A faint rumble echoed through the air, and Emberline flinched, her gaze shooting back up at the projes.

  One of the giaaurs had mao get its cws into one of the kids and held her up to its gaping jaws. She was bleeding heavily from where she had been caught and sshed by its cws, and the blood stained her dress crimson red.

  Emberli out a strangled gasp, c her mouth with her hands.

  "Tess, that's enough! Please. Yoing to kill them. You're taking this too far!" Emberline screamed, g her fist tightly.

  She turoward Tess, gring daggers into the other woman.

  Tesseract looked away, biting her lips.

  "Emberline... I asked you to trust me," Tess said, gng back at her teammate. "I've had weeks to set up very plicated hyperpo cover every inch of the academy's grounds. The students aren't going to be in real danger of dying unless I'm incapacitated."

  She gestured around herself and at the projes that showed the age unfolding before her. "You know I'm better than that. No matter how much it would appear otherwise, this is all under trol."

  Tesseract looked down at the ss as a massive explosioed on one of them.

  A magical girl with ptinum blonde hair in a silver dress erupted from a crowd of monsters, wielding a scythe that glinted against the misty background.

  Emberline's breath caught ihroat as she watched the magical girl's silver dress transform into a dark cloak with a bck dress and red corset.

  "Isn't that...?" She whispered.

  Tess nodded, frowning as the cloaked girl desperately cleaved through the monsters with her scythe in a fsh of red.

  "I k was her as soon as she hijacked the mana manipution trick I used to sort the teams," Tess chuckled. "She was always quite a handful, wasn't she? Always was a crafty little shit who couldn't sit still for more than two minutes. Still, she's seriously gotten rusty iime off."

  Emberlinne couldn't help but smile as the image of pying hide and seek with a young, eic, giggling child fshed in her mind.

  She ughed along at the memories, but the tension didn't fade from her body.

  "Ok, but Tessie. I've had enough of your bullshit, okay?"

  Tess raised an eyebrow at her teammate.

  "I want to know how you're keeping this under trol. Cut the cryptic bullshit for my sake, please."

  Emberliured at the ss again and at the student struggling against the taur's grip. "Because from where I'm standing, those monsters you dumped on them are going to kill them. You've gooo far already."

  Tesseraarrowed her eyes, looking up at the struggling student captured by the taur with an appraising eye.

  "Shortly before the Cataclysm, I discovered my hyperpnes have a couple of iing properties. From where we're standing here, I more or less affey part of the hyperpne I desire. And I weaved in several tingency funs in the event I'm too slow to bail them out directly."

  She raised one hand at the portal, eyes glowing purple.

  And then a series of tiny purple portals began to open up around the proje whied in on the taur's body.

  And then another, and another. All across the room, dozens of portals opened up around Tess's projes, all aimed torojes where the students were under visible distress.

  "Alright, I'm calling it here for that group. Let's end this before it actually gets out of hand," Tess spoke with a fident smirk.

  But before anything happehe projes flickered, turning gray, as if they'd been disected from the world around it.

  "W-what?!" Tess said, tensing up.

  The student in the portal thrust her hand out, firing a golden beam straight into the monster's eye, melting it with a silent scream.

  Emberline could only stare in horror as it reared its head bad cmped its massive, gaping maw oudent's arm.

  "Dammit!" Tesseract yelled as she raised her hand again, only to be suddenly lifted off her feet. She struggled as she was levitated in the air with intricate yers of magigs and triangles surrounding each of her limbs.

  "Tess?!" Emberline asked. "Hang on, I'll —"

  She was cut off as a rumbling, eg purr came from the table o them, drawing both women's attention as a golden-eyed Bastet stared back at them.

  "Mmm that wouldn't be too much fun now, would it?" the Guardian cooed, swishiail. "After all of this buildup? No no, that simply would not do."

  "Bastet, what's the meaning of this?" Tess hissed, gring down at the Guardian from her bound position.

  "The stage is set," the Guardian whispered, a purr rumbling through the room. "All the pyers are on the field. And it's time for them to shiesseract."

  Bastet leaned forward oable, her eyes glowing brightly as her lips curled up into a feral grin.

  Tess glowered at the feline Guardian, her fists tightening in rage as the words rang in her ears.

  "Oh to hell with that."

  She snapped her arm forward and the air crackled with static, dist around them.

  With a gesture the portals that she had opened began to shift again, the air around them rippling and ing. The air in front of the projes shimmered, and suddenly, there were six more of the portals.

  They all showed different angles of the taur creature and the struggling student, and they shimmered and distorted around them, like ripples on the surface of water.

  Bastet recoiled in surprise as purple suddenly cshed with gold, their auras mixing in the air around them in an eerie lightshow of magid will. With a brief crack of her neck, Tesseract fred her aura and snapped her bindings, ndily on the ground.

  Bastet narrowed her eyes and looked up at Tess, who met her gaze with a smirk of defiance.

  "I told you. This is my css," Tesseraapped, her voice dripping with pt, aiming her arm at the most immediate threat.

  With a flick of her wrist, a purple bde of energy shot forth from her arm straight through the portal, cleaving off the taur's cws and freeing the student it was viciously mauling. Emberline couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief as her protege fshed onto the se, scythe fshing in a crimson whirlwind.

  Bastet hissed as she and Tesseract cshed, their auras colliding with a force that sent sparks flying through the air.

  Tesseract's eyes burned as the purple glow around her grew stronger and stronger.

  Her hair billowed in the air as the static around them intensified, and she took a deep, shaky breath before taking a step back, holding the cat-like Guardian's gaze as they fought for dominance.

  And then the Guardian was bound, shackled by invisible bonds that tightened and stricted around her like a straightjacket. She fell over, the bonds keeping her in pce as Tesseraed above her with a dark look on her face.

  Bastet thrashed against her magical shackles as they tightened, pulling at them with all her might, but she could not move. Her eyes bzed a bright gold as she struggled, her cws filing against the invisible bindings.

  "I will not have my students' lives toyed with and pced at risk just because you're bored." Tesseract growled, looming above the trapped Bastet.

  "This is a school. A pce where people are supposed to learn to be heroes and to protect this world." Her voice dropped, her words taking on an edge of ahat was unmistakable. "I may push them hard, but I won't have their lives treated as pythings just because you think this is all some sort of game, Guardian."

  Bastet glowered back, her eyes fshing gold as she ceased her struggle. Her expression was unreadable as her eyes met Tesseract's.

  Then, she smiled, her lips curling up into a grin that showed far too many sharp teeth.

  "You tio impress me, Theresa. Humanity's stro, indeed."

  Bastet ughed and bowed her head mogly, before flexing, snapping her own bindings with a fsh of purple. "But, let's be clear on something. I have never, and will never, sacrifice the life of one of my chosen Champions needlessly either. That is not my style, not at all."

  She grinned again and shrugged her shoulders dismissively. "Besides, you're the one who's been pushing them, not I. I merely provided an avenue for your lesson pn. I assure you the seds I bought here were truly necessary."

  Tess scoffed, gring daggers at the feline. "I would have spare her the actual pain of being mao the degree she has, but it seems I was too te to prevent it. No thanks to you."

  Bastet chuckled. "Oh? Are you sure that wasn't iional, Theresa? To let her feel a taste of the pain that be inflicted upoo show her hile she truly is in this world?"

  The guardian raised her and tilted her head as Tess gred daggers at her.

  "I'm simply stating that, even in the worst case, I would have ensured my Champion's survival," Bastet mewed, smirking. "sider that this moment may have been far more important for her than you'd even fathom."

  Emberline ched her fists as she watched them argue, her eyes dartiweeeammate and the Guardian.

  This was getting ridiculous.

  The tension was thi the air. The magical pressure was so inte was almost suffog.

  She felt a bead of sweat drip dowemple. It was too hot, too close. Too dangerous.

  Bastet had a reputation as one of the wisest and stro of the Guardians, although the mysterious entities had rarely showcased their powers.

  If it came down to an all out brawl between those two, she wouldn't bet her life oher one of them winning. Or the city even standing, after.

  A, her of them backed down.

  They stared each other dowher one of them willing to give an inch, and she could see the veins on Tess' temples bulging as her temper frayed. Bastet was as calm and posed as ever, her lips curled up into a sardonic smile that made Emberline want to punch the daylights out of the feline.

  "Still, I am impressed by how far you've taken your simple Signature of mathematical projes," Bastet purred. "I must admit, your talent has grown far beyond my expectations, Theresa. You've bee quite the artist! This training field is truly an exquisite masterpiece, and I have to wonder what else you have in store for us. It certainly makes me excited for what is to e."

  Tesseract's expression hardened, and her gaze narrowed.

  Bastet tinued, standing back up to stretch her back. "You saved their physical state the sed they crossed the boundary into the pocket space. That much is true. But you ot save them from their own fears, nor you save them from their memories of pain and terror. Have you sidered that? Do you really uand what it is you've dooday?"

  Bastet paused for a sed, and then she shrugged.

  "I don't pretend to be an expert in psychology. But it is clear that your students will remember the events of this training exercise vividly, despite your best efforts. And, well... It's only fair that they make a decision for themselves in the end, isn't it?" she mused.

  Tesseract let out an indignant snort as her fists balled. "You said it to me yourself. The threat to our existence will fall upon us sooher we like it or not, Bastet. The System that has protected this world for turies has failed. The Cataclysm has arrived, and the only thing that hold back the darkhat's ing is our own strength."

  She turned and looked up at the portals again.

  Tess's eyes softened, her lips parting in a small, sad smile.

  "They... they his," she whispered, "I don't like doing it. But the threat that looms over our heads demands no less."

  "Indeed, a, you still don't uand. You ot force people to be fit before they be." Bastet sighed, shaking her head in exasperation. "That's not how this world works. Or mankind."

  Tesseract gred at her, and Bastet chuckled.

  "Theresa, Theresa, Theresa," Bastet purred. "The champions given emergency tracts are amongst some of the hardiest prospects we could find. I uand you wish the students who escaped the worst of the Cataclysm to uand what their peers are dealt with... but this?"

  She shook her head, swishiail as her eyes grew somber.

  "Even the hardiest souls only take so much, you know that as well as I."

  Bastet looked away for a moment before she turo Emberline.

  "Emberline, do be a dear, and make sure the younglings survive the ordeal with their hearts and minds intact, would you?"

  Bastet gave her a wink before disappearing in a puff of bck smoke, and the two women were left staring at each other in sileheir expressions grim and tense.

  Emberline was the first to break the silence, shaking her head. "What's her deal, anyway?"

  "Nothing good I imagiess replied coldly. She snapped her fingers and Emberline was engulfed by a bubble of light as Tesseract's proje ability enveloped her. She looked up at the irl, and Emberline could see the pain and anguish etched in every line on her face.

  Tesseract sighed, looking back up at the portals. "Bastet is right, though. The trauma of experieng all of that will not go away because of my tricks, and my attempts at mitigating it. Even if their injuries don't follow them outside the pocket dimension, their memories and experiences will. And that was the real point of all of this. To teach them what their peers were fag, and give them a glimpse into what it was like to be ihick of the fighting."

  Tess' hands tightened into fists, her knuckles white. "And that is why I wanted you here. You may not be able t them back from the brink of death, but your talents are invaluable when it es to the mind."

  Tesseract looked away, her eyes turning back towards the portal where the girl in bd red was clutg a badly injured Lux as the two ical girls, one in bd yellow, the other with an angel motif, joihem.

  Tesseraced down at Emberline, her expression pained. "I'm going to have a long, long night of up ahead of me."

  She sighed, running a hand through her hair. "And so, I hope you uand now why you have to be there with them, Emberline."

  Emberline looked up at her friend, her teammate. She saw the anguish in Tess' fad felt the pain and guilt radiating off of her.

  "Tess... just tell me this. Would you have dohis to your own child?" Emberline asked, her voice soft. "If it were up to you."

  Tesseract paused.

  The pain was evident on her face. A...

  "If it would have made her more resilient in the end?" Tess replied, her eyes meeting Emberline's, "If it would have givehe tools she o survive in the world that's ing for her? A world I know she's destined for?"

  She took a deep breath, her jaw g. "Then yes. I would have. And still would. And I would do everything I could to ensure she survived, no matter the cost."

  She turned away then, looking down at the portals and the three figures that were verging on the fallen strawberry blonde in her bloodied dress.

  Emberline furrowed her brow, her eyes focused on the angelic healer as the magical girl in the bd yellow witch outfit approached.

  "That girl's healing ability..." Emberlitered.

  Tess gnced down at her, and nodded.

  "Impressive, isn't it? Eric personally wrote me briefs on every student under my jurisdi. Love Angel Aurora's potential is off the charts. If we help her get it under trol, I'm sure she'll give even you a run for your money one day, Emberline."

  Tesseract smiled softly. "And I've got a few more aces up my sleeve as well, but... Well, let's see how our students do, first."

  The two of them watched in silence as the young girls worked to heal their badly injured panion.

  "And she's not the only ohey're all going beyond eveandards I expected."

  Emberline could hear the admiration and respe her teammate's voice, and she frowned.

  "Tess..."

  "Emberliess cut in, "I 't do this on my own, and you know it. I'm... I'm too goal-driven to be good at the kind of emotional support you're capable of, or at the level of empathy that's necessary with the pressure we're uhat the world's under. We both know this."

  She sighed. "But that doesn't mean that I 't do my part. So please. Help them, Emberline. We'll hat golde of yours for the days ahead."

  The fiery girl frow her friend's words.

  She still thought Tess had gone over the line, but... Well...

  "Kat..." Tesseract whispered.

  Emberline finally relented with a nod, her shoulders loosening.

  With that settled, she looked up to watch as the girl with golden hair and wings k beside the fallen strawberry blonde's prone figure.

  "Alright, Tessie. Alright," she sighed. "You're a bit of a bonehead. A reckless, stupid, bonehead with a knuckleheaded engineer's brain. But let's go see just how big of a mess you've made with these kids, huh?"