"This is the end for you all…Witness the might! Extreme Magic: Psychic Cataclysm!"

  The ground trembled and the sky darkened. Psychic tendrils, like monstrous serpent snaked their way towards Kintovar, Becky, Sybil, Roselle and Risebelle. It also targeted the injured Alan and Sylra who had been unable to move.

  Kintovar struggled to maintain her footing against the overwhelming force but she managed to activate her Psychic Jamming Pods, hoping to disrupt the Headmaster's control over the Headmaster’s powers like she did before, but they didn’t faze her magic at all.

  "No effect?" Kintovar pondered inwardly.

  “Acid Rain!”

  Risebelle called upon her Acid Rain ability. A dark rain cloud began to form in the sky above. The cloud released a corrosive rain that descended toward the battlefield; however, Headmaster Aimathema had exceptional psychic control.

  The psychic tendrils that had been snaking toward Alan and Sylra suddenly shifted their focus and converged on Risebelle instead. The tendrils wrapped themselves around Risebelle and immobilized her.

  Risebelle’s entire body tensed. A numbing sensation crawled into her mind.

  Her Acid Rain—stopped. The dark clouds above began to disperse into nothing.

  Her vision swam. The battlefield blurred. Her head lolled slightly to the side. Why… did she feel so… disconnected?

  A small smirk played on the Headmaster Aimathema’s lips. “Did you really think I would let you cast such a thing?”

  Risebelle felt trapped inside her own head. ‘Damn it…!’

  Nearby, Sylra watched.

  Her body was still unable to respond to her will. She could feel helplessness pressing down on her. Her fists clenched.

  They’d saved her. Twice.

  And she’s still just lying here?

  Her teeth ground together. ‘No.No more.’

  Her eyes blazed.

  ‘Move.’

  Her fingers curled.

  ‘MOVE! DAMN LEGS!’

  She let out a shaky, pained breath—then forced herself to push up,

  Sybil darted forward towards Risebelle. The psychic tendrils lashed out and aimed straight for her.

  Sybil’s breathe sharpened. A violent gust of wind erupted from her sword that sliced through the tendrils like they were nothing but paper strands. They whipped back with severed ends flailing before they dissipated into energy.

  But more were coming. So many more.

  A flash of red and brown streaked beside her.

  Becky.

  The pink-haired fighter skidded in. Her hammer was suddenly coated in jagged earth. With a roar, she spun and created a miniature shockwave that sent psychic tendrils reeling backward.

  "Tagging in!" Becky called. She pivoted for another swing.

  Sybil nodded and shifted positions with her.

  Tendrils lunged—

  Sybil’s wind slashed.

  Becky’s hammer crushed.

  Tendrils came again—

  Sybil cut them down.

  Becky smashed them away.

  They fought their way toward Risebelle, back to back, step by step.

  Just as Sybil reached to sever the tendrils binding Risebelle, the Severed tendrils regenerated and multiplied.

  Becky shouted, “Are you kidding me?!”

  Risebelle’s glazed-over eyes flickered.

  And then—

  CRACK!

  Jagged spiked rocks shot out from the ground, spearing into the writhing psychic mass.

  Sybil’s head snapped to the side—

  Sylra.

  The red-haired warrior was down on one knee. Her toned stomach rose and fell with each labored breath. She forced one hand toward them.

  "Free her…" she panted.”Hurry… I can’t hold out long!"

  Sybil and Becky pushed through the chaos of psychic tendrils. Sybil’s wind magic howled, slicing through the thick tendrils and Becky’s earth-charged hammer smashed into them. Finally, they reached Risebelle.

  "Hold on!" Sybil called. She sliced through the last of the psychic restraints around Risebelle.

  The moment the tendrils were severed, Risebelle’s eyes snapped wide open. The mental fogged lifted from over her.

  “That was… weird,” she muttered while rubbing her temple.

  But before any of them could celebrate the brief victory, a new psychic wave shot toward Becky. Tendrils snaked out from it that wrapped tightly around Becky’s mid-section and dragged her away from the others.

  Becky’s face twisted in a panic. Her body tensed. She fought against the pull, but the tendril dragged her relentlessly and soon, more latched onto her.

  "No!" Sybil yelled. She moved forward with her sword raised, but the Headmaster’s cold voice slithered into the fray.

  “You will do,” she purred. Aimathema stepped forward. “I believe I should punish one of the traitors first.”

  Her hands flicked upward with psychic energy spiraling around her fingers.

  With a grin, she whispered—“Mind Break.”

  The moment the words left her lips, Becky’s eyes widened. The psychic pressure slammed into her skull. Becky’s scream was silent, but it echoed in her mind as memories, identities, and sense of self began to warp and twist. Her mind was shattered in mere seconds.

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  Her body collapsed.

  Sybil’s heart dropped in horror.

  “B-BECKYYYY!!!!!”

  Sybil's anguished scream pierced the air. Becky was still. There was no rise and fall of her chest.

  Sybil’s heart hammered in her chest. She desperately searched for some sign of life within her friend.

  "Becky!" Sybil’s voice cracked. “Oh Becky…no…Becky…don’t leave me…”

  But there was nothing. Becky was gone.

  From behind her, the Headmaster spoke with mocking sweetness. “That is very unfortunate, but you’ll be joining her soon enough.”

  She Smirked. “How about I amp up the lethality a bit more?”

  With a flick of her wrist, the Headmaster conjured multiple orbs of psychic energy with deadly intensity. They floated towards Sybil.

  The young girl’s body went cold. Her mind was still processing the loss of Becky.

  In that instant, Sylra lunged forward. Her hands swept through the air, and the earth beneath her responded. Spikes of rock erupted from the ground and lashed out toward the psychic orbs fierctly.

  “NO!” Sylra shouted.

  But the orbs overpowered the rocks and cut through Sylra’s stone defenses like a hot knife through butter. With no time to dodge, she threw herself directly in front of Sybil.

  “No!” Sybil cried. “Sylra, why?!”

  Sylra’s turned to her. She gave a weak smile. “Because…” Sylra breathed out with strain. “Because I know...”

  Her vision blurred momentarily as a flash of Thalindra, her older sister appeared in her mind.

  “This is not the same Academy my sister fought for,” Sylra whispered. “Mages like you and Becky…” She swallowed. “I always had this gnawing suspicion… but I didn’t know for sure. We were being sacrificed all along. I didn’t want to believe it, but now... now I do.”

  She took a shaky breath before her continuing. “I hate that more than anything else.”

  A sharp voice pierced through the battlefield.

  “Headmaster, don’t you dare kill her!”

  Arlysa’s tone was cold. This was the first sign of defiance she had shown toward the Headmaster and it shocked mostly everyone. “She still has uses for us.”

  The Headmaster’s gaze shifted.

  A slow, almost lazy turn of her head—but the instant her piercing molten-silver eyes met Arlysa’s, a pressure unlike anything crashed down upon her.

  Arlysa’s knees buckled. She barely caught herself with her staff before collapsing entirely.

  “When,” the Headmaster said quiet but terrifying, “did I give you permission to speak?”

  It wasn’t a question. It was a reminder. One that sent a cold shudder through Arlysa’s core.

  At the same time…

  "Aqua Whirlwind!" Risebelle declared,

  A barrier of swirling water and magic began to form which created a shield that warded off the Headmaster's psychic tendrils.

  Kintovar's movements were a blur. With the Aqua Whirlwind providing cover and protection, she closed the distance between herself and the Headmaster with remarkable speed.

  She flipped over a stray tendril, slid under another, ducked to avoid a third and twirled gracefully to evade a fourth.

  Finally, with one of her two small guns aimed squarely at the Headmaster's face, Kintovar smirked and said, "Check."

  The Headmaster had her psychic powers momentarily diverted. Her eyes widened for just a second before lowering half-way.

  “Check?” she echoed with amusement. “My dear Doctor—don’t you mean Checkmate?”

  Before Kintovar could even register what had happened, invisible psychic sigils ignited beneath her feet. They pulsed in perfect sync with the Headmaster’s silver irises.

  Kintovar’s muscles locked.

  Her mind, sharp as it was, raced to calculate an escape—but her body wouldn’t move.

  The Headmaster let out a low chuckle.

  “Just as you tinker with your little inventions,” she said with condescension, “I have my own craft. And I have, oh, what is that term you scientists use?—‘experimented’ with it.”

  Across the battlefield, Roselle and Risebelle stiffened. Psychic tendrils surged from the air itself before either could react. They were both ripped from the ground and suspended midair.

  Roselle gasped. She trashed against the vice-like grip, but the more she struggled, the tighter the tendrils squeezed. Risebelle growled.

  Kintovar’s eyes snapped toward them briefly. She twisted and tried to slide free and take her shot but another pulse of psychic energy exploded beneath her.

  Her entire body lurched backward. Her gun slipped from her grasp and tendrils not one, not two, but so much as to leave only Kintovar’s head free gripped the very life out of her.

  "Dr. Kintovar!"

  Roselle’s rang out with desperation. She kicked, twisted, and fought against the psychic tendrils constricting her body, but their grip only tightened into her like iron vices.

  Sybil’s gaze snapped toward them.” No. No, no, no!”

  Kintovar could do nothing but glare at the Headmaster.

  With an air of theatrical grandeur, the Headmaster raised a hand. “And so… here we stand, on the precipice of history. The day we bid farewell to the infamous Dr. Kintovar—a woman whose very existence has defied the natural order.”

  A guttural growl rumbled from Risebelle. Her mind raced. She couldn’t move. But—magic wasn’t just about movement. Even bound, she could still manipulate it.

  Her fingers twitched slightly, summoning a single, nearly invisible droplet of water along her glove. She prepared to compress it and turn it into a high-speed water projectile.’ I just need to disrupt her concentration for a split second—‘

  Her thoughts were interrupted by a psychic jolt crashing into her skull like a hammer that sent pain ripping through her nerves like wildfire.

  Her magic fizzled out.

  The Headmaster’s smirk widened ever so slightly. “I must commend your efforts, but within my Psychic Domain, I see all magic. Even your little—” She tilted her head toward Risebelle. “—desperate attempts at deception.”

  The Headmaster turned her molten-silver gaze back to Kintovar.

  “Now then. Any last words, Doctor?” A slow, deliberate pause. Then—“Ah, wait. No. I’m not particularly a fan of your last words.”

  Her smile sharpened.

  Kintovar’s breaths were shallow. Her body was pinned under the weight of psychic tendrils, but her mind—her mind—that was the real battlefield.

  ‘I can counter this…’

  Her own voice echoed in her head. The thought repeated firmer and firmer until she questioned, ‘Can I?’

  Kintovar strained against the fog. ‘Think. Think, damn it!’

  Her vision blurred—static in her brain, a pulsing white noise that gnawed at her concentration.

  A blueprint. A spark of inspiration. A moment in her lab where she muttered to herself:

  "If she ever pushes me this far... I’ll need something that doesn’t rely on memory alone."

  Her eyes widened slightly.

  ‘That’s right. I knew this would happen. I planned for it!’

  Her fingers twitched, though they barely moved against the psychic restraints.

  ‘So where is it? What was the trigger? What’s the activation code?!’

  The Headmaster’s voice slithered into her ears. "Your despair begins now, Kintovar. Your precious creations will watch as you draw your last breath."

  Kintovar had seconds to figure this out. ‘Come on, brain. You’ve built world-altering machines. You’ve defied nature. You’re not losing to a psychic hag!’

  “Mind Break.”

  The words of Aimathema were like a death sentence, and with them, Kintovar’s mind shattered into fragments. Her memories began crashing over her like waves breaking against a fragile dam.

  She felt the weight of it all—the faces she had created, the lives she had shaped, the impossible missions she had set in motion. Every connection she’d made began to pull apart.

  "No... NOOOOO!"

  Her mental scream was drowned out by the void where memories splintered and bled into each other.

  Risebelle. Her sharp gaze in that tank.

  ”Destroy all humans.”

  The killing intent in Risebelle’s eyes had been real.

  She should have died that day.

  But she didn’t.

  Because her own brilliance saved her. A failsafe embedded so deep into Risebelle’s very core that even her murderous instinct had been kept under control.

  Then—

  Roselle.

  That moment in the lab. The spark of new life blinking into being.

  But this one…this one was different.

  No hostility. No cold programming.

  Confusion.

  Innocence.

  Uncertainty.

  Roselle hesitated at Kintovar’s commands, not because she was ordered to but because she chose to.

  Then—

  Runebelle.

  A different setting. Roselle was training her. Encouraging her.

  She could hear Roselle’s voice, softer than usual. "Come on, Runebelle. You can do it."

  She watched the two of them. Roselle, fighting to give Runebelle something that Kintovar herself never designed: happiness.

  That was…

  Nice.

  A flicker of warmth.

  Then—

  A face.

  Bubblegum pink hair.

  ‘What? Who are you?’

  The name was gone from her mind, yet the image burned like an afterimage behind her eyelids.

  ‘I don’t know who you are but I’m sorry…I can’t avenge you…’

  And then—

  She hit the ground.

  The battlefield fell silent for a single, agonizing second.

  Then—

  “DR. KINTOVAAAAR!!!”

  Roselle’s scream ripped through the air. Her entire body trembled. Her blue eyes reflected only the crumpled figure of the woman who had created her—the woman who had guided her, tested her, protected her.

  And now, that woman lay motionless.

  Risebelle’s breath hitched. “No...This… isn’t real.”

  Dr. Kintovar was a genius. She always had a plan. She was never supposed to lose, right?

  Yet there she was. Lifeless.

  Risebelle’s throat went dry. “T-This… No way.”

  Sybil collapsed to her knees with sobs. “NO!!” she wailed and clutched at her chest "NO! NO! NO!"

  And towering above them all, basking in the devastation, the Headmaster tilted her head back and let out a deep, soul-chilling laugh.

  She exhaled with a pleased sigh escaping her lips.

  “I win."

  Project Mage