Glass
dark heroThe strange weapons had barely finished taking shape when the first man moved.
Nezu watched from behind the classroom window.
A moment earlier, none of them had been armed. Now a shield rested against Riku’s arm, two katanas gleamed in the hands of the man beside him, and the woman closest to Akane wore a metal gauntlet over one hand, three long claws extending beyond her fingers.
Across from them stood three more.
A large man with heavy knuckles covering both fists.
A woman carrying a staff.
And a man whose mace looked heavy enough that Nezu couldn’t understand how he was holding it with one hand.
Then the man with the knuckles lowered himself.
Something formed over his face.
It wasn’t solid. Nezu could still see the man’s features beneath it, but another shape had appeared over them, broad and heavy, extending forward into a single translucent horn.
He charged.
Riku stepped forward.
His shield struck the ground.
The courtyard rose.
Pavement split as a mass of earth burst upward and compacted in front of him, forming a wall between Akane and the charging man.
The horn hit it.
The sound reached Nezu first.
A deep crack rolled through the courtyard, followed by a pressure wave that slammed into the school.
Every window facing the courtyard shattered.
Nezu threw an arm across his face as the glass in front of him burst inward. Fragments scattered across desks and skipped over the classroom floor while somewhere farther down the corridor more windows broke one after another.
Then came the noise from outside.
Shouts.
Breaking stone.
The grinding of earth against pavement.
Nezu lowered his arm.
The window was gone.
Only jagged pieces remained around the frame, and through it the courtyard no longer seemed distant or separated from him.
The wall had held.
Then it moved.
Riku moved with it.
His boots carved two lines through the ground as the man continued forward, pushing Riku and the entire wall ahead of him.
Riku turned his shield.
The ground beneath one side of the charging man rose sharply.
His direction changed.
He shot past Riku, carried several metres farther by his own momentum before digging his feet into the ground and stopping himself.
Nezu hadn’t finished processing what Riku had done when water crashed into the wall.
It came from the woman standing behind the other two.
One hand was extended toward Riku, fingers closing slightly as water struck his defense from the side. It poured through cracks, spread across the broken pavement and gathered around his feet.
She moved her hand.
The water followed.
Riku raised another section of earth.
The water divided around it.
Steel rang nearby.
One katana met the enormous mace.
The swordsman moved around the heavier weapon before its swing had finished, his second blade cutting toward the man’s ribs.
Something appeared between blade and body.
Scales.
Hundreds of tiny translucent shapes flashed across the man’s side.
The katana struck them.
Light rippled across his body.
The mace came back.
The swordsman ducked beneath it and attacked again.
One blade high.
One low.
The mace stopped the first.
The second struck the man’s thigh.
Scales again.
Nezu stared.
A blur crossed the courtyard.
The woman beside Akane disappeared.
She appeared beside the water user.
The staff snapped upward.
Three claws struck it.
Metal screamed against metal.
The clawed woman twisted around the staff, almost reaching the other woman’s shoulder before water surged between them.
She was already leaving.
A heartbeat later she was beside Akane again.
Her long spotted tail swept sideways as she stopped, while the small animal ears on top of her head lifted from where they had flattened against her hair.
Nezu barely had time to register either.
The horned man was moving again.
Riku raised another wall.
Impact.
The wall slid.
Water rushed around its base.
Riku changed the ground beneath the charging man.
The man was thrown aside.
The swordsman attacked.
The mace met him.
The clawed woman disappeared.
The staff blocked.
She returned.
Everything happened too quickly.
Earth rose.
Water curled around it.
The horned man crashed through the space between them.
Katanas flashed against the enormous mace.
Those strange scales appeared whenever a weapon should have reached a body, shining for an instant before fading again.
Nezu’s eyes moved from one impossible thing to another.
Eventually he stopped trying to follow all of it.
Akane.
She wasn’t fighting.
That much he understood.
“Stay close!”
Riku’s voice carried through the broken window.
Akane stepped toward him.
Water swept across her path.
Not at her.
In front of her.
Akane stopped.
The clawed woman immediately pulled her backward.
Another stream moved behind them.
Riku slammed his shield down.
Earth erupted between Akane and the water.
The horned man hit it.
The wall moved.
Riku with it.
The swordsman looked toward Akane.
Only for an instant.
The mace struck.
He crossed both katanas in front of himself.
Scales burst across his arms and chest.
The impact threw him backward.
He hit the ground, rolled and stood again, although one shoulder remained lower than the other when he raised his blades.
The water woman stayed behind the other two.
Her staff remained close to her body.
Her hands did most of the work.
A turn of her wrist sent water around one of Riku’s walls.
A sweep of her arm spread it across the courtyard.
A closing fist sent it upward.
Riku blocked one attack.
Then another.
The horned man charged through the opening between them.
Riku intercepted him.
The water changed direction.
Again.
Again.
Thin streams were spreading everywhere now, filling cracks and running around the broken pieces of earth scattered across the courtyard.
The clawed woman disappeared.
The water woman turned.
The staff came up.
Claw struck metal.
The water woman gave ground.
The clawed woman left.
Back to Akane.
Again.
She crossed the courtyard from another angle.
The staff barely caught her this time.
The claw scraped along it.
Scales flashed briefly across the water woman’s shoulder as one of the blades slipped past.
The clawed woman could have continued.
She didn’t.
She returned.
Always back to Akane.
The water woman’s eyes followed her.
Another charge came.
Riku created three layers of earth.
The first wall moved.
The second joined it.
Then the third.
Riku braced his shield behind all three.
Water rushed beneath them.
The ground softened.
The walls tilted.
Riku abandoned them.
He drove his shield upward.
Earth erupted diagonally beneath the charging man.
His direction changed.
He shot away from Akane.
Riku immediately turned back toward her.
The water woman moved both hands.
Water rose between them.
Riku stopped.
Another stream appeared to his left.
Then his right.
The horned man turned around.
Riku was forced to face him again.
The swordsman attacked harder.
His first katana struck the mace and forced it aside. The second came across the defender’s chest, scales spreading over the point of impact.
Another strike followed.
Then another.
For the first time, the man with the mace gave ground.
One step.
Then another.
His breathing became heavier.
The swordsman pressed forward.
The mace rose too slowly.
One katana knocked it aside.
The second struck the man’s shoulder.
Scales rippled across it.
The man stumbled backward.
The swordsman followed.
The mace came around again.
Slower.
The swordsman avoided it easily.
One blade struck the man’s ribs.
The other followed toward his neck.
Scales again.
The man retreated another step.
His chest rose and fell heavily now.
The swordsman didn’t give him space.
The mace suddenly rose over the man’s head.
Both hands around the handle.
The swordsman shifted his stance.
The weapon came down.
Not toward him.
The mace struck the courtyard.
The ground exploded.
Broken pavement, dirt and fragments of Riku’s ruined defenses erupted around them. A thick cloud swallowed both fighters and rolled outward.
The swordsman jumped backward.
Both katanas came up.
Nothing followed.
Dust moved in front of him.
He waited.
Heavy breathing came from somewhere inside.
The swordsman adjusted his grip.
Across the courtyard, the clawed woman moved.
She appeared beside the water woman.
Claw met staff.
The impact forced the staff sideways.
The clawed woman stepped inside its reach.
Water surged between them.
She twisted away.
Another stream came from behind.
She jumped over it.
Then she turned.
Back toward Akane.
Water swept across her path.
She changed direction.
Another stream rose.
She avoided that too.
A third came from the side.
Her ears flattened as she accelerated.
She slipped around it.
The path back to Akane opened.
The dust moved.
Something enormous emerged from it.
The clawed woman’s eyes widened.
The mace was already swinging.
She crossed her gauntlet in front of herself.
Impact.
Scales erupted across her entire body.
Hundreds of overlapping pieces of light covered her from head to toe.
The mace continued through the swing.
Cracks spread across the scales.
More.
More.
The pattern shattered.
The clawed woman flew.
She struck the ground, rolled across the pavement and stopped several metres away.
The swordsman turned toward the sound.
His expression changed.
The man he had been fighting stood outside the cloud, mace hanging loosely beside him.
His breathing was perfectly calm.
The clawed woman pushed herself onto one knee.
The water woman was already moving.
Water gathered around one hand.
Not a wave.
Something thinner.
Compressed.
Riku saw it.
“Move!”
The stream crossed the courtyard.
The clawed woman raised her gauntlet.
Too late.
Water cut across her side.
Red followed it.
“Rin!”
Akane’s voice cut through everything.
Rin staggered.
One hand immediately pressed against her side.
Blood slipped between her fingers.
Her ears flattened completely.
Akane ran toward her.
Rin looked up.
“Stay back!”
Akane stopped.
Rin forced herself upright and stepped between her and the enemy again.
Riku tried to reach them.
The horned man lowered himself.
The translucent mask returned.
He charged.
Riku raised his shield.
Impact.
Scales flashed across Riku’s body.
The pattern wasn’t as complete as before.
Some disappeared almost immediately.
He was pushed backward.
Away from Akane.
The water woman extended one hand toward him.
Water struck from the side.
Riku planted his shield.
Earth rose.
The water curled around it.
The horned man kept pushing.
Riku’s shield cracked.
The swordsman moved.
One of his katanas had been damaged badly enough that part of the blade was missing near the tip. He still carried both.
He attacked the man with the mace.
The first blade was blocked.
The second struck the man’s side.
Scales flashed.
The mace came around.
The swordsman crossed both weapons.
Impact.
His protection appeared across his body.
It flickered.
He was thrown backward.
One katana left his hand and disappeared into the shallow water covering the courtyard.
He landed hard.
The man with the mace advanced.
Riku was still being pushed away.
Rin was bleeding.
Akane stood behind her.
The water woman raised both hands.
Water moved across almost the entire courtyard now.
Rin glanced left.
Water rose.
Right.
Another stream.
Behind.
More.
Her tail curled around Akane’s legs for an instant as she shifted closer to her.
The swordsman forced himself upright with one katana.
Riku stopped sliding.
He drove his shield into the ground.
Another wall rose.
The horned man hit it.
It moved immediately.
Riku looked back.
Akane.
That single glance cost him.
Water struck the wall from the side.
The earth buckled.
The horned man drove through.
Riku’s shield took the impact.
Cracks spread farther across its surface.
The scales around his arms flashed weakly.
Rin stepped forward.
Her claw came up.
Her other hand remained pressed against her side.
The swordsman returned to them.
One katana.
Riku moved backward.
Shield raised.
They closed around Akane again.
Riku in front.
The swordsman to one side.
Rin immediately beside her.
The same formation as before.
Only tighter.
Their weapons told the rest.
Cracks covered Riku’s shield.
One of the swordsman’s katanas was gone, and the remaining blade was chipped along its edge.
Rin’s gauntlet was scratched and fractured.
Blood stained the side of her clothes.
Across from them, the three attackers were still standing.
The horned man rolled his shoulders.
The man with the mace rested his weapon against one shoulder.
The water woman remained behind them, her staff still in her hand while water flowed around all three.
Nezu looked at Akane.
Then at the people surrounding her.
Every time Riku could have moved somewhere else, he had stayed between an attack and Akane.
Every time the swordsman gained ground, he had been forced to look back.
Every time Rin attacked, she had returned.
The other three didn’t have that problem.
The horn formed again.
The mace left the man’s shoulder.
Water began to rise.
Riku lifted his damaged shield.
The swordsman tightened his grip around his remaining katana.
Rin raised her claw, her ears pressed flat against her head, her spotted tail curling behind Akane.
Nezu didn’t understand what these people were.
He didn’t understand where the weapons had come from, why the ground obeyed Riku, why water moved through the courtyard as if it were alive, or what those strange scales of light were.
He didn’t understand any of it.
But he understood this.
Akane’s people were losing.
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