"Thea!" Evan screamed as her blood spilled onto him.
His breath heavy, he rushed forward and tried to fight the Kaiju. It barely even registered him and simply flung Thea up in the air, opening its mouth in anticipation.
Watching in helpless horror, Evan felt time slow to a treacherous crawl as she came closer and closer to death. All she wanted to do was pick flowers for him...
For that simple crime of wanting to please somebody, she was going to die. And he was unable to do anything except watch.
SHING!! THWACK!!
A blur passed Evan and knocked him off his feet. Landing with a loud thud, he pushed himself off the ground as he looked up, trying to find out what had happened.
Squinting his eyes, he tried his best to look through the growing dust, but to no avail. All he heard was repeated strikes and a sick squelching of blood. Yet there were no screams.
As the dust cleared, Evan saw a figure standing over the corpse of the Kaiju.
Aria.
And she was covered in blood, but not her own. It was the Kaiju's, which was now nothing more than a mangled mess of muscle and fractured bone.
She stood over the Kaiju for a few seconds. Even as the students surrounded the site, none of them dared to move any closer to her. This was because she was trembling with an intense rage that whittled them down to their souls.
The world itself paused for a moment when she closed her eyes. Although it was clear she was trying to rein in her emotions, the students couldn't help but feel as though she was going to lash out at them.
Even the oldest ones, like Varek, who had been there since the beginning, never saw her like this. Never.
But then again...
Evan looked down from the gigantic Kaiju's corpse. There was a small, frail, beautiful girl next to it.
Even though there was a gaping hole in her stomach and her spine was shattered in half, she was still smiling. Walking over to her, Evan didn't even bother creating a false pretense of calm.
Tears flowed down his face, so much so that his entire uniform was soaked before he even knelt by her side.
"Why?" Evan asked to no one as he reached out with his hand, grabbing hers in some desperate attempt to bring her back to life.
Of course, life wasn't a fairytale. After a few seconds, it was clear no amount of pleading would bring her back.
She was dead.
Just like that, she was dead.
And for what? Some stupid flower?
Looking down at their connected hands, Evan shook his head. The flower she had wanted to show him... it was in her hand right now. Crushed, destroyed.
Evan squeezed his eyes shut as grief and the fact of the world struck him. It didn't matter how pure you were. All that mattered was strength.
As long as Kaiju existed, all that mattered was strength.
He felt nothing when Aria knelt beside him, looking at her dead student.
He felt nothing when she closed Thea's eyes forever.
He felt nothing when she finally spoke, her voice cracking every other word.
"I said to follow orders. I said to follow every fucking order."
...
The students walked forward in the specific formation Aria set up. Varek rolled his eyes the entire time she ordered them around, but otherwise, not even he rebelled.
All the spirit of adventure had dissipated, leaving behind nothing but an emptiness of existential dread. Looking around, Adam could tell that each of them was wondering if they'd be the next to die.
The unfortunate truth was that they wouldn't. As long as they followed Aria's orders, they would survive.
If Thea had just fucking...
"Adam. I didn't tell you to use your artifact," Aria barked, not slowing her pace in the slightest.
Adam unclenched his fist as quickly as he had closed it, the anger fading as fast as it came. Now was not the time to lose his head, especially when he had multiple things to think about. Somehow, he had to find a way to escape the group and complete the system's quest.
With the tightened security, that was sure to be nearly impossible. Then there was also the problem of his injury.
Although it had greatly healed thanks to the [Healing] skill Natalie had as a Projection-type hero, it was still very irritable. Every second it felt like his back was peeling, as if it was being torn apart all over again.
It was an unpleasant feeling, to say the least.
"We're here," Aria announced, raising her hand with the signal to stop.
Without delay, every student stopped in their tracks. Everyone except Red Hair, who walked next to Aria and asked, "Why are we stopping here?"
Looking around, Adam couldn't help but have the same question. They had walked into a sort of wild grassland, which was covered with grass that rose over 4 meters in the air. There was a single trail, the one they had been walking on.
Now that they stopped, Adam couldn't keep his eyes away from the grass. He couldn't shake the feeling something was staring right back at him.
Therefore, in this instance, Adam wondered the same thing Varek did. Why the hell would they stop here, where they were exposed to hidden enemies?
"I didn't tell you to walk next to me, Varek," Aria said with a stern voice before pushing him back with her baton.
His usual carefree attitude dropped instantly. "Don't push me, bitch. Just because that waste of space died—"
Aria did nothing but glance at him, and he shut up. The aura she emitted was simply far too strong. Varek could feel his very skin peeling, his existence shriveling from fear of someone that strong.
He was strong, and he was a promising warrior. That fact was repeated to him over and over by the headmaster.
Yet, against the immense pressure Aria had emitted, he felt like nothing more than a baby cub meowing at its mother.
Therefore, even he did just as she asked and shut up. Good thing too, because Adam had nearly turned his arm into an array of knives.
'What did that bastard say about Thea? That she was a waste?'
Varek turned to Adam and smiled. It wasn't a pleasant or friendly smile, but rather one that promised a fight to the death.
As the two glared at each other, their killing aura clashed equally. A small grin formed on Varek's face, as he wondered what the blood of an inheritor tasted like.