“Victoria, stop it! This is embarrassing!”

  Victoria gripped the girl’s ear like a vice. She didn’t care about the stares. She didn’t care about the ughter. She didn’t care about her protests.

  Victoria didn’t release her until the moment the door to the staging room shut. She stumbled back, rubbing her ear, gring with a mask of fury.

  “What the fuck is your problem, Victoria?” she snapped.

  “My problem is that your behavior is unacceptable.”

  “Wha—”

  “You almost killed another competitor while pying around, you ignored my orders to return, then you almost did it again. You are reckless.”

  She had to punish her, to reprimand her. Luna made them look like would-be killers in front of thousands. But... she won.

  “You were given a task,” Victoria continued, her tone the cold, sharp bde of a Velstrad. “You ignored it. You ignored a direct order and embarrassed the academy. I am benching you for two matches. Kier and I will handle it. You will sit, and you will think about what it means to be part of a team.”

  “Benched?!” Luna’s voice was shrill. “You’re benching me? After I just won three straight duels?!”

  “Yes.”

  “You can’t just—”

  “I can,” Victoria interrupted. “And I just did.”

  “But I was practicing! I’m figuring it out!”

  “Enough. No more discussion.”

  Luna opened her mouth—just a squeak escaped before she stopped herself. Instead, she just kicked the table, sending it sliding across the room.

  “I hate you.” She threw herself onto a nearby chair, arms folded. She refused to look at Victoria, like a brooding child, cheeks puffed, jaw set. If she weren’t covered with snow and blood, the whole thing might’ve made Victoria chuckle.

  But she didn’t smile. She couldn’t. “You’ll get over it.”

  She needed to learn restraint—to remember who was in command.

  But still... she looks like she’s about to cry.

  Victoria shook the thought away, forcing her composure back.

  The mission is to develop an asset... a weapon. The orders, delivered by Commandant Gideon, repyed in her mind. Showcase her abilities to them. Let them see her potential. And none of them would care that the girl they wanted to weaponize was still just sixteen.

  She gnced at the sulking girl.

  But this isn’t a showcase. This is a chaotic mess. Six months. Six months into this operation, and she’s still so uncontrolble, unpredictable, and immature.

  Benching her wasn’t just discipline—it was containment.

  “Are you done pouting?” she asked finally.

  “Depends,” Luna muttered. “Are you done being a control freak?”

  For a heartbeat, Victoria almost ughed. Almost.

  Then the mask slid back into pce. “You’ll thank me ter.”

  “Doubt it,” Luna shot back.

  Victoria turned to Kier, who had been watching the entire exchange in silence.

  “We’re up against Sunstone next,” she said, her voice perfectly level, all business once more. “Let’s think up a strategy.”

  The announcement for their second match—Aegis vs Sunstone Coastal Academy—came an hour ter. Victoria walked to the field in silence, Kier at her side. Luna trailed behind, grumbling to herself and radiating childish anger.

  She forced herself to ignore the girl’s theatrics.

  “Kier, you’ll take the first duel,” Victoria said, eyes narrowing as Sunstone’s fighter stepped forward. “Their mage focuses on quick casting, no staff, rge variety of spells. Don’t let him control the tempo. Don’t lose focus.”

  Kier nodded, resting his staff across his shoulders. “Got it.”

  The duel was, from Victoria’s perspective, a clean, tactical victory.

  It opened with a fsh of light—Sunstone’s mage unched a barrage of quick-fire spells.

  Sloppy, Victoria analyzed, a panic-fire approach. He’s wasting energy, trying to end it fast.

  Kier didn’t hesitate.

  Wind surged to life before him, spinning into a translucent barrier. The oncoming fire struck it and broke apart into scattering embers.

  He pivoted. Lightning coiled down his arm, hissing, and a spear formed in his hand.

  He hurled it.

  The Sunstone mage cursed, diving for cover—but he was too slow. The spear grazed his arm, electricity arcing across his body. His muscles seized. His jaw locked tight.

  Good, an opening.

  Kier pushed, not giving him a chance to recover. He raised his staff, mana fring. Dark clouds bled into existence, spreading until half the arena was shadowed. Thunder rolled and lightning crackled.

  Bolts struck one after another in rhythm, hammering the mage before he could steady his stance. He scrambled to throw up a basic barrier with his shaky hands.

  It flickered, cracked, then—shattered.

  The final strike hit home, flooding the arena in a blinding white.

  When the light faded, the mage was kneeling as smoke drifted from his robes. His hands trembled, raised in surrender.

  The storm eased. The crowd roared.

  Kier’s Magic... It’s precise and predictable. The exact opposite of her... Victoria’s eyes slid toward Luna. She was sitting, crossed-legged, eyes closed, doing what she’d called meditating. But Victoria knew better. She knew that the girl was hiding something, and she couldn’t bme her.

  Her heart ached, and she reached out, ruffling Luna’s messy hair, trying to ground herself.

  “Luna,” she whispered, “watch closely... please.”

  Victoria stepped onto the field next.

  The Sunstone leader, a rge man with an even rger spear, met her gaze and took his stance. The strategy was simple. Overwhelm him with precision and control. Make Luna see what discipline looks like.

  The signal sounded, and Victoria exploded.

  She shot forward, a blur of motion. The man panicked, sweeping his spear wide to keep her back—but she was already beneath it, inside his guard before the arc finished.

  Her bde fshed upward, fast and clean—a Velstrad technique meant to disarm.

  But the Sunstone leader was experienced. He roared, yanking back his spear to block, his other fist swinging in a desperate counter.

  Perfect. She thought.

  She slipped back half a step. The punch swished through air. He was too close to reset the spear, too slow to retreat. He was trapped.

  He dropped the weapon and lunged to grab her instead, trying to use brute strength to crush the space between them.

  Foolish. Exactly the opening she wanted.

  She met his charge, and instead of resisting it, she redirected it. She caught his arm, pivoted, and reversed his momentum. His weight shifted before he even realized. One kick to the back of his knee was all it took to bring him crashing down.

  He twisted, scrambling to his feet, but froze at the bde between his eyes.

  “Yield,” she commanded.

  The man smmed his fist into the ground in frustration. “Dammit—fine! I yield!”

  Victoria dropped her sword and turned back to her team’s tunnel, ignoring the cheers. She’d won the fight as she pnned, and now she had to set an example. No celebration. No showboating.

  She caught Luna watching, but the girl quickly looked away when their eyes met.

  At least she saw it. Victoria thought.

  It wasn’t long before the st Sunstone cadet trotted out. The final duel was wholly uneventful. Victoria’s opponent was a man with a short sword and a round shield, who seemed to have already accepted defeat. He mounted a brief, desperate defense. But Victoria didn’t give him an inch. A short flurry of strikes, and his defenses were crushed. He gave up with little resistance.

  “Aegis Academy wins the matchup, three-zero!” the announcer decred.

  A perfect, clean sweep. No nonsense. This is how it should be. This is the result of discipline. Victoria allowed herself a small, internal nod of satisfaction as Kier rejoined her.

  Her gaze flicked back to the bench. Luna was sitting there, eyes closed again, already lost in her own world. She hadn’t even watched the final duel.

  The walk back to the staging room was just as suffocating as before. Kier, sensing the fragile truce, kept his distance, walking a few paces ahead while Luna moped three paces behind.

  Victoria’s victory felt hollow. She had done exactly what a leader should. She had enforced discipline, protected the team’s integrity, and secured a fwless victory. Her father would have called it a textbook success.

  So why did it feel like a failure?

  The mood only got worse as they all took a rest in their staging room. Kier busied himself with his book in one corner, Luna sat on the floor meditating in the other. Dead silence.

  Kier coughed and broke the silence first. “Those were some good fights, Victoria. Your skills were fwless as always.”

  “They were unprepared,” She replied, forcing the words. “It was a simple matter.”

  “Simple for you, maybe,” Kier chuckled. “You made it look easy.”

  Victoria nodded, fixated on the girl in the corner. The anger from before had chilled into an aching guilt. She’d punished her for her own good, yet somehow it felt wrong.

  The previous night fshed in her mind. The quiet, the warmth, Luna’s sleepy, trusting voice. The promise she made to her. And yet she publicly humiliated her just hours ter.

  She hesitantly crossed the room and sat on the floor next to Luna.

  “Luna.”

  The girl didn’t react.

  “You... you did well in your matches,” Victoria said, the words feeling stiff and awkward in her mouth. “You won. But what you did... it was too much. You can’t just...”

  She’d already been the lecturing leader, but now, as a friend, she was stuck.

  “I know you’re angry at me,” she tried again, softer this time. “But... you need to learn some restraint.”

  Luna’s only reply was a quiet, “Hmph.”

  Victoria’s fingers twitched. She wanted to reach out, to break through the childish, maddening wall. But she stopped herself. The closeness from st night felt so far away.

  “Luna... don’t shut me out.” She pleaded before she could stop herself.

  Luna’s eyes finally snapped open. Not angry. Cold.

  “You benched me,” she said, her voice ft. “You wanted me to sit. So I’m sitting. That’s what you wanted, right?”

  She didn’t give Victoria a chance to reply. She just stood up, snatched her massive sword, and stomped to another corner of the room and flung herself back onto the floor, this time facing the wall with her cheeks puffed.

  A small, painful breath escaped Victoria. Such a Luna thing—childish, theatrical, impossibly sincere.

  A wave of guilt gripped Victoria’s heart. Luna was pouting because she thought her team leader—her friend—was being unfair. She was acting like a child... because she was one.

  She thought of her brothers—distant, formal, benchmarks to be surpassed. Luna was the first person who had ever felt like... family. A chaotic, infuriating, needy little sister. And Victoria crushed that bond under the weight of her duty.

  They’d swept their matches, but Victoria still felt like the loser. Discipline had won. And it felt nothing like victory.