Hitori caught up with Kamiya, he saw him moving out of the ring when he threw his leg out of the ring, too.
The audience watched in disappointment and the teachers watched in confusion. What were they doing? They wondered, but they did not have to for any longer.
Their foot touched the rock pavement at the same time, they both were out of the ring. It took time for the audience to process it, and by that time, they were near the exit.
"Stop them. Where do you think they are going? They can not just leave the battleground!" a wizard said.
Two wizards jumped forward and pointed their wands at Hitori and Kamiya. "You should stop there unless you want to be forced---"
"Oh, shut up," Hitori said and turned around. "Can not you see, sir, we do not want to fight."
Kamiya clenched his wand and took a glance over his shoulder. "Just till we kill Onogi, that is," he whispered to Hitori. "Maybe we will have to settle our dispute someday."
"You can not leave the battleground unless one of you is out of the ring," the wizard continued, "you are breaking rules, step back into the ring. How can we declare the rankings?"
Kamiya clicked his tongue. "We both stepped out of the ring, that means it is a draw. The hell with your rankings."
The wizard frowned and raised his eyes. Senso glanced at Atama, he was staring at the kids below him. Should I stop them? Should I make them fight? What should I do? He was making a decision.
"Atama-sensei..." Senso called but got no reply from Atama.
Kamiya and Hitori turned to leave the arena when the wizard lifted his wand and cast, "Levitation!"
Kamiya heard him but continued to walk till he realized he was walking not on the rocks but on air. Hitori turned his head and raised his eyes.
"W-What the..." He turned to the wizard, he had a superior grin on his face.
Hitori shook his head and drew his wand. In an instant, the wizard lost his wand and hence his control over the levitation spell.
"Hi-Busou." Hitori swung his wand.
Kamiya felt his guts dropping back into his stomach, he stumbled to the ground.
The wizard turned his glare to Hitori. He pulled his hands together and formed a fireball by his side.
"Sir!" Senso jumped to his feet. "He will kill those kids," Senso said.
The teachers in the room turned to Senso. Another teacher jumped and agreed with Senso.
"I know, I know," Atama said, "but, he will not kill the kids, the kids might end up killing him if they may."
Hitori struck a spear of ice at the wizard. He threw his fireball, his fireball swallowed Hitori's icicle spear.
Hitori pushed Kamiya who was getting up and jumped away from the fireball. It fell on the rocks and left black dust on it.
"He is going mad." His fellow wizards wanted to stop him but when he conjured another fireball with the intention of killing the kids, they shuddered.
Hitori got up and reached to Kamiya. "Do you know how to teleport?"
"No." Kamiya grabbed him and stood beside him, his legs were still shaking.
"You should, it is a useful spell in such situations."
Hitori grabbed Kamiya's shoulder and imagined the hostel building, he forced his mind to keep the image till Kamiya swung Hitori to the other side.
"Open your eyes, this is not the time for daydreaming."
Hitori opened his eyes and found himself going backward. He threw his hands in the air and tried to control his foot movements, but nothing stopped him till he hit his back against one of the grasslands.
He jerked forward and fell to his knees. He was panting, he felt as if the impact had pushed his heart from behind as if it would pump out anytime.
He raised his ears, he heard fire gushing towards his end. He raised his eyes and found a fireball aimed at him. Hitori jumped to his feet and raised his hands.
He used Hydro Pump, enough to extinguish the fireball. "What the heck are the teachers doing? Have they turned into an audience?" Hitori created a fireball of his own and threw it at the wizard.
The wizard focused on blocking Hitori's fireball but was unaware of the Electrify beam coming from the other side.
He felt a stinging pain in his abdomen, and when Kamiya increased the intensity, the wizard screamed at the top of his lungs. Breaking the silence, and waking the audience and teachers from their daze.
Hitori glanced at Kamiya. He nodded at him, then bent to touch the ground. The first layer of stone moved, followed by two more layers. The light blue beam from Kamiya's wand disappeared. The wizard was left twitching on the ground.
Hitori raised four walls around the wizard. His mates jumped in the air and panicked. Hitori clapped his hands and compressed the walls together, before closing it with a lid.
He glanced at Kamiya. "I want you to transfer me your mana. And think about the dormitory, the dormitory's porch!"
Hitori stretched his hand. "Come on, we need to leave!" he shouted.
Kamiya glanced around him, the audience was leaving the arena once again, the students around them had stepped off the grassland, the teachers had stood in their stall, and the wizard guards were running towards them.
Kamiya raised his hand, tucked his wand by the side, and grabbed Hitori's hand.
"Do not let them go!"
"Stop them!"
They heard their distorted shouts in the back, and their voices began to fade. They felt the insides of their stomach lifting up and down.
Then suddenly, the dizziness faded and they felt stable, the insides landed in their stomachs, and their heads stopped spinning. They decided to open their eyes.
Hitori found a hallway in front of him. He looked around him and his eyes fell on a board that read: Dormitory Rules. It was the dormitory's porch, he realized.
Hitori had to fear a mask when he left his room the next day. His fight was stated to draw by Atama-sensei, so he was still ranked fourth and Kamiya was still ranked fifth.
Atama gave him a good scolding this time, he would have to pay for hurting a wizard guard. But since he attacked you first, I will let it pass, he said.
But Atama said, "You can not take two days off, only one day after you draw a battle. You are fighting tomorrow. Only seventy students are left, if the students at the bottom knock the rest, we will have our top fifty pretty soon."
Hitori was disappointed to know he could not take two days off, but he had the rest of the day to spend. He did not want to spend it with Kamiya, and he bet Kamiya wanted the same-- to stay away from each other as much as possible.
It was awkward now, they made up but were still angry at each other. It was awkward for both of them, so much so that they did not contact each other after that incident yesterday.
Heck, Kamiya shook his hand off and ran to his room as soon as he reached the dormitory's porch. Hitori kept staring in surprise.
Since he had time, he decided to visit the Vr-cade. He could not bring himself to invite Kamiya. In fact, he did not want to touch the topic again. He felt a sort of ugly bitter turn of things in his stomach every time he thinks about the reason for their conflict.
Kamiya made it clear-- he wanted to stream-- when why should Hitori force him to take a look at a territory that once was his? Why should Kamiya care anymore?
Hitori logged in, the inbox was again filled with personal messages like: 'Accept my request, I want to be a part of your guild, please make me a part of your guild, I like your guild, I want to play with U, I want to...'
Hitori wondered what kind of messages Reon-san must have got. I love you and I want to play with you, please make me yours, please play with me, I will be your pet, and please let me...
Hitori felt a surge of hot blush around his ear. "She sure is popular." He was embarrassed by his own imagination even when nobody was present to judge him.
Hitori canceled the requests once again. They were above hundred, he was accepting only twenty-five. He took a look at the first players to send the request, but he still deleted them.
Then he posted another request with the same caption. He closed the inbox.
Reon was not online today either. Now Hitori was sure of his suspicion. She was held captive by Onogi.
He pulled himself away from the table and dropped his head back, he looked at the ceiling and raised his hand to touch it-- but it was far away from him.
"Power..." He clenched his fist in the air and banged his fist on the table, he stood straight and looked at the magic screen. "Do not ever think of giving up, if you are going to do it, do it with confidence and no self-doubt."
He tapped the table and got up from the table. "After the expeditions," he said to himself and walked out of the Vr-cade.
Onogi lifted his glass and took a sip. "I need an army, Erabu."
Kuzu sighed and dropped his cigarette. "An army to kill two kids?"
Onogi put his glass on the table. "Then what do you need to kill two kids?"
"You. And me."
Onogi giggled. Then he chuckled.
"What is wrong?"
"Do you realize our situation? We are nothing but drug addicts right now, living off on alcohol and tobacco."
Kuzu paused his cigarette in front of his lips, he pulled it away and took a look at it.
"I have finished two bottles of both," Onogi said. Kuzu rolled his eyes and moved his cigarette to crush it in the ashtray but stopped, "and you do not have any space in your ashtray to crush a cigarette."
His ashtray was full of black and grey ash and several cigarette butts. They had piled over each other, forming a mountain of cigarettes.
In a certain basement of someone's lab or house, a man removed his glasses, his orange eyes flashed for a second, then he started rubbing them.
"Sir..." he heard his man calling him, "I have found them," he said.
Onogi allowed Kuzu to crush the cigarette on the table. "Where is he by the way?"
Tengoku stopped and removed his hand from his eyes. "What did you say?"
Kuzu crushed the cigarette and sighed. "A place where we can not touch him. If we want to, we really will need an army."
"We have found Saibai Hitori's location."
Tengoku smiled, then grinned, and almost laughed. "Where is he?" he asked.
Onogi turned his head, then rotated it in a circle. "Let me guess," he chuckled again, "he is with them? In there?"
"He is in there, hiding in his rathole-- the shithole," Tengoku's man said.
"And where is that shithole?" he asked, still grinning.
Kuzu nodded. "You have already guessed it. Those bastards hid in that shithole. They know we can not start a war."
Tengoku's man took a deep breath and said, "Mahoutokoro."
Onogi still said, "The place of magic."
Kuzu nodded again. He opened a case and went for another cigarette.
Tengoku leaned forward, his grin spreading wider, he said, "The Mage Academy?"
"The Mage Academy," Kuzu said.
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