When Seiren had first enrolled at Sunbird, his class had been the laughing stock of the school. Never in the deviant-only high school’s 50-year history had there been a class with such disproportion between the students’ gender in favor of the girls as the one the young Blackscale had been put in.

Up until that point Seiren had only ever known one truly strong woman – his mother – and had considered all other girls to be first and foremost a feast for the eyes and second – gentle flowers to be protected. He had, however, met only two of his female classmates prior to enrolling at Sunbird because they had been in the same class in middle school as well.

And without knowing what the rest were capable of, he had been left as shocked as the other students and teachers when at the end of their first year together his class had reached second place in the overall power and intelligence rankings of the school. They had fallen behind only Mara Kilzarad’s class, but by the end of their third year not too long ago, they had managed to topple even them.

Many would attribute their latest successes to the efforts of Yuki and the six boys from the class, but all who thought so would be very, very wrong. For it was the girls everyone needed to watch out for.

Their devas might not have been as strong as those of many others, but their reason-defying stubbornness came second to none. And that was how they had managed to come out on top time and again, no matter what they had had to go through.

Those girls had been the ones who had changed Seiren’s mind about women and from a mere fan, he as well as Tokura had become the most fanatic perverted worshippers of the opposite sex. While they had always been known for their beauty and grace, some women could also be as, if not more ferocious and mighty warriors than any man – something the golden-haired pervert personally found more arousing than perhaps even their appearance.

That was why Seiren believed the girls from his class who were part of Zoran’s Martian Phoenix Squad fighting near Dreadblade Fortress’s main gate in the present were going to win this battle as well.

Even though Vega, Mara Kilzarad, Rafael Lahala and the Two Pillar Guard protecting them had been swarmed by around 300 demons a while ago and since then, that trio could no longer empower the Sunbird School Force with their pale green energy, mind control and frenzy deva.

Even though Seiren himself and the rest of the Goran Rescue Team led by Neana could only restrain and keep safe all their fellow citizens from the undead brainwashed force who had already been defeated because they had to save their strength for the battle with Deathaxe.

Even though the Martian Phoenix Squad and Zoran were forced to fight alone against the rest of the undead Deckstorians along with the ordinari darkalighters constantly firing their machine guns, energy cannons and bronze spade humvee arsenal to not let anyone break through Dreadblade Fortress’s gate – the main goal everyone was striving to achieve.

Even though this battle to get inside Dreadblade had been going on for so long, Seiren could no longer tell how much time had passed exactly, if it was even the same day as when the battle had started and if it was going to end any time soon.

But as a dozen more incapacitated undead were crushed at the young Blackscale’s feet and he saw the state of his three female classmates who had brought them in, he felt doubt for the first time.

Two of them, Annabel and Yonira, had suffered only minor injuries and didn’t look too tired yet, the fact Yonira’s face was completely devoid of emotion and did not change its expression at all having nothing to do with the present conflict, but with her sacrificing a part of her soul to save Rose Summerbolt’s life a few weeks ago. As for the trio’s third member – Miluna – she was the one in a really rough shape.

Namely her eyes, mouth, hair and veins had all erupted into pale green energy, cracks with the same color scarring her skin, her body having become leaner, abnormally hunched and with the arms and legs being further apart than normal. Plus a cloud mixing pale green energy and her own acid deva had formed around Miluna, the look on her face as her body was taking so much damage being one of pure ecstasy.

(Seiren) ‘Milu … what the hell’s wrong with her?’

(Annabel) ‘Well, she’s got an overdrive shot addiction and ever since the battle’s started, she’s been getting her hands on more and more and shooting it up all the time.’

(Seiren) ‘What, and you just let her?!!’

(Yonira) ‘She’s a lot more efficient in battle like this, Seiren, and that’s the only reason we’ve let her go at it for so long!’ – she paused for a moment to turn her head to her acid-using classmate, then turning back to Seiren, who could tell Yonira was worried despite her motionless expression – ‘Though even I have got to admit she’s gone a bit too far this time.’

As Seiren’s attention was drawn by the dozen beaten undead who started moving again, King went through all of them with an arc of his scarlet-colored Daroid, wrapping his fellow citizens in enough of it to immobilize and then carry them aside. Before he could get far enough, the golden-haired teenager threw Miluna at him while shouting after having restrained her energy-acid cloud by channeling vermillion fireworks through it.

(Seiren) ‘Take Milu to Neana, too, King! Have her restructure her back to normal or something!’

While King went away, Seiren turned to his two female classmates, Annabel clearly having become angry and most likely Yonira as well, though she couldn’t show it.

(Annabel) ‘She could’ve kept fighting a bit longer, you know. Even if just a bit.’

(Seiren) ‘I think she’s done enough of that!! I’ll take over for her and when Neana’s got her back to normal and she’s rested, Milu will come back to help us!!’

(Yonira) ‘You can’t do that!! Your team is only here to fight Deathaxe while our squad has to clear you a path to him!! That was the …’

(Seiren) ‘The hell with the fucking plan!!! Look at everything that’s going on around here!! All our plans went to shit!!!

So I say we all fight together and get this done already!!! No matter how tired we are by the time we get to Deathaxe, we’ll figure out how to deal with him as a team, the way we always do!!

Yuki and that bastard Hikaru aren’t here, but I’m sure they’d say the same if they were!! Now let’s …’

Seiren was unable to finish his sentence, because all of a sudden a massive typhoon of lightning that looked almost white pierced through the dark rain clouds in the sky to crush in an area near Dreadlblade Fortress. The moment he saw this attack, which shook half, if not all of Deckstoru and disappeared as quickly as it had been summoned, the young Blackscale knew.

This could only ever be the work of one person. Of his rival. Of Hikaru.

And although Seiren didn’t know what the young Summerbolt’s condition was or if he had managed to defeat the demon he had been fighting earlier with that technique, merely seeing this typhoon that had a power the likes of which Hikaru had never displayed in front of his rival before made him feel something. Something he would never admit to have felt to Hikaru’s face.

HOPE.

The silence that fell over the battlefield in the wake of the lightning typhoon’s disappearance lasted only a few seconds, another thunder’s echo interrupting it. This one, however, came from much closer and its source was a single pink bolt that had appeared out of nowhere and crashed through the ceiling of the sort of shelter made by Exo’s metal deva to keep safe all the captured undead Deckstorians.

Seeing as how Miluna who was supposed to be healed by Neana and everyone else from the Goran Rescue Team were all there, Annabel, Yonira and Seiren looked at each other for a brief moment before he teleported all three of them away with a blast of vermillion fireworks.

When the fireworks disappeared, the shelter was seen up close, having a tunnel-like structure, but with a very high ceiling, while hundreds of big metal spikes were sticking out of its outer surface, its interior being full of piles of Deckstorians wrapped in restructured versions of the Goran Rescue Team members’ devas.

Neana Ilre had knelt amid the piles and was in the process of restructuring Miluna with Exo’s help, Reimei having relieved him as the shelter defender by forming barriers made of multiple water waves around the tunnel. Her and Exo’s attention, as well as Tokura and King’s, both of whom had just come back with more captured undead, was redirected toward something else in the present, though.

The pink bolt Seiren had seen pierce the shelter’s roof was revealed as everyone’s Literature teacher Obur Segune, carrying Chemistry teacher Gudard Beo on his back. Both of them were in a near-death state, most of the upper layer of their skin missing and their almost completely naked bodies being covered in enough blood to make it impossible to tell how many more injuries they had suffered. Yet despite their similar condition, the two’s behavior was starkly different.

While supporting Gudard with one hand to make sure he would remain on his back, Obur had used the other to grab Neana by the collar and was roaring with a mixture of rage and desperation in her face, at the same time Gudard only smiling gently with barely open eyes and not saying anything.

(Obur) ‘You bring him back, Neana!!! RIGHT NOW!!!!’

If anyone else were faced with the Literature teacher who now had a more ominous feel to his fury than in any other moment Seiren had seen this side of him being shown, they would be frozen in fear. Neana Ilre, however, had a face as expressionless as Yonira’s right now, continuing to use restructuring on the screaming Miluna, whose energy-acid cloud was contained by Exo’s multilayered metal sheets, as she looked straight in the maddened Obur’s eyes and spoke with a tone as cold as humanly possible.

(Neana) ‘Let go of me, Obur. I don’t have time to deal with dying old men now. Gudard’s 62. He’s lived long enough as it is.’

(Obur) ‘That’s for me to decide!! Your only job is to save him, so do it already!!!’

(Neana) ‘The brats come first. That’s what we teachers agreed on before the battle, remember?’

Seeing how unyielding Neana was and how desperate – Obur, Seiren couldn’t help but intervene, pushing Annabel and Yonira toward the arguing teachers and going after his two classmates as well.

(Seiren) ‘I got Bel here with me! And Aria and Rika are out there, too! Can’t they patch up sensei with their healing devas to …’

Miss Ilre kept looking at Mr. Segune with a disturbing level of calmness as she answered the young Blackscale’s question.

(Neana) ‘We need more healers than we have here to keep him alive long enough to get fixed by me, so don’t bother, Seiren.

Save your strength to help the living instead of wasting it on the dead. That’s an order.

And it’s valid not just for Gudard’s case, but for the rest of us old dogs when our time comes, too. This war is yours to win while we’re here just to keep you alive so you can win it.’

While knowing full well what Neana was saying was an undeniable fact, the horrific sight of seeing so many comrades this close to death and the pressure of all the emotions in him made Seiren lose control in that moment.

As he erupted in vermillion fireworks and pushed Annabel and Yonira aside to start an argument of his own with Sunbird’s headmistress, the golden-haired pervert realized Obur had stopped pulling her by the collar and had looked in another direction with a surprised look on his face.

Turning his gaze toward the cause of that surprise, the young Blackscale saw how a mass of arms, legs, heads, torsos and other body parts multiplied millions of times was crushed in the undead Deckstorians the Martian Phoenix Squad girls were fighting. That mass split in two from there, one half staying by the girls’ side to provide as much cover from the darkalighter attacks as possible, the other pushing aside the Deckstorians who had already been hit.

From the latter half jumped out two silhouettes, landing just beyond Reimei’s water wave barriers around the metal shelter. The scarlet-haired beauty turned to Seiren then, after getting a confirmative nod from him removing the waves to reveal the silhouettes as Yuki and Sunbird Biology teacher Cane Garasu.

Both of them were in a state almost as bad as Obur and Gudard’s, but at least these two had preserved their upper layer of skin. On the other hand, though, Yuki had a bandage covering her right eye she had most likely lost, so the terrified young Blackscale couldn’t really decide who had it worse.

At least there was one thing about the whole situation Seiren didn’t find surprising at all – how burned-up and ruined the body of Hikaru who was being carried by Yuki much like Gudard had been by Obur was. Whenever his rival got separated from him and Yuki, that was the condition he wound up in, because that was how hopeless he was.

(Seiren) ‘Yu’s got only one eye and still she’s saving your ass, Summerbolt. You really can’t get more pathetic than that.’

As the golden-haired pervert went straight to the white-haired beauty the spiky-haired mad genius on her back, the three of them smiled at each other, meanwhile Cane stepping closer to Neana, Obur and Gudard.

(Hikaru) ‘Really, Blackscale? You’re gonna talk about pathetic after I took out a high-level demon?

You’d be dead right now if it wasn’t for me, so even if I wasn’t expecting an apology from a piece of shit like you, not making fun of me would still be …’

(Yuki) ‘OK. Let me stop both of you right there. You’ll wind up killing each other before the enemy can and I’m too tired to deal with your bullshit as it is.’

Succumbing to the calming effect Yuki always had on him, Seiren redirected his attention from Hikaru to her, and though he was still smiling, he couldn’t take his eyes off the one his friend was missing. Miss Iceflame had apparently noticed that, because her smile also changed.

(Yuki) ‘Don’t worry about the eye. I’m good to go.’

(Seiren) ‘I was just about to ask if you’re OK, but if you’ve made it here and there’s no Tyra around, that means you killed her, right? So you gotta be feeling great!!!

And what about Vivaya-sensei? He go with the rest of the Multi-talion to fight the demons?’

Yuki’s response to what Seiren said was not what he had been expecting. All of a sudden, she turned sad and looked away from him, her expression being almost pained for a moment.

(Yuki) ‘We’ll talk about that later, but I can assure you Tyra will no longer be a threat. And Vivaya-sensei … he’s better than ever.’ – her confidence wavering lasted only a little, the white-haired beauty returning to her usual resolved self right after as she looked at Seiren again – ‘I say we focus on what we’re going to do about the enemies here right now.

After we came and picked up Hikaru and the Stormbringers, they told us what the situation is around here and that things aren’t looking good at all.’

(Seiren) ‘You got the Stormbringers with you?’

(Hikaru) ‘Don’t be relying on them to do any fighting soon, though, Blackscale. They’re probably the most exhausted and beat-up people here.

The half of the Multi-talion Yu and Garasu-sensei sent away are going to support the Two Pillar Guard so Vega, Mara and her class can come over to us. And when they do that, our class and their class are going to break through the gates.’

Moments after the young Summerbolt had finished his explanation, his rival unleashed an outburst even more explosive than his deva against him, which left Yuki comically annoyed as usual.

(Seiren) ‘I think Neana’s gonna have to restructure that brain of yours, too, Summerbolt, cuz you’ve really lost it!!

Is that your great plan?! Us and the ex-Martians working together and making some kind of miracle happen?!!

Cuz I sure as hell don’t see how that’s gonna work!!!’

‘I do.’

Seiren turned to the person who had said that and whose voice he knew all too well, the metal shelter having become even more full of people as some members of the Multi-talion had come inside it and had brought along Mara Kilzarad and her class of ex-Martians who had gathered around the very serious Vega.

(Vega) ‘I couldn’t empower anyone anymore after the demons hit us, Seiren, but if it wasn’t for the ex-Martians, I wouldn’t be alive right now and I wouldn’t have been able to fix the brains of the undead you guys brought to me earlier.

Mara used mind control to help those people get in the fight on our side as soon as I was done with them and with their and the Multi-talion’s help, whatever demons are left around here are gonna be taken care of.

I was the one saying the ex-Martians better pay us back for saving them, but with everything that’s happened, I’d say we’re even now. So it shouldn’t be a problem to start working together.’

As much trust as Seiren had in Vega, he was still not entirely convinced of the ex-Martians and their homeroom teacher’s loyalty, looking away from his friend and at his old enemies then.

(Seiren) ‘That right? You on our side now? How’d that happen, huh?!’

It was hard to tell if Mara or her students were more annoyed by the pervert’s question, Hikaru answering it before any of them could get over the annoyance, however.

(Hikaru) ‘It happened like a lot of other stuff during this battle, Blackscale – because it had to. Because bringing down Darkalight is what matters most to all of us right now. I don’t like the idea of working with them anymore than you do, but they had Vega’s back while neither you nor I did.

That means they’re at least somewhat reliable and no matter what happens, no one can deny this – our two classes are Sunbird’s strongest and the only two that have never worked together.

What would happen to the enemy if we did, hm?’

While Seiren was contemplating his rival’s words, Cane seemed to have just about wrapped up his small council meeting with Neana and Obur near the youngsters.

(Cane) How about it, Neana? Yuki, Hikaru and I came up with this plan and I think it’s the best shot we’ve got now.

You give the ones who’re in the worst condition here a quick patch-up and go out there with your and Zoran’s team and Mara’s class to take out the gate while Obur and Gudard will stay here to watch over the Stormbringers and the Deckstorians as they get healed.

Me and the Multi-talion will go help the Two Pillar Guard against the demons and then we’ll go to check on the rest of the ground forces.

When the Stormbringers get strong enough for another fight, Obur and Gudard will bring them to us, so we can deal with whoever’s left outside the fortress and make sure all beaten Deckstorians are restrained. That will leave only Deathaxe and some small reinforcements inside for you to finish off.’

Gudard shared his opinion before Neana, having regained consciousness as a few of the Multi-talion members who had brought Vega, Mara and the ex-Martians were using their healing devas to keep him stable before the headmistress could start fixing him up.

While he spoke, he had a surprisingly confident and lively smile on his face considering the healing hole Seiren now saw he had in his chest, Obur not being able to help smiling himself as he watched him regaining his strength.

(Gudard) ‘I sure as hell am game for that plan. And if a dead man’s saying that, what’s the excuse for the rest of you?’

Even more surprising was Miluna’s rise after her restructuring to a normal appearance had been complete so Gudard’s healing session could start, the acid-using beauty now stepping closer to Seiren with clenched fists and as much determination burning in her eyes as he had ever seen.

(Miluna) ‘I’m in, too.’

(Seiren) ‘Milu, you sure you gonna be able to go at it again already? Neana will be fighting with us on the front line this time, so if you take too many overdrive shots …’

(Miluna) ‘Nah, Seiren. I won’t have to.’ – from simply looking determined, Miluna grinned with mad joy all of a sudden  – ‘All of you guys will be taking them instead of me this time!!! My job will be only to get them for you and support you along the way.’

Looking over at everyone else from the Goran Rescue Team and Annabel and Yonira behind him, Seiren finally smiled confidently as well.

(Seiren) ‘Well, I trust the girls from our class … and the boys … so I know they’ll do just fine, especially since we’ll be fighting together. Only thing left is to see if the ex-Martians can keep up with us.’

(Mara) ‘You haven’t done almost anything useful since the start of this fight, Seiren, so I’d watch how I talk to my class if I were you.

You new Martians will be the ones having a hard time keeping up, I promise.’

After Mara finished countering Seiren’s challenge, Neana got up while continuing to restructure Gudard, looking at the whole force gathered under the remains of the metal shelter’s roof, all of them looking determined and confident now.

And then something happened that was so rare, Seiren could not believe he was bearing witness to it.

Neana herself had now got a super wide grin full of confidence on her face.

(Neana) ‘If the two biggest rivals among Sunbird’s classes are getting this fired up to work together, there’s only thing left for me to do as headmistress that I’m sure Zoran will agree with as my predecessor – SUPPORT YOU BRATS WITH EVERYTHING I’VE GOT TO GET YOU THROUGH THAT GATE!!!!!’

 

 

*

 

 

When they were all ready, it began.

First, a tremor was sent through the earth by Yonira and Zalan that shook all of Dreadblade, but in particular, its barbican and curtain wall, causing their slight collapse to the shock of all darkalighters and undead Deckstorians in the area. Then Lara Jade’s steam waves were released to limit their vision enough that they could no longer fire on the remaining Martian Phoenix Squad members.

Just as the steam waves were torn apart by multi-elemental volleys and pale green energy projectile barrages, the fully gathered Martian Class No. 1 (The New Martians) and Martian Class No. 3 (The ex-Martians) led by Zoran Lawell, Neana Ilre and Mara Kilzarad came at them.

Violet and Zilly released a wide-range burst of their dark blue and pinkish-purple smoke, combined with one of the ex-Martians’ darkness deva to both hinder their opponents’ vision and conceal as many of their allies’ attacks in the burst as possible. The absorbers, wind and light deva users among the undead Deckstorians made quick work of the smoke and darkness, their allies using static elemental devas building walls to block the Allied Martian Force’s multi-elemental barrage.

But Violet, Zilly and the darkness-using ex-Martian had incorporated more in their attack than made readily apparent, revealing hundreds of clones for the former two and blade-like structures that drew all nearby matter to them automatically for the latter one. The level of lethality of the clones and blades’ attacks for the undead Deckstorians and the darkalighters was very different, the ex-Martians’ sensor and Keiry D giving cues to differentiate between the two.

To keep at bay the attacks coming from the massive pale green energy cannons and the 30- and 50-caliber ones attached to the bronze spade humvees lined up along Dreadblade’s battlements as well as the standard machine guns being fired by the darkalighters on the barbican, a living wall was used. That wall consisted of a hundred organic perfect copies made by one of the ex-Martians’ devas, when the clones got their allies close enough to the gate, another ex-Martian and Vega releasing an attack.

The former created a 100,000 cyan energy projectiles, the latter – just as many pale green energy ones, to them being added support from attacks of the same type and number, but of different elements – Annabel’s light, King’s Daroid and Tokura’s Flexoid. All the other attacks were of the channel type, being run through whatever surface they came in contact with after being deflected by the Deckstorians covering the darkalighters to erupt in another attack from there, Tokura alone applying a different approach to provide support.

Using his azure-colored energy compound’s special ability of ultrafast, multistage and mass teleportation, he kept wrapping as many of his own and the attacks of his comrades as possible in Flexoid to teleport around the battlefield again and again so they could hit at least one target in one way or another.

That barrage became so triumphantly great in quantity and duration and the darkalighters firing the bronze spade cannons had been so preoccupied with destroying the organic clone wall, that all bronze spades wound up getting destroyed by Vega and co.’s attack, which was just what he had been waiting for.

The humvees blew up shortly after their weapons were hit, the young drunkard absorbing all the pale green energy emitted by those blasts, blowing out his cheeks as he fired back at the enemy the biggest energy roar Seiren had ever seen him use.

Vega’s roar alone managed to blow the entirety of the barbican to pieces along with all the machine guns lined up on it and the darkalighters firing them. The Allied Martian Force moved forward after that success to clash with the rest of the villains, many of whom were wearing V1 partial anti-deva armor, amid the smoke and rubble left from the barbican, meanwhile undead Deckstorians coming from the sides and also needing to be dealt with.

All flame attacks were countered by Zoran’s phoenix flames along with Mia and Kia Nelaz’s turquoise flames, forming walls to the side of the Martians so they could keep advancing while Feoria ran naked through the fire users’ ranks, carrying Neana on her back.

The former used her skin-heating deva to withstand the heat from the fires and the latter put her restructuring to use to get rid of the fire-using darkalighters’ anti-deva armor as well as weaken some of the Deckstorians.

After Neana was done with the restructuring, Yuki took Hikaru off her back to throw at Vale from the side before smashing her foot in the ground to create a garden of ice octahedrons to pierce several more armored darkalighters left on the ground as some had taken flight. Upon catching the mad genius, Vale combined her electric charge channel deva with his lightning so both could be run through the opponents left without armor, some of which Feoria had beaten up on a purely hand-to-hand level.

Order-infused energy was channeled along with the electricity to ensure additional restructuring and oblivion for all the darkalighters, Hikaru and Vale being moved aside extremely fast by King’s Daroid who himself was surfing nearby on the layer of water Reimei had covered the ground with. Once the water reached the opponents being electrocuted, all of them got taken out, the electrocution being milder for the Deckstorians so that they would only lose consciousness. Vale had a sensor deva as well as the electric charge one, this allowing her to guide Hikaru to the right targets to focus on in the chaos of the battle.

A retaliation from the undead had to come at one point due to the big losses they had already suffered, many of the active elemental deva users sending out a storm of their devas while those with static elemental devas filled that storm with blades, spikes, stakes and the like made of rock, ice, metal, etc. Seiren’s time to shine came then, sending forth five full-body hydras from his vermillion fireworks on a river-size attack combining Miluna’s acid and an ex-Martian’s lava.

The two combined techniques pretty much canceled each other out, but what the mind-controlled Deckstorians didn’t know was that another member of Mara’s class who could use a paralysis gaze had been snuck in amid the smoke risen from the latest clash by Seiren and co. As soon as enough of the smoke had risen for her opponents to see her, she stared at tens of her fellow citizens and successfully paralyzed them all, the rest not being given enough time to strike at her.

Both the New and ex-Martians’ close-range fighters hit this group of undead, Feoria beating them up with her heated fists and kicks, Turora using the same attacks, but applying just enough of her life force stealing deva to weaken her targets without killing them and Aria fighting while clad in a healing cloak of her making. Rika was using her deva to lengthen and strengthen her tongue to use as a whip, the ex-Martian capable of turning into a spiny-tailed iguana using his tongue in a similar manner, but also relying on his great speed and agility for spring-like attacks.

That left the ex-Martian able to create brown tentacles partially covered with orange scales, using those to tie up some opponents so that her allies could finish them off and beating up or choking others to the point where they lost consciousness.

At around the same time Annabel combined her normal-colored light deva with Kataleya’s lime green one, the former creating a big burst of light beams similar to a shining star while the latter clad herself in a radiant cloak to place in the center of the burst and strengthen it, together managing to blind all terrestrial morph deva users among the Deckstorians.

While they were blinded, Exo, Yonira and an ex-Martian made a gigantic blade of metal, rock and coral-colored crystals to cut that batch of enemy fighters into an incapacitated state, all three creators of the blade still paying attention to the destruction that was about to reach their classmates from the side.

The cloning ex-Martian, his copies, Mara Kilzarad, the healer and sensor from her class and Keiry D had focused on the darkalighters, due to all of them not possessing battle-oriented abilities having stolen weapons from said darkalighters to shoot back at them, which led to a lot of energy-powered arsenal exploding. Exo, Yonira and the crystal-making ex-Martian responded by combining their devas again to build thick walls of metal mace bases, rock cubes and crystal obelisks to protect everyone from the destruction.

Another ex-Martian wasted no time in using her pink jelly deva to immobilize most of the Deckstorians capable of using limb-multiplying and other somatic devas, one of her classmates raining down meteors on them from above along with an attack by Vix and Ayli.

Vix transformed in a golden-haired fox and Ayli – in a silver-furred hare, cladding themselves in dark purple and pale red energy and uniting in a massive projectile that brought down quite a few opponents, leaving only the aerial morphs among the hot heads’ fellow citizens as a threat.

To deal with those, Reimei brought down torrents of rain from her water deva, some of the drops turning into truly massive shots which were then frozen by Yuki’s ice from a distance, the scarlet- and white-haired beauties’ attack being carried out so fast that none of their opponents had time to counter it. The aerial morphs proceeded to get cut and stabbed in a nonlethal manner many times until eventually they turned back to their human forms and fell down.

Yuki was then carried forward along with Jart from the ex-Martians by Nalisia’s hair that had been turned into a gigantic black mass of organic spikes and blades, the duo armoring those spikes and blades in thick ice and mini typhoon drills, aiming them together at the remaining ordinari darkalighters wearing anti-deva armor. No mercy was shown to these opponents and as their damaged armor blew up, Nalisia advanced, Jart jumping off her hair in order to combine his deva with those of the rest of the ex-Martians and all the girls from the Martian Phoenix Squad to form a massive wave meant to push the hair-changing beauty forward.

The terrain under the remains of the gate and the barbican around it was restructured by Neana in such a way so as to become steep enough for many of the darkalighters standing on it to roll down forward or at least lose their balance, when that happened, Nalisia revealing the Allied Martian Forces’ final trump card.

While no attempts had been made to hide Yuki was being carried by her classmate’s hair, the rest of the Goran Rescue Team had been concealed in that hair earlier, upon reaching the last batch of villains blocking their way to the fortress’s interior, having become evident to all the time for a final push had come.

King, who had gone back to his normal form to be able to fit inside Nalisia’s hair along with the others, now turned into his giant form, but got a little bigger than he normally did, holding Tokura by the back of the neck with one hand and by the belt with the other and directing his head forward to use as a manual battering ram.

Zoran turned into his phoenix form, Neana restructuring him into a slightly bigger version and one that would not hurt Nalisia as he went below her to carry the girl and her friends forward, the two headmasters clearing the path for the youngsters who had finally reached the ordinari darkalighters.

The darkalighters launched a multi-elemental energy-focused volley from their anti-deva weapons while roaring and screaming from both anger and desperation at their opponents, Yuki and Exo cladding themselves and all their fellow team members in ice and metal to make sure they would be protected as a response.

Hikaru added another layer of protection to himself and the rest with an Order-charged lightning cloak which partially restructured every attack that came in contact with it, with the defense front having been covered, everyone from the Goran Rescue Team focusing solely on offense.

Being able to sense where all the intact and unused overdrive shots in the vicinity were via her addiction to them, Miluna had guided some of the cloning ex-Martian’s copies to them, a combined teleportation getting those clones on Zoran’s back as well now so that they could distribute the shots among the main hero group. There were two syringes for most members and one for some, injecting themselves and continuing with the attack while the clones rejoined their classmates next to the Martian Phoenix Squad.

Using channel-type techniques under Vega’s direction, who had been absorbing pale green energy from every source in the area he could find for a while now, they all poured their full power into a single focus point, which was Tokura’s head. Whatever destructive potential Hikaru’s lightning, Seiren’s vermillion fireworks, Vega’s pale green energy, King’s Daroid and Reimei’s water could carry was combined with Tokura’s own Flexoid and the deflective might of his invisible shield  to go straight to the shining rainbow ball his head had become.

Yuki armored it in ice octahedrons, Exo cladding all of them in his metal to turn the pseudoknight’s head into a mace’s base, giving the ‘go’ signal to all the members of the Allied Martian Force behind them so both classes could push them forward with their special combined techniques.

The part of the unity wave from earlier housing the Martian Phoenix Squad girls’ devas was sent forward, turning into torrents of glistening phoenix feathers along the way while the ex-Martians’ part turned into a humanoid giant moving on top of the torrents, an orb of both groups’ devas forming around Zoran, Nalisia and the Goran Rescue Team. As the abilities of those outside the orb were combined with those within and the feather wave and giant smashed it in the darkalighters’ ranks with a unified roar, the orb changed in appearance.

It became rainbow-colored at first and looked like it was full of stars, galaxies, nebulas, planets, moons, storms and flares from outer space, all of it being painted vermillion red in the last moment as Seiren unleashed even more of his power under the effect of the strong emotions he and no doubt everyone else around was feeling.

Maybe because of the state of internal harmony the New, ex-Martians and their teachers had managed to reach as a result of giving it their all to achieve the same goal, all of them were somehow able to shout the name of their technique they seemed to have agreed on almost beforehand in perfect sync:

‘MARTIAN SUNBIRD’S MULTIELEMENTAL FLOOD OF FURY AND ORB OF ANNIHILATION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!’

Dreadblade Fortress’s curtain wall and the remains of the towers were blasted away into oblivion along with the ears of anyone in the vicinity as the orb hit the living wall the darkalighters had made as a final desperate measure, the giant and feather wave tearing through them right after with an otherworldly thundering roar. A whirlwind was then formed by the shredded and crushed villains’ remains in the wake of their wall crumbling under the might of an attack that could have struck fear into the hearts of the mightiest gods in high heavens and the foulest devils inhabiting the pits of hell.

But even that was not the end, a final shockwave being released by the combined technique which cracked and shattered more parts of the fortress’s exterior and interior, only after its passing a still silence falling over everything.

Due to having lost his sense of hearing and having been blinded by the light that had come flooding from the sky after the Allied Martian Force’s final attack had blasted away every single remaining cloud in the sky a long distance away, Seiren couldn’t see or hear himself fall. He could definitely feel it, however, especially with his jaw which soon became filled with blood to be spat on the dirt outside.

Eventually getting accustomed to the light and managing to temporarily ignore the pain in his body and head, the young Blackscale fully opened his eyes, Dreadblade’s sun-drenched courtyard being revealed then. The dark clouds from yesterday were finally all gone, the second stage of the Sunbird School Force’s plan having been completed.