Student 32: Sunset Shimmer

by Show Stopper

Arc 6.4: Chapter 63

She sent me away.

I understood. Really, I did. I’m not a fighter. I’m not a strategist. I’m a bassist and a soccer player and overall not really impressive. She sent me away so that I would be safe. So she could fight without having to worry about if I was alright. I understood.

It still hurt, though. More than I expected it to.

To be specific, she sent me to help Nakajima-Taishou. Not with strategy or logistics or anything like that. It was mostly fetching supplies. Organizing messages as they came in. Getting her and the others tea and water. The sort of thing that anyone could have done. The sort of thing that a background character does.

Of course, Nichibotsu knew that’s where my mind would go. “I’m not asking you to do this because you aren’t important. Just the opposite. You’re too important. Important to me, and to the rest of our class. Most of them can take care of themselves, but you aren’t the only one we’re keeping off the front lines in case Chao decides to take prisoners to try to get us to back off. But you are the only one we’re holding back that I trust enough to do this work. Because this work takes attention. It takes endurance. It takes quick reflexes in both mind and body - believe it or not, your soccer club has prepared you perfectly for this job. But most of all, this job takes trust. Trust from your superiors that you’re doing it right, that you won’t slack off, that you won’t give up. Nakajima-Taishou trusts me enough to heed my recommendation, and I trust you more than enough to loan you to her. You’ll be fine.”

…I didn’t even realize she knew I played soccer.

The battle didn’t start out great. Chao launched her attack early, something that Nichibotsu hadn’t expected, but Nakajima-Taishou had been ready for. Of course, she hadn’t been ready to (temporarily) lose most of her forces in the first minute of the battle. She has this terrifying sort of cold fury when she gets mad, and she was furious at the “idiotic civilians bumbling around on the beaches with no cover and nowhere to run” who had been stripped in the first wave of enemy attacks. The northern line was mostly able to hold thanks to Nichibotsu’s quick intervention and support, but the southern line was a mess. The only reason they were “in retreat” instead of “running away” was because of Nakajima-Taishou’s subordinates taking control of the situation. Still, all three of the southern fronts had retreated to their secondary defensive positions within the first ten minutes, and the three demon gods to the south had had nothing to stop their slow and steady advances once they rose from the lake. Even from as far away as the central command tent, it was scary to see them plodding closer and closer.

Of course, that’s when the heroes swooped in.

Asuna-san and the others took out the front lines of the southern armies, giving Nakajima-Taishou’s girls enough time to regroup and reorganize. Takahata-sensei and the other mage teachers - I had no idea there were so many mages at Mahora! - stopped one of the demon gods and brought it down for a while. From reports we got a little later, it looked like they were going to be able to take it out completely.

That’s when Tatsumiya-san started firing.

Negi-sensei had told me and Nichibotsu about the special bullets Chao-san had used in the other timeline, but it was still scary to see the teachers vanishing one after another. We had spyglasses and binoculars so we could keep a general track of the battle while we waited on more detailed reports, and Nakajima-Taishou almost froze with shock when she saw what was happening. A brief burst of panic nearly overwhelmed me at one point, and I knew that something had happened to Nichibotsu. I turned my binoculars south, searching the skies for her, and saw her appear right next to a ball of strange, dark energy right before it collapsed. Both of our hearts filled with relief - her teleportation spell had worked! - before she suddenly dove towards the front line of the north-western front, panic filling her heart once again. My mind raced as I tried to figure out what had her panicked. She was safe from the mystery bullets, and the other armies were only using defabrification beams, right?

But… what if they weren’t? What if Chao had changed the rules again? What if they had more mystery bullets than we thought? A lot more? And if they had enough bullets to use on the front line, then how many did their sniper have? Who would Tatsumiya-san target after she’d taken out the mage teachers and other heroes? Where would she target next?

I had just enough time to tackle Nakajima-Taishou to the ground before the first bullet shattered the window, striking the wall behind where she’d been standing and exploding outward in a sphere of dark-colored energy.

“SNIPER!” someone yelled. Everyone reacted immediately, grabbing what papers and maps they could before bolting out of the classroom we’d taken over and into the hallway. They dove to the floor, keeping low and out of sight of the windows. Nakajima-Taishou pulled me under a table and held us both down, waiting for another shot to follow.

“FUFUHAHAHAHAHA!!! LOOKS LIKE YOU’RE HAVING A TOUGH TIME NE, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN MAGES!”

Nakajima-Taishou glared in the general direction of Chao’s projected voice for a minute before nudging me to follow her as she crawled out from under the table and stood. “If she’s showboating like this,” she muttered, “her sniper isn’t going to interrupt. I’d bet 500 meal tickets she ordered her forces to cease fire while she makes her little speech. That’s good. It’ll give us time to relocate somewhere without windows. That’s gonna make keeping track of everything hell, but better than having to worry about a sniper.” She placed a hand on my shoulder and smiled down at me. “I assume you knew from Nichibotsu-Yuusha about this special technology?”

The way she said “special technology” made me suspect that she knew something stranger than that was going on. I just nodded.

She nodded back and squeezed my shoulder. “That was some quick thinking, realizing they’d attack us here. Good work. If you ever get bored of soccer, we’d be happy to have you in the MJ-JSDF.”

She led me into the hall before I really had time to process the compliment. “Allright, everyone! Listen up! We’ve probably got until that windbag Chao stops bragging to get to the gymnasium behind this building! Leave everything non-essential behind; we’ll send runners for it later. Let’s move!”

“YES SIR!”

Nakajima-Taishou’s soldiers moved quickly, rushing outside and across the small distance to the gymnasium where a few of her backup officers were already waiting and ready to receive them. The new command center was sent up almost before Chao’s speech was finished, giving Nakajima-Taishou time to wonder what Chao was doing when she gave brief, confusing statements a short time afterwards. “It looks like she’s talking to someone,” she muttered. “But who?”

A certain overwhelming confidence that had been filling my heart since the speech had ended gave me a pretty good idea. “600 meal tickets says it’s Nichi-cha - er - Nichibotsu-Yuusha.” Nakajima-Taishou raised an eyebrow at me and I giggled. “She’s probably giving a rousing speech to your troops up north or something. I wouldn’t put it past her to try to steal the limelight from Chao-san.”

Nakajima-Taishou chuckled. “I guess that’s another role of a ‘hero,’ huh?”

Things quieted down a bit after that. Reports and orders continued to flow in and out, but with everyone keeping away from potential sniper-fire, we were no longer able to directly monitor the battle. It was taking a bad turn, though. Most of the troops to the south had fallen, the south-central area being the only one that had retained enough forces to keep putting up a good fight, even if they had retreated all the way to the World Tree Plaza. The north was doing a lot better, but the north-east was still in retreat, with the north-central and north-west forces retreating as well so as to not leave their flank too exposed.

Meanwhile, the demon god that the mage teachers had managed to take down had recovered, and no-one else seemed to be able to do anything about them. Most of the hero units were down, with only Negi-sensei and a few of the 3-A girls remaining. We eventually got a report that Tatsumiya-san had been taken out, but Nagase-chan had sacrificed herself to do it.

Night fell, and the first defense point fell with it.

Comments

[Pinklestia]

Well, looks like indeed they will have to take down Chao.