like Master Krots warding field back in Alchemy class, but on a much larger  
scale. I spent most of my free time in here to practice my spells, mostly when  
I wanted to attempt Blast Bomb. In case I failed to mention: that spell never  
worked.

            As  
I entered the practice building, the inside instantly lit up. Indeed, it looked  
like a gymnasium. On the sides of the room were bleachers for people as the  
large flat floor was spread out. On the floor was a magic circle with several  
ruins inscribed, entwined around a hexagram. The warding field was so strong it  
was almost like slipping into a warped space.

            I  
stepped into the center of the large room with my journal in hand. Opening my  
book, I looked at the spells I copied from my schoolbooks and started  
practicing. My time in the training room had its smooth points and its bumpy  
ones. I was able to pull off some black magic spells pretty easy. Even my  
original spells worked rather well.

            Then  
I moved on to try and cast my most desired spell. The Blast Bomb.

            Reviewing  
the chant in my mind, I prepared to cast the spell. Crossing my arms in my  
spell-casting pose, I chanted the spell clearly and aloud. With my aim clear, I  
shouted my spell. "Blast Bomb!"

            Nothing  
happened.

_            At  
first you don't succeed, cast and cast again._

            I  
repeated the spell again and again, constantly trying to muster anything from  
my efforts. If anything, I thought it would at least raise my magical capacity.  
After exercising that one spell for the twelfth time, I let out an aggravated  
growl. 

            _Okay,  
now with feeling._

            Once  
again I held up my hands and spoke the chant with a raised tone of voice. As I  
did, I thought of Alpha. That masked, fur-fledged, ninja psycho's face hung in  
my mind as I attempted to boost my magic. I dwelled on those thoughts that  
ticked me off. Cassandra's teasing, when I accidentally blew things up _almost  
unintentionally_ , people calling me SHORT! Then, what might have been my  
imagination, I saw small glows of light around me.

            Keeping  
my concentration, I spoke the end of the spell and threw my magic forth.

            "Blast  
Bomb!" I cried and threw my hands forth.

            At  
my words and to my surprise, three balls of light appeared before me. A smile  
quickly spread across my face. But soon my joy got deflated like an overblown  
balloon. In less than a second that the small balls of light had appeared, they  
abruptly flickered out.

            I  
stood silently for a moment. Normally I would have been sad and disappointed,  
but instead I felt a sense of achievement. Before now, I had gotten squat from  
that spell. The fact that I had even got a spark from it was good news to me.  
It meant that I was getting better to fully cast that spell.

            _Oh,  
yeah! I'm good!_

            After  
taking in my latest success, I took a deep breath, brushed off my blue cloak  
and made my way across the darkened room. Wait a minute, dark? I stopped in my  
tracks as I noticed something terrible wrong. When I entered the room, it was  
lighted. Absorbed in attempting Blast Bomb, I must have not noticed the change  
in my surroundings.

            A  
low hum filled the air, sparking my sense of danger. Then from the dark around  
me, I caught the glint of several yellow eyes.

            "Lighting!"  
I quickly threw my hand towards the ceiling and a sphere of bright light burst  
into existence. With my bright sphere of light high overhead, I saw who, or to  
be technical, WHAT was around me. Now surrounding me stood several transparent  
black creatures with yellow eyes. They looked like humanoids whose limbs were  
twisted about to make them resemble spiders. I had seen them before. In combat  
training, upper classmen were allowed to simulate actual spell-combat against  
magically conjured monsters. I was not allowed to participate yet, but I always  
watched as others fought them. They were artificially created Mazoku.

I quickly turned to the far  
left wall, where the control panel for creating the Mazoku was. Someone had  
turned it on. The strength, numbers, and skill of the Mazoku was determined by  
the training level on the gauge, differing from one being the lowest and fifty  
being the highest. And what luck, the bastard had set it to FIFTY, expert  
level.

_Oh crap!_

No sooner had I breathed  
the shadow men scampered towards me. Spurred by their frightening advance, I  
ducked and lunged under them. There was a rough count of twelve of them, all  
spread about the room. Getting to my feet, I started to chant a spell. No  
sooner had I started, the monsters close to me opened their once unseen mouths.  
With inhuman bellows, they spewed out an array of fiery Flare Arrows. I quickly  
leapt away as the arrows came exploding behind me. I kept chanting, luckily  
uninterrupted from the sudden assault.

"Digger Volt!" I cried, and  
a blast of lightning came shooting out of my outstretched hand.

Digger Volt was a spell  
that created a lethal lightning blast upon opponents. Normally such dangerous  
spells are against school rules to use on the grounds, but I felt this time  
could be an exception. Hey! I was being attacked by deadly inhuman monster  
drowns here, so sue me!

Just then, as I had let my  
spell fly, the bolts of lightning just passed through the animated Mazoku and  
struck the far wall instead. My jaw fell open at the result of my spell's  
effect.

A small note, considering I  
forgotten myself, Mazoku are demonic creatures from the astral plain. Because  
of that, they have no physical form. The only thing that could hurt a Mazoku  
was spells that can target things on an astral level.

Thinking of a way out of my  
predicament, I quickly began running. Dodging both claws and Flare Arrows, my  
mind raced for a spell that could damage these alchemically created rejects. As  
I said at the very beginning, astral spells were my worst subject.

Then I realized something.  
While my performance of certain spells was not great, I recalled what Master  
Zolis taught us a few days before. He said that certain Black magic spells had  
the capability to damage low-level Mazoku. Even though the Mazoku around me  
were acting on an expert level of assaulting me, they were still low-level  
conjures from the astral plain.

If I wanted to get out of  
this, I had to be swift. Even through it wasn't a lot, I did know a spell or  
two that targeted spirits. Still running, I clasped my hands together and  
chanted a spell. The shadowy, spider-men came running--er crawling after me.  
Then with a twist back towards them, I stopped with my clasped hands aglow in a  
bright red light.

_That's right, folks!  
Zane Cosmon's back on the offence!_

"Elmekia Lance!" I shouted  
and threw my hands out, releasing a bright spear of light. Elmekia Lance is a  
spell that targeted spirits or an opponent's mind. Since Mazoku are spiritual  
creatures, it can indeed do damage to them.

My spear of fiery light  
struck right on its mark. The spell skewered a shadow monster right in the  
chest and continued forward, striking two more. No sooner had those three vanished,  
many of the fake Mazoku blasted another volley of Flare Arrows.

In an act of desperation, I  
dived under the arching Flare Arrows and ran in the direction of the shadows  
that spewed them. Before you think I was crazy to charge at them, I had a plan.  
Preoccupied throwing up their fiery arrows, I prepared to cast a spell at them  
in their stationary state.

"Blast Ash!" I threw a hand  
out and let it fly. A pulse of black energy shot forward and spread out before  
them. In a flash, the monsters were vaporized into dust. Blast Ash was a spell  
that _incinerates_ anything with a spirit in the blast range. Since the  
monsters' bodies were spiritual manifestations, they were easily affected.

Now only five Mazoku  
remained. No sooner had the targets I just vanquished disappeared, I ran  
towards the center of the room. In the blink of an eye, a Flare Arrow came down  
and struck in front of my path. I quickly turned to double-back but another  
array of Flare Arrows struck and exploded around me. As soon as the flames and smoke  
cleared, I found myself surrounded by the remaining shadow spider-men.

Seeing their non-emotional  
faces, I quickly canted my next spell. With any luck, this would end the fight  
right there and then. Chanting my words, a ball of blue light appeared between  
my hands and grew in size.

The ring of monsters  
charged at me as soon as they saw my spell took form. I didn't have much time.  
I focused as hard as I could, compressing the spell into a denser form. Only a  
second away, I aimed my hands towards the ground. "Bram Blazer!" With those  
words, the ball of blue light became a beam and shot at the floor.

With a bright flash, an  
aura of blue light erupted around me, followed by a shockwave of light. With  
their final low cries, the shadowy Mazoku faded away under my light.

To elaborate, Bram Blazer  
was capable of both physical and astral damage. Instead of focusing on a  
frontal attack, I directed the spell's shockwave around me. Aimed at the floor,  
it amp up the shockwave's strength just enough to destroy the remaining  
monsters around me. Like shadows before a bright light, the Mazoku threat  
disappeared.

As soon as the blue light  
disappeared, I quickly sprinted towards the Mazoku spawning machine before it  
could produce any more monsters. Running right into the wall it was attached  
to, I punched the off switch and the low hum of the machine dissipated. With  
the machine off, I finally took the moment for a well-deserved sigh of relief.

Pants flowed from my mouth  
like water as a finally calmed down. Knelt with my hands on my knees, I took a  
moment to pull myself together and think of what happened. Someone had snuck in  
here when I was practicing, turned on the machine and had me fight for my life  
against artificial Mazoku. For whatever reason, it was anything but a practical  
joke. Just then, a faint gleam caught my eye. I looked up at the machine and  
gave a small gasp. Lodged into the large on switch of the simulation gauge was  
a small silver blade. One of Alpha's throwing darts.

With a crossed grumble, I  
gripped the dart and without ceremony yanked it from the machine. "Alpha," I  
grumbled," That guy is starting to tick me off!"

Quickly turning around, I  
began to scan the dimmed room for him. He might have been hiding somewhere,  
hoping to catch me when I was exhausted. My nerves were on end, feeling ready  
to snap.

"Zane."

"AAAHHH!" I screamed out  
loud and spun around to see who said my name.

There, standing just  
through the lighted doorway was Master Krots. My werewolf teacher took a step  
further into the room. "What are you doing in here?" he asked.

Slightly on edge by  
everything that had just happened, I felt rather hesitant to respond. "Um... Just  
practicing," I replied sheepishly.

With narrowed eyes, Master  
Krots examined the room, seeing all the scorch and blast marks from what had  
happened. Then he glanced at me next to the training machine. "Zane, were you  
using the training simulator?" he said in a knowing growl. Still hesitant, I  
stumbled what to say. He gave me a slight scowl. I swear he could get a career  
at interrogation the way he looks at you. "You know younger classmen are not  
allowed to use the machine, especially without a teacher supervising. Even  
though they're artificial monsters, they're dangerous."

_Gee? **Really**?_

"Uh, what are you doing  
here though?" I finally asked, rather curious he'd showed up here myself.

Walking across the large  
room, he approached me. "I was monitoring the lunchroom and failed to see you  
there, so I went looking for you," Master Krots said, a faint smile on his  
mussel.

"Oh, uh... sorry about that."

With that, he reached his  
paw and placed in on my shoulder. "Come on," Master Krots said as he tugged at  
me to come with him. "You shouldn't really miss lunch, you know?"

I was thankful he didn't  
notice the throwing dart in my hand as we walked across the room. It might have  
made him ask questions.

Just then, a frightful  
thought occurred in my head. Master Krots was probably just outside to hear the  
racket I made against the monsters, yet why didn't he just show up after I had  
finished. I got a sickening feeling in my stomach as I thought about it more.  
In my state of shock, Master Krots was not surprised for some reason. And then  
there was the throwing dagger. He might not have noticed... or he just might have  
didn't care because he knew it was his.

_Oh my god!_

No sooner had I thought of  
that, I immediately looked away from his face, thinking if he saw my reaction  
he would know what I thought. Could it be? My favorite teacher could have been  
Alpha? I tried my best to remain calm as we walked side by side. It was  
possible. Alpha and Master Krots were both werewolves. Master Krots was just  
present after Alpha's Mazoku attack just now. Even more curious, if Master  
Krots had been just out looking for me, wouldn't he had told the other teachers  
that I'd gone missing, especially with an assassin sneaking around the school.

Realizing the possibility,  
Master Krots's paw on my shoulder started to feel most uncomfortable.  
"Something wrong?" Master Krots asked, looking at me with a calm, friendly  
look. He must have sensed my tension or something.

"Oh, no-nothing," I said as  
we headed towards the lunchroom.

I  
couldn't be sure. There was a chance that Master Krots wasn't Alpha. I may be  
imaginative, but I wasn't about to accuse a teacher that he was a mass  
murderer. If I wanted to find any proof that he was indeed Alpha, there was  
only one way to be sure.

 

Evening was minutes away as  
the glow of the orange sunset gleamed through the windows of the hall. The day  
had gone easy enough. As soon as I finished my detention with Master Krots, I  
had gone up to the dinner hall. Let me tell you, when you have detention with  
someone you suspect is a possible serial killer, it's easy to be nervous around  
him. Anyway, after dinner and dessert when the students headed towards their  
dorms, I slinked away from them to head towards the school office.

There is a twenty-minute  
time frame between dinner's end and everyone reporting to the dorms. Which  
meant that I didn't have much time to look for what I wanted to find? The halls  
were empty as the sunlight lighted up the halls. Running with my blue cloak  
wrapped around me, I probably looked rather suspicious myself. Well, to catch a  
sneak, you got to be a sneak. I was able to slip by two guards who were  
patrolling the hallway easy enough and reached the stairs.

As I got to the foot of the  
stairs, I found the school office room. It was empty. Most staff and teachers  
were at the dorms and staff areas when the day was good and through. That made  
my job easier. Sneaking to the office, I slipped passed the doors. This room  
was where they held all the student records, where they came from, their family  
background, grades, _the works_.  I  
had to admit I was tempted to sneak a peak at my grades, but I had bigger fish  
to fry.

Silently, I approached a  
door labeled "School Archives". Score! No surprise when I tried to open the  
door it was locked, but it was just your basic mechanical lock. That I can  
handle easy enough. Casting an unlock spell upon the door, I heard the sound of  
a click and the door opened ajar.

_Am I good or what?_

            Opening the door as quietly as I  
could, I sneaked inside and closed the door behind me. The room was rather  
dark. Whispering a lighting spell under my breath, a tiny sphere of light  
appeared in the air. Inside were several metal filing cabinets and a wooden  
desk on the side of the cramped wall. I scanned the cabinets until I found a  
bin labeled "Teachers and Staff."

            Opening the cabinet, I immediately  
looked for the letter K. "Let's see," I began leisurely, "Karus, Kimar, Kimari,  
Korius... Krots! Here it is." With excited hands, I yanked the folder from the  
draw and jumped towards the table. My lighting spell floated above my head with  
its gentle light as I opened the folder upon the table.

            According to what Ms. Magdalene  
said, Alpha had been knocking off people for the past six years. If I wanted to  
make any ground of my thesis, I had to see how long Master Krots had taught at  
the school. Inside were a series of papers. The first page was Master Krots's primary  
information with a picture of him in the page corner. I scanned through the  
pages, looking furiously for the information I sought.

            Then I found it. On the third page  
of the document, I found the registration date. I held my breath. According to  
the paper, Master Krots had been accepted at the sorcery school about two and a  
half years ago. Wanting to find more, I scanned through the document some more.  
The next thing I found was a series of legal absences posted on his record. Now  
I began to worry. According to this, he had been leaving the school grounds  
upon weekends and certain school days on important business. He had been absent  
from His total absences for this year alone were twelve.

_Important business, my  
butt!_

My heart began to race a  
little. The more and more I thought it all over, the more I was beginning to  
think that my own teacher was actually Alpha. A masked killer under the cover  
of a teacher for a well renowned sorcery school; it made perfect sense.

I gulped as I looked at the  
picture of Master Krots with his wolfish grin. My hands gave a small tremble as  
I closed the folder. "No way," I said in a nervous tone, "I just can't believe  
it."

"And what might that be?" a  
low voice answered me.

_Oh, god no!_

All my muscles jolted in  
place at the sound of the familiar voice. My arms felt immobile as I had a good  
idea who was there. With a faint whimper of reluctance, I slowly turned to look  
behind me.

There, atop of a pile of  
metal file cabinets knelt Alpha. The masked, black clothed werewolf looked down  
at me coolly, sending a chill down my spine. The way he observed me from up  
there made him look like a raven watching a freshly killed meal. His steely  
eyes glinted with the glow of my lighting spell, making him all the more  
frightening.

"Uh-oh," was all I could  
squeak as I saw him above me.

"And just what are you  
doing here, I wonder," Alpha spoke calmly, as if he'd catch me even if he took  
his time.

I had to think fast but my  
body was two seconds behind me. "Um--well, _he-he,_ I was just here t-to  
sort of--" Hoping to throw him off in the middle of my sentence, I leapt from  
the desk to get to the door.

Apparently, Alpha had a  
reason to be so calm. With movement which appeared like a blur to me, Alpha had  
leapt from his perch on the cabinets and landed right in front of me. I began  
casting a short spell. Nothing fancy, but I just couldn't afford fancy! "Air  
Valm!" As I ran before Alpha, a barrier of wind suddenly came to life and threw  
Alpha next to the door with a loud thud.

Guessing that wouldn't faze  
him for long, I ran for the door and opened it. _Almost_ accidentally  
while opening the door, I slammed it upon Alpha just as he was about to get up.  
Come on? Wouldn't you do that too to a guy who was trying to attack you?

No sooner had I touched the  
doorknob I began to enchant it with my words. Now out the doorway, I witnessed  
as Alpha leaped off the floor and attempted to grab me before I closed the  
door. With my chant still present, I slammed the door hard, eclipsing the view  
of Alpha. "Lock!" I cast the last word for the spell as I slammed the door. No  
sooner had I did, I felt the door bang as Alpha collided with the hard wooden  
door.

_Ouch! I bet that hurt!_

My spell had taken hold. I  
had cast a locking spell on the door, sealing it with a magical force. Stepping  
away, I heard several bangs upon the door. I guessed it was Alpha trying to  
open the door and come after me. I couldn't help but smile at his struggle.

"You little brat!" he  
growled aloud, "Open this door!"

"What're you gonna do? Huff  
and puff and blow the door down," I teased gleefully.

A few seconds later I'd  
wished I'd didn't say that.

"Bomb Di Wind," he growled.

A loud hum came from behind  
the door and caused me to jump back. No sooner had I did, the door came flying  
off its hinges with a violent gust of wind. That spell must have been close  
range because as soon as it flew off, the door shattered into a bunch of broken  
boards and splinters. I shielded my face from the flying debris for a moment.  
No sooner had I took my arm away, I was suddenly staring into Alpha's angry  
eyes.

Taken off guard, he grabbed  
my neck hard. I cringed as I was held there. He lifted me an inch from the  
floor, only to weaken my resistance. "I grow aggravated of you, pup," he  
growled in his low voice. I felt short of breath as he choked me. I'd probably  
only be a matter of seconds before I passed out.

With every once of strength  
I could muster, I slowly reached for the arm he used to choke me. He probably  
thought it as a feeble attempted to ease his grip on my windpipe. To some  
extent that was true. With my dieing strength, I gripped his wrist and took  
action.

"M-Mono... Volt," I uttered  
with the last of my breath.

At that moment to my  
rescue, my spell sparked to life. And boy did it spark! Electricity surged  
through my palm and surged up Alpha's arm to him. Alpha yelled in a painful cry  
as small jolts of lightning traveled up and down his body, delivering painful  
electric shocks. After a second or two, Alpha released his grip on my neck and  
dropped me to my feet, allowing me a much-needed gasp of air.

I let go of Alpha's wrist,  
ceasing the electric current on Alpha's body. With it, Alpha fell to his knees  
on the floor. With staggering feet, I quickly reached the office door. Getting  
out of the office, I immediately took the door leading outside into the  
courtyard. "Guards! GUARDS!" I shouted as hard as I could.

Apparently I was still  
lightheaded from having the oxygen cut off from my brain, because before I knew  
it I saw several of the royal guards running towards me. They must have already  
heard the large boom in the office when Alpha blew down the door.

"What happened?" a guard  
asked me. "Are you alright?"

I gave a thin gasp. "The...  
he's... the office..." I said through ragged breaths. No sooner had I mentioned  
'office', the soldiers came running towards it. Slowly but directly, I followed  
them back to the office.

Falling a bit behind of the  
guards, I walked into the now messy office room. The guards were gathered  
around the remains of the smashed doorframe. To my horror, I looked around the  
room to find no trace of Alpha anywhere.

_You've got to be JOKING!_

I hit the guy with a Mono  
Volt, a paralyzing electric spell and the guy just got up and walked away  
without a trace. Why can't bad guys just stay down? After looking over the room  
and archives room, one of the guards came up to me. He knelt down with his  
spear still in hand and looked me in the eye. "Can you tell me what happened  
here?" he asked.

Again I felt in the  
position to lie again. I seemed to have been doing that a lot today. If I told  
them I was investigating who was the assassin, the same assassin I thought was  
a teacher in my school, I would have some heavy duty explaining to do to the  
headmistress. If you ask me, her wrath is worst than Alpha's.

"Well," I began meekly,  
coughing a bit with a rough voice. "I was heading for my classroom because I  
forgot one of my books. When I was heading back to the dorms, that guy attacked  
me." I added a few sniffles into my voice, making my bluff more convincing.

"Did you see his face?" the  
guard asked.

I simply shook my head. "He  
wore a mask," I answered.

At that moment, Master  
Zolis and Master Krots entered the wrecked office. "What happened here?" Krots  
asked, slightly surprised.

_Oh sure, **act** like  
you don't know._

"Zane," Master Zolis asked,  
"Did you blow up something again?"

I wanted to yell at him  
'NO', but all I could muster was a low grumble.

"It was the intruder,  
sirs," the guard defended for me. "This student was just here to pick up  
something from a classroom and got caught by him." Master Zolis and Master  
Krots looked at me with concerned glances.

I nodded at them. With the  
pain in my throat, I gently rubbed the sore spot. Just then, the teachers  
looked rather worried as they saw me reach my throat.

"Zane, are you okay?"  
Master Krots asked. "What happened to your throat?"

I panic a second, slightly  
frightened to what he'd do. "Uh, nothing really. I'm fine."

"Zane, let me see your  
throat," the werewolf teacher demanded. With swift speed, he took a hold of my  
arm, lifted my hand away from my throat, and raised my chin up with his other  
paw. Exposing the red welt where the werewolf assassin had choked me, Krots  
looked at it as well as Master Zolis.

"Did Alpha do this to you?"  
Master Zolis asked. Painfully swallowing back my panic, I nodded. "We should  
take him to the infirmary."  

"Don't worry about it. I  
said I was fine," I assured them.

Master Krots seemed to not  
take no for an answer. "No Zane. You should have this looked at," Master Krots  
said with a growl. "Master Zolis, I'll take him to the infirmary. Why don't you  
stay here and see what you can find."

Glancing over to Master  
Zolis, I gave small, almost unnoticeable shakes of my head. The last person I  
wanted to be alone with was the guy I thought to be an assassin.

_No, no, no, no, no, no..._ 

"Okay, I'll clean things up  
here," Zolis replied.

**_NO!_**

I gulped again, painfully  
thanks to the pain in my neck. "Come on, Zane," Krots said. Still gripping my  
arm, he pulled me with him as he headed for the door.

As we entered the hallway,  
we walked silently towards the infirmary on the other side of the building. I  
kept a nervous eye on him, wondering if he'd kill me right when we were about  
half way there. I tried to pull my arm away, but he wouldn't have it. On our  
way there, I couldn't help but picture an image of us entering the infirmary  
with no one there, he getting a medical scalpel from a draw and slicing my  
throat open. Again, I gave a painful gulp.

After a few minutes, we had  
walked through the halls and made our way to the outside of the infirmary door.  
He hadn't tried to kill me. That was a relief. Then, as I was about to walk  
towards the door, his grip stopped me from proceeding. I cast a nervous glance  
at him. He gave an unyielding look at me, making me want to back away.

"Zane," he asked slowly,  
"You didn't leave anything in a classroom, did you?"

The guy was on to me.  
Trying my best, I gave him the best ignorant look I could. "What do you mean?"  
I asked.

"Don't give me that!" he  
growled, causing me to jump in his grasp. Gently, he let go of my arm and took  
a grip of my shoulders. He then slowly pushed my back to the wall, forcing me  
to look into his wolfish eyes as he knelt to my height. "You were there looking  
for Alpha, weren't you?"

Busted! I gritted my teeth  
as he looked at me, his gaze practically piercing like daggers. Was he going to  
kill me now? I could hear the headlines now. Zane Cosmon. Potentially promised  
sorcerer killed by werewolf teacher. I'm not dying that way people!

Nervously, I faced his gaze  
with my own. Not getting a response from me, the werewolf teacher gave my  
shoulders a shook. "You know well not to go off on your own with that killer  
running around! Do you want to die?" I still remained silent. His unyielding  
stare was frightening, but I did my best to be calm.

"I'd better not catch you  
trying to find him again, Zane," Krots said in a growl, "Messing around with  
someone like Alpha insures grave consequences."

_Did he say **grave**?_

Trying my best to give a  
brave face, I looked right into Krots dagger-sharp eyes.

"Who knows what he's  
after," he said.

"Why don't you tell me, _Master Krots_?" I rebelled.

His eyes suddenly soften a  
little at my words. "What?"

"_Why would_ Alpha want to attack me?" I asked him rhetorically, "I  
got nothing of value. I'm just a sorcerer trying to do well in his classes. _You_ wouldn't know of any reason why a _killer assassin_ would come after me, _would you_?"

_Okay, maybe I made that a little too obvious._

Taking my words in, the  
werewolf teacher removed his paws from my shoulders, finally giving me some  
personal space. "Zane, what are you implying here?" Krots asked as he stood at  
his full height.

"Nothing," I said simply,  
my suspicious look still glued to him. "I'm just asking you, do you know of any  
reason why that rotten psychopath assassin would come after me?" I purposely  
chose those _subtle_ words for a  
reaction from him.

Master Krots gritted his  
teeth and stifled a tiny growl. He took his time to answer that question. "No.  
Nothing," he said softly.

With that, I gave a small  
shrug of my shoulders and a carefree look, the best I could give before his  
presence. "Okay then," I said with a huff. With that, I walked away from Master  
Krots to the door of the infirmary. "I think I can go in on my own, thank you  
sir."

He gave me a slightly  
questionable look, and then slowly nodded. "Okay. I'll wait out here to take  
you to your room."

"Nope," I interjected, this  
time clearly stating my discomfort around him. "That won't be necessary.  
Goodnight."

With that, I hastily  
entered the infirmary ward and closed the door behind me. That settled it.  
Master Krots had to be Alpha. This was the second time he'd showed up after  
Alpha attacked. He was always just a small distance away from the action. On  
top of that, he had appeared during my search through his records. He probably  
got threatened that I was closing in on him and decided to get me then.  
Everything was pointing to him, plus how he'd talked to me earlier. Only guys  
with personalities of killers would be so aggressive.

Until I could find real  
proof, I had to be on my toes. Whatever reason Alpha was after me, I was going  
to give that fleabag assassin a run for his money.

 

Chapter 3: Suspicion 101

 

That night had been rather  
uneventful after my little run in with Alpha, or whom I thought rather, Master  
Krots. My throat was actually in worse shape than I thought. I was lucky that I  
was able to speak. After drinking down a tonic that tasted like puree spinach  
and an hour's rest in the infirmary, I was allowed to head back to the dorms.  
Like he said and against my insistence, Master Krots awaited me outside to  
escort me to the dorms. He didn't try any funny stuff either. Still, I felt the  
need to keep on guard around him.

They had fixed my room, now  
as good as new. Resting in my bed I quickly dosed off. No other events happened  
that night. I suppose after the ruckus Alpha caused that afternoon, he'd  
probably didn't want to rush knocking me off so soon. Despite how nimble he was  
I must have given him a hell of a shock when I retaliated against him. Anyone  
would feel a little worn out after taking a Mono Volt to heart.

 Morning came soon enough. Guards had now been  
stationed patrolling the dorm halls at night, probably under the headmistress's  
orders to keep an eye on me. I wanted to tell her what I thought of Master  
Krots, but the most she would do was tell me that I was overreacting.

How can one overreact when  
someone tries to crush your windpipe, for crying out loud?!

Anyway, for the rest of the  
day I studied my butt off. In class I absorbed as much of the new spells as I  
could. When the teacher was simply talking, I would jump from my class notes to  
the textbook for spells that I'd thought would help me. If I wanted to fight on  
even ground with Alpha, I was going to need to get a hell of a lot stronger and  
able to use my heavy-duty spells freely. I even broke out the notes I made for  
my original spells. When we met, I was going to sock him with my bag of tricks.  
The day seemed to blur by, as time grew shorter and shorter. After mulling  
about all of today's class notes and about three textbooks, afternoon came.

Finished with my last  
class, Black Magic arts, I decided to do my last bit of research in the library  
before dinnertime. Walking down the hall, I reviewed over what I knew so far of  
my dilemma.

So far I had five of the  
six W's: **w** ho, **w** hat, **w** here, **w** hen, and ho **w**.  
Who: Alpha; with the very promising possibility that his true identity was  
Master Krots. What: He wanted to kill me. Duh! Where and when: All this trouble  
started three days ago at the school. And the how: Another Duh! Something to do  
with crushing my windpipe was a _distinct_  
possibility!

That only left one, but a  
very important W. **Why**? Why would anyone wanted to come after me. Alpha  
must have bigger fish to fry than go after a youthful teen sorcerer. As  
talented as I was, I wasn't the kind of guy to make enemies. Perhaps next time  
we'd cross swords--_er_, claws to  
spells, I could ask him myself.

"Zane, _Zaaaannnneee_!"

_Oh gods, I don't have the energy for this now..._

I hesitantly turned around.  
It was Cassandra all right. Didn't she have anything better to do than pick fun  
at me? I didn't have the time now to deal with her. With her usual cheery tone,  
she came running up to me priestess robes and all. "Where you going?" Cassandra  
asked, a glint of suspicion in her voice.

"To the library," I  
answered with a grumble. I quickly made a retreat down the hall with her still  
behind me.

"But Zane," she called back  
at me, "Don't you have detention with Master Krots today?" Her reminder caused  
me to freeze in my tracks.

_Detention, **right!** _

I slapped my palm against  
my forehead and pulled it over my eyes. She was right. I still had detention  
with Master Krots. I might as well been brought before my teacher on a silver  
platter. I turned my head to Cassandra with a dour look. "Thanks..." I grumbled.

What happened then actually  
surprised me. Instead of giving me her simple cheery response and smile that  
made me want to slap it off her face, she gave me a sincerely concerned look.  
"Is something wrong?" she asked right off the bat.

Truth be told, I wanted to  
tell her. Hell, I wanted to tell anyone about what was happening. I guess all  
this anxiety began to take its toll on my nerves. But I couldn't tell her of  
all people. Even if she did believe me, what I'd told her would only put her in  
danger. If I told her that Master Krots was a famous assassin and I was right,  
he would kill her too to keep her quiet. Even though I disliked the girl, I  
didn't want to throw her into harm's way like that.

I can be a nice guy too,  
you know.

Hesitant, I looked to her  
fully with a serious look. "Cassandra," I started off, "Remember when you told  
me that you felt a malevolent around the school, and how it surrounded me?" She  
nodded slowly. "Well, you were... sort of right."

I think I surprised her  
myself because she gave a silent gasp at the news. I was lucky that the hall  
was mostly empty so no one overheard. "I can't tell you everything, but someone  
has been trying to kill me. He's already tried three times to kill me and even  
worse, I think he's someone who's been in our school the whole time," I told  
her clearly.

Her look of concern  
deepened, as she took as step forward. She gripped her books tightly like a  
classic, shy schoolgirl. "Who? I can help you," she said.

"No!" I jumped immediately.  
I cast my gaze to the tiled floor. "If I did tell you, he'd come after you too.  
The less you know the better."

A rather deep silence hung  
between us as she took in what I said. "Never mind," I said sadly, "I shouldn't  
have told you anything. Just forget it, okay?" With that, I turned around to  
leave.

"No," Cassandra pleaded in  
a strong tone. I still kept my back to her. "Let me help you. If something  
malicious is going on here, I want to do whatever I can to stop them." It was a  
side to her I never heard before.

"I got to go," I said  
solemnly, ignoring her brave words "I got detention to go to."  With that I walked away, leaving Cassandra  
behind me. I had to admit, I was rather thankful that she actually expressed  
genuine concern for me. I'd had to remind myself to thank her if I made it out  
of this mess alive.

Gripping  
my books tight to keep my nerves in check, I walked towards the Alchemy Lab. I  
was going to detention, managed by a teacher who moonlighted as a famous ninja  
bent on skinning my hide. The entire scenario _screamed_ suicide.

 

The late sunset gleamed  
into the room from the back windows. There I sat, quietly in my seat with my  
books on my desk. Sitting far ahead of me at his elegant desk was Master Krots,  
or quite possibly Alpha, whichever you prefer. He sat there with his small  
glasses perched upon his nose. He probably did so to make his appearance more  
innocent. Well, he wasn't fooling me.

The silence was so thick in  
that room you could probably cut it with a knife. We were the only two in that  
room. I kept my eyes on him, keeping him in constant sight in case he would to  
try something. Another daydream that haunted me was of one of those crueler  
detentions when they'd send the student to a torture chamber, all done my  
Master Krots's hands-- _er_ paws.

_No_, they _really_  
don't do that here. J

He'd occasionally look from  
his papers and gave me a quick glance, keeping an eye on me. I continued to  
keep my guard up around him. It was impossible to relax around him as a  
constant chill grazed my body.

Ten minutes had past when  
he'd put his papers down and looked to me. He gave his gentle smile. That smile  
showed no more kindness for me. It was an act, nothing more. If he turned that  
smile in anyway icy, I was getting the hell out of there. My furious look  
tightened at him as he looked towards me.

"So," he asked leisurely,  
"How was your day?"

"Peachy," I replied  
grumpily.

He blinked at me, slightly  
surprised by my reaction. "Are you mad at me or something, Zane?" Krots asked.

_Gee, how'd ya guess?_

"You know," I replied,  
casting a crossed look at him. "How'd you feel if you were pushed against a  
wall and threatened?"

Krots then closed his eyes  
and shook his head rather remorsefully. "I wasn't threatening you, Zane. I was  
only firm with you because I just didn't wanted to see you get hurt," Master  
Krots answered.

My look upon him sharpened,  
now with a touch of suspicion. "Why are you _so_  
concerned about me?" I asked.

I got him to blink his eyes  
open towards me. "What do you mean?" he counter-asked in a lighthearted tone.  
"You're my student. I take your well being to heart just like all my other  
pupils."

_Not buying it, pal!_

I began to tap my finger  
against the book I had on my desk. All this info stalling was pulling at my  
cool like an over tightened guitar string.   
"Really?" I played along.

"Of course. What other  
reason would I have for your safety?"

"You tell _me_?" I said rather distrusting.

My tone might have been a  
little too insinuating because at that moment, Master Krots's gaze at me became  
a bit stern. He looked at me with questionable suspicion. A silence hung  
between us for a long time. That was when I knew something rather disturbing.  
There was no one else around. The halls were completely quiet and empty.

At that moment, Master  
Krots stood up from his seat and took a step around his desk. "Zane," he said  
with a soft growl, "what are you trying to tell me?" His wolfish eyes gleamed  
with the orange sunlight, casting a suspicious stare at me.

That veil of silence  
quickly turned into suspicion. The sudden change in the atmosphere sent another  
shiver down my spine. "I just wanted to know," I found my tone of voice  
wavering under Master Krots stern gaze. "Why you're so interested in me?"

Stepping next to his desk,  
he leaned against it and crossed his arms against his chest. "Because, you're a  
good student who tries very hard to succeed," the werewolf answered. "I notice  
how hard you try to master your spells. Especially how much you attempted to  
pull off Blast Bomb."

Just then the guitar string  
in my mind snapped at what he said. I immediately shot my eyes at him in full  
attention. "How did you know I was trying Blast Bomb?" I asked hastily.

His eyes met mine, seeing  
the fright I clearly had at his words. A painful silence hung before us. How  
did he know I was practicing Blast Bomb... unless he was there to see me  
practice!

Pushing my chair back from  
my desk, I stood up smoothly but swiftly. "Um, Mister Krots, I-I really got to  
leave now," I said rather aloud and grabbed my books.

He got off his desk and  
stood up strait as he watched me gather my stuff. "Zane, you still have thirty  
minutes of detention," he said with a firm tone of voice. "You'll have to  
wait."

"I'll make up my  
transgressions later," I answered hastily as I headed for the door. However,  
Master Krots wouldn't hear of it.

"ZANE," he growled, his  
tone of voice becoming frightful. "You are not leaving this classroom!"

Needless to say, as I kelp  
heading for the door, Master Krots came after me. Before I reached the door,  
the werewolf teacher had stepped into my path. He peered over his glasses at  
me, giving me a stare that denied any insubordination.  "Get back in your seat, Zane!" he growled.

"I'm sorry," I said with a  
raised voice of my own, "I have to go!" With that, I attempted a break for the  
door.

What he did next gave me a  
jolt of fright. He quickly jumped before me again and grabbed me by my arm. I  
dropped my books as he grabbed me. It appeared that he was being gentle with his  
grip, but for how long was probably not going to last. I pulled and struggled,  
making my resistance against Master Krots all the more troublesome.

"Let go!" I shouted at him.  
He just gripped my arm as I tried to use my other to push him away.

"Zane, calm down! Listen to  
me!"

I was done being nice. I  
placed my arms against him and pushed. "I said LET GO!" I shouted as I threw my  
arms upward, throwing his grip upward.

Just then when his arm went  
up, I noticed the red sleeve of his robe slip down a bit to reveal his arm. My  
eyes widened with fright at what I saw. There, on his arm was a rather  
noticeable scorch mark. It dawned on me. It was the same place I had  
electrocuted Alpha with my Mono Volt spell when he was choking me. I had no  
doubt now. Alpha and Master Krots were one and the same!

 Krots looked at me a moment with a concerned  
look, seeing the fear in my eyes. "Zane, what's wrong?" he asked. Still  
upholding his act, he reached out for me again.

Before he could even touch  
me, I had sprinted with all my might out the door. No sooner had I ran into the  
deserted hallway had I heard his call after me, followed by the sound of his  
pursuit. I had only run three feet from the doorway before I felt his paw clasp  
upon my shoulder, stopping me.

"Wait a second--!" he  
shouted at me.

Interrupting him, I twisted  
around and shook off his grip on me. Taking a step back, I quickly brought my  
hands together and a spark of energy came to life between them. "Stay back!" I  
yelled, rather panicked at his attempted to grab me. I had enough proof to be  
scared right then.

Seeing my magic in hand, he  
took a step back with his arms up a bit. "Zane! What's come over you?" Krots  
asked with a shout.

I kept my stance firm and  
my magic ready; my eyes were fixed on his movements. "Keep away from me!" I  
shouted, prepared to cast my spell. "You can't fool me anymore!"

Krots looked surprised,  
possibly for me figuring it all out. "What are you talking about?" he asked  
with a bit of a growl.

"Don't play dumb with me!"  
I spat venomously, "I know who you are!"

His eyes were wide at my  
words. Lowering his arms down, his tone of voice suddenly eased up a bit.  
"Zane," he said in almost a soothing tome. He took a step forward and attempted  
to reach for my shoulder. "Just calm down and--"

"Diem Wing!"

At his advance, I cast my  
spell. A strong gust of wind erupted between us and right into Krots. With a  
shout, the werewolf teacher was thrown backwards and sent flying across the  
floor. He landed on his butt a good few meters away from me and slid to a stop.  
Surprised by my attack, he gave me a surprised look with his wolfish face.

As soon as he hit the  
ground, I took off running down the hall away from him. "Zane, wait! Come  
back!" Krots shouted after me, but I just kept running. I wouldn't be doing  
what he said anytime soon. I was positive Master Krots was Alpha. I couldn't  
believe I ever thought he could be such a nice teacher, let alone one I would  
call my favorite teacher.

I had  
only one option in mind. To face Alpha one on one, man to man... _er_, wolf.  
To hell with being safe. How the hell was I suppose to be safe if my own  
teacher was the one trying to kill me? I made up my mind. I was going to  
confront that bastard tonight. If I was going to become wolf meat, I was going  
to give him the mother load of indigestion.

 

The crisp night air was  
chilling as I waited to escape from my dorm room. I had been preparing myself  
for my encounter with Alpha no sooner had I entered my room. I quickly dressed  
myself with my dark blue sweatpants, my light blue shirt with a blue flame on  
it and my favorite blue cloak. Finally I put on my favorite enchanted, moon  
talisman, used to increase spell power. If I was going down, I was going down  
looking good.

I waited until the late  
night. All the while I studied my spells one last time. I reviewed every one,  
including Blast Bomb but I doubted I could rely on that one. I waited and  
waited, until it was ten at night. It was time for me to take action.

Waiting until I heard the  
footsteps of the guards outside pass my room, I got out of my bed and went  
towards the newly repaired window. I got discouraged for a moment. Someone had  
put a protection spell around the window, probably ordered by the headmistress.  
Not only did it keep the window locked and unbreakable, but it wouldn't allow  
me to open it as well. I wondered if she had planned on that.

Anyway, it was an easy  
enough problem to fix. Taking my time, I ran my fingers about the window's  
frame, my magic at my fingertips. After working my fingers around the hinges of  
the window, I felt a sudden breeze of air as the spell around my window was  
released. I smiled coyly at my ingenious craftsmanship.

Opening the window, I  
crawled onto its ledge. It was a four-story drop to the ground, but again, not  
a problem. Casting a levitation spell, I slowly dropped from my windowsill and  
slowly floated towards the ground in a heavenly descent. In about twenty  
seconds, my feet softly touched the ground. It defiantly beat tying bed sheets  
together to scale out of my room anytime.

"Hey, you there," someone  
called from behind me.

 I slapped my forehead again. I had forgotten  
about the guards posted outside the dorms. Slowly turning around, I found two  
armed guards looking at me. They appeared to be friendly in nature, but nothing  
looks friendly when they hold sharp spears in their hands.

"What are you doing out  
here?" one of them asked, realizing I was a student and lowered his spear a  
bit.

"It's dangerous, and  
students are not allowed to go out of their dorms past curfew. I'm sure you  
know that," the other said.

I did know, but I just  
didn't care at that time. Save neck first, worry about rules later. Giving them  
a smile fitting for my age, I gave a nervous chuckle. "I'm sorry, sir," I said  
with a hand behind my head, "Your absolutely right. I don't want to get in  
trouble and I really should be... Sleeping." 

Just as I had said  
'sleeping', the guards suddenly collapsed with a sigh onto the ground. It  
worked. I had cast a sleeping spell on them, a trick until now that I had a  
chance to perform. With the two guards now sleeping lumps on the ground, I  
quietly walked around them and made my way towards the school grounds.

With my blue outfit I felt  
practically invisible against the night sky and the dark around me. I kept a  
steady pace. If I knew Alpha as I did up till now, he'd probably already knew I  
was out in the open and hiding somewhere among the buildings around me. Cutting  
my way across the deserted courtyard, I headed towards the one place where I  
could do battle to my full extent. The training building.

My trip there was quick and  
easy. To my luck, no guards were anywhere in sight and hadn't spot me as I ran  
there. Weather it was from the cold brisk air of the night or just me at the  
thought of Alpha, my body was shaking as I approached the door. With trembling  
hands, I quickly opened the door and stepped into the dark room.

The large room again was  
very quiet. Now at night, the room seemed shrouded with shadow. It was easy  
enough to see through, but creepy nonetheless. Taking a deep breath to calm my  
nerves, I walked into the very center of the room. If me standing in the center  
of the magic emblem on the floor like a giant bulls-eye wasn't enough to  
attract Alpha's attention, then nothing would.

I stood there for what felt  
like an hour, taking deep breaths to keep my cool. Eventually I was able to  
remain calm. No matter if I'd stayed in my room and played it safe, he'd still  
come after me. This way, I was going on the offensive with him. I kept my  
senses open, focusing on the silence of the room around me. Then, as faint and  
chilling as the first time I felt it, I sensed a presence from somewhere in the  
room.

"So, Alpha," I quipped  
calmly, my gaze still on one point of the room. "How long have you been  
watching?" I then turned around.

From the framework of the  
ceiling, the werewolf in black dropped from the shadows above. He landed  
silently on the ground as if he was a phantom. "Long enough to tell that you  
knew I'd come. You got a lot of guts for a kid your age," Alpha said rather  
leisurely with his low tone.

_A compliment from a  
killer? Huh, go figure._

I gave a sly smile at him,  
reciprocating the incentive. "How's the arm?" I quipped, remembering the scorch  
mark on Master Krots.

He gave me a low growl in  
my direction under his masked mussel. The thought caused him to give the arm a  
gentle rub. "Not too bad," he said, "That little electric shock of yours really  
stung you know."

"I do."

His steely eyes narrowed at  
me as he stood at the edge of the room. "So, why did you come out here?" he  
asked, "Have you come to give yourself up?"

I gave him a challenged  
look. "No," I said clearly, "I came to fight you."

"Really?" he asked. I think  
I caught a small chuckle in his tone, causing me to give him a crossed glance.  
"Is that why you came all the way out here in the middle of the night?"

The way he felt he could be  
so relaxed, that my defeat was so inevitable had really peaked my ire. "I came  
here because of this place in particular. You _were_ the one who deployed  
those Mazoku on me, _weren't you_?"   
I asked rhetorically.

"I was."

I gave him a confident  
smile. "Then you should already know that this room was built to contain magic  
energy. When we fought last, I was holding back because I knew I couldn't fight  
freely on open school grounds," I explained calmly. I watched him as his  
narrowed steely eyes rested upon me. "In here, I can fight you at my full  
strength, and not worry about blowing the place up."

I thought I saw a slight  
smile under his mask as he looked at me. "Very well. This place will do just  
fine," he said, a bit of a quip to in his tone. Man, there were a lot of  
quipping tonight. "There's an advantage for me too. In here..." he paused and  
took a small step forward. "No one can hear you scream." As he took another  
step, he reached behind him for his blade.

"Wait a sec," I said just  
before he reached his sword. "Before we start, can I ask you a question  
please?" I didn't know what stopped him first; that I caught him before he  
began to attack, or the fact that I used the word 'please'. Either way, he  
looked at me with a questionable look and withdrew his paw away from the sword.  
"Why exactly are you after me? What did I do to you?" I asked.

Alpha just stood there in  
silence, taking his time ponder the question I had asked. After him glancing at  
his claws for a second, he looked back to me. He gave a small huff under his  
mask. "Hm, I don't see why not," he said simply as his eyes laid rest to me.  
"Maybe if I tell you, that will make your surrender that much easier." 

I couldn't help but cock an  
eyebrow at what he said. "What do you mean?" I asked hesitantly.

Relaxing again, Alpha  
slipped into his leisurely tone of voice. "To let you know, I am work for hire.  
I do no less than what my employer asks of me."

_A killer, teacher, and a  
businessman. Will the surprises never cease?_

I was growing more  
interested in what he had to say. I had been busting my brain trying to figure  
out the why of all this for the past three days. "I was instructed to  
infiltrate the school and find you. This, however, has been a most unique job  
I've been asked to do."

"Why? Never killed a little  
kid before?" I butted in rather venomously.

To my surprise, he gave  
another huff at my rudeness. "Not at all," he said, "To my surprise, my  
employers asked me to bring you back... ALIVE."

"Alive?"

"Yes," he replied, his tone  
now growing into a growl. "Truth was if I were just asked to kill you and be  
done with it, I could have done so in a heartbeat. But you..." I sensed his growl  
with a bit of anger in it. "You sure made this task all the more troublesome."

_Oh, boy..._

"I admit I had  
underestimated you as a mere boy. But this ends tonight. You're coming with me,  
weather you want to or not," he said coldly. His steely eyes twinkled with his  
killer instinct trying to come out.

Regaining my confidence, I  
gave him an intrigued smile. "So," I asked, "Who is this employer of yours and  
why do they want me so bad?"

His eyes narrowed at me  
through the slits in his mask. "That I won't say," he stated simply.

It was clear he wasn't  
going to spill any more info about why he was after me. He was just the  
messenger, which meant that I had more things to worry about. Just great.

"Now," he said with his  
narrowed gaze locked on me. "This is your last chance. Make this easy for the both  
of us and come quietly."

I gripped my fists, holding  
my courage strong in myself. "Alpha, I'm not going with you!" I said clearly,  
"You might have to hold yourself back against me, but that doesn't mean I  
won't! I'm not going anywhere!"

Alpha remained still. That  
leisurely attitude of his slowly melted away as he eyed me. "So be it," he  
growled and held the grip of his sword.

The two of us stood there  
silently. Neither of us moved, him awaiting my first attack and me awaiting  
his. He kept his paw on his dagger, prepared to draw it on an impulse's notice.  
A minute must have past and neither one of us moved. Waiting for the other one  
was growing pretty old, pretty fast. Like a gunshot to start the battle, I  
crossed my arms across my chest and made my move.

"Get ready to fry, wolf  
boy!" I shouted and prepared my spell. With my words and extending my hands  
out, a ball of yellow light appeared between my palms. A Fireball maybe? Nope...  
something even better.

"Thunderball!" With energy  
flickering around my hands, I shot the ball of yellow light forth. It rocketed  
right through the air with amazing speed right at Alpha. The werewolf only was  
able to give a 'wha--!' as he barely dodged the high-speed ball of light. As it  
struck the wall, the ball of light exploded in an amazing blaze of lightning  
and electrical energy. With the explosion, a large dust cloud swept over Alpha  
as I watched with a proud smile.

"That," I said proudly to  
Alpha, somewhere hidden in the smoke, "was my original spell! Mixing the basics  
of a Fireball and a Mono Volt spell!" I wasn't stupid. That spell was indeed  
powerful, but I was well aware that wasn't enough to stop Alpha. Then as the  
smoke cleared, I saw him.

My spirit dropped a tad.  
Not only did he dodge the ball head on, but also he was without a scratch. His  
eyes sliced through the smoke as he looked at me. It was if my attack was more  
troublesome than painful. "Now your mine!" he growled and sprinted from the  
smoke towards me.

I prepared my next spell.  
To pull it off, I had to juggle my energies at just the right time if I wanted  
to throw him off. I had to focus on him, making sure my spell met its mark.  
With Alpha sprinting strait towards me, I took aim. He held his knife in his  
paw, ready to attack. Then, closing in fast, I released my spell.

"_Hello there, handsome,_"

At that moment, I could  
have sworn I saw Alpha's eyes bulge out of his mask and sockets. He came to  
such a stop I'd though he'd fall over. Standing a couple of feet before him was  
a beautiful young, half-naked women with long blond hair and the face of a  
beauty queen. I heard a gasp from my attacker as he gawked at the beauty, torn  
from how she got there and shocked from how she looked.

The women then bended over  
with a hand on her knees and held a finger to her lips. "_Why wolfy_," she  
said in a sexy tone, "_Don't you want to play with me instead?_" With  
that, she blew Alpha a kiss.

The guy completely froze in  
his tracks. I had bet under that mask, he went slack-jawed at the sight of her.  
"W-W-W-What the--"

"FIREBALL!"

I cast my next spell.  
Before Alpha knew it, a ball of fiery light passed through the beautiful maiden  
like she was a ghost and shot right at him. Direct hit! Yeah! The ball of light  
caught Alpha right in the gut and propelled him backwards with it. In, what I  
bet was a painful crash, he slammed into the wall and the Fireball exploded.  
The fiery explosion lit up the room, spreading fire into the air around the  
wall. I couldn't see how Alpha could survive **that****!**

"Ha-Ha!" I laughed out  
loud. I pointed to the sight of the explosion as the flames died into smoke.  
"Gotcha, with my Fireball-Fake out!" I had cast an illusion spell on Alpha as  
he came after me. Focusing as hard as I could, I was able to juggle upholding  
my illusion while I chanted up the Fireball. I had used that technique one, all  
it got me though was a very displeased teacher and a week of detention.

The smoke hovered in the  
air for a few second, and then slowly receded. My glee turned sour as I looked  
through the smoke to find who stood behind it. There, with no more than a few  
singes on his already black outfit stood Alpha. He slowly stepped out of the  
smoke, his creepy eyes locked on me again. I couldn't believe it! The guy took  
a Fireball right in the chest and he wasn't cremated! There should have been  
nothing but bones from a blast like that, but there he was.

"My, aren't we inventive?"  
he asked leisurely, brushing a paw against his arm to remove some suit. "Is  
there anything else you want to show me?"

_Now he's mocking me?!  
That's it! The only guy who gets to poke fun at the bad guys is me, pal!_

Not giving me the time to  
answer, he charged again. Then, before he had made it across the floor to me,  
he disappeared in a blur of speed and vanished. It was my turn to be  
flabbergasted as he pulled a Houdini on me. I glanced about, keeping my eyes  
and ears open to find where he'd go. Then I sensed his presence again, right to  
my left. In an act of pure instinct, I leapt away from where I saw. As I did,  
three throwing darts struck the ground where I once was. 

From a foot in the air,  
Alpha had reappeared in another blur. He lunged at me, his blade poised towards  
my neck.

_Hey! What are you doing!  
You want me alive, remember?_

With that steely knife  
coming at me, it gave me an idea. "Mono Volt!" I cried and held my hand out.  
Lightning quickly shot forth and struck Alpha's blade. I had figured I'd use  
the sword as a lightning rod for an effective attack. But before the electric  
shock could even reach Alpha, he flung the sword away and towards the wall, taking  
the electric attack with it. It struck the wall and the electricity around it  
discharged harmlessly.

I gulped, I hadn't expected  
that. Alpha landed on his haunches and faced me with his claws now extended.  
"Did you honestly believe that I would fall for the same trick TWICE?" he  
growled with an arrogant tone, sounding as if he was the most powerful foe in  
the world. Well, his tone left his mark at least as I took a step back.

Those spells I created had  
powerful results and all they did was slow him down. I'd bet a Dragon Slave  
would defiantly be enough to barbeque his tail, but I didn't know if the  
warding field I was in would contain the blast. Not to mention if I did, it  
would probably take me along with it.

Even without his sharp  
dagger, Alpha was still a force to contend with. Now standing a few feet ahead  
of me, he watched me closely like a cat anticipating a mouse's movements. With  
his speed, he would grab me as soon as I made a run for it. "Tired yet?" he  
quipped dully.

"You wish! Flare Bit!" I  
shouted.

Small balls of light  
appeared around me. Throwing my hand down, they collided with the ground  
between Alpha and me. Their combined force exploded on the ground and released  
a dense smokescreen around us. I doubt that Alpha would be fooled, but I wasn't  
about to nick-pick about diversions. Taking advantage of it, I ran to my right.  
I escaped the smog and sprinted far from the area to gain some distance.

Somehow, I figured Alpha  
wouldn't allow it as he let out a growl in my direction.

"Freeze Arrow," he growled.

From out of the array of  
smoke, three arrows of blue light shot out towards me as I ran. Two of the  
arrows shot over my head while the other struck the ground. At first what I  
thought was poor aim I attempted to run, until I felt something snag my feet,  
followed by a cold chill up my ankles.

Frozen in place, I looked  
down. My feet had been frozen to the floor. Ice had formed around my feet,  
sealing them to the ground with a thick coat of frost. I tried to yank my feet  
free, but it was as if my soles had been sauntered down. As I looked up towards  
the billowing smoke, I saw the silhouette of Alpha appear.

He stepped out of the smoke  
towards me and approached in his leisurely pace. On the approach, he held a  
fist before him. "Let's see how _you_  
like taking a Mono Volt," he said in a shallow growl.  Then, opening his fist, a ball of flickering  
electricity appeared in his paw.

Alpha took his sweet time  
walking up to me as I frantically tugged against the ice around my feet. If he  
struck me with it, it was over. He might have been able to withstand a direct  
hit from a paralyzing lightning spell, but I sure as hell wasn't that  
resilient. The flickering ball of light lighted up his steely eyes as he  
approached me.

Then, finally calming down  
to stop my frantic pulling at my feet, I came up with an idea. I chanted up  
another spell under my breath as he approached. Now only a few feet from me,  
the ball of electricity in Alpha's paw flickered madly in anticipation to  
discharge. "Flare Bit!" I cast again. Another bunch of balls of light appeared  
before me and I threw my hand down... except, my target wasn't Alpha. I aimed  
right below me.

I felt the ground boom as I  
threw my hand towards my feet. The balls of light exploded with a heated charge  
of air and created another smokescreen upon impact. Instantly, I suddenly felt  
my feet were no longer frozen to the ground. I had aimed Flare Bit on the ice  
around my feet, freeing me just in time. Guessing where Alpha was within that  
second in the smoke, I sprinted towards his left. I didn't know if it was  
survival instinct or my going crazy to just survive that night. With a loud  
shout I threw a high kick right for where Alpha's head should've been.

My foot was suddenly caught  
by something, not really making a strong impact. As the smoke blew away, I  
found Alpha before me with a paw clamped around my ankle. The way he looked at  
me showed a small hint of boredom at my attempt. "I'll say again, you've got  
guts..." Then, with a murmur that escaped my hearing, a blast of wind suddenly  
struck me.

I was thrown far, out of  
the array of smoke and sent spiraling across the floor. After sliding halfway  
across the room, I knelt up as quickly as possible. When I looked up, I saw the  
blown away smoke give way to Alpha as he stepped forward into view. With a  
scowl on my face, I got up to my feet to fight again.

"I can't believe I ever  
liked you!" I growled at Alpha, "I should've known that a teacher like you was  
too good to be true."

Stopping as he came out of  
the smoke, he looked at me simply. "And why would you say that?" he asked,  
rather curious.

"Drop the act, pal!" I  
shouted and pointed right at the werewolf assassin. "I know you're Master  
Krots!" My anger escalated as I thought of the whole idea of it.

"Really?" he asked, his  
eyes narrowing at me with intrigue. "And what makes you think I'm this... _Krots_?"

"The most upstanding  
evidence," I said as I looked towards the arm I had zapped last afternoon. "The  
scorch on your arm, you had the same mark when I had zapped you earlier." I  
caught a slight snicker from Alpha as he heard what I said. He may have pissed  
me off before, but his snickering was just making my blood boil. 

"Go ahead, deny it all you  
want!" I shouted aloud. Regaining my strength, I crossed my arms in my spell-casting  
pose. I kept an angry scowl on Alpha, showing that I was ready to fight with  
everything I got. "It doesn't matter! I'll expose you once I take you down!"

With that, he took another  
step towards me, prepared to fight again. "My, what spirit you have," he said  
leisurely, and then glared at me with his silvery eyes. "Enjoy it while it  
lasts, because once this is over... I'll be sure to crush it!" With that, he made  
a deadly sprint for me. My eyes flared with attention as Alpha entered his  
sprint.

"Grey  
Bomb!" I cried and threw out my arms wide. The ground trembled as my spell took  
hold. The ground beneath Alpha suddenly erupted with a mighty blast, sending a  
cloud of debris high into the air.

I instantly took a few  
jumps back as the explosion of earth ended, preparing for when Alpha reemerged  
from the smoke. Right on cue, Alpha jumped out of the smoke and high into the  
air, poised for an aerial charge at me from above. With him in the air, I  
doubted that he would be able to dodge my next spell so easily. Holding my  
hands out with my fingers in a crossed pattern, I chanted the spell.

"Scatter Brid!" From the  
space before me, waves of small energy balls rained a hailstorm towards the  
werewolf assassin.

The annoying waves swept  
around Alpha, not only hitting him with several electrical shocks, but also  
doing well to blind him in the blizzard of sparks. After a few seconds of  
annoying pelts of the energy swarm, Alpha leapt from the air and to the far  
side of the room. To my luck, he'd altered his express route at me, which gave  
me time to cast one of my major spells.

I closed my eyes as I began  
to feel magic flow through me. Wind began to swirl around me, waving my blue  
cloak in its breeze as my words churned it with magic. Opening my eyes  
slightly, I saw Alpha now out of the storm of energy balls. Alpha charged at me  
once again. I kept chanting.

_Wind which blows across eternity,_

_gather in my hands and become my strength!_

            The  
wind around me picked up more, flapping my cloak upward as felt wind build in between  
my palms. The spell I had planned would unleash a powerful blast of wind in the  
form of an arrow. With contact, the spell would shred the target to pieces.

            My  
words must have caught Alpha's attention because as I finished my chant, he  
came to a sudden stop. Can you say _sitting  
duck_ ! It was my time to show him why I was so confident.

            "Bram  
Gush!" I cried and shoved my hands forth. A gust of wind violently shook from  
my hand as my arrow shot forth. Like a hawk diving towards its meal, the arrow  
cleaved its way through the air and hummed with its destructive cyclone within.  
Alpha stood right there in its path, the arrow a second from impact.

            Suddenly  
with a blur of speed, Alpha vanished right before my eyes. "What!?" was all I  
could say as my arrow missed its mark and continued on. Speeding onward, it  
struck the back wall of the training gym and exploded. With its blast of  
razor-sharp wind, the spell ripped a rather large piece of the wall with it.

            I  
found myself silent and mortified as my spell ended with a large crater nailed  
into the wall. Seconds after the arrow struck, Alpha reappeared with another  
blur and landed right where he was seconds before. Unsurprised by the falling  
debris behind him, he locked his steely eyes towards me.

            "Enough  
warm-up," he growled with almost an intimidating growl. "Go ahead. Give me your  
best shot."

            _THAT was my best shot..._

            I  
felt like falling to my knees, but I willed myself to keep standing. I was out  
of ideas. That was the best spell I knew and he deflected it. I wouldn't have  
time to chant it up again without have him all over me mid-way in my chanting.  
He had walked away from most of my spells without serious damage.

            "Its  
time we end this game," Alpha said and raised a paw out towards me. A faint  
glow showed over it as he began to cast a spell. "Dark Mist."

            Not  
again, I thought. Like a fast moving fog, darkness filled my vision and  
surroundings with the black mist. I couldn't see a thing, not even my nose in  
front of my face. It wasn't hard to tell that Alpha was planning to cripple my  
sight so I was an easy target. If Alpha was like any ninja, he could find me in  
this unnatural fog without even trying.

            I  
looked around, trying to sense Alpha but found nothing. "Lighting!" I cried and  
made a ball of light appear in my hand. But to my shock, the lighting spell too  
was absorbed into the fog, only showing a blur of its glow. I waved the light  
around me with its blurry glow, but it did nothing. I was just spinning my  
wheels to find Alpha in his dark spell, but as he already knew, it was futile.

            "What's  
wrong?" I heard Alpha's voice from somewhere around me, "afraid of the dark,  
pup?" It was as if his voice was coming from everywhere, making it impossible  
for me to tell where he was. I was trapped and I had no way to escape the Dark  
Mist spell... or Alpha hidden within it.

            "Sleep  
tight, kid," Alpha growled.

            "Flow  
Break!"

            Like  
a flare from the brightest heavens, a light suddenly broke the shroud of Dark  
Mist before me. With its brilliant light, it shoved the darkness back and  
before long swept it away. I found myself back in the surroundings of the  
training area. My mind raced for what had happened. I hadn't cast that spell.

            As  
the light faded away, I found Alpha where he was before. He stood a far distance  
from me with his arm over his eyes. Removing his arm, he glanced around to find  
his Dark Mist spell gone.

            "What,"  
he snarled angrily, "What was that?"

            "Surprise!"  
a voice cried from high above.

            Both  
of us surprised, Alpha and I looked towards the row of bleachers that stretched  
towards the ceiling. Hidden in the shadows at the very top, stood the figure of  
a person.

            "Prepare  
to face defeat villain!" the jubilant voice shouted.

            My  
eyes went wide as I looked closely through the shadows at the person hidden in  
them. As I saw the person's silhouette, I felt the sudden urge to roll my eyes  
in grief.

            _Oh no, it's her!_

            Chapter  
4: Bang from beyond! Blast Bomb!

 

            "Lighting!"  
our mystery savior shouted and launched a bright ball of light into the air  
above her. The light shined right on her like someone on a stage. There,  
standing dramatically upon the top bleacher stood Cassandra with her hands on  
her hips as she stared down at us. She wore a white fighter garb with a flowing  
white cape off her shoulders. Her flowing blond hair hung off her shoulders as  
she stood high and mighty like some sort of superhero.

            The  
whole sight wanted me to bury my head into the tiled floor.

            "CASSANDRA!?"  
I cried aloud, more in dread than in relief. "W-What are you doing here?"

            With  
another act of drama, she brushed a lock of hair over he shoulder and looked  
down at me. "You think I'd let you have all the fun here?" she quipped as her  
gaze came to Alpha. He, on the other hand was anything but intimidated by her  
strong dramatic entrance.

            "Who's  
this girl?" Alpha asked rather dourly.

            Then,  
she held a finger out in Alpha's direction with a heroic pose as if she was  
about to rain hellfire upon him. Instead she was going to do something worse. A  
speech. "Hear me, evil-doer! Your evil shall never prevail! For as long as such  
deeds exist in this world, there shall be good to stop it! I am Cassandra, THE  
HERO OF JUSTICE!"

            Cassandra  
took a step back and then leaped off the bleacher into the air. With an  
impressive acrobatic somersault, she flew through the air as Alpha and I  
watched. She defiantly got the acrobatics down... except she underestimated her  
landing. Landing onto one of the lower bleachers, her foot slipped and entered  
a most embarrassing fall. She suddenly tumbled down the remaining bleachers  
like a heap of old laundry. Tumbling down, she fell face down to the floor with  
a rather loud and painful SPLAT!

            I  
winced at the sight as she hit. A part of me felt sorry for her at that moment.  
No more than a second after she hit the ground, Cassandra pushed her self up  
and stood up as if that rather embarrassing fall never happened. Both Alpha and  
I stared at her with dull looks, seeing her proud and cheery look despite  
falling like a ton of bricks.

            "I  
see my grace and appeal have left you speechless villain," Cassandra said  
bravely and pointed to Alpha once again. "Now, prepare to taste my Justice!"

_I think I was better off with just Alpha..._

"Stay out of this  
girly," Alpha snarled, "This got nothing to do with you."

At that moment,  
Cassandra did what I hated most. She let out a painfully shrill laugh,  
announcing her overconfidence and vast self-superiority. That laugh would  
probably make grown men cry. "Ha!" she announced aloud, far more than she had  
to. "You attack my classmate and say it has nothing to do with me? For such  
action I shall not forgive!"

Just when I  
thought Cassandra the student was a handful, Cassandra the superhero was  
anything but subtle. I rolled my eyes as Alpha kept his eyes on her. I'd guess  
he was surprise to find someone else here after I had snuck in all alone. I  
wondered how long she was hiding in the shadows.

The look in  
Alpha's eye was clear that he was annoyed of Cassandra's over jubilant nature  
as I was. "You _don't_ want to fight with me, little girl," Alpha growled,  
"Go home and play superhero on your own time."

"You won't  
intimidate me," Cassandra boomed, "No matter how strong you are, you will never  
scuff out my flame of just--"

"FIREBALL!" Taking  
advantage of Alpha distracted by Cassandra's motivational speech, I threw a  
fireball from right next to Alpha and shot it directly into his chest. The  
sphere of fiery light threw him clear across the long room and crashed into the  
wall. The Fireball took effect and erupted right where he was. If my last  
attempt to hit him with a Fireball proved anything, he wouldn't be down for  
long. It just bought me some time.

With an impressive  
leap, Cassandra landed right at my side with a rather upset look on her face.  
"What was that for? I was in the middle of saying something important!" she  
shouted at me.

_Gee, sorry  
Cassandra. I was only trying to... SAVE MY HIDE HERE!_

"What are you  
doing here?" I shouted, particularly mad that she got involved after I told her  
not too.

Again, she gave me  
that overly confident laugh. "Please Zane," she bellowed and held a hand close  
to her mouth, "You don't really expect a weakling like you to single handedly  
take down such a foe. Though, it's no surprise that I had to come and save  
you."

She called this  
saving me? I like to see her take on Alpha and see how she fairs against him!

"This isn't a game  
here!" I shouted at her, now being serious, "Run and get out of here while you  
still can!"

"Oh no, you  
don't," a grim growl came from the other side of the room.

We both turned to  
it to find that Alpha had once again emerged relatively unharmed by my spell.  
Cassandra's eyes went wide. Even she knew as I did what a direct hit from a  
Fireball would do and yet here stood a guy who wasn't a burnt corpse.

"I had warned her  
to leave before," Alpha said as he fully emerged from the smoke. "But now that  
she's here, I fear her fate will be **far** worse than yours."

With Alpha now  
ready to fight again, the both of us got ready. With a look of determination in  
her eye, she began to cast a spell. Alpha made a deadly sprint for us, this  
time aimed particularly at Cassandra. I stayed by her side, preparing a spell  
of my own, but she was already ahead of me. Alpha had closed the gap and  
prepared to strike with his claws.

"Defense!"  
Cassandra shouted.

Then without  
ceremony and to my surprise, Alpha suddenly slammed into the air right before  
us with a painful crash. My eyes went wide to find nothing was there, as if the  
werewolf ninja was playing mime or something. No sooner had he rammed into... whatever  
it was, Alpha pushed himself off and jumped away from it.

It dawned on me as  
I saw it. Cassandra had used the White magic spell, Defense, which created a  
transparent solid field of energy around us. The barrier was in the form of a  
large, crystalline shape. It supposedly was the strongest defense spell known.

After Alpha had  
made a long leap across the floor, Cassandra let go of the shield around us.  
"Go ahead, attack us with sword and sorcery alike!" she laughed triumphantly,  
"You'll never break my spirit, nor my shields!"

"DON'T ENCOURAGE  
HIM!" I scolded at her.

With that, I let  
the spell I was holding fly. "Flare Arrow!" I launched a volley of arrows right  
at Alpha's direction. With blurs of speed, he dodged the arrows, leaving them  
behind his tail with fiery explosions.

I hated to admit,  
if we were going to do something that time was now. Now with Cassandra here, we  
stood a glimmer of a chance against him. "Cassandra," I quickly got her  
attention, "If we want to get out of this, were going to have to work together,  
okay?"

Her face  
brightened up at the suggestion. "Absolutely!" she shouted, "Prepare villain to  
fall at the power of our unity!"

I slapped my  
forehead with my palm.

"Okay," I began  
quickly, "this is what we need to do."

About as I  
explained mid-way through my plan, Alpha had finished dodging the array of  
arrows I sent his way. Catching his sight on us, he sprinted our way with his  
steely eyes glimmering with bloodlust.

"Now! Go!" I  
shouted, and the two of us separated into sprints of our own. As I ran to the  
right, Cassandra ran to the left as the both of us attempted to surround Alpha  
ourselves. Alpha came to a stop. Now with us separated, he was unsure who to go  
after. While he tried to decide, we took action.

"Aqua Create!" Cassandra  
cried, and held her hands out towards the ground. As if she was a living water  
fountain, water came pouring out from the space between her hands and cascaded  
across the floor. While she did this, I prepared a spell of my own.

With Alpha now  
curious to what we were doing, he felt the water quickly reach his pawed feet.  
The water rose madly, reaching up to our ankles and stretched throughout the  
room. It was a simple plan. Cassandra would handle setting the stage, and I'd  
follow through with the fireworks.

_It's Showtime!_

"Dolph Zork!" I  
shouted and let my magic work. From the water below me, I conjured a sharp  
blade of water and threw my arm out, launching the blade at Alpha. Cassandra  
already jumped out of the way, but Alpha's stood right in the blade's path.

Seeing the blade  
coming, Alpha ducked on both his hands and feet, looking now like an actual  
wolf. The blade flew over his back and shot towards the wall, casting a breeze  
against Alpha as he dodged it.

Not getting our  
hopes up on that one spell, Cassandra and I quickly sprinted in separate  
directions across the floor. Seeing us separate, Alpha made up his mind and  
went after me. With no less than a second, he cut off my path and I stopped  
before him. He then lunged for me, but my accomplice already had me covered.  
"Elmekia Lance!" Cassandra shouted.

A ray of fiery red  
light shot across my flank and shot right at Alpha. Knowing the spell was  
coming; he immediately sprinted for his left and missed the spell. With his  
superior speed, he sprinted through the air and landed on the other side of the  
room. At that time, Cassandra rushed towards my side and took her guard.

"Okay, villain,"  
Cassandra shouted, "I don't care who you think you are, but you're no match for  
our COMBINED POWER!"

_She's getting  
WAY too wrapped up in this,_

"Cassandra!" I had  
to burst her bubble and tell her who Alpha was. "That guy is Master Krots!"

Just then, I saw  
her jubilant exposure drop a notch. "WHAT!!!" she cried, apparently as let down  
as I was when I figured it out.

All Alpha did in  
response was narrow his gaze at us. "You fools!" Alpha growled in our  
direction. "I have but one true name, one true identity. Whatever aliases I  
take mean nothing to me, and should mean nothing to you." The way he talked  
only did to ratify he was purely hard-core.

However, Cassandra  
didn't seem to listen to him. Taking a step forward, she cast a gaze of watery  
eyes in a pleading state. "No! Master Krots please, it's not too late!" she  
cried remorsefully towards Alpha. I ended up rolling my eyes and slapping my  
forehead again. Why she would try to change the morality of a deranged serial  
killer was an utter waist of time. "Repent for your sins and you'll be saved!  
Cast your killer nature aside and give peace a chance!"

Alpha's narrowed gaze  
looked at Cassandra as if she was a puppy dog that was gnawing on his slipper.  
He held back the urge to snarl as he tried to stomach the holy dribble my  
friend was force-feeding him. "Enough of this," he grumbled and then proceeded  
in another attack towards us.

Taken aback by  
Alpha's violent reaction to her pep talk, Cassandra backed up again towards me.  
Rather alarmed, she prepared another spell. "Defense!" she shouted again and  
that veil of impenetrable, see-through energy appeared around us.

"Not this time,"  
Alpha growled as he charged for us. "Dill Brand!"

Suddenly the earth  
below Cassandra and I began to shake and swell. We both looked down with  
shocked glances before we got hit. The ground suddenly erupted with a large  
blast, sending us flying upward. No sooner had the explosion gone off, the  
barrier Cassandra created shattered into shards of light. With the blast, the  
two of us were sent flying. I fell to the ground hard and found myself  
spiraling across the floor. I stopped only to feel the wind knocked out of me.

I should have seen  
that one coming. Cassandra's barrier spell stopped at ground level, making us  
vulnerable to underground attacks. Finally getting my strength back, I knelt up  
as quickly as possible. The large smoke that had spread out from the blast area  
clouded everywhere around me.

"Cassandra?" I  
cried out, hoping to find if she was unharmed. "Cassandra!"

"I'm... I'm okay..." I  
heard her answer from somewhere through the smoke. I was about to follow her  
voice to find her. Just then, I felt someone grip my shoulder and held me down  
on my knees.

I gave a loud gulp  
as I felt the furry hand upon me. Turning my head ever so slowly, I looked up  
to who it was. Surely enough it was Alpha, standing just next to me with his  
paw on my shoulder. Through his mask, his steely eyes gave me an unyielding,  
crossed look. "This has gone on long enough," he growled in a shallow tone. All  
I could do was give a nervous chuckle as he held me there.

"Dimilar Wind!" I  
heard Cassandra shout. With that spell, a ball of wind shot right over my head,  
cleaving the smoke around us as if it was nothing. To my luck, the swirling  
ball of wind knocked right into Alpha and threw him several feet away from me.  
With that ball of wind, the smoke in the room was swept away.

Surprised myself,  
I turned towards the source of the spell. Knelt down with her hand held out was  
Cassandra, who had cast her spell while hidden in the smoke. As we got to our  
feet, she ran towards me. "Saved your butt!" she quipped playfully.

_Urgh! Even in  
the heat of battle she finds time to torment me,_

At that point, the  
water that had once flooded the floor had receded and dried away. With the  
smoke gone, the both of us found Alpha had been thrown only a few yards away.  
Slightly stunned by the wind attack, it gave me an idea of how to stop him. It  
would require me to use a spell I kind of stunk at, but I was willing to risk  
it.

"Cassandra, we  
need light!" I hinted towards her. To my luck she nodded, catching my drift.

"Lighting!" With  
her words, a bright ball of light appeared in her hand and like a baseball, she  
threw it at Alpha.

Snapped back into  
attention, Alpha saw the brilliant bright ball coming towards him. With no more  
than a shift of his head, the ball shot over his shoulder harmlessly. Just as  
it shot behind Alpha, the ball erupted with a brilliant glow of light and  
illuminated the surrounding area.

"Keep it up!" I  
shouted to her as I concentrated on my next spell. Like I asked, Cassandra  
launched more Lighting spells in several areas around us. Alpha dodged the  
lights as those came his way, thinking them as attacks. After four more light  
spells, the entire room was as bright as day.

Alpha gave us a  
bored look. "What are you doing--?"

"Shadow Snap!" I  
cried. At that moment, a dagger appeared between my fingers as my spell took  
shape. With a flick of my wrist, I launched it towards the ground and...

Bull's-eye! Yes!

The dagger struck  
its target. Just then, I saw Alpha attempted to come at me... but he didn't. His  
eyes went wide as he looked at the ground before him. There, looking at the  
shade of his own shadow he saw the dagger I had thrown into it. Shadow Snap  
targeted a person through the astral plain. By pinning Alpha's shadow, he  
couldn't move.

But I wasn't done  
yet. I immediately ran towards Alpha's right. There, stretched out far across  
the floor was yet another, thinner shadow of Alpha. "Shadow Snap!" I shouted  
again and shot another dagger into the shadow.

"Damn!" Alpha spat  
as he felt another part of his body jolt with the feeling of immobility.

Following my  
example, Cassandra went after another shadow as well. I felt great joy as I  
finally got Shadow Snap to work. As Cassandra nailed another shadow herself, I  
cast my last Shadow Snap into a fourth shadow on the ground. My look of joy was  
the same as Cassandra's as we saw Alpha before us.

In a perfect  
pattern, four clear shadows were cast upon the ground in the four directions.  
With each one pinned by a dagger, Alpha couldn't escape. From what I learned  
about Shadow Snap in astral studies, one shadow originally halted a person from  
moving. But by pinning four shadows, it was possible to completely immobilize a  
target to every limb and part of his body. From what happened then, I was  
right. There stood Alpha as still as a statue. Cassandra and I had completely  
immobilized Alpha to every limb and part of his body. The only thing that was  
left was his head, which he used to look at the shadows of him pinned to the  
floor.

With Alpha  
trapped, Cassandra sprinted opposite of him with me on the other side. "Let him  
have it!" she shouted strongly. With her words, a fiery ball of light appeared  
in her hands. I too began to cast a spell myself, and a ball of yellow light  
came into existence.

"Fireball!"

"Thunderball!"

At the same time  
we released our spells, hers of fire and mine of lightning. With large flashes,  
the two spells took form as large spheres of fire and electricity and rocketed  
towards their target dead ahead. With nowhere to go, Alpha remained frozen as  
the Fireball and Thunderball came at him from both sides. Moving his head as  
best he could, his eyes were wide with shock as he glanced at the Thunderball  
from my direction before the spells struck.

**_KA-BOOOM!!!!!_**

The two spells  
struck at once, hitting their mark with a wicked explosion. Fire and lightning  
shot around where the spells clashed, releasing the mother-load of flashes that  
I bet had surpassed the boundaries of the building we were in. I looked in  
wonder as the lightshow slowly faded away and looked at the billowing smoke  
cloud. As the explosion ended, the lighting spells we'd used to create Alpha's  
shadows disappeared. Quickly retreating from where she was, Cassandra ran  
around the boundaries of the explosion site and came to me. Her look shared my  
expression as well.

After a small  
moment of silence, Cassandra, now cheerful as ever gave a humongous smile of  
accomplishment. "We... DID IT!" she cried, causing me to jump back at her  
enthusiastic remark. "Justice: One. Evil: ZERO!"

I cracked a tiny  
smile and gave a sigh or relief. That's the extent of my joy at the moment.  
Cassandra, however, needed to know the meaning of subtle. She kept on cheering  
like we had just saved the world, followed by a parade in her honor.

"Yeah!" she sang  
jubilantly, "We did it, we did it!"

Just then, as if I  
had fallen into the worst nightmare of my life, we heard the sound of a faint  
growl from within the smoke. Caught in mid-cheering, Cassandra's tone slowly  
sank to a disappointing low as we looked into the smoke. There within the  
shroud of smoke appeared the silhouette of our foe. He then stepped out into  
the open air. I looked at him with disbelief, dread and horror as I found Alpha  
still alive... _again!_

"_Oh boy_,  
did we _do_ it..." I groaned in response to Cassandra.

The good news was  
that we did actually hit him with a rather good blast. Clear scorches were on  
his clothes, and he slightly held his arm as if to rub a sore muscle. The bad...  
let me rephrase, very, _very_ bad news was that the look in his eyes was  
now plain frightening. He looked at us with a gaze of rage and anger that made  
it clear that he was really pissed off.

"You little brat!" he  
growled, his tone now showing the cold, beastly side of the werewolf assassin.  
"I was told to bring you alive... but I don't think they'll mind if you're missing  
a limb or two."

I felt myself shake, and I  
was pretty sure Cassandra was trembling a bit as well. Alpha took slow steps  
towards us, in return the two of us stepped back. I wanted to cast a spell, but  
it was clear if he could walk away after all we did to him that night, was  
there any spell we knew that could stop him? As he stalked towards us, he  
lowered his injured arm, gave it a small shake to rid the pain and reached into  
his pocket. He pulled out one of his throwing darts. It gave a gleam, equal to  
the cold malice in Alpha's eyes.

With the sharp  
knife utensil now drawn, Alpha made a deadly sprint towards us. Cassandra  
prepared to cast a spell, but was caught mid sentence as Alpha disappeared into  
another blur again. He reappeared another place on the other side of the room,  
only to vanish elsewhere as he approached. Alpha was trying to divert our  
attention, making us lose our guard. With his final jump, Alpha reappeared  
before us and made a strait beeline right for me.

"Van Rail!"

            Cassandra  
and I were surprised as we heard someone shout out that spell from somewhere in  
the room. A thick vein of frost suddenly streaked across the floor in front of  
us. Seeing the frozen streak in his path, Alpha quickly came to a stop and took  
a small jump back. From the side of the room, several other veins of frost  
spread out around the room like snakes across the floor. As some of the frost  
attempted to come after him, Alpha quickly made several jumps away, steering  
clear of the growing ice veins. Before long, the ice veins stopped growing,  
forming intricate patterns around Cassandra and me as if to protect us.

             "Uh, what was that?" I asked  
rather dumbly as Cassandra and I looked around.

            "Rebellious  
as ever I see, Zane," a voice spoke, and we turned to look.

            From  
the far side of the room, a lone figure stood in the shadows near the wall. Ice  
had covered the wall where he stood which had sprouted into the growing veins  
of frost that had slithered across the floor. With a hand upon the ice wall, he  
lowered it with a small stream of cold steam trailing off his fingers. After I  
looked closely into the shadows where the figure stood, I released a rather  
large gasp.

_            What  
the--!?_

            "Master  
Krots!" Cassandra cried. Stepping out of the shadows was, to my grand surprise,  
Master Krots. The brown werewolf teacher walked onto the floor, carefully  
stepping over the veins of frost he conjured onto the ground. His red robe hung  
elegantly off his body as he approached us. The only thing different about him  
was that he ridded himself of his glasses, giving way to his famous unyielding  
eyes.

            "Master  
Krots!" Cassandra cried happily as he approached and stepped into the circle he  
created around us. "I knew you weren't evil!"

            Okay,  
now I felt stupid. I thought Alpha and Master Krots was the same guy. And  
thinking that he was I had sent Master Krots flying down the hallway. Oh boy...  
was I in for an earful at the end of this mess.

            "Are  
you two alright?" was the first thing he asked. We both nodded at him. "Zane,"  
he then came to me with a sly look, "Didn't I say I'd better not catch you if  
you were looking for Alpha again?"

            At  
that moment, being captured by Alpha was sounding mighty tempting.

            No  
sooner had our happy reunion with our teacher started; a rather annoyed growl  
came from across the room. "You again!" Alpha snarled. Master Krots and the  
rest of us looked to find Alpha was on the far side of the room. He stood clear  
from the veins of ice as if they were deadly. I couldn't figure why. "Why do  
you always interfere?"

            Then  
it dawned on me. Alpha was there in the training room yesterday. The only  
reason he probably didn't attack me when I was good and exhausted was because  
Master Krots came and found me before Alpha could make his move. I had to  
remind myself to give Master Krots an apple when this was all good and through.

Hearing the  
werewolf assassin, Master Krots grew a rather angry stare at him. He bared his  
teeth and gave a rather frightful snarl in Alpha's direction. "YOU!" Master  
Krots growled furiously, his claws now extended from his paws. "How dare you  
attack my students!"

            I  
had never seen the beastly nature of Master Krots before. It was unlike  
anything I've ever seen before. The very look on our teacher's furry face made  
Cassandra and me back up a bit. With a rather ferocious growl, Master Krots  
took of with amazing speed. Jumping over the veins of ice around the floor, he  
made his way right for Alpha. Still holding the dagger he'd drew, Alpha took  
off himself and jumped away from Master Krots.

            Alpha  
must have been pretty freaked if he was going on the defensive. And for an  
Alchemy teacher, Master Krots had really good moves. Sprinting across rivers of  
ice, Alpha kept his eyes on Master Krots as he attempted to strike him down  
with his claws. In an attempt to strike back, Alpha launched his throwing  
dagger right at Master Krots. With speed almost as equal with Alpha's, Master  
Krots dodged it and the dart went towards the ground.

            As  
Cassandra and I watched, we noticed as the throwing dart struck one of the veins  
of frost. To our surprise, upon contact the dart was completely covered in a  
thick sheet of ice, poised up from the ground as if frozen instantly. Master  
Krots's spell arsenal was amazing. If his spells were anything like this one,  
then I was _glad_ he wasn't Alpha.

            From  
the looks of things, Master Krots had Alpha on the ropes. With so many parts of  
the floor lined with instant freezing trip-wires, the werewolf assassin's  
movements were quite limited. Alpha was casting several attack spells at Master  
Krots, only to have our fast teacher leap away and dart towards Alpha again.

            Then,  
in a rather shocking turn of the tide, Alpha made a Houdini again and  
disappeared in another blur of speed. Master Krots stopped where he was,  
perplexed to see Alpha disappear right before his eyes. Then, as we watched  
from the safety of the ice ring, Cassandra and I saw as Alpha reappeared behind  
our teacher, poised for a sneak attack!

            "Master  
Krots, look--!" Cassandra's warning barely got out before Alpha landed a rather  
painful looking kick right at Master Krots upper back. With strength that was  
hard to believe the assassin had, his kick sent our teacher hurtling through  
the air and into the far wall. With a growl of pain, Master Krots went crashing  
into a wall. Hitting the floor, he immediately got to his feet, but just as he  
did, Alpha was already on him.

            Snarls  
flew as the two werewolves brawled on the floor, locked paw and paw as the one  
tried to overpower the other. The scene looked as if they were real wolves in  
mortal combat. Locked in their wrestling, Alpha had pinned Master Krots on his  
back, still pushing against his attacker. Inch by Inch, the werewolf assassin  
slowly tried to push Master Krots towards the ice vein, growing dangerously  
close to him.

            Watching  
from the center of the room, Cassandra and I saw the sudden danger our teacher  
was in. "Master Krots will be a wolf-sickle if he touches that!" Cassandra  
cried as she saw Alpha push him closer towards the vein of ice on the floor.

            I  
had to do something. Luckily, Master Krots's rescue gave me time to recover  
some of my energy. I then looked down to the circle of ever-freezing frost  
close to our feet. Looking at it, I gave a smile as an idea came to my head.  
Bringing my hands together, I pointed my palms down towards the ice vein at my  
feet and power filled my hands.

            "Dam  
Brass!" The air around my hands gave a faint hum as a bolt of light appeared.  
With my cry, the bolt of light shot right at the vein of ice. The spell I used  
had another name. A.K.A: Vibration Blast.

            The  
bolt of light struck. Like a highly struck tuning fork, the high-pitched ring  
echoed into the ice vein and with a jolt from the ground, the ice vein  
shattered to bits. Just as I had hoped, with that well placed spell I had  
created a chain reaction that began to shatter the other veins connect to the  
one I had shot. With the ice weaved like a spider's web, all the deadly frost  
veins began to shatter like rows of dominos.

            Alpha  
was too busy trying to budge the resilient Master Krots to an icy doom that the  
ninja bastard didn't see it coming. Just as he was about to shove Master  
Krots's head upon the deadly ice vein, it shattered and disappeared into shards  
of frost.  Alpha's eyes went wide as he  
saw the vein of ice disappear.

            Taking  
advantage of the surprise, Master Krots brought his feet against Alpha's chest  
and heaved. He sent Alpha flying backwards and far, allowing him a chance to  
get back to his feet. "Thanks," he called in our direction, and then brought  
his gaze on Alpha again.

            Alpha  
gave a growl of annoyance, and I couldn't blame him. This fight had lasted  
probably after midnight.  
You'd be cranky if you were in a fierce battle in the middle of the night. Now  
angry, the werewolf assassin attempted another charge at our teacher. However,  
he didn't count on Cassandra's interference.

            "Scatter-Brid!"

            Like  
the spell I had used earlier, Alpha was struck by a storm of small energy  
balls. While Cassandra's spell took action, we both ran towards Master Krots.  
When we got to him, he looked at us with a fierce look. "What are you still  
doing here? Get out now!"

            "No  
way," I shouted back at him, "Alpha came here for me! I'm not just going to run  
away!"

            "That's  
right," Cassandra shouted as jubilant as ever. "And I too, shall not hide before  
the face of evil!"

            "That  
wasn't a request!" Master Krots growled, clearly stating an order as our  
teacher.

            Just  
then, a shrill buzzing noise interrupted our talk before Master Krots could  
scold us anymore. "GET DOWN!" he shouted, grabbed us by our backs and shoved us  
to the floor face-first. A rather violent wind grazed our backs as whatever  
came at us flew by. Then with a violent blast, it struck the wall and exploded,  
sending pieces of the wall flying threw the air. I had realized that the spell that  
was thrown at us was a spell called Dark Claw, a rather nasty bugger in the  
tear-your-foe-to-shreds column.

            Looking  
up, I found that Alpha had emerged from the gale of energy balls and had  
launched the spell at us. His eyes now glared at all three of us with their icy  
glimmer. Then, finally sensing his rage for the first time that night, I picked  
up a now burning anger within him.

            "Burst  
Flare!" Alpha growled. With his words a bright ball of light appeared before  
us.

            Alarmed  
by its presence, Master Krots quickly got up and stood before us as if to  
protect us. Speaking as quickly as he could, he had shouted out a defensive  
spell I failed to hear. By the sound of it, it was probably Defense. My eyes  
went wide as I saw the orb of light before us release a rather strong flash,  
followed by an explosion of flames.

            Alpha  
must have done some serious amplifying or something on that spell because as  
soon as it erupted, it practically shook the defense spell around us. A second  
after that, the shield shattered and the shockwave from the fiery explosion  
stuck us. We released a loud shout as we were sent flying backwards.

            Smoke  
clouded everything as we fell to the ground, tumbled on our backs and stomachs  
as we tried to recover from that rather painful blast. I heard the groans of  
Master Krots and Cassandra beside me as I slowly regained my bearings. Not  
giving us the time to recover fully, Alpha stepped into the lifting array of  
smoke and before me.

            It  
was clear now. He no longer cared about what became of my friend or my teacher.  
If I didn't do something, he'd kill them right then and there. I couldn't let  
that happen. I wouldn't let that happened.

            "Die,"  
he uttered as he charged forth, making a deadly sprint towards Cassandra.

            My  
mind snapped with anger and my blood became a broil in less than a second.  
"NO!" I yelled aloud. "LEAVE MY FRIENDS ALONE!!!" My cry had probably had been  
louder than any explosion that had went off all day. 

            I  
quickly got in front of Alpha's path right as he made a charge for her. I kept  
my ground. I had lost all sense of logic as I strived to protect her with  
everything I had left. Just then, right as Alpha was about to collide with me,  
he was suddenly shoved back. Still mad as hell, I looked with surprise as I saw  
this. Master Krots was still on the ground just regaining his senses and  
Cassandra was still behind me. The only other person who could had repelled  
Alpha like that was...

            Me?

            Suddenly  
from below my feet, a brilliant gold light suddenly shined into existence. It  
stretched out to me as I felt power like that of a spell. It was then I had  
realized that Alpha was thrown back by the power of my aura alone. When a spell  
is being cast, a power aura is created. Most wouldn't do a thing, but this had  
somehow thrown off a charging werewolf.

            Regardless  
of all this news, I was still pissed at Alpha. My anger escalated beyond  
anything I had ever experienced before. I wanted to end this, to get rid of  
Alpha right here and now. As I wished this, only one spell came to mind. The Blast  
Bomb.

            Everything  
else had done squat, but Blast Bomb was still the highest risk I ever took. The  
most I ever got out of it was a simple spark. Still, even if my spell didn't  
work, it was better off than just being a human shield for my friends. With my  
anger driving me, I was prepared to blast his butt to hell. I promised I'd  
fight him with everything I got, and he was going to get it!

            The  
golden aura, whatever it was, stretched up around my body, illuminating my  
surroundings and wrapping me in its golden glow. I felt as if my soul was  
burning with power from deep within. Whatever it was, it was making me feel  
all-powerful. I began to chant my spell.

            Regaining  
his senses after being thrown a distance back, Alpha looked towards me, drawn  
by the golden light. For some reason he appeared shocked. I heard the sounds of  
Master Krots and Cassandra beside me but while lost in the overflowing energy,  
I didn't acknowledge them.

            I  
was seeing red... actually it was gold. Whatever! I was blinded with anger as I looked  
towards Alpha. The words of my spell began to flow like water. For a moment, I  
felt as if the words were coming out by themselves. The golden aura surged  
around me as I felt my words brought more power forth. I caught a look of shock  
in Alpha's eyes as the golden aura glowed brighter.

            I  
heard new energy hum around me. Too forgone with anger and power, I finished my  
chant.

            _Please  
let it work! Come out right this time!_

_           _ I  
shouted at the top of my lungs. "BLAST BOMB!!!"

            Throwing  
my arms out, the air around me whooshed and whined. Dozens of balls of solid  
light appeared around me, flickering with power and a brilliant fiery glow. I  
caught the look of horror on Alpha's face as the orbs formed. With an angry war  
cry, I threw my arms in a downward swoop forward at my target.

            The  
orbs of light then tore through the air; spiraling outward in the direction I  
had thrown them. I only saw the silhouette of Alpha's fleeing form as the orbs  
shot forward all about the room and struck.

**_            KA-BOOOOOOOOM!!!      _**

            The explosion was so loud I thought  
my ears had been blown off. The massive roar led to a violent shockwave and a  
blast of overheated air. The light from the explosion blinded my senses as I  
felt my anger vent away with the launching of the spell. As the loud boom and  
light overloaded my senses, I began to feel weak. The last thing I saw was the  
blinding fiery light of my spell as I passed out.

 

            "Zane...  
Zane...?"

            A  
faint, gentle voice called out to me. I couldn't move my body, more exhausted  
than I ever thought I could be. My eyelids felt heavy as I tried to see. Slowly  
willing my eyes open, I looked. When I opened my eyes I saw a very bright light  
far above me. Hanging in the way of the brilliant white glow was the gentle  
silhouette of Cassandra. Her hair seemed to flow in the light as she hung over  
me.

            "Zane...  
can you hear me?" she said in an almost heavenly voice. She drew her head lower  
to me, growing closer. As she came closer, I thought I saw her lips open just a  
tad.

            If  
I could move, I would surely react. But I couldn't, so I didn't. Still not  
fully together, my mind raced with questions. What happened? Did I die? Why is  
Cassandra here? Is she trying to... _gulp,_ KISS ME?!

_What is this? I  
can't tell if I'm in heaven or hell here!_

Drawing closer to  
me with that heavenly look on her face, she still called my name. "Zane..."  
Unconsciously, I tilted my head a bit to receive the kiss. She drew closer with  
closed eyes. The heavenly light gleamed in her hair as she came. She drew  
closer; her lips drew near, then...

SLAP!

My senses took a jumpstart  
as I felt a strong blow to my cheek and threw my head to the side. My eyes shot  
opened, rather alarmed as Cassandra gave me a painful slap across the face.  
"Ouch!" I shouted alarmed, "What the heck?"

"Serves you right,  
Zane Cosmon!" Cassandra's voice boomed. Still on my back, I turned my head up  
to find Cassandra over me. She gave me a crossed look with her arms across her  
chest.

Finally finding  
the strength in me again, I slowly sat myself up. "What the hell happened?" I  
asked, rubbing both my head and my cheek from Cassandra's painful wakeup call.

"What do think!?  
You almost blew us up, you idiot!" she shouted, the last thing I needed as I  
tried to remember what happened.

After blinking a  
moment, I looked around me. I was still in the training area. Kent beside me as well was Master  
Krots. Glancing around a bit, I noticed that several guards were posted about  
the tattered room. My mind was a bit bleary as I tried to remember what had  
happened.

That light I saw  
when I came to was that of a healing spell. Cassandra must have healed me. What  
a way to sully your work by slapping someone right after you heal them.

"You okay?" Master  
Krots asked as he placed a paw on my shoulder.

My only answer was  
a small grown as I rubbed my head. "What happened...to Alpha...?" I asked while a  
bit disoriented.

"Gone," Master  
Krots said simply.

"Gone as in dead..."  
I asked hesitantly, "Or gone as in..."

Master Krots just  
smiled at me and tried to lower me back to the ground. "Ran away, but relax. I saw  
him flee and run out of the school grounds. I seriously doubt he'd be back  
anytime soon."

I gave a sigh of  
relief. Sure he got away, but I felt safe for the first time in days. Lying  
back on my back, I brought my hand up to my eyes and rubbed them. "What  
happened?" I asked with a groan.

"You don't  
remember?" Master Krots asked curiously, as I slowly tried to piece together  
the scattered jigsaw puzzle of my mind.

"I remember us  
fighting Alpha..." I began, announcing the memory as it popped back into my head.  
"I ran into Alpha's path as he attacked Cassandra... there was this strange  
light, then..." the last part was on the edge of my mind. "...then..."

"Then sent us  
ducking for our lives after blowing the hell out of the place with that spell!"  
Cassandra shouted, scolding me as I recovered.

Just as Cassandra  
finished her shouting, my mind snapped in attention, remembering what had  
happened next. "_That_ spell?" I repeated in an awed tone. Finding my  
strength again, I sat back up and looked at her. "What do you mean, _that_  
spell?"

She gave me a  
narrowed glance as if I was playing dumb with her. She seemed really angry.  
"The _spell_ you used to send that assassin running for the hills! _And_  
the one you almost _killed_ us with!"

"What was it? What  
was it called!?" I pleaded to her, grasping the helm of her shirt in a  
desperate action.

She backed up a  
bit in surprise. "How should I know?!" Cassandra said in a frazzled tone, "I  
think you call it Blast Bomb, or something!"

With wide eyes of  
disbelief, I quickly let go of Cassandra's shirt. My mind went blank for a  
moment as I took those two words in. It worked? Turning around as quickly as I  
could, I looked at the room behind me. I gave a slight gasp.

The room looked  
like it had been hit by a thousand natural disasters at once. The walls were  
scorched and parts were blown off it. Water damage had collected around the  
floor and the hexagram symbol on the floor had been completely demolished by  
the series of craters, scorches and frost marks on the floors.

_The cleaning  
crew was going to have a fit tomorrow._

Then my attention came to  
what I was looking for. And truth be told, you'd have to have been freakin'  
blind to miss it.

In the floor, to  
be more exact what was left of it, enormous craters had been pummeled into the  
ground. Each one was several yards wide and was probably six feet deep. Small  
streams of steam lifted from its bottom as the walls of the craters gave off a  
reddish glow. My mouth went open in awe as I took it in.

"I...did it..."

Blast Bomb worked!  
A large smile grew on my face.

"IT WORKED! I CAST BLAST  
BOMB! YEEEAAHHH!" I cried out jubilantly. I spun around with renewed energy as  
I saw that the legendary spell I worked so hard to accomplish actually worked.  
After growing faintly dizzy after spinning around a bit, I ran back over to  
Master Krots and Cassandra. They looked rather perplexed at my grand  
excitement.

"Did you guys  
see?!" I cried out with glee, "I did it! I cast the legendary Blast Bomb! I'm  
the forth person in history to _ever_ cast that spell! I did it!"

"_Oh_, boy  
did you _do it_," Cassandra said bleakly.

            My  
balloon of celebration burst as she said those words. They sounded almost out  
of grief. "What?" I asked simply. With a sigh of her own, she raised a finger  
and pointed up. Innocently, I looked up.

            My  
jaw went open and I felt the blood leave my face.

            The  
ceiling of the room was completely blown off. Ragged pieces of stone were all  
that was left connected to the walls. The now roofless building gave way to the  
night air as the stars' light came in. The Blast Bomb I cast was so strong it  
literally blew the roof of the place! I felt like screaming... so I did.

            "AAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!"

            What  
the hell happened?! The Blast Bomb was so strong it broke the warding field  
around us and fired right through the roof. Was Blast Bomb even stronger than  
Dragon Slave? But the more pressing matter at the moment was... how the hell was  
I suppose to explain this to the headmistress _this_ time!

            "_Uh-oh_,"  
Cassandra sang in her teasing tone of voice, "_You're in trouble_."

            I  
was starting to panic. All Master Krots did was scratch the back of his head  
with his claws. He observed the room and then looked to me as I came running up  
to him and Cassandra. Again, did I mention I was in a panic?

            "B-but  
it was an accident! Plus it was self defense, right?" I pleaded, looking to  
Cassandra, Master Krots and back again. "The headmistress can't be mad at me  
over this, right? RIGHT?!"

            Then,  
sprouting her annoying smile, Cassandra sprung her overly cheerful response.  
"Not a chance."

            _I'M  
DEAD!!!!!!_

_           _ Dreadfully,  
I slumped to my knees. "_Not again_..." I groaned, voicing my thoughts  
aloud. Hopefully, I brought my head up to look at Master Krots. "So, what  
now...?" I asked him.

             "We'll speak of this in the morning," he said  
calmly, only to add to my gloom. With that, he reached for my hand and I took  
it. He lifted me back to my feet. "I'm sure the headmistress would want to know  
what happened."

            "Master Krots, no!" I practically  
begged him. "Don't tell her I blew up the building! She'll never let me live it  
down! Please?"

            He cast me a stern look. "Zane, I  
can't do that," he said with a growl. "She's going to find out sooner or  
later." Master Krots then gave one last look to what was left of the training  
room, surveying the now roofless room. "And trust me, she's not going to  
overlook _this_."

            "WHY IS THIS ALWAYS HAPPENING TO  
ME!!!"

 

            "WHAT?!"  
Master Krots shouted with amusement. He then actually began laughing as  
Cassandra and I stood there before him. "You thought _I_ was Alpha?" His laugh was almost unbearable for me. I made a  
mistake, but it could happen to anyone, right?

            Don't  
answer that!

            It  
was now nine in the morning and the first things asked of us when Cassandra and  
I stepped out of our rooms was to head strait to Ms. Magdalene's office. I should  
have been okay after dealing with a psycho ninja, but the thought of the  
headmistress smacking me with her mallet of punishment made me feel nervous.  
And now there we stood, with Ms, Magdalene at her desk while Master Krots stood  
before us as well. As I felt nervous however, Cassandra remained as cool as a  
cucumber with that overly cheerful smile on her face. Cassandra, Master Krots  
and I explained what had happened last night. Just between us, I left out a few  
bits of information for later. If the teachers wanted to keep secrets, then  
I'll keep my own.

            And  
now we go back to when I mentioned I thought Alpha was Master Krots.  
Apparently, Master Krots found the thought humorous. "What in heaven's name  
would make you think that?" he bellowed.

            "A  
lot of reasons," I began in a rather defensive tone, "Both of you were  
werewolves, Ms. Magdalene said he's been killing for over six years and  
according to your records, you've only been here for two and a half."

            Master  
Krots leered at me with his knowing glance. "And _how_ did you know that?"

            I  
began to sweat a bit. I hadn't told him or the headmistress that I snuck into  
the office for his records. I was enough trouble already. "Well," I slowly  
started, "I just... you know, looked around."

            "In  
the school archives perhaps?" Master Krots asked knowingly.

            Ouch!  
He got me there. I sank my head down a little in shame. I then decided to try  
another question. "Well, you always seemed to show up right after Alpha  
attacked me! And how the hell did you know I was practicing Blast Bomb anyway?"

            Master  
Krots then began to pace before us as he explained. "Remember when we first met  
in class at the beginning of the year. I asked you all what were your goals.  
And you said..." He went on until I answered for him.

            "I...  
wanted... to master..." I said slowly, feeling rather stupid. "Blast... Bomb." Master  
Krots nodded knowingly. I was actually starting to feel like he was playing  
with me before he ate me for breakfast, considering if he actually ate people.  
I doubted that.  I shook off my guilt and  
went strait to my most confident evidence.

            "Yeah,  
well what about that burnt on your arm?" I proclaimed and pointed at Master  
Krots's arm, covered under the large sleeves of his red robe. "I had zapped  
Alpha with a Mono Volt on that exact spot and you had one as well! How do you  
explain that, Mr. Smart Guy!"

            Rather  
calmly and before Ms. Magdalene, Master Krots reached up to his arm and pulled  
up his sleeve. He exposed the darkened singe mark against his brown fur and  
showed it to me. "Zane," he said rather crossly, his tone coming down a notch,  
"You were there when I got this."

            I  
blinked, looking at him rather curiously. "I was?"

            With  
a step forward, he stood over me with his towering posture. He showed the  
scorch mark clear before my face. "You remember, don't you," Master Krots said  
with a growl. "The day you blew up the alchemy lab."

            My  
mind jolted as I recalled that dreadful day. The entire scene replayed in my  
head as I remembered how Master Krots had looked right after my Fireball went  
off. He had burns along his robes and soot and smoke along his fur. It was  
beginning to make sense. Master Krots had gotten that mark when my fireball  
spell broke out and accidentally wrecked the lab. 

            As  
I came out of the clouds of my mind, I found myself looking right into Master  
Krots unyielding eyes. I felt a wave of grief wash over me as I lowered my head  
away from his stare.         

            "I'm  
really, really, **really** , **_reallyreallyreally_** sorry," I  
groaned meekly, bowing my head in Master Krots direction.

            Now  
standing back up fully, Master Krots began to pace again with his calm look on  
his face. "Well," he began with a sly tone, "So far you've wrongly accused your  
teacher as a killer, broken into the school archives, directly disobeyed me,  
attacking me, snuck out after curfew... Shall I go on?"

            My  
head sunk down lower. "I'd wish you'd wouldn't..." I said meekly. I was so  
embarrassed I just felt like dying.

            "Zane,"  
Ms. Magdalene said rather direly. "I'm very displeased with you."

            I  
suddenly sprung right up strait and faced her. This was going to hurt. She was  
about to yell at me about blowing the building up. "Ms. Magdalene please," I  
think I pleaded rather pathetically, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to--"

            "I  
specifically told you not to go after Alpha," she said looking at me with clear  
eyes.

            Huh?!  
That threw me there. I'd a thought she'd scream a fit after I had blew the roof  
off the training building. I was speechless for a moment before she started up  
again.

            "Do  
you realize you could have been killed? Not only did you specifically disobeyed  
me, but you voluntarily went out looking for the one who tried to hurt you!"  
She said rather loudly. I had to admit, her words felt like daggers at me.

            "But,"  
I couldn't help but ask, "What about the building?"

            "Zane!"  
Ms. Magdalene shouted clearly, "I don't care about that now! A building can be  
replaced! _You can't!_" I felt really low then. I didn't know that the  
headmistress cared that much. She probably wasn't such a witch as I thought her  
to be. "Why would you go confronting him?"

            I  
cast my gaze a little lower to the floor again. "When I talked to you guys at  
first, I felt as if you weren't telling me everything about why Alpha was after  
me. You really got me angry. Also the fact that I thought Master Krots was  
Alpha made it all the more suspicious. I knew Alpha would just come after me  
eventually, so I decided confront him." I remained solemn, speaking truthful of  
what I felt. "I'm sorry." 

            The  
room fell rather silent. Then, Cassandra spoke up. "Well," she said in her  
confident tone of voice, "I think my work here is done." She placed a hand on  
her hip, looked at Ms. Magdalene and then to me. "I'm proud that I, Cassandra  
could provide you headmistress with my help and happy to know I brought Zane  
here to face the justice of his transgressions." She gave me a rather playful  
pat on the head. I gritted my teeth, suppressing a growl of annoyance from my  
throat.

            _Cassandra  
you arrogant... AUGH!_

_           _ Cassandra  
then turned around and headed for the door. "Well, I shall be off."

            "Not  
so fast, Cassandra," Master Krots said smoothly.

At that moment, Cassandra  
froze in her tracks. Hesitantly she turned her head to glace at Master Krots.  
An anxious look was now on her once overly confident mug.

"If I recall," Master Krots  
said as he approached Cassandra, "You _too_ had left your room after  
curfew." Cassandra then turned back around, looking directly to Master Krots as  
he stood before her. "Also, you too disobeyed when I told you two to leave when  
Alpha attacked, but you didn't. Am I right, Miss Cassandra?"

She then became defensive,  
as Master Krots looked her in the eye. A sweat drop dripped from her forehead  
as she stood before our teacher. "B-but... It's my priestly duty to seek out the  
evils that lay afoot among us. Justice dictated me to come to Zane's rescue. I  
can't be blamed for that." She said in a bit of a plea. "I'm innocent here,  
right? _Right_?"

Then, with his sly look,  
Master Krots bent down and peered at Cassandra with his unyielding glare. "_Not  
a chance_ ," Master Krots said, quoting Cassandra from last night. I saw as  
Cassandra's jaw dropped for a moment, followed by a heavy sigh of  
disappointment.

I cracked a smile. Oh, the  
look on her face was just _priceless._

Master Krots stood right  
back up. "You both confronted Alpha, so the both of you can wallow in the same  
boat," he said as he took a glance at Ms. Magdalene, who nodded to him with  
silent conformation. "But I'm feeling rather lenient today, so I'll assign you  
to... one day of lawn cutting _for the entire courtyard_."

"WHAT!" Cassandra pouted,  
"N-No Master Krots! This is cruel and unusual punishment! I must be free to  
fight the never ending fight for justice!"

"Don't worry Cassandra," I  
said rather wily, "I hear crabgrass is _full_ of evil. You'll have a ball  
weed-whacking your justice around." I sensed her give me a scowl behind my  
back.

"I wouldn't crack jokes  
yet, Zane," Master Krots said with his sly tone, "Because you're joining her."

The look of glee left my  
face as I spun around. "Say, WHAT!?" I cried at him.

He still had that look on  
his face. "I said I was being lenient today," Master Krots said as he pulled  
out a pair of small desk scissors from his robe pocket. "Would you rather cut  
the lawn with _these_ alone?"

The skimpy pair of metal  
scissors gleamed a second as I firmly kept my mouth shut. "Ahem," I started  
politely, "I'll accept your earlier punishment without question."

"Smart kid," Krots said  
simply as he put the scissors away. "Now Cassandra, go outside and wait for us.  
There is something we need to talk to Zane about." With a glum look on her  
face, Cassandra hauled herself slowly to the door and left the room. Now only  
Master Krots, Ms. Magdaline, and myself were left. 

"Zane," Ms. Magdaline said  
calmly, "you were right to think that we were hiding something from you."

I was surprised. I glanced  
at her, then to Master Krots who nodded himself. "What is it then?" I asked the  
headmistress.

She cast her eyes down a  
little at my question. "Zane, I'm sorry but we can't tell you."

"Then I have no reason to  
talk to you anymore!" I said rather angrily and attempted to leave the room.

Before I could get a few  
steps away from the desk, Master Krots stopped me with a paw on my shoulder.  
"Zane, wait a minute!" he said with concern, "What she means is that we can't  
tell you because it's for your own protection."

I turned to him for a  
moment. "What do you mean?" I asked, turning back to Ms. Magdalene.

She gave a sigh. "I'll put  
it to you this way," the headmistress said reluctantly, "You have... an amazing talent.  
You are the most promising student we have seen in a very long time."

"And why would Alpha want  
to attack a talented student?" I asked knowingly.

"Zane," Master Krots said,  
"We can't tell you that."

I gave a grunt of  
aggravation. What about me was so secret that they couldn't tell me? Seeing my  
aggravation, the headmistress leaned towards me on her desk.

"Though I will tell you  
this Zane," she said, "I see great promise in you as a sorcerer and a priest.  
If what Master Krots said was true, you had cast Blast Bomb."

My look lightened up a bit.  
I had expected her to yell at me for the building damage but she didn't do so  
once. I saw a look of pride on Ms. Magdalene's face as well as Master Krots.

"You're truly blessed with  
great magical capacity if you were able to cast Blast Bomb all on your own,"  
Ms. Magdalene complimented proudly, "I'm truly impressed."

I cracked a smile on my  
face. It was actually nice that she would give me a compliment. Then, Master  
Krots came up to me and kindly placed a paw on my shoulder. "Zane, you really  
deserve it after all your hard work," he said with a friendly growl, "I'm proud  
to call you my student."

I couldn't help but beam  
with happiness. "You mean that," I said happily, "Really?"

They both nodded and smiled  
at me with proud looks.

"And you'll let me off the  
hook?" I tried to spring on them.

Apparently that didn't  
work. Narrowing his eyes at me, my werewolf teacher came up to me and gave a  
pat on the shoulder. "_Nice try_."

_Oh  
well, can't blame a kid for trying._

 

"What you mean you didn't  
tell them everything?!" Cassandra shouted at me with a scold.

There we were in the  
beautiful sunshine. The birds were chirping. The wind was blowing. The smoke  
from the ruined training building was billowing. It was a great day... except we  
were out in the large courtyard. As everyone else was doing their business,  
Cassandra and I were casting wind-cutting spells to trim the grass and weeds.  
Gees, you'd think you could get a day off after fighting off a serious killer.

Turning towards her, I gave  
her a stern look. "They won't tell me everything, so will I," I replied simply.

Since Ms. Magdalene didn't  
want to tell me why Alpha was after me, I decided to keep out the small detail  
of my talk with the werewolf bastard. The fact that he was work for hire only  
meant that this was just the beginning.

"But what didn't you tell  
them?" Cassandra pried, launching another wind spell at the grass and slicing a  
patch of it even.

"Like I'm gonna tell you of  
all people." I turned my back to her and prepared another spell to cut the  
lawn.

She gave me a 'humph' and  
cleared her throat. "Well, if you don't tell me, I'll go tell Master Krots that  
you're holding out on him and the headmistress."

Launching the spell at the  
grass, I froze. Damn her, why did she always do that? With a sigh I turned  
around to her. She may have been a pain in the butt, but she still was someone  
I could trust among other people I knew. Besides, she wasn't holding any  
secrets from me.

"Alpha is work for hire," I  
said simply, catching a look of interest in her eyes. "That means that someone  
else sent him after me." She turned around and looked at me fully, taking a  
break from her grass cutting as I did at the moment. "Before we fought, I took  
the opportunity to ask him why he was after me. He said that he had orders to  
come after me. He wouldn't tell me who, but he did give me a very important  
clue."

"What's that?" Cassandra  
asked softly, taking my words seriously.

"He said his _employers_,"  
I said clearly, pointing out the word exactly for Cassandra. "Which means that  
whoever is after me is a part of a group, like some kind of organization. At  
least, that's what I'm thinking."

Cassandra took a moment to  
ponder this.

"There's still more," I  
told her, grasping her attention. "What surprised me the most was when I talked  
to Alpha, he said his orders were to take me alive."

"Alive?" Cassandra repeated  
with surprise. "Why would a lethal killer want to kidnap you?"

I shrugged my shoulders.  
"Your guess is as good as mine."

The two of us remained  
silent for a bit as Cassandra began pondering again. Looking up to the clouds  
in thought, Cassandra sighed. "I've got nothing," she said at last.

"Well," I told her,  
"Whatever they want me for, I got a feeling the teachers already know about it.  
Since they won't tell me, there is only one other way to find out."

"And that would be...?"  
Cassandra asked curiously.

With her words, I chanted  
another spell to cut the grass, adding a bit of anger to the spells power. "To  
beat whoever's after me and make them spill the beans!" I shouted. With my  
shout, I launched my spell and sliced the grass a good few yards away.

After venting my anger  
through that spell, Cassandra looked at me with concern. "If Alpha was just  
their lackey, as you say," Cassandra said as she put the pieces together, "Then  
whoever's pulling the strings must be madly powerful."

"Don't get me started on  
that one," I sighed. We were silent once again. Cassandra was taking her time  
taking all this news in as our garbs flapped gently in the wind. The gentle  
breeze lifted the bits of cut grass into the air, and blew them away.

Then, ending the peaceful  
silence, Cassandra cleared her throat. "They are really going to come after  
you, aren't they?" she asked rhetorically. Despite it, I nodded in return. "I  
see," she added understandingly.

Suddenly, she erupted with  
a rather loud battle cry. I jumped away as she raised her arms towards the sky  
and shouted. "Alright, it's settled!" She boomed in a proud cry. "Then I'll  
fight them with you!"

I backed away again,  
surprised by both her words and her shouting. "Say what?"

Before I knew it, she  
practically jumped right in front of me. She stuck her face right at me with  
her eyes gleaming. "You heard me!" she said proudly, "I'll help you fight these  
creeps and find why they're after you!"

I instantly repelled the  
thought. I couldn't stand her when she was around me in the halls. Now she  
wanted to join in my fight. They wanted me alive, but they probably wouldn't  
give a damn about her life. "No, seriously! That's not necessary!" I said  
quickly.

"Don't be silly," She  
boomed right in my face. In another jump, she leaped away from me. She then  
pointed out towards the sky before her and stood in her dramatic hero pose.  
"When those who fall into darkness against their will, they shall always seek  
the light! And I Cassandra, the Hero of Justice, vow to stand beside such souls  
until the evils who seek them are VANQUISHED!"

I hung my head low with a  
groan. "Oh, god," I mumbled in dismay. Her zest was just plain painful.

"Yes!" She shouted again,  
"When we're finished, they'll beg before the awesome might of Cassandra, the  
Hero of Justice and my new, diminutive junior sidekick!"

"Excuse me," I growled at  
her, finally getting her attention. "Who's a diminutive sidekick?" I looked up  
at her with a crossed look.

To my further dismay, she  
once again gave me that shrill, overconfident laugh. "_O-ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!_ Don't  
be foolish Zane!" she said loudly, "Any hero needs a loyal underling to cover  
her back! You should be honored to bask in my shadow as we trek the trail to  
victory!"

_Like hell I'll be your  
underling you bimbo!_

Finally, she calmed down  
and reduced her voice to a regular low. About time too, any further shouting  
and she might as well announce our plans to the whole student body. "Okay,  
listen," I explained to her as if she hadn't invited herself already. It  
probably wouldn't help, but still. "If you're going to tag along, for which by  
the way I TOTALLY DISSAGREE WITH, you can't tell Master Krots, the teachers or  
any of the other students. Got it? It's our little secret."

With her cheery, little  
smile, she nodded at me with her approval. "Okay. I won't tell a soul."

"Good," To that end, I  
turned back to my work at cutting the large lawn.

"So then Zane," Cassandra  
asked. I sensed her peeving nature creeping up on me. "I just got one  
question."

I braced myself and spoke  
through gritted teeth. "Yes?"

"When can you start being  
my sidekick?"

Braced or not, my temper  
couldn't take it. "I'M NOT GONNA BE YOUR SIDE KICK!!!"

Once I had finished telling  
off Cassandra about her hopes of me being her sidekick... _Bleh..._we  
continued with our punishment. With the sun overhead and the sky clear, I was  
at peace for the time being. I flashed a smile at the sky as I thought of the  
challenges to come. Whatever would come, Zane Cosmon would be ready for them.  
One thing was for sure; this year was going to be pretty exciting. 

Source: https://sofurry.com/s/GnDAjd81
Part of the series Slayers GD series
Next: https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/275158-slayers-gd-book-2-mage-s-market-festival.md