BA3 - Chapter 38

Within minutes, Woong-ji had led us all the way back to Anbura. We were cloaked in a strong ry glimmer, dampening our sound and hiding us from sight. The grounds was teaming with Anbura students, all of them searching through bushes and trees.

It was likely they were searching for us, so we kept out of sight. We raced across the grounds and past the gardens to the steps of the school with the frantic students none-the-wiser. Long River, my initiation group, stepped out from the front of the building.

“Jiyong, Shin-soo, both their escort instructors, and the boy Aki are still missing,” Yin—the oldest of Long River—said. “Grandmaster thinks they’ll try to come back to get the others, and we need to capture them. Got it?”

“Yes, Yin senpai,” the others of Long River said together.

“Find them all,” Ena yelled through speakers lining the lower walls of the school. “We must bring every last one of the assassins to justice.”

“Assassins?” Roku asked with a queasy look.

Yin sighed. “Their attacks have killed several of king Hisachi’s political rivals, including Yamamotto senpai. But…” he trailed off.

I clenched my fists, wanting to punch the lie out of Yin’s mouth.

“Look for them, but do not fight. You’re no match for their power. If you find them, call for me. Let’s help keep our school safe,” he ordered, sending the rest of Long River off to patrol. He stood on the entrance steps, arms crossed, with a hawk-like gaze combing the yard.

Keep the school safe. That was exactly what I had wanted, I reminded myself. I released my anger and relaxed my muscles. He’d been lied to and believed it to protect his home. I would’ve done the same. But this loyalty didn’t bode well for all of Kokyu. How were they going to believe our far-fetched, treacherous truth over Dokun’s kind lies?

Woong-ji tapped my shoulder, then grabbed my hand. I couldn’t see her, but she led me down the side of the building until we reached the large windows of the dining hall. She cracked one and peered inside, then opened it all the way.

She vaulted through the window with a single fluid jump, and I followed suit, then closed it behind us. I stopped when I noticed the mud on the ground and reached out for my master. We pulled off our shoes and I grabbed a nearby cushion to hide the marks.

Only the muffled creaks of the wood floor could be heard as we sped through the halls to Ena’s office. The doors were guarded by two Enjiho and I smirked. Like a ghost, I snuck up behind the bots and injected them with the last of my uw.

“Ena is mine,” Woong-ji whispered.

I recalled how easily Ena had backhanded Woong-ji across the room and my palms clammed up. I didn’t want to leave her to a horrible fate like that. “I’ll stay out of the way,” I said, though planned very much to get in the way if my master was in danger.

I turned the Enjiho toward the door, and with one fluid motion, pulled them open. The Bastion students were bound and unconscious on the floor, save for Hana, Cho, and Yuri. My blood ran hot when I saw her—Hana—strung up by the wrists with uw munje at the back of the room next to Ena. She had all three of them detained in the same red power and stripped down to only undergarments. Their faces were streaked with tears and their limbs covered with blood.

I barreled into the room with the machina, ready to throw punches at anything and everything. Ena’s goons advanced on my bots. I unleashed the spicy spray directly in their faces and they reacted as I’d hoped, bringing their hands up to their eyes. I pulled the anti-munje cuffs from the compartment on my chest and slapped them over their wrists, then punched both men so hard I heard their chests crack from the hall.

Woong-ji ended her glimmer, revealing us in the doorway.

“Monster,” I yelled from the inferno of anger in my stomach.

Ena hummed with amusement. “I didn’t just kill two men.”

I looked at the bodies of the goons on the floor. Their chests were caved in and eyes wide. My breath caught in my throat and I hesitated—hating myself.

Ena twisted her fingers and the red uw flowed back into her body from my friends. Cho and Yuri dropped to the floor, but Hana stood on wobbling legs. She took a sloppy offensive stance, but Ena pushed her to the ground with a single finger.

“Sit. It’ll all be over soon.”

The Enjiho moved forward, fueled by my rage.

Ena gathered her power about herself in a dark cloud and charged my bots.

Wind ruffled my hair and Woong-ji collided with Ena in a burst of blinding blue. A shockwave burst out, lifting dust from the wood floors and sending everything in its path reeling back.

When the smoke settled, Woong-ji had Ena trapped in a blue-gold sphere. The munje ate at the woman’s façade, revealing the golden eyes I’d seen once before. The short, straight-edge black hair disappeared, replaced by flowing white curls. Ena’s face aged by twenty years, and her body shrank.

“What is this foul magic?” Yin asked behind me.

I whirled, prepared to fight, but Yin wasn’t looking at me. He was looking at the woman who used to be Ena.

“What have you done to our Grandmaster?” He yelled at the old woman trapped in Woong-ji’s sphere.

“Jiyong, you must go,” Woong-ji said, her voice strained. She held her arms out, fueling the munje spell from a glowing point in her stomach.

Yin grabbed my arm. “Jiyong. You—”

“I’m not what you think. I came here to save Kokyu, not destroy it,” I said. I lifted the Enjiho back to their feet and ran to my friends. I picked up Yuri and Cho with the bots, then scooped Hana up into my arms. She looked so frail, as if she’d been drained of her very lifeforce.

I looked around at the unconscious Bastion students on the floor. I couldn’t leave them like this. I bit back anger and devastation. A clear head was the only thing that could get us through this.

My heartbeat quickened and I looked to the mortified Yin. “Senpai, I need your help to save my schoolmates. Please, they’ve done nothing wrong.”

“You can’t escape me!” Ena—or whoever she was—screamed from her confinement.

Woong-ji shifted, pressing more munje into her barrier. “I can’t hold her. Jiyong, you must leave!”

“Yin, they’re innocent!” I pleaded with him.

His brow smoothed and fear entered his eyes. He ran to the wall of screens and pulled close a microphone. “Attention students, this is Yin of Long River. Ena was an imposter, and the Bastion students are not assassins. They are in danger, and we must help them, please. If you’re able, come to the Headmistress’s room.”

Yin cut the feed and turned to me. “And you, are you innocent?”

“I—” pain slashed through my thoughts as the Secret Pact took effect. Even considering telling him the truth crippled me. I dropped to one knee and looked to Yin. There was nothing I could say to reveal our intent. “I came to help you, to help everyone. I am innocent. But I’ve done things—” I looked to the dead men on either side of the room—“things I’m not proud of.”

A group of Anbura students rushed to the door.

“Yin?” Roku asked, then gasped as he saw Woong-ji at the center of the room. “Where’s the Headmistress?”

“She’s likely dead.” Yin rushed to the first bound Bastion student. “That imposter took her place. I saw her glimmer melt away before my eyes moments ago and know it to be true. We all know it. She’s been acting strange for months.”

The students in the doorway murmured and nodded while Yin untied the spell amplified knots the held my fellow students captive.

“What do we do?” a tall girl asked.

“You’ll do nothing you simpering welp!” The witch in containment screamed and the students cowered.

“We need to bring the Bastions outside, unbind them, and revive them from whatever this monster has cast so they can escape.” Yin said, unaffected by the witch’s command.

“Jiyong, run!” Woong-ji screamed.

The bubble around the witch burst in a brilliant shower of sparks and Woong-ji skidded backwards. Purple and red munje twisted through the room from under the Witch’s dress, reaching for the students, Bastions and Anburas alike.

She cackled. “You’re not going anywhere.”

Woong-ji rocketed from the floor in an explosion of zo and smashed into the false Ena. They went through the wall of her private study and tumbled out into the frosty brush behind the school.

“Hurry!” Yin shouted and the other students snapped from their trance.

We charged out into the cold afternoon, away from the screams and explosions of pure power. Woong-ji had faked her frailty before when Ena hit her, lulling all of us into a false sense of her strength.

Hana shivered in my arms and I looked down. Her eyes were open and her gaze pinned on me. “She told me you were dead. She showed me things,” she trembled. I sunk to the ground and held her close.

I looked about at the Anbura students as they shared information, crowding around the side of the pagoda to get a view of the fight. I brought the Enjiho to me and set Yuri and Cho against my back. Their systems were already taxed, and their energy levels low. We couldn’t escape like this.

I wracked my brain, desperate for a solution in the desolation. Shin-soo and Sung-ki were still missing, and they didn’t make the rendezvous—but I couldn’t think they were dead. They would make their way on their own, and we had to, too.

Yin knelt beside me. “What do you need?”

“Clothes and shoes for these three. Any potions on hand for endurance, or revival.” But that wouldn’t be enough.

Yin rallied Long River and a few others, then gave the orders. The fighting behind the pagoda escalated, sending shards of rock and dirt flying high into the air. Yin twirled in a wide circle, blue en shielding us from the debris.

“You have no reason to believe me, no reason to help us,” I whispered.

Yin placed a hand on my shoulder. “You could’ve killed the boy who poisoned your school, many times, but you didn’t. You gave him another chance.”

“How did you know about that?”

He smirked. “Ko-nah’s third level spells are no match for my fourth. I heard everything the night after you fought the shūspekta.”

Another blast of dirt and splintered tree branches flew. The Anbura students clustered together, shielding themselves from damage as they watched.

Yin blocked the shrapnel for us. “We need to get you away from here. Do you have transport out of Kokyu?”

I nodded. “But it requires a several day hike through the mountains.”

The students Yin had sent off returned with potions and clothes. I pulled the loose-fitting pants over Hana’s legs, and tugged on the long-sleeve turtleneck to accompany it, then tied them both in place with a thick sash.

I opened Hana’s mouth and poured the energy potion down her throat. It would take a few moments, but she would be strong enough to run. Around me, the other Bastions were sitting up, rubbing their eyes like groggy children. A rumbling overhead sent my mind into overdrive.

We were out of time.

I reached into my inner pocket and pulled the first of four vials Sung-ki had left me. I drank back the potion with a desperate gulp, the roar drawing nearer every second. Power blazed through my veins and swelled in my core. I twisted the bands for uw and double ma, then let the energy flow through them.

I breathed through the heat in my chest. “Yin, the others don’t know anything, but Yuri will be able to lead you on the right path through the hills… I fear she’s too weak to get them all the way there. They need to get to bay on the north end of Kokyu territory. Our transport waits for us there.”

“And you?” He asked.

Eight Enjiho with red stripes and stars flew over the tree line, landing with a ground trembling thud that set my heart hammering.

“I’m going to fight.”