"What's going on?" I shouted in panic pressing my hands over my ears to dull the sound.

"Amber means something triggered the perimeter alarms." Ashley shouted.

Scarlet quickly scoffed down some bread rolls and put some into her pocket, and gave an affirmative nod to. Ashley began tapping on a panel on his robotic arm, and the same runes before began to draw beneath our feet at a much fast rate. The familiar blue flash occurred blinding me. As I regained vision we are now standing in a corner in a large room room filled with computers each with a student stationed at it frantically operating them, there was also very large table in the middle projecting a 3d imagine of what I expect to be Atlantis.

"This is the ops room emelia, so please don't touch anything." Scarlet instructed.

A very stern looking woman entered the room walking quickly to the centre of the room.

"Reports!" she shouted out to everyone in the room.

"Unknown sources have triggered the furthest deference perimeter, number and identity currently unknown." One student spoke out.

"Status of all new students and none combat students??? She carried on shouting out.

"Paul is currently securing them all" another student answered.

"Where's Travis and Scarlet?!" she shouted.

"Travis reporting in currently on route to investigate southern alarm triggers." A voice boomed out from somewhere.

"Scarlet here awaiting for orders Deputy Headmistress!" she spoke out walking towards the woman.

"Defense teams getting geared up and heading to checkpoints" another student spoke out.

"Inner barriers have been breached! At two locations north and south east" a student shouted out.

"Travis heading south east!" His voice boomed.

"Paul heading north, Scarlet stay in the ops room, these guys are unbelievably fast!" Paul Instructed.

His voice filled me with nostalgic feelings, even after so many years just hearing his voice brought back all the memories we shared, and how much I have missed him. This must have been the communicators that Tim spoke about earlier today.

Several minutes passed with no response just silence, "Travis approaching alarm trigger, nothing to see here!" he reported.

"Travis head back to the school and await further instructions." The Deputy Headmistress instructed.

"Copy" Travis replied.

"Paul here sensing several signatures seven to be exact." Paul reported.

"Paul fall back you're heavily outnumbered wait for support!" the Deputy Headmistress instructed.

"Too late they have already enga..... ....." Paul's message was interrupted with static.

Scarlet shot a look to Ashley, which he understood and started to tap on his panel again, assuming he's using the transportation runes earlier. A female hooded figure slowly rose slowly up from the ground exuding this very strange black glowing aura around her, her face pitch black with blue glowing eyes. Instantaneously Scarlet went on the offensive dashing towards her swinging her fist, some reason her fist passed through her with no effect, all the students seemed to be unaware of the risen threat. The Deputy Headmistress pulled out her wand from her robes and began firing off sparks of light at the assailant, I instinctively tried to back off and look for cover, but my body wasn't moving.

She was unfazed by Scarlet's flurry of punched and kicks and the nonstop barrage of lights being shot at her. She seemed as if she was searching for someone looking around the room very slowly, until her eyes met mine, her posture changed as she began to walk towards me, I tried to run but I was unable to move. Slowly walking closer and closer, I began to panic, trying to call for help but my mouth did not happen.

A small metallic ball rolled on the floor towards her and opened up unleashing a small blue explosion, the assailant jumped back avoiding the explosion. But Scarlet was clipped by the edge of the explosion, as the smoke cleared, Scarlet now standing between us and the assailant unfazed by the blast while her metal armour letting off sparks of electricity.

Scarlet drew her large sword from her back and assaulted her with an unnatural speed, the assailant barely being able to keep up with her speed and combat prowess, was cut a few time by her blade, this time miraculously making contact and cutting her. The assailant posture suddenly changed as if she was ready for combat drawing out two pistols.

It was impressive watching the fight, Scarlet maintaining her offensive pressure while evading any counter shots the assailant took at her, with the assailant equally as fast evading Scarlets attacks and the Deputy Headmistresses constant barrage of lights.

A red flash appeared as Travis came stepping out a portal firing shots at the assailant catching her by surprise, one shot hit her in the shoulder piercing through leaving a hole. Scarlet taking advantage of the opening sliced off the same arm with one swift swing, her arm fell to the floor strangely the arm slowly fading into dark black glowing particles and eventually disappearing, she did not bleed from her open wound either, what the hell is she? The assailant now heavily outnumbered began to solely avoid Scarlets attacks while letting Travis and the Deputy Headmistresses attacks pass through her. The assailant leapt backwards spinning high into the air unleashing a torrent of dark black glowing daggers enough to fill the whole room. Unable to react, still trying to move with no avail, I just stood there observing my own fate with a flurry daggers flying towards me.

Scarlet leapt back and began deflecting the daggers with her large sword, it was truly awe-inspiring how Scarlet being so slim and a girl could easily be so agile and swift with her heavy and clunky looking plate armour and a giant sword. In the middle of the motions she manged to also throw her wooden katana to intercept several dagger heading towards some other students near us side. The Deputy Headmistress also turning defensive as she waved her wand in a large circle making a huge blue glowing transparent wall on her half of the room. Travis also attempting to protect himself and the surrounding students began to shoot the projectiles.

The daggers somehow passed through Scarlets wooden katana as if intangible like the assailant herself and the Deputy Headmistress' wall, her face in total shock as why these projectiles passes the wall effortlessly and now her and the students she tried to protect defenceless from the oncoming onslaught. Travis's attempts to shoot the projectiles were also futile as his shots although being on target didn't have any effect on the projectiles.

The constant blizzard of daggers proved too much for scarlet as a few managed to get past her now flying straight towards me. Why the hell can I not even move? Sitting here being a spectator to my own fate was infuriating. Ashley suddenly leapt into me holding me close, to shield me from the oncoming daggers. I heard the sickly sound of sharp blades piercing flesh, Ashley letting out a small grunt of pain. Suddenly in an instant the assailant was now standing directly behind Ashely, how did she cover so much distance in an instant? She effortlessly grabbed Ashley with her remaining arm and tossing him aside. "No you don't!" I head Ashley shout out, as a section of his arm detached itself and letting out a beam of energy.

"Tch" I heard the hooded figure let out as if annoyed by the hindrance of Ashley's attack letting it pass through her, as she proceeded to reach her hand towards me, her face was totally obscured, it was pitch black like a void, all I could see was her intense glowing blue eyes. Her hands similarly just as dark slowly opening to grasp me, and Scarlet desperately trying to reach her swinging her blade.

Several red flash appeared near every student, a strong force pulled me from behind and all the other students through their portals narrowly escapes the assailants grasp, Falling backwards I barely caught a glimpse of Paul walking past me stepping into the fray as the portal closed behind him.

"What the hell?" one of the students spoke, totally unaware of everything that just happened.

Screams of pain was let out from several students with open wounds in various locations on their writhing in pain. "WHAT THE F?" A student shouted out!

Did they not see what I witnessed?..... How could they be totally unaware of everything that just happened? Looking around we were now in the courtyard totally encased in a transparent golden box. The dorm building was similarly encased in the same golden box but much larger, I guess that is when Paul secured the students.

Two students both female began standing up and heading towards the more critically injured students and their hands began to glow golden yellow as the proceeded to touch the students, miraculously the wounds stopped bleeding and began to slowly seal itself healing without a scar. This must be some sort of holy magic....

"This.. seems.. to.. be.. one.. of.. Paul's.. barriers." An injured female student spoke taking breaths in-between words clutching her shoulder in pain.

"Does that mean we was in trouble?" An unharmed female student gasped and spoke.

"Most likely otherwise we would still be in the ops room, nothing to fear though no one has ever bypassed one of Paul's barriers". A male student added as he struggled with one arm to sit up against the side of the barrier.

"Nor has anyone passed the defence barriers, yet someone must have managed to get to the ops room." Another student added.

In the distance I saw a dark blur appear from the wall near the top of the main castle screaming towards us, with a red blur bursting out the wall in close pursuit along with several smaller blurs, "What the hell is that? It's heading straight to us!" someone shouted.

The blur passed the edge of the barrier effortlessly, everything began to slow down again, and I could now recognise the blur was the assailant heading straight for me with an outstretched hand. I tried to back away but my body didn't respond again. A recognisable red flash appeared from behind me and another yanking feeling pulling me through. The red portal quickly closed cutting off the assailant hand dropping on the floor and fading away, like the arm Scarlet severed before. Looking through the hole in the wall, the black blur carried on passing through the ground, as the red blur impacted the floor leaving a large crater, and the several smaller blurs started rushing towards us. As the rubble and smoke cleared and settled Scarlet was left in the centre of the crater.

"F***************" she resoundingly roared, as she punch the ground causing the crafter to deepen and several larger fissure cracked out.

Paul proceeded to turn around and look at me, "are you okay?" he questioned me softly. As several books slowly floated towards him hovering behind him.

Stunned by his caring demeanour and voice, I found it really hard to speak, so I just nodded yes. A few seconds past as we stared into each other's eyes, I could see from his expression he was worried for my wellbeing, maybe he does care after all. He knelt down to inspect me carefully making sure I wasn't hurt in any way, his hand firmly gliding over me and him looking at me closely made me feel extremely shy and hot, "hmm... Seems like you're unscathed." He said with a smile.

He then proceeded to walk to Ashley kneeling down again, his hands began to glow golden similar to the students before, as he began to hold Ashley's non robotic arm with left hand, "Thanks bro, hope your fight went better than ours." Ashely spoke out.

"There was a few but they weren't too difficult, you did well though, she seemed quite formidable." He smiled. His right arm pointed at the Deputy Headmistress, two of his floating books flew towards the deputy flicking through its own pages again, then flipping around to face her, golden runes began to draw themselves in a circle on the floor around her, and a small golden flash was released seemingly healing the Deputy Headmistress of all her wounds, as she stood up slowly. The books closed themselves and flew back hovering behind Paul again.

The aftermath of the fight was quite devastating, multiple students were injured including the head mistress and the whole room was covered in holes where the daggers impacted the computer, walls and floor. "Who the hell was the masked assailant, brave enough to hit us head on and willing to fight against two S ranks and myself." The headmistress spoke out.

"No idea headmistress, but when I manged to subdue my assailants they vaporised into a black smoke for some reason" Paul answered. Scarlet joined us as she arrived through the hole in the wall she made.

"And who is this girl that the assailant was after?" the Deputy Headmistress asked.

She's Emelia a freshman." Scarlet responded.

"Who would be crazy enough to attack us head on for a freshman? And why is she so important to them?" She questioned everyone.

"No idea Deputy Headmistress!" Paul replied.

"Regardless everyone check yourselves into the infirmary, make sure you're all okay!" she ordered.

Paul Stood up and nodded, as the familiar red flash occurred again, on the other side of the portal the injured students in the courtyard, "you guys need a lift to the infirmary?" he asked politely. None of them responded with faces of shock, "hmmmm I'll take your silence as a yes!" he smiled. As he forcibly pulled them through the portal with some unknown magic.

"Ohh and someone set up a personal guard for this freshman, just as a precaution." The deputy head shouted as she walked out.

A secondary red portal opened leading to a room with a counter and a student waiting there looking bored. A force then suddenly pushed us through the portal with Ashley closely following. Turning around to see if Paul followed, I managed catching a glance of Scarlet and Paul walking away as the portal quickly closed.