Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Sometimes when a human being decides to give up on living, nobody notices because it is a slow process of decay. Maybe a human has some moments to give life a chance and feel the rush of emotions that tell them how living is beautiful, yet most of the time it was not enough. This decay was a slow process in which the doubt, the rage, the tears, and the hunger would eat away a person both in body and mind. A process that was so tiring that even moving became a heavy chore. One simple task that one could not even do in the face of danger.

Somehow it was her decision to not move when that strange, and wild black carriage was barreling down the dirt road in such an unrestrained hurry. It was so strange; one would think that the driver was being chased by the devil. It was honestly a not well-thought decision on her part, but what could she have done in the first place? Her mind was so busy replaying her biggest embarrassment in her short life that she didn’t even notice the sound of those horses running straight in her direction. If you think about it, it wasn’t her fault in the first place!

...

It was dark, and cold…

She didn’t know where she was, but it was so cold. Cold to the point of hurting her, a coldness so brutal and deep that not even her skin, muscles and blood could stop it from touching the very bones inside of her. Why it was so cold? What is this darkness that surrounded her? It was strange, like the void that she was seeing was tangible enough to cover her like a blanket, yet fine enough to slip through her fingers, as if it was black sand traveling with the wind.

… was she dead? Maybe she was, no one could survive a full carriage with horses running over their body, but this didn’t feel like death, but what did she know about it, she had never been dead before.

Maybe she was finally dead… and she didn’t even know how to feel.

On one hand, this was the rest that she had needed for a long time, the rest that she has been waiting for since she had any memory of being aware of her existence, some silent last moments before joining the unchanging and infinite void in which she was floating in. On the other hand, what a waste of the years she would never live, of the music she could listen to, or all of the knowledge that she would never learn; no scratch that, she had no right to think that.

She decided that these were the last thoughts she would have… then she floated into the void.

...

Ah… my dear beloved,
A noble and beautiful flower of evil,
Truly, you are the fairest in the land.

What is that? She thought she heard a voice in the middle of the nothingness even though it was impossible, since the only things that existed right now were the nothing, and her. Maybe it was just a trick of her mind, she read somewhere that hallucinations were somehow common with blood loss. Yeah that was it, she was bleeding too much on the ground, and it made her imagine voices.

Mirror, mirror on the wall,

Who is the most…

Wait, that was definitely a voice. Was she actually dead?

O thee, guided by the Dark Mirror,

Follow thy heart’s desire

And take the hand of the one reflected in the mirror.

She didn’t know what to do, what was going on? Where was her rest? Her last moments before disappearing? A familiar sense of panic started to take over being over the new possibilities of not really being dead, or maybe she was dead and the afterlife was actually real. If the afterlife was real, then it meant that she was going to be in huge trouble with whatever gods were out there. Since what she did was practically suicide, and if her memory didn’t fail her suicide was one of the most terrible sins of all. While she was trying to not fall into a panic attack something flickered in front of her eyes. Something had appeared.

Like a fairy dancing between fresh flowers, a little green light was moving in all of the dark, leaving tiny streaks of color that broke through all of the black. It danced around her as if it was a butterfly searching where to land, it was unnatural, yet she still followed the light with her eyes while trying to understand what was happening around her. 

She decided to try and grab it. 

Flames that incinerate even the stars, 
Ice that imprisons even time, 
The great tree that engulfs even the skies,

Her arms materialized in their place, and she opened her hand to try and get the little light. It was now slowly circling her arm until it flew to where her hand was floating. However, when she tried to grab the tiny thing it escaped from her grasp with ease. She tried grabbing it once, twice and thrice, yet it kept escaping faster and faster the more she did said action. Now with tears in her non-existent eyes over failing to do something so simple. she just opened her palm and did not move it… the green light slowly moved from the vast void to her index finger.

It was really warm, and so small. The moment it landed on her finger she felt a wave of sadness, and tranquility that she had never experienced before in all of her life. She held the little green light as it was a fragile thing that could break with a breath. She held the light towards her chest, and slowly moved it from the tip of her finger to her palm, as a way to protect it… from what exactly?

Fear not the power of darkness.
Now- demonstrate thy powers.

Suddenly more and more green lights started to surround her at an alarming speed. A good amount started to appear and fall like stars from what it seemed to be “the sky” of the void, then more and more fell until the lights looked more like a glittery green rain that was trying to consume her. The color was everywhere, filling the dark void with explosions of light, shining so hard and quick that it started to overstimulate her senses, she became more and more aware of how the lights glimmered like fireworks along with a rushing sound that only thunderstorms could make. It was a complete overload on her senses.

The only thing that she wanted right now was that everything would stop. The sound, the color, the light, the sensations, EVERYTHING was overwhelming her; she wanted to cry, she wanted to be in her room buried under her blanket, she wanted to see sun again, she wanted something to put herself out this misery. The green rain continued for a short time as she couldn’t stop it, but something compelled her to open her eyes once again, it felt like she was going to miss an important moment of this chaos. The moment her eyes opened quick flashes of images started to form and collapse on themselves, more and more until they started to look less like static, and more like a clear painting.

The painting stretched and stretched until it reached all the corners of the infinite void, shallowing the rain and the sounds, as if it was protecting her. Despite that, it was still terrifying to see such process in the making, so she closed her eyes once again, and curled herself into a ball, it was at least the only thing she could do right now.

Yet, she felt ground under her feet, and against all of the warnings her mind screamed at her, she opened her eyes once again. She was now in a desolated field surrounded by destroyed buildings, fire, and people in black robes shouting and attacking something, it was pure madness. She looked at the sky to at least get a grip of reality, yet the only thing she saw, and felt was the same glittering rain that invaded the void. However, it was different now, the rain instead of simply sounding like a thunderstorm it was actually one; a crushing force of water and lightning which did not put out the fires around her, nor stopped the people fighting a giant thing at mere meters from her.

The ground tremble as what she recognized as an enormous creature jumped to escape the ambush of lights that almost surrounded it. The sound banging in her ears like a sledgehammer directed right into her brain. The giant thing roared, and swung a paw at the people who fruitlessly tried to either kill it, or keep it at bay while she tried to scurry away from all of the violence. Her endeavor seemed to be positive until she tripped, and fell over some rubble… and the beast heard it.

The monster saw her, finally noticing her after she had looked at it since she appeared there. Time stopped, and nothing else existed except her and the monster. Everything felt frozen now that the giant beast locked eyes with her, building a tension that could snap at any moment if she made the wrong move or tried to do something. 
Nothing else mattered in that moment, she didn’t even notice that she had stopped breathing, and the only thing separating her weak body from what it seemed to be an unreal massive animal which could crush her like a twig was a few meters of distance between the battlefield and her. She tried to crawl back a little bit, yet it was the wrong choice.

With a strong ripple movement that only a creature of its weight and size could make, it jumped… and it landed right on top of her.

If she thought that the cold pain felt in the void was horrible it meant that she knew nothing, this was pure hell.

For me. For them. For you.
We are all running out of time.

Her whole body was on fire, nothing had ever felt like this. Not the continuous hunger, nor the sting of cat claws cuts on her hands, not even the time when she managed to rip the skin of her own forearm, all of that paled compared to the feeling of being crushed like a plump grape. Every single nerve screamed at her because of the sudden weight, activating all of the signals of pain that a body can have, all of the shifting of the bones inside her, from the biggest pieces to the smallest shard, and the cackling of her teeth after her head bounced against the ground. Moreover, at some point she couldn’t feel anything from the torso down, and she was pretty sure that the wet feeling on her back, and around her mouth was warm blood. 

The intensity of this hell should have sent her mind into overdrive, but she had never thought so clearly in her life, the monster on top of her had stopped growling for a moment, and started sniffing her face, was it going to eat her? 

What was she supposed to do now?

She decided…  to simply touch the monster’s nose in a pure moment of desperation. It was an irrational decision to make while being crushed by a giant creature, but she knew that these were her actual last moments. The pain of her broken bones, and the wet heat of her pooled blood did not stop her from reaching out the snout of the beast, and while it was watching her trembling hand with giant blue eyes that reflected a mixture of curiosity and anger as she touched the giant nose in front of her. 

The monster stopped everything to watch the human under its paw… she was touching its nose, it felt a sudden wave of indignation towards her for daring to do that, but it also felt… happy.

Something violently snapped inside of her, and everything turned black as she stared at those blue fiery eyes.

No matter what,
Never let go of that hand.

Then she opened her eyes again.

It was only just a horrible dream… no, it felt too real to be a dream, too squishy, and too dark. What was she supposed to do if it was real? every sensation which she remembered happened, from the cold to the blood, but she was still alive after all. For her mind’s sake she just classified that experience in her “Horrible and traumatic nightmares” folder. It was the third time this month she had one of those, her sleeping quality was getting poorer by the day.

She went to stretch her whole body as she always did, until both of her forearms bumped into something solid. Wait where was she? She thought she was in her room because of the darkness, but the only thing that was around was… wood? Smooth, solid, and by the sound of it, really thick wood. She lightly kicked her legs to confirm her suspicions, and yes it was wood. It was so weird, she touched what she could, following the crafted lines that she could feel with her fingers as she racked inside of brain to find the exact shape of what could be a kind of lid. Huh it was really interesting, the sides of the wood formed a hexagonal shape, not too sharp, and the back of it felt very soft, as if someone put some kind of bedding on it. Just like… a coffin.

What..

She was inside of a coffin, still breathing.

No, oh no, she was inside a coffin, she was inside a shut casket. She was inside of a coffin with no idea where she was, or how did she got there, why did they put her in a coffin, was she actually dead after all?!?! And that nightmare had been real?!? Her breathing became further labored the more she imagined a possible explanation for her predicament, one more horrible than the last. 

Question after question embed themselves right into her brain as everything around her was filled with white sound, clouding her vision in a very familiar manner, what if she was underground already? How was she supposed to get out of here? Did she had to wait to suffocate?!? If she somehow broke the lid off the dirt would fall over her head and kill her!

… Was she going to actually die underground because no one checked if she was alive?

Now she could hear her breathing from loud it was. Her chest started to hurt, and her eyes became wet with tears. Little pitiful sounds of panic started to escape from her mouth, inhaling and exhaling so fast that no one could see where one breath started and where it ended. She wanted to curl up in a ball, to make an illusion of safety with her body, but every time she tried to do that the fucking lid of the coffin stopped her. So she broke down more, and more.

But, something was happening. A rattling noise could be heard outside despite her not hearing it. It sounded like someone was punching the coffin, and whoever that someone was, they weren’t being very careful nor victorious if the continual pounding and ineffective shaking had something to say. Yet, these attempts were ignored.

“Crap. The humans are coming. Gotta get this uniform while…” a small frustrated voice said.

Then more shaking was delivered to the lid, someone was trying to somehow open the lid by force.

“Grrrrr, this lid is too heavy! Why?!? Well, time for… My special move!”

She didn’t hear the voice as she was currently inside her head with every horrible thought she had been having, making her state worse and worse. Suddenly, a loud rumbling noise was heard outside of the coffin.

Suddenly blue flames lit up the edges of the lid, and smoke started to leak inside the shut casket only for it to go straight into her lungs. The sudden smoke forcefully snapped her out of her hopeless state, and sent her straight into panic as she felt the heat of the flames on her skin. She didn’t know what to do in this bizarre situation, first she was buried inside a coffin, and now she was being burned alive?!?! The only answer she could think of was to instinctively kick and punch the lid even if those actions were hurting her.

One, two, three, and four panicked kicks and punches were delivered until the lid broke.

She fell down from the coffin, making an ugly sound of flesh and bone against a hard, defined floor. A fall like that would definitely leave another bruise on her face and body while the pain blossomed once more without giving her a minute of rest. 

She was outside of the coffin now, yet she didn’t feel better because she still didn’t know what was happening around her, it was like going from one bad situation from one slightly less bad. But one thing was true, now she could finally curl up in a ball as she had wanted to do, and that is exactly what she did. In spite of the pain, and the discomfort of a weak body which howled at her to not do anything she moved her legs to hold them in her arms, so she could finally have the panic attack that clogged her mind. 

“WHAAAAA! Why are you up!?” In the middle of her sobs, and her choking breathing someone shrieked.

She partially opened her eyes to see who was talking, but her tear-blurred vision only allowed her to see a strange, blurry animal form in the shape of a cat. A cat, a chubby weighted cat, her Mango. She slowly unraveled her arms, and gently positioned herself in the right way to grab to not scare the little sack of rice because Mango never knew what to do at onset of her panic attacks, and almost always ran away from her when she tried to hug her.

“Hey! Wha- what are you doing!?”  

That was exactly what the kitty was trying to do now, but she was an expert in catching her after all of these years. Even the panic attack playing would not stop her from her goal, she waited for the perfect moment… there! With a quick movement she threw herself on top of Mango, and trapped her in her arms just like how a bear trap catches its unsuspecting prey.

Hugging her cat was the best sensation in the world. The heavy body again her chest, the little paws trying to find a good position, and the soft fur which had always calmed her down every single time she lost control of her emotions, she could even say that it was a heavenly feeling. She closed her eyes in order to not get Mango more nervous, and when the grumpy cat stopped fighting the hug… she finally let herself go to cry without any remorse.

In between all of the tears, the snot, the fast breathing, and the whimpers she thought she heard someone say something to her in a weird mixture between angry and frustrated, but it didn’t matter right now, she would have to apologize later. 

After a long time of crying, she finally felt how the tension was leaving her body. She didn’t realize how much time she had spent being a mess on the floor, but now maybe she could see and examine this weird situation with a clearer head. Along with not letting anything happen to Mango of course, her poor cat had always the talent of getting herself into massive problems thanks to her mischief. However, as she opened her eyes she was not received by the warm-toned orange eyes which gave Mango her name, instead she saw fiery blue eyes that were looking straight into hers. Dilated blue eyes which not only indicated that this was not her cat, but also how the poor thing was scared out if its mind because a stranger basically cuddled it without permission. A wave of embarrassment bloomed through her when realized her mistake of confusing this cat for Mango.

The cat was also breathing quickly on top of everything, so that means she needed to be careful when she released it, else she wanted a new face look full of scars and blood. Maybe she should apologize first.

“I’m so-” her words died in her dry, and puffy throat. One, two, three, four, breathe through your nose, “I’m sorry little Michi.”

After her apology was said, the grey cat looked at her with a strange face for a moment, oh, she knew that type of face; the face of “Why are you acting so dumb human?” that all cats have. It was so cute; she simply couldn’t resist to playfully tap its black nose to see if it would scrunch up that little face in anger, and it did by looking at her with those big blue eyes… a strange sense of repetition overcame her out of nowhere, like she had done that exact same thing before, but totally different.

It was probably nothing, she had never met this chubby cat in her short life. Now that her mind was not clouded, she moved herself into a sitting position to see where she was. One of the worst feelings in the world was the dizzy disorientation of being in an unknown place, so she carefully held the fuzzy cat while looking around. Then, the all familiar feeling of confusion was already coming back to her bones as she realized that she was in an elegant, very spacious, and unknown room completely filled with black floating coffins.

What…

With a slow movement of her head she turned to see where exactly she had fallen from, and the only thing that received her gaze was the black void of the partial burnt casket at her back. The thing was now floating a little low compared to the others, it looked a little pitiful too with its destroyed lid and small size. She didn’t notice how she had started to grip the cat a little tight while her brain started to rack for possible, yet useless explanations as for where she was. Until a little growl of discomfort startled her out of her thoughts.

She looked at the cat again, giving it a little face of apology for her actions. The cat was still frustrated for the rough treatment, blue eyes expressing an adorable look of disappointment right at her. Huh, the little feline had a very expressive face, and maybe to see what more faces it could do.

“Um- do you know where we are Michi?” she asked.

Again the little cat made a cute face, but this time it was one of confusion, she watched as it opened its mouth to probably give a loud barrage of meows. Yet, the little moment was interrupted by the sound of a door opening, and the footsteps of someone coming right where her and the cat were sitting.

“Aaaah, now it is time to wake up the new stude- What!? Why are you up already?!” an unexpected voice exclaimed.

She felt anxiety hit her in the head as the potential of being seen by a stranger came closer and closer by the second, and she didn’t want to find out who was talking so the best solution... was to run.

“Wait! Stay right there!” 

Taking all of her strength, and almost face planting on the floor again, she darted from the room without looking back.

The door opened to a long and ancient looking stone corridor with long archers in which one could see the dark sky. It was at that special point between night and dawn where the light had not yet overcome the shadows, and made everything look tenebrous. She ignored the scenery in favor of turning to the left to take the stairs to a short hallway then keep running through a courtyard, then through more dark and empty rooms. She needed to find somewhere to hide quickly, the cat was getting fuzzier and fuzzier to indicate her that it would jump from her arms whenever she wanted it or not. After aimlessly running in any direction for a while she found herself in front of a large wooden door, without thinking it she opened it by its ring pull, and threw her body in the room. She kept running before she got too tired, and she did almost immediately. 

The adrenaline was finally leaving her body now that she was sure that no one was following them. What a horrible sensation to feel after running through so much space. All the fatigue, pain, and nausea which were suppressed with fear had begun to invade her body like a colony of ants crawling over a piece of splattered food. She needed to put the cat somewhere before she puked. The poor thing was now angrily yowling in her arms with rage, so she walked over to a table and released it.

“AAAAAAH, FINALLY YOU LET ME GO! Stupid human, my poor body is all sore!” huh, the nausea was getting into her head, she imagined that the little cat was talking to her.

“Why did you grab me like that?!” the hallucination of the kitty kept talking, “You are so stupid! How come someone so bony has all strength?! You look too weak!”

It directed an accusatory look at her. Wow, her brain was really playing this one for a long time. How dare her brain to take the animal that she loved the most and use it against her.

“Maaaaa, it doesn’t matter right now, why did you have to run from the ceremony like that? Now I doesn’t matter if I get a robe” Wait, the voice didn’t lag when the cat moved and its mouth matched the words in perfect sync… it wasn’t a hallucination.

“Who do you think you are? Handling the Great Grim like I am some dumb prey.” 

The little grey cat was talking to her. It was talking like a human, in a spoken language that she could understand. A cat somehow had trained its own vocal cords to directly talk to her…  she may be losing it after all, yet the more she looked at the cat looking animal while it was talking, the more She noticed more odd things on its chubby body. This cat like-monster may resemble a normal cat at first glance, but the electric blue fire coming out of its ears, and the pitchfork shaped tail said otherwise. A magical being straight from a fairytale.

So she did the best thing one could do after being confronted with an impossibility of nature, she tried to respond to it.

“Huh? You can ta-” then she promptly threw up acid all over the floor.

The new burning pain in her throat only made her vomit more, even if her stomach was practically empty. She didn’t know how to stop the sensation, most of the time someone was holding her and coaxing her to calm down that traitorous stomach. However, this time she was completely alone with a panicking talking cat-monster, and he was the least helpful option right now.

“GYAAAH! Human stop doing that. The great Grim orders you to stop!” the poor talking cat expressed.

She tried to hold herself onto one of the chairs next to the table. Since she doubted that her noodle legs would support her any further when her body was so bent on making her throw away all the food she had never eaten. How could she stop?

The jerking movements of her body made her weaker, she knew that at some point she would stop throwing up acid only for the nausea to remain, and trick her body into thinking that it still needed to vomit.

“Human stop it! You will end up with your stomach on the floor. It’s so gross!” Grim cried at her side. "Wait human, why do you look worse? Grab yourself better dumbass!”

God, she felt bad for making him worry, he was only a cat-monster, and he didn’t need to feel responsible for her mess. Apparently he thought she was slipping from the chair... Oh, she was actually falling even if she had the chair for support. The least she could do was to braze for another impact.

Unexpectedly, someone grabbed her.

“Whoa, you almost fell on top of your filth young man. Thanks the heavens that I reached where you were on time. Such predicament would have left you utterly unpresentable for the ceremony. Aaaah, aren’t I gracious?” someone said after grabbing her.

She thought she was alone with Grim in here. Said monster cat made a nervous little squeak at the sight of the person holding her, so she gently turned her head to see them. A man was holding her by the armpits. A very tall man as she needed to raise her head to see who had saved her. The first noticeable thing about him was a peculiar top hat with a feather tucked on a ribbon, along with the bird-like mask covering half of his face, while only leaving two glowing golden lights floating in a black void.

She gulped nervously as the man simply flipped her in his direction, and then sat her down in the same chair. He was really well dressed, even if some elements of his ensemble made him appear more bird-like, but she had an inkling that his help would be short if she followed by the expression of his face.

“Ah, I finally found at last. You are that stray student who ran off before the ceremony.” The elegant man said while placing his hands on his hips, “You shouldn’t do things like that on your own. Leaving the Gate like that was very irresponsible. On top of that your familiar woke up long before you! I had to chase him around for a while until I couldn’t find where he was. Uuuugh… Young people are so impatient.”

He told her that with the same tone that a teacher uses to scold for an accident. Immediately a wave of shame coursed through her body. Although, she did not even understand why he was talking about gates. The realization that she behaved so badly in an educational space made her lower her head. However, it seemed that Grim did not share her sentiment. Next thing she noticed was how Grim walked up to the man with his chest puffed out, with a prideful stride that made him look more adorable than intimidating 

“Hey! Who are you calling familiar!? I’m not theirs! This human just captured me,” Grim said and pointed a paw at the man to address him.

Yet what his protests only accomplished was make the man roll his eyes, and grab him by the scruff of his neck. Surprisingly, the man placed a clawed finger on Grim’s mouth, somehow silenced him, and placed him right into her arms.

“Yes, yes. The rebellious ones always say the same thing. Now, just quiet down for a minute. I wasn’t finished.” he said in a disinterested way.

“Now what was I talking about? Ah, right. You should take care of your familiar more, or else these types of incidents will happen again,” the main continued while placing a hand on his chest in a very dramatic manner.

“My goodness. It’s unprecedented for a new student to leave the Gate on their own. Hmmm, you seem to be feeling better after that outburst. Now follow me, the entrance ceremony is already underway. Let’s go back to the Hall of Mirrors.” The man turned around and began to walk with the intention that she, and maybe Grim would follow him to where that famed ceremony was taking place.

But before leaving, she glanced back at the puddle of vomit on the floor… it was really mortifying that the first impression she gave to a stranger was of her acting like a sick fool. She really didn’t know what was going on, where she was, or why she was somehow enrolled in some kind of bizarre school. The only thing halfway normal was how she, apparently, was now in charge of Grim, who was sulking in her arms with his ears flattened. Still, she would say absolutely nothing, she wasn’t so stupid as to scream to the four winds how she was essentially a stranger to everything here.

Moreover, even if she didn’t trust this zanate-dressed man he at least had helped her a little bit. So, the best thing she could do was apologize for her own mess. So as she caught up with him as they started to enter the courtyard, she went for it.

“Uhhh, excuse me sir…” She realized that she didn’t know his name. How could she apologize if she didn’t know that, it was the first step of her plan and she already ruined it.

She slowly lowered her hand to hold Grim properly again, deflated over her mistake. Nevertheless, the man did not turn around to look at her, but he answered without losing his walking pace, which was tiring her already, compared to him her legs were much shorter.

“Crowley, Dire Crowley. Headmaster of this academy. It’s strange that you don’t know who I am, but sometimes the teleportation magic leaves new students disoriented… Well, it’s no matter.”

She decided to ignore the clear mention of magic because she didn’t want to deal with that right now, it was time for the apology. She remembered her words, and her lessons: Do not leave room for interpretation, and state your intentions well enough along with a solution which you can do.

“Oh, then… headmaster Crowley, I apologize for the mess that I caused. I shouldn’t have run at the sound of your voice. If it is necessary, I can return there after the ceremony, and clean up the vomit myself.” There, she was satisfied with how she worded it.

Abruptly, Crowley stopped walking.

Panic again began to invade her mind as she watched the headmaster bring a hand to his masked face while trying, and failing to suppress a weird trembling motion in his body. But, at the time she was scrambling her brain for more apologies, Crowley suddenly turned quickly to her with clasped hands, and a slightly pathetic smile.

“Oh! In all of my years as an educator, I have never had a student sincerely apologize for anything! It feels so refreshing to be spoken with respect!” He expressed with a tone that only screamed desperation.

She looked at Grim, and he was as shocked as she was, with his ears pricked forward coupled with wide open eyes. Apparently Crowley noticed their expressions because he quickly stood up straight, and covered his outburst with a few coughs.

“Ahem! Excuse me for my words. Pray tell, I have been talking for a while, yet I still don’t your name.” he expressed. “So tell me, what is your name?”

She looked at him with incredulity, wasn’t he supposed to know her name since he was the headmaster?

She stood up nervously, when she tried to remember it, her mind gave her nothing. Maybe she should attempt to get him to say it, he should know as the authority in charge of the students.

“Uhm... You-” she prompted, yet before she could ask, Crowley interrupted her.

“Yuu? What an unorthodox name, but it’s strangely fitting. I haven't rea- I mean! I have not yet completed my survey of this year's student roster.” He said while nervously tapping a clawed finger to his cheek.

That wasn’t her name, she was sure of it, yet with her mind coming blank again, the only thing she could was nod her head in affirmation. Crowley’s eyes became crescent-moons as he smiled.

“Well Mr. Yuu, let’s keep going to the ceremony. If my intuition is correct, then it should be coming to a close.” They continued walking.

She didn’t know what to say, but the name Yuu… it wasn’t bad, at least it was a name. it was easy enough to remember, and it was something to identify herself while she tried to understand what happened to her.

“Alright mister Crowley,” she walked quicker, “Can I ask you something?”.

“Yes, you may,” Crowley practically beamed at her after she finished talking. She felt that he was liking her whole “I speak with a polite tone” far too much to be normal, was he serious when he implied that students didn’t respect him? That was… concerning.

“Ehhh, what exactly is this academy about? I am still a little confused,” at her question Crowley’s eyes dilated with surprise. Nonetheless, before he started talking he put hand on the back of her shoulder to push her to walk faster. In response, Yuu quickened her pace before he accidentally tripped her, and consequently tripped Grim too.

“Now, that is surprising. But I shall give you an explanation as we go to the Hall of Mirrors, for I am gracious.”  he started the explanation with an air of professionalism, “This is Night Raven College. Those magicians blessed with a unique aptitude for magic gather from all over the world…”

-***-

After the hefty explanation given by Crowley that left more questions than answers in Yuu’s head, they finally arrived at the supposed Hall of Mirrors. At first she didn’t notice when they arrived because her head was too busy buzzing over particular points which confirmed that she was not in her world anymore.

Apparently magic is real, mages are real too, this college was basically the top of the top academy for said mages, and that dream of a demonic black carriage painting the ground with her blood was actually real. The main source of transportation for this academy trampled her, and somehow brought her alive to said academy. She wasn’t going to think about that too much, she didn’t want to have another panic attack with Grim struggling more and more to be freed.

“And we are finally here. It seems that we still have some time left for your dorm assignation.” Crowley said as he opened the tall wooden door with a quick movement.

“C’mon enter quickly, or the Housewardens might get impatient; ahhhh why do I always get such troublesome students.” Yuu looked at him, there it was that desperate tone of voice again, but before she could even ponder over it, a barrage of voices broke the silence as Crowley closed the door with a noisy slam.

She couldn’t focus on any single one. There were too many people in the room. Speaking, mumbling, and blabbing being combined a cacophony of noises that blended in her ears while Crowley pushed her with urgency to the front of the crowd. There it was where she finally discerned some voices of some students, but even them were speaking over each other.

“Is that all for the new student dorm assignments? Listen up new students. Here in Heartslabyul-” said one boy with a strict yet gentle voice.

While he was talking another expressed, “…Uuuuuugh. This stuffy ceremony is finally over. We’re going back to the-” but his low voice was drowned out by another one.

The next guy announced, “To the new students, congratulations on entering this academy. Enjoy your life here to its fullest. As the Housewarden of Octavinelle-” with a proud voice that had a hint of malice. Nonetheless, she focused on two voices that answered why Crowley was so determined to come back quickly.

One very tall person asked, “By the way, where did the headmaster go? He flew out right in the middle of the ceremony…” their voice expressing a tired form of contempt which only could have been achieved through experience.

“Did he get a stomachache or something?” the last guy asked with what seemed to be genuine curiosity. But if Yuu had to say something, it sounded more like a jab covered in a layer of candy.

By the way they expressed themselves, and how they commanded the attention the room, Yuu assumed that these students must the impatient house wardens Crowley was talking. If not by that, then it was because all of them draped themselves in an air of confidence, and authority that only came by ordering people around… except for maybe that sad floating tablet which looked out of place in the lineout.

Yuu was taken out of her thoughts once again when Crowley reacted with indignation to the short conversation between the Housewardens.

“Not at all!” he said, “I cannot believe you all. We were missing one new student so I went to find them.”

The Housewardens didn’t react to his words, they only looked at Crowley as if he was an uninvited guest crashing a party, and not the headmaster talking directly to them. Nevertheless, Crowley passed by them, and placed her on a small, raised platform. She could now clearly see the black coffins floating at the sides of the platform like they were some sort of morbid decoration. Crowley walked to her side, and quickly took a struggling Grim from her arms.

“You are the last one to be assigned a dormitory. I shall watch over the raccoon.” But as he said that he simply grabbed, and carried Grim in the most incorrect way to carry a cat… a monster cat in this situation. Moreover, by the sound that Grim made, he was already uncomfortable, and an uncomfortable cat would do anything by force to free themselves.

“Uh, miste Crowley, you shouldn’t hold-” Yuu tried to tell him.

“Don’t worry about it, now step in front of the Dark Mirror.” But he quickly interrupted her again. What was she supposed to say? her eyes only looked at Grim who was already tense, and angry. He was already at his last limit with those wide and dilated eyes looking at every direction, and his pitchfork tail puffed up and anxiously swishing. Maybe she could try and gently pry Grim from Crowley-

“State thy name.”

Time stopped.

Yuu stopped looking at Grim, and turned her gaze to what was in front of her. A mirror, a large and terrifying mirror with a talking mask focused solely on her. A background of green fire surrounded it, making it look like a vengeful spirit coming for her soul. A feeling of guilt, and fear came over her, making her unable to look at anything else except the empty spaces where the mask would have its eyes.

Judgement.

“…Yuu.”

Your fate is…

“Yuu. The shape of thy soul is… I do not know.”

She ignored the surprised voices around her as the mask delivered its verdict.

“I sense not a spark of magic from this one… The color, the shape, all are nothing. Therefore, they are suited for no dormitory.”

And her execution.

The mask disappeared, leaving behind a black mirror which only reflected Yuu’s expression of misery, and resignation. She looked at herself in the reflection, why was she so surprised at the mask’s words? Yuu knew that she didn’t have any magic because this was not her world, she knew that everything was upside down here, like a clock going backwards, and still… it felt horrible to be singled out completely as an anomaly. She was empty, like a carcass with no meat. Please don’t let her cry in public, in front of an audience. She tried to subtly use the long sleeve of the cloak she wore to cover her eyes, but what she managed was to feel the hot tears streaming down her face in the fabric, so she used both sleeves to cover her whole face. The whole room was silent, and the only thing that could be heard was her broken breathing, along with her poor not crying attempt.

“Ahem… an Ebony Carriage would absolutely never go meet someone who can’t use magic!” Crowley decided to break the silence. “In 100 years there has not once been a mistake in student selection.” he made it worse. The tone of his voice indicated that he was explaining that to the sea of students behind her. 

“Then, why in the world…” that was actually directed at her. Yuu wasn’t going to turn around and face strangers at her worst.

“Mghmgh… Pah!” Suddenly, Grim’s mouth finally broke free.

The sound of his voice made Yuu turn to her left to basically see in slow motion how Grim violently wiggled within the headmaster’s grasp, and loudly exhaled… several balls of blue fire from his little mouth which made the Housewardens hastily jump from their positions. Yuu could only watch; frozen and unmoving with still tears in her cheeks, as very tiny seeds of chaos started to form around the scene. If it was not the headmaster stubbornly trying to shake Grim into submission, or the other students suddenly screaming at the sight of fire, it was the few ones who were around Crowley also trying to subdue Grim.

“AAAH! That raccoon clawed my hand!” one screamed.

Yet failing miserably in their new self-assigned mission. However, as Yuu tried to force herself into moving to help her distressed feline friend, said monster cat twisted himself into an all familiar curved shape with his paws extended, and claws ready. With the swift flexibility of a predator, and the power of thousands of years of felis evolution Grim sank his claws into Crowley’s forearm. A second passed, then two, and it seemed that no one wanted to move less the flimsy façade of control truly slipped out of everyone’s hands.

Two of the Housewardens quickly tried to physically pry Grim out of Crowley’s grasp, and sleeve without considering how to truly do it in a correct way, which ended with Grim fully biting one of them on the hand. Now, all of the people around the poor headmaster were slowly retreating after realizing that their baneful attempts at “rescuing” a man who was swinging an angry animal around could result in injuries for them instead. For someone who was used to handling cats that movement, and Grim’s anger were normal to calm down, but for someone like Crowley who looked like the kind of person who would overreact to even the tiniest of cat-scratches, it was a losing game. It was a scene out a confusing dream, one that finally ended with a strange and throaty cat yowl, the dry tear of a sleeve, and a forceful shake which sent the grey monster cat on the air, and down in four paws.

Grim was now on the ground, proudly standing while Crowley was kneeling dramatically on the ground, holding his forearm. As Yuu predicted, he was overreacting to the tear made on the long sleeve of his shirt if the wails of assault and pain told her of the state of the headmaster. She was sure that the cat-monster didn’t even draw blood, the position would not have allowed him to since it was a very normal defense mechanism for cats, she would even dare to call it the first and always chosen option. Grim decided that this was his time to shine.

“Then I’ll take their place! Unlike that dumb human, I can use magic!” he said while raising a little paw in the air. “Let me in the school! If you need proof…” but Grim stopped talking when he realized that the same three Housewardens who tried to restrain now had started to surround him with the clear intention of grabbing him again, this time with force.

“It’s certainly enthusiastic. Care to help me subdue it, Riddle?” said a panting boy with glasses while taking out a pen out of his pocket, he positioned himself to the right of Grim.

“I can’t overlook those who break the rules. Let’s hurry up and get this over with,” replied the shortest boy out of the bunch while putting himself in the middle.

“Ha! I never thought I would be catching a raccoon in the entrance ceremony, but this is fun! Well… except for the scratch. Azul, let me help too,” the last boy expressed as he slowly walked to the left. Together with their poses, and their weird pens in their hands, the Housewardens were ready to catch the ever unruly Grim.

“Eh? What do you all think you are doing? The Great Grim won’t back down!” Plus, the monster cat also looked ready to do something rash since he was practically an animal backed into a corner.

Whatever these boys would try to trap Grim, it smelled like disaster. So before they could try their plan, Yuu swooped in and quickly grabbed Grim with the correct technique. With a hand under his hindquarters, and with most of his body against her chest. 

“Ahhhh?! Human stop holding me like I am a baby!” Of course he complained, but Yuu didn’t let Grim go back down, not with those boys still trying to catch him, and now looking at her like she was a nuisance. The boy in the middle adressed her with a no-nonsense tone.

“Please drop the raccoon down so we may apply the proper punishment according to the rules it broke.” He said while pointing to Grim with the pen in his right hand. Yuu didn’t know what they were going to do, but she won’t let them do anything.

“No.” She firmly replied while looking at him.

“No? I don’t think I have to inform you that it not only broke several rules when it attacked the headmaster, but also its actions detracted from the decorum of this ceremony. It has caused enough problems as it is.” The boy said with a tone that left no room for an argument.

“Well, he is not doing anything right now.” Yuu replied, “and since he was getting agitated, you are the ones to blame. Look at his body language and his eyes, see how dilated they are? Those are the signs of a distressed cat; he wouldn’t have caused problems if the headmaster had not cut me off when I tried to tell him about the position in which he was holding Grim.” She said as clear as she could.

“I assure you that it’s so called distress is not important at the moment.” The boy stated, “I am telling you again to drop it so we can simply have it leave at once.”

…

Neither of them moved.

“I told you to drop the raccoon at once.” Said the boy again, he was annoyed.

“And I already told you that I am not going to drop Grim.” Yuu responded, annoyed too.

“Drop it.” The boy commanded again.

“He is distressed.” Yuu hissed.

“I don’t care about if it is distressed or not! I am ordering you to drop it so we can get rid of it,” the boy stubbornly continued, his voice rising in anger. “This ceremony doesn’t allow familiars so it shouldn’t be here in the first place. You may be spouting surface level knowledge to cover up its horrible lack of training, but this situation only has one outcome, and it’s with that monster gone!”

Oh, it was fucking on. No one can tell Yuu that she doesn’t know about the animals she cares about, not even this hypercritical, stuck-up asshole who didn’t understand, nor notice how Grim was doing absolutely nothing now that he was held in a more comfortable position. So she arranged Grim to make sure that her arm made a kitty seat-belt, and replied to him.

“Surface level knowledge?! That’s rich coming from someone whose first solution to handle a distressed animal is violence.” Yuu told him while looking directly into his eyes, “I know more about cats that you will ever know in your life! Also, what makes you the authority to order me around? The only person who can give orders here is the headmaster. As far as I know you are just a busybody with a strong desire to hurt someone weaker than him!” Grim cried in protest at that implication, but Yuu only felt rage simmer inside of her body.

What she failed to notice was how the two other house wardens slowly walked away from where she and the other boy were standing.

“How! dare you to imply that I-” The boy was now clearly angry and ready to tell her off, but Yuu won’t let him.

“And don’t try to rebuke me about what you were going to do! I have seen enough heartless people treat cats like they are garbage. How am I going to trust that you won’t simply physically kick him, or worse kill him! I don’t know you!”

“YOU CLEARLY DON’T!” the angry boy called out, “If you knew who I was, you wouldn’t talk to me so nonchalantly! Rather what can one expect from someone who has no magic? Your behavior makes you look like you were raised on a farm! If I knew that both you and that monster-cat would cause all of this rule-breaking in the ceremony, I would have collared you BOTH!” his face was quickly turning into a concerning shade of red.

“GUESS WHAT! I was raised on a farm! And much better than you! Were you born with a stick up your ass?! My god, I feel so sorry for your poor mom, she got a disrespectful, screaming cricket for a son!” Yuu angrily replied, now pointing at him. Grim had jumped from her arms, and was now hiding behind her.

The boy stared at her with raging disbelief and his mouth open, and she stared back at him with angry tears and her teeth clenched.

“OFF WITH YOUR-”

Suddenly, Crowley physically separated them with both of his arms. The boy, and the girl made an undignified squeak that sounded like two animals fighting.

“Alright Mr. Rosehearts and Mr. Yuu!” he said with a shaky wince, “Those are enough emotions for today! Oh my! Young people have so much energy, and passion! I hope that both of you put that spirit to good use this year!”

Yuu quickly turned around. She knew what she did was wrong, there was no way of denying it. She was disrespectful to an unknown boy, and she had insulted him to his face. It was a huge mistake on her part for not controlling her emotions in a mature manner. Yuu was so embarrassed, and at the same time she didn’t want to apologize. Her hands were shaking.

“We had a bit of trouble along the way, but this brings the entrance ceremony to a close.” Crowley announced to the multitude.

“Bu-but, headmaster! This one broke many rules of The Queen of Hearts! Are you going to let him go unpunished?!” replied the boy whose last name was Rosehearts.

“Like I said Mr. Rosehearts,” Crowley said again in a slightly dark but authoritative tone,” the entrance ceremony has come to a close. I will take care of Mr. Yuu's discipline. Now, Dormitory Heads, please show the new students back to the dormitories… Hm? Now that I think about it. I don’t see the leader for Diasomnia, Mr. Draconia, around at all…”

Then, all of the now confirmed Housewardens started to tell excuses to someone for not noticing a fellow leader of the ceremony, while the other students were expressing terror about the absent Dorm Head. As if he was some evil being. Yuu didn’t notice this ruckus because she was busy with grapping - not pulling! - her short hair to get rid of the leftover energy. It was the most effective stimming method to calm herself at the moment. When all of the students finally left the Halls of Mirrors, Crowley walked over to where Yuu was crouched next to Grim, picked her up, and simply put both of his hands over her shoulders. She didn’t dare to move an inch… after some time Crowley raised his head.

“Then, Yuu, I’m terribly sorry about this but…” he said with a serious voice, “We must have you leave the school. Those without any talent for magic cannot be allowed to attend class here.”

Yuu sighed tiredly, it was for the best. She felt that if she stayed in this academy only trouble would find her way. Grim tried once again to convince Crowley to let him attend after telling him he was not her familiar, but the monster-cat was again denied.

“Do you have any method for me to go back to my house sir?” Yuu asked wearily.  

“There is no need to worry! The Dark Mirror will send you directly back from where you came,” said Crowley with a reassuring voice. “Enter the Gate, and picture your home clearly in your mind…”

But, after the first try the Dark Mirror stated that her home did not exist. How she belonged to nowhere because she had no place this world. Her home… was simply gone, and while Crowley was rambling about impossibilities, Yuu let the statement dawn upon her mind. Yuu was stranded in a strange world with no way to back to her home, and now she was homeless too. 

…Crowley asked her something, and she simply answered it.

-***-

After telling Crowley everything that Yuu remembered of her home, she was met with silence. He looked very pensive, and he even started to walk from side to side. So, Yuu attempted to mask her nervousness with Grim as she tried to encourage him to play with the long sleeve of her robe. Yet the poor monster cat only sat on the ground with his paws crossed. A look of frustation crossed his little face, even when his tail was thumping the floor, indicating that he was interested in playing.

“That is not going to work on me human,” Grim said, “I’m still mad at you for handling me like a baby, and for making that crow believe that I was your familiar when I’m not!”

“I’m sorry,” she replied. That made her feel guiltier, Yuu didn’t mean to ruin his chances of being accepted into the academy.

Before Grim could reply, Crowley walked to where they were.

“I’ve never heard of that place,” Yuu eyes widened in distress as he continued, “I have a general grasp of where all the students came from, but I’ve never heard that name before.”

All of her hope was shattered with those words, if she couldn’t go back to her world, and she couldn’t be in this academy made of magic then… what would happen to her? She wondered if the best solution to all of this was to lay under a bridge after getting out of the academy, and simply die of exposure. It certainly looked like the most attractive option right now. It seemed that Crowley noticed her mental dilemma because the next thing he did was to pat on her shoulder, in a very awkward attempt to console her.

“Let’s do some research at the library. maybe we can find a clue to solve this predicament. You come too raccoon, I won’t let you out of my sight again.”

So, Yuu and Grim followed the headmaster back to the library, the former feeling like a turned inside out wet sock, and the latter grumbling under his breath something about becoming the greatest magician in the world.

Chapter Text

Yuu didn’t know what to think. It was still impossible in her mind to think about how she was stuck in a world where she had practically no one, and nowhere to go. Her home, her memories… her name, all of it was gone in the sands of existence, and Yuu was the only one who remained. It was a hopeless feeling that kept making itself known in her chest, a cruel void which was eating any soft things that had been stored there. Even then, Yuu thought about how Crowley had referred to that horrible coffin as a gate. Maybe, just maybe Yuu’s world still existed, but its gate was now closed, leaving her behind.

It was strangely fitting for her, if there was one vague thing that Yuu remembered it was the sensation of always being two steps behind everyone she knew. So if her world finally deemed her useless, and discharged her into another… there was nothing she could do. At least Yuu was not lost in a forest, or somewhere with no civilization. It wasn’t so bad to sit in a magic library, and read dozens of books to find even a crumble of information about what had happened to her, or the possibility of her home being in this Twisted Wonderland, changed but familiar at the same time.

The library in question looked very different now that it was illuminated by the soft glow of the lamps. Before, it had looked like a black maze in which both Yuu and Grim could hide at the risk of something waiting for them in the darkness. Now, with light shining on even the tiniest corner, the library looked like any old library from her country, with its wooden shelves filled with old and new books, the smell of paper in many states of decay, and the almost emptiness devoid of people. 

Along with certain liminal feeling that all libraries had, how strange that something so mundane was the same in a completely different magical world. Yet, before the headmaster had told her to read with him, Crowley simply handed Yuu a bucket filled with what seemed to be soapy, sparkly, purple water, and a mop, then quickly pointed to where she had thrown up earlier. 

Now, Yuu was reading what it seemed to be a fun old book of history that recalled the foundations of the first established nations of this world, while Crowley was carefully examining a fragile-looking map he found on the highest shelves of the library. Ones that she could never reach because the headmaster practically flew to look for it along with other ancient looking texts. Crowley wasn’t even touching the paper, instead it was floating as it was wrapped in a blue glow. Meanwhile, Grim opted to take a nap on top of a few books after Yuu had fruitlessly tried to get him to read something.

He told her that “human problems” didn’t matter to him, so she concluded it was for the best that Grim simply fell asleep. It was so endearing, and adorable that a magical monster acted just like a lazy cat after eating. Yuu didn’t feel guilty to steal a few glances at Grim while he laid with his tummy open, and softly breathing. It was so calming to at least have a cat around her, Yuu was so grateful that Crowley didn’t kick Grim out. Sometimes people didn’t understand her need to have something to ground herself sometimes, so it was a very welcomed change of pace when Crowley allowed the little monster cat to stay, even if the real reason was that Grim would probably get himself into trouble if left alone.

Yuu was on the chapter about the birth of an ancient kingdom surrounded by a black magical forest when Crowley let out a resigned sigh, and walked to the table where her and Grim were. A train of the other books, and yellow maps were floating behind him, then when Crowley finally stopped all of them slowly pilled on the table. By the look on his face, Yuu thought that he found nothing about her world, or any country that parodied it. 

“There really isn’t anything.” Crowley expressed with his arms crossed, “Not on the current world map, nor the older ones, not even on the oldest map we have here. The name of your home isn’t even written in any recorded history to today.”

Yuu quickly closed the book she was reading to pay attention to what he was saying. As she thought there wasn’t any trace of her home in this world, and even if there was a country that mimicked it Yuu still would be a stranger in it. But, in response to her silence, Crowley got closer to where she was sitting, and stared at her with one of his finger under his chin.

“Are you truly from where you say?” he asked with a skeptical tone, “You aren’t lying to me by chance?” Crowley asked again, but this time he turned his head to the side in a very bird-like manner, still watching her without blinking.

Oh no, the familiar feeling of anxiety started to crawl back on Yuu’s mind. She couldn’t let the headmaster think that she was lying. On top of her not making any eye contact with him since they sat down, that was the fastest way of losing any credibility to whatever she could say in the future, so Yuu needed to quickly fix it. With her words in her mind, Yuu adjusted her tone of voice to a calmer one, one that would not denote the nervousness that was going through her.

“Yes sir I told you everything.” Yuu said while not looking at Crowley’s eyes, “I don’t know how I ended up here, and my home is on the coast, it’s very humid, and it is surrounded by two seas. The only thing that I remember before finding myself inside of one of those coffins was how a horrible uncontrolled carriage trampled me while I was walking from my house to-”

“WHAT?!”

Yuu was startled out of her explanation when Crowley interrupted with a loud question-like squeak that made him sound like a scared bird. Moreover, Grim also woke up if the blows of falling books, and the distinct voice of a frightened cat realizing that he was falling were indications of it. She quickly reached down to the side of the table where Grim had fallen to grab him, and prevent him from hurting himself on the books. 
When Yuu finally had Grim in her arms, she stood up while he was asking what woke him up from his nap. As she was trying to soothe the poor monster cat a cough interrupted them, and both met Crowley’s expression. The man was clearly highly strung from what she said about the carriage, yet he tried to remain courteous with her… that wasn’t supposed to happen. It was understandable, the main object of transportation of a prestigious academy suddenly killing the students would create a horrible stain on its reputation.

An awkward silence filled the space while Yuu and Grim waited for Crowley to compose himself. He quickly did it, but without abandoning the tense position that he acquired.

“What I was trying to ask… what did you say about the Ebony Carriage?” he expressed while waving his hand around in an attempt to disguise his nervousness. It was really weird how his demeanor changed by the second depending on what Yuu answered, she thought that someone who had such an important role would have a better control of his reactions. However, what did Yuu knew about taking care of an entire academy, she had only took care of cats, chickens, and pigs, so she simply answered back.

“As I said sir, the only thing that I clearly remember was a black carriage driving straight into my direction, then trampling me. The last thing that I saw was the hooves of the horses coming down towards my head.” Yuu remarked as she stroked Grim’s head, while Crowley made another bird-like sound of distress.

“Pffff! That’s so funny human, you came here with your head made mashed potatoes.” Grim remarked, with the ever present funny cruelty that all animals had. Yuu thought once again how he was really cute.

Apparently Crowley didn’t take Grim’s comment very well by how he was anxiously sighing, and pacing. After the monster cat shared his comment the man began to quickly walk from right to left, as if his manic phase could somehow answer the puzzle of how Yuu was even brought to the academy. On the other hand, Yuu decided to try and see which kind of places would make Grim purr, it was the most calming activity she had done so far. She counted three places that she was already familiar with like the head, the chin, and the base of his pitchfork tail.

The feeling of his short fur against Yuu’s fingers was so nice that she wanted to keep petting Grim until her hands bled. The constant sense of repetitive notion of strokes had planted itself in her mind, lulling her into a false sense of security which Yuu was already intimate with so many times. One that was immediately betrayed by Grim swiftly swiping one of his clawed paws at her hands.

“Don’t pet me that hard human! I am giving you the privilege of stroking my fur. So don’t do it like that.” Yuu couldn’t contain her faint laughter at his grumpy comment, which only made Grim look grumpier. She laughed again, and that seemed to snap Crowley out of his own cycle of questions to continue his theory. He cleared his throat to call back their attention once more, and talked again when both human and monster directed their eyes at him.

“Well, looking at all of this, and your… predicament with the Ebony Carriage, you may have somehow been brought here from another planet” Yet, after Crowley said that he shook his head to correct himself, “There is also the most likely possibility that you’re from another world.” He finished while he put his hands on his waist.

At Crowley’s words Yuu stopped petting Grim, and looked down at her hands now resting on the table. She sadly knew that he was right, something in her mind was poking her to say anything to make her sudden travel to this world less… weird? Uncomfortable? Annoying. However, nothing was coming to her aid.

“What did you have on you when you came here?” Crowley asked once more, “Do you have any identification? Like a license for a magic car, or some kind of affiliation card…”
At the headmaster’s suggestions Yuu looked at him with new found hope. She actually had something! Yuu had made it a habit to always have her phone with her, one never knows when one will need to call someone. She quickly told him so as not to worry him.

“Yes I do!” Yuu told him with a more vibrant tone, “I have my phone with me, and it has a copy of my identification in photo format. It’s in my front left pocket...” but when she reached for it, it wasn’t there. That was not a good sign, the more she searched for it, the more she panicked. Yuu started to search through the other pockets of the robe with more hurried moves, she couldn’t find her phone.

“Uh, I’m pretty sure that it is somewhere over here,” Yuu told Crowley without looking at him, too occupied with searching, “I’m sure I put it in one of my pockets, maybe not on my front left one, but maybe its somewhere in this robe…” she continued to ramble more, a bad habit that she had tried to get rid of without any progress.

As Yuu tried to wordlessly search for her phone with the nervousness and the fear building more and more as the objective was looking more fruitless by the second, a hand was placed on her shoulder. Yuu stopped searching, and froze when she felt the pressure and weight of it. She looked up from her hands, and rose her head to indicate how she was listening without having to make eye contact.

“You appear to be empty-handed.” Crowley said to her with a flat tone after taking his clawed hand away.

Yuu simply sat down again, this whole experience was proving to be exhausting, both mentally, and physically. She wondered if this was some kind of punishment to something she had done in the past, or maybe something to prevent her from doing anything in the future. Yuu had never been on the receiving end of this amount of situations, nor information; her life had a routine that she followed correctly from top to bottom. With no derivations, nor unexpected moments for most of the time, Yuu just couldn’t conceive being thrown away from all of that, without even having a say in anything.

“This is concerning, very concerning. A teenager without identification is basically a dead child at the eyes of paperwork.” It seemed that Crowley noticed her state of tiredness, and yet what he said did not ease her rising nerves. However, to Yuu’s surprise, Grim had several opinions about her situation.

“Huh? What does have to do with anything? Aren’t ya the boss of the academy? You can just make whatever you need to let us stay. You just need to let me attend classes, and Yuu can be my henchman to carry my stuff.” Grim then finished his little speech with a huge stretch, Crowley gave him an unimpressed look, but Yuu smiled.

Maybe he didn’t understand how cats acted, but this type of careless and prideful talk was exactly what she expected if a feline could speak. Most cats didn’t care about the steps of how things were done, whatever they wanted they needed it done yesterday. More if they were accustomed to get their needs met by a human that answered to their yowling with hurry, and care. Grim was clearly a feral monster cat, but he was already placing her into the normal slot of “Human I can count to do stuff for me” if he mentioned her. Nevertheless, Crowley addressed Yuu again.

“You must to understand. I can’t just let someone who doesn’t even have a speck of magic to stay at the school.” He told her, yet he said something that surprised Yuu. “However, as an educator, I can’t just toss a penniless teenager out of the street with no form of communication. For I am gracious.” Crowley finished that sentence with the same self-satisfied tone he had used before.

Well… at least Yuu didn’t need to use her plan of how to fall from a high place in the least painful way possible. She had thought of each step very carefully, even the best way possible to not attract any attention. Yet, Crowley had only said that he will offer something to her, not to Grim. She couldn’t separate herself from the monster cat as she was right now.

“Hmmmm… That’s right! There is an unused building on campus.” The golden lights in Crowley’s mask became half-moons as he smiled, “it was once used as a dormitory in the past so if you clean it up you should be able to at least sleep there. For the time being I shall allow you to stay there!”

That was… better than Yuu had expected, the promise of a roof over her head was mildly comforting at least. For both her, and Grim. Maybe she could convince him to act in a more respectful way, so that Crowley could see himself how he was able to not cause trouble.

“Then I will look for a way for you to return home.” Crowley continued to complimented himself without an ounce of shame in his mannerisms, “My graciousness is limitless! I am a model for all educators.” He finished as he looked once again to where Yuu and Grim were sitting. Yuu’s vision didn’t connect with eyes, not only out of discomfort, but also to hide her restrained smile. Then, Crowley quickly changed his speech to the professional tone he had used before.

“We had better be on our way. Let’s head to the dormitory.” Crowley did a simple twirl, and started to walk with the same intent of before when he had guided Yuu to the ceremony. It really seemed that the headmaster did not want to waste any more time. “It may be a bit old, but there is a certain charm to it.” So Yuu grabbed Grim again, and followed Crowley to whenever he was going.

-***-

It was worse than Yuu had expected, so much worse.

After an excruciating long walk from the library to their point of destination; her, Grim, and Crowley had arrived to the now known named “Ramshackle dorm.” The walk itself was nothing to scoff at, even if Yuu was accustomed to walking long distances thanks to living a little isolated from her village it was still tiring to walk so many meters of land. Moreover, Yuu decided to not speak at all while they were walking, and it seemed that Crowley didn’t mind either since he was content enough with her following him.

The only voice that made itself know through the whole walk was Grim’s. He had found out that whenever he told Yuu to carry him or drop him as he pleased she would do it without any complain, so the monster cat quickly took advantage of this to simply get carried through most of the journey, and walk short periods of time. Grim’s voice was heard many times as the three of them walked, and walked, and walked, to what seemed to be a major portion of the whole academy to go at the back of it.

When they finally arrived to the building, Yuu’s thoughts of maybe resting down a bit before cleaning quickly vanished as they arrived at gate of the clearly abandoned dormitory. When Crowley had used the word “unused” Yuu though more about a building which hadn’t been used in more than two to three years, not an imposing looking house that looked like it came straight out of another decade of living.

Yuu didn’t know how a students’ dormitory should look like, but she had an inkling feeling that those would look like anything else except the building she was looking at right now.

The dark sky only helped to accentuate the eeriness, and creepiness of the giant house. The scene inside of the spiked fence appeared to be a gloomy picture of terror.

All of the nature surrounding the dorm was either dead, or in the process of dying, with big decrepit trees looming around the corners as if they were waiting to snatch any unsuspecting person who dared to walk underneath them. The only sources of light were six dim street lamps which were covered in dust and cobwebs, and those only illuminated the stone stairs of the dorm. The fence that divided the dorm from the outside looked more like it belonged to a cemetery rather than a dormitory, all spiked, crooked and dark as coal with a well-placed shovel on one of the small pillars holding the gate. The thing of course was held closed with an intimidating winged black lock stamped with an unknown flower. To finish the scenery, the famed dorm was on top of a hill, as if it was the fated location of a gothic heroine’s new home in which she would experience many horrors through the narrative, and near the fence there was two “rocks” that looked more like headstones.

Yuu and Grim were supposed to reside there for the time being, and Crowley didn’t notice, nor seemed to care about the uncertain horror painted in Yuu’s face. Then, he took one of his many keys, opened the gate, and with a cheery tone on his voice Crowley addressed the two beings at his side.

“And we are finally here! Ah, this brings so many memories.” He started to walk towards the dorm like everything around him was normal, as if the headmaster wasn’t going directly to the main location of a horror book.

However, Yuu quickly opened her arms to let Grim know that she will carry him, the monster cat obliged of course. She didn’t want him to dirt his paws with the years of dust and grime accumulated on the stairs. The crunch of dead leaves, tiny rocks, and stone dust were the only sounds heard in the middle of the dark night, the dim lights making way to more shadows as the three of them approached the abandoned dorm.

Yuu was deep in thought as the image of the house was getting closer and closer with each step she took. She thought of how much she would need to clean to at least make the space livable enough for two living beings, to check for bugs, to see which furniture was sturdy enough, and to get rid of everything that was too rotten or damaged so neither her nor Grim got ill. Suddenly, the second Yuu took the last step needed to be in front of the dorm, the ever-escaping shape of her memories suddenly hit her with a warning. A stern yet warm toned voice whispered inside her head while Crowley was searching for another key to unlock the wood door of the dorm.

Never go those parts mija, you don’t know what kind of demons hide there.

“What are you looking at human?”

Yuu snapped out of her thoughts when she heard Grim’s voice directed at her. She looked down at where the monster cat was sitting after she let him down, he was watching at her with an interested look. Oh, Grim noticed that she was troubled with something.

“… it’s nothing, I’m just watching the dorm. Do you like sleeping on a bed?” Yuu asked him.

“Hah? Of course I want to sleep on a bed you dumb human. The great Grim won’t sleep on the floor! I’m not an animal.” Grim quickly replied with great indignation

“Then, you will have to wait until I clean a room for us to stay.” She replied with a smile.

Before Grim could reply to Yuu, the sound of a door unlocking interrupted them. Both of them turned their heads to look at Crowley, who was putting away the key of the Ramshackle dorm into his key holder. Yuu noticed that the key was pitch black, and it also had the same flower as the lock of the entrance. After opening the door, Crowley gestured to both of them to enter. 

“Right, right. Please come inside.” Yuu and Grim followed the headmaster, and the scene that welcomed them was worse than the outside. The entrance hall was in shambles, with peeled wallpaper revealing wooden panels, and scattered things on the floor. Moreover, the living room had all of the marks of the nightmare of every clean person, even if everything was still dark, she could see how the accumulated dust on everything was so thick that it looked like snow. Yuu covered her nose and mouth with one of her sleeves, and Grim sneezed. With the flip of a switch, weak light caressed everything, and the true weight of the damage was revealed.

It seemed that now Crowley realized how horrified Yuu looked, so he quickly gathered himself, and gave her a fast explanation before escaping.

“Staying here will at least keep you out of the rain. I’m going back to do more research, make yourself at home. Don’t go wandering around the school, and if the raccoon causes any problems I will kick it out! Goodbye!” after saying this, he immediately moved towards the door, and closed it.

Yuu stared at the empty spot in where Crowley was standing moments ago, then looked at the broken down living room, then at Grim. The monster cat had a look of disgust while looking at where they were supposed to be staying. Yuu had half a mind to try her luck, and search for the headmaster to ask for supplies to clean everything, but a sudden flash of lightning, and the following sound of a thunder made her rapidly change her mind. Grim jumped to her legs, and questioned her.

“Gyaaaaah! This place is a dump! Where am I going to sleep?” The monster cat told while staring at her, but Yuu was too occupied measuring the damage to see if she could clean it with her bare hands.

“… I need cleaning supplies… and tools.” Yuu said to herself.

“I’m not going to do anything human. Don’t try to get me to help.” Grim told her, and looked finally looked down to where he was.

“You don’t need to do anything Grim,” she said as she took off the robe, and folded it into the shape of a rope, “stay in a corner in which the dust doesn’t hit you, I don’t want you to get sick.”

-***-

The pitter patter of the rain filled the living room with a calm atmosphere as Yuu continued to clean, check, and dust every single thing within her range. After practically beating out the dust one of the stripped sofas with the robe, so Grim could have a place to sit; opening a fraction of the giant glass panel window to let the dirty air out, and finding a storage that had some supplies that were serviceable, Yuu attacked everything. The entrance hallway, the other sofa, the table, the carpets, the pillows, even the paintings, and the windows that she could reach.

Nothing was left out of Yuu’s methodical eye, and her steady hands. it was necessary to deeply clean at least where they would be for the time being, she wasn’t going to try her luck with any sickness brought by the grime. Moreover, it was a very calming activity to do, and this time it was actually rewarding for Yuu since everything was in such a deplorable state that she would need to make several rounds to at least make the room habitable.

After shaking as much as she could the center carpet outside, Yuu went back inside and rolled it. She placed the carpet in a corner, and finally grabbed the broom found in the storage closet. It was an old looking broom, like the ones she remembered to have in her home, but this one looked more like the type of broom a witch would use to fly. Yet, it seemed very sturdy, and after a few swipes Yuu decided that it was perfect for the job. As she was collecting the years of dust with strong swipes, Yuu observed how some parts of the walls grew darker, and the already peeled wallpaper separated itself more with the force of the rain.

Of course there would be leaks in an old wooden house, more if the house looked like it was decades old, but the question was how was she supposed to fix that. Yuu never lived in a wooden house as far as she could remember, less one that it was this big. If an abandoned dorm was supposed to be this huge, then Yuu didn’t want to imagine the amount of work needed to clean an actual dorm. However, as she was putting the swept garbage into a bucket, Grim’s voice snapped her out of her thoughts.

“Nyaaa! So cold! The roof is leaking!” Yuu observed him as he moved from one spot on the sofa to another, but it turned out to be pointless, “Fyaa! It keeps coming down! My adorable ear fire is gonna go out at this rate!”

Yuu placed the broom on the floor, and quickly went to pick the monster cat up. She also needed to move the couch, they couldn’t afford to lose more furniture. The broken rotten chair outside of the dorm was enough to lose, so after Yuu let Grim down she pushed the sofa out of the way. What she also expected was to be more dust behind it, so she grabbed the broom again, and swiped it. For now, the best solution for these leaks would be a reliable tactic used across homes around the world.

“We need to find another bucket.” Yuu said to Grim, she looked up to see where was the leak, but she remembered that this was the first floor.

“Magic should fix this leak real quick,” Grim answered. “…Wait, that’s right. You can’t use magic! Pfft! You’re useless!” he continued with a mocking tone, then laughed at his own comment.

Yuu thought he was really cute, but she wasn’t going to let his insult pass just like that. Lucky for her, and unlucky for Grim; Yuu knew exactly what to do to get back at the monster cat.

“Aaaaw, really?” she rebuked with a sad tone, then she quickly grabbed Grim again with a swift movement of her arms, and started rocking the monster cat as if he was a baby.

“Then how am I supposed to help Grimmy have a clean bed to sleep if I am useless? Little Grim will have to sleep on the cold, cold floor since there is no bed for his soft kitty paws. Oh, poor tiny baby Grimmy will wake up freezing tomorrow because his normal human was too useless to fix a leak, ooooooh.” Yuu finished speaking, and then started to plant a bunch of kisses on Grim’s face, and head.

“Fgnyaaaaaa! Stop it human! You can’t treat the greatest magician of all time like this!” he tried to push Yuu’s face away, but she simply moved her head and started to nimble on Grim’s cheeks.

Suddenly a drop of water interrupted them, another leak.

“…We really need to find another bucket,” Yuu said while putting down Grim, “it may look like nothing, but these constant drops will form a puddle if left unattended to create it. We don’t have anything to soak up the water, so it is better to find another bucket.”

With this new objective in hand, Yuu had finally gathered the courage to see where the door with the lady's portrait went to. Maybe it was a door to the garden, or maybe the kitchen. If it was the latter, then the possibility of more supplies would increase by a lot. Yuu still didn’t want to go upstairs, not yet.

“Why don’t you use any of the buckets that you found already? They are not full.” Grim told while he followed her, so it seems that he didn’t want to be left alone.

“They are not, but they still have trash. Wet trash smells horrible, and I don’t want to clean up wet clumps of dust from a bucket. I would rather bang my own hand against a wall than touch that, even if it means cleaning it.”

After moving a fallen painting out of the way, Yuu touched the knob of the door, and gently moved it to the left, and to the right. The click of unlocking it surprised her, but it was the better outcome instead of having parts of the dorm blocked off. Grim got ahead of Yuu, and pushed the door to enter first.

An old iron oven greeted them as it was leaning against the last wall, at one side a sink with a strange faucet and a window were the home of many spider webs, cabinets and some hooks were placed strategically around the room, a closet, and one large wooden table with many chairs plus a tablecloth that had seen better days completed the atmosphere. They had found the kitchen. A very old kitchen, a very old kitchen that probably had many pots, a kitchen that was probably filled with many critters depending on whether there were any crumbs of food that could still be considered edible. So it was better to be prepared.

“Do you want to stay here? I need to get the broom.” Yuu said to Grim. He looked at the whole layout from side to side, and simply turned to her to say his verdict.

“Nah, this place gives me the creeps. Why do you need the broom anyways? It’s really fun to see you clean everything, but I don’t think you have any energy left. You look tired human.”

Yuu didn’t know what was Grim talking about, she felt fine. As fresh as a recently watered toad. So she simply went back to grab the broom just in case, the worst surprise that could receive them was a well-placed rat family in any of the cabinets. Yuu walked back to the kitchen with Grim at her feet, readying herself mentally to possibly… scare any old residents of the dorm.

“I need it to scare any bugs, or rats that could hiding here. I don’t know where would they go if I scare them. There is only one window, and I don’t think I could direct them to climb the sink…” Yuu looked back at Grim and spoke on a sweeter tone, “Maybe if certain monster cat helped me in this, then I could finish cleaning everything here earlier, so I can check which room has the most comfortable bed.”

“Hah! If you want me to help, you better get a can of tuna ready before I raise a single paw.” Grim replied while he hopped over to the other sofa. Yuu instead walked through the kitchen door again, and got ready to act. However, as she opened the cabinets there was nothing living in them, the only things housing themselves were pots, pans, and spider-webs with no spiders in them. Just how old was this building to not have spiders in their silk webs anymore, it was a very troubling thought. At least they had found something to catch the water.

When she finally closed the last cabinet next to the sink, Yuu stood up with a big pot on her hand, but froze as she saw something at the edge of her eyes, she carefully looked at the window without moving her head. There was… someone outside, someone who was looking straight at her through the window, pale and sunken without eyeballs to look at and bony hands pressing down the glass, directing empty sockets to where she was standing. Yuu felt how her hands started to shake, and how her feet were now rooted into that spot.

What was she supposed to do? Were they intruding? Did she move something, and somehow angered one of the last residents of the dorm? What was going to happen to her? What would happen to Grim? Why did the headmaster put them in here instead of somewhere with no vengeful spirits after her soul? Yuu screamed.

“GRIM!”

A screech was heard outside of the kitchen, and the sounds of running paws came quickly through the door. Grim ran until he collided with Yuu’s legs which made her drop the metal pot, and fall down as her legs gave up. The blow of the pot against the floor echoed throughout the kitchen, perhaps even throughout the whole dorm, making the calm atmosphere of the rain change into one of dread. Following said action, Yuu grabbed Grim, and pressed him on her chest once again.

“What?!?! Why did you scream like that?! You scared me, and stop hugging me so much!”

Yuu didn’t release him, she didn’t want to. If she opened her arms Grim would escape, and Yuu would be left alone to lose it on the dirty floor, too scared to run from whatever was out there.

“Human? Human! What is going on?!”

She hugged the monster cat, tightly. Yuu just needed a shifting weight on her chest, something to remind her body, and mind that she wasn’t alone. Grim’s protests fell on deaf ears, and Yuu realized how his constant talk was akin to purring, a sound that she could feel through her being the more she squished Grim. After a while, Yuu left Grim go although she was still shaken by the experience. One, two, three, and four times she breathed with both of her fists pressed directly on top of her heart. When Yuu felt that she had calmed down enough she grabbed the broom, then Grim with one hand, the pot with the other, and stumbled and sprinted to the door as quickly as possible. If someone had seen her they would probably think that she was being chased by a ghost, and they were probably right.

After gently putting the monster cat down, and throwing the pot whenever it fell Yuu closed the kitchen door with a violent slam. It was decided, they weren’t going to the kitchen unless it was daylight, which meant that she needed to find another option to feed Grim. Yuu was fine, she had not eaten since she arrived in NRC, but she was not hungry, nor did she feel like eating. Grim started to speak again.

“Answer me human! Why did you scream like that?!”

“Uh,” Yuu thought how to answer. “I panicked when I looked out the window, the rain made me think there was something observing the dorm in the dark, sorry for reacting like that.”

“Mhn! I didn’t know humans were such cowards. Now what are you going to do with the pot you threw away, nothing?” questioned Grim with his little front paws crossed, and an exasperated look.

“… The pot? Oh right the pot for the leaks,” Yuu mentioned as she went to grab it to place it under the drops. She really threw it without a care, “It’s for the best we just stay here, maybe we can even sleep here in the living room for today. There is no need for now to clean up a bedroom, and we don’t even know if any room upstairs is unlocked. Do you imagine the amount of stuff that is possibly living inside those mattresses? Lice, ticks, bed bugs, spiders, cockroaches. Everything that could give either me, or you a bedridden day where we lay as the unmoving prey to anything wanting to eat our skin. It’s for the better that we stay for a while here.”

Yuu ended her rant, and looked at Grim who had an expression of horror painted on his little face. Oh, she had talked too much again, and had unnerved who was listening… again. Yuu put a nervous smile on her face while clicking her fingernails together, which did not make Grim look less worried.

“Anyways, the rain isn’t going to stop soon, so… You can sleep some more if you want to. I’m going to rearrange the books that I found on top of the fire place, and clean it.”

“I was sleeping until certain human screamed at the top of their lungs,” Grim said while jumping on the sofa again. “Hey! Can you read me some of those books? I bet they have super cool spells that I can practice.”

She started to drag the now clean table to where the fireplace was. Perhaps it was built at a height that was reasonable for the former residents, but Yuu wouldn’t be able to reach it without help. Thanks to being so short even at the age of 16, she was the target to many height complications. Someone once told her that it was because she didn’t make an effort to eat well, but Yuu knew that it was probably something to do with her whole being.

With a rag in one hand, and the table now positioned, Yuu began to carefully take down all of the objects from the dusty fireplace. It seemed clearer now that everything in the dorm must be incredibly old, the books looked more like encyclopedias because of how dense they were. Moreover, the candle holders with no candles were made of heavy steel, clearly designed to stand the test of time. So Yuu moved all of these items carefully, just because they were weighty it didn’t mean that they weren’t fragile. After a few well-planned cleanings to keep the dust off the floor, and leave everything in a better state, the fire place looked more presentable.

The candle holders went back into their place, and the table was moved again with its new, heavy passengers. Yuu grabbed the red encyclopedia, and sat down next to Grim, who was looking at the book with a lot of curiosity covered in mischief. However, if she went by the title of the book, it was clear that Grim’s ambitions would not be realized.

“Magical, and non-magical fauna of the Queendom of Roses. An exquisite classification of many living creatures, book one.” Yuu said, intoning so that the monster cat would pay attention.

“Eeeh? A book about monsters? That is so boring, why would this be here? Pick the other one human, it better contain cool spells.” Grim replied. Yuu obliged him by grabbing the blue encyclopedia.

“Magical, and non-magical fauna of the Coral Sea. An exquisite classification of many living creatures, book four.” Yuu told again, but this time she had to suppress a tiny laugh. Which Grim didn’t seem to like for his expression.

“These books are useless! why would they need something like this in here? I can’t become a great mage if I don’t know any spells.”  The monster cat leaned on Yuu’s legs while releasing a sigh, but something resting besides the fire place called his attention.

“Hey human! There is another book there. Go and grab it!”

Yuu directed her eyes to where Grim was looking, and it was true. Thought it was a little hidden, a book was calmly resting there, like it intended to stay there without interruption. However, such precious thing couldn’t stay on the floor, so she stood up to meet the monster cat’s demands.

“Here.” Yuu said while holding the book so Grim could read the title, she sat down again while being careful to not let any part of the sofa touch her skin.

“The speech and manners of… Ughhhh it’s another boring book,” he sadly exclaimed while pushing the book on Yuu’s arms with one paw, then dramatically falling down on one of the beaten pillows, “this academy doesn’t have book spells, only junk.”

It was really funny how Grim was being so dramatic just because a few books didn’t meet his expectations. Yet, between barely contained giggles Yuu wondered the same thing. At least the first books mentioned magical creatures, which in her uninformed opinion could help the students in some way, but why would a book about manners be needed? It wasn’t something that she would ignore, Yuu read the whole title again, the speech and manners of the fair folk: From double speak to unbreakable promises by Lady Maria Autumnus.

So it was a book about faeries. Yuu opened the hardcover, and began to look for the author’s page, but she was surprised to be greeted by a rather peculiar image. The photo, although it would be more correct to say the painting, of the author was of an elegant dark skinned woman with a beautiful flower ornament in her curly hair. Round glasses rested on her nose as she gazed thoughtfully at the reader, along with a pointed ear that was highlighted by the position of her head. 

Yuu’s eyes widened at this detail, pointed ears? She continued looking at the picture, and found another weirder detail, the lady’s pupils were vertical slits like a cat’s eyes. Puzzled by these aspects, Yuu began to read the description below the photo, and what she managed to do was become more confused by the words on the yellow paper. According to this, lady Maria Autumnus had been part of the diplomatic branch of the fae court, even becoming one of the few advisors for the queen, for 500 years before dedicating herself to documenting the customs of the faeries for the understanding of the other regions of the world.

Yuu didn’t know what to do with this information, and she began to grow more nervous at realization that she still knew absolutely nothing of this world, even though she knew that magic was real.

… Did this meant that she didn’t imagine the thing pressed on the kitchen’s window?

It wasn’t the right time to fall down onto an endless cycle of questions, more if Yuu didn’t really have any kind of answers at the moment. She needed something to occupy herself again, so Yuu put the book on the table, and turned to look at Grim, who was busy trying to open the pillow with his claws.

“Don’t do that to the pillow please,” Yuu mentioned as she grabbed his head and gently massaged his cheeks, “it’s one of the few that I could clean enough to use. If Crowley finds that you broke something he could use it to kick you out.” It was great that she started a conversation in the least awkward way possible. Grim shook his head to free himself from Yuu’s hands.

“HA! Let that crow try it, if he thinks getting thrown out it’s gonna make me give up on entering this academy, then he has another thing coming!” he exclaimed while climbing onto Yuu’s shoulders.

She didn’t move as to not let him fall, “I didn’t know that magical institutions let animals take their curriculum. It’s a real peculiarity.”

“Well… not really I think. I just wanted to come this day. It’s my destiny! I’m genius who is destined to be a great magician!”

“Oh, it’s that why you want to be able to attend here?” Yuu replied, feeling the weight of the monster cat’s body on her frame, but still not moving. A little head obscured her vision.

“That’s right! There is only magical greatness for me in the future! I’ve been waiting for the Ebony Carriage to pick me up, but…” Grim’s voice took on sad tone, “but… Hmph! The Dark Mirror just doesn’t have an eye for this. So that’s why I came here on my own. Not letting me in would be a loss for the world, humans just don’t get it.”

Before Yuu could ask more questions, a violent sound of something breaking shut both of them. Then, a bolt of lightning and a clap of thunder rattled the windows as the rain continued to restlessly pour from the sky. Nothing in their seeing range moved, so it meant… that the sound came from upstairs.

Her shoulders hurt because of Grim’s claws, but that could be dealt later… somehow. The only thing that mattered right now was the damage upstairs, yet Yuu didn’t want to go there at all.

“Hu-human, what was that?!”

“… I, I don’t know.” Yuu replied.

Another sound of something breaking surprised them again. This time the impact was louder, and Grim’s body was shaking badly, but not more than Yuu’s own trembling. She really didn’t want to go to investigate whatever that was happening to break havoc with the already defeated structure of the dorm. It was the recipe for disaster that could end up with them running away and getting lost, or Yuu dying by breaking her body on the stairs.

“W-what are you g-going to do?”

Yet, Grim’s voice reminded Yuu that she was now responsible for another life. She wouldn’t leave Mango alone if something scary was happening, so Yuu couldn’t leave Grim alone either. Thus, with new found, and fragile confidence Yuu quickly stood up from the sofa, and walked to confront the strange phenomenon that was wrecking the roof over her head.

As Grim was still holding her shoulders rather tightly, Yuu carefully walked through the hallway of the second floor since she didn’t want to make any sound possible. The soft blue glow coming from Grim’s ears was almost a holy light in the middle of the darkness, in spite of how actually it was very little against the ever consuming black that filled every crevice of the dorm. At least Yuu could actually see where she was going after fruitlessly trying to turn on the lights to illuminate their pact.

A sound of something falling broke the silence. Yuu and Grim froze. An old cold cackle was heard after it, while a softly glowing white line passed from one wall to another. Yuu felt her heart accelerate while her mind screamed at her to run.

“We haven’t had such interesting guests in so long…”

“I’m itching for some action.”

To put the nail in her coffin, the sound of a laugh full of energy echoed through the whole space. If Grim’s claws were holding onto Yuu before, now only single bad movement could tear the cloth and her skin in lines.

Yuu tried to hold herself with a trembling hand leaning on the old wall. She rapidly blinked once, and three figures appeared on the hallway. One short and stout, another large and robust, and the last one long and thin. Floating, and with possible unfinished business in the world of the living, three ghost were flying in the hallway, and coming closer to where she, and Grim were standing.

“GYAAAAAAAAA!!!!! G-g-g-ghoooostts!!!!” Grim screamed, his reaction was so intense that Yuu had to violently rip him from her back so he didn’t fall.

The sting of the claws, and the weird feeling of hurt was ignored as adrenaline coursed through Yuu’s body in a way that only pure horror could invoke in a human being. Yet, her limbs were locked and unmoving, choosing to freeze in fright instead of moving on their own and escape. The ghosts were not only circling them, but also they were talking directly to their ears, like the cold sound of the wind at night.

“The people living here got scared of us and left.” Mentioned the short one with a fake sad tone.

“We’ve been looking for more ghost pals…” the big one paused, “how about you guys?”

Yuu was going to die. 

Grim whimpered in her arms as he tried to burrow himself in her ribcage. As they laughed harder than before, the ghosts began to move faster. Coming and going in various directions as the cacophony of laughter increased once more.

Suddenly, something changed the tides of fate. The monster cat jumped from Yuu’s arms, and stood in front of the scared human in an act of foolish bravery.

“Grim the Great Magician isn’t scared of some ghosts!!!” then he fired from his mouth a huge shot of blue fire that illuminated the entire hallway in an instant. Grim started to move his head from side to side in an attempt to catch any of the ghosts, yet the floating souls easily dodged the fire.

“Where are you aiming?” the thin ghost taunted as it moved amidst the flames.

“Over here, over here! Heeheehee!” the biggest one said while he waved his arms in a mocking manner along with his laughter. At these results Grim grew frustrated.

“Shoot! Stop disappearing!” the monster cat cried, but Yuu realized something. Between her incoming panic attack, and her silent cries of terror, Yuu noticed that Grim was aiming with his eyes closed. Somehow her mind only focused on that detail, which could mean that there was more impending danger, one that was more important than the ghosts.

“Gri-Grim! Please open your eyes when you are aiming!” Yuu said out loud, but Grim didn’t listen, “The dorm will burn down if you continue breathing fire like that!”

In a hurried, and a not well though decision, Yuu forcibly bent down, knocking her knees in the process, and grabbed Grim from behind. The monster cat answered to this action by using her chest as a hinge to take a large leap towards the ground again. Yuu pressed her hands flat on her sternum, that was really painful considering how much a cat of Grim’s size weighed, but the pain also made her focus.

“Shut up! Don’t give me orders!” Grim mentioned as his fork pitch tail was puffed up.

The distant sound of something opening echoed through the dorm, but it was drowned out by the laughs of the ghosts.

“Please listen to me. You won’t do anything if you can’t aim at them, so at least let me tell you their position. I’ll get you your favorite fish treat if we work together.” Pleaded Yuu.

“Wah…?! A can of tuna?! Mmmmmgm, I-I’m a genius, I won’t let one…” but before Grim could say anything more, the ghosts’ laugh grew louder as their movements grew more erratic. The monster cat jumped to Yuu’s chest once again, startled by the situation.

“Bunch of cowards ganging up on us!” Grim screamed as he climbed up Yuu’s back again, but this time he planted himself firmly on her shoulders. “Grrrrrr! Tell me where those ghosts are!”

“Thank you Grim! There is one your left!” Yuu loudly exclaimed, and a quick succession of fire balls hit the thin ghost so hard that his image became slightly distorted. Seeing this, the other two ghosts moved quickly from side to side.

“I hit it!” Grim celebrated the small victory, and with a paw in the air he declared. “Alright, let’s chase them all outta here!”

The hallway descended into chaos. Screams, howls, and the roar of blue fire filled the whole place as Yuu and Grim used all of their abilities to make the ghosts go away, either by the danger of the flames, or by the promise that the human, and the monster cat would continue to chase them through the whole dorm. When the ghosts tried to escape in the hallway, the duo quickly followed them with quick precision, and more attacks. When they tried to use the stairs to flee, a swift order from Yuu caused Grim to expel a wall of fire as the ghosts passed. Burning their non-corporeal forms to smoke, and making it more difficult to reassemble themselves.

Any sense of terror felt was abandoned by the duo as they saw their plan worked, being replaced by the most human response of all, survival. With a shout, and lines of fire, Yuu and Grim had cornered the ghosts, and as the lost souls tried to think about how to counter attack Yuu indicated Grim to give his all in this shot.

“Fugnaaaa!!!” Grim screamed as he breathed another wall of fire at the trio of ghosts, who melted into thin fog, and reformed quicker than before, but this time they looked scared.

“Hee, heeeeeee!” The big ghost exclaimed as he saw the determined faces of the duo. “We’re gonners, Run away!!!”

And with a chilling scream of fright, the ghosts vanished from the hallway. Leaving everything with the same eerie silence that was there before. Neither Grim nor Yuu moved.

“E-eh? We… won?” the monster cat asked.

“We did.” Yuu replied. Then she proceeded to tightly hug Grim, and collapse on her own weight.

Small whimpering sounds came out of her mouth as Yuu tried to contain her emotions after enduring so much terror. It was too many experiences for one day, and this time it seemed that Grim agreed with her, if his deeply buried claws and attempt to hide himself on her arms again had to indicate whatever he felt.

“Ha-hee… That was sc-” but Grim quickly gathered himself. “No, I wasn’t scared at all! This is nothing for the Great Grim! How ‘bout that ghosts? You done?!” 
Yuu didn’t comment how he was taunting while still not letting her arms go. Instead, she simply kissed the monster cat’s forehead, and cuddled him.

“That was some of the most impressive teamwork coordination I’ve seen in my years as an educator.”

Grim shouted once more, and Yuu quickly whipped her head to see who else had invaded the dorm, but the only living being she saw was Crowley. The headmaster had one of his hands on his hip, and the other carried a metal lunch box. However, the look on his face was something Yuu didn’t expect, Crowley was somehow amazed by whatever he had seen before speaking up. Questions started to fly in her head as he walked up to where her, and Grim were sitting, and the first one was how long had he been standing there? Why didn’t he do anything to scare away the ghosts himself?

Yet… Yuu knew she couldn’t demand those answers from the headmaster. Crowley was already housing her, and Grim out of a fickle feeling of responsibility towards her misfortune, so Yuu wasn’t going to try to do anything that could extinguish it.

“Good evening headmaster,” Yuu greeted him as she stood up. “How strange for you to visit us at this hour… what are you doing here?”

“I have graciously brought supper,” Crowley replied, pointing at the metal box. “I was hoping that the monster wouldn’t cause any trouble, yet I think you two did a lot more than that.”

Oh, Yuu didn’t really understood what he wanted to say with those words, but to her understanding it was nothing good. Were they in trouble for scaring away the ghosts? It sounded like they were, maybe she shouldn’t have let Grim use his fire so carelessly. Now that Crowley was there a strange glow had illuminated the hallway, and she could see all the burns and ash marks on the walls. Surprisingly, Grim had something to say about the situation.

“Hey! I exterminated the ghost problem, be grateful! I can’t be in trouble for getting rid of those!” the monster cat said while still standing on Yuu’s shoulders.

“Neither of you are in trouble. In fact, I graciously thank you for getting rid of those prankster ghosts. So many students had to be relocated to other dorms because they kept away from this dormitory, and it ended up abandoned. I’d forgotten about that… However, for you two together to get rid of them.” Crowley said while looking back and forth between Yuu, and Grim.

“I’m not gonna overlook that “together” comment.” Grim replied while crossing his paws, “they were just standing there watching. I did this for a can of tuna, and I haven’t gotten that tuna yet!”

At his protests Yuu slightly bent down, and let Grim jump down to the floor, but before the monster cat could say anything else she picked him up again. What Yuu didn’t know was how Crowley was looking at her simple cat handling, as if she was performing the impossible.

“I can’t believe… there is a person who can command monsters so easily,” he said to himself while he watched Yuu calm down Grim with ease.

“… What?” she exclaimed in surprise.

“Let’s go down to the living room so we can talk properly, shall we?” Crowley said, and with another twirl he started to descend the stairs.
Yuu looked at the spot where Crowley was standing seconds ago. She didn’t know what to think about what had happened so far, but there were still things to clarify, and a bedroom to clean up. So, Yuu followed too with Grim in arms.

-***-

The living room of Ramshackle dorm was being occupied by three new beings, two sitting on a sofa, and the other in a rocking chair. All gathered around the table, on which rested an open lunch box filled with steaming, aromatic pasta, with small pieces of bacon along with green bits indicating the presence of herbs in it. Grim was gleefully wolfing down his part on the lid of the lunch box, while Yuu ignored the rest of the pasta to pay attention to what the headmaster was saying, she could eat later.

“Let me explain, my teacher senses were telling something about you since the uproar during the entrance ceremony.” Crowley started, then pointed at Grim, “By the way you handled him, it means that you have talent as an animal, or wild beast trainer. This type of affinity is one that very sought by magical academies around the world because it’s practically required in order to work with familiars of any kind.”

So even in this world there were animal caretakers, Yuu thought that those types of jobs could be done with magic, but it seems that they were some things that could not be replaced. But, what Crowley said next surprised her.

“However, you do not possess any magic, but it seems that this talent comes out of you naturally since with a monster of… such attitude a normal wild beast trainer would need to severely use their magic to educate him before even trying to achieve a quarter of what you did with the ghosts. His magic is too chaotic, and he is too feral to obey orders.”

At the mention of his magic Grim perked up, stopped eating, and interrupted Crowley.

“My magic is good enough!” the monster cat said, but Yuu saw an opportunity even if it meant summoning enough courage to talk.

“Actually mister Crowley, I… have a suggestion. Grim really wants to go this school, if you think that his magic is too unruly then maybe he can learn to control it here.” As Yuu finished talking both Crowley and Grim were looking at her in an odd way.

“… did I say something wrong?” she started to feel nervous, but for some reason Yuu couldn’t stop talking. “Please, if you saw our unfortunate encounter with the ghosts, then you can assess that Grim is very capable of learning, and he also knows how to read! He read the title of a book to me, so he has all of the abilities to become a great student.”

Once again Crowley, and Grim looked at her in a very odd way. Yet, this time Grim had a glazy look on his eyes, and the headmaster rested his chin on his finger. The moment was short, but it was enough for Yuu to look down, and start clicking her fingernails against each other. But, with a sigh the headmaster broke the silence.

“... hah… It can´t be helped. Alright.”

Both Yuu and Grim tensed in their seats, but Crowley held a hand in the air to signal he was not finished. This was met with her confused look, and Grim’s grumpy face.

“I can let the monster stay. But, I can’t simply allow someone into the school who wasn’t selected by the Dark Mirror.” Then he continued, “also I can’t let you be a freeloader until you return to your own world.” 

“Talk about short lived joy…” with a sad sigh Grim started to eat again, deciding that the conversation was not of his interest anymore.

“Listen until the end. Concerning the fact that your soul was called here the school must take responsibility of your being as the owners of the Dark Mirror. So, legally speaking NRC is your guardian now.” Crowley crossed his arms, “for the time being you’ll be permitted to stay in this dormitory for free. BUT, other necessities you will have to provide by yourself.”

It wasn’t that bad of a deal. Yuu knew how to take care of herself in her opinion, the only thing she needed to do was to somehow find a job that could maintain everything that was needed to make the dorm… enough, just enough. In addition, Crowley somehow knew what was passing through her head.

“Seeing as you have nothing to your name… Fufu, here is my proposition.” The tone of his voice did not inspire any confidence in Yuu, so she simply kept clicking her nails without looking up.

“No need to fret, I’ll have you do maintenance, and odd jobs around campus. From what I can see, you’re pretty decent at cleaning. It’s not in its former glory, but you managed to make the dorm look a little presentable again.” Crowley explained as he watched the living room. “Would you two like to become the ‘handymen’ of the school?”

Yuu stopped clicking her nails, thought about for a moment, and nodded. It was the safest opportunity, and she didn’t need to think of a plan to leave Grim alone in the dorm.

Crowley talked again. “Excellent. This way you will receive special permission to remain on school grounds. You’ll also be able to research about going home, or study whatever you desire in the library. For I am gracious. However! Only after your work is done.”

Yuu finally released the breath she was holding. They had secured roof, and possible income. It wasn’t so bad, the only thing that her and Grim had to do was survive… the headmaster mentioned her going home, yet the mentioned monster had something to say as he placed his weight on Yuu’s legs.

“Eeh?! I’m not okay with that! I wanna wear that fancy uniform, and be a student!”

“It’s fine if you’re unsatisfied. I’ll simply toss you out then.” Crowley quickly replied, with a cold glee that remarked how he was not kidding. Yuu put her arms around Grim in protection.

“Ffgnaa!? I get it! I just have to do it! Just do it!”

With a clap of his hand Crowley stood up, but before leaving he left them with a few words.

“Wonderful. Then you two starting tomorrow, endeavor to be the best handymen at Night Raven College!” then the headmaster disappeared in a swirl of black feathers.

After that, there was nothing else to do except clean up the lid of the lunch box (the dorm had running water), clean up enough one of the open rooms on the second floor along with beating the mattress outside with the broom stick. Then, clean up enough the bathroom, and take a shower without soap. Yuu decided to close the metal box, and leave it on the weirdly placed fire place for easier access, she didn’t have enough will to eat for now so the pasta could be her breakfast.

With everything cleaned enough, and with Grim’s stomach full, the duo collapsed on the bed in the middle of the night.

Tomorrow was going to be another day.

Far away from the room in which the girl was trying to sleep, and the monster cat was dreaming, a red rose was blooming. 

Chapter Text

The heat in this of the year was unforgiving. The streets of the pueblo burned, and cooked the skin as they received the rays of the sun attacking the dry earth, removing any type of humid sensation other than sweat, heat, and the choking humidity that was always present in the environment. Not even the most grandmotherly grandmothers could withstand the heat that had been aging them for years this time. Choosing instead to rest under the shade of the trees in their front backyards with the help of electric fans brought out by some of their older grandchildren, and their own stories and gossip that they told to each other, like old comadres do when the only thing that is left is to talk.

The mothers cooked the lunch, submitting themselves to the inferno of the kitchen, the stoves, and the pots in order to serve the sustenance of the day. Some of them even made soup as a harmless way to get back at their kids for not helping enough with the chores, knowing the chorus of complaints that they would receive after serving the steaming broth would refresh their minds. The fathers slowly came back to their homes after leaving the corner stores with the goods bought, walking through the heated streets, and regretting not leaving with an umbrella just like their wives said.

It was a day of doing nothing thanks to their scorching heat, and everyone understood that.

Everyone, except for the children.

All of the children were running to the less populated parts of the pueblo. To a place where they knew nobody lived, and nature grew wild without restrain. The place was special, so special that not even the heat would stop their spirits after being trapped in their boiling houses for most of the day. When the children arrived to their precious spot, they shrieked in joy, and started to run at the multiples trees that shielded them from the sun. Many of them ran to the biggest tree of them all, wanting to climb it, and between the shifting little multitude, there was a small girl, the smallest of them all, whose nervous face didn’t reflect the same childish happiness of her peers.

“C’mon ---! Don’t be afraid, the tree is not going to bite you! Just put one feet after another, and you will reach the end in no time!”

She saw how the other children around her quickly threw their flips flops on the ground, and started to grab any crevice on the giant tree that they could use to push themselves up. Yet her little body didn’t move from where she was standing, an older girl slapped her back, and gently pushed her to the lowest part of the trunk, encouraging her to climb with the others… but when Yuu had taken four steps up, an intense wave of nerves invaded her, and she simply went back to the security of the floor. Yuu watched how everyone else was laughing, and climbing, and playing, yet she felt an oppressing void form inside her belly.

Yuu woke up, barely. The first weak streaks of blue light melted onto the barely closed curtains as they announced the start of another day. Yuu sat up, and blinked to properly wake up her brain, but the morning fog clouding her wouldn’t go away unless she splashed her face with water. The blurry shapes of the unfamiliar room welcomed her eyes, a chair covered up with a sheet, a painting with seemly nothing except solid lavender, stains and tears on both the ceiling and walls, and a weird fire place.

A bedroom that was not her own, and had probably received more people that she could ever meet in a lifetime. Yuu rubbed two fingers on her eyes to get rid of her clinging sleep, even if she was in another world her body refused to let go of her inner clock, so going back to sleep was not an option. However, before Yuu got out of bed, she patted around the blanket in search of a familiar lump. With her eyes almost closed off Yuu found the lump, and pet it a few times, it moved.

“Unnnn… munyaaa... Five more minutes…” and the lump slightly moved for a few seconds, before it stopped again.

Content with knowing where her cat was, Yuu moved to get out of the bed. Yet, in her slow hurry she had committed a two steps mistake. Forgetting her lack of flip flops, along with the weird chilly atmosphere of the bedroom, what greeted Yuu was a painful shiver that ran through her whole body when her feet made contact with the floor. She immediately jumped back onto the bed, and started to shake her legs to get rid of that horrible sensation.

Yet, for Yuu it felt more than a simple pain from an unfamiliar floor… it felt more like a reminder to her, of something. Whatever it was, Yuu had no time to think about it, she had to get started for the day.

With a now anticipated sensation for her feet, Yuu got out of bed as careful as she could. A wooden floor this old could make noises, and she didn’t want to wake up Grim, never a cat has ever been happy after being woken up against their will. So, Yuu slowly moved towards the old door, and opened it to reveal the hallway.

The same hallway that still had marks of all the fire Grim directed to those awful ghosts, and Yuu wondered how had she resisted to clean the walls in the middle of the night, more if most of her nighttime had been dedicated to simply think about everything that happened, cleaning was a good way to occupy the mind without actually feeling the emptiness that may come from the action. It was soothing, and it gave a result in the end, so it was the most productive activity Yuu could do.

Yuu’s eyes were greeted by the blue hue of the early morning as she opened the door of bathroom; which was exactly where she had remembered, three doors down to the right, and just like the rest of the dorm it was incredibly old. A cracked mirror, a thick porcelain sink which was almost grey from the dust, a weird toilet with the tank screwed into a high place on the wall and not behind, and a porcelain bathtub with a what seemed to be a bronze shower. It wasn’t the weirdest bathroom Yuu had seen, more if the fog clouding her memories let her remember an all concrete bathroom with a shower that had a giant water tank connected to the pipeline.

The weird thing was the bathtub, what was Yuu supposed to do with that? The only thing that occurred to do was bathe Grim in it, but the more she looked at it, the more it felt like a huge waste of water. Yuu decided to not use it, and to prepare herself to learn how to stand in it if she wanted to feel clean.

The lights didn’t work in here, so Yuu’s many attempts to somehow make the melted lightbulb over her head work by turning on, and off the old switch were abandoned, and replaced for the view of the cracked mirror. Maybe it was something that Yuu was supposed to fret over, but she didn’t really mind it. The mirror itself was cracked yes, but as long as neither her, nor Grim touched it, it wouldn’t be a problem. Yuu wondered how something broken had managed to stay in the frame for such a long a long time as she opened the tap – with actual running water – and cleaned her face exactly three times in a row to free herself from the grease of the late sleep. 

After drying her face with the low part of her shirt, Yuu had the strange impulse of looking at her face in the mirror; something very rare in this instance. Maybe it was a feeling born out of insecurity… to see if anything had changed in her, but when Yuu looked at her distorted image the only thing found was her face. The same face that she had all of her life. Yuu saw how everything was as she remembered, the short hair hastily chopped with scissors, her dark brown eyes with thick lashes and equally thick eyebrows, even the dark eye bags that shouldn’t be that visible in her brown skin were there.

Yuu didn’t know why, but seeing her reflection made her feel a strange sense of relief.

“Heehee…”

What was that?

A new sense of nervousness made Yuu turn on her feet, and observed the whole bathroom. The laughter ringed again, like a haunted bell announcing a bad omen, and Yuu locked eyes with the cracked mirror again. There! Instead of the distorted view of the wall, a sunken and pale face was making a scary expression before laughing again. However, before Yuu could even emit a sound the same long, and thin ghost from yesterday came out of the mirror with a quick twirl, and stopped right in front of her while laughing.

“Heeheehee! Isn’t too early to be awake at this hour young lady?” the ghost said while waving a finger in front of her face while putting his other hand on what Yuu could assume it was his hip. A mockery of the pose of a worried, yet stern mother.

Yuu’s answer was to run out of the bathroom.

Quickly, Yuu ran directly to the bedroom where Grim was still sleeping. If those horrible ghosts were back, then she had to somehow protect him with the little strength that she had. The prideful monster cat didn’t show it, but Yuu knew he was exhausted from using his magic yesterday… it was almost unbelievable how she had to consider the concept of magic as something to add to her priorities. Grim had looked thoughtfully beaten yesterday, with his little paws trembling before falling asleep. 

However, in what seemed to be a second, the short ghost blocked Yuu’s path for the bedroom door, and the scared surprise sent her tumbling down her feet. The other ghost joined his comrade with hearty laughter as they looked at Yuu like she did the funniest thing they had seen in their afterlife.

“Although, it’s good that you are awake at this hour, and not before!” The long ghost said with a few giggles left in his voice.

“You know what the dead say! Between three and four a.m., the Witching Hour unfolds thy door to them! So do not open thy windows unless thou want to play! Heehee!” The short one responded.

Yet, Yuu didn’t care about whatever they were saying, she only cared about what could happen to Grim. There were only two ghosts out of the three Yuu saw yesterday, she couldn’t afford to let them distract her. Suddenly, a shrill scream behind the door alerted the three of them, and Yuu quickly decided that nothing would stop her from getting inside the bedroom.

Mustering all of her courage, Yuu grabbed the doorknob, and threw her body through the ghost to open it completely. As she opened the door, the feeling that overcame Yuu could be described as frightening. In those mere seconds Yuu felt a dreading cold seep into her whole body, a vice grip winter held her heart for a moment, squeezed it, and forced all of her breath to come out of her lungs.

With a shove, Yuu entered the room. The first thing she saw was how visible clouds of breath came out of her mouth, the second thing Yuu saw was how the big ghost had somehow made Grim levitate in the air. Even if it wasn’t a great height, and Grim was still above the bed, Yuu couldn’t stop feeling horrified as she observed the ghost move his fingers, and make Grim rotate while tiny black sparkles surrounded the monster cat.

“Let go off me! Let go! You dumb ghosts, the great Grim wi- GYAAAAAAAAH!”

“Hehehehe! Don’t you like heights little cat?” the big ghost giggled while quickly moving his wiggling fingers, “I heard mortals say how much cats loved being in high places, so I solved your dilemma!”

Grim answered the comment with the deafening combination of a screech, and a growl.

Her heart couldn’t take the sight anymore, so Yuu jumped into the bed, bounced, and grabbed Grim. As the three ghosts laughed at their actions, she checked the poor monster cat in her arms. Yuu’s suspicions were right, Grim was trembling horribly, to the point that she could feel it even if she tightened her hug around him. Little claws were struggling to get a hold anywhere, without caring where they landed, or the injuries that could cause. Nevertheless, even in his frightened state, Grim didn’t wait to voice his concerns.

“S-S-Stupid human! Wh-y-y did you leave ALONE?!?!? Th-ose ghosts came back!!!”

Yuu’s only answer was to hug Grim tighter than before, she didn’t consider the possibility of the ghosts coming back, and now they were back on square one. Yuu looked at the ghosts with anger, maybe it was funny for them to scare her, but it was better for them to know that Grim was off-limits. However, in response to Yuu’s look, the ghosts only erupted in laughter, along with mentioning something that made Yuu’s stomach drop.

“Are you two going to be living here?” the long ghost asked without waiting for an answer, “You’re gonna get pranked. Kekekeke!”

“Better not laze around the house! Sleep for a long time, and you’ll never wake up again.” The big ghost advised like he was telling something that everyone knew.

“Just like us!” the short ghost finished with a giggle.

Grim, and Yuu watched as the three ghosts erupted once again in laughter at their own words.

“I-I don’t care! Just don’t play pranks on Grim. What you did was very cruel!” Yuu responded with all of her might.

“Yeah! Don’t play pranks on me. You all will see; we’ll get rid of you eventually!” Grim said while still being in Yuu’s arms, “This dorm is ours now!”

To the uncertainty of the two beings on the creaky bed, the ghosts’ response to their words was to simply laugh again, and disappear in a cloud of white mist. Yuu, and Grim didn’t dare to move for some time, waiting for any kind of weird movement, or any even out of place as the blue sky made itself brighter with the pass of the minutes. When, after a considerable time, nothing happened Grim detached himself out of Yuu’s arms, and stretched his whole body to the point that a little sound came out of him.

“Maaah, who do they think they are? I was finally sleeping well until that dumb ghost came in, I was all sprawled out then I fell out of the bottom before! This is the worst! Just how did they let this place get so rickety?” 

Yuu only watched as Grim rambled about his sleeping conditions, and thought about what time it was currently. There wasn’t any working clock on the dorm when she checked, at least the one in the bedroom didn’t work since it was almost hanging from a thread on the wall, so Yuu tried to guess what hour it was. Suddenly, Yuu though about what one of the ghost had said to her before entering the bedroom… an hour later than three and four, so it meant that it was probably five a.m.

So it meant that Yuu woke up exactly when she should wake up. Yuu walked up to the windows, and opened the two of them in order, letting the early morning breeze enter the bedroom, and breathing in the chilly wind of another day.

“Ffgya!? Human! Don’t open the windows like that! The wind is going to freeze me!” Grim said.

With a simple turn, Yuu watched as the monster cat buried himself in the little pile of double blankets that they have found in the bedroom. Such cute action only deserved one thing, a hug. So Yuu simply moved to stand in front of the bed, and hugged the lump of monster cat plus blankets with all of her strength. What received her was Grim’s head popping from the lump, so Yuu simply put her head against his. If he didn’t want to get out of the blankets, then Yuu would simply carry him to the living room to start the day.

It seemed that the monster cat didn’t know how to react to the sudden contact, watching how the human that had only met him a day ago was carrying him while being buried in blankets as she carefully walked down the creaky stairs. The liminal blue hue of the sky reflecting on the giant window of the living room received them both as the clouds slowly moved by the wind, looking so close yet so far away. Yuu put Grim in one of the sofas, and quickly fixed the pile, she looked at the monster cat’s confused expression, and decided to tell him her routine.

“It’s five a.m. right now, it is the hour when I normally wake up, so if you want to keep sleeping you can do it, normally I would eat first then shower, but since everything still needs cleaning, I’m going to that first. Just sleep here where I can see you, I’m going to try and clean everything I can, before the headmaster comes to give us any instructions for our… handymen jobs.” Yuu ended her monologue with a single bop on Grim’s nose.

“Eeeeh? But I’m hungry now human. Can I get some food before you do anything?” Grim said while dropping on the blankets, and watching how Yuu retrieved the same things that she used to clean up the night before.

“I will get the leftover pasta from yesterday after I clean up. I’m not hungry right now, but I will give you the rest after I separate my portion.” 

“Hmp! I’m going to keep sleeping, those ghosts were really annoying.” Then Grim simply burrowed himself on the blankets as Yuu started to sweep the floor.

-***-

Many sounds of swiping, moving things, and shaking surprised, and received Crowley when he opened the door of Ramshackle Dorm once again after letting the building rot on itself. Except that, to his amplified surprise, what the headmaster saw after entering was a foyer free of dirt, and grime. Of course the manual labor of a single person wouldn’t eliminate the years of neglect suffered by the wood, and the metal, but seeing the floor clear of dust, the walls with a lighter color, and the space free of all the objects that have been abandoned was a nice start for the morning. 

The Headmaster thought about the situation of the current new residents of his college as he walked towards the source of those noises. There was something really odd about this whole mess, the Dark Mirror has never committed any kind of missteps since it was created many centuries ago, and used for their strict enrollment process. Every single time it has chosen a student for their repertoire, it has been someone who had the potential to become a great mage no matter what. From powerful heirs to working sons, any person deemed fit to the college’s high standards was summoned. So why had the Dark Mirror chosen an… uneasy and eerie boy with a bubbling talent for the beasts, but still weirdly devoid of magic nonetheless? Crowley kept asking after stopping just at the entrance of the living room.

“… then you grab the rag with both of your tiny paws, and move it up and down without letting it fall, then you call me to rinse it on the bucket.” The scrawny figure of Yuu was kneeling at the monster’s height, and was showing him how to clean the window with great enthusiasm. 

“If I knew that cleaning was this hard I would have stayed asleep… you don’t mind if I go to sleep now right human?” then – although it was a little hard to see – the monster put his best begging face.

“I do mind in fact, I’m sorry if I’m being too demanding Grim, but we have to clean everything deeply. My brain is not going to leave alone if I even leave a dirty corner.” Yuu said while cleaning one of the glass panel with another wet rag, “Call it my feminine strangeness.”

“Ha? You call it that because you smell like a girl? That’s lame.” Now the monster was pawing the mentioned rag, as if by touching it, it would do the job for him.

“Well, I am one, so it’s not lame… wait do I smell?”

Crowley corrected his earlier assumption while his blood pressure went to great highs that he had never felt. Not a weird boy, but a weird girl…

The situation went from mainly manageable to nerve inducing as he watched Yuu instruct that unruly monster; that she was strangely fond of, in how to use a rag to clean the lowest parts of the giant window. As the gracious headmaster that he was, Crowley decided to change some of the school provided supplies that he was going to give the black haired girl, a quick modification on some of the components of the sanitary products would go unnoticed, and it will give him time to think about what to do…

“Can’t I just simply throw the water on the glass, then use the rag?” the monster cat protested while still stepping on the tiny piece of cloth.

With everything now set, Crowley tapped on the wooden framework to alert the two unexpected additions; that he hoped wouldn’t give him a headache, of his presence. 

“That is what we should do after we clean it up like I said earlier, do you want me to explain everything again?” Yuu asked as she saw Grim’s little face scrunch in displeasure.

“Ehem.”

Both Yuu, and Grim turned around to see Crowley once again entering the living room with a confident stride. She quickly grabbed Grim who had a grumpy expression, and stood up to greet the headmaster properly. Yuu wasn’t going to take a risk with her manners, after all there was a lot to lose if she somehow displeased the person with the right amount of authority to kick both her, and Grim out.

“Good morning headmaster. How are you doing today?” Yuu greeted the man who was leaving two strange packages on the table. As she approached, Grim slightly wiggled his body to let Yuu know that he wanted to be let down, instead she held him in a more conformable way.

“Good morning to you two, I’m well thank you. Did you sleep well?” Crowley addressed them while sitting down in the nearest sofa, and crossing one long leg on top of the other.

“Hmp! I fell out the bottom of the bed, and then the ghosts woke me up. Just how did you let this place become a dump?” Grim answered while still being on Yuu’s arms.

When she saw that the headmaster didn’t take offence to his comment, she finally let the monster cat down. In a too quick movement Grim jumped to the table, and was now eyeing the two packages in a very curious manner. Yuu moved to grab him again-

“And you?” Yuu stopped her movements, “Did you have the same problems?” Crowley asked her again.

“I… slept well.” At her response, Crowley cocked his head to the side.

“Even though you just got tossed over from another world you can still relax, wonderful! I came to speak to you two about your work for today, also to give some supplies for your stay.” The headmaster then pointed to the two resting packages, “It goes without saying that these will be only provided this time, after these run out it’s your responsibility to buy your own supplies.”

Yuu decided to open the box which Grim was methodically smelling, and found many sanitary products including the two things she couldn’t live without: soap, and shampoo. They were only two bars in total, but for her it was enough to survive a few months. However, as Yuu moved the products – there was a toothbrush and deodorant! -  she realized that there wasn’t any shampoo that was safe to use for Grim. Before she thought about vocally asking for one, Yuu quickly stamped out that idea. It wasn’t going to be well received either way, so she decided to wait for any future payment to buy some.

“Henchman let me see! Something smells weird in there.” Speaking of someone, Grim was very interested in the box, to the point of trying to move away her hands to get a hold of it.

In a weird way it was his almost lucky day, Grim really needed a proper bath since Yuu didn’t know where he has been living, but that didn’t mean that he wasn’t going to shower. Therefore, Yuu let a tiny giggle come out of her mouth as she watched the monster cat practically put his entire head inside the box. With him occupied, Yuu opened the second box, and there was… a black jumpsuit with boots? She pulled out one of the boots while feeling a little nervous. Yet, before she could confuse herself more, Crowley decided to inform her about the things inside the box.

“Yes, that jumpsuit, and those boots are your uniform. The Ebony carriage provided you with the Ceremonial Robes, but those are far too formal for you to wear around on campus. Since I am so gracious, I have provided you with a good alternative. You can save your gratefulness for later.”

The only thing that Yuu could do was nod back, gently put aside the boots, and pull out the jumpsuit from its imprisonment. It was… long, but not long enough to become a problem, at least Yuu had the assurance that she wouldn’t be uncomfortable wearing it. Moreover, the fabric of the uniform itself felt very nice, it was made of a sturdy yet soft material that didn’t bother Yuu’s touch as she examined it, so it probably wouldn’t bother her skin.

After gathering everything out of the boxes, and letting Grim have what seemed to be a very weird bath sponge, Yuu raised her head to see Crowley fidgeting with a phone, she needed to ask him if he could wait for a moment while she prepared for the day. Tensing her arms, and with soap in one hand, Yuu gathered her all of the confidence she had to ask.

“… Headmaster, Grim and I need to-”

“Hm? Oh.” Crowley’s eyes left the screen, “You may go, and wash yourself. I hope that it includes the monster, no offense but no one knows where it has been.”

“WHAT?!?” Grim expressed, the bath sponge falling from his mouth after hearing that comment. Yuu also still felt a little surprised by the bluntness of how everyone talked… yesterday’s incident with the other students was sitting fresh inside her head.

“… come Grim.” Yuu responded while letting the frustrated monster cat climb her back. With a last look at the headmaster, the two went to the bathroom on the second floor. It was going to be a very long day, Yuu at least hoped that nothing would happen.

-***-

After finally doing all of the steps needed to keep her routine afloat; taking a proper shower – hair washing included – bathing Grim with a very diluted water mixture of shampoo, drying then dressing up, eating breakfast, brushing her teeth, and putting on shoes. Yuu was finally ready to follow Crowley’s instructions for whatever odd jobs he had planned for her. Both her and Grim; mostly Yuu since Grim didn’t leave her arms since they went out of Ramshackle dorm, were following Crowley through the school, until they stopped on a street with many statues, all grey-colored and imposing with an air of importance.

Then, Crowley turned to them, and with a snap of his clawed fingers two buckets filled with water appeared in front of them in a swirl of dark sparkles along with a hose, cloths, towels, and two pink and purple balls that looked strangely sandy. Yuu eyed the objects with wariness as she moved her head to the left, while Grim moved his to the right.

It was surprising to see magic in action, how easy it was to simply make so many things appear out of nowhere, it seemed very convenient, or maybe Yuu was only basing this on the only person she had interacted so far with magic that didn’t involve the possibility of burning down everything. After all, Crowley was an adult, and the headmaster no less, maybe he was capable of doing complex things, while the students still had a long way to go in their paths.

“Your main job is to clean up the campus,” Crowley started. “… But the campus itself is quite large, so cleaning it without magic would be impossible. So I’d like you two to start cleaning the Main Street from the main gate to the library at least for today.”

Yuu thought about where exactly were the main gate, and the library since the headmaster was talking about them like she already knew their location. However, Yuu was already aware that she would need to find both of these places on her own. At least starting with this street, and its statues was good, it would take Yuu a few hours, but it was nothing that she couldn’t do by herself. Crowley continued his explanation as he pointed towards the cleaning supplies.

“The buckets have a refilling spell attached so they don’t run out of water, and the hose will work normally if you just put the correct head inside. Only choose one of them for the detergent bombs because they will expand inside, and override the water.” Then Crowley pointed at the two balls, “Also be careful by mixing them. First the purple one, second the pink one. Understood? Please watch Grim closely so he doesn’t try to cause a scene like he almost did yesterday.”

When the needed explanation was over Yuu finally nodded. It was going to be hard, but she needed to do it if she wanted to at least have a roof over her head. The only thing left was to think of something to keep Grim occupied.

“I’m counting on you.” Crowley said while his glowing eyes became half moons again. “you have permission to have lunch in the school cafeteria. Take care of your work enthusiastically.”

And with his final words, the headmaster left them at the side of the street. While Grim looked like he was waiting for Crowley to get away further, Yuu quickly started to examine all of the supplies for today’s task. She looked at the two buckets, one larger than the other, and after trying to move it Yuu was surprised to see it had wheels. 

“Tsk… No way I’m doing any cleaning–” Grim started to talk as he walked to the pile of towels.

With her decision made, Yuu went to grab the two detergent bombs while fixing once again the sleeves of her uniform. It wasn’t big enough to be uncomfortable, the size of it even helped with the long t-shirt Yuu was using under it, also it kept her warm against the chilliness of the day. The problem was the length of… everything? Yuu had to basically roll up both the legs, and the arms if she wanted to do anything without dirtying them. The rolled up sleeves of the jumpsuit almost covered her elbows, but that wouldn’t stop her.

“… Boom boom boom! Use a bunch of awesome spells!” Grim was still ranting about not cleaning, yet wanting to go to the classes while falling on top of the towels, it was really cute.

Now with both of the detergent bombs in hand, Yuu dropped them in order. What happened right after was downright amazing, both of the balls dissolved in a swirl of colors, leaving a little whirlpool behind. Now the smaller bucket had a strong detergent scent, and was slowly filling itself with sparkly bubbles. Yuu turned to Grim, who was still rambling about going to class.  

“We can go study in the library if you want.” She said while picking him up, and putting the monster cat on top of her shoulders. Yuu always wanted to do that with her cat Mango, but the poor thing had always feared unstable places, so her wish of holding a cat like that was simply an unreachable dream.

Until she landed here.

Yuu was feeling incredibly giddy as she felt Grim trying to balance his body on top of her shoulders. Her hands couldn’t stop shaking from excitement, and she didn’t want to suddenly move while Grim was getting comfortable, so Yuu repeatedly slapped her fingers on her palms to get rid of the sensation. Afterwards, Grim placed his paws on top of Yuu’s head, and looked around.

“Uwaaah! Amazing! So this is the Main Street. I couldn’t see much of it yesterday.” Grim’s eyes darted between each statue, “But what’s with these statues? All seven of them look pretty scary.”

While Grim was still seeing the statues, Yuu moved the two cubes closer to the first one. It was a quite imposing woman, but the sharp posture, and the graceful way she held both her skirt plus the tiny heart gave her a particular air of sophistication. The tiny crown on top of her head indicated that she was royalty, and by how solid the statue looked Yuu imagined that the lady was probably an important figure in the history of this world… something was chewing on the back on Yuu’s mind as she grabbed the other supplies, and moved them at a reaching distance. The hose’s butt was dunked on the bigger bucket, and Yuu started to direct the water up and down the statue. However, as she was in the middle of soaking the upper part, Grim unexpectedly jumped. The movement was so sudden that Yuu had to quickly redirect the hose to the lower part of the statue, then when she looked up Yuu saw how Grim started to walk around the shoulders without caring that it was wet.  

“This granny looks especially snobby.” He said while pawing the collar of the statue. Yuu thought about trying to get him down, but the more she saw him there… maybe Grim could try to put the soap mixture up there first, before Yuu could try to climb the statue itself. 

“You don’t know about the Queen of Hearts?”

Surprised by the sound of an unknown voice both Yuu and Grim turned to see who talked, or rather who decided to talk to them specifically. At their right there was a boy with a heart on his face, and red hair that didn’t look combed, he was wearing the same uniform that Yuu had seem on all of the students while they were walking with Crowley from Ramshackle to this spot. Except that both his vest, and the ribbon that seemly everyone wore on their arm was rose red.

“Queen of Hearts? Is she important?” Grim asked him with an air of curiosity.

“In the past she was the queen who lived in the Rose Maze.” The boy started to explain while weirdly turning his head between her and Grim, “She was someone who valued rules and discipline above all, strict in all things from the march of the Card Soldiers...”

Yuu didn’t know what to do. She only expected to clean up, not… interact with the students. Nevertheless, why was he even talking to them? Shouldn’t he go class? A familiar nervousness started to invade her while Grim kept talking to the boy, so to disguise her shaking hands Yuu removed the hose from the bigger bucket. With practiced finesse Yuu grabbed one of the pieces of cloth, dunked half of it on into the soapy water, and started to clean the engraved plate in front of the statue.

Up and down, left and right, and repeat. Up and down, left and right and repeat. Up and down, left and right, and repeat…

A small sigh escaped Yuu’s mouth, it was always relaxing to simply do a repeating motion from time to time, yet she still felt on edge. It was worth nothing that Yuu’s worries could be only worries, but she had far too much experience with people acting nice to her, then bloodily twisting that niceness to the point of unrecognition because she “did” something… Yuu tuned in the conversation. 

“… the Witch of Thorns from the Magic Mountains. Noble, and elegant, even within the seven she is top class in magic and curses!” the boy explained while pointing to the dignified, and really tall statue of a lady with horns, “She can summon lightning and storms, cover an entire country in thorns, her magic is on a whole other level. There was even a time she transformed into a huge dragon!”

“Oooh! A dragon! All monsters look up to them!” Grim said with a really happy expression on his face.

Huh, it seemed that Yuu lost most of the conversation if they were already talking about the last statue out of the seven. She wondered about the importance of the information given, but it was probably fine since if that guy knew it then it was probably something that both her and Grim could find in the library. Which meant that neither her nor Grim needed this conversation. Yuu turned to the bucket again, soaked more detergent into the cloth, and extended her arm to carefully clean one of the bigger stone roses of the statue.

“They’re so cool,” the guy blissfully said while turning his head to look at Grim.

… something felt off, Yuu didn’t like that tone of voice.

“Unlike a certain raccoon.” The sweet tone turned malicious in a second, and unlike the very surprised noise that came from Grim, Yuu only slumped her shoulders down. At least she didn’t need to feel on edge anymore. A mocking laugh came right after.

“I can’t bear it anymore! Ahahahaha! Aren’t you the guys who went crazy at a House warden at the welcome ceremony?”

Keep cleaning.

“You were summoned by the Dark Mirror even though you can’t use magic –”

Keep cleaning.

“And you, monster, weren’t called but still trespassed. Yaah, it took everything I had to not lose it in front of everyone.”

Keep cleaning, and ignore him.

“Wha!? You’re a rude one!” Grim responded when he should ignore him.

“And now you weren’t allowed in, and regulated to janitor? Haha, how lame.” Yuu felt the presence of the guy directly behind her.

Ignore him, and keep cleaning the roses.

“On top of that, you don’t even know about the Great Seven. How ignorant can’t you be?”

Keep cleaning the roses.

“I recommend you go back to kindergarten before coming to Night Raven College.” The self-satisfaction of that last line made her feel sick.

It seemed like… some things never changed, no matter where Yuu was.

Yuu rose her head to see Grim, and the monster cat was puffing up from anger. Oh no.

As the guy giggled to himself, Grim kept puffing more, and more. The hissing noises increased in volume too, Yuu had to do something herself before Grim did something that both of them would regret. Attacking a student when their housing, and employment situation was so unstable wouldn’t be good. Furthermore, Grim was more than ready to put his claws, and his fire to good use regardless of any consequences. There was a single problem, Yuu was frozen in place. 

“I thought I’d just mess with you a little bit–” a weak uncomfortable slap sounded on Yuu’s back, and that was as if a spell had been broken.

Suddenly Yuu dropped the cloth, raised her arms, and started clicking her tongue towards Grim. The result was instant, the monster cat was now looking at her, his cute face was scrunched in a horrible scowl that made Yuu’s heart break. Grim didn’t deserve any humiliation that would be thrown at her, so maybe the next thing could be used as consolation.

“What henchman?!?! Don’t you see this guy is insulting me?!” Grim angrily shouted from the arms of the Queen of Hearts, like a tiny scorned prince taking refuge in the arms of his mother. Yet, Yuu forced herself to maintain eye contact with him, she must only look at those round blue eyes.

The intensity of the stare, and the coming movement of her hands somehow got Grim’s attention, and now looked like he was debating himself on what to do. Yuu’s eyes now were leaking tears, if it was from not blinking, or from her emotions it didn’t matter.

“Hehe, what? Scared of a few words? Don’t you have any guts in that twig-like body of yours?” someone was talking behind her. 

A last “please come here” movement from Yuu’s hands convinced Grim to finally jump from the safety of the height of the great monarch, and fall directly into Yuu’s trembling arms. After a few small steps so that she would not fall when Grim’s full weight landed on her arms, Yuu instantly started to pet the monster cat. Behind his ears, his chin, his cheeks, everything that she could touch while her right arm was holding the now less angry monster cat.

“Now you hide yourself behind a monster? Man, couldn’t you get more la–” Yuu walked to the other side of the statue, so Grim could only listen to her.

As she gently put her hand on the monster cat’s head Yuu said, “Don’t be mad Grim please.”

“NO!” what greeted Yuu’s hand was a quick swipe of claws, and a very angry rebuke, “that guy is calling me stupid! I saw him read the plates of the statues, and he calls me stupid?!? Anyone can read that!”

“If you do a good job in helping me clean, and ignore whoever is talking I will give you half of my lunch.” She whispered while slowly massaging Grim’s cheeks.

“Really?!” the monster cat perked up, but slumped down right after, “wait… are you saying this because you don’t want me to kick that guy’s butt? Because if so, then forget it! I saw you only eat like three forks of pasta for breakfast, no one can survive with so little food!” 

“Are you even listeni–” a voice was heard at Yuu’s right, but she only petted Grim’s pink beans. 

“I mean it; I will give you half of my lunch. Consider it, you have your lunch, but if I give you half of mine, you will have both your lunch plus an extra portion. You can even choose whatever you want from my part.” Yuu explained to the monster cat, who was looking quite interested at the promise of food. There was a voice at her right again, but Yuu’s mind didn’t acknowledge it. It sounded more like white noise.

“Fgnnnn… alright, I the Great Grim will accept that. But don’t try to back down when we go to the cafeteria henchman, any meat that you choose it’s mine!”

Yuu giggled a little bit, Grim looked so happy. The face he had made when he jumped from the statue was not surprising, but it still made her really afraid. Despite how cute he was, or how chubby he looked, Grim was still a monster with no living experience around humans’ despite being able to talk. So it was up to Yuu to teach him to at least don’t attack people on sight.

Suddenly the noise of everything rushed to her ears.

“– the guts to look at someone in the eyes when they are talking to you weirdo.”

The click-clack noises of shoes against stone indicated that the boy was leaving, but Yuu didn’t trust a sound that could be so easily faked, so she held Grim tight despite his protests to brace herself for anything. To Yuu’s surprise, after opening her eyes after waiting what met them was the back of the boy while he was walking away with a slower discouraged step… was he disappointed that she reacted like that?

Well that was… quite weird.

-***-

After the weird incident with the boy, Yuu and Grim proceeded to clean the Queen of Roses, and all of the other ones as the time went on. It was a little difficult task since all of the statues not only were big, but also had a lot of details engraved on the material. Lots of nooks, crannies, and delicate endings were beautifully constructed on all of the statues, and most of them extended up to the head on every single one of them. The dilemma of how they would try to clean was a messy one at first since Yuu didn’t want to risk anything by trying to climb onto the statues, but it was solved by promising Grim more food after a few praises on how he would do a spectacular job cleaning them. 

It was quite fun to fall into a pattern of cleaning when the activity was expected to take a long time. Especially since it was the first time Yuu had cleaned any kind of statue, but the detergent plus the water were doing a really good job, they didn’t need to do more than three coats for every soak that she did, and Grim’s paws didn’t seem to get irritated by the constant exposure to the detergent. Even if all of the statues were completely different from one another, the cleaning part was still the same with a few adjustments depending on their figure.

A weird surprise was how so many different students stopped to watch when both Yuu and Grim were cleaning the statues. Some of them stopped to watch for a moment, while others spent what she thought was a really long time watching her direct Grim on how to properly clean up the tentacles of the Sea Witch. Unexpectedly, one of them had approached Yuu while she was starting to clean up the statue of the very Fair Queen, and Grim was trying to climb the long straight robe to get up to the crown. A hand touching her on the shoulder broke Yuu’s concentration so fast that she was pretty sure she physically jumped with only said hand grounding her with hidden strength, but after she turned around what Yuu saw was a smile.

The first thing she noticed was the climbing boots, then the purple vest, blonde hair, and last was the hat. Yuu didn’t know that the school allowed students to wear hats. It looked very dramatic, like something that a performer would wear than a normal student, but it was weirdly charming in a way. Moreover, the guy only said one thing to her. 

“Please be gentle with our queen, her beauty is something to be preserved.”

However, the only response that Yuu could express was a slow nod, which at least seemed to satisfy the guy since he quickly responded with a small head bow, and a “Merci!” before walking away. After that Yuu and Grim finished their work right on time for lunch, which was taken besides the statue of the Queen of Hearts.

“I don’t understand you human,” Grim said between bites of what seemed to be morcilla, cheese sandwich, fried meat, grilled fish, and sweet and sour chicken, “why did you have to hurry ordering the food? We could have stayed there, and easily eat on a table.”

Yuu paused on the spoon of shrimp rice she was holding, “… I thought it would be a little uncomfortable to eat there, I didn’t see any professors nor staff. It’s better for us to stay away from the students”

“Hmp! I don’t care about what they have to say. If they have a problem with me, I’ll just roast them!” the monster cat declared before taking a huge bite of the fish. The tiny crispy sounds of the skin made a nice ending to the heartfelt, yet incorrect comment.

“You can’t do that Grim. All of the students outrank both of us, even the youngest ones. You have to be careful when talking to anyone, one of them might get the wrong impression, and tell the Headmaster something that could get us in trouble.” Yuu replied while choosing a strawberry from the fruit bowl on her left.

She had never seen so many tasty looking fruits in one place that didn’t cost an arm to get a perfect amount of strawberries. The cook ghost serving them had brightly laughed when Yuu kept asking for the red treats when the question of “what other fruit?” had been mentioned. Not even the huge amount of food that they took was blinked at, but somehow her bowl of strawberries was an oddity. Whatever it was, then she will have to choose which days were better to choose the fruit bowl, and not gather attention. Yuu took one of the smaller strawberries, and gave it to Grim, who in his race to eat one bite of everything at the same time simply chomped on the little fruit without a care.

The sounds of eating, and Grim’s voice filled the space besides the Queen of Hearts’ statue. However, it was a rather silent time. Calming as the clouds passed by, as the trees slightly moved in a gentle breeze. The looming shadows of the great statues giving both Yuu, and Grim a shadow to shield themselves from the sun. A weird feeling on the back of Yuu’s mind started to form as she noticed more differences between Twisted Wonderland, and the smoky memories of her home. There weren’t any sudden chills of the morning as they opened another day of scorching heat. No blistering sun blasting its rays on everything, no sudden breezes that interrupted the unforgiving weather, no vehicles moving on a constant stream of noises that remarked how everyone was going somewhere to do anything in their daily lives.

The different plants, the different uniforms, Yuu had only spent a day, and half in this upside down world… so why was she suddenly feeling so sad right now? They were just thoughts, nothing important enough to cry.

“Mroowr?”

Yuu looked up from her rice towards the unexpected sound, and saw the most beautiful cat in the world. It was black with white patches, and had a coat so shiny which indicated a very rich level of care, along with a chunky physique so plump that Yuu could almost feel under her fingers. Its yellow eyes had a shade of wisdom and mischief so perfectly blended, like it knew who she was the second it saw her.

The perfect image of a pampered, yet comfortable cat, and Yuu had to hug it. Maybe, at least touch it after she gained its permission.

“Mrooowr.” The cat exclaimed again as it walked towards them.

“Hello!” Yuu responded in a lighter voice, “How are you? Where did you come from?”

Suddenly Grim stopped eating, and looked at the cat with a frustrated face, “Hey! Piss off! This is my henchman, and she won’t give you food, so go somewhere else!”

“Mreoow” the cat answered him as it planted itself at Yuu’s feet.

“I don’t care if you’re still hungry! Go and ask for freebies from the stupid students, you already ate, so bother your own human!”

“Mrow!” now the cat was looking at Grim with a slightly annoyed look. 

“Grim don’t be rude, it wants to say hello.” Yuu said while petting the monster cat.

“Say hello yeah right, he just wants you to give him the rice!” an accusatory paw was pointed at the new cat with a mighty affirmation.

An accusation that seemed to be true if Yuu went by the smug look of the black and white cat was giving a more enraged Grim. Furthermore, the cat decided to downright ignore Grim, as well as start to rub himself on Yuu’s boot. Two big yellow eyes, and a weak begging meow were directed at her in the most insincere, yet cute attempt to convey hunger, and pity. Which the cat didn’t need since Yuu was already going to give him some of the shrimp anyway.

Yuu held one of the shrimps with the spoon, “Do you want some? I don’t know how they seasoned the rice, since if it seasoned with garlic then I can’t give it to you. However, I don’t taste any garlic so I’m not sure either. It is very tasty, but I can’t risk you getting sick and worrying your ow–”

“Mrowr.” The cat interrupted her while now plating himself at her right side, in perfect eating length.

“Don’t give him anything!” Grim said as he unexpectedly climbed on Yuu’s lap to look at the cat directly, “He is just putting up an act! And you haven’t given me shrimp either.”

The cat’s response was to simply bap Grim on the face. It was incredibly funny from Yuu’s perspective. Yet, she still separated the monster cat from their visitor to prevent any kind of fight.

“It’s ok Grim I want to give some shrimp; besides you already ate a lot of food. We don’t want to end up with a kitty tummy ache later don’t we?” Yuu explained as she carefully separated three shrimps from the rice.

Grim crossed his front paws, “Hmmp! I didn’t know that you had shrimp on your rice until now. Give me some! It’s only fair if you’re going to give some to him.”

“No Grim, you already ate a whole piece of fish, I could instead give you another strawberry.”

With the shrimps laid out on top of a leaf that Yuu had found, the cat didn’t pay attention to Grim’s comments in favor of delicately eating his given bounty. Yet, before the monster cat could complain more, Yuu immediately grabbed one of the bigger strawberries, and presented it to Grim with a smile. As if the discussion from earlier didn’t happen, the monster cat happily chewed on the fruit without a care. 

It was so cute; it was almost paradise. Yuu wondered if there were more cats on campus, and she hoped that she could meet every single one of them. This cat was certainly a higher expensive one, especially since he seemed to be properly trained, and poised. Yuu held one of her fingers as a greeting to the black and white cat, and in response he smelled it. A small noise of happiness escaped Yuu’s lips as the cat smelled more of her hand, oh it was such a wonderful moment to have.

Suddenly hurried steps, and two voices interrupted the calm atmosphere.

“LUCIUS! My dear Lucius where are you?!?”

“I don’t understand why you have to turn this into a life or death situation! To find a sim–” the voice of the Headmaster traveled through the statues.

“It is a serious matter! And don’t you dare to finish that sentence if you value yourself Dire.” The other unknown voice warned with severity.

The two handymen slightly jumped at the interruption, surprised to hear a new voice coming along with the Headmaster, one that sounded really desperate in their haste to find whoever was named Lucius. Although their new visitor didn’t jump, the black and white cat now looked weirdly annoyed, he paused his eating to look at the direction of the two voices. A decision traveled in his yellow eyes, and the cat walked to the other side of Yuu. Exactly where Grim was sitting before.

“Mrrrrrrrw.” He expressed after sitting down.

“Ha! Your human is calling for you Lucius,” Grim responded with a smug face, “Get lost!”

To prevent another possible fight, Yuu petted the cat’s head with her index finger, “Is that your name, Lucius? What a wonderful name.”

“Wonderful? It sounds like the name a granny would put on a cat.”

Lucius’s response to the jab was to try, and climb onto Yuu’s lap, even if Grim was firmly planted there. An outstanding move in the elegant art of cat pettiness. Which of course was met with equal anger, now Yuu had two cats battling for the right of using her lap as a victory spot.

“Hey! Don’t climb my henchman!” Grim said while trying to push Lucius.

“Mroowr!” A quick response was fired as Lucius now was trying to climb on top of Grim.

Between the meows, Grim’s voice, and the growing pain of having two grown animals putting all of their weight on not only upstaging each other, but also pushing down on her abdomen area… Yuu sighed. The situation could escalate to worse if she let them do whatever they wanted, so it was for the best to calmly separate them. With slow movements, Yuu grabbed Lucius with one arm, while delicately pushing Grim down with the other on the grass.

“Fgnyaa?!”

“Mroow!?”

Without paying attention to their complaints, Yuu stood up with Lucius in arms, and side stepped from their spot behind the statue. Taking care of not accidentally stepping on the food, nor the plates, she simply moved to the right, and abandoned the shade provided by the Queen of Hearts. Just a simple physical separation would do the trick to slow them down. However what Yuu had not expected was for Grim to follow, and try to climb her again despite not having any spots to climb while Lucius was in her arms.

“Don’t look so smug. When I get there I’m going to burn your tail to a crisp!” The monster cat said as he put his front paws on Yuu’s legs, preparing himself.

“No Grim, Lucius is going to go after I put him on the floor, and you can finish your lunch alright?” she answered while looking at the cat who wasn’t impressed with her question, nor with the pleading sight she sent him.

No wonderland could twist the personality of cats. All mighty, and unmovable with a pride bigger than any star. Neither of them would back down from their insults, nor the challenge that was fighting each other despite the distance between them. Yuu kept trying to separate Grim and Lucius as gently as possible, which involved a few pets, and a hand firmly put on Grim’s head to stop him from sinking his claws on her torso in order to reach the black and white cat. In the midst of everything, Lucius bopped Yuu’s nose.

“OH LUCIUS THERE YOU ARE!”

Yuu, and the two cats were startled, frozen in one spot. There was an older man standing with the Headmaster at the front of the Witch of Thorns. The older man looked sickly worried, and relieved when he saw Lucius in her arms, so maybe this was Lucius’ owner. On the other hand, Crowley looked both surprised, and troubled, chewing one of his clawed fingers as the long maroon robes of the other man moved like water the more he approached them. He was walking towards them with a stern face, but the trembling of his hands betrayed his confident posture… Yuu could only muster one question after the man stopped to stand in front of her.

“Is this your cat?”

-***-

The first long day of work ended after the good remarks of Crowley for their work – along with meeting professor Trein and Lucius – and finally Yuu and Grim went to the library. 

Some books were floating, while other were resting on their shelves, and the warm light of the lamps along with the orange shine of the afternoon indicated that the day was coming to an end. The cold liminal feeling of the library was replaced by something less familiar, the few students entrapped in their own books, the sound of more students outside of the big wooden doors, the big window in which Yuu and Grim had situated themselves to see the sun slowly go to bed. All of it made the library feel like a room from another dimension that somehow materialized itself after opening the door.

Firstly, Grim had been excited to visit the library, telling how he was going to find so many spells and practice them to perfection. With the help of his henchman course, the monster cat wasn’t really fond of the actual process of studying, but Yuu was going to indulge him a little bit. As a way to reward him for actually doing a good job with cleaning. That lasted for a while until Grim realized that all of the spell books were mostly based on theory, and that he couldn’t practice any fire spells while he was surrounded by paper. After that Grim passed out on the table once again, and Yuu dedicated herself to read anything about dimension traveling, or if it was possible. Most of her searches were really heavy books, but one specifically called her attention. Yuu opened it, and what she saw surprised her. 

A black and white photo of an entire group of students were pooled in front of a stadium. Yuu carefully examined the photo, the group was sporting the same uniform that she was wearing, and every single one of them had band-aids, gauze, and medical tape everywhere she looked. One them even had a cast on his arm, yet that didn’t stop him, or his comrades from striking a powerful pose for the camera, all of them looked very joyful. 

In the center of all there was a young man with long and apparent white hair, with cat ears on top, and like everyone else covered in injuries, and medical gauze. A pair of broken round glasses rested on his face, which also had many bandages covering wounds of various degrees since a few of them were not enough to stop the blood. However, the most curious thing of all was the trophy, which explained the very self-satisfied grin that he had in his face. It was almost sinister, like the young man was challenging whoever saw the photo to doubt the accomplishment on his hands.

There was a caption at the corner, it read: “Ramshackle Dorm’s victory – 2st NRC Spelldrive Inner Tournament of the year…” but the ink that marked the date was long gone.

A flick of another page of the album, and another photo took the place of the last one. This time it was a different group of students from another dorm, the difference being the lack of injuries, the organized position of everyone, and how every student was seemly a fae if Yuu went by the pointy ears. One student with a medium ponytail, and closed eyes was holding the same trophy as before. 

This time the caption read: “Diasomnia Dorm’s victory – 4st NRC Spelldrive Inner Tournament of the year…” and the date of this photo was lost too.

What a surprise, Yuu had grabbed an old sports album by coincidence, one that was very old. The pages were yellow, and most of the first photos didn’t have the recorded year on their written captions. It took seven pages to finally get one with the year 1867 written on the corner (a dorm named Savanaclaw won that one), and after that Yuu entertained herself for a while observing the winning students of years’ past. Until at some point the photos of Ramshackle stopped and never appeared again. It was… odd to see the consequences of the ghost invasion in “real life”, nevertheless that had already happened, and Yuu gained nothing by worrying over students that already graduated.

Suddenly the sound of a book abandoning its spot on the bookshelf was heard. 

There was someone near her and Grim…

Yuu silently rose from her seat to see who was troubled enough with any homework to come to such deep, and so far away from the main parts of the library. With careful steps Yuu followed the noise of old pages turning, until she turned around the corner of one of the many bookshelves that made everything feel like a maze. A little behind where Yuu, and Grim were sitting there was a tall guy, a very tall guy.

So Yuu chose to only poke her head a little bit, yet he was so concentrated on whatever he was reading that he didn’t notice Yuu watching him. Pale skin, and long dark hair were the first things she noticed, along with a poised aura around him, very elegant. A bright green ribbon with the brooch of a dorm was tied on his arm, and a large pair of black horns were sitting on top of his head like a crown. Overall the guy looked very put together, and responsible, so it was better for Yuu to simply leave him alone. Not that she was planning to suddenly talk to him either way.

Unexpectedly the guy turned his head around, and locked eyes with Yuu.

…

It was becoming a little awkward so she just simply waved at his direction, and the guy – with a weirdly surprised look on his face – waved back in a slightly insecure manner.

Happy with realizing a successful social interaction Yuu went back to her seat to check if Grim was still asleep, without noticing how the young man kept staring at the spot where she had been standing.

Chapter Text

Deep, deep in the woods behind the cursed dorm a song was heard. A song of tricks, flowers, and fairy dust. Laughs that reminded of the sound of little silver bells rang through the many branches as speck of green and pink danced in the middle of the night, celebrating the joy of the eternal beauty of nature. Finally, the decay will leave, and life could bloom once again in the cold forest which had not met the warm hand of spring since many human lifetimes had passed.

Thousands of tiny feet tapped on the trees, the stones, the bushes, and the ground. Blessing the forest with a bountiful bloom, there shall not be a single branch without the touch of spring. In rejoice all of them held hands, and danced, danced, danced in circles without pause. Oh, how delightful is to revive these gloomy woods, the Fairy Queen will spend many springs dancing between the beautiful flowers that will be born in this untouched land.

All of the little specks flew to the night, happily dancing in the shining moon light as their colors filled the black inky sky of glimmer. Every single one passing the cursed dorm, and leaving it behind in their celebration.

Except for one.

A tiny pink speck stopped at the window of the cursed dorm, curious of… something. They somehow had felt a single sparkle of feral magic while flying, yet it knew that there shouldn’t be any living inside the dorm. How the wood could still house magical humans if those spirits were still clinging to their breaths beyond their grave was a mystery.

The tiny fairy looked through the spot of the window not covered by fabric.

What they saw surprised them.

A lone child of man was sleeping on the bed, at their side there was a monster with Holy Fire coming from their ears, so that is where the feral magic had come from. The curious thing was how; even if they tried so hard to search for it, there wasn’t a single spark, nor gentle breeze of magic coming from the child. All children of men inside that pesky barrier had magic coursing through their whole bodies, always growing and blazing, so why this one felt so empty?

The tiny fairy felt their petals fall down on their face as sadness invaded them. A child of man with no magic when it was already so intricate today? They must feel so alone…

Maybe this one was like the ancient ones! The first children of men blessed with the care of gentle fae who helped them find that single spark of true magic inside their hearts! So overflowing that now every corner of the mortal world had the beautiful sparkles everywhere. The ringing of silver bells grew more, and more excited until it attracted some of their comrades, and explained their finding.

New waves of emotions moved through the spring bringers. Not only they were awakening the forest from its state of decay, but also they finally had the opportunity to raise their own child until it bloomed into one of their most beautiful flowers.

How coincidental was to find a foundling in such an uncaring landscape.

-***-

A pile of rotten wood was resting in the middle of the yard; the poor rocking chair had given up on itself the first moment Yuu had tried to clean it. Moreover, the second she had seen the rot eating up the chair, the entire thing was horrifically kicked out of the door, and kept aside on one of the corners of the porch.

Unlike Yuu who was looking if all the precautions she chose were enough to not accidentally start a fire, Grim was extremely giddy to use his fire powers on the sacrificed chair. The monster cat was almost vibrating at the prospect of burning something without any consequences, Crowley wouldn’t miss an old chair from an abandoned dorm. Plus, since they were only two residents of such big house losing something that was already broken anyway wasn’t going to make a dent in their inventory, so the poor chair was fair game.

“Can I burn it now?!”

“Not yet Grim,” Yuu responded without looking at the monster cat, “I already wet the grass around with water to minimize a possible fire… I surrounded the broken chair with rocks-”

“You already said that four times henchman! Just let me burn it now!” 

Grim’s tail was moving right to left at a very fast pace, and as cute as he looked with his big eyes shining with intent, Yuu needed to be very careful with this particular endeavor. She has seen the grass around the dorm, all yellow and crunchy, so it was crucial to not miss anything… Yuu wasn’t really a fan of burning down the dorm by mistake.

With another rearrange of the heavy stones surrounding the rotten chair, and a final look, Yuu signaled Grim that he could fire as he pleased. A happy scream left the monster cat as he started to quickly stalk the wood in circles, with seemly no rhythm nor plan. Suddenly, Grim fired two fireballs towards the wood. The first one landed on one of the rocks making Yuu feel relieved, but the second one hit the chair almost perfectly, and it lit instantly.

“YES! I did it! The great Grim will become the best magician of all time!”   

As Grim was celebrating his arson like activities, Yuu watched how the blue fire consumed the wood at a very fast rate. The movement of the fire was hypnotic; the flame was dancing in the air with a strange rhythm only known itself while it kept eating away the rotten wood, and slowly leaving ashes behind. Could the fire be hungry? Or maybe the truth of blue fire being hotter than normal fire was also applied in this world? No matter Yuu kept watching as the wood shattered, and collapsed on itself as the fire ate the broken parts.

“How was that henchman?” Grim said as he climbed her, “Aren’t I awesome? Bet that none of those stupid students have blue fire like mine!”

“It looked really nice Grim, and it was very useful to get rid of the chair.” Yuu responded while petting him.

“Hmm? We could have left it there on the porch.”

“No we couldn’t.”

As careful, and slowly as she could do Yuu grabbed Grim from her back. After accommodating him in her arms like a baby she explained, “The chair was rotting from the inside, and it would have been bad for our health in the long run. It could also have infected other parts of the dorm with the fungi. So, it was better to simply burn it.”

“Oh I see...” he was pensive for a moment, “Oi human! Stop carrying me like this I’m not a baby!”    

Yuu laughed a little at his protests, some cats liked being held on their backs while others didn’t. Moreover, it seemed that Grim liked it… but didn’t want to admit it, he could easily wiggle or claw her neck in this position, but the monster cat only used his words to express mild anger over his “misfortune” towards her treatment. Maybe it was a matter of pride, or a matter of presence, but Yuu wouldn’t deny that he looked very cute as she petted the white fur on his chest, it was so soft.

The soft ringing of a bell made Yuu stop, and look around for the source of the sound. A bell? from where? Only her, and Grim were living here… she didn’t know if the ghosts could hold physical objects, but they were only scaring them in the early morning, so it wouldn’t be them.

A pink, and tiny spark quickly moved from a bush to the nearest dead tree from them.

What was that?

The tiny speck stopped, and hid behind the tree. Both Yuu, and Grim waited to see if the speck would do something, or if they needed to run away. Neither of them had explored the dorm long enough to discover its secrets, so it would be good to have a plan prepared to escape, if the speck had bad intentions with them.

However, what Yuu saw was something that she didn’t expect. The tiny speck finally abandoned the security of the tree, and left itself be seen. It was not a speck, instead a tiny figure materialized out of the sparkles. Delicate pink wings moved in the sunlight as pink flower petals danced like a skirt, tiny green arms hid part of their face, but their rose red eyes were zeroed on her. Another type of thin flowers petals sprouted of the tiny head, making it look like long hair. Their green legs were relaxed, yet there was an aura of excitement around the tiny thing.

A fairy was visiting.

“What is that?” Grim asked as he warily watched the tiny fae approach them.

“Oh… it’s a pixie!” Yuu exclaimed with surprise. She knew what those were! A passage from lady Maria’s book appeared on Yuu’s mind as the pixie smiled at her while flying around them. At least, her reading of the book while she couldn’t sleep yesterday was going to be handy. What did it say?

Oh right, Pixies are one of the most important types of fairies, they are the helpers of mother nature herself in the Faelands, and dress her whenever the seasons change. By the looks of this one, it could be a flora pixie dedicated specifically to flowers, since normal flora fairies tended to resemble wood. However, as cute as they were Yuu couldn’t get out of her head two words in regards of their interactions with humans.

Utterly capricious.

Yuu couldn’t define the pixies as good nor evil. Rather than that, they were either helpful or harmful in their actions, or their fleeting moods. The book really stressed, repeated, and explained many times how human morals, and fae morals were different, so the readers couldn’t commit any mistakes when interacting with any fae.

There was one rule that applied to pixies in a more specific manner, one that Yuu thought it would be crucial if she ever encountered another pixie.   

Don’t be dismissive of their presence, nor their calls, they will be your Good Neighbors for a long time if some decide to take rest around the gardens of your home.

“A pixie is a fairy of nature Grim, they help in the changing of the seasons, and they are very dedicated to their work… maybe this one moved around the forest.”

“If it does something funny,” The monster cat said while jumping from Yuu’s arms without taking his eyes from the fairy, “I will eat it.”

The fairy was apparently entertained by Grim’s comment since the sound of ringing bells erupted from their laughing face. It stopped by just a few centimeters of Yuu’s face, and it stared at her. She didn’t know what to do, but at least Yuu could follow the most important rule when interacting with fairies: Be polite.

“… Good morning, how are you?” Yuu asked.

The fairy nodded their tiny head, and started to “speak”, without caring or ignoring that the only thing that Yuu, and Grim could hear was bells. It was a pretty sound yes, but it was a little ineffective regarding communication. So… maybe Yuu should tell them.

“Uh, my apologies for interrupting you, but I cannot understand you.”

“Yeah! The only thing we hear is ringing, do you have a bell hidden somewhere?” Grim added.

While Yuu was slowly panicking because of Grim’s comment, the fairy stopped talking and blinked a few times. Then it slowly flew towards Grim, and tried to talk once more, but this time the sound of bells was slowed down. The monster cat now made a face of annoyance at not being immediately understood.

“Grim, maybe we should explain-” Yuu tried to talk as she sensed danger coming.

“Didn’t you hear me?” Grim crossed his paws, “I can’t understand you!”

A new silence invaded the place as the pixie stared at them. Soft wind moved the grass, and the trees, but Yuu only felt her anxiety grow more. She didn’t consider how Grim, a monster, would react to a fairy in front of him. Grim’s species wasn’t listed anywhere in the first book about magical creatures, but as Yuu had suspected the mild rift between magical animals, and fairies still applied.

Ignorant of Yuu’s worries, and Grim’s annoyance, the flora fairy looked pensive as their eyes watched Yuu’s face, looking for something that only they could find in the silence. Suddenly, the pixie clapped their tiny hands with a victorious expression, and quickly flew up to Yuu’s face. The girl went still in fear that she would do something wrong, and offend the fairy.

What Yuu felt afterwards was a tiny, yet gentle kiss being placed on her forehead.

“How silly of me to forget that children of men don’t hear our voices, it seems that the blessing of Spring does not have me yet in its light.”

A new soft voice, like the warmth of a slow afternoon, spoke in the wind.

“Good morning, pure child who carries the heavy void of an empty soul. How do you find yourself in this new day?”

The pixie’s voice was crystal clear, and Yuu couldn’t even imagine that someday a mythical creature would be talking to her with such gentleness. She was speechless, utterly speechless, but she had to respond, it was the politest thing to do.

“Good morning, it is nice to meet you here.” Yuu answered to the pixie while making sure that her voice didn’t stutter.

“Oh, such well-mannered child! It is wonderful to finally talk to-”

“Hey henchman! I still can’t understand the fairy. What are you talking about?!?” Grim quickly interrupted the pixie again as he pawed Yuu’s leg.

Yuu’s nervousness came back with a vengeance as she observed how Grim was turning his head from her to the fairy with the expected explanation of why he wasn’t included in the short conversation. The only problem was… Yuu couldn’t really explain to him that the magic kiss happened because the fairy only had interest in her, and not him. It would be a huge blow for his cat ego.

“Hehehehe, beasts have surely gotten bolder with the years. Yet, it is really rude to be able to hear, but to not understand.” The pixie calmly told her.

Surprisingly, they weren’t mad at all, or at least they didn’t show how mad they were. Instead, the pixie slowly flew to Grim; in between his tries to swipe them with his claws, and tapped his nose with a sparkling hand. The action made Grim stop his tantrum, and try to lick his nose.

“There! Now the beast familiar, and the child can understand me,” the pixie flew to Yuu once again, “But don’t call me a pixie! That is the word humans chose for us, not ourselves. It’s such an uncouth word too.”

The fairy waved a tiny finger while pointing towards her, “I am your Neighbor! It has been a long time since I saw a human living here.”

No wonder they had come to see what was going on. Yuu wondered for how many years had this fairy moved through the forest of Ramshackle if they had detected so quickly how both her and Grim had only started to live there. She felt a little bad for not noticing something within the plants, but every single one around the dorm was either dead or in the process of dying. Nevertheless, this was a first impression, so Yuu had to make sure to at least put herself, and in consequence Grim in the fairy’s good graces.

Yuu grabbed her hands tightly in order to not click her nails, she was very nervous.

“Yes,” she replied, “we now live here for the time being, the Headmaster said that this was the only place available for us.”

“Hmm? The only place?” the fairy mimicked Yuu’s voice tone, “that sounds very curious… it is strange to not care much for children, especially someone so delicate as you. Who is this ‘Headmaster’ that you speak of?”

Yuu paused for a second… that sounded weird, “He is the Headmaster of this academy–”

“And he is very greedy too!” Grim interrupted, “he hasn’t even given me the tuna cans he promised, and I can’t attend classes in this stupid academy for some reason!”

That wasn’t good, that wasn’t good at all.

“He hasn’t?” the fairy now sounded like they had a mocking smile, “how peculiar to not fulfil something promised. This Headmaster of yours is not a very good caretaker. What a way to express the joy for a new life who is trusted in your hands. It seems that humans still haven’t learned to appreciate a foundling.”

“Found– what? What kind of word is that?” Grim was now frowning, “caretaker? Hah! That crow only threw us in that gloomy dorm, and basically said buh – bye before leaving me to my luck.”

A flurry of giggles escaped the fairy’s mouth as they kicked their legs, while Yuu was starting to get suspicious about what they had said before Grim. A foundling? Crowley had only mentioned that NRC was responsible for her wellbeing, there was never any discussion of adoption. Yuu had understood that Grim, and her were staying in a very precarious situation, the guarantee of housing because of the Magic Mirror’s decision was something that was, in her opinion, only made out of resignation and not responsibility.

But how was she supposed to explain that to a fairy? When every wording uttered was taken, deconstructed, examined, and arranged to find any loophole?

“I wonder why humans always get so mad when their children find a new home in the heart of our forests. Some of them don’t even want them! It is out of the kindness in our spirit to care for them, so why–” Yuu slightly raised her hand, “Yes child?”

“… If there is no mindfulness in asking, what brings you here today... uh…” Yuu’s explanation died in her tongue while she twisted her fingers. She realized that indeed, as the book said, fairies didn’t give their names to anyone. However, this time the fairy acknowledged her silence with gusto.

“How rude of me, to not at least tell my name to the children that now reside so close to our land.” They said as they flew around Yuu, and Grim a few times.

Then, they simply stopped, and started to talk again.

“More valuable than any ancient gold, more beautiful as any gem of the land of the Fairies, and delicious like the morning dew dropped from flowers. Dear empty child, and magical beast…”

The fairy opened their eyes, and smiled at Yuu directly.

“You two may call me Feirdhris.”

-***-

The clear beauty of the sun shined over the stoned streets of the college, with its rays softly touching the trees, and standing proud in the middle of the sky to announce the intensity of the morning. Yet, there was something strange. No matter how bright that yellow disk became as that clouds called for its light, the cold stone and marble never stopped having an eerie feeling of desolation. A sad feeling of sternness that only was remarked by the gothic architecture of the place, and a strange hostility which washed over everything. Competitiveness? Nervousness? Crowley had explained to Yuu that all of the students that she saw at the ceremony were new, so the first few days of the week were simply dedicated to them getting accustomed to the home in which they would stay for a long time.

The assignment for today was cleaning once again the paths connected to the Main Street, along with its surroundings.

It could have been an easy task, if it wasn’t for the students themselves.

Yuu wasn’t in the position to judge, but some of them… the majority of them were not mindful of their actions, nor they seemed to be careful with their own trash. The messes left behind on different parts of the street weren’t as current yesterday, so why today the students were throwing their trash in such uncaring manner? There were plenty of trashcans strategically placed around.

“Bah! This is the third bag of chips that we find here again!” Grim cried as he indicated Yuu where the offending object was, “all of these guys are slobs.”

With a simple squat, and a quick pinch of her gloved fingers (great courtesy of the same closet in Ramshackle) Yuu grabbed the empty bag, and threw it in the garbage can that she was guiding around. At least the Headmaster was strangely fond of devices with wheels because the amount of garbage that was accumulating as people walked around was concerning.

“Henchman, there is pile of soda cans over there. How can these sleaze bags can attend here, and not me?!? These humans are so disgusting.” Yuu grabbed her broom, and slowly pushed the pile towards the garbage can.

Grim moved his cute legs to search for anything else while grumbled about how this job was horrible under his breath, Yuu thought about the state of the dorm to distract herself as she threw the soda cans one by one. It was very easy for her to simply slip into a bad state of mind, definitely not thinking about her home, or recounting the void inside her stomach which grew more if she thought about it. Maybe that was what Feirdhris was talking about when they said empty? Her stoma–

An unexpected thundering metal bang scared her soul out of her body, and made Grim jump. It was so loud, and so painful that Yuu covered her ears with her wrists. The sound kept jumping inside her head, all overpowering every thought she was trying to have.

It hurts! It hurts! It hurts!

Her wrists pressed against her ears more, and more. Yet, it wasn’t enough for Yuu, she kept trying to open her eyes, and only saw brief flashes of Grim. Stop it, control yourself! Were the only words Yuu repeated to herself without noticing how she was sinking to the floor. When her knees touched the ground, Yuu couldn’t see anything since her tears were blocking anywhere she looked.

Pain suddenly invaded her forearm, and Yuu snapped out of her panicking state. She cleaned her tears with her other forearm, and looked to the source of the pain. Grim was holding her with his sharp teeth with a worried look on his little face. Yuu slowly petted the cat monster to tell him that she was alright, and he did let go of her forearm, but after that he voiced his opinion.

“Henchman you have to be stronger! What is going to happen if the Great Grim isn’t–”

The voice of stranger interrupted the moment.

“Ho my… look at all of this trash thrown on the floor.”

“What a disappointing surprise to see how an academy as prestigious as NRC doesn’t meet a normal standard of cleanliness.” A second laughed.

“Fret not my dear friends, look over there! The new janitor is here to clearly fix this mess up.” A third voice said in fake panic tone.

Yuu looked at the source of the metal bang, still shaking from the sound, and saw three students standing near it. At the sound of new voices Grim’s fur started to rise, and his mouth formed a scowl while he observed the smug demeanor of the three humans. He already had his paws full with his weird henchman and her fretting panic, the greatest magician of all time didn’t need other dumb humans giving them problems!

“What?!” he answered.

“Wow the beast talks, so interesting.” One of the students told while putting his finger at one side of his mouth, “However this situation doesn’t concern you. Oh janitor! It seems that your incompetence made you forget this visible pile of trash, but don’t worry; out of the kindness of our hearts we alerted you of it before the Headmaster could see how useless you are.”

The other two simply laughed at Yuu’s blank expression, and Grim’s growing anger… what they didn’t expect was for Yuu to look down at the pile, and simply stare at it while holding Grim back. She didn’t understand why they would do this, first that one red haired student and now them.

It was still unknown for the girl, but the social dynamics in NRC were truly brutal. Moreover, since Yuu had been presented as the only magic less person on the college’s grounds, all of the students were eager to establish a new pecking order now that a new year had started. Sadly, this meant that Yuu was at the bottom of the barrel despite not even being a student. No dorm, no friends, no acquaintances, nothing.

“What are you looking at janitor? Shouldn’t you start to clean?” the same student who said cruel things to her retorted again, this time with a hint of anger.

… the only thing left to do was clean up. Putting Grim behind her, Yuu grabbed her broom, and simply started to sweep all of the empty snack bags, soda cans, crumpled papers, and weird lumpy food bits that were once inside the garbage can.

All of the three students had the same light purple band tied with some ugly symbol on their right arm, and Grim memorized this detail in case he had the opportunity to get revenge.

There was a weird tension in the atmosphere as the sounds of the broom against the ground, and the soft rustle of the trees were the only things heard. Grim was still looking at the three students with an angry face while Yuu fidgeted a little bit with the sleeve of her own uniform. She didn’t like this tension, it was too unpredictable, and it only made her nervousness rise more as the silence stretched after she was finished with putting the trash inside the can again. Yuu could feel their eyes watching her like she was a weird bug they found, they were judging her on her poor attempt at acting like a normal person.

“… what is wrong with you?”

“Who cares, let’s go.”

Yuu sighed with both relief and resignation as the three boys went away with one last jab, “He is such a loser, maybe the magic mirror is getting old if it brought a magicless nobody to NRC.”   

It wasn’t anything that Yuu was surprised with, not even the insults were new. The only novelty was how they thought that she would be upset at her lack of magic which was weird since logically Yuu had lived all of her life without magic. Although, there was maybe a key detail she was not considering at the moment, but so far it didn’t matter.  

For Yuu, these types of interactions were familiar, it was alright.

For Grim, it was not.

Which ended with Yuu wrestling Grim into her arms, so he couldn’t deliver all of threats he was screaming while yowling at her to let him go. It was something that Yuu shouldn’t do since she was bigger than Grim, and his adrenaline could have been easily turned towards her resulting in bites, scratches, and now blue fire to take care of. Which she could already feel in her tights as she managed to hug the monster cat.

Strong legs, and claws capable of tearing meat. A very good sign that despite being a feral monster, Grim was healthy.

“Let me go henchman!” he yowled at her while wiggling his body, “The great Grim will beat them, and burn their faces off! Those humans can’t treat me like this, ALL OF THE–”

“I know it feels bad, and that it hurts Grim, but you can’t attack anyone. I already told you, if you hurt any of the students they will tell the Headmaster, and we are going to get kicked out of the college because I’m in charge of you. Then, if we get kicked out I won’t be able to buy you tuna.” Yuu carefully explained as she hugged Grim, not so tight to hurt, but tight enough to make him understand.

In return, the monster cat growled at her comment, without malicious intent. “Whatever you say human. I’m not going to stop… but I do like tuna. Heh, at least you understand that you are now my henchman, so you have to give me everything I want!”

Now it was Yuu’s turn to laugh. It seemed that Grim didn’t know how cute he was, or maybe he knew and that was why he kept acting a little bit bratty. Despite it all, maybe the both of them should make a better effort in their sudden interactions with the students. Not ignore them, but simply not look at them, nor pay attention to their voices. Words previously ingrained in Yuu’s mind resonated with heavy weight, make yourself as small as possible, never respond to any aggression, and remove yourself from the problem. She hasn’t done the last step so maybe that was the problem.

With this in mind, Yuu grabbed Grim by his armpits to hold him at eye level, “A henchman? That really doesn’t sound right. I think butler should be more appro–”

“Well, if you say that Housewarden Schoenheit warned you about over hydration, then I shall get rid of this bottle quickly.” A voice that wasn’t there before said. The sound of a bottle cap opening followed after, clear as a cloudless day.

The cold feeling of a liquid pouring over her head made Yuu clamp her mouth in sudden silence.

…

The only thing that she could see was Grim’s expression going from surprised to a level of anger which she didn’t know cats could do. His big blue eyes reflected so much of his emotions that it was a wonder to see his face contort every time the monster cat said something. It was such beautiful wonder to see. A feeling of something wet fell upon her head, it wasn’t liquid.

“It seems that you missed your target of choice with the water.” A second voice asked the sound of pouring liquid stopped.

“Hmmm, did I?” the other voice responded with a tone of satisfaction. The voices were pretty, really pretty, but they sounded hollow. A pretty outside with a rotted inside. Like a shiny watermelon with its delicious meat ravaged by worms.

After this realization had hit her… what was heard after the moment of silence was the sound of Grim’s fireballs being spit out to two very specific targets, and the screams of the students along with Yuu’s hurried pleads to make the monster cat stop.

-***-

Many shoes were walking through the busy halls. Tennis, dress shoes, boots, sandals, loafers, even some heeled shoes, and many more. Yuu had though how the students were allowed to wear so many different types of shoes when the uniform was standardized, she had only seen students wear anything they wanted in movies. Yet, since this was supposed to be an exclusive college for the magically gifted then maybe the teachers, and disciplinary team were more relaxed with things like shoes. In contrast, the sleek dress shoes of Crowley sounded like warning sirens when he walked, and in unison the sea of students parted to make way to whenever the chatty Headmaster wanted to go.

The same treatment wasn’t extended to her, nor Grim. The cat monster had already given up on trying to follow Yuu through this amount of students without risking getting stepped on, and was now sitting on her back again. On the other hand, Yuu was struggling to follow along the steps of the Headmaster; between him going faster than her, the weight of the cleaning supplies, and the students who didn’t want to move, Yuu was really having a hard time.

More than a hard time, it was overwhelming. There was too much happening at all once, and Yuu was getting dizzy with all of the stimulation coming from every direction, even the cold air of the whole building had started to feel warm. Why couldn’t they wait for all of the students to leave the halls instead of trying to navigate between them?

However, even if Yuu had tried to do that… it was pointless. She was still trying to process how the Headmaster had come to her, and Grim with another task for the day in the weirdest way possible to do it. Now Yuu could tell that she watched a grown man jump out from the highest window of a church like building then gracefully land on his feet as his cape moved in an odd wing like manner. Poor Grim had almost jumped out of his own skin when he saw that, and Yuu was sure that she froze for a moment.

After not having time to recover from the whole experience Yuu was simply grabbed by the shoulder, and guided into the main building while the Headmaster rambled about something along with Grim tailing behind both. It took a good amount of time, and the fearful words “Sometimes I feel that Divus just wants to whip me,” to shake Yuu out of her shock. Moreover, it happened exactly when they were going just starting to enter the multitude of students. Which was not fun at all.

Before Yuu could think of anything else, Crowley suddenly stopped, and exclaimed, “And here we are, the Hall of Mirrors!”

It seemed that she got too deep inside her head again if the three of them had already arrived to the destined location.

The hall where the three of them were standing was filled with mirrors. Seven big, and hazy mirrors with very different decorations around them, along with a weird dissonance carried by each. Between the cards and the roses, the animal bones and the torches, the tentacles, the snakes and the sand, the peacock, the columns, and the dragon wings; none of them looked like they belonged in the same room.

“This is one of the most important places in our prestigious college.” Then with a dramatic turn, the Headmaster faced them and started to explain their function with pride, “All of these mirrors are the gateway to our amazing dorms, and a marvel of magic engineering. Normally, each of these mirrors would need an individual Magestone to function, but thanks to our talented fourth year students, we only need a single one to power everything. The mirrors are so attuned with the main Magestone that even magicless people like you can use them! It’s practically our pride as an academic institution to have these wonderful gates, and of course to have one of the biggest Magestones in all of Twisted Wonderland.”  

Crowley then pointed towards the start of the ceiling, and both Yuu and Grim moved their heads to look. Embed, and framed in the inner wall like a picture they saw a bright gem shining like a small rainbow. It was very pretty, and it looked weirdly… alive? Yuu noticed that the small bursts of light followed a pattern, like a heartbeat. Then, in the inside of the frame there were copper looking tubes that spawned from it like a plant, and the seven of them went directly into each of the mirrors.  

“Oooh! It’s so shiny and pretty!” Grim exclaimed as his pupils expanded to take more light.

“Indeed it is, and very expensive too.” The Headmaster put a clawed hand on his chest as he puffed up in vanity, “Not to brag, but for hundreds of years that same Magestone has maintained its power without problems. It’s almost a miracle that is here since NRC had to pay a lot for it, but at end cutting the art classes budg–  I mean! I mean! Carefully balancing the budget of the college was worth it at the end.”

Yuu then raised her hand, and Crowley asked, “Yes young Yuu?”

“I have a question,” she waited for the Headmaster to signal her to speak, “Why is the Magestone uncovered? Was someone cleaning it before we got here?”

What answered her was Crowley’s laughter, “Ha ha ha, no! there is no need to cover it. Every single student here knows that they would be immediately expelled if the Magestone was an inch out of place. After all, it is the only way to access the dorms.”

That didn’t sound very safe to be honest. Yuu watched the Magestone beat again in its frame, and saw how easy it would be to throw something at it with the purpose of breaking it. Even if it was inside the wall itself and held by all of those tubes, a huge chunk of the stone was still visible.

“I bet I could climb up there,” Grim boldly declared to the Headmaster, “and watch it very closely.”

“If you try do that monster I will zap you out of here into a lake.” Crowley replied with the same cold smile that Yuu saw before at Ramshackle dorm.

“Headmaster,” she called out before something could break out, “What are we supposed to clean here?”

Snapped out of the staring contest with Grim, Crowley responded, “You two will be cleaning the entire Hall of Mirrors. Make sure to polish these mirrors until they shine! Now, if you excuse me I need to catch on some drama shows, SOME RESEARCH! I need to catch on some research regarding your arrival to this dimension. Goodbye!”

With a hurried gesture of his hand Crowley left them alone again. Yuu observed the sky through the high barred windows of the Hall, morning still without the warm feeling of the multitude. So devoid of people that she could hear every step she took, it felt a little creepy. This emptiness wasn’t like the emptiness in Ramshackle, it was more… dreadful; Grim was approaching one of the mirrors with curiosity, so it would be better for her to start with that one. Grabbing her janitor basket Yuu followed the monster cat to the mirror with the cards, and the red roses.

The emblem on top was a divided heart with a tiny crown, it read Heartslabyul.

“Look at this Mirror! It got giant cards, and mushrooms. Mmh, I wonder if I can eat them” Grim said after walking the tiny stairs that led to it, and started to pawn at the mushrooms growing on the bottom of the mirror.

“Please don’t eat those. All mushrooms may look edible, but a lot of them are poisonous to the point of death Grim.” Yuu told him as she grabbed a rag to start to clean.

“Don’t worry henchman I am very sturdy. A simple mushroom won’t take me out.”

Instead of answering, Yuu simply picked Grim up and moved him behind her. This gave some wiggle attempts of release, but at the end Grim simply sat down with a sigh to lay on the stair floor as limply as a lazy cat. Such cute pose was enough boost for Yuu to start to clean the Mirror from top to bottom. It was an easy task since it wasn’t that dirty, but at the end the cards and roses had a new shine on them, now looking more like silver rather than stone.

There was a detail that Yuu couldn’t let go as she walked to the next one. Every time her hand had directly touched the surface of the Mirror the entire thing had rippled like water, and stopped reflecting anything. When the Headmaster had said that these were gates, Yuu had thought that the mirrors opened like gates, that there was a secret doorknob to grab, or a lock to open… maybe she had thought wrong again.

As Yuu was carefully cleaning the snakes of the fourth mirror, Grim unexpectedly pawed at her ankle, “This is so boring! Henchman I need to do something or I will die.”

“You can grab another rag, and help me.” She replied with a smile after squatting down to the monster cat’s height.

“No way, I’m already beaten down from the morning.” Grim said while grabbing a bitten apple that was at side, “making me wipe the inside of the chimney like I’m a mop.”

“Where did you get that red apple?”

Before answering he took a huge bite from it, “Hmm? I went to the heart Mirror, walked a little bit, and I grabbed this baby from a table with snacks. It’s so juicy and tasty! The perfect balance between sweet and sour.”

“Did you stole the apple from someone Grim?!” as cute as the eating display was, Yuu knew that it was the opposite of not getting in trouble!

“NO! I did not! The table was alone, and there was no one around to take it. So I took it, my tummy craves food right now.”

Well... that was how cat’s logic operated with basically everything. Food was fair game as long as it doesn’t have a clear, and present owner… it made sense from Grim’s perspective to simply grab the apple because he wouldn’t have the concept of leaving property unattended. However, Yuu couldn’t say that to him, nor forgive that he stole from a dorm. The consequences for this would have been horrible if a student had seen him.

 “Grim, listen to me,” Yuu said with intent, “I know that you get very hungry, but you will have to maintain your actions in line; we have to live with other people, and you can’t steal food just because is unattended. It’s not an if, it’s a fact.”

“Mmmmh, what if someone leaves their food then I grab it after?” the monster cat inquired while holding what was left of the apple.

“If you do that then I wouldn’t have tuna for you since the Headmaster wouldn’t give me enough money.”

“What?! Mmmmm… grrrrrr, fine!” Grim took another bite, “but I want premium tuna, nothing less!”

Happy that the monster cat understood her Yuu moved to clean the decoration around the mirror. Yet, when Yuu looked at how it was time to change the water from this bucket, it still held up if she stopped force cleaning the crevices of the snakes, but she wasn’t going to risk cleaning the remaining mirrors with dirty water. Where was the bathroom in this building? Could she even leave the Hall without getting lost? Suddenly, an idea appeared on Yuu’s head.

Turning to Grim again, she asked, “Grim do you want to choose an all meat lunch for today?”

“Yes! I’m going to choose that giant pot of meat stew for today! The entire pot!”

“Good, then…” Yuu felt giddy for what she was going to say, “Can you help, and search for a bathroom around here? The water is already getting a little murky, so I need to replace it.”

After that, Yuu couldn’t contain her laughter as she observed how Grim’s happy expression at the prospect of meat fell down into a grumpy scowl, with his ears down. It was so cute to see him change expressions so openly.

“We both are handymen, but since I am doing the hard labor then you should do more light tasks. I have opposable thumbs to carry stuff, so with your cute eyes and nose you can find a bathroom right?” she explained as she grabbed the broom.

 In return, Grim simply started walking away, the turned his head, “Alright, I will go. Don’t try to get in trouble henchman because the Great Grim won’t be here to protect you!”

-***-

Tch, stupid henchman! Sending him away to find some meager bathroom when he was having so much fun exploring the lion Mirror on his own. Yes, it had been incredibly confusing to where to go, and his paws had started to hurt the more he walked on the hot ground, but that didn’t mean Yuu could interrupt his exploration. Well, the least he could do was find the bathroom quicker before some student could play another prank on his henchman.

Grim didn’t understand why everyone around them seemed so aggressive towards Yuu. Even if the human was pathetic, and a pushover most of the time it wasn’t like she was trying to get in trouble with anyone. All of the things done would have been good if Yuu had been cocky, and acting like she was the top predator of the room; a part of him didn’t like this feeling, but she was mostly trying to disappear, as if her being seen was a problem.

Well, Grim thought to himself, that was one thing he will fix once he convinces Crowley to enroll him in NRC. Most powerful, and amazing mages needed assistants to carry their stuff around, and feed them, so Yuu was already doing that on her own! What a great way to start his journey to being the greatest mage of all time.

The monster walked through the hallway smelling each door he passed to see if he could a whiff of human residue, or anything that indicated that a bathroom was behind it. It was getting harder, and harder to see the difference with each door, on top of only finding maybe two in every hallway Grim had passed.

… where was he now?

He stopped walking, and started to look around a bit. Grim… maybe had not been seeing where he was going, but that didn’t mean he was lost! He wasn’t lost, he just got into a detour because he wanted to find that stupid bathroom. The hallway didn’t have many windows, and the ones he had seen were barred with strange metal vines that prevented him from trying to get out.

Some students were now walking through the hallway, but not enough for him to be alert.

Yet there was something that wasn’t right, an instinct inside his head announced that danger was coming. Grim’s ears perked right away as the soft sound of shoes, and a very familiar voice was heard from one side of the hallway.

“Man, rules this, rules that. We don’t need that many in the first place, and who wants to hear a bunch of rules so early in the morning? I got the craziest Housewarden…” he said while reading something on his phone.

The same shitty redhead that tried to push him around on the first day was walking straight towards him. The monster’s body tensed immediately, this one was rude, very rude. He even dared to insult the Great Grim! If it wasn’t for Yuu being there, he would have teared that smug face apart like red thorny vines.

What Grim didn’t notice was how he was too still in the middle of the hallway. Not taking into account how his fur had puffed up, his ears flattened down, and was now attracting the attention of the few students who were crossing the hallway. However, the one causing this turmoil on the monster slowly stopped, and observed around to see from where was coming that strange sensation of hate.

His eyes quickly landed on the grey monster, which looked absolutely furious.

“Huh? Wait… you are that weird raccoon from yesterday,” the boy mentioned before smirking, “Does the little raccoon wants trouble again? And that weird dude is nowhere to be seen. Ha! Looks like you don’t have–”

Before he could finish, Grim exhaled a fireball right into his face. Then, another, and another. To the monster’s dismay the rude human didn’t stay still to be roasted like he deserved, instead he kept dodging his fireballs while complaining about it.

“Hey! watch out!”

Grim spit out another fireball just like he did in Ramshackle with the ghosts.

“Stop doing that–”

A fire wall was breathed into the direction of the redhead, who had started to run away. In return, Grim’s body launched from the spot; with his legs made to run to catch prey, and quickly chased the guy to the point of catching up his speed.

“WAIT!”

His heart was hammering inside his ribcage, and his paws were starting to slip on the sleek floor, but Grim didn’t deter from his objective. Who does this human think he is to insult him? To call him a raccoon? To tell him that his dream of becoming a great mage was stupid? It wasn’t fair that someone with such weak magic talked so much about how he wasn’t talented enough to come. Stupid humans!

Between his rage, and his realization that his blue fire was going to keep being dodged, Grim did the best next thing to stop this dumb redhead. With a simple side, and a quick jump, the monster latched every single one of teeth on the calf of the guy, and bit with all of his might.  

“OW! You damned raccoon, let’s see how you like this!” and the boy kicked the leg that Grim was holding towards a wall.

What Grim felt next was the pain of colliding with pure stone. He didn’t know that walls could be this solid… as he shook his body to get rid of the dizzying sensation, the monster heard steps approaching to where he was. Grim snapped his head to see, and his eyes turned into pin pricks when that same redhead was now looking at him with a very angry expression. The monster started to map a way to escape.

“Ah… ah… so you think you can just get away with this because you are a stupid raccoon? Well you have another thing coming.” The boy snarled as he pulled out some kind of stick with a Magestone attached to it.

Grim waited for the perfect moment to escape, and to humiliate this dumb human…

Everything felt in slow motion as the monster cat observed how the Magestone started to shine red when the boy moved his arm to send an attack. However, Grim was certainly faster than him, so with the other being too concentrated on his spell, Grim prepared his paws to run.

“TAKE THAT!” screamed the redhead as he sent a blast of sharp wind towards the monster.

In that single moment Grim ran away without looking behind. The sound of wind colliding against stone was ignored in favor of getting away as fast as possible from the human. If Grim did everything according to his plans, then Yuu’s willingness to be his shield would come in handy. The monster cat was feeling both giddy, and… nervous? It wasn’t the first time that he felt like this, the thrill of hunting was something that all monsters had, but this time it was different.

What he didn’t expect was the shout that came afterwards.

“HEY YOU RACCOON!”

Grim didn’t turn around to see.

“Get back here right now so I can hit you!”

Instead of stopping, Grim made himself run faster and faster. Now catching on the faint scent of soap left by his henchman he knew where to go. The voice, and attacks of the redhead were becoming fainter while his paws only moved forwards. Always forwards without looking behind no matter what. Yet, what Grim never expected was a second voice, and a new sound of running shoes to join the chase.

“Why are we following this monster again?!?!” a nervous voice surprising asked.

“Are you blind?!?!?! That is the dammed raccoon that almost caused a mess on the ceremony! If we catch it again then the Headmaster will give us something!” the now annoying voice of the redhead ringed through the halls.

“But doesn’t this familiar has its handler?!? The boy that fought with Housewarden Rosehearts!” the other voice was now matching the volume of the other, which only meant that both of them were screaming at each other.

the monster cat evaded a sudden blast of wind thrown at his side. “Fgnyaaa!”

Another turn to the left, and the smell of chemicals plus Yuu became stronger, a little bit more and Grim would be at the arms of his henchman.

“Dude you saw him! Do you think someone that looks so weak and pathetic would ever get this thing to obey him? We need to trap it with something!” and this time, an orange fireball; a mockery of his precious blue fire, was thrown at Grim with no accuracy.

“W- with what?! A pitfall? Or make the floor slippery? Maybe stop his limbs? Uhhhh…”

“Use your pen, and do whatever spell you want! The point is stopping that raccoon so I can give it a lesson!” the redhead screamed in a more agitated voice.

“Whatever?! Okay, okay. I summon thee… CAULDRON!”

A giant cauldron suddenly appeared, and almost squished Grim flat. By his whiskers he saved himself. An annoying laugh was heard behind him, and with more orders for throwing spells, Grim kept running.

Finally, finally after three cauldrons, and many spells being flung at him without victory thanks to his reflexes, Grim was finally in the same hallway that directed towards the Hall of Mirrors. Those two were getting too close to him if their ragged breaths indicated something. Another hurried steps, and there was his henchman! Yuu was simply so unaware of his problems, simply sweeping dirt with a broom. So Grim decided to get her attention in the best way possible.

“HENCHMAAAAAN, THEY WANT TO HURT ME!” he screamed with all of his might.

What happened next surprised Grim. Yuu’s eyes; that were so hollow to the point of looking like a void, quickly steeled with resolve, and as the blue haired guy tried to run towards him… his henchman swung the stick of the broom right into the guy’s chest. The sound produced was dry, and painful, on the top of leaving the blue haired coughing on the floor.

Grim was speechless, and so was the redhead.

“Dude what the hell?!?!” the boy exclaimed while he wildly pointed his finger towards Yuu, as the grip on his pen tightened.

Yuu now moved in front of him in a gesture of protection, “Leave Grim alone! We are cleaning here. Go away!”

In return, the redhead’s face morphed into a cruel smirk, “Oh now you want to play hero huh? Where was that courage when you slithered like a worm in between the statues? Lucky for you, magicless janitor, I will just only take that raccoon, and make the Headmaster kick it out here forever.”

Yet, before he could do fling any spells at Grim, Yuu immediately threw herself on him.

It was a bizarre vision for the monster cat, the same puny human who made themselves smaller if anyone breathed in her direction was now reaching for the magical pen with the fury of an enraged beast. It didn’t matter if the other human was trying to push her off, or hitting her, his henchman kept climbing to grab the pen.

At some point she grabbed a handful of red hair, and started to pull down while the guy started to scream in pain. However, with the first scream the other guy jumped from the floor, and was trying to separate them.

“Let him go please! We are sorry for scaring your familiar, we didn’t mean to do it!” the blue haired one exclaimed with increasing worry.

However, something changed in the atmosphere, and Grim’s instincts were suddenly alert. With his own eyes, he saw how in between the forced pulls, the redhead managed to free both himself, and Yuu from the other boy’s grasp. And, with a violent move of his magical pen send a strong gust of wind that not only lifted Yuu from the ground, but sent flying towards the ceiling.

And directly towards the giant Magestone.

Despite being the early afternoon, the second the sound of breaking glass was heard, the whole Hall of Mirrors fell into a light darkness.

Grim, and the other two boys could only helplessly watch as his henchman didn’t even make a sound after being flung directly into the pointy thing.

A second, and an eternity passed, then the wet sound of meat, and bones collided with the marble floor.

“YUU!”

The monster ran towards his henchman, who was not moving. Yet the first thing he noticed after getting close to her was how most the shards of the Magestone hadn’t stopped shining even if they were buried in Yuu’s back. The pungent smell of blood hit Grim’s nose as he watched the back of the uniform turn into a darker, brown color. His henchman was bleeding. Yuu was bleeding because that Magestone had broken inside her back when she hit it.  

“… im… Grim.” Yuu said while weakly trying to pat the floor. The monster immediately moved towards her, and put his paws on one side of her head.

“Henchman what do I do?! Those stupid guys flung you to–”

Then, she slowly lifted herself up “Grim… a– are you… okay?”

The sight of Yuu’s trembling face rendered Grim speechless.

He didn’t know where to look because everywhere looked worse. There were horrible bruises under both of her eyes as tears cascaded from them like crazy, her nose was bleeding… a lot, it made a horrible sound every time Yuu breathed, and it was slowly turning into an angry red color. The black hair that was carefully brushed was now in a mess, and her mouth was also bleeding with the blood staining her upper teeth. Yuu had tried to get on her feet, but her arms were trembling a lot.

Two shadows were moving at the corner of his eyes, so Grim turned around, and hissed at the two humans who made this mess. However, both of them didn’t pay attention to him since their eyes were horrifically fixated on Yuu’s back. One of them even choked a weird sound on his throat.

“Is that… blood?” the redhead asked as his face grew paler.

“Yes it is.” The blue haired responded with fear.  

An edging, nervous laugh escaped from the former, “Ha! Ah… well… time to get out of here.”

Yet before the redhead could escape, the blue haired guy stopped him with a firm grasp on the back of his uniform.

“No, we need to get him to the nurse’s office.”

“That’s a great idea Juice! Then, you can go and- AGH! Dude!” the redhead said as he struggled to get free.

“WE need to help him because thanks to your fucking obsession with chasing his familiar… we caused this.” Juice? Said with solemnity as his grip tightened.

“Hey listen! How was I supposed to know that his direction was towards the Magestone?! I just threw him! If you think about it’s his fault that he bashed directly in it!”

Instead of answering, Juice looked at the other with cold fury. Which apparently worked since the redhead stopped struggling, and was now looking everywhere except at Yuu. After a few looks, and a mental conversation Grim didn’t understand, the two of them moved towards to Yuu with the intention of grabbing her. Immediately Grim put himself between them, with every intention of not letting harm his henchman.

Juice kneeled, then told him, “Please let us help him, I know that you want to protect him, but this is something you can’t fix with raw magic. You can come with us too.”

He didn’t like this at all, but Grim didn’t have other options. So, he observed how both Juice and redhead carefully peeled Yuu from the floor; who was surprisingly still awake, and put her on the back of the latter. Then, with a “come here” move of hand, the three of them were rapidly moving to whenever the nurse office was as silently as possible.

If Grim sensed the dark magic of the Headmaster suddenly appear, flutter, and spark in rage behind him as they left the now powerless Hall of Mirrors, then that was something he wasn’t going to say. Let these dumb students take his henchman to get help while he prepared himself to say everything that happened… in a way that would make him, and Yuu look blameless.

Chapter Text

There was something weird with pain. It is described as a highly unpleasant physical sensation which is caused by physical injuries, or body illnesses. Everyone felt pain, it was something normal, something human. Since stepping a foot into the world, and taking it back everyone felt pain. 

However, to Yuu, pain had always felt like an intruder. Every time she was in pain it felt wrong, for both her body and her mind. No matter when, nor how many times it happened Yuu had always reacted like it was the first time she knew pain. A disconnection between her own body, and trying to make sense of what was happening; like reading how lady Macbeth kept trying to wash her hands of blood that wasn’t there.

Burning her fingers on an accidental grab of a hot pot, and simply staring at the reddening skin while they throbbed in pain. Pulling her milk teeth, and feeling the hole on her gums, then simply going to her mom and say “my tooth fell.” Smashing her arms on a thorny plant because somehow her brain thought that the solution for the uncomfortable sensations beneath her skin was letting it out there, then seeing the blood flow through the cuts while her eyes filled with tears.

Pain was both familiar, and unfamiliar.

And coming to Twisted Wonderland didn’t change that. What changed was the magnitude of the pain, and the gravity of the injury. Yuu didn’t know, oh god she didn’t know, that trying to protect Grim from guys who wanted to hurt him would result in this. It was an error of the moment, a flare in her emotions as she saw the poor monster cat run to her with a plead on his tiny mouth.

It was a mistake to try to fight these boys who had magic while she did not. Her whole body felt like it was slowly separating itself from her skeleton. This was supposed to be pain, but for Yuu it felt like torture.

The shards embed on Yuu’s back confirmed her suspicions about the Magestone, and how it worked, it was indeed like a heart. With every beat, every breath, every trickle of her blood Yuu felt all of the prickly shards do… something on her back. She didn’t know what it was, nor why they were acting like this since shards were not only objects, but broken parts of objects; still Yuu felt how all of them somehow synched with her rapid heartbeat the more they stayed inside her body.

No matter how much Yuu had tried to distract herself to stop feeling nothing was working. It didn’t matter how careful the two boys tried to be, they still slipped from time to time, and held her without much care. All of the corridors felt endless, and the only thing that Yuu could hear inside her pounding head were the sounds of their shoes against the floor, and the hushed voices trying to decipher how to get out of this maze.

“Wait, was this the correct hallway?” a voice asked in increased incredulity, “I thought that the infirmary would be here…”

“What?! This is the third time you said that! Do you even know where the nurse’s office is?!?! He is not two grapes of weight you know, and his nose is staining my blazer!” another voice answered while shifting her body once again.

“Shut it! You have to carry him because YOU threw him! And stop moving him so much, you are going to make his wounds worse.” A hand grabbed Yuu’s shoulder to stabilize her.

“Then try to remember where it is! Also… why do you even know where the infirmary is? That is so weird–”

“I–it doesn’t matter! Just follow me, and then we–”

“AAAAAAAAH! YOU TWO ARE SO DUMB!” Grim suddenly screamed, “None of you smell it?!? We have passed a room that smells like blood three times!”

His little shriek of indignation was music to Yuu’s ears. It was something so cute, yet so chilling for her. Huh, maybe it was her imagination, but she was suddenly feeling… cold, the pain was still there somehow, but her feet were feeling very cold despite the boots, and the socks. Voices around Yuu kept talking, and talking, but the little nagging feeling of voicing her thoughts about Grim kept floating inside her skull.  

“G-grim… you a-are so cute…” she didn’t know why, but she needed to say it for him to know.

An uncomfortable silence stretched after Yuu had talked, and the hand that was holding her was now just resting on top of her shoulder.

“… We need to get him to the nurse office fast.” One of the voices said with increasing worry.

Then, everything moved again. With more hurried steps, and the sound of shoes clicking on the hallway. Yuu didn’t dare to look anywhere, yet she couldn’t close her eyes because it would be more uncomfortable to close them while being awake, so for the best Yuu only focused her eyes on the back of the head of the guy who harmed her. The hair seemed soft, clean, and despite looking a little wild it was well kept, even the red had an orange tint that looked very charming. Normally boys wouldn’t take much care for their hair, but maybe here was different. So far, Yuu’s nose was well rested from any unpleasant smells besides the trash.

Suddenly they halted their walk so strongly that Yuu had to hold herself a little bit, the redhead’s response was a sound of surprise, and a readjustment of her legs on his hands. This time Yuu looked up, and saw the medium white sign at one side of the giant door, it read with big, and bold black letters the fated words of “Infirmary.” The door also had on top a laminated picture that read “Knock first before entering.”

A huge sigh that went for far too much time was resealed by the guys, and Grim. Even if her face didn’t change, Yuu felt relieved to be there. She didn’t want to feel all of the shards digging inside her back, and her precious blood escape from her body. It was becoming more, and more difficult to think about anything else to distract herself from the deep, beating pain.

“Thanks the seven we are finally here,” the guy with the spade drawing on the side of his eye expressed, “I thought we would never find it.”

“No thanks to you thought.” The redhead commented after calming down his breathing.

“Mnh! You two are really stupid, the great Grim already knew where this was.” The monster cat added to close down the short conversation. Then, none of them made a move to knock on the door.

… Yuu’s back was starting to feel numb.

A few beats of silence passed until finally the spade boy closed his eyes, and knocked once… there was no response, he knocked twice this time… nothing. With his trembling hand he knocked more forcefully three times, and nothing again.

“Ah fuck it.” The redhead exclaimed before simply grabbing the doorknob, twisting, and opening it. Finally, after going in many directions around the building, they were finally inside the nurse’s office.

What received Yuu’s eyes were three rows of pristine white sheeted beds separated with those curtain like dividers, barred windows without curtains to let the light of the sun enter, a big closet filled with many unidentified stuff inside resting on the last wall, and surprisingly tiny dressers with candles on top. The whole room was far too cozier to be an infirmary, but the ever present cold smell of hospital permeated it, so it must be the correct room.   

Unexpectedly, within the smell of antiseptic, cold metal, and sterilized cotton there was a weird smell… a burning floral scent mixed with smoke. It smelled like the types of herbs her grandmother’s friend burned on the room of her cousin’s baby. Yuu inhaled through her painful nose as she suddenly remembered.

It was done in secret since her cousin was skeptical of whatever grandma had told her, but Yuu knew. While eating some sweet bread she looked how the elderly woman – whose entire head was weirdly covered with an inky substance – waived a bundle of half burned herbs around the room to let the smoke into the walls while reciting prayer after prayer heard in their church, then she put a pair of open scissors with the sharp edge pointing towards the feet of the tiny crib. The little green pillow of the baby was rested on top of it afterwards. Finished, the old woman turned her head towards Yuu while drops of black splatted down the floor, and told her something that she will never forget.

Witches are very active in this time of the year, and this little angel isn’t baptized yet. The least we can do to protect him is this dear.

Yuu was perplexed, if this was the infirmary, then why did it smelled like a limpia made in a hospital?   

At least the answer to that question was given to Yuu almost instantly when her eyes landed on who seemed to be the nurse. An older man was sitting behind an organized desk with a pose that indicated surprise; his long, curly, and puffy black hair gave him a very warm appearance that clashed with the deep blood red shirt he was wearing, and the golden triangles on his ears. On top of this ensemble he wore a simple white nurse coat that was as clean as the rest of the infirmary, indicating that no one had visited it yet. What was the most surprising thing out of all was mostly the lit cigarette held in a strange short holder…

The nurse was smoking a cigarette that smelled like a limpia inside what was supposed to be the infirmary.

Without caring for any kind of manners, Grim spoke up high and loud, “Hey nurse guy! My henchman needs to get patched up! And do it quickly so I can climb his back.”

However, it seemed that their entrance to the office only had caused something else. Yuu may not know a lot about subtle social clues, but she knew that when someone released a disappointed sigh while putting their head between their arms was a sign of not wanting to deal with whatever was in front of them. The four of them stood awkwardly, and silently until the nurse moved his head to look up to the ceiling, then finally at them.

“Haaaaa, and my morning was going so well. Now three brats and a rat have come to give me a headache” the nurse said with a low annoyed tone then laughed, “Hahaha! I’m just teasing don’t worry. Now, what do you all need? Quickly.”

The redhead started to talk in a very low tone, “Uuuuh, well… you see…”

“It is a really normal story hah…” the spade guy told despite his nervousness betraying his voice.

The two boys started to mumble apologies, excuses, and reasons of why they were there with overlapping voices while Yuu watched everything else. She didn’t really care about whatever story they were weaving since the shards of her back were more important, so Yuu tried to slowly tap the redhead’s shoulder to catch his attention. What she actually did was slap her hand on his shoulder since her limbs couldn’t quite obey her, which made the four beings in the room put their eyes on her. The nurse only raised a single eyebrow before talking again.

“First, I despise mumbling, it’s just senseless babble that I can’t stand,” the nurse waved his hand around before pointing a finger towards them, “now are you two going to stand there like growing trees, or are you going to put your hurt classmate on one of the beds?”

The nurse annoyingly motioned with a hand towards one of the nearest beds besides the desk, one that had an open curtain around it instead of a divider, then simply looked down at the book Yuu hadn’t noticed earlier. At his order, the redhead carefully walked towards the bed, and turned around to slowly place her on top it. Yuu felt herself bounce a little bit after being placed, then the sensation of starting to fall on her back… a hand steadied her right shoulder, and another grabbed her head.

She forced herself to open her eyes a little bit, and the only thing she saw were two red eyes focused only on hers. Yuu immediately felt her emotions rise, the boy who had threw her had not left her. He was looking directly into her eyes, and Yuu tried to look at everything else around her, but he was still holding his gaze. His other hand moved to rest on her left shoulder, now he had trapped her, so what was left – because Yuu really didn’t want to see him – was drop her head.

“Not a single word of this to the nurse,” he said to her in rushed hushes, “it sounds unfair, but life is never fair to losers, you wouldn’t want to involve the Heartslabyul Housewarden in this do you? Because that would be–”

The sound of clicking shoes was heard, and a shadow was now in front of them. “Scram, no peepers in my work space. That includes the rat”

The boy laughed, and said something to the nurse before leaving, and Yuu didn’t look up. Then, Grim’s yowls were heard through the whole room, which indicated that those two were handling wrong, or simply trying to touch him. The characteristic sound of a curtain being pulled suddenly muffled everything around, and the only thing left was the sound of Yuu’s heart beating inside her ears.

“Ugh annoying brats not knowing how to act… now,” the sound of the rubber glove hitting skin was heard, and Yuu nervously gulped, “we shall see what exactly happened to cause this alright? I don’t want any twists, nor lies to cover up whatever they did because this will get reported to the Headmaster… to his own dismay ha! Lift your head kid.”

And Yuu did exactly that. She cradled her neck up, and the second her eyes finally landed in the middle of the eyes of the nurse, he released a hiss of what seemed to be disgust. Was it that bad? She wasn’t feeling her nose, and her eyes never stopped leaking tears since the other boys peeled off the floor, but Yuu thought a broken nose wasn’t something that important.

With a surprisingly gentle touch, the nurse examined Yuu’s face, “For the Great Seven kid what happened? Did you three tried to fight some Savanaclaw students? Or did you try to pick up a fight with those two, not something that I recommend since you look more like the pitiful secondary boy who dies of exposure in a fairytale. Haha! I’m just teasing you.”

Yuu simply nodded her head at his comments. She didn’t have the strength to respond to anything at the moment, so she simply decided to obey all of the instructions he was telling her while pulling a tiny table towards the bed. An assorted bunch of medical stuff was over it, some things that Yuu didn’t recognize, and others she did. Including something that looked like a white clover leaf, which then… flew away to somewhere outside of the curtain as if it was a butterfly.

“Now,” the nurse said to her, “this might take either a short time, or a long time depending on your own attitude, how is it going to be?”

Her response was another nod, and with a sigh everything started.

The nurse elevated her head a little bit, and told Yuu to breathe through her mouth, then his steady hands started to work. First, cleaning the bloody mess on her face with some kind of antiseptic liquid, second using a wet cotton swab to wipe inside each nostril, both swabs came drenched in blood and mucus. Then, pressing a warm cloth on top of it… it hurt. After that, without taking away the cloth the nurse grabbed a white and round stick, then told her to steady her neck, and not move.

“This might hurt a lot, but understand that I can’t let you leave with such disfigured nose. Well, it would be another thing to worry about on top of that hair, ha!” He said before holding her face with one hand. Then the nurse closed his eyes, and said.

“See Beyond the Petals.”

He opened his eyes again, and golden light shone directly from his eyeballs. Yuu was speechless, utterly speechless. What was even happening? Was this supposed to be magic? The nurse’s pupils were taking the form of a flower, and he was focused only on her nose. He quickly took away the cloth, used his index finger to push down her upper lip, and with needle point precision inserted the stick on her left nostril.

Immediately a sharp pain exploded inside her whole face, and Yuu’s hands grabbed his forearm as tears flew from her eyes like a waterfall. Pitiful whimpers, and tiny screams escaped her.

“Stay still, we are not done yet.” The nurse said while carefully placing a finger on the other side of her nose, and pushed towards the stick. That made more pain flare, and something move inside. More whimpers escaped from Yuu as the nurse’s steel like hands worked like he was accustomed to fix broken noses on a daily basis.

Then, after leaving the stick inside her nose, he pulled one of those magical pens from the pockets of his coat, and made float the little white clover leaf on top of her nose. The thing felt sticky, and hot, the kind of hot which is only acquired by boiling something; as much as Yuu wanted to squirm to get away from the heat… she didn’t. Practical hands vertically pressed the spongy leaf on top of her broken nose, and the sides of it while being ignorant of how another wave of sharp pain invaded Yuu’s face once again.

“Kid I’m going to need you to stop crying so much,” the nurse said before using one of his hands to pad a gauze under her eyes, “the splint is already softened, and your cold tears will only hinder it.”

At the new order, Yuu simply tried to stop her tears from forming again, but it was an almost impossible task. Even after the nurse retrieved his hands from her face, Yuu couldn’t stop sniffing, but a single and seemly disgruntled sound from the nurse made her immediately stop. Then… nothing. The beats of Yuu’s heart tried to keep count of the seconds passing, a new trickle of blood dropping on her back again because she moved, and the nurse taking out his phone from one of his pockets. She didn’t know what was going to happen, so Yuu opted for simply staying still, and quiet.

… before the silence became awkward the nurse put his phone away, and reached for a roll of medical sticky tape, and more gauze. With another cleaning of Yuu’s entire face – or at least the parts not covered by the leaf splint – the nurse carefully cut, and put stripes of medical tape on the top of her nose, and on top of her nostrils. Perfectly securing the splint on her face, and not so gently taking out the stick from Yuu’s nose.

A short whine escaped her mouth, and a new wave of coldness invaded her as she observed how bright red was the blood on the stick. That blood was supposed to be running through her veins.

It was thrown into the trash, and was never seen again. Yuu blinked once, and twice before trying to touch the finalized splint on her face.

Only for the nurse to gently slap away her hand, “Don’t touch it. I already set it up so it doesn’t move.”

Both of her hands moved to grab each other to not let themselves wander so the nurse couldn’t get angry at her, yet there was something that was far more urgent than a simple broken nose… the slow idea of how Yuu was supposed to explain to the nurse about the magical shards inside her back kept moving up, down, and about inside her head. However, before Yuu could ever say something, the nurse started to talk.  

“Listen carefully kid, this splint is going to stay on your nose for two weeks from today, nothing more nor less. Consider yourself lucky that it was only a clean displaced nasal fracture, and not something that would have needed to heal before I could treat it, or worse something that would have put you directly into a hospital.” He said while rearranging the things on the little table, “no wetting the splint, no touching it, nor trying to remove it a week earlier because you think it feels fine, understood?”

Yuu could only reply with a simple nod, and a head move towards the curtain. The sound of a single clap grasped her mind to see the nurse again. The man was now writing something on clipboard while not paying too much attention to her except for maybe a single glance. So now the only thing left was the grandiose injury on her back, which was now suddenly claiming attention by sending a wave of nausea through Yuu’s body. The dizziness combined with the gross feeling of her empty stomach churning in protest was not well received, why was this happening now?

“Now that it is done, do you have any other injury hiding somewhere? I hope not kid; my morning was going very well before you four barged in.” the nurse mentioned as he put his hands on his waist.

Yuu watched the curtains from the corner of her eyes, maybe the two guys had already left… maybe Grim was with them too, so she was probably alone with the nurse right now. No risks of getting in trouble, or even trying to defend what happened. No one would believe her story anyway since it was two people against one, nothing and everything was against her words from a situation that started when Yuu wasn’t even there.

“Kid I don’t have all day, if you have anything else busted please do tell.” The nurse repeated with a harsh tone, and Yuu took a deep breath… and looked up to the nurse’s eyes. Two grey dot received her sight as one of the eyebrows accompanying them raised itself as a response to her action.

Well, it was all or nothing. Either tell everything, or leave with an open wound to rot her within the inside… Yuu turned her head again to see the nurse’s hands, and said in a low voice, “Uhm… I can’t feel my back anymore, can you… examine it?”

“What?” the nurse exclaimed at her weird request, and yet before he could say something else, Yuu finally let herself go forward.

It was an unexpected response, but it was something that she wanted to do since she sat down, Yuu remembered how one time as a smaller child she had mildly cut a useless rope to experiment what she had learned on science class, about tension. The rope finally snapped in two after so many efforts of her weak arms. Tension is the result of the action of two pair of forces pulling at each end of an element like a rope, or a similar shaped object. Now, instead of the rope experiencing tension it was Yuu’s whole being.

It was weirdly liberating to simply try, and ragdoll your own body towards the floor, and a possible second broken nose.

However, the weight of her entire upper body was suddenly supported by the nurse’s entire arm.

“Kid what is wrong with you, do you know that you could ha–” Ah… Yuu once read somewhere that an image could capture thousands of words in one look. It wasn’t something that she agreed with since an image was not enough for her to comprehend sometimes.

However, Yuu could comprehend that the slow raise of the eyebrows, and the pin pricking of the pupils along with the opening of the mouth only to not let any sound out were clues that a person gives to indicate that they were starting to feel scared.

So the nurse was somehow scared.

Her body went completely still after falling down. Yuu didn’t what was going to happen next, but the quick way that the nurse fished out his magical pen, and threw a spell to god knows where was not the answer–

The sudden, and thunderous slam of the infirmary door took her by surprise.

“Hey nurse what gives?!?! Unlock the door we weren’t going anywhere!” the voice of the redhead resonated through the infirmary as a response to the surprise spell. Why was he locking the door? How were those two still inside the infirmary? Yuu thought that they would already be on their way to their classes.

Instead of suddenly answering any of her mental questions, the nurse took out his phone once again, tapped a few things, and started to call someone. The ringing didn’t even have time to start before the person on the other side answered, and somehow before they could even say anything the nurse simply said.

“Crowley, I found them.”

Suddenly the atmosphere of the infirmary became utterly cold.

-***-

The next things that happened were something to remember in Yuu’s mind. After the sudden phone call, the Headmaster simply closed it on his side without uttering a word, and the nurse simply laid her face down on the bed.

“I will be right back kid, do not move, and do not press your nose on the pillow.” Were the last words he said before disappearing behind the curtain with a hurried move. It was weird to feel alone again.

Not really alone because the two guys, Grim, and the nurse were still outside. Yet, the curtain felt like a wall that covered her whole being, something to delay the upcoming disaster to explain why the Magestone was not on its place… Yuu hoped that her and Grim could at least leave with what little money the Headmaster had given them yesterday. she wasn’t stupid, there was nothing to do to delay the inevitable. As the nurse came back with more stuff to put on the table, Grim popped his head in between the curtains, and suddenly jumped right on top of the bed.

“Henchman!” he said while completely ignoring the nurse’s apparent disgusted noises, “what happened? Why do you still have those things on your back? You are a useless nurse! You wasted all of time doing nothing while my henchman was losing blood?!”

Instead of answering to the monster cat, he talked to her, “Can you tell your familiar that he can’t be here while I try to remove that mess on your back?”

“What?! I’m not their familiar, and I’m not leaving my henchman alone with any of you!” Grim screamed in return along with puffing up his fur. Yuu was a little speechless to see how he was trying to threaten the nurse into doing what he wanted when he was so small, like a little warrior. However, unlike how the monster cat had wanted, the nurse wasn’t impressed by the feral display.

A hand move pointed towards Grim, “You left him alone just now. Listen monster, I don’t need your fur dirtying the sheets, my materials, nor… his injuries. Do you want him to get an infection on top of all of this blood?”

Grim’s voice got higher as he screamed, “NO!”

“Then I don’t why you try to become a nuisance in my space. Ha! I’m just teasing… get out of here.” As the nurse exclaimed those words with the same weird tone he directed towards the two other guys, the atmosphere suddenly became heavier with something.

Something that warned them how non obedience would be met with punishment. Yuu tried to slightly move her head to see Grim, but a sudden jolt of pain stopped her endeavors. Why was her back hurting so much now when she had felt almost nothing before? It was nonsensical. Yuu’s mind tried to make sense of the change, but the only thing she could think about was how her back hurt more, and more. Before she could even notice it, Yuu’s hands started to shake, and her breath started to become frantic.

“Ugh, his brain is finally processing what happened to his body. Get out of here monster, we don’t know what kind of reaction he will have,” the nurse’s voice rang through her head, “and I’m serious about it, last thing I need is someone flooding the infirmary with their Unique Magic again.”

Surprisingly, Grim obeyed the nurse with a huff. With a last look at her, and a tilted head move, he jumped down the bed to the floor then trotted towards the curtains. The monster cat was clearly displeased at being told what to do when he didn’t want to, but Yuu knew that his self-preservation was stronger than whatever he was feeling at the moment. There was no malicious intent behind it, just cat instincts.

When the last part of Grim’s forked tail disappeared from behind the curtains, the nurse released a sigh, and turned towards her, the snapping sound of rubber hitting skin was once again heard. A new pair of gloves for a new injury. The sound grounded Yuu’s brain into reality once again as the pain started to get worse.

“Shall we get started again kid?” the nurse said, and Yuu could only nod once again.

Although, something new presented itself this time. The nurse procured a strange lollipop from a small cooler on the table, and quietly pressed it on Yuu’s lips. Yet, as much as Yuu wanted to just keep following orders without a care, she couldn’t just let anyone feed her something so strange. The lollipop itself was shining in a sheer blueish gray color while tiny green specks were eternally floating inside of it. At the end of the stick there was a little note with words Yuu couldn’t read at the moment, and whole thing was utterly cold.

“Don’t tell me that you are one of those picky old mages that don’t trust new equipment,” he sighed like he had expected this, “these little things are exactly like a potion brat, just faster and more concentrated. If you want to take a potion, and wait while your blood rots be my guest, just don’t come here whining about pain inside your back afterwards.”

“No, I just… what is it?” Yuu asked in a whisper.

The nurse’s face shifts once again, “This is just an anesthetic combined with an analgesic to numb your body from the neck down. I seriously need to take out everything inside your back quickly, and the risk of you simply vomiting the potion is greater than before.”

Yuu’s only response to his reasoning was to simply take the lollipop, and endure the harsh chemical taste of it while the nurse grabbed a pair of scissors from the table.     

What came next transformed itself into a blur of colors, and sounds as the effects of the lollipop began to infiltrate on Yuu’s system the second it started to dissolve. She only noticed when things were happening around her when they had already happened. Cutting up the entire back section of her uniform to gain access to the shards, peeling the now ruined fabric, cleaning the area, and taking out the little cracks that shined like a rainbow while bathed in red; all of the process felt like had already passed, and that it was still at the same time. 

Little sounds of the shards falling into a metal bowl were softly ringing inside Yuu’s ears, a delicate sound that was lulling her into a restless sleep. She didn’t know how much time had passed, or how many shards were left, yet before Yuu could continue her train of thoughts, the nurse spoke again.

“You are very lucky kid. None of the shards so far had made it deep enough to gouge any of your organs. However, we might have run into a tiny… complication of sorts. Well, for you, not for me.” The nurse said as Yuu somehow felt the thongs insert themselves deeper on her back.

However, this time the instrument didn’t leave clean like the other, and Yuu could only hold on the lollipop as the phantom sensation of what she could describe as loosening the shard made itself home. It felt like removing a very stubborn tooth except that it wasn’t a milk tooth on her gums, and it filled her mind with pure dread.

“Wow this one is really stuck,” another tug inside her skin, “I had heard about Magestones being used as buffers, but this one is just ridiculous.”   

The sensation was wrong, even with Yuu didn’t feel any pain. Her hands felt weak, and she couldn’t focus her eyes on a single thing as her vision became blurrier the more she thought about what the nurse had said. Stuck? Why would it be stuck like that? It was a magical stone intruding her body, not in reverse. It was unnatural, it was–

A gross squelching sound interrupted the silence as what Yuu could only assume was the final tug to get the shard out of her back. Her jaw snapped shut, almost forcing the stick of the lollipop inbetween her teeth. Yuu couldn’t talk, not even a sound could escape from her mouth as she tried to concentrate in not to panic, nor move.

Unlike Yuu, the nurse could talk, “Finally! This thing did not want to let go… good thing that it was almost fused with your skin, look at the size of this chunk. Imagine if this had ever moved deeper, your lungs would have been badly damaged.”

Deep red, and crystal rainbow invaded Yuu’s view after the nurse stopped speaking. The shard was fractured, and had a pointy end that dripped blood, it looked both beautiful and violent. It was not as big as she though, but what the nurse said was true, if the shard had pierced even a little bit more, it would have been a trip to the hospital. How could something so small do that much? It wasn’t like she had accidentally stepped on a glass bottle while barefoot in the middle of the dawn... where did that come from? Yuu’s memories were so fuzzy since she got out of that coffin.

The passages and holes in between what could be core recalls of her past before ending up on a hospital bed in another world were troubling Yuu the more she tried to remember something more consistent than a desperate feeling, or a fleeting image. Something, please something; a name or a face, something more than the brush of the hot wind on the afternoon while sitting on a front yard in a plastic chair to watch the orange sun go down.

“Huh? why is this one more bloodied than the others? Kid are you using a spell to feed off what is left on the stone?” the nurse asked to a now more unresponsive Yuu.

Something, please anything.

Yet, before Yuu tried to delve into what was now the flowing sands of her mind as the nurse’s words were ignored by her ears, the bang produced by the infirmary door being violently opened interrupted her. Screams of surprise, and Grim’s high pitched yowl did not hold a candle to the scream given by the Headmaster.  

“GORAN! WHERE IS IT?!?”

“Headmaster! I can explain!” The redhead shouted in an attempt at catching the attention of the nervous crow, but it was futile as the man went directly towards the covered bed, and threw the curtains wide open.

In response of the sudden action, both Yuu and the nurse – named Goran – froze in place. However, unlike Yuu, the nurse only stared at Crowley in rage while the headmaster stopped himself from almost crashing against the other man. The ruffled feathered coat moved in tune of the headmaster’s emotions, and in the bottomless dark pit of his mask, two bright yellow lights stammered to look at the nurse as he extended his arms in a hurry.

“WHERE IS THE–” the nurse only response was to drop the shard on the clawed hand, “… magestone.”

No sound came from Crowley as he watched how the shard mildly stained his gloves with blood.

“Goran Schatten… are you trying to pull a joke on me? Are you, and young Yuu conspiring to tear my mind apart right now?” the headmaster whispered without looking up.

“You always love to fill the air with nonsense Crowley. Look at the kid, do you really think that he is capable of anything?” the nurse told, then pointed towards Yuu.

Still frozen, Yuu could only watch as the headmaster directed his eyes to the bed. She couldn’t physically stand up to greet him properly, but at least she could do it verbally. Swallowing the disgusting mix between saliva, and the melted syrup of the lollipop, Yuu slowly moved her mouth to slowly get the lollipop in place, and softly spat out the blasted thing attacking her nerves.

“Good… good afternoon headmaster.” Yuu tried to say as loud as possible before the nurse simply grabbed the lollipop on the pillow, then put it in her mouth again.

Yet, apparently Crowley didn’t like her tone of voice since he responded with a choked squeak while he moved closer to the bed. Everything felt tense as he observed Yuu’s back with a strange look on his face, was he trying to make sense out of the destruction of the Magestone by only using her injury? That was a weird way to assess any situation given that the injury was the result of the problem, but not the cause.

“Are all of those shards the Magestone?” Crowley asked the nurse, and finally tearing his gaze from Yuu to the table where the little metal plate was with the sacrificed stone.

“Yep, almost all of them. The kid still has some left on his back, and those will need a little bit of force since they are dying to fuse within his magic system, or maybe just his skin since that one was a battle, and half to loose and pull.” Goran replied while grabbing the thongs again, and getting into position to work.

“Ah ha ha… yeah, his magic system is mostly not there because–”

“WHAT?!” The blue haired boy yelled at the words.

“YOU TWO BROKE MY HENCHMAN!” Grim suddenly screamed after hearing the nurse’s explanation.

The two men stopped talking after one of the boys who were – for some ungodly reason – still in the infirmary screamed in surprise. Yuu tried to move her neck to see who of the two screamed, but she physically couldn’t. It was still unbelievable for her to hear the voice of either of them, more so when the headmaster had paid them zero attention when he stormed the infirmary. A grave mistake that they were probably regretting in that exact moment now that Crowley’s gaze was locked in their presence.

The infirmary stood in silence after the shouting, only the sounds of the shards falling down the plate were what remained. A tense feeling overcame the atmosphere as Crowley walked towards the seats where the three of them were sitting, or maybe standing since Yuu had noticed how every time someone screamed they always jumped if they were sitting. She wanted to see Grim again, the monster cat was now with those two boys under the judging eyes of the Headmaster, and as much as Yuu didn’t want to admit she didn’t trust Grim to give a good explanation.

Or any explanation that could save them both from homelessness.

“Headmaster, I know you are like… really angry right now, but let me explain what happened!” the redhead repeated again, but this time his voice was trembling.

No one responded after he said that.

“Uuh… the reason why everything happened was because that magicless loser and that raccoon attacked us first! We were just trying to kick the monster out again before it could try to do another disaster! And, see? Apparently he just couldn’t live without the stupid furball, and brought it back again without a care!”

In response, Grim puffed up and screamed, “That’s a lie! You are lying because you know you are in the wrong for making fun of the great Grim, and my henchman! You just threw Yuu towards the Magestone because he was kicking your ass!”

“Shut up! Stop deluding yourself with lies raccoon, everything that I said is true! It’s not my problem that you can’t handle the truth.” The redhead shouted to match Grim’s volume.

However, with a single raised hand Crowley made the silence return again. Instead of answering to either of them, he simply showed the bloody shard that he still held in his clawed hand, which made the two boys become more nervous, while Grim’s ears started to droop at the reminder of the gore on Yuu’s back that he had seen at the Hall of Mirrors.

“Do all of you know what is this?” Crowley asked without prompting.

“The… Magestone?” the blue haired one responded, then regretted it.

“We are not stupid Headmaster… it’s the Magestone.” The other one said with still lingering anger.

“Oh, but you two are stupid,” the words startled them both, “and utterly irresponsible TOO!”

“Headmaster I said–”

“BE SILENT!” Crowley’s booming voice shut any kind of rebuttal, “What are your names. Your complete names.”

“Ace… Trappola.” The redhead responded with stubbornness.

“Deuce Spade.” The blue haired one said with sadness.

Crowley looked at Yuu again, then spoke, “Well, Mr. Trappola and Mr. Spade, let me tell what both of you did in the third day of this new period.”

The nurse had finally gotten out all of the shards, which he showed Yuu. Then, he grabbed a curved needle, and blue thread with other type of thongs. Yuu already knew what was going to happen, yet her fear still grew as she watched Mr. Goran prepare to take sutures. It was going to be fine.  

“Trappola, you used magic against a non magical civilian – which is punishable by the disciplinary rules of Night Raven College, and the law of Twisted Wonderland – with the intent of hurting said person. Not only you were successful in your endeavor that ended up causing Yuu grave injuries, but also you are solely responsible for the destruction of the Magestone that connected all dorms to the college itself!” Crowley finished before turning towards who was named Deuce.

A soft sting appeared on Yuu’s skin as the needle sank on one of the injuries. She gripped the lollipop with her front teeth.

“Spade, you helped Trappola in his assault against Yuu that ended up in these horrible injuries. Moreover, according to some students who were present when this situation started you summoned multiple cauldrons that broke the marble floor in the ridiculous attempt at catching Grim, a monster who already has a handler, which you instigated by following Trappola’s commands.”

The lightning of the afternoon reflected on the metal of the needle when the nurse gathered more thread, looking like the claw of cat. Yuu always remembered why curved claws were such amazing feature for cats; they were so useful to climb, and to aid them in catching and holding prey. Mango’s claws were always thicker on her hind legs, they didn’t tear as much, but they always left nasty scars on her tights when she annoyed her on purpose.

“However, Grim!” Crowley startled the monster cat, “You used fire magic to attack a student on a hallway when my explicit rules for you two were to remain in the Hall of Mirrors doing your cleaning duty! And as for young Yuu…”

“Pffft, what Crowley, are you going to scream to the kid who has 20 sutures all over his back?” the nurse laughed as he put the needle back on the table.

“… no?” Goran raised an eyebrow with an amused face to him, “Yes? Aaaaagh, alright, I saw your work before coming here, and you have done a good job in cleaning the Hall of Mirrors so far. Yet, Grim’s actions are yours by default. So, as punishment, you two alone will be on cleaning duty, and restocking in the kitchens for three, no… four months.”

“HAAAA?!? I don’t want to clean a smelly kitchen for four months! Henchman do something!” Grim replied with dread at the punishment.

Cleaning duty was not bad, Yuu wasn’t going to complain about it. She thought the punishment would be worse considering that Grim almost burned someone alive, but cleaning kitchens for three months didn’t sound bad. The only things needed were rules, and more food to bribe Grim, nothing less, nothing more.  

“Ha! Did you really think that you were going to get out of here free of charge?” the one named Ace smugly said to Grim, “You are exactly like that loser, no wonder–”

The Headmaster quickly interrupted him, “As for Ace Trappola, and Deuce Spade, you both are expelled from Night Raven College, you only have this day to collect your things, and go back to your homes.”

“WHAAAAAT?!?!?” both boys screamed in incredible terror.

“HUH?!” Grim said in surprise.

And Yuu felt a wave of nausea roll over her system. The worst outcome possible became real, and now she was responsible for the expulsion of two students.

“Oh for the seven, stop screaming inside the infirmary!” nurse Goran exclaimed, but his words fell on deaf ears as the three teenagers descended into panic.

“Hey, w-wait Headmaster! This is insane! You, you can’t be serious right?! Expelled?!? You– ah, that is–” Ace’s voice trembled as he tried to speak, his hands moved to grab his hair in despair.

“NO! please Headmaster give us a second chance! I- I… I will pay all of the damages, I’ll accept any punishment, but please don’t expel me!” Deuce screamed as pleaded with his hands open.

“Y-yes, what he said, we will reimburse everything!”

Crowley’s angry voice resonated as he spoke, “That Magestone was an entirely priceless object which has been part of Night Raven College before even any of your parents were born! It was obtained in the height of the Gemstone Rush, donated here when our prestigious college was just starting, and its most recent value was of one billion thaumarks! Tell me Mr. Trappola, and Mr. spade, how exactly are two amateur mages going to pay for what is basically a historical artifact?”

The two teens kept trying to negotiate, yet their voices sounded devastated after the headmaster stopped talking, utterly devastated. Yuu kept wracking her brain to think about how everything had escalated to this point, and what had she done wrong to end up with two students being kicked out of while her responded with violence.

“That is… ah… one billion? This is truly bad…” Ace tried to reply without stuttering.

“What am going to do?! Expelled without even starting classes… what am I going to tell mom?” Deuce sounded close to crying.

Crowley just responded “That is not our concern as an educational institution anymore except notifying your parents about the reasons for our decision. Like I said you two have only today to collect your things.”

She had to do something, anything to at least make the Headmaster understand that she played a part too. However, it seemed that the nurse had somehow noticed her nervousness because he lowered himself to whisper.

“A little advice to survive here kid, don’t extend that generosity of yours to other students. If they know how weak willed you truly are, they will use it to their advantage. Now I will help you sit to bandage your stitches, so be a little tolerant of the pain.”

She could only slowly nod.

As that wretched lollipop was finally out of her system, the nurse rolled Yuu to her side by holding her shoulders, and arms. It was a weird sensation to be rag dolled into sitting, was this how her stuffed toys felt? A jolt of pain from one of the sutures interrupted Yuu’s thoughts.

Goran spoke again, “Crowley, tell those two to scram. I need to bandage this kid’s whole chest, and back. What an injury I have to say, normally we only see these on Spelldrive season, but this is a very annoying way to start the year, ha! It’s almost a miracle that he didn’t need a blood transfusion.”

“Alright, you heard the nurse,” the headmaster repeated, “Go back to your… dorm, and start packing.”

No one was heard trying to argue, nor to talk. As the sound of the door being shut was heard, the infirmary took a more somber atmosphere. Yuu could finally see everything around her once again; while being careful of not moving her head too fast, and her eyes first landed on Grim. The monster cat was seemly still stunted from Crowley’s decision because he was looking at the headmaster in a very weird way. Then, the man walked towards one of the chairs, and did a move that Yuu could only describe as collapsing, in the way something held up by strings collapsed. A chuckle from the nurse, and Yuu turned to see him take a cotton ball with antiseptic, and go to her back. The cotton ball carefully cleaned the sutures while the cold liquid chilled her injuries.

Maybe the headmaster was tired from all of the decisions he made, so Yuu simply directed her eyes at Grim again. Yet when Grim realized that Yuu was looking at him, he simply jumped out of the chair he was sitting, and walked towards the bed.

“Henchman! Scoot over I want some space to land.” The monster cat said while getting prepared to jump.

“And I already said that I don’t want any monster fur on the beds. If you try to jump on here I will kick you out.” Goran told him while pointing at him with the cotton ball.

It seemed that Grim really didn’t like that as his face scrunched up in anger, yet instead of actually doing something, he simply looked at Crowley, then the nurse, and walked away.

“Hmmp!” then he grumpily jumped to the same chair again.

Yuu couldn’t help but laugh a little. Grim was so cute when he was grumpy, she wondered if the smell of chemicals wasn’t disturbing his nose, some cats were really sensitive towards any kind of harsh smells. It would be a little unfair to make him stay somewhere he didn’t want to… Yuu ruminated through her brain before speaking.

“Headmaster?” she said, catching Crowley’s attention, “… do you really have to expel both of them? I understand that the Magestone was really valuable but–”  

“I will have to stop you there Yuu.” He replied before sitting correctly on the chair, “I know that from your perspective this punishment might sound harsh, but they must understand that breaking the Magestone was truly bad. Many students are in dismay for not being able to access their dorms! Worse is that some of the Housewardens have accosted me to immediately fix it!”

“Which one, the little heart firecracker? Also, kid I already told you to not do that.” Goran said after putting the antiseptic bottle on the table.

“Rosehearts, Ashengrotto, somehow Kingscholar, and even the vice Housewarden of Scarabia Jamil Viper are on my neck! I couldn’t come here right away because he found me while I was running, and started to practically blackmail me! ‘Oh it would be such a tragedy for NRC to get the Al-Asim family involved in this terrible case of management neglect Headmaster Crowley. Since Kalim is trapped inside the dorm, I suggest that the faculty deals with this faster.’ BULLSHIT! You should have seen him Goran, that little snake was smirking the whole time! When did teenagers get so bold with their elders!” Crowley exclaimed, then held his head with his hands, and started to do a weird sound that might be crying.

“You should know by now that the boys coming here don’t throw spells at us out of a weird sense of respect that apparently you don’t project anymore. Just try to get a Magestone as quick as possible before the Diasomnia students burn the whole college down.”

“The quickest that I can get one is in a whole week! And it’s not even going to have the same amount of power!” Crowley now looked desperate, “400 million thaumarks for a Magestone half the size, along with having to re-measure the holder for it too. Aaaaahg, since the Dwarf Mines were abandoned it has become so difficult to get those, Leonard will curse me for cutting up the art classes budget so suddenly…”

As the Headmaster talked more about the situation, Yuu saw the nurse grab two thick bandage rolls, one beige and one white. He tore the plastic open, and started to unroll it on his hands.

“Now please carefully take the rest of the uniform. I need to cover up the stitches with these.”

Yuu didn’t want to take off her uniform while the curtain was open. Why was he telling her to do that while the Headmaster was still looking? Even if this was infirmary, she felt very exposed. However, before Yuu could even mount a word, Crowley suddenly jumped on the chair, and spoke in a weird hurried manner.

“Goran! Are you… are you sure that you need to bandage up Yuu right now? Like right now?” a bead of sweat rolled on his cheek.

The nurse gave him a look, “Yes, the kid has his entire back covered with fresh sutures, if someone mildly puts their hand on anywhere except his shoulders, he will scream.”

“But maybe this time it’s not necessary you know, or maybe you can give the bandages to young Yuu to do it himself on the privacy of his dorm ha ha…”

“Does he has another injury that I somehow do not know of Crowley? Are you hiding something from me?”

“No! absolutely nothing Goran! I just think that minuscule stuff like wrapping bandages is something–”

The nurse squinted, “Now you are acting weird, what exactly are you hiding… any idea of what kid?”

At the sudden mention, Yuu responded without thinking, “… I think he doesn’t want to see my chest.”

“Yeah he doesn’t want to see the weird tiny mounds that Yuu has.” Grim happily chimed in while looking directly at Crowley.

Goran seemed satisfied with their answers, “Well then I just need to roll the– I’m sorry what?”

Until he processed what Grim had said. Now he was looking at Yuu in a pensive way, it was almost the visual representation of a written scene of a character staring at the window, and the uncomfortable feeling running through Yuu became stronger.

“GRIM!” Crowley screamed again, “please don’t pay attention to what the monster says Goran, Mr. Yuu just acquired him as a familiar, he is sadly still feral.”

“I’M NOT A FREAKING FAMILIAR!” the monster cat screamed in indignation.

“Mounds…  do you have breasts kid?” the nurse asked while putting his free hand on his chin.

“Yes, why wouldn’t I?” Yuu responded with confusion.

Goran opened his hand to point at her, “I don’t want to make any assumptions around it, but…”

Crowley once again, interrupted him. “May I remind you Goran that a percentage of our students have bodies that don’t align with what we call a standard masculine body–”

“Oh please Crowley don’t piss on my leg, and tell me it’s raining. I’m the first person that knows when those boys get their hands on the first gender changing potion they find. Tell me kid, are you a girl or a boy?”

“A girl… why are you asking?” Yuu responded, still confused.

And what happened next didn’t help with her confusion. The nurse froze for a moment, the busted in laughter, on the other hand Crowley looked… wobbly? he looked like he was going to fall down, and Grim looked as confused as her. Both Yuu, and him didn’t know what to do as the only adults in the room lost themselves in their reactions.

“Congratulations Crowley, I didn’t know that the plan for this year was to allow more competition inside these walls. Very good idea, it is a perfect opportunity to scare those brats into having actual manners.” Goran finally spoke while still giggling.  

“Noooo… no one knows that Yuu is a girl… the Dark Mirror just summoned her on its own… I don’t even know why.” he responded while looking at his hands.

The nurse smirked more, “Oh that is even funnier. So, it’s just playing a prank by getting this little lady into one of the most prestigious magical academies of the land? It’s amazing, maybe this morning wasn’t so bad.”

“Uhm, is there a problem with me being a girl?” Yuu asked before realizing that she had interrupted them.

Crowley just waved his hands around as he spoke, “It is a complicated situation that I’m going to resolve at my… office. Yes! My office, after the day is over please come to discuss your delicate situation young Yuu.”

That explanation did not inspire any kind of positive feelings in Yuu, but there was nothing that she could actually do to solve it, so she just nodded once. She looked at Grim once again, and the monster cat was just giggling to himself, so Yuu smiled. At least someone was having fun in this confusing conversation.

“Well, now that the situation is mostly clear, I’m going to close the curtain to finally bandage those injuries right away.”     

“Soooo… can I trust that you won’t reveal the actual nature of Yuu’s gender to anyone Goran?” Crowley said in a nervous manner while holding his hands.

“Of course not Dire, that would violate patient/physician privilege. In fact, I think that tomorrow it would be the perfect time to get her health in check. Moreover, I just know how the next faculty meeting it’s going to be delightful when you perfectly explain to both Crewel, Trein, and Imara why is she here.” He responded with a smile before closing down the curtain, and leaving Crowley, and Grim behind it.

As the nurse bandaged her whole torso, Yuu thought about how the resolution to the misunderstanding wasn’t so bad after all. She was always surprised how easy it was for other people to simply talk about a situation without having their words misunderstood, but it seemed to be an art mostly achieved by adults. So, maybe while Yuu was here, she could practice it inside the dorm.

-***-

Yuu felt horrible. The stings of the stitches plus the bandages felt warm and horrible, the painkiller lollipop that nurse Goran had given her was at its last bites, and the feeling of pain was creeping inside her back again. All around the sensations of laying on her side to let the wounds rest was tiring.

At least both the Headmaster, and the nurse had let Grim stay with her.

The monster cat looked very peaceful while he was sleeping. His tiny paws were tucked under his body, and by the position of his head and tail Grim’s shape probably resembled a croissant. Yuu moved her eyes from him to look at the window, the diming blue light of the evening had never left her no matter where she went.

… it was comforting.

Unexpectedly, the sound of the door opening made Yuu stop her train of thought. Clicks of shoes whispered inside the infirmary until a shadow was approaching from behind the curtain, then the shadow became two silhouettes coming straight to the bed’s direction. As they approached Yuu thought about what to say to the students who were probably searching for the nurse until she heard the two voices that she wanted to hear the less.

“This is a bad idea, this a really bad idea. We are already expelled! I don’t want to give my mom more problems.” Deuce Spade said in a hushed yet still loud voice.

“Quit it! We one chance to turn this all around in our favor, ONE! Do you really want to pack your things, and say goodbye Night Raven College so easily? We have nothing left to lose at this point, we might as well try this plan.” Ace Trappola replied with an exasperated tone.

At this rebuttal, Deuce’s voice grew in intensity, “But why do you want to involve Yuu, and his familiar?!? He is here because of us Ace, the Magestone shards were fusing with his WOUNDS!”

“Why are you still bringing that?! Besides the dude owes me one for getting me into this mess in the first pla–”

“I can hear you.” Yuu said without energy.

Her feeble voice somehow shut both of them up.

The two silhouettes stopped behind the curtain, and one of them grabbed the edge to slowly open it. To the surprise of no one, both Ace and Deuce were standing there in all of their worried glory.

“Heyyyy…” said Ace while raising and opening his hand to wave at her, but after not receiving any kind of reply, he simply put it down, “listen we have to talk to you about something. Something very important that can help all of us right now with this whole thing.”

On the other hand, Deuce looked more nervous now that Grim had started to wake up thanks to their noisiness. The monster cat had already a very grumpy face because of his interrupted nap time, but surprisingly for Yuu he didn’t say anything. Instead, Grim just rearranged his body, plopped himself on her lap, and zeroed his eyes into both Ace, and Deuce.

“Fgnyaaaa...” the monster cat yawned, then stretched his front legs, “I thought that stupid crow had kicked both you out by now. Are you here to beg the Great Grim for mercy?”

Yuu simply responded with a defeated, “Now what?”

“So, I assume you remember what Crowley said about the Dwarf Mines right?” Ace started to explain while pointing towards her.

“Both of you were eavesdropping.” Yuu said with worry, would she had to tell the Headmaster about that?

“Agh! Don’t call it that! It was more like… strategical listening. Anyways, Deucey and I here… well mostly just me, thought about a plan to give back a new Magestone. I say all us pack some stuff, and go to a trip into the mines to get our hands on a new Stone! I already searched where is it, so we just need to move our legs.” Ace explained with what Yuu could only interpret as confidence.

Hers, and Grim’s silence only made them look at each other.

Deuce chimed in after, “I know it sounds… a little crazy, but this can work. We should really try it, I worked really hard to get into NRC, if taking risks means that I have a small chance to get that gem to beg the Headmaster to let us stay, then I’m taking it.”

“… I understand, but what has to do with Grim, and me?” Yuu replied as she started to pet Grim.

“Are you kidding? Ha ha! It is practically your fault that we are here. Who is stupid enough to crash against a precious Magestone like that?” Ace laughed a little while having the same mocking tone he used in front of the statues.

“But… I don’t have any magic, and I just wanted you to stop attacking Grim.” Now Yuu was starting to get angry.

“Yeah! My henchman was just protecting me from you two weirdos!” Grim said as he burrowed himself more in the blanket.

At his words, Ace got closer to face the monster cat, “Maybe if you didn’t throw fireballs at me we wouldn’t be here at all you dammed raccoon”

“You don’t have to go if you don’t want to!” Deuce interrupted everyone. “You don’t have to go if neither of you want to. We just wanted to tell you to consider this chance because of your punishment too.”

Why did they think that her punishment was bad? It wasn’t that bad, and their idea was really dangerous. An abandoned mine outside of the walls of the college which was the only place Yuu was relatively safe in this strange world. A place where no one would try to rescue her if she got lost, or buried under collapsing rocks because there wouldn’t be anyone to claim her dead body. It was such wishful thinking to ever consider–

“Hey, hey henchman!” Grim suddenly said, interrupting Yuu from her mind. “We should go with them!”

Yuu blinked at him, “… Why?”

“Hehe! This is the perfect opportunity for me to demonstrate to that crow that I am destined to be the greatest mage ever! If we can find that Magestone, and trick him into giving us anything for it, I will be a student in no time!” the monster cat happily explained as he climbed Yuu’s chest to stare face to face with her.

Aw, it was a bad habit, but Yuu simply couldn’t say no to that cute face. Grim was so earnest in his plans to become a student that it felt bad to deny him any opportunity to prove himself, even if he basically wanted to bribe the Headmaster with a possible Magestone. Maybe… it would never be safe to explore an abandoned mine, but it would be relatively safer to go as a group than risk letting Grim go without her. So, Yuu sighed, and simply pet Grim.

“I will go with you, but if we don’t find anything we will come back right away Grim.”

The monster cat jumped in joy, “Yahoo!”

“Welcome to the team!” Deuce said with enthusiasm.

“Pffft, you really don’t pay attention to anyone else but that furball.” Ace mentioned with a smirk, “Thought, I knew I would convince you. Alright, let’s go to those mines!”

Chapter Text

The forest was quiet, as much as a forest can be.

The crunching sounds of leaves, and twigs against three pair of shoes, and a set of paws slightly resonated in between the dense visage of trees that blocked the setting sun of the evening. Branches, stones, and leaves stood in stillness while the teenagers treaded deeper into the cold wood. A familiar, yet cautious purple hue bathed the landscape while Yuu walked behind the two boys alongside Grim in pure silence since there was no need to talk after they crossed that dreaded mirror to arrive here.

No sounds of animals, nor birds were heard so far, and Yuu started to worry a little bit. Not for the walk on itself because they were luckily following a small man made path – which Yuu had found – towards what they hoped would be the mines. What made her worry was how quickly their most trusted source of light was going down, it didn’t matter if both of them had phones, without the sun to guide them it would be next to impossible to go back to NRC again. In the clear darkness so away from civilization, everything would mingle in the distance, every sound would be amplified, and their human eyes will only squint before observation itself became difficult in front of the pure pitch black sky. 

Well… maybe not for Grim since he seemed to be pretty content to walk, and observe what was around him. His round blue eyes looked from left to right with every step he took, sometimes he even sharpened his gaze towards something that only cats could see. Maybe another animal, or a rodent caught the monster cat’s attention, and as much as Yuu enjoyed watching Grim she hoped that he wouldn’t suddenly jump to hunt whatever he was looking.

Her eyes looked up, and again what only received her were the visages of the leaves, and the branches blocking the clear sky. Time kept going, and their surroundings started to look hazier, and darker than before; night was coming down on them too soon. Neither of the boys in front of her had expressed any kind of worry for how they were going to go back, and Yuu didn’t really know how to ask it without inciting any kind of panic. However, the blue haired one – Deuce, his name was Deuce – interrupted the silence with his own inquiry first.

“Hey Ace, when are we going to reach the mines? The sun is going down, and… it’s getting a little creepy here.” He asked as he walked.

“Huh?” Ace replied without looking up from his phone, and turned around, “Why would I know that?”

The three of them immediately stopped, and directed their eyes at the redhead, unsure on how to respond to the quite important detail that could mean not getting back to the college in a timely manner. Yuu was speechless after her two feet refused to take a single step forward, Grim planted himself at Yuu’s feet in surprise, and Deuce looked paler by the moment while his hands started to tremble. Did he seriously mean that? Was it supposed to be a joke? Yuu could not believe even if it was one, and it seemed that Deuce didn’t want to believe it either.

“Why are you looking at me like that? I never said anything about time. I only searched where these mines are, and all I know that they are in this forest in that direction.” Ace continued talking while he pointed his phone at them.

“What do you mean you don’t know?!? It almost night, no one knows we are here, and it was your idea to try this plan in the first place!” Deuce loudly responded.

“Did you actually thought that I would have all of the information? What a mistake Deucey, you shouldn’t trust people so easily! Haha, but don’t worry your secret is safe with me.”

“Huh?!?! Why you–”

Deuce’s arms started to move back as it looked ready to punch Ace, but for some reason that Yuu was unfamiliar with he turned around to look at her, and Grim then simply shook his head. However, his thoughts were ignored by the ever growing voice on the back of Yuu’s head which whispered beside her left ear about the true realization of their helplessness. It hit her mind like an arrow finding its target; what was Yuu truly thinking by trying to come here? What was she trying to do? More tribulations swung inside her ever panicking head while she watched the two boys in front start to argue again as voices without names echoed advices said in years past within the fibers of her brain.

“What do you mean mistake?! We all trusted you to guide us here!” Deuce talked as his voice rose with every word.

Come back before the sun goes down dear, your eyes are still not good enough to wander in the dark.

“Like I told you, I know where the mine is, don’t worry about it! I just didn’t know that it was this far jeez.” Ace replied while his right hand moved behind his head.

Always see where you came from, so you don’t get lost.

“That is not the point, and you know that! How can someone know where something is, but not know how much it would take to actually get there?!”

If you see someone that you don’t know on the fields as the evening goes down, don’t talk to them, leave immediately, and don’t turn your back on them.

“For your information Explorer Maps does not fully work while being so far from civilization, and you also have your own phone to see it if that little detail bothered you that much. Again, how can you trust someone so easily? We have only known each other for a single day.”   

In response, Deuce waved his arms, and screamed, “WE ARE IN THE SAME DORM!”

Yet, Ace only answered with a smile, “So?”

“UGH! Can’t we at least walk while you two fight?!?!” Grim yowled them with an adorable scowl, and pressed ears. Unexpectedly, both Ace and Deuce actually stopped to look at the monster cat with an incredulous expression.   

Not caring for their reactions Grim continued, “My henchman can’t carry me because of that stupid injury you two gave him, and my paws are getting tired! Who cares how long it takes to get to that mine, I ain’t leaving until we get that stupid stone! Unless… don’t tell that you two are actually scared.”

“Don’t say that Grim.” Yuu surprised herself by interrupting his comments, “we should just focus on the trajectory towards the mines. The night is coming down too quickly, and–”

However, her words were only dismissed as Ace very intently walked towards Grim. A scrunched up expression decorated his face with each short step he took, until he stood up in front of the monster cat, and before Yuu could even react to what she thought he had a planned to do, a gloved hand already launched itself to grab Grim.

Several things happened at once as the situation escalated. Ace’s hand immediately had Grim’s ribbon in a tight grip, distorting the black and white lines into ripples that moved in the illusion of the darkening forest. In return, the monster cat let out a forceful yowl of both surprise and rage while Yuu moved as fast as she could to grab Ace’s forearm while not caring about the painful pull of the treads inside her bandaged back. Her hands were tense, and her short nails were slowly embedding themselves in the black fabric of his jacket. Then, everything around them went still, neither teens nor monster moved from their spots, almost looking like a bizarre statue if not for their blinking and slight twitches in their tightened limbs.

Deuce looked at the scene, he didn’t know what to do, “Uh… let’s calm down–”

“Release Grim now.” Yuu’s voice said – no, ordered – as her eyes were locked with that gloved hand.

“Huh?” Ace responded in defiance with a smile, “well, look who tries to be intimidating now. I think that our trip would be much better if this raccoon was away for a while you know? Let him go for a little walk in the forest.”

Meanwhile, Grim started to violently trash his body, “Let me go! Get your dirty hands out of my adorable bow you idiot!”

“Let Grim GO!” Yuu couldn’t hold her scream at the end, which utterly mortified her, she didn’t want her emotions to get to her, but she couldn’t stop it.

Fear always came crashing down onto her like muck clinging to her lungs, sipping all of her body heat and leaving only cold trembling hands. She wasn’t going to leave Grim here, and she wasn’t going to let Ace try it either. if Yuu had to try punching the boy – despite risking all of the stitches coming undone inside her flesh – to make him drop Grim then she will try even if it meant failure.

“Geez, can’t you even take a joke? I’m not going to do anything. You should have thicker skin if you want to ever survive in NRC.” Ace said with an almost sweet tone, as if he was singing. Yet, unbeknown to Yuu, and very known to Deuce and Grim, he sported a scrunched scowl that completely contradicted his words.    

Neither of them still didn’t make any move except shake in barely contained anxiety, or rage.

However, Grim wasn’t so keen in participating in the frozen spat. Unchained by human social norms, any man made shame did not deter the monster cat from trashing against Ace’s hold with more energy. This made Yuu snap out of her frozen anxious state to immediately change her tactics, crouching as fast as she could to grab Grim himself out of Ace’s hand; it was a perfectly logical strategy, it didn’t matter if an inferno of pain exploded on her back in the sudden move, her priority was only Grim. However, this gesture was not really expected, nor appreciated by the other teen who released said monster in surprise.

“By the seven, what is wrong is with you?!” Ace said after throwing his hand out of range as if burning coals have been thrown in his way.

Yuu swiftly ignored his comment with the cat monster in arms, “Don’t do that to Grim, ever! I don’t understand why you are so mean to him, please try to be nicer. He is an animal; he doesn’t have the same thinking process as humans do.”  

“Yeah! what my henchman said! Wait… what do you mean by that?” Grim shouted, then looked up to Yuu’s face with questioning blue eyes.

Yet, when Yuu tried to explain her comment to him, Deuce silently interrupted with a paler face than before. Both of the teens, and the monster cat had completely forgotten of his presence in their spat, so seeing him again while shoving himself in the middle of them was a sobering reminder that they got in a fight in the middle of the forest. A forest that was now quite plunged in early darkness since the only light now available was the shine on Deuce’s phone.

“We should just- WALK until we find the mines,” he said while turning his head to look at both of them many times until his eyes landed on Ace. “Please don’t rile Yuu up, this is getting us into more trouble!”

From the look of his face, Ace didn’t quite like that, “Ha?!? Why are you only blaming me?! I ain’t the only one who is screaming, and rumbling you know?!”

“You are the one making us lag behind right now! Stop trying to fight Yuu, or else who knows when are we reaching those mines! I don’t want to cause more problems for my mom!” the blue haired teen finalized with his hands made fists.

It was the truth how they were losing time with their stupid bickering, Yuu perfectly knew that because she had repeated it inside her head. However, her thoughts and actions never agreed to follow each other. So, with a last weird look directed at Ace, and a gentle drop for Grim, Yuu continued to follow the two boys through the darkening wood… even when that awkward feeling of wrongness lingered around them.

-***-

After following the worn path for what Yuu could only think as many hours, the four of them finally seemed to arrive at their planned destination. Well, at least Yuu hoped it was the correct one if she judged by how Ace, and now Deuce were looking around as they walked; first to the surroundings then quickly to their phones. Their actions did not calm her down, but it was hopeful to have proof of human hands in between the wavering darkness. A clear part without trees gave away of a big area with a few stone streets, and an old shack which all of them connected to. Although she remembered little to nothing of her home, Yuu knew that she had never seen nor visited a mining site in her life, yet she was sure that what she was seeing right now was possibly the resting quarters of the workers.

“Hmn, this doesn’t look like a mine at all.” Grim murmured while lazily looking around, even if his perked ears betrayed his seemly bored attitude.

Yuu smiled at him, “Do you know what a mine looks like?”

“Nope!” he proudly answered before pointing one of his paws towards the old shack, “But I can tell it’s not this.”

In that Yuu had to agree in all sense of the word. It was certainly nothing less of a miracle to find a place which was more damaged than their Ramshackle dorm, maybe it had been a cozier place to stay in the far past for the workers who longed for it after a long shift, but as it was now the poor shack looked desolated. The darkness of the forest didn’t help in its presentation, but even in the light of the day the shack would still have that unsettling feeling of danger; overgrown weeds around an uneven stone path, torn down holes in the hay ceiling only revealing pitch black darkness inside while old roots were digging up in the sickly wooden columns supporting the stone structure. Then, to finish it all, a fine coat of dust painted the broken windows.

Overall, nothing in the presentation inspired anything remotely close to confidence. The preceding rush of the stillness in the woods became more apparent the more the group got closer to the shack, it was more an all-around forced abandonment rather than simple natural decay of time. Yuu eyed the very rusted mining tools around the path of the shack, carelessly thrown on the ground as their shoes made what could be the first man made sounds that the forest heard in a long time. When they finally arrived to the door of the shack the group stopped.

“Is this… the correct place?” Deuce asked.

“It seems so.” Ace responded after pocketing his phone. “So, who is going first? The opportunity is all open!”

Nobody moved an inch.

With a single look, and a sigh, Ace stood forward to grab and twist the dusty knob. Yet, the awaited opening of the door did not come with a screechy creak of wood against filth, instead the sound of resistance made itself known in the shack. The three teenagers, and the monster cat looked at each other to search for any kind of explanation despite being in the same situation. Then, without any kind of solution on sight, Ace simply started to shake the door knob in order to force it to open, along with pushing his arm forward to unlock the whole door. Surprisingly, this move startled Deuce who, to Yuu’s confusion, started to reprimand the other. 

“Hey! Ace don’t do that! This may be abandoned, but it’s still private property. We can’t leave any traces that we were here.”    

He, in return, turned around, “What?! Do you really think anyone is coming here at all? look at the state of this thing, there is not a single person in all of Twisted Wonderland who would live in these conditions. Just help me open this!”

“Well… haaa, okay.” With no actual counter argument in hand, Deuce simply walked to the door, and started to push the heavy thing along with Ace.

Even if Yuu had wanted to help with the task, she knew that whatever she could offer would have ended as a hindrance for both of them. It was nothing to be sad about since her injury already represented a huge rock in what was already shaping to be a very difficult activity if they ever wanted to go back to the college with something, even if all of them came back at all. in her thoughts, and the fourth heated discussion between Ace and Deuce, Yuu directed her eyes to Grim to see what the monster cat was doing. Weirdly enough, he was looking up at the sky with a blank expression face, big eyes fixated on a bright point shining in the vast expanse of the endless roof around earth. He looked so concentrated that Yuu didn’t have the heart to talk to Grim, and interrupt whatever he was looking at, so she decided to do the same. With a great effort, and some stray tears escaping because of the burning pain, Yuu kneeled down at Grim’s side then directed her eyes to where he was looking. Up, up, up, and towards the moon.

Yet, when Yuu’s eyes connected with the celestial body, something made her pause. The moon was… blue, not blue hued in a onetime celestial event; it shone brightly blue instead of the familiar off white or sometimes almost grey, that she has seem all of her life… or at least the parts Yuu could still remember. Such apparent innocuous detail would have been the center point of a new unfortunate distress spiral for the young girl, but instead it became another simple point in the road already taken; all of the painful surprises taken from the morning to the afternoon, on top of blatantly helping in what could be called a bribery scheme made Yuu feel a little numb to any noticeable differences between her home, and Twisted Wonderland.   

“The moon looks like my eyes.” Grim suddenly said without looking at her.

Yuu hummed in response, “yes it does.”

A sudden heavy thump, and the chorus of coughs coming from the entrance alerted both of them that the push and pull against the old door was a success. They stood up, and slowly got closer to the now open door as the smell of old dust, and humidity started to spread up to their noses.  

“There! It’s open!” Ace shouted as he swatted all of the stray dust flying around him.

“I still don’t like that we had to force the door to open. Maybe we can close it again, or…” Deuce said after covering both his mouth, and nose with his hand.

“But it is completely abandoned.” Yuu answered without thinking. A complete out of place action that surprised the two boys who turned to look at her. With a weird look, and another shrug Ace followed her comment.

“Yeah he is probably right. As I said if someone, somehow, still lives here then they are doing a horrible job with the cleaning. Let’s go inside to see if there is anything of help.” With those words, the redhead stepped inside the dark house.

The three left followed right after, and Yuu blinked twice as she carefully put the front neckline of her t-shirt over her mouth and bandaged nose. As her eyes adapted into the dark, the rays of moonlight entering from the open door revealed a worse state inside compared to the outside. The wooden floor creaked under all of their weight with every step they took, cobwebs littered every corner Yuu put her eyes on, and little particles of dust danced around them with every movement uttered inside. Finally, the four of them reached what could only have been a living room in its times of use.

Grim broke the silence with a simple comment. “Huh? What happened here?”

Yuu asked herself the same thing as she examined the old wreckage of the room. She couldn’t stop herself from thinking of the worst from how the tiny chairs were thrown around the floor, or how many broken glasses and dishes were around the tiny table, there were even some destroyed closets along with some of the mining tools left outside. It was an image of a desperate escape which didn’t inspire any kind of comfort. Her reluctance to slightly investigate further was unknowingly shared with Ace and Deuce who eyed everything with doubt.

“ACHOO!” Grim sneezed, “This looks worse than the front! And the dust is trying to… to… ACHOO!”

“Grim come here so I can cover your nose.” Yuu responded from behind her t-shirt face mask.

Ace talked over both, “We don’t have time to fool around right now. Search for anything that could lead us to the actual mines this time. Just try to not shake around anything.”

“Why are you giving us orders?” Deuce responded while crossing his arms. Yet, Ace simply turned around with a smirk to face him.

“Oooooooh? Weren’t you the one who was babbling how we only needed to do the thing instead of fighting?”

“Huh?!? Well… I was just saying that because you two were fighting–”

While the two boys talked to each other, Yuu carefully walked around the wreckage of the old living room as she tried to find any possible clue without actually moving anything. Grim seemly followed her actions, and was now elegantly tip toeing around the mess, not so subtlety showing his animal agility to her, it was really cute to see him look back to her every time he jumped over a broken plate, or around a broken cabinet. As Yuu watched around, a shape under a piece of fabric caught her attention.

“Grim look at that.” She said, catching the attention of the monster cat.

As carefully as possible, Yuu bended her legs to slowly pull up the blanket, which revealed a single metallic handle. After contemplating a little bit Yuu grabbed it to delicately slid it out of its hiding place, and with a final thug the mysterious object was freed with little fanfare. Grim made a sound of disappointment, while Yuu gasped in small joy; an old iron lantern in great condition, it even had a partially intact candle! A good source of light was never a hindrance.

“Isn’t it pretty? I can’t believe how little rust it has.” Yuu said to Grim while showing him the lantern.

Grim looked at it with his ears pulled down, “Pretty? It’s just an old thing.”

The creaking of the wood under steps made them aware of Ace coming over to their spot.

“What? What did you guys find?” Ace suddenly interrupted while he turned his head to look at both of them.

“A lantern.” Yuu simply responded.

His eyelids covered half of his eyeballs after she said that. “You only found that? Man, we already have phones if we need to see anything, this is unnecessary.”

“Don’t… it would be really beneficial for us to have another source of light. I will hold it so neither of you need to inconvenience yourselves with it, I promise.”

“… alright, suit yourself.” Then Ace directed his head to another smaller table on the right wall of the decayed living room.

After an awkward pause both teen, and monster looked at each other again.  

“Hmnp! Rude.” Grim said to himself before turning his eyes towards the lantern again, “This is pretty useless henchman, you have nothing to light this stick… unless you managed to steal something to make fire then you are out of luck.”

Yuu smiled to him as she opened the little iron door, “Really? That is such a shame, I wonder what should I do? Who would have such magical talent with fire to let this old lantern feel once again the warmth of light? How unfortunate I am in this situation.”

“Oh?” Deuce suddenly spoke then hurried to them, “Do you need help with fire magic? I can do a simple–”

Yet, before he could ever finish his offering of help, Grim breathed a small fireball directly at the wick of the candle. Immediately, the blue hue of the lantern filled the living room, which let Yuu see a toothy and proud smile on Grim, a smirk spreading across Ace’s face, and Deuce’s mouth form two straight lines after the fire set in the candle.

“Hehe, that is how you light a candle henchman. I will receive my payment right now.”

Without caring for the audience Yuu set the lantern aside, and quickly grabbed Grim to hug his squishy body while making happy noises. Considering the immediate protests and yowls from the monster cat after she did that, it was clear that whatever Grim had in mind as payment was not Yuu’s affection, which she didn’t really care at the moment. However, neither Ace nor Deuce moved as they tried to process the image in front of them.

The first talked with a smile, “Huh… how does it feel to lose against a little beast like that in spell casting Deucey?”

“Shut up! Grim was just quicker than me. It doesn’t matter.”

Now with more light inside the space, all of them could see a little better, and one thing in particular caught the attention of the two boys. Dancing in the shadows casted by the blue fire of the lantern, and resting on the dusty table was a square of what they thought at first to be some kind of fabric, yet on second thought for Ace it looked a little too flat to be old fabric, so he called to confirm his suspicions.

“Hey, Yuu! Come here with the light, I want to see this.”

At the comment, Yuu let Grim on the floor to grab the lantern, and moved towards where ace was. The blue light illuminated the old table with easiness, revealing what could only be called an ancient piece of paper, a piece of paper that will push them to their expected goal. The three teenagers gathered around it so quickly that Grim was left behind Yuu’s boots, eagerly trying to find even a single opening to squeeze himself in the middle.

“Oh wow…”

“Let me see henchman, I want to see!”

“I can’t believe we were wasting so much time doing nothing. This was laughing in our faces.”

Finally, Deuce spoke with a smile, “It’s a map for the mines!”

-***-

After leaving the shack behind, the group finally reached the clearing of the mine itself in no time. Thanks to the map, and the light of the moon all of them managed to find the cave with no struggle, along with finding how to actually read an old map thanks to a lucky pocket of reception found at the side of the road to the mines. Now, all of them stood in front of an imposing mountain completely covered in nature, almost as if the forest itself was trying to devour the man-made structure out its soil, to the point that the roots of a gigantic tree grew around the dark entrance with the intention of hiding it from the outside world.

The four of them stood in front of said entrance, not moving out of a sense of common fear towards the unknown, of what could be waiting for them inside the mine itself. The soft whistle of the air traveled through the grass, interrupting the absolute silence between them. Yet, Grim spoke up, shattering the ambiance.

“So, henchman… are we really going to find the magic rocks to bribe the crow to let me take classes?”

Yuu looked down, “Magestones Grim, and I don’t think that the Headmage would approve of trying to bribe him into your enrollment.”

“Yeah!” Ace spouted. “Also, don’t forget that we are doing this to save my, and Deucey’s spot on NRC, you monster. There’s better be a Magestone inside here, or else everything we did was for nothing!”

Grim screamed back. “Hey! I’m becoming a student no matter what!”

Deuce massaged the back of his neck, “I really hope there is at least something inside. Going to Night Raven College is my life chance to turn it all around… if we go back with empty hands I don’t even know what I would do, or how would I face my mom…”

“It would suck a lot if we do get kicked out for real… an expulsion on my permanent record would ruin everything I want to do in the future, more if it’s from Night Rave College. What other chances do I have if this doesn’t work?” Ace finished with crossing his arms.

The blue flame of the lantern danced in its glass walls as Yuu thought of the subject of higher education. The two boys were reasonably worried for their academic futures, and now she was slowly realizing that hers was practically paused. Even if the offer of accessing the library – that Yuu hoped was still available – was more than Crowley gave away, she needed the rules of something to understand it first. Maybe, maybe she could sneak into some lecture to at least not be clueless about the kind of knowledge that was necessary to have in this world. Yet, Yuu shook her head to disappear those thoughts, right now what was important was the search for the Magestone.

Grim spoke again, “Well, you two can mope outside! I’m going in, and I’m getting the Magestone by myself if that’s what I need to fulfill my dream! Even if this is… all pitch black.”

“He is right! I don’t care if I’m all beaten on the way, I’m not going down without a fight!” and to emphasize his point, Deuce punched his open hand with his fist.

Ace laughed, “Dude what was that? You sound like a thug.”

“Huh?! NO! No, I just–”

“And you raccoon, did I hear… fear in your voice? Don’t tell me you are scared.”

“What?!?! No I’m not!” Grim eagerly rebuked, “and to let you know that I’m not scared, I will lead! C’mon henchman follow me!”

Then, without waiting for anyone else the monster cat entered the mines. Moreover, Yuu immediately went after him into the dark, uncaring of whatever that could be inside, and the shouts of the other boys as they quickly followed too.

Even if the light of the entrance was still present, a wave of darkness covered them at first, gripping their hearts with new found haste at their rashness. However, Grim’s fire and the lit candle inside the lantern quickly illuminated the small section where they were standing, which gave the teens a small push to move their legs again. Colorful rocks, and broken gems of all sizes started to weakly twinkle as the sources of light became stronger as the group walked deeper into the mines; following the old rail tracks revealed jagged stone walls with tiny specks of gems, and abandoned wooden carts in different places. Some were placed normally on the tracks while others were turned over, spilling their shiny contents onto the dirty floor to accompany more ancient mine tools which in turn looked almost rotten.

In the small stops they took to search their surrounding for the famed Magestone, Yuu kept looking at the walls, and the small gems or chunks that littered the floor. None of them were as big nor glowed with the same intensity as the destroyed Magestone, and the ones that did glow had a light so dim that one could confuse it with the light of the blue fire reflecting on them. She looked back, and the others seemed to be in her exact situation, with no luck. In their sixth stop the air of the mines grew much mustier, and the number of gems growing inside the walls decreased along with their hope.

As Yuu tried to pull one slightly loose gem from the wall, Ace shouted at the same time something made a crumbling sound. What Yuu didn’t expect was for all of them to look at him, and see the burgundy remains of a gem at his shoes. Grim made a disgruntled face, then pawed at her leg before walking up to Ace, which she didn’t want to do. Yet, the sight of Deuce walking up to him too gave her the cue of doing the same.

“Ugh! This is hopeless!” Ace exclaimed with a dramatic movement of his arms. “This stupid mine is empty, there is nothing here that could replace the… the other one that was broken.”

“Henchman, for how long we have been here?” Grim asked her while he threw himself on top of her boots.

“I don’t know Grim…” Yuu looked down, then around, “I think we should go back. Maybe trying another path–”

“NO! WE CAN’T GO BACK!” Deuce screamed, surprising both Ace and Grim, yet scaring Yuu out of her mind. The scream bounced, and resonated on the walls of the cave until it faded into the deafening silence that surrounded them. However, after seeing Yuu’s reaction, Deuce looked at the side as he frowned. Was he mad because she suggested a reroute?

“Sorry for screaming.” He said, “we can’t go back yet. Even if we still have found nothing, there must be something! We should go to the very back of the cave to make sure that we didn’t miss anything, to the very end. Who knows, maybe there is a huge Magestone down there.”

At that, Yuu tried to speak again, “But… that is dangerous, the air around here is unclean enough. If we go further we can get intoxicated, and–”

“Let’s try a little more please. We have our magic so you don’t have to worry, let’s walk until we reach a little bit of the end.”

Ace decided to speak, “This time I do agree with magic beast boy here. Who are you to give us orders? This is stupid, and it’s very unlikely that we can find anything at the end of this cave.”

“And how do you even know that?! Who are you, the expert on mines?! I’m just saying we need to check everything! How are we going to bring back a Magestone if we give up?!” Deuce screamed this time.

“Who said anything about giving up dude, we are wasting our time! This thing has more roads than this one. We are not going to find any Magestones here! Much less at end of it, are you stupid?!” Ace also screamed.

Then, with another row of exchanged words, another fight broke out. This time the two boys were downright engrossed in their minds to assert who was right, and Yuu could only watch in confusion since she didn’t want those screams directed at her. Moreover, the fight seemed to stir up the dust particles floating around, which made Yuu cover up her lower face with her shirt again, this time with more painful results; she watched Grim wave his tail from side to side to convey his frustration. Then, the monster cat turned to her, and with a mischievous grin he confided a little secret.

“We should leave them here fighting, and get the Magestone for ourselves, what do you say henchman?”

“Mmm… I don’t think that is a good idea Grim.” She said while taking away her eyes from the bickering pair.

In response he chuckled, “But it will be so fun to hear them cry in confusion when we come back with the stone in paw!”      

“It is not nice to confuse people just because you want to, less when you are a little animal. There is always a solution when one considers a problem, so we should wait for them to calm down to choose what to do.”

Not so surprisingly, after Yuu uttered those words neither boy calmed down. Instead, they restarted all of their minor arguments once again; it was almost like they couldn’t stop to actually talk in a more normal manner. Maybe… it was worth to try, and dissipate their humors? Grim now looked at her expectantly, waiting for her to act and fulfil the vague promise she had made as his ears now laid almost flat on top of his head; he was irritated. Yuu looked once more towards the bickering pair, carefully put down the lantern, and slowly approached them like one would do to a pair of hissing cats. Step by step, Yuu recounted how to grab their attention without directly putting herself in the line of danger. Suddenly, the sound of a hand clap made Ace and Deuce remember that they weren’t the only people in the space; a somber shadow covered them once more. Both directed their eyes towards Yuu, who was doing her best effort to appear authoritative.   

“Eh- enough you two!” she tried to exclaim, but instead it came more akin to a screech.

“Pfft, you look so weird trying to act tough. I wonder how could you even stood up to our Housewarden.” Ace said with a giggle, which was immediately effective in tumbling Yuu’s bravado.   

“Sorry, I’m just…” Deuce paused to put his hand on his jaw, “really stressed right now.”

“This is nothing but a little bit of healthy dorm bonding beast boy. There is nothing to worry about.” Ace continued while putting his arm on top of Deuce’s shoulders, which the latter quickly physically protested against.

“Yeah if that is how you wanna’ call it.”

“Awwww, c’mon Deucey don’t tell me you are mad at me.”

Yuu wasn’t sure about their affirmations, but at least they stopped loudly fighting against each other, which was a small victory from her perspective. A little bit better in spirit, she went back to Grim with a slightly proud smile on her face; the monster cat was giggling to himself while covering his mouth with his paws. It was weird to see him stand on his hind legs like it was nothing, but at least he seemed to be enjoying himself despite their dwindling objective.

“See? I told they would calm down.” Yuu said after slowly retrieving the lantern once again.

“Hehehe, sometimes you act very funny henchman. Those two are really–” then Grim suddenly turned his head towards the darkness of the tunnel.

The voices of both Ace and Deuce stopped after such motion, leaving everything around them in pure silence, not even the telltale sounds of their breaths could be heard in the mine. Yuu became tense as Grim’s body language started to change for a reason that she couldn’t see, nor sense. The monster cat suddenly tucked his limbs to his body as it became tightly bound, his back arched while his entire fur puffed up with his tail quickly swishing left to right, and left to right in a nervous rhythm. The blue eyes that reflected the moon were completely wide and dilated, swallowing the now brighter fire of his flattened ears. Whatever he had seen in the dark, it was dangerous, and all of them needed to get out right now.

“H-hey Grim… are you okay?” Deuce asked while he slowly, and wrongly walked towards the monster cat. Yet, his words fell on deaf ears as Grim didn’t move an inch from where he stood, and instead started to deeply growl.

She quickly stood in front of Deuce, “Don’t touch him! If you try to grab him he will wound you!”

 “What do you mean?!” Ace said behind her, “What is happening to the furball? Why is he like that?!”

“He saw something that scared him. We have to give Grim his own space to calm him down, so–”

 “… stone…”

The three of them immediately stopped talking, and Grim’s fur became more frizzled. The remnants of the ghastly voice bounced around the walls until it disappeared in a whisper.

Neither of them moved nor spoke, only to stop breathing for a moment when the sound of something big, metallic, and heavy echoed around as it dragged itself around the jagged floor, still hiding in the darkness. Grim hissed again with such uncharacteristic intensity that unconsciously Yuu tried to move to soothe him, but she was stopped by Deuce suddenly gripping her upper arm. His hand trembled with the strength of holding her. The blue light of the lantern kept dancing inside its glass cage, distorting the shadows around them. Ace tried to speak again while drawing himself closer to both, Yuu could feel his breath at the top of her head.

“Wh-what? What was–”

The metallic sound sluggishly approached to where the four of them were, and with it a fetid smell of… ink? Invaded their noses. Deuce’s grip on Yuu’s upper arm became tighter, and Ace trembling arm pulled out a pen with a red crystal out of his pocket. Still in guard, Grim walked backwards, and his mouth made the hissing sound that Yuu now recognized as his igniting fire breath.

“neeevvaaaa… iiivvv… oooouuu… stones…”

A memory comes to Yuu’s brain. The voice of an old priest sounds on the radio, reciting the last part of a prayer to Saint María that everyone knew by heart, and that she had repeated every night before going to bed.

Santa María, madre de Dios, ruega por nosotros pecadores, ahora y en la hora de nuestra muerte. Amén. 

Then all of them finally see it, a demon coming from hell.

An aberrant, and distorted figure resembling an old miner drags itself out of the darkness; with iron lantern and pick axe in hand it filled the entire cave in all of its colossal monstrosity. The smell of putrid ink hit them with more force, making her notice how the demon’s entire form was practically a fountain of it, from its blob body to the broken glass globe that had for a head. Everywhere she looked, there was ink sloshing, and pouring, almost as if it was a living substance. The only part that was not black was a tattered maroon uniform.

Yuu wringed herself out of Ace and Deuce’s grasp, and grabbed Grim from behind; barely dodging the monster cat’s fire balls, and receiving the brunt of his tensed claws on her arms.

With a deafening scream, and a single word resonating like thunder inside the mine, the demon sprung towards them, leaving traces and splashes of ink behind.

“… THIEF… THIEVES!”

Chapter Text

If one were to stand outside of the mining cave, it would feel as if a small earthquake was destroying everything inside. The sounds of walls crumbling, stones falling, and objects breaking under the commotion were shaking the very foundation of the mines; the wooden pillars holding the entrance were creaking, giving away a low warning to the explorers inside of it. If the mayhem continued, the entrance will collapse to bury this forgotten monument of greed in the deepness of the forest. Unfortunately, said explorers were deaf to its risky calls.

Screams of unaltered terror escaped from all of their mouths after their brains rapidly caught on the danger which was quickly approaching at them without caring a single bit of the destruction that rose around its thunderous movements.

“THIEVES! THIEVES!”

In a hasty feat made out of pure panic, Ace used all of his might to throw a sharp gust of wind towards the demon, yet his mind only panicked more as his spell practically dissolved once it met the unholy amalgamation. At the attack, the demon only riled itself up and charged at them faster than before. In the blink of an eye and a drop of ink, the giant pickaxe swung down towards them… yet it did not collide with their soft flesh on account of Deuce grabbing all of them by hand then throwing everyone down on the hard floor. The attempt was successful in barely getting all of them out of the way, but the pickaxe still mercilessly hit the ground, its force made debris fly and very roof the cave started to fall apart.

At the sound of rocks falling down on them Yuu simply moved her body on top of Grim, uncaring that the monster cat was still in a frenzied state. It didn’t matter if she suffered, Yuu just wanted to keep Grim safe even if the adrenaline inside her veins kept locking her trembling limbs, tiring her more every time she tried to grab Grim’s paws. However, any kind of painful sensation only came to Yuu’s legs, something or rather someone was blocking the rain of debris from falling.

“Agh, fuck!” Deuce screamed in pain.

“NEVER... EVER...!”

Everything went horribly wrong. The ignite of pain in Yuu’s legs couldn’t compare with what Deuce was blocking, and in between the chaos she finally saw Ace; he was desperately covering himself with his arms. When the rain of debris stopped for a second, all of them could only breathe once before the pickaxe dropped with force once again.

Adrenaline invaded them at once, rushing their bodies to move from danger, to escape death. Dust was now floating with every strike on the mine, and invading their eyes and noses; even if they had tried to cough their panicked states did not let them.

“THIEVES! NEVER FORGIVE… WON’T FORGIVE!”  

Grim was now wildly moving his entire body with ardor while yowling with such intensity that one could believe that he was suffering the worst of tortures; only being barely held by Yuu’s trembling arms. His mouth spat fire at reckless abandon, lightning up the giant splashes of ink left by the demon, and heightening the foul smell of it as it evaporated in pure black smoke.

Yuu had thought of many different hypotheticals that could have happened when they went inside an abandoned work site at the beginning of the late afternoon. The possibilities of getting lost, or retreating after finding nothing were high, but to find themselves prey to a creature that could only could have come out hell was never something that crossed her mind. Her frantic state almost led her to believe that she was seeing nothing, that the chaotic collapse of the mine had left her blind to everything around her, if not for a hand grabbing her forearm and forcing her to stand up and move. Yuu could only tighten her grip on Grim and the lamp in response. 

Another swing of the pickaxe hit the other side of the mine, this time it was closer.

“We gotta go, NOW!” someone screamed.

“BEGONE! BEGONE! THIEVES!”

In between all of chaos the four figures; one still locked in a frightening frenzy, hurried their steps inside the tunnel to escape. Bolting as their poor human minds were overwhelmed with a carved primal instinct for safety, they managed to evade everything in their path. The carts, the rocks, the falling debris, the rails, even the earthquake like steps of the rapidly approaching demon were no challenge for the group. Then, by the force of a miracle, all of them escaped from the mines.

Yet, none of them stopped running. In their panic they didn’t notice the trees, nor the bushes, all they could still see were the rocky walls of the mine threatening to collapse over them. Even if the unholy screeches of the ink demon were long gone, they could still hear them resonating inside their minds. They barely managed to stop after Deuce tripped on the exposed root of a tree. Surprisingly, more pain was the perfect way to snap all of them out of their manic state.

Akin to an avalanche, all of them tumbled down on top of each other until their own bodies recoiled from the shocking movement, and landed on the grassy ground. Yuu’s blurry eyes were now looking at dark treetops as she slowly adjusted to breathing normally again, the weight of Grim’s body warmed her stomach as the cuts on her back started to crawl like ants biting her flesh on various tiny lines, yet Yuu did not have any strength to move. She looked at her left…   

Oh, one of the glass windows of the iron lantern was broken.

As slow as she could, Yuu released her fingers from the tight iron grip she had on the handle. Her palm had little crescent red moons on it, proof of her stress. With her right hand, she started to pat the ground to find something to stand up in the most careful way possible. Whimpers of pain at her right made Yuu look back, and she watched how Ace trembled as he pushed himself up while clutching his head, curiously she noticed a red heart painted on the side of his eye… the color was now dripping from the crown of his hair to down his chin in a manner that was certainly not paint. Dry coughs interrupted her thoughts, and the sound of someone desperately scrambling to stand up, but failing to do so.

“I... thought we... we were done for.” Deuce rasped in between coughs. “Is every– are you all… alright?”

“… what do you think genius.” Ace answered in a more muted way, he didn’t make any move after peeling his upper half from the ground.

However, it seemed that his response convinced Deuce to stop trying to get up on his own. His entire body slowly sank down on the floor until he resembled an old stuffed toy, beaten by time and hand.

“Yeah… sorry.” He simple said after a moment.

Now with a less busy head, Yuu started to pat Grim, “… wake up, please.”

The monster cat was still unconscious on her stomach, his grey fur was dirty with debris, and his nose was twitching because of it. Yuu slowly moved his body again to wake him up as she tried to clean him the best she could, and this time Grim scrunched his face before blinking twice. He looked up to Yuu, then sneezed right after with no warning, and she could only be thankful of her closed mouth.

“Mmmm… did we get the stone henchman?” he asked while looking at her.

“No Grim… we didn’t… more like we couldn’t.”

The monster cat blinked again, “Oh… that sucks.”

“Yes it does.” Yuu simply responded.

An uncomfortable silence followed right after, leaving the group unsure of what to do next. It was unlikely that the demon suddenly abandoned the mine to chase them since there wasn’t any signs of it around, nor they could confront it in their state. The trees, with their obscuring canopies, silenced the sounds of the night; not giving away any clue nor sight of any living beings between the bushes. It was as if nothing, but them existed in the world at that very moment.

One more turn, and Yuu somehow locked eyes with Ace. The boy was looking at her without any intent, more so to confirm that she was conscious, then he simply examined the blood smeared on his bare hand. his voice broke the silence.   

“Well, we tried at least. Let’s go back… oh man I have to buy new stuff at home.”

Deuce quickly turned to him, “Wait… IS THAT IT?!”

“Dude don’t scream.” Ace answered while covering one of his ears, “I already had enough yelling with the freaking monster that was trying to kill us.”

“Sorry! But, why?! We still need to find a Magestone, we can’t go back that quickly!”

The unexpected opinion of their blue haired fellow made the three of them jump out of their pain. It was incredible how a few words managed to snap them out of their locked stances, and sit up. Even Grim seemed to quickly gain his wits back after hearing those outrageous words leave Deuce’s mouth, Yuu could only watch in despaired surprise at the clear intent of his ambition. Of course, the only one who could rebuke was Ace.

“Oh I was actually joking back then; you are truly stupid. Are you saying that you WANT to go back there?! With the THING that almost made us into batter?!” he exclaimed in sheer desperation.

At his words, Deuce’s face morphed into pure fury. Both in offense, and incredulity.

He sharply pointed at Ace, “It was YOUR fucking idea to come here! You said that this was our only chance to stay in NRC!”

“Yes I did!” he fumed in return, “But that was before I knew there was a monster living inside there!”

Then, without caring for his imbalance, Ace pushed himself to stand up before the other boy. His uniform was dirty, and there were thin gashes ripping on the fabric after surviving such horrific ordeal inside the mines, yet he still stood up in front of Deuce. From Yuu’s view, Ace was almost trying to make himself bigger by putting his hands on his waist, almost looking like one of those birds who puffed up to intimidate an animal they could not attack, but he immediately scrunched his face in pain with one of his hands quickly holding his side.

“Look at us! Two green first years, a non-tamed monster, and a guy who can’t even use magic!” Ace gestured while resisting his injuries, “how exactly are we going to go against that monster?! We have no chance against that thing! If we even try to enter the mines again we will die, plain and simple!”

His words escaped in a hurry as he finished speaking, leaving only the hurried breaths to fill the silence. Yuu did not dare to move, the air was getting charged with something the more Ace and Deuce stared at each other, so she only did what her body order on instinct, hug Grim.

Deuce didn’t back down, “E-eh… we have to try! I know we can figure out something if we think together! May– maybe we can send a bunch of cauldrons then sneak past it, or–”

“Ha!” Ace snickered then pointed at him. “Do you hear yourself?! What makes you think any of that stuff will work? All of us saw how spells did nothing on that abomination, anything that we hurl at it will just bounce back. Also, sneak past it? If it wasn’t for the furball we wouldn’t have even noticed it inside the cave!”

“You don’t know–”

“We barely made it outside! I don’t know about you, but I’m too young to die!”

With those words, it seemed that the conversation was over. Deuce’s face became paler than before as Ace’s response truly sank in his head while his hands turned into fists. The frustration of not having any rebukes of substance to the very primal instinct of staying alive was very apparent on the young boy. Yuu could not interfere, nor speak since all of what was said made complete sense to her, she did not want to die at the hands of demon, if Yuu had to die… it would be by her own volition.

“We can sneak past it if we are fast enough.” Grim suddenly said, “well, I am fast enough he he! But you three can use those fancy sticks to channel your magic to help. That thing is barely alive anyway, it smells like it’s dying–”

As much as it pained her, Yuu quickly tried to shut him up, “Grim, no!”

“But! But henchman–” his ears perked up in surprise.

“Nah beast boy, let it speak if it wants to.” Ace said with a bite, “It is hilarious to see a beast think it knows anything about how technical magic works.”

Grim hissed, “You are so rude!”

“As I said before, don’t be mean to Grim. In his head, what he said makes sense because he is an felinae animal driven by notions that we humans don’t have, in fact–”

Ace dropped his arms in annoyance, “I don’t want a lecture right now dude. All of this sucks, and the thing I need less right now is a feral beast boasting about its abundant magic. Unfortunately for us human mages, it’s not that simple. It takes years to learn a single type of elemental magic if you are lucky enough to be attuned to one, and more years to build a good foundation; even more if your reserves are standardly low, it can take decades to reach the level we need right now to even fight that thing.”

“Huh?! Are you guys naturally weak?!” Grim said.

Yuu intercepted his words, “It’s not that Grim, they just need to work harder since humans are built in a different way.”

The monster cat scrunched his face, it seemed like the very notion of building magic by working on it was offensive to him. However, before Grim could express his displeasure, Deuce chimed in with more input. He was tapping his chin with his hand.

“Yeah, Ace’s right… the art of magic is very hard to learn. This is why we have schools like Night Raven College, to train magic users into becoming mages, or if you are more talented a wizard or a witch.”

“Oh, that make sense… No one is naturally good at anything, we can only have affinity for some aspects, then cultivate them for our betterment.” Yuu spoke while petting Grim with a shaky hand, the pain from the caves still lingering.

What she didn’t notice was the grimace both Ace, and Deuce gave to each other after her words. Unknowingly to Yuu, there were some people in the college who were naturally very adept at magic… scarily so. The comment was easily let go, for the simmering tension of the main topic for the conversation, to try to go back, or not. The considerable state of danger which all of them were in was obvious, but the peddling possibility of victory in finding the famed Magestone was still lingering in the back of their minds, or in Deuce’s mind at least. With his outburst from earlier, it was not strange for him to try, and convince his very beaten companions again.

“You guys don’t get it, there has to be something we can try! What about... we created a distraction with Grim? Like with his fire, or maybe– maybe there is another entrance to the mines? Or–”

Yuu quickly exclaimed, “I’m not letting you put Grim in danger!”

“What gives using me?!” Grim screamed.

Ace also answered in pure disbelief, “Are you still hung up on that?! I can’t believe it. It’s over you idiot! we’re done here! The only thing we can do right now is just go back, get our papers, and try to apply to other magic colleges. It sucks that we got expelled from NRC, but there are other options!”

The words were akin to the finished line of a novel, with assurance in its own conclusion through the whole narrative, counting all of the steps that led it to the end. No options, no arguments, nothing which could change the course of their little adventure… if it was appropriate to call it that. Both boys were equal in magic inexperience, all green behind the ears; the outsiders of their system, one entirely magicless, and the other wild in his unrestraint were even less privy to what it had to be done to win. All of their characteristics spelled an early doom.

“Tch, useless…” Grim muttered under his breath. Yet, Yuu noticed how his fluffy fire fueled ears dropped in sadness, and his eyes looked down on the grass. They may be far luckier than Ace, and Deuce if she compared their situations regarding their stay in the college if it was that prestigious; the possibility of Grim attending classes should have to be quickly abandoned, but nonetheless everything made her feel really–

“HELL NO! That ain’t happening!”

Yuu’s thoughts were quickly interrupted by Deuce’s voice. His booming scream filled the forest for a single second, frightening her a lot and hurting her ears. His fist harshly connected into his open palm, and he quickly closed the distance between him and Ace in a blink. It was as if Deuce’s clear, unmistaken fury compelled him to intimidate, yet unlike Ace he seemed to actually mean trouble instead. Yuu quickly held Grim against her, but the red haired boy simple stood in place.

“This may be news to a prissy ass like you, but I can’t get expelled from this college of all places! I don’t want to get expelled! I’ve worked too hard to simply give up on this chance!” Deuce shouted at Ace, “I… I’d rather die than get expelled.”

Unexpectedly, Ace barked an ugly laugh, “Can’t get expelled?! We are already expelled! The Headmaster screamed that right at us! You want to face that ink thing, and die while trying to throw those pathetic spells at it? Then, be my fucking guest! But I’m not dying here!”

With those words, Ace simply turned his back on his enraged dorm mate to simply head back, without looking towards Yuu or Grim. If she had to assume what he was thinking, it was probably a way to maybe salvage what little he could from the freakish situation. However, whatever Ace had planned was thwarted in front of Yuu’s eyes when Deuce’s suddenly, and very violently yanked him by the collar of his uniform, then grabbed the lapels of his jacket to put each other face to face.

“Myah?!” exclaimed Grim, “Are they going to fight henchman?!”

Grim’s question went quickly unanswered. Yuu could not take away her eyes from the scene, the buzz inside her amnesiac mind started stronger again the more Deuce acted like a reckless juvenile punk. The way his fingers dug on the fabric, how his mouth was crunched in a snarl so tight that his teeth were clenched, and how Ace quickly tried to pry off the offending hands to no avail. A familiar image of recess on the hottest moment of the day, a call for a fist over a misunderstanding, the start of a fight. Yuu started to breath faster.

“So you’re just gonna run away with your tail between your legs?! Like some spineless punk?!”

“What the hell?! Dude, let go of me!”

Yet, Deuce just continued, “If it wasn’t for you, none of this would have happened! The only fucking reason we’re out in this forest is because of YOU! You broke the Magestone! You dragged us all here since it was YOUR IDEA!”

“Oh, so ALL it’s MY fault now?!” Ace screamed before he finally untangled himself from his grasp.

Yuu felt paralyzed in place as their voices escalated. Grim’s body started to tense.

“Stop acting all highly with me! You’re not better! You also chose to follow me, and break all of the floor with your stupid cauldrons! I may have called you, but you responded!”

“At least I’m not heartless enough to fling a magicless person towards a stone, and fuck up their back!” then Deuce pointed at Yuu with his whole hand. She didn’t like this at all, being included in their fight could only end up badly.

Ace pointedly did not look at Yuu, instead he dodged Deuce’s attempts to grab him again. The other teen was so insistent in his chase that Ace’s only response was to messily hold Deuce’s wrists. Yet, if Yuu had to guess, the following struggle between them showed that Deuce was far stronger than Ace. The former immediately started to swung his arms back, and forth without much effort, it looked like Deuce was two seconds away from flinging Ace back.

“You didn’t even apologize to Yuu! We both saw his back, IT WAS SHREDDED!”

“IT WAS AN ACCIDENT! I didn’t meant to do that! How would I know that–”

“How would you fucking what, that flinging a guy at a sharp point makes him bleed?!”

“FUCK YOU! I just reacted! Who grabs the hair of someone else on reflex?! I didn’t want to see all of that blood! At least he gets to stay with his magic raccoon on the college, we got expelled!”

It seemed that… those words were the incorrect ones to say because Deuce’s sneer worsened, and violently shoved Ace against a tree. Finally freeing himself from the grasp, but he did not back down, instead the tension rose more as Deuce grabbed Ace’s uniform again; his grip crinkled the fabric.

“You son of a bitch, you are a coward. You tried to leave Yuu for cold, and now you try to ditch everything behind when it gets a little hard.” He practically snarled.

“Your idea will get us all killed! How can we solve anything if we are only corpses to find?!”

This time, Yuu looked up to Deuce’s eyes, it frightened her which was exactly why she never looked at human eyes. His pupils shrank into pin pricks, but unlike a gentle cat’s pupils zeroing on something to attack it, Deuce looked murderous; the red veins in eyes looked sharper, and clearer. Suddenly, without a second to waste, he punched Ace across the face. The sound it made was deafening.

However, they didn’t stop there.

Horrified, Yuu watched how their verbal fight became physical. Ace somehow recovered from the punch enough to elbow Deuce on the chest many times, which led to the blue haired boy to cough from the pain. Still, he didn’t let go of Ace, in a weird movement that only betrayed some kind of experience in violent roughhousing Deuce aimed his closed fist right back at Ace’s stomach, immediately audibly knocking all of the wind out of him. In consequence, and without the correct balance to support himself, Ace collapsed on the ground while taking Deuce with him.

Both girl, and monster cat were stunted in dreadful silence as they watched both boys writhe on the ground. Neither of them acknowledged their audience, too enthralled in their violence to notice; Deuce was on top of Ace firmly throwing blow after blow at the other boy without stopping, while the red head tried to protect himself by simply staying on the defensive with his arms attempting to protect his face and body.

“Yuu…” Grim whispered as he hid behind her. “What do we do?!”

She was as afraid as him, both boys now looked as they have gone mad with rage. They threw punches, kicks, jabs, everything that could cause the most bodily harm they could inflict, and they were not stopping. What could Yuu even do? Try and get in between? Scream? … Maybe physically separate them? She had already done that with cats, and those were far more vicious than teenage boys… in her experience. Nevertheless, Yuu had to do something if all of them wanted to go back alive to civilization. So, with crumbling fortitude she quickly stood up, and as she tried to not fall down again on her legs she searched for a branch big enough to… push between Ace and Deuce since both didn’t seem to stop trading blows. A thick blanket would have been better, but Yuu had to improvise with the meager things of the forest.

“Wait henchman, what are you–”

However, this did not go well. She did not consider - in her hurry to stop both from harming each other more - how it would be received to be suddenly touched by something foreign in a state of panic and anger.

“Get off from him, please!” Yuu exclaimed a little louder in the hopes of being heard. Yet, just as she tried to wiggle the branch between the two, Deuce immediately grabbed it, and quickly used it to jab her right on the ribs many times.

The boy shortly noticed what he did, “By the seven, Yuu!”

New pain exploded inside her body once again as she screamed, and with the exhaustion of the mines still weighting inside, Yuu collapsed into the ground in tears, locking herself into a ball. Grim yelped in panic as the situation grew worse, quickly coming to her side to aid her. Finally, Deuce had stopped his barrage of punches, and tried to stand up to help the crouched girl.

“Henchman! That was so stupid, you should have listened to me!” Grim said while trying to make Yuu uncurl from herself.

“Are you alright?! Dammit, I’m so sor–”

Yet, Deuce couldn’t finish his apology in time. Instead, in that single moment Ace tackled him into the ground then punched him right in the stomach. The red head trembled as he stood up again to gloat over Deuce, his face was riddled with painful bruises along with the injury on his head reopening to flood its side with blood. He was breathing heavily in short bursts, trying to fill his lungs with air again.

“Ah ha ha! That’s what you get–”

Without waiting for a reply Deuce tackled Ace to ground. It reignited their fight again, but this time they were far more violent with each other. Once again it was pure madness; the noise, the pain, the brutal impact of flesh on flesh, all of it was too much for Yuu. The weight of all of the sensations were agonizing in a way that she had never experienced before… nothing existed outside of her head, nothing was around except herself, and a white void pulsating with pain. With only a beating sound in her ears to give her company, Yuu retreated inside herself to cry.

“Hey…”

It could have been a second, or a lifetime that has passed, but she only became aware of herself once again after feeling that something was shaking her.

“Hey!”

“Oy! Are you okay?!”

Then the something became more than one.

“C’mon dude stand up, or something you’re scaring me.”

“Henchman! I have to bite him; it can snap–”

Nothing was coming, nothing was going, all was inside in Yuu’s mind were thoughts, thoughts, and uncertainty. Bouncing around in rapid fire with no signs of stopping as the white behind her eyelids started to bleed red; the beating sound became faster, bordering on high pitched. Yuu moved her hands to grab something, something soft to anchor her, and what she found were shorts strands which when pulled made her head twinge in pain.

“Oh fuck, don’t do that! Hey! Pull him by the back while I try to grab…”

Suddenly, Yuu was lifted off the ground, then someone forcibly moved her head outside of her arms. The white void slowly cleared to give away to the obscured tree tops, the shadowed illusion of the branches, and the face of Ace, disgruntled yet with something hidden in his pupils. When he realized that Yuu was looking at him face to face, he quickly let go of her arms… to grab her cheeks for some reason?! Out of nowhere, he started shake Yuu’s head from left to right. It made the bandages of her nose sting.

“Hey! Be careful!” chimed Deuce.

“Haaaaa, so the only way you can look at someone normally is if you have a massive freak out?! What was that dude? I don’t want to give you another piggy back ride.” Said Ace after stopping his bizarre actions on Yuu’s cheeks.

“… sorry.” She simply answered, locking her eyes on the curve of his nose. Then, Yuu directed her eyes towards Grim, whose adorable ears were sideways, and his blue eyes were looking straight at her. Huh he was scared, but of what?

“Aaaand we are on step one again. Your weird stuff is over, get up.” Ace sighed as he interrupted her thoughts, and made her stand up with the help of Deuce.

Although, none of them made any move to speak out about the awkward situation they were now in. Both boys didn’t seem too eager to talk about what they had witnessed in that moment, Grim was viciously looking straight at them again, and Yuu was still trying to recollect all of the information that was scrambled inside her head. Maybe this state of consciousness was why Yuu decided to simply speak out without any second guessing in favor of her peers.

“… why do you two keep trying to fight instead of helping each other? None of this is going to solve anything. Either we all go back to the college, or we try something to see if there is an actual Magestone inside the mines.” She mumbled before looking down to her hands.

At Yuu’s words, both Ace and Deuce flinched while Grim crossed his paws, clearly annoyed of how she wanted to reignite the fight between the boys now that they had finally stopped butting heads like two animals fighting for territory.

“Seriously henchman? Why are you going to bring this up again–”

“Listen here,” Ace interrupted. “I was only stating the truth, if we try to fight that thing we will die. It’s not my fault that he is too stupid to see it.”

“By the seven, you just keep pissing me off.” Deuce snapped back, “You were given a single chance to become a student in one of the hardest schools to get into in the entire world, and you are going to give it up like it’s nothing!”

Yuu quickly put herself between them, she was tired of their fights escalating into physical violence. Surprisingly it worked, for some reason instead of trying to push her, both boys simply stared at each other in what Yuu recognized as sheer frustration. Despite how they were the ones who were frustrating her mood.

“We have to cooperate for a while if we want to do something. Either we go back to the college, or we try our luck the mines. It’s as simple as that.”

Ace laughed, “What? Work together with this guy? Absolutely not!”

“At least we agree on that!” spat Deuce towards the red haired boy.  

“Either we go back to the college, or we try our luck the mines.” Yuu repeated, forcefully.

“Haaaa, you don’t understand, I’m too young to die thanks to Deucey–”

“Either we go back to the college, or we try our luck the mines.” Yuu repeated again, now rising her voice.

Deuce weirdly stared at her, “Yuu, it’s about trust, this douche won’t have my ba–”

“Either we go back to the college, or we try our luck the mines. THERE ARE ONLY TWO OPTIONS! ONLY TWO, STOP BEING SO STUBBORN!” this time, Yuu screamed. Why neither of them could see that there were only two logical outcomes in this situation? Was it always like this?! This stubbornness that blinded the forest from the trees?

Immediately, both of them stopped talking to stare at her in surprise. Which made Yuu close her mouth in return, then click her nails together in response. As she did not look at them in favor of staring at Grim – who was now discreetly playing with the laces of her boots – Ace giggled.

“Wow, you sounded just like the Housewarden there. You only need a red wig, a meaner mug, and you could be twins.”

Yuu could only feel her face heat up in shame. Nonetheless, she tried to steer herself to continue talking.

“Wh-what I’m trying to say is that we only have two options in this moment. We just need to calm down, and think through what we are going to do. If we decide to simply go back to the college then we have to move right now since nighttime has already arrived, if we are going… to try to find any possible Magestone we need a strategy.”

Deuce raised his hand to chin, “That sounds… well…”

“Do you even have a plan beast boy?” Ace questioned.

“I think I do, but I need your help and more importantly Grim’s help.” Said Yuu while clenching her hands.

Grim excitedly gasped at her words as the other boys watched her in surprise. Continually, the monster cat managed to successfully climb Yuu to meet her face to face. His forked tail was languidly moving side to side.

“Really henchman?! Yes! What do you need from the Great Grim?” said he while Yuu started to hold him.

“You said something before they started to fight, something about that demon ‘smelling’ like it was dying somehow. What was that about?”

“Mmmmm,” Grim moved his ears, “That thing smells rotted, I don’t know how it keeps walking around since its magic is leaking around like crazy.”

“A wounded… animal it’s a dangerous animal to others, but this also leads to behaviors that are dangerous to itself. Then, that demon was very single minded, it was protecting something… I got it! I have an idea, but I still need the cooperation of you both.”

It seemed that Yuu’s words worked perfectly to excite them.

“Well, we got nothing else to lose right now.” Deuce said as he brought his hand to his face.

Yet, Ace only responded after a moment, “Ugh! Fine! But, if I don’t like I’m not doing shit.”

Then, all of them formed a circle around Yuu, with all of their undivided attention tuned to what she was going to say.

“… My idea is…”

-***-

On the outside of the dark mine, the ink creature moved back its failing and bubbling body back towards the darkness of the rocky maws now that the thieves were finally gone. Those horrid intruders wanting to steal its precious stone, the light inside its mind, its beating heart… the creature still maintained itself awake, knowing by now that thieves were cunning, and that they will always come back. As it crawled around the paths of the mines – gurgling with difficulty as the ink bled onto the floor – its mantra of protection to the Magestone resonated inside its head, wandering around in the darkness with only fractured promises made of old greed, and forgotten loyalty.

Regardless of anything, it will protect the Magestone as long as it could; in between the silence and the darkness of the forgotten mine.

A shrill laughter interrupted the silence.

Like a hound dog, the ink creature immediately ran towards the mocking sound. Once again, intruders have invaded the mine to steal the Magestone, filth who only cared about their earnings. The laughter echoed again, and in return the creature let out a horrific roar that etched itself into the old rock walls. Sounds of shoes clacking against the ground were heard as the laughter grew into an aggressive scream that made it far easier to pin point from where it was coming from.  

There it was! That tiny gray animal who dared to hurt it with its flames.

“Hahaha, you thought you saw the last of me?! Think again! I’M THE GREAT GRIM, REMEMBER MY NAME WELL BECAUSE IT WILL GO DOWN IN HISTORY AS THE GREATEST MAGE EVER!” it screamed as the fur surrounding it frizzed up.

How dare it to be back again!

Everything inside the mines trembled when the ink creature screeched loudly enough to rattle the very foundation of it, and immediately it slammed the pickaxe on the ground. Grim rightfully jumped at this ferocious display, but instead of choosing to fight head on he quickly absconded towards the exit before the creature could even began to charge at him.

“Catch me if you can! You stupid ball of ink!” Grim taunted.  

And charge it did, the ink creature’s sluggish movements were gone, and what was left was the demon which almost got them the first time. Grim’s heart was almost jumping outside of his chest as he battled with the weird hypnotizing feeling caused by the stench of the rotten magic, just a little bit more and the plan will work. Fortunately, the monster cat was small, cute, and nimble; Grim only needed to make sure that the distance between them was big enough to JUMP!

“GRIM!” screamed Deuce right around the corner, and Grim obliged by jumping into his arms. Then, the boy turned him around to face the creature.

“THIEVES!”

“EAT THIS!” said the monster cat, before shooting a blast of fire directly into the ink demon.

The creature roared in rage at the attack, but its vision was immediately blocked by the curtain of foul smoke radiating from the burning ink. Both Deuce and Grim took advantage of its confusion, and ran as fast as they could until they were greeted by blue moonlight. However, they didn’t stop there, they could hear the ink creature coming towards them faster than before, so they turned right up to the hills of the mine.  

The creature thankfully followed them outside of mines, uncaring of the change of its surroundings in its cursed quest to find the intruders. It couldn’t see them anywhere, but the pull for the mines was weak, so instead of going back to the manmade cave, it searched for the thieves without stopping.

“OY! OVER HERE!”

The monster instantly turned to the sound, and saw the intruders on the top of the rocky hill. It immediately started to claw uphill with its pickaxe, screeching as its boiling rage charged it to move forward. Yet, the boy and monster never faltered, nor looked scared; they looked assured. Both were stand right on top of the jaded cliff, over a bunch of debris.

“YOU THINK YOU ARE BETTER THAN US?!” screamed Deuce, “WELL THINK AGAIN PUNK! GRIM, FIRE”

“Hehe! We are going to turn you into mud!” then, the monster cat fired several flames right below them, igniting a blue inferno that would have swallowed them if not for their above positions.

In turn Deuce pointed his pen at the sky, “I summon thee, Cauldron!”

With those few words, the cauldron fell down. In a mere second, the creature was suddenly under four gigantic fiery cauldrons, all blazing in blue fire and coming down the hill like an avalanche. Before it could even try to do something, the ink creature was slammed head on with them. Screeching, it tried to stop the attack, but the burning iron only made its ink limbs melt, making the ink creature scream louder. On top, the magical fire was not put out like before, instead the element proliferated on everything that could house it, including the ink creature, which in a blink was enveloped in the blue flames.

“That’s what you get!” Deuce screamed at it while Grim celebrated in triumph. Although, they quickly jumped down, and ran towards the mines again.

The first part of the plan was a success.

While Deuce and Grim occupied the ink creature’s attention, Yuu and Ace were already inside of the mines. With blue lantern in hand, the two of them quickly followed the traces of ink left behind after Yuu noticed how they could serve as more reliable map than the one made of paper.

“Are you sure this will work out?! It sounds insane as it is!” Ace said as he ran, trying to not outrun Yuu.

“Again, I’m not sure. It’s a possibility, we are banking on the possibility of this demon being slowly rotting from the inside just like Grim said it is.” Yuu answered while following the ink marks.

There was no time to truly think about what she was doing, the only way for her plan to work was to go straight on with in, even though it made Yuu wildly uncomfortable to not have any backups or afterthoughts ready as much as she wanted to. That ink demon would not be deterred forever with the cauldrons nor the fire, so they needed to act fast.

Yuu ran, and Ace followed. Concentrated on the ink marks, and slashes on the floor the girl simply moved toward whenever they went without saying a word, always surprising her companion every time she took a sudden turn.

“Hey! A little warning would be good!” Squealed Ace when they took yet again another turn, which led to a wider, and darker area of the mines.

It was bigger, but the blue flame of the lantern helped them see well enough. The ink marks were more scattered, but far more abundant, so Yuu held up the lantern as she put her index finger over her lips to think while Ace inhaled, and exhaled to calm himself. Maybe, if she was searching for a gem, then…  

“Haa, now what?! There is nothing–” suddenly an unnatural blast of light interrupted Ace, shining right in his face.

As he screamed about his eyes, Yuu quickly pointed the lantern again, and she couldn’t believe it.

“Ace!” she said while pulling the sleeve of his jacket, “Look! We found it!”

The boy too couldn’t believe once he cleared his eyes, in front of them, and on top of a small rocky ledge there was a clear gigantic crystal. Lustrously shining like a rainbow beacon in the dark mine. The thing was as big as melon despite looking kind of scruffy, but Yuu did not care, they have finally found a Magestone! After they took it, there was a far smaller purple gem left behind which she pocketed immediately, it could help too.

“Shit… I can’t believe it, your plan worked!” Ace said while not moving his eyes from the gigantic stone in his hands.

“We have to go back right now, we don’t know if Grim and Deuce managed to entertain that demon long enough.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice beast boy, let’s go back!”

Yet, nothing always goes as perfectly as one would want.

“YUUUUUUUUUUUUU!” suddenly screamed Grim, who was on Deuce’s shoulder.

“STONE!”

Both were running towards them, with the crumbling ink demon right after, and by the sounds of it the thing was incredible pissed at their plan. Yuu looked at death right in the eye again when she saw the gigantic pickaxe loomed over them, all as if time slowed down…

“Oh fuck NO!” Ace suddenly screamed, “It doesn’t end here!”

Subsequently of that, what only could be called a pressured tornado was directed right at the ink demon, slamming it into one of the walls of the mines, and slightly entombing it on the rock. The spell was so strong, that neither of the teens nor the monster cat moved for a second, until the telltale sound of collapse started to shake the mines.

“Okay, this was kinda fun!” Ace screamed, “But let’s dip from this place!”

None of them objected to that decision. As the angry roars of the trapped creature dimmed as they followed Yuu towards the exit, the grounds and the walls of the mines started to finally break because of the sheer damage they endured. The group didn’t stop again until they disappeared inside the safety of the forest, not even to look back how now the entrance of the old mine was sealed by its own debris, and to hear how the shrill echo of breaking glass was the last sound inside for forever.

-***-

The blue moon hung high in the sky, illuminating all in its path that was not obscured by the forest canopy. On the very edge of the path towards the mirror that connected the placid, and abandoned nature to the famed Night Raven College were three teenagers, and a monster cat somberly waiting for the right time to go back to face the issues of their actions.

Around the fire, their forms revealed a level of tiredness that could only be conquered by another burst of will… which could wait for a little while since all of them felt pretty defeated despite coming victorious from their hastily concocted plan.

Yuu cradled the Magestone in her lap, examining how the orange light of the fire made speck of colors reflect from its raw surface. She still couldn’t believe how they managed to survive an actual encounter with an ink demon, and retrieve a stone that according to the Headmaster was valued in millions; it was surreal. Far more surreal than anything Yuu had experienced so far, she looked down at her right to see Grim mushed on her thigh, snoring away in a funny pose.

On the other side of the fire Ace was rubbing at the wound on the side of his forehead, the bleeding had stopped, and the only thing left behind was the gruesome looking smudge of his painted red heart. Deuce sat still with his legs splayed, looking up to the moon with a look that Yuu couldn’t decipher, the black spade on his bruised eye was half gone.

A fleeting thought of what could be happening right now at NRC appeared on Yuu’s mind, but she quickly dismissed it in favor of resting, for once.

All of them could deal with whatever circus that was brewing inside the college once they rested enough, she thought, they deserved to at least breathe in peace for a moment.