Back at the castle the female students room sat at the end of the west wing. It was opulent and grand in a sickening way.
Gold on everything, the bed frames, the lamp stands, the trim along the ceiling. Pink and white dominated every surface, from the patterned bedsheets to the painted walls, aggressively feminine, the way medieval men imagined young women wanted their rooms to look.
Wooden lamps cast a warm amber glow across all of it, designed to be comfortable, to be calming. No body was fucking calm.
A single large chandelier hung in the center of the ceiling, flinging light into every corner.
None of it was helping.
Yelena stood at the window, arms folded, staring out at the castle grounds below. She had not moved for some time.
On one of the beds, Elara and Isabella sat together. Isabella had her arm around her friend, speaking quietly, "We'll get out of here," Isabella said. "They promised we don't have to fight if we choose not to. We'll be fine."
Elara said nothing. She was staring at the floor, her hands pressed together in her lap. The trance had terrified her more than anything else, more than the throne room, more than the guards, more than the king's voice.
The giant golden being of light that stared into her soul and crowning her it's champion, she could still feel those large haunting eyes of it. Everything had moved too fast, it was still moving too fast.
"What way?" Yelena's voice came from the window. She did not turn around. "What way are you finding?"
Isabella looked up.
"We are in another world, without any way to call for help. We have already been chosen by gods and no, we never had a choice.
That ritual, the trance, the things we saw. Our opinions didn't matter in that moment, and you know it."
She turned then, and her eyes moved between them with the calm as she had made peace with her reality.
She had been speaking in Russian.
She had her suspicions that someone outside was listening.
The walls of castles always had ears, and the nobles would want to keep tags on their investments.
Forget your house, forget your life, forget your family, forget everything you knew before today. Kill it, all of it.
Carrying it will slow you down and this world will not wait for you to catch up. We have one option, to survive.
We take whatever they give us, every resource, every training, every advantage they offer, and we use it to get stronger.
Stronger than they expect. Stronger than they can measure. Stronger than anyone here can control. And when that day comes, we leave.
We find the demon king, we take the warp stone, and we go home.
She paused.
Our only real hope is that the stone exists and that they have been honest about where it is. Prepare your mind for the possibility that we never return.
She continued to speak while watching the door the entire time. "I'm going to shower."
She walked into the bathroom and closed the door behind her.
The room was very quiet. Elara and Isabella sat with it, the weight of everything Yelena had said settling into the space between them.Isabella's arm was still around her friend.
Neither of them spoke for a long time.
Down the corridor, in the boys' room, Hikaru Azarashi was lying on his back on the largest bed, staring at the ceiling with the expression of a man who had just been told he won a lottery he didn't remember entering.
He turned his head to look at Finn.
Finn was crying, the kind of crying that doesn't particularly care who can hear it.
Hikaru watched him for a moment. "What's the big deal? Why are you crying so much?" He sat up.
"This is good news we can finally be bees. We got reincarnated into another world. This is another life. Do you know how many exciting things you can do here?"
Finn looked up at him unable to believe what they were hearing. "I don't want to be here. I don't care about this world. I want to go home. I want to see my mom and dad. I want to see my siblings."
Hikaru nodded slowly. "Ah. Came from a loving home." He laid back down and looked at the ceiling again.
"My mom only cares about social events. Looking pretty. Impressing other women with how much money my dad has. My dad only cares about his public image and producing the best heir for his company. He made it a competition between me and my two older brothers. Cutthroat levels of contest. There were scheduled times to use the bathroom. If you missed the window, you held it." He paused. "My whole life was a schedule I never agreed to."
Finn had stopped crying.
"My dad found out I drew manga. He burned all of them. Told me it was a childish dream. Said why would I want to go and work such a stupid job when I could have an empire to run. My older brothers hit me. My older sister doesn't give a shit whether I exist. In that house I was just an obstacle lying around."
He smiled at the ceiling.
"So yeah. I find joy in the fact that I'm in another world without all those weights on me. Your sorrow is my joy, Finn. Your trash is my treasure. I can't understand why you're sad. But I really don't care right now." He turned his head and grinned. " For the first time in a long while, i'm very happy."
From the chair by the window, Alexander exhaled slowly. He had been listening without speaking, arms resting on his knees, eyes on the floor. He began to address Hilary in Japanese.
"As touching as your story is, Hikaru," he said, "it doesn't change the facts. We are no longer in our world. These people see us as battle items, tools."
Hikaru shrugged. "Yeah. I know. That's the point." He sat up again, pushing his glasses up his nose. "If someone sees you only as a tool, they forget that you think. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to say yes. I'll fight. I'll do my absolute best to get stronger.
But I will hide how strong I actually am. And eventually, when I reach my full potential, I walk out of here and none of them can stop me."
He spread his arms wide. "Dungeons. Dragons. Women. Elves. Fairies. I don't care about their plans. As long as they give me the resources to train, which they will, and in mass, I'm fine."
Finn turned to Alexander.
Alexander sighed. "This is going to be tough. Perilous. This is not a manga, Hikaru. Our lives will be in danger."
"That's the fun part," Hikaru said immediately.
"We only have each other." Alexander looked between them both. "We were not close at school. We saw each other as rivals. That ends now. We are foreigners in their land. Expect to be treated like it. We have to work together to survive."
" He looked at Finn directly. "You will see your family again. I swear it. You will return to your parents, even if it costs me my life."
Hikaru sat up straight. "Yo. Slow down. It's not that deep."
"I'm a man of my word," Alexander said simply. "Always have been. I'm the only child of my parents. My mother had complications, she cannot have another. She does not want surrogacy. I am all they have. So I carry their values with me wherever I go. And if I don't return to them," he paused, "at least I will have lived keeping those values alive."
Finn wiped his face with the back of his hand. He was quiet for a moment. Then he nodded. "Okay. I'll do my best too."
Hikaru clapped once. "Wonderful! Look at us. We're like a group of Power Rangers."
He looked between their unamused faces and shrugged. "Anyway. I'm going to shower." He stood up and headed for the bathroom, already grinning. "Hopefully there's a maid who can help me wash down there"
The bathroom door closed behind him.
Alexander and Finn stared at the door for a moment.
Then Alexander looked back at the floor and muttered the first swear word in his life. "Crap".
Selene Smith sat on the edge of the bed and stared at nothing.
The room was beautiful. Gold frames on everything, soft lighting, sheets that had never been slept in. A bathroom through the far door that was probably bigger than her apartment.
Her heart had not slowed since they arrived.
She had kept it had been panicking in the throne room . She had kept it together in front of the students because she had to.
That was the job, that had always been the job. Olympus Academy had a system unlike most schools, once a teacher took a class they stayed with that class, from junior school all the way through to the final year.
She had been with these six since they were small. She had watched them grow up. She knew which ones needed pushing and which ones needed steadying.
She knew their parents' names and their habits and the particular way each of them dealt with anxiety.They were supposed to finish their national exam today.
They were supposed to go home victorious, start planning for university, start becoming the adults she had spent years preparing them to be.
That was how it was supposed to end. Her last day on the job before she finally clocked out. She had been planning it for months.
The money she had saved from every paycheck, all of it set aside for the life she was going to start living once she stopped pouring herself into other people's futures.
She had not been married. A few relationships over the years, nothing that lasted. Currently was seeing someone, but it wasn't serious. She had been planning to change that. She had been planning a lot of things.
And then boom. Another world. A demon lord. Six children who had to fight.
She felt the tears before she decided to cry, and she pressed them back down. She could not afford that.
If she fell apart, they fell apart. They looked to her, they always had, and she was not going to destabilise them anymore than they were.
She would join their training. Whatever they did, she would be there. She had not officially clocked out. She was still their teacher. That had not changed just because the world had.
She took a slow breath, held it, let it go.
Then she lay back on the bed, still in her clothes. Her mind was full and loud, she was too tired to do anything about any of it.
She closed her eyes and decided she would be ready tomorrow.