Brava watched as Arwen stole the final blow on the horde leader, the elf's sword impaling the goblin from behind and sending him to his knees. Mana flooded out of the goblin's body as it struggled to heal, evidence of a compromised mana core. A wound both physical and spiritual in nature, fatal without the right treatment.

Disgust filled him as Arwen taunted the goblin in his own tongue. Murderous as the monsters were, goblins were still thinking beings. Taunting a foe as he died, threatening his daughter even though she was a combatant, it was just cruel, and foolish. The paladin saw the way the goblin's muscles bunched, the slight flex in the horde leader's claws, how the goblin's ears twitched. A dozen minute tells that he picked up from minutes spent dueling the horde leader, trading blows as they each sought to weaken each other.

Arwen chose the wrong time to look away. As the goblin reached for Arwen's wrist, Brava instinctively started to react, his muscles tensing as he shifted his weight, his mana already cycling to empower a rush. He could intervene, defend Arwen and put the horde leader down.

But he didn't want to defend a murderer. Though he'd never been able to find evidence of the elf's wrongdoing, monster activity had steadily grown in the area ever since the elf arrived ten years ago, alongside injuries and deaths among the lower ranks. Especially amongst those Arwen mentored, either as students or after they left his care.

With a conscious effort of will, he stayed his blade. Whatever happened next, Arwen deserved it. Time slowed to a crawl as Brava stood by, watching the final moments of the horde leader's life play out. Clearly pushing through the pain, the horde leader stood, his clawed hand snapping out to grab Arwen's wrist and crush it with the same strength he used to crush Brava's armor. Arwen's smug face twisted with pain and fear as he turned his head back around, his body already starting to jerk away from the horde leader. But it wasn't enough to save him.

"You will die first, and the ancestors shall feast on your soul!" The horde leader's claws were coated in magic as they sank into Arwen's chest. With a loud, gory rip, the goblin pulled Arwen's heart free, crushing it to pulp as mana surged away from the two. The goblin didn't just crush Arwen's heart, Brava realized with a frown. He crushed the elf's core. As the two corpses collapsed, an alien will seized control of the mana in the area, pulling at it as it concentrated in a single point above the horde leader's corpse.

The alien will lashed out at Brava as ethereal claws ripped at his core, desperately trying to pull him in. He wasn't the only target. Brava watched as Ghorro and the remaining two goblins he fought instinctively flinched away from the dead horde leader, backing away in confusion and fear as something told them to get away. Brava felt it too. An instinctual fear screaming at him to run while he still could.

Jun's warrior classmates were stretched thin holding the line against the goblin onslaught as dozens moved around Ivar and added their weight to the press against them. As good as each of them were in a fight, the goblins had numbers and used it to great effect distracting the defenders so that some could slip past to threaten the less martially inclined within.

With the scouts already on the other side of the river securing that side, Jun fought to defend her classmates. Her mind split a dozen different ways as she fended off goblins, her snares whipping about as she commanded them to knock weapons aside, grab and drain goblins, and throw them back across the defensive line. Each of the goblins flailed and screamed as they flew through the air and slammed into their brethren, knocking goblins over and temporarily easing the pressure on the front.

For every goblin she sent back, two more slipped through another gap and charged at her or the other mages. Michael joined her in the defense as he darted about behind the line, healing the fighters with a brief touch on the back or shoulder before pummeling a goblin with his fists and moving on, but there was always another gap, another enemy slipping past.

Small darts of flame peppered any goblins Jun or Michael missed, the spells not strong enough to kill outright, but enough to set hair and clothes aflame, causing them to panic and try to put the magical flames out. Half a dozen goblins screamed as Aya peppered them with the small spells, their deaths slow as the spells whittled away at them.

The fight brought back uncomfortable memories for Jun, ones she shoved back down violently. She didn't have time to deal with them. They needed to get out of here first.

"I'm dropping the barrier! Get back!" Jun shouted, her voice feeling quiet against the sounds of the battle raging around her. For a few seconds no one responded, anxiety squeezing her chest tight as the warriors continued fighting, especially Ivar who charged ahead, far beyond where she could cover with her protective spells. Feelings of inadequacy welled up in her mind. She was an imposter. A weak mage. Not worth listening to, or maybe just too easily unnoticed. Maybe they hadn't even heard her, her voice too quiet and the warriors too busy fighting for their lives. Should she try again Yell louder? Draw someone's attention? She didn't want to disturb the warriors. Images of Melody getting stabbed, blinded by Jun's spell unraveling, filled her mind with guilt and regret. What if her getting their attention got someone else hurt?

But there were a lot of goblins attacking. More than they could handle alone. Already Jun barely had more than a second to drain a goblin before she had to throw it back, burning more of her mana to reinforce and move her spells than she gained back. If she couldn't drop the barrier, buying them time to escape across the river, they'd be overwhelmed, crushed by numbers. Taking a deep breath, she started to yell again. "I—"

"Barrier's dropping! Get back here Ivar!" Gregor's voice cut through the sound of battle, clear and resonant. Everything Jun's own voice wasn't

Ivar's muscles ached, but it was a good ache. The ache meant he was using his muscles in battle, working up a manly sweat even in the cold and frost of Winter. He long lost count of the number of goblins he'd slain in the few minutes since their fight began. More than the other warriors combined he was certain.

Swinging his axe in a low sweep, he gutted another monster as it tried to get into his reach, but it was a stubborn one. The goblin dropped its weapon as it clung to the haft of his weapon, desperately holding on as more of its comrades swarmed him. Chuckling, he swung the weapon around even with the extra weight at the end, bashing the uninvited passenger into another of its kind. Ivar felt more than heard the pop as his weapon drove through the goblin's spine with a pop and he ripped it free, splattering blood and viscera around in an arc.

The smells of blood, shit, and death filled the air. A glorious smell to him, one of battle, one that screamed his strength and valor to the world. He couldn't help but do a fanciful flourish as he attacked the next goblin to come at him, his massive weapon and immense strength rendering its guard useless as he shattered the thing's poorly crafted sword and drove his axe head deep into its head.

Roaring his victory, he ripped his axe clear as he hunted for his next target, but the goblins were going around him now, too busy pushing against the weaklings and cowards that stayed in line. Including, he was ashamed to note, his friends Roger and Karl. Though they were his friends, he couldn't help but judge them the weaklings and cowards they showed themselves to be, refusing to sally forth and bring death to the enemy, instead content on hiding next to other warriors and letting the monsters come to them. Pathetic, but he couldn't fault them. Try as they might to keep up, his friends weren't nearly as smart, strong, or impressive as him.

Especially as he stood surrounded by the broken corpses of his enemies, covered in blood yet none of it his own, while bloodthirsty monsters fled his presence in fear. He bet the girls hiding behind the defensive line stared at him with admiration, and he couldn't help but preen to give them something to fantasize about. But just for a moment. There were enemies to slay. Hefting his axe, Ivar started to advance again, only to be interrupted by his so-called leader.

"Barrier's dropping! Get back here Ivar!"

Scowling, Ivar froze in place as he thought about ignoring the order and continuing his advance. New strength flowed through him as he leveled up a couple of times, and there were more goblins to kill, more strength for the taking. Retreating now was the wrong call. They should advance, wipe out the force that attacked them, then bring the fight to the rest of the horde, join their advisors in battle and prove their strength!

But he knew the others would never do it. They were too weak, too afraid. The frail girls relying too much on their magic and holding men back, turning their strength to protecting them instead of letting the men bring the fight to monsters.

Especially that girl Emily who played at being a warrior but relied on the men beside her to survive. The line was her idea, something to make up for her own weakness by holding other warriors back. It made his blood boil.

But at least she and the other girls tried to contribute to the fight, actually killing their enemies. Not like the girl Jun who threatened to lock him outside a barrier to deal with their enemies alone. Her magic was powerful, but largely useless. All the energy spent on defense could have instead been put to better use killing the monsters, but she was too timid, too weak. The worst failings of her entire gender. She should have just stayed in the city and become a wife and mother, not playing at being an adventurer when she was too weak of mind to do what needed to be done.

Glancing back at his classmates, his eyes were drawn to the subject of his scorn. The pretty girl was just a distraction. One that the others seemed to tolerate for her beauty, even forming their entire plan around the girl's magic. She needs to learn her place, he thought to himself.

Jun watched the heavily armored figure beyond the students' defensive line freeze in place, surrounded by broken corpses as goblins streamed around him. It was clear to her that Gregor's shouted order With every second that Ivar remained still, the anxiety and stress gripping her heart grew worse. She didn't like the boy at all, and part of her wanted to just slam the barrier down, leaving him to deal with his own stupid choices. After all, he abandoned the group to show off, putting the rest of them at risk. But he was still one of her classmates, distasteful and reckless as he was, and her job was to protect and defend as best she could. Even the people in the group she didn't like.

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In the long seconds that Ivar stood still, Jun grabbed another pair of goblins that slipped through the defensive line and bashed them together, knocking their weapons from their hands before throwing them back out to collide with another group that rallied for a charge against her classmates. The ground between her and the frontline fighters was littered with dropped weapons, so many that they were becoming a hazard. One of her classmates in the line, Hunter she thought his name was, stepped back as a group of goblins pressured him, his foot landing on the hilt of a sword that sent him slipping off balance. The goblins didn't let the opportunity go, springing forward weapon first as he fell off balance. Splitting her focus again, Jun shoved mana into her barrier spellform, sacrificing strength for speed as the barrier manifested, blocking a pair of strikes before it shattered. It wasn't much, but it was enough for Hunter to regain his balance, moving his shield up just in time to stop a blade headed for his unarmored throat as he planted his feet again, but it was clear he was flagging, the long minutes of fighting in the cold with limited rest sapping his strength like everyone else's.

She couldn't wait any longer. Looking one last time at her reckless classmate, she sent the command to her barrier, willing it to drop down. As the pink and gold barrier started to rapidly descend, the reality of the situation finally seemed to catch up with Ivar as he turned around and started to sprint back, using his weapon more to push goblins aside than to kill as he started fighting his way back. The pervert made rapid progress back, but Jun could tell he wouldn't be fast enough. Guilt eating at her, she willed her barrier to slow its descent as she grabbed another pair of goblins that slipped through the line and flung them, the flailing enemies landing against some of the goblins in Ivar's way and knocking them aside. He better appreciate it, I'm tired of trying to help a perverted idiot, Jun thought to herself.

Taking advantage of the goblins knocked off balance, Ivar rushed through the press, ducking under Jun's descending barrier. With Ivar finally back inside, Jun slammed the barrier the rest of the way down, wincing at the sound of several fleshy pops as blood sprayed across her barrier. With most of the raiding group cut off outside of her barrier, the students inside fought with renewed vigor, quickly finishing off the goblins that were trapped inside.

"No time to rest! Get across the river," Aya yelled, her voice echoing slightly in the glowing half dome as the last of the goblins inside died. The bridge she made was narrow and thin, limiting how many could go across at once, and how fast they could go. The safest thing they could do was do it one at a time, each warrior taking a full minute to ease their way across. Holding the barrier, Jun would be the last to cross so that she didn't drain herself reinforcing the barrier, though the golden energy laced throughout it helped. Waiting for the others to cross, Jun started to pick up the weapons scattered about the snow and shove them into her bag. Grabbing them now meant the goblins wouldn't be able to get them back, and that could only help. Besides, the extra money from selling them would help her and her team when they got back.

But Jun wasn't the only one who looted while waiting to cross. Several of the warriors moved through the corpses, looting as they moved with just Jun's barrier standing between them and hundreds of goblins, though most grabbed the choicest weapons or small pouches before they left. As Jun finished picking up the last of the weapons she shook free from their owners, a sound reached her ears and she looked up to see Roger laughing as he gleefully took another grisly trophy from a fallen goblin, waving the severed thumb around in a taunting manner as the furious goblins beyond the barrier.

Ivar, Roger, and Karl hwoever chose differently, wholly focused on taking ears and other grisly trophies. Laughing, the three boys raced to sever ears and other parts from the dead goblins, each mutilation drawing howls of fury from the amassed goblins as they threw themselves at the barrier again and again.

The mocking and mutilation only seemed to enrage them further as Jun felt a noticeable spike in damage against her barrier, the strange energy she'd stolen and infused into it noticeably dropping as it was consumed to repair the damage.

"Leave them alone already!" She yelled with disgust.

"I'm just having a bit of fun gorgeous," Roger replied with a wink. "You need to relax."

"R-Relax?! You're making them angrier!" Jun pointed at the goblins as they furiously stabbed and bashed at her barrier, cracks appearing in the pink energy before the gold veins throughout it flashed, dimming slightly as the cracks vanished.

"Calm down girl! Getting mad isn't very pretty," Ivar said, taking a step towards her with his arms open. "Just sit back, we'll protect you from those nasty goblins."

"I don't need your protection," she said with more heat than she expected. Embarrassment and anxiety reared their ugly heads, biting at her with fangs of doubt. Pushing through it was tough, but she managed it somehow, continuing to speak before one of them could open their mouths again. "Every time you make them mad, they fight even harder and it's draining my magic!"

"It's fine, you worry too much. They're just goblins," Ivar said dismissively, waving her off as he looked her up and down.

Jun's skin crawled with revulsion at the boy's tone. Even with his face hidden behind his helmet, she could feel him undressing her with his eyes, and she didn't like it. Worse still was the way he just dismissed her concerns like they didn't matter. It reminded her too much of her father on Earth. The dismissive attitude. The casual disdain like nothing she said mattered. Like she all she should do was listen and obey. She wanted to scream in fury. Instead, she swallowed her anger down, clenching her hands into fists as she fed half her mana into the barrier, topping it off as the barrier absorbed the strongest blow yet.

Drawn by the strike, Jun turned to see a massive goblin, taller than her and bulging with muscles as it wound up a blow with a massive maul and smashed it down, shaking the barrier as yet more of her mana and the stolen energy was consumed. She wasn't the only one shaken by the attack. As full of bravado as the three boys were, they recoiled away at the first strike, hands on weapons as they eyed the large goblin warily. Something about him seemed different than all the others they fought. More dangerous, more real. Like the two Silver thugs, Jun realized.

"Move faster!" Aya yelled as Clint shuffled past the midway point, joining more than half the students on the other side.

Snarling, the Silver goblin shouted something in his guttural language, pointing at the other students. Jun couldn't understand what the goblin said, the guttural language completely foreign to her, but the meaning of the gesture the goblin made was clear enough as he drew a clawed finger across is throat while staring them down. He was going to kill them. Strike after strike crashed into the barrier, shaking it more and more with every blow as the students started to crowd around the bridge, waiting for their turns.

Jun's mana neared empty as she funneled more into her spell, cannibalizing the mana still in her snares as she ran low to buy more time. Focusing on the barrier, Jun fed her mana into it carefully, slowly shrinking the space she guarded down as more of her classmates crossed, giving ground a step at a time as their foe advanced. She bought a brief reprieve as the goblin's corpses were exposed, most of the goblins bending down to grab and drag their fallen brethren away, but the Silver never took his eyes off her and the others, raining down blow after blow on her barrier in a rage.

"Jun, you're the last one! Come on!" Aya yelled out as Jun pumped the latest of her recovered mana into the barrier, the golden energy all but depleted. Shaking away the fuzziness in her head from mana depletion, Jun jumped on the bridge and started to walk across, her arms stretched out for balance as she did.

Halfway across, Jun stumbled as a wave of something washed over her, squeezing her chest tight with dread. It took all her training and discipline not to fall, not to panic as she felt an overwhelming sense of doom. She barely noticed as Shiori finally shifted, uncurling from around her neck and hopping down to land on the spike of earth, her fur bristling as it stood on end.

Shiori slept as her kitten fought, her body draped around Jun's neck as she cast spell after spell, but that didn't mean she was unaware. Her spirit remained active, watching the world through her aura.

The Gold goblin's aura was impressive for his kind, a threat that would finally get the three advisors to act, but still not one strong enough for her to take care of, not unless the edicts were broken, and they hadn't been, yet. The advisors would be enough to handle the horde leader and his elites, unless something went wrong. Which of course it did.

Damnable bug! Shiori cursed to herself as she felt the fabric of reality start to tear. Exactly what she tried to avoid by staying uninvolved.

Of course the bug of an elf taunted his foe instead of finishing him, playing with his prey like he was a cat when he lacked the strength to handle the consequences. Shiori considered saving the bug, taking him away before the horde leader could consume the elf's strength to fuel the tear, but it wouldn't be enough to truly stop what was coming, nor could she step in yet. Not until the threat fully materialized.

It wouldn't be long now. Another wave of void energy pulsed through the air as a pair of claws gripped the tear in reality and started to pry it open. One by one, Shiori felt as all of the goblins still tethered to the horde leader, alive and dead, began to feed energy into the tear, weakening the fabric of reality.

Jumping down from her kitten's neck, Shiori's fur stood on end as the dimension screamed with pain as the tear sucked mana from the world, consuming it as fuel to widen itself. The universe fought to hold itself together as more and more claws appeared at the edges, waves of causality rippling through the fabric of reality, twisting the Great Cycle as the void won. A ripping sound, felt but not heard, rang throughout the world, telling those in tune with the universe that they were coming.

"What is that?!"

Jun shoved down the growing sense of doom as she whipped her head around, her eyes widening as a tentacled thing rushed across the landscape, charging her classmates as it threw up snow in its wake. Cian, Gregor, and Chao rushed forward, their shields overlapping as they braced themselves, preparing to receive the mysterious monster's charge, but it vanished as suddenly as it appeared moments before another wave of doom washed over them with physical force.

The wave caught Jun off guard as it pushed against her, knocking her off balance. Shrieking, Jun struggled to regain her balance, only to flinch as she felt her barrier break, that last jerk spilling her legs out from under her!

Time slowed to a crawl as she fell, what little mana she had left in her core coming to her aid as she called for it, shoving the arcane energy into her spell as she reached out for the bridge, willing her spell to manifest!

Nothing happened. Sparks appeared as her spell collapsed half formed, not enough mana to manifest the snares she had come to depend on. The rush of the icy river filled her ears as time started to speed back up, the sensation of weightlessness filling her with a brief thrill as she fell. Her eyes landed upon Shiori still standing on the bridge, her Master's golden eyes fixed upon her as she fell.

Her Master told her she would need to learn to defend herself, that she couldn't count on others to always save her, but she thought that was years away. Not now. Betrayal stabbed her in the heart as she closed her eyes, preparing for the icy shock of the river. Another death by betrayal. Ice instead of fire. Would it burn like the last time, or would the cold feel different? More painful? Less?

She didn't find out.

Jun felt a hand grab hers and pull, the force of the tug nearly dislocating her shoulder as her fall reversed course and she slammed into something firm with a gasp of pain. Her eyes squeezed shut, she felt arms wrap around her and pull her tight, pressing her face into something warm and soft. Her chest aching, Jun sucked in a deep breath, the smell of medicinal herbs filling her nose. Something about the smell touched something deep inside of her, an instinctual feeling of disgust and fear mixed with love and warmth and she tried to pull away, bile rising in her throat. But the arms wrapped around her were unyielding, her strength like that of a child before an imposing mountain.

Gravity took hold again as the woman's arms released her and Jun shrieked as she fell, only for it to be cut off with a pained yelp as she landed in the snow on her backside. As cold started to penetrate her clothes, Jun opened her eyes to see her classmates standing and staring at her and the strange woman that released her.

The woman wore a deep purple robe that glittered with golden sigils, her hair a deep black. Behind her hovered a simple ball of white light, reminiscent of the moon, that glowed warmly, illuminating the area. In the glowing light, she had the ethereal beauty of an ageless woman carrying an air of maturity but still retaining her youth, an air of restrained power and authority surrounding her. It felt like she gazed upon an Empress.

Yet it wasn't the woman's ageless beauty or air of authority that grabbed Jun's attention. It was the pair of twitching cat ears on the woman's head as she smiled mischievously, a pair of black furred tails flicking about behind her.

"Is that how you thank me kitten?" she said in Shiori's voice.

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