ACT I – POST-NEBULA FORMING

Part I: Same Start, New Twist

Reimei Scarlettail got the feeling she would get along with Yuki Iceflame pretty well right from the start. Little did she know she would also have a similar first-day-of-school experience in Deckstoru to her white-haired classmate, though. Namely, a fight broke out during the lunch break on that day, the two girls involved in it escalating their conflict to a point where they needed to change their battlefield to Sunbird High School’s inner yard.

The difference between what Yuki and Reimei went through was that in the latter’s case, she wasn’t a participant in the fight, only being the trigger for it and more importantly, that this time around the fight was between two girls from the same class. Her class – Earthling Class No. 1. Those girls were Annabel and Yonira – the duo Miss Scarlettail had already learned were known throughout Sunbird and beyond as the female version of the school’s greatest rivals Hikaru Summerbolt and Seiren Blackscale.

Presently Annabel used her hands to channel her light deva through the ground of the inner yard’s grass-covered area to have a number of thin beams of concentrated light come out in a circle around Yonira, the beams merging with each other to form a prison, the inside of which was then filled with light just as intense. After a bit, that prison disappeared and when the same happened with the smoke that came in the aftermath of Annabel’s attack, it was revealed her opponent had formed a cube-shaped rock to hide in. Although the outside of the cube had partially crumbled, the inside seemed to have taken no damage at all.

As annoyed as she was by the failure of her last technique, Annabel wasn’t given enough time to dwell on that because the cube was quickly broken into a number of mini-versions of itself, spikes coming out of all of them as they were launched in a bullet-like fashion at the Earthling Class No. 1’s chief medic. This time she used her feet to channel her deva through the ground, a line of multiple concentrated light pillars bursting forth in front of her and successfully cutting the cubes to pieces, by then Yonira having jumped forward with both her arms clad in rocks to the elbows.

(Yonira) ‘You really don’t deserve to be in the genius’ row anymore if you couldn’t see through that diversion!!’

The moment the cubes were all destroyed and the pillars responsible for that removed, Yonira crushed her double rock fist in her rival’s head with all the weight she could put in that attack, turning out that Annabel was only a light clone. With the clone collapsing into tiny flickers of light, its attacker looked around in search of the original, her search being all too brief.

A tremor shook the entire inner yard, cracks starting to form across its grass area afterwards, rays of light percolating through the cracks more and more. Realizing what was about to happen, everyone ran away to the safety of the yard’s concrete part right next to the main school building, Yonira being left all alone.

As she was watching the battle closely, Reimei could now clearly see how this moment in it had come about – Annabel must have not only channeled her deva through the ground to create the pillars that had stopped her opponent’s cube barrage, but had also gone underground herself while changing places with a clone. That clone had thus distracted the Earthling Class No. 1’s chief female defender long enough for the light-using beauty to prepare for what seemed to be her final attack – and one Miss Scarlettail considered would be overkill to use in a simple scuffle.

Judging by the look on Yonira’s face, she seemed to be of the same opinion on the matter, but her shock didn’t last too long as her confidence returned soon enough, being mixed with anger, the rocky beauty kneeling and slamming her palms in the ground. Even now, none of the observers of the rivals’ clash seemed willing to break it up, Reimei herself knowing she could stop them with her power, but thinking it was not her place to intervene due to being a newcomer to Sunbird and moreover, due to how afraid she was of her deva.

Annabel’s rival further shattered the earth in the inner yard, extracting all the rocks from it and having those rocks move to her in waves, starting to cover her with a multilayered armor that kept growing in size as rays of light kept ripping through the ground under her. Just when she had built a rock version of herself which was ten times bigger than the original, the entirety of the grass area was bathed in light, that light taking the shape of a single massive beam to consume Yonira completely.

Two of the rivals’ classmates, Miluna and Nalisia, finally jumped at them before any of the others could stop them, the former pouring massive amounts of acid on the light beam to try and weaken it, the latter increasing the length and volume of her black hair, aiming to wrap it around the rock giant so it could protect the girl inside.

(Miluna) ‘That’s just going too far, both of you!!!’

(Nalisia) ‘Stop already! Before …’

A silhouette was seen jumping from the roof of Sunbird’s main building right about then, no one being able to see who it was because of all the light exuded by Annabel’s attack, but everyone being able to hear the person’s loud roar, by the sound of which Reimei could tell it was a man.

(Man) ‘Cloniiiiiiiiiiing KICK!!!!’

To the scarlet-haired beauty’s shock, the man somehow kicked the beam the light-using beauty had made, upon contact with it tens of people forming out of his foot, spreading all around and more and more of them appearing. Eventually such a mass of clones had been formed that they managed to quench the fury of the light beam with sheer numbers, landing amid the smoking ruins of the yard now, with the apparent end of Annabel and Yonira’s fight the students rushing back toward their battlefield.

Miluna and Nalisia were trying to calm the rivals down, both of whom were held by a clone of the man, the identical appearance of all those clones currently being clearly visible. Their hair was cut very short, but it was supposedly black in color like the van-dyke beard and moustache on the lower half of their faces and the thick brows above yellow eyes on the upper half, their skin being fair, their lips – fuller than what was considered standard for the people of Barilia.

And as if their facial features weren’t exotic enough, their clothes were even more bizarre, wearing a formal jacket along with a shirt and tie on the upper half of their bodies and shorts and winter boots on the lower half, plus having a red headband on their forehead.

Those foreheads were now wrinkled due to their stern expressions as the supposed original stepped closer to Annabel and Yonira, alternating between looking at each of them while speaking in a serious tone, just prior to that Yuki answering the question she could tell was on Reimei’s mind.

(Yuki) ‘That’s our PE teacher, Aguaro Vivaya.’

(Reimei) ‘He’s a foreigner?’

(Yuki) ‘Yeah. Though that’s got nothing to do with his outfit.’

(Reimei) ‘Why does he dress like that, then? He seems to have a cloning deva, but I don’t think such clothes will make it more convenient for him to use it.’

(Yuki) ‘It’s just the opposite. He combines clothes in the most ridiculous way to prove that one can fight in anything.’

With the information of immediate interest to Miss Scarlettail being provided by Miss Iceflame, both of them returned their focus to the scolding of their classmates that seemed to be nearing its end.

(Aguaro) ‘So before I put both of you to work to fix all the damage you’ve done, do you mind telling me what started all this?’

The rivals seemed too angry to answer, Miluna and Nalisia sensing their unresponsiveness in turn annoyed the teacher and deciding to give him the explanation he demanded to hear instead.

(Miluna) ‘It’s about Reimei, the new girl who joined our class today. They put her in the first row of desks in our classroom which is usually reserved for the smartest ones and because of that Bel was moved to the second row. Yoni teased her about it earlier and after she came back from the bathroom during lunch, Bel started fighting with Yoni over the same thing.’

(Nalisia) ‘Which is how they got in a fight. They do that all the time, but this time Bel looked like she had really lost it.’

Gasps were heard among the crowd of students gathered around the combatants next as their ranks were parted by someone passing through, that someone turning out to be none other than the first person of Sunbird’s staff whom Reimei had met – the new headmistress, Neana Ilre, having a face that seemed completely devoid of emotion.