Aoi threw up her hand and translucent blue ribbons flew to Niji out of nowhere, but Rebecca scooped her weapon from the ground and cut the arcane substance. “It’s you who should step aside,” she hissed, standing in front of the girl. “We leave no one behind.”

"And we don’t leave behind the law.” The enchantress unsheathed her sword and swung it: the aura of empowerment embraced her subordinates. “And today I don’t care about equal ground. Go!”

Elio and Elia sent several throwing knives flying at the enforcers, making Rebecca teleport to safety. Niji didn’t move an inch as her Celestial Shield encapsulated her, hair soaring up from the flow of magic. The knives clanged against the barrier and fell to the ground. No, she frowned, in order to win they would have to get closer and break through the tight defenses. She wasn’t that easy to defeat. It was somewhat of a pity she wouldn’t enjoy the battle like the one in the illusory world. Everything was real here, and her destiny was at stake.

Cinder lunged forward, but not at Niji—he was going to ram into Dammit, his most beloved enemy. The Celestial straightened up the ears on his everlasting cat hat and temporarily blinded the “tank” with a hex. Viktor pushed the beefy giant away, blocking the healer.

“You’re such a bad boy, picking on little guys. How about you deal with someone of your rank?”

“Hey!” Dammit was indignant behind his back. “I’m older than him!”

“Just half a year, you pipsqueak!”

The bald Asian thug touched his amplifier, located at the back of his neck, and a huge sword materialized from orange dust beneath his palm, its design inspired by equipment of some fantasy paladin. Cinder gripped the weapon, struck it in front of him and grabbed the hilt with his other hand. At this time, Viktor summoned his barrier shield. Dammit, however, wasn’t about to enjoy his life for long: Aoi began to hunt him instead of the Amber, trying to strike him with her sword and avoiding his debuffs in turn. Dammit worked as a multi-handed Shiva, casting spells left and right in a frantic dance of dodges while Sacred kept his distance and tried to support whoever needed his help.

The twins, meanwhile, switched to Dasnor: they ran at him, multiplying into many copies. But he was too mobile to feel any pressure as the clones were weaker than before and he could crush them almost with one punch. There was obviously less coordination between Elio and Elia as well. He looked at Niji’s Academy friend: despite the order to attack, she was only watching the fight in a daze, perfectly still, as if under a paralyzing spell. With her being so hesitant, the Lackluster had no doubt M.A.G.E.’s conditions were winnable.

After leaving Niji, Rebecca quickly teleported to Shadow in an attempt to distract him from his healing duty. It wasn’t the first time she had fought against a Celestial—and compared to the psycho named Jesse, her Olympics nemesis, this healer posed no great danger to her. No matter how much he avoided her strikes, it was hard for him to resist the onslaught of the top-class Manipulator: as soon as he cited his signature spell of the Goddess Cage, the Golden immediately disappeared to pop out elsewhere, making Shadow lose sight of her time and time again.

The main target, Niji, was focused on by Hitomi. She had learned enough of the Elementalist’s abilities and didn’t go for ranged magic: her summoned fox, breaking through the battle between two tanks, pounced on Niji. The girl fenced herself off with a blazing wall and ran to the other side, hurling balls of fire at the kitsune. The spirit dodged Niji’s attacks, reached the girl in three leaps and knocked her to the ground. She pulled out her gun and shot at the creature, but the bodiless fox didn’t take any damage from ordinary bullets. However, the loud blast stunned her for some time, so the Elementalist managed to push the spirit away and unleash a stream of fire. Dammit arrived immediately and sent the fox to another dimension, then returned to his unfriendly conversation with Aoi in the language of spells.

Having dealt with the twins who were now lying beaten on the road, Dasnor jumped to the unaware Summoner and pointed his pistol at her.

“One more animal, and it will be your last one for good.”

The young woman touched the strand on her perfect hair and lifted her chin up, as if proclaiming she didn’t care about this threat, but she stopped her assault. Once the familiar was destroyed, Niji decided it was a perfect moment to escape. Should the fight begin, Dasnor instructed her, she must use every opportunity to flee, because their task was not to win. As shameful as it was to abandon her friends, Niji knew that her escape was all they were fighting for.

Yet the mage girl didn’t even reach the corner of the pub before she was trapped in a frosty cocoon. She had no difficulty in melting and breaking it, but the precious seconds were lost. She saw how Shiningreel, who hadn’t participated in the battle yet, approached her with decisive steps.

“Shiny…”

Niji didn't know why she was calling out to her. Yes, the face of her friend still expressed a complete dismay and she clearly wasn’t fond of what she was doing, but her choice was unambiguous and understandable. And it was not only that Shiny was obliged to obey the Institution. There were too many lies and betrayals from Niji’s side to reconcile with—Shiningreel Phelomena Karen Omnious would never forgive all that. And neither would Niji.