As soon as Hayato sent out his signal, his team moved into action. The meaning of this signal was clear. As they were setting up their strategy, Hayato had informed of them of the need for a signal just incase things went south. "Simply enough, should the plan be thrown into disarray for any reason, I'll send out the signal."
"The signal being?" Jayden asked.
"Ill set off a controlled explosion that will travel down through the floors. That's what I've been doing right now." Hayato said as he stood up from the pipe he was tinkering with. "Once you receive the signal, it basically mean that the plan has gone to shit, and to do whatever you think is best.
Kayden looked unimpressed. "That's your big backup strategy?"
"Don't complain, lackey."
The room chilled considerably.
"Who are you calling a lackey?"
"Just get in position."
In the present, Kayden smiled to himself as the signal went of. "Just get in position huh?" Standing in front of him was Touka. Currently, she couldn't move, due to the fact that her feet were encased in ice, as well as the entire staircase. But it wouldn't last.
She easily sliced the ice away with her Katana. "Magic will have no effect this deep." She slowly began to walk down the stairs, holding her 75 cm katana out to her side, letting it scrape against the wall. "Fortunately for me, I don't rely on magic."
"Are you insinuating that I do?" Kayden allowed the ice under them to crack, as he waited for Touka to get closer. Once she was on the third step from the bottom, Kayden allowed the ice to shatter completely, revealing the trap he had set. Multiple ice stalactites that had been hanging on the ceiling came down. Touka sliced through them easily with her sword, and it was followed up with a immediately with a spike of ice that that Kayden fired.
Touka jumped out of the way, and as she landed on the ground, another spike of ice shot out immediately. She barely managed to spring back up and unto another spot on the ground before another one erupted from the ground as well. Noticing the pattern she launched herself unto the wall, where the same thing happened. She summersaulted unto the railing, where the endless wave finally ceased.
"This was caused by Emma's ability, wasn't it?"
Kayden nodded, smirking. "The law type magical ability, 'Status Effect.' Able to apply a certain outcome or effect, once a certain condition is met. In this case, if a pressure of over 2 psi is applied to it. Once that happens, a spike of ice will be shot up 6 feet into the air."
"Was there really a need to explain the specifics?"
"Of course there was. I needed to have a villain like monologue overexplaining my plan."
Touka looked at him with a dead expression. "Unbelievable."
"Unbelievably, badass, right?" Kayden's smirk grew wider.
"Unbelievably idiotic." Suddenly, Touka had teleported directly behind him, and there was a slash on Kayden's chest. She landed on the opposite wall, launching herself back onto the railing in what seemed like an instant. Another slash appeared on his chest.
"Even with the magic nullification, your ability is just as strong as ever."
"Shame I can't use it to its full extent. If I don't unsheathe my blade, I cant cut." Touka reentered into attack position, her hand on the hilt of her sword, and her stance wide.
"You'll regret not aiming for the neck." Kayden joked.
"If I really wanted to kill you, you'd be bleeding out right now." Touka said without a hint of humor in her voice.
Touka prepared for attack, and Kayden tensed as he prepared to dodge. However just before Touka launched another attack, a glowing light seemed to flow from her body as some sort of magic was released. Touka froze, as she noticed it. Then, she immediately teleported forward. However Kayden caught this moment of realization on her face, and instantly summoned an ice wall behind him to block her path. Touka landed on it, not allowing her momentum to die and instead using it to pivot on the wall, face Kayden and attack. Kayden jumped out of the way, and attempted to use the same strategy to catch her once again, but once again, she pivoted easily and counterattacked.
She began to bounce off of the two ice walls created, creating a multitude of back and forth slashes at Kayden, who weaved and dodged to the best of his ability. But the attacks were coming at such a frequency that it was impossible to dodge them all.
However, after a few seconds of this, Kayden collapsed one of the ice walls, essentially pulling the seat from under her. Touka flew past, and would've crashed directly into the railing if it wasn't for her fast reaction speed. She barely managed to recover and slide along the railing. This left her completely open to the follow up punch that Kayden landed directly to her side. It sent her straight into the wall, and immediately ice reached out and grabbed her, trapping her against the wall.
Kayden, stood on the railing, admiring his handiwork. "Looks like I win."
Touka, who was unable to make any major movements, smiled. "I guess this is the cliche where the villain thinks they've won but the hero pulls out a secret they've been holding just for this moment."
Kayden's mind paused as he processed what she meant by that. Instantly, his eyes drifted towards her hand, where her katana was still unsheathed. She made the slight movement of flipping it so that the handle faced the ceiling, allowing the sword to completely enter the sheath. As soon as it did, it felt like a separate space was created around the entire corridor, where every single slash that Touka had made with her sword in the last minute was visible. The lingered in the air for a few moments, allowing Kayden to bask in the feeling of horror. And then the space seemed to shatter, and all the previous slashed returned, their power doubled, slicing straight through the entire floor, and sending them crashing down.
* * *
Lucius dodged a kick, before grabbing Raiden's leg and tossing him straight into a group of mirrors. Raiden spun in there air, recover quickly and launching himself back at Lucius. They clashed once gain, and reengaged in hand to hand combat. They were mostly trading blows, Lucius playing defensively, waiting for a chance to counterattack, while Raiden was playing pure offensive, not giving Lucius time to do anything but dodge. Raiden aimed a sweep that Lucius jumped over. Raiden immediately followed up by grabbing Lucius shirt and tossing him straight through the wall. Lucius rolled over the table, grabbing a vial of acid and tossing at Raiden who dodged easily. Raiden vaulted the table and kicked Lucius. Who blocked it and moved to create more distance.
Raiden looked over across the table at Lucius. "This is no fun if your going to spend the entire time just running away from me. You know that?"
Lucius just smiled. "Who said I was just running?" Suddenly, the ground under Raiden collapsed, and he dropped down another floor. Lucius jumped down immediately and attacked, grabbing Raiden and propelling him into the ground. As soon as Raiden hit the ground he immediately began to roll, as both of them fought to get on top.
Raiden managed to get up, but instantly, Hayato shoved a hang in his face and let of a bright light flash. The magic was weak, but being point blank it didn't need much strength. Lucius followed up by pushing Raiden off and kicking him. Raiden skidded backwards and rubbed his eyes. Across from him Lucius stood. "Your still just as sneaky as ever." Raiden said with a smile.
"Your just as much of a junkie as ever." Lucius returned with the same smile.
However before their fight could continue the floor above them was destroyed, as Hayato and Alice dropped down, along with Kayden and Touka. Before anyone could react however, Luke threw multiple barrels of gas that Yuka detonated with her flame's. The floor exploded in a vibrant flash of color as the fell down unto the next floor. Debris and smoke rained down unto the next floor. And the next. When they finally stopped falling, they appeared into a completely barren floor. The magic nullification was almost suffocating.
Instantly, a massive blast of wind generated from some sort of massive fan at the end of the long barren corridor cleared the smoke, revealing the situation. At the end of the long corridor was a massive sign and arrow that pointed to the left, reading, 'Basement Floor.'
Akira and Suijin were standing right next each other, the exit just a hallway down. In their way?
All of the other students.
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GOT IT
Chapter 8: Wild Cards
The sound of a massive explosion had rung out throughout warehouse. Rooms shook, boxes were knocked off of shelves, and some entire sections began to collapse. Raiden walked through the destruction calmly, as he analyzed his surroundings. He much preferred to work alone.
The pressing feeling in his chest was slowly starting to grow as he descended lower and lower into the warehouse. He could already tell that his magic was weakening, and so was his ability to sense other people magic as well. However he could tell that just a floor or two below him, t14he two groups had met up in an all out clash. Just a few more floors below them, and magic would become completely useless. that was also where Raiden predicted Suijin would be.
Raiden entire strategy was to essentially break off from his own team, and trust that they chaos that would come from the two teams meeting, would be able to mask his movements, as he attempted a flank on Suijin. Normally, he would have no chance of catching up to Suijin, however, he had a plan? He took a look at some of the barrels and vials that lay around the room he was currently standing in. A few minutes earlier, he had noticed that some of these barrels were labeled. A majority of the barrels were actually filled with high pressure gas. That had given him an idea.
He picked up one of the vials, noticing that it was filled with a very corrosive substance. He moved unto the next one, which wasn't anything special, besides an extremely basic liquid. He pocketed multiple vials of the corrosive liquid, before return to where his base of operations was. Their, was an entire room filled with barrels of high pressure gas. He had used his insane speed to go around the building and gather as many of them as he possibly could,
Now, he turned and made use of the corrosive liquid, by pouring it into a hole he had created in the ground. The stuff was much more potent than acid, and within a second, multiple floors had massive holes in them. Then, Raiden began to flip the barrels on their sides, in a position where if you pushed them even slightly, they would all go rolling down into the hole. Then, He punched the ground as hard as he could without destroying it. Instantly every single one of the barrels slid down the whole he had created, through the multiple floors that had been completely corroded with the acid. Over a hundred barrels were falling through the warehouse. Then, for the final touch. Raiden snapped his fingers, allowing a singular spark of lightning to fall down the hole.
Raiden smiled, as he prepared for his huge surprise. It seems Yami was right. "Not being able to use magic really changes the way your approach situations."
And for the second time that day, the warehouse suffered another massive explosion.
* * *
After the brief momentary stare down, Hayato immediately jumped into action. He knew that he would be alone in this encounter. He was the highest person up, or the first line of the defense. The only other back up he might have had would be Jayden, who was most likely caught up by whoever had slipped past him. So Hayato's first move was to get a better understanding of who he was up against. He used his wind magic to clear out the smoke currently blocking his vision. Along with Alice, he saw Yuka and Luke. That left either Akira or Touka as the one who had just rushed past him. While it did make the most sense for Akira to have tried and cut straight through, he didn't have to worry because Kayden would be right there to stop her.
Alice would know that though.
So that why he was sure Akira was hiding somewhere in the smoke. However before he could spread the reach of his ability and blast through the rest of the smoke, another, even larger explosion tore through the metal frames and floors. The building shook violently, knocking Hayato off of balance.
The hell was that!
The explosion continued to tear through the warehouse, multiple floors below their current position, which told Hayato that this explosion was natural, and not caused by magic. However the second explosion didn't have his attention for long, because there was suddenly a leg inches from his face. He ducked downward, narrowly avoiding Alice's kick, and the follow up which came from Yuka. He flipped over the railing of the stairs, trying to create some distance. Yuka used her flames to boost her self forward, while at the same time, Alice stretched out a hand and emitted a blinding bright gold light.
Shi-
Hayato's thoughts were interrupted by the jet powered kick that had just hit him in the side, sending him crashing down the stairs and sliding into the end of the corridor. Hayato stood up just as Alice and Yuka appeared from the stair case.
"Cheap tricks, eh?" Hayato joked as he rubbed his side. The side of his uniform, a simple blazer was burnt up.
"Nothing personal." Alice said, creating a bow of pure light.
"This is very personal." Yuka said at the same time, as she punched her fist, emitting flames.
Instantly, another wave of blinding light was emitted.
Before any of Alices arrows could be fired, Hayato punched the ground, knocking them down a floor, before doing the same thing again. This time, as they burst into the next floor, the crushing feeling intensified, and it felt like all the Mana circulating in their bodies had begun to freeze, turning into ice. Alice's magic made flares effectiveness had dropped significantly, allowing Hayato to react to the light arrows fired, batting them away with just his bare hand. They landed unto the the ground, and instantly, Yuka launched herself at Hayato. However this time, as opposed to what happened only two floors above, Yuka's jet boosted attack was easily dodged by Hayato, and he grabbed her arm. Yuka tried to instantly emit flames from her body, but they were too weak to actually effect Hayato, and he pulled her in, throwing her arm into the air, and than landing a direct punch to her gut, sending her crashing, straight through the wall. Yami's lecture popped up into his mind once again.
"The lack of magic changes the way you think in certain encounters. Your decision making is very different when you can just summon a wall of fire to solve your problems, as opposed to having nothing but your surroundings to rely on."
As Hayato turned he barely reacted into to see a light arrow, centimeters away from his eye. He grabbed it, stopping it just before it pierced him. He turned to face Alice, who already had another three arrows ready to be fired. "Was this strategy your idea?"
Alice didn't respond. Behind her, floating bows of light appeared, with multiple arrows ready to fire. All aimed at Hayato. Hayato simply smirked at the sight of this. Then, he used a little bit of wind magic to flare the small flames lingering around. The flames detonated another controlled explosion that traveled down and deeper into the warehouse. Alice instantly knew what this was.
A signal!
What for, she couldn't tell. And with a majority of her team spit up, it would normally be impossible fore her to warn them of the upcoming danger. But the magic nullification had yet to reach zero, so she had time for one more effort. Muttering something under her breath, she seemed to release some sort of magic that she had been holding around her. Hayato noticed that the same magic also began to release itself from Yuka's body flowing into the air.
"So you had a back up plan as well." He removed his blazer, allowing it to drop to the floor. Faint wind magic began to swirl around him, causing his hair to flow softly.
Alice did not release the bow from her hands, instead allowing a pair of hand made of light to remove the coat that hung around her shoulders. Her white dress seemed to glow just as much as the light magic surrounding her. She chuckled. "I forgot to thank you. For finally getting Lucius off of his ass." Then her expression turned to serious. "But I do think you need to be punished for the methods that you used."
And then she let a thousand arrows of pure light rain down on her opponent.
* * *
Raiden made use of his shortcut to descend down straight into the path of the oncoming Suijin. She stopped in her tracks, and Izumi and Emma moved to stand in front of her. Raiden stretched his arms as he looked at then, a smirk on his face. "Looks like I found you, Ms. 'Checking them out.'"
Izumi and Emma looked rightfully confused, but Suijin's fist clenched. "Didn't I already explain that that was a misunderstanding.
Raiden put a finger to his chin and pretended to be in deep thought. "Really?"
Suddenly, he was behind Suijin, Winding up a punch. "Cuz I could've sworn it w-" In the middle of his sentence, he was caught by by a punch straight to the face, that sent him skidding backwards. He turned to see and Lucius was standing in front of him, a grin plastered on his face.
"In the middle of your sentence and everything."
"Damn. I thought you still be laying on your ass at the top floor."
"And let you get away with that cheap shot?" He scoffed. "Yeah right." Suijin, nodded towards Lucius, and continued making her way down.
They were standing on a floor that seemed to be filled with mirrors. Each one of them broken. The cracked and distorted mirrors reflected an image of the two boys facing off that almost made it seem as if they were enemies, locked in a battle to the death.
The dashed at each other at the same time, the force behind their clashing fist shattering what was left of the already cracked mirrors.