NOTES:  This is mostly a silly chapter based around the movement of time not being controlled by the magic of protagonism in a realistic , but some things that happen in here will be mentioned later!

So...yea!
——-

Although you may be sleeping, things change, and move, and crumbled, and grow. The world has a busy schedule. It can't wait for you...

While protagonists sleep, the same is true.

Like so.....

______________
———————

Elephys: A Splash of Pink in the Desert Sand.

———————-

Time fell silent as he watched them fall.

He didn't feel himself release a bubble large enough to encase them, and only but for a moment did he witness the final damage the two had endured, a wordless tale, its aftermath bleeding onto the ground.

It made him feel faint, and faint he did.

When he awoke, Vyr had fallen to slumber at the foot of the infirmary bed, his familiar tucked itself snugly under one arm.

Perhaps that darling sight blessed him later on.

Once he too was awake, they had intended to simply go find food, but like Orpheus, Elephys made the poor mistake of turning around.

Although he was still and dreaming, the simple sight of Riddle Rosehearts reminded him of the brief moment in which if not for, as irony would have it, the least pure magic using students, he would have his life taken.

It had been long since a memory have him shaking, nor feeling near unable to move or breathe.

Magic is the lifeblood of Fae. They are creatures who, if fully stripped of magic, will perish.

Without the intervention of Vyr Ambrose and Ophelia Avillion,  he, Elephys Pachydubb, would cease to be.

He envisioned it all again, the collar, the gelatin wall, the screaming of students escaping into the maze, the ashes dusting their skin,  those remaining fighting desperately,  Ophelia dashing across the field to inform them of her strategy, right leg aflame and left impaled.   Cater's double blocking a shot directed perfectly at Elephys.

The wretched smell of burning ink.

In that moment, he knew Heartstabyl was no longer somewhere he'd feel safe returning to.

Two days he stayed with Vyr, until receiving an unexpected blessing, perhaps caused by that very sweet sight he awoke to.

The alchemist, and the other awakened first year student, Deuce, had discerned a distinct shade difference between the red of Elephys's Magestone and Deuces.

Scarabia's housewarden was delighted to hear of this, shining yellow joy circling him, whilst Cater bemoaned the loss of one of his proclaimed favorite underclassman, although he claimed it humorous, small Cerulean dotted him.

However, Scarabias Vice Housewarden...

Elephys hoped that burning ink scent was simply a result of his own imagination.

———-

Ace: Little Rascals

————————

"Listen, I got the cheese, can you help me or not?"

Here he was, attempting to bargain with a 6 year old dream version of Riddles childhood friend, to get Ophelia away from the older Riddle. How his life got here, Ace would love to know. 

After chasing all three of them around for an hour in a game of hide n seek tag, which he did not agree to playing, mind you, he was finally able to strike a deal with one of them.

The purple one was easy to single out as the younger version of guy Ophelia had introduced them to as the one who gave her the fae charm, and considering the guy was powerful enough to be flying around at age 9 or something; that was his best shot here.

The deal was pretty simple : Cheese for Entry into the "Super Secret Garden", as he called it.

When he confirmed the garden in question had hibiscus, he was sold. 

There was no way in hell Ophelia wouldn't beeline for it, considering how mopey she was about them being in the middle row of the botanical garden.

So on the kids instructions (Why did his life come to this) , Ace staked out behind a tree while Older Riddle and Ophelia had a trauma dump session, and boy oh boy, did Ophelia have ALOT to answer for when they woke up.

———————————
Vyr : Meeting an Idol, Someone you all know very well
—————————-

The room had long since fallen quiet, most entirely asleep when the Alchemist knew he was followed after seeing a short shadow on the wall, all the way out of the Nurse's Office, and outside to the Statue Street.

If he was right, and he hoped he was, he might be about to meet someone who he fantasized about meeting ever since he found a terribly old wanted poster in the forest as a kid.

𝑀𝑎𝑦𝑏𝑒 𝐼 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑐𝑘 ℎ𝑖𝑚 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑜 𝑟𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑎𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑖𝑚𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓... ?

Standing firm, the brunette called out to the darkness, hopes high.

"I can see you!"

A flapping sound fluttered closer from the direction of the Statue of the Briar Fairy until the Vice Housewarden of Diasomnia appeared before the Alchemist, a smirk dancing across his face.

"Well then, pray tell, what is your name?"

𝑂ℎ...𝑂𝐻! 𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑠 𝑎 𝑡𝑒𝑠𝑡!

"You first, and maybe I'll tell you mine after?"

"Clever boy. Something tells me you are well aware of who I am, no?"

Nearly shaking with excitement, Vyr pulled out a large Scrapbook from his ever flowing bag, opening it to a page with the bat faes former appearance on it.

"You're General Vanrouge, or Lilia Vanrouge, or the Flaming Devil of the Fleur City Entertainer Troupe, or the Right hand of the Royalty of Briar Valley, and some other titles! You've made some of the coolest achievements 600 years of history has ever seen!"

Within the flash of a second, Lilia was now holding the scrapbook, flipping through while casually floating mid air.

"My, you have quite the collection. Pity, they really could never get my nose quite right in those old wanted posters. How did you happen across such old relics?"

"When I was little, I used to go through the forest behind my village to find stuff to use for my experiments, and I found that poster one time.

I got curious and started trying to find more about it, and then I found out about all the amazing stuff you've done! You've practically been everywhere and been everything! You're like, my idol!"

The old fae chuckled, placing the book back in the boys hands, along with a small sealed letter.

"If you ever desire to know more about history from one who has experienced it, I will be more then happy to tell you the tales of what I know."

"Really?! Wait, why did you follow me out here in the first place?"

By the time Vyr had spoken, Lilia was already gone.

Looking at the letter, the Alchemist could only assume his answer lied in there.

———-

Deuce : A Call to a Good Mother.

———————

Hours of assaulting the punching bags in the gym to take out his anger, small breaks for water, and more attacking for once didn't release the thoughts closing in.

𝐼 𝑤𝑎𝑠 𝑡𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑢𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑒𝑠𝑠!  𝐼𝑓 𝐼 𝑐𝑎𝑛'𝑡 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑡𝑒𝑐𝑡 𝑚𝑦 𝑓𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑠, 𝐼-

"Oi, You broke the damn thing already.
Now you're just making a mess out of it."

Admittedly, hearing the gruff voice from out of nowhere spooked him enough to nearly uppercut the guy,  instead his fist was caught in his single hand.

"-Sorry, I—Who?"

Releasing the freshmans fist, the beastman's tail flicked around, its owner obviously in no mood to be present at the moment.

"Leona Kingscholar. "

Scowling at the absolute wreckage Deuce had made of the now defunct punching bag, he growled sharply.

"You better clean that massacre, because I have to kick your sorry ass out of here by 10.
Vargas already won't get off my case about not locking a student in here again,

Plus, it's my tail on the line if he finds someone broke a whole punching bag and left the carnage out."

From around the corner, a tumbleweed like puff of blond and brown hair popped out from behind the cooler.

"Shishishi, You know, I'm pretty sure he's one of the Ramshackle prefects closest buddies."

The already loosening knit he had on his temper was near a blow at hearing the mini taunt. The next thing he knew, he was holding the hyena up by the collar.

"You better her refer to her with some more fucking respect, or I'll kick your ass into next week, you understand?!!"

Ruggie put his hands up as if in surrender, obviously not expecting how aggressive Deuces reaction was.

"Wait, Wait, Hold on , I didn't say nothin bad about ——Her? Its a her, Yea?"

"𝑅𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟, 𝑖𝑓 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑡𝑎𝑙𝑘 𝑡𝑜 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑜𝑛𝑒 𝑎𝑏𝑜𝑢𝑡 𝑚𝑒 𝑎𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑟𝑒𝑓𝑒𝑐𝑡, 𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑜𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚, 𝑔𝑜𝑡 𝑖𝑡?"

There went the improv lessons.

Leona raised an eyebrow as watched the bluette pale, then grit his teeth.

He moved closer forward, all but ignoring the sharp turquoise glare as he waved his hands.

Perhaps if Deuce were more in sound mind at that moment , he would of realized sooner the tone of Leonas voice was entirely underlined mocking.

"Temper, Temper."

"Huh?"

With a quick flick of his hand, the punching bag fixed itself entirely.

"Congratulations, its fixed, problem solved.  Now scram."

Releasing Ruggie and grabbing his small bag and water bottle, Deuce yelled a thank you before vanishing down the halls.

The lions glare landed on the now released hyena.

"If you think I knew he was gonna blow that quick?"

"Tch."

A jingle filled the air as nimble fingers caught the projectile that had been thrown by Leona.

"Whatever, heres the keys.
Lock up, I'm late for an appointment."

"With who? The Devil?"

"My bed."

"With they way you sleep, I'm starting to think they might be one in the same."

-~

The bluette had returned to his room, solemnly glancing over at Aces side of it before calling the only person he felt like he could talk to at the moment.

"Deuce, Honey! How are you?"

"Hi Mom...I.."

Theres no way she couldn't hear how choked up he was, and spoke softly as to not push him.

"Did something happen? You know you can tell me anything, right?"

The sweet voice of his mom, even just through the phone, made him crack, holding one arm to his eyes to catch falling tears.

"The Housewarden Overblotted...and we saved him, but....Two of my friends...there in a coma, I saw them all impaled and bloody....and they nearly died. And I- I don't know what I did wrong... I got struck through the leg, but they...
Ophelia and Ace.....I couldn't—they were falling from so high and I just—-I couldn't even fucking do anything..!"

"Deuce."

Gentle to firm, the other Spade spoke again.

"Honey, you should of told me this sooner. The school can't just sweep that under the rug, especially if students were harmed, and especially hiding from me that you got injured too. Is your leg all better now?"

"It got healed, nobody knows how-"

"Good, now listen carefully ok?  I want you to keep me on the line, bring a charger just incase, and wait out in that Headmages room until you can get him on the phone, understand?
I need to have a little talk with him."

The last time Dylia Spade had a "Little Talk" with someone regarding her sons safety, 3 grown men came out weeping.

Deuce wished he could pity Crowley, he really did. But he couldn't find himself to.

Once (with the assistance of Crewel) he found the Headmage, the bluette wandered down the hall, entering the infirmary.

Lying peacefully, Ophelia and Aces faces no longer resembled the brutality it had when they hit the ground, but part of Deuce almost saw the two images flickering together, idling in silence as he stared at the two beds.

𝑃𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑤𝑎𝑘𝑒 𝑢𝑝 𝑠𝑜𝑜𝑛. 𝐼...𝐼 𝑑𝑜𝑛'𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑘 𝐼 𝑐𝑎𝑛 ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑑𝑙𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑚𝑢𝑐ℎ 𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑟.

——-

Idia : Not a Hero

————-

If the strong wifi and data signals hadn't ominously shifted to the weird crevice between Mr. Impossible to Please and Ophelias med beds, he wouldn't have moved there, but Ortho needed to turn off his portable hotspot feature to cool down, so desperate times call for desperate measures.

D̶e̶f̶i̶n̶i̶t̶e̶l̶y̶ n̶o̶t̶ p̶a̶r̶t̶i̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ t̶o̶ b̶e̶ a̶ s̶e̶m̶i̶ u̶s̶e̶l̶e̶s̶s̶ b̶a̶r̶r̶i̶e̶r̶ b̶e̶t̶w̶e̶e̶n̶ R̶i̶d̶d̶l̶e̶ a̶n̶d̶ t̶h̶e̶ s̶i̶d̶e̶ o̶f̶ t̶h̶e̶ r̶o̶o̶m̶ w̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ O̶r̶t̶h̶o̶ w̶a̶s̶

The Shade....How many had Ophelia defeated now? Two? One was a easy mode beginner run, but still.
She had zero magic stats, barely any knowledge on this world, and yet here she was, pulling off hero stuff.  Zero to Hero, just like that.

I̶f̶ h̶e̶ c̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ b̶e̶ a̶n̶y̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶ l̶i̶k̶e̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶, i̶f̶ s̶h̶e̶ w̶a̶s̶ h̶i̶m̶ i̶n̶ t̶h̶a̶t̶ m̶o̶m̶e̶n̶t̶, O̶r̶t̶h̶o̶ m̶i̶g̶h̶t̶ s̶t̶i̶l̶l̶ b̶e̶ a̶l̶i̶v̶e̶.

What was the point of running off to help anyway? She had so many friends now, she'd probably already forgotten about him, or would soon. 

Even the fact she was friends with him to begin with was already spreading, because nobody in this school knows how to mind their business.
The second she heard more about him, she'd probably ditch him.

Ortho had been so excited when they returned to the dorm that night they met her, it was like he'd witnessed a miracle happen to Idia. 

But just like Idia said.  A Shroud being her first friend here must of been a bad omen.

—-

It felt like a 50/50 that he was KO'd by someone else in the room, or Dr Keolas severe lacking inventory of energy drinks, or his own deteriorating mental stability, because at no point did he remember falling asleep.

Did it have something to do with the fact he was one overly loud noise away from a mental breakdown? The world may never know.

The first time he woke up, he swore someone was crying.  Very close by. Hallucinating or not, got KO'd again two seconds later and somehow actually rested, even though there was a quite literal monster two feet away.

IRL is weirder then online sometimes.

——————

Nevermore: You Shall not Pass

——————————-

Ramshackle seemed oddly magnetic to problems.

Standing guard and nearly drop kicking someone you consider family from ten feet above after mistaking him for a threat is certainly a problem, but the several unconscious students in camo around him and cowering in the bushes most definitely rivals it in terms of a problem.

After some entirely normal, non life threatening involved interrogations, the results came in lackluster as each either fainted from fear or injury from whatever mass spell a certain someone decided was a jolly idea to hit them with.

Sebek immediately losing his shit because Nevermore may or may not have forgotten one or two of the unconscious human filled bags in the lounge, and the Dulce triplets thought it would be fun to put him in a bag, resulted in yelling loud enough to wake up every phantom in the Isle of Woe.

This snowballed into Lilia and Oogustus getting involved.

One mischievous old fae? Nevermore had long since learned to handle that. But two? Misery.

The 3 demon children Oogustus had adopted years prior, Loxin, Shoccin, and Baxin, somehow smuggled themselves into the school , pulled a three kids in a trenchcoat during orientation to complete the invasion, and yet somehow succeeded in getting sorted into Diasomnia. 

Spoiler Alert:  Thirteen year old fae triplets are surprisingly not allowed to be considered necessary student exceptions, but leave it to Oogustus to out loophole the loopholer and get Crowley to let them stay. 

With the promise of "candied spiders", the aforementioned managed to get his trio of evil to steal the security feeds of each dorm.

The entire monitor and security set up of Scarabia and Savanaclaw was somehow abducted in the process, but if it works, it works.

Most of the feeds were less then tame, from physical fights in Savanaclaw, to an Ignihyde student being chased down the hall by a 
platypus wearing a fedora.

Octavinelles feed is where they struck a gold mine.

—

"So, I presume you've heard the news?"

"Yeaaaa, turns out Yadokari-Chan is becoming a Kabutogari-Chan!  She beat Kingyo-Chan at his own game, studied all that borin' rule junk ' just cause he collared that Kani always with her."

"I believe Azul was referring to the issue of her now being comatose."

"Meh, lame."

The twins emerged from the side of the frame, flanking a light haired student heading towards the lounges V.I.P room.

"Lame or not, her cover as the blue hooded student will be obvious to anyone with half a brain if the most suspicious candidate goes missing at the exact same amount of time the confirmed female student is said to be comatose for."

"I see. Should that happen, all interest in revealing her identity will falter, correct?"

"So what? She snost, she lost."

"She won't be the one facing the loss. The betting pool breached over 100,000 madol,
But we lost 40% of that revenue the millisecond the majority of Heartstabyl practically swore loyalty to her as their savior, and the less courageous betters receiving word about her combative feat."

"I heard some desperate guppies attempt to break in to the infirmary when nobody shoulda been in have gotten their tail fin handed to em',  kept whining about it."

As the trio disappeared off the screen, a soft click and close of a door signaled they had reached their destination.

On the very edge of the frame, something rippled, then appeared, revealing a very disgruntled student with dark purple hair, tied back in a long messy ponytail, eyes squinting to see before pulling a round pair of glasses from his pocket, along with a sleek phone with a large M on the case.

Although he somewhat whispered into it, what he did was still caught by the cameras audio recording.

"Hey, I think I got an idea on how to get that cash, as long as that enlarged leprechaun didn't delete all the posts with her in it, that is. 
Know anywhere that sells camo for cheap?"

—-

Lilia paused the video, clapping his hands together with an smirk.

"It seems we found the root of this mystery all much sooner then expected!"

Signaling the devil children three, he summoned three small bags of what was likely candy, holding them out in his hand.

"Well done little ones, here is a small reward for your efforts. Don't eat them all at once now!"

Baxin and Shoccin swiped theirs quickly and dashed away, whilst Loxin paused a moment.

"Mr Vamps, do you knows why Mr Ashes keeps disappearing and goin' to the Stitches Office to watch over the sleeping girl? Thoughts he said somethin about only watchin' over her for one day?"

"I'm afraid I don't. He is prone to odd decisions at times, even with good intentions behind them. I'm sure you have nothing to worry about, little one."

"Kay then, bye!"

The round baby blue mask hanging off the side of his head lifted up a bit in the wind as he dashed off. 

———————

———-

NOTES:

THIS ISNT THE END THERES ONE MORE

I gave Lilias its own Chapter, because not only is it a huge lore drop, I just think I'll be easier to reach that way, if that makes sense (?)

It's the How I became your Godfather one, If you're curious.

ANYWAY TO THE NEXT!