The mine trembled with an unnatural chill as the wails of ghosts echoed off the jagged stone walls, their translucent bodies weaving through the gloom like fish through murky water.
“More ghosts?!” Ace barked, ducking instinctively as one drifted too close. “They’re floating around here too?!”
“We can’t stop to fight,” Deuce said, tense but focused. “If we stop now, we’ll never get anywhere. We have to keep moving.”
“Oh, so now you're team leader?” Ace shot back with a scoff. “Remind me when we elected you. Last I checked, this mess started because you launched me like a cannonball!”
Deuce turned, affronted. “Excuse you, but if we’re talking about starting messes, maybe don’t bring up window cleaning and conveniently forget how you tried to ditch us!”
Ace crossed his arms. “Ancient history. This whole spiral started when the furball incinerated a Queen of Hearts statue.”
Grim’s fur puffed. “MYAH?! Maybe you shouldn’t’ve made fun of me, then!”
“OH MY GOD SHUT UP!” Yuu’s voice cracked through the chaos like a whip. She’s barely spoken but right now? She yelled. The boys and cat-thing all stared. “It doesn’t matter anymore! In the end, you three collectively fumbled the bag! Now we’re all up to our necks in it, and if we don’t find this stupid magestone, all of you are getting expelled!”
Grim’s ears drooped. “Myahh?! You would too!”
Yuu exhaled like a dying wind instrument. “Grim, love… my only contribution to this disaster is being physically near you.”
Ace snorted, still bitter. “Yeah, which is why we don’t need you ordering the rest of us around. It gets old real fast.”
Yuu, easily ignoring its words, blinked. “Am I hearing things again, or is there something else talking?”
Then came a voice, wet and gurgling like someone drowning in tar.
Yuu silently mimed strangling herself. Not out of fear. Just... sheer frustration with reality.
Ace spun in place. “Wh-Where’s that comin’ from?!”
“…neeevvvaaa... ...iiivvv... ...ooouuu…”
Deuce paled. “It’s getting closer...!”
“Stooonesss... Stooonesss aaare miiiiine!”
A shape emerged from the shadows; and even Grim clamped his paws over his mouth.
It was huge, easily twice the eels height. A vaguely human silhouette, cloaked in a dirty, decaying sleeping dress, like someone long forgotten. Its head was a cracked glass sphere, partially filled with thick black goo that oozed out in slow, sticky drips. It dragged a rusted, giant pickaxe behind it, screeching against the stone floor like nails on a chalkboard.
“What is that?!” Deuce choked.
“Myahhh! No one said there’d be monsters!” Grim shrieked. “Let’s get outta here!”
Ace backed up fast. “That thing’s super creepy! But didn’t it just say something about stones?!”
Yuu, who had zero intention of dying before reaching her favorite pretty man later in this hellhole of a school year, moved fast.
She hoisted Grim like a football, grabbed both Ace and Deuce by the wrists, and yanked them into a dead sprint.
The monster dragged itself behind them.
“Stooonesss… …nevvva give stooonesss…!”
Yuu caught sight of a small cavern tucked behind a cracked stone pillar and shoved the three of them inside, cramming in after them just as the creature’s silhouette came lumbering past.
They crouched in the dark, the air thick with the scent of old magic and fear. Grim trembled in her arms. Deuce was panting softly. Ace looked like he was trying not to pass out.
“I… think it passed,” Deuce whispered.
“Wow,” Ace muttered. “You sure have a talent for getting us killed.”
“Oh shut up,” Deuce hissed. “There are still magestones here, that’s what that thing meant!”
Grim shivered. “Myaaah… Even as a master sorcerer, I… I don’t think I can take that thing down!”
Yuu raised one brow. You think?
The monster’s dragging pickaxe clanked further away. They all held their breath until it faded entirely.
“…Alright,” Deuce said with quiet resolve. “I’m going in.”
“What?!” Ace snapped as Deuce moved to step out of their hiding place. “Are you outta your mind?!”
“I won’t be expelled,” Deuce said firmly. “No matter what. I’m not letting this chance slip through my fingers!”
Yuu made a small, soft noise of defeat. Like someone who’d been forced to babysit a team of fire-prone toddlers and had just watched one walk into traffic.
Then she sighed, stood up, and followed after him.
“YOU TOO?!” Ace shouted. “ARE YOU STUPID?!”
Yuu didn’t even look back. “Yes. Sometimes. But currently, I’m making sure he doesn’t die alone.”
Ace groaned, head tilted back against the wall before getting up to follow. Grumbling the entire time.
The cavern quaked again as the monster slammed its rusting pickaxe down, narrowly missing Deuce’s head by mere inches. He barely dodged, his body moving before his brain could catch up, instincts sharp from a life not-so-long-ago full of brawls and broken rules.
“Aw, crap!” Ace cursed. “He’s got Loosey-Deucey on the ropes! Not on my watch!” He thrust his pen forward, sending a gust of wind barreling toward the creature. “Hee-yah!”
The monster roared, deep, guttural, wrong, as the wind pushed it back a step. But its cracked glass head barely shook, the dripping black goo inside sloshing once before settling.
“RRROOOARRRGH!” the monster howled, swinging in retaliation.
Ace flung himself to the side. “Ooof! Okay, wow! That’s… okay, that’s fast! That thing swings fast! No warning, no chill, rude!”
Grim hissed. “Myaaah! Stay away from me!” He hurled a fireball toward the creature’s legs, flames licking at rotted cloth and rusted metal.
The monster didn’t even flinch.
“MYAAAH?! It’s like nothin’s even hurtin’ it!”
Dust exploded in thick clouds with each swing, and Yuu stumbled back a few steps, arm over her face. She coughed hard, eyes squinting through the haze, nearly tripping on a raised stone. The attacks weren’t hitting her, but the environment sure was.
“You okay?!” Ace shouted, glancing toward her without turning his back to the monster.
“I’m not the one being chased by a sentient blender, Ace!” she wheezed, clearing her throat.
Grim’s eyes caught it first. “Huh?! Did you just see that sparkle?!”
Ace squinted past the monster’s swinging bulk. “Behind the monster! There's something sparkling in the mineshaft!”
“That’s gotta be it,” Deuce breathed. “A magestone!”
But the creature snapped, the moment their attention shifted.
“GWAAAAAAAH! Nooo giiive yooouuu stooooooone!”
Grim, ears pinned flat, yelped, “Yuu, we need to book it, and fast! That thing's gonna pound us into tuna paste!”
Without waiting for confirmation, he leapt into her arms. Her legs aching, she bit her lip but kept going, dragging the boys with her into a blind sprint down the shaft.
The entire tunnel felt like it was collapsing under the sound alone.
They burst out of the mine like bats from hell, lungs heaving, into the twisted silence of the woods surrounding the old house.
Yuu’s arms ached, her calves burned. Grim was still curled in her hold, and she knew she’d drop him soon, but she clenched her jaw and kept upright. Maybe, just maybe, the story would follow the manga version this time.
“This should be far enough, I think?” Grim whispered, eyes wide and still flicking back and forth.
Ace slumped to the grass with a groan. “Owwww… What was that thing?! No one said there’d be anything like that!”
“That was no normal ghost,” Deuce agreed grimly. “That thing had weight, power…”
“It wasn’t a ghost at all,” Yuu muttered. “Ghosts don’t leak ink stuff from their glass heads.”
She carefully avoided any mention of “blot.” That was rule number one of isekai: do not act like you know anything.
Ace rolled onto his back. “Let’s just give up and go home. I’ll happily take the expulsion if it means never having to fight that thing again.”
“What?!” Deuce sat bolt upright. “No way! I’d rather die than get expelled from Night Raven! How can you just give up when the stone is right there?!”
Yuu whispered to Grim, “Boys are so annoying.”
Grim grunted. “Myah, tell me about it…”
Ace snorted. “Pfft. Big talk from someone who's not even half the mage I am. You want that stone so bad? Go get it yourself. I’m out.”
Something in Deuce snapped.
“Oh YEAH?! Fine! Go back to your coop, you big chicken!”
Ace whirled around, affronted. “Whaaaat?! Who’re you calling chicken, huh?!”
Grim blinked, voice lower. “Whoa, Deuce… Is it just me, or did you, like, turn into a totally different person just now?”
Deuce jolted. “HUH?! Cough cough- sorry. Lost my cool for a second there.”
Grim turned to them both. “Can’t you guys just blow that thing up with magic or somethin’?”
Deuce shook his head. “The headmage said it himself… magic has limits. If–”
“Magic needs focused visualization,” Yuu interrupted quickly, coughing into her sleeve. “Especially when it’s a spell outside your element, or just something big. That kind of casting takes time, and none of us have enough of it.”
“Yeah,” Ace added. “That’s why magic academies exist. It takes a lot of training before you can snap your fingers and summon lightning like some warlock. And the more stressed you are, the more likely you’ll botch it. Unless it’s your specialty, then maybe you can cast on reflex.”
Deuce crossed his arms. “Either way, we need some way to defeat that creature and grab the stone.”
Deuce crossed his arms, jaw tight with resolve. “Either way, we need some way to defeat that creature and grab the stone.”
Ace scoffed, running a hand through his hair. “Right. Just like last time, huh? You ‘find a way,’ and everything goes sideways. We nearly got flattened back there and now have added trauma. So what exactly is your brilliant idea now, genius? Because I’m not trusting another spur‑of‑the‑moment plan.”
Deuce bristled. “Hey, you’re the one who-”
“Aaand they’re at it again,” Grim muttered, ears flattening.
Yuu closed her eyes for a second, counting silently. One. Two. Three. Then she leaned down and whispered something in Grim’s ear.
He blinked, then grinned crookedly. “Yeah… gettin’ expelled on the first day… that’d be pretty lame, huh? Maybe even lamer than runnin’ away.”
Deuce looked away, lips pressed into a thin line.
Ace let out a long, frustrated groan and scrubbed at his face. “Gah… Fine. Fine! Let’s just get this over with, then.” He glanced at Yuu. “Alright, Yuu. What’s the plan?”
Yuu stared at him. “…Why do you automatically think I have a plan?”
Ace raised an eyebrow. He didn’t say anything, but the look clearly translated to you really think Grim’s gonna come up with one?
Yuu pinched the bridge of her nose, then turned on her heel. “Unbelievable,” she muttered, already walking back toward the mine entrance.
The jagged mouth of the mine loomed ahead again, dark and patient, as if it had been waiting for them to stop arguing. Grim perched on Yuu’s shoulder, claws lightly gripping her collar.
“Yuu…” he said quietly. “Is this plan of yours really gonna work? I’m sca- I mean, I’m a little… uh, hungry.”
She shot him a sideways look. “Gang,” she said dryly, “I’m a girl. Of course I’m right.”
Ace snorted. Deuce blinked. Then, after a beat, they both nodded.
“…Yeah,” Ace admitted. “Fair enough.”
Deuce straightened, determination settling back into place. “Let’s go, Yuu.”
Ace cracked his knuckles, a crooked grin tugging at his mouth. “Heh. Let’s do this.”
guys yuu is only talking more with them cause she already feels bonded like close friends, she's actually rlly quiet
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