A swirling mass of wind and flying rubble slowly moved toward our position.

  Our position also happened to be near the temporary hospital.

  If that thing reaches… a massacre will happen.

  An imminent threat slowly approaching us would be the perfect opportunity for me not to hold back.

  A few debris were launched our way, and I was prepared to telekinetically deflect them.

  Except that Ms. Black Ponytail stepped in front of me as the debris flew.

  Huh?

  Worry and panic sharply rose within me as the momentary distraction would prevent me from deflecting the debris as I had planned.

  She took the spear I had given her, and with a few simple yet strong swings, the debris was either deflected or destroyed by her might.

  After deflecting the 3rd incoming debris, her spear broke.

  Perhaps my assessment of ‘flashy-yet-useless’ moves needed reconsidering.

  There was little time to focus on making her a new spear as more debris was launched at us at high speeds.

  I stepped forward, in front of the armored woman, so that the storm’s attacks would be in my field of vision. When they were close, I swiped at them, deflecting the broken chunks of buildings to somewhere away from the hospital. I needed to be careful, not to carelessly launch them toward the temporary hospital patients. Although deflecting them wasn’t difficult, accounting for innocent bystanders made defending all the more nerve-wracking.

  Instead of large chunks, a swirl of small, possibly pebble-sized debris flew toward us.

  Quickly, I imagined a wall with a thickness of one brick-in-the-road’s width, erecting upward as I had done against Electric Blue. There was an unbearable clattering noise as the small pieces hit the hastily erected wall, with it crumbling in certain spots. I should’ve made something much thicker than that.

  The 3 of us backed away as the wall crumbled, all of us ducking into another empty building, her through a window, and my summoner and I through a doorway. I must be on adrenaline, because the fall from that jump should hurt.

  What followed was the sounds of crashing and breaking. I didn’t know what the small flurry of debris hit, but I’m glad it didn’t hit me, although they sounded a little strange.

  After confirming my summoner looked alright, I looked back through the doorway, and a weird white fog appeared, moving over the ground as if it were a liquid.

  I slowly got up, not wanting to agitate the pain in my bruises, and walked to the doorway, still staying inside to avoid being in the field of vision of the person in the storm.

  A massive mound of ice took up the entire width of the road!

  It reminded me of Electric Blue’s ice, but this one was whiter and had more bubbles and other pockets under its translucent surface.

  Just then, someone emerged from on top, shouting something while waving at us. From their voice, I knew who it was, the boy with snow-white hair.

  He stood on top, shouting something, before making some arm movements, producing 3 chunks of ice and launching them ahead. I followed their trajectories and turned around just in time to see them intercept some large debris being launched forward, both of them shattering from the collision, producing a cloud that was a combination of dust and fog.

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  Through the cloud, another onslaught of projectile debris flew through, but was quickly blocked by another mound of ice being erected on the street. One of the launched debris partially broke through, with a small chunk of the newer wall shattering, its pieces scattering across the brick road.

  Another voice shouted, and someone who suddenly appeared next to the snow-white-haired boy. My summoner poked his head out of the doorway before grabbing my wrist and pulling me forward, heading towards the mound of ice the two were standing on. I would’ve preferred exiting the building a different way, somewhere not within the storm’s line of fire, but the snow-white-haired boy already produced a set of stairs made of ice to climb up, leading to their position, and my summoner looked intent on climbing them.

  I tried my best to keep up with my summoner’s pace up the steps, shifting my focus between trying not to trip and watching for the 2nd ice barrier’s inevitable shattering.

  True to my expectations, it did. Around halfway up the icy stairs, part of the ice barrier collapsed, and a pile of debris burst through like water breaking through a dam. The flood of rubble hit the ice barrier we were climbing up. Luckily, it didn’t hit us, but we hurried up anyway, not wanting to wait for the rubble to pile up and swallow us.

  When we reached the top, I quickly looked down at the building we had come from, checking if Ms. Black Ponytail was still inside. She wasn’t near any of the openings, and we had no time to check if there was another exit in the building.

  I could only hope she was alright as my summoner and I were escorted to safety.

  …

  Why didn’t I do anything to help?

  My summoner and I ran as we followed the lead of the other person who was with the snow-white-haired boy, another student with green hair. Broccoli-colored, if I had to be more specific.

  For some reason, the snow-white-haired boy didn’t come with us, instead choosing to stay behind, looking at the oncoming threat with a serious expression.

  The last thing I saw was him sending more chunks of ice.

  As I followed, more questions ran through my mind.

  How come I didn’t block the barrier with something?

  Why didn’t I react to projectiles back there?

  I know what my power does and how it responds to me. If anything, I should’ve made the stairs so that Mr. Snow White didn’t have to waste energy on helping us escape.

  No. I should've made the barriers myself.

  As we ran, we passed by the temporary hospital that was set up earlier. It was abandoned, with blankets and supplies scattered about.

  Eventually, we entered the same building that all the students had been escorted to when the storm in the sky first appeared. It was more packed, and I got a glimpse of a bunch of people close together in the hallways connected to the room we were in.

  As we moved through the dense crowd, I noticed a few faces that were lying on the temporary hospital blankets. They seemed relatively fine, but I couldn’t dismiss the possibility of their treatment being incomplete due to the sudden relocation.

  I looked around, trying to see if there was any face I recalled being near the food warehouse.

  How is the food warehouse group?

  Even if I could speak, the dense crowd and the cacophony of voices would’ve made talking pointless.

  We made it out of the crowd, no longer having to struggle and resist so many people pushing in every direction. Broccoli-haired boy led us to a hallway, stopping just before a door. He gestured for us to go in.

  My summoner took the lead, grabbing the doorknob and turning it, slowly pushing the door open with a slight creak.

  Inside were the students who were distributing food to the people, sitting or lying in beds. All of them looked worse for wear in different bandages, bruises, and cuts across their body. Ms. Nurse was using her magic to heal another student’s injury.

  What? But they weren’t anywhere close to the danger!

  When the door opened, everyone’s eyes were on us. There was a mix of defeat, fury, frustration, and confusion on their faces.

  My summoner walked forward, and I unconsciously followed him, slowly walking down the room, passing by each person’s bed. Some kept their gaze on me while others looked away or stared at the foot of their bed, uncaring to our presence.

  We stopped at a bed at the end of the room on our left. In it was the blonde girl I met earlier, her left arm in a cast, and the rest covered in dirt and scars. If it weren’t for how frilly and curly her hair was, I wouldn’t have recognized her.

  The blonde girl looked up, eyes scanning my summoner, then mine.

  All of a sudden, she started shouting at me. Her face contorted into something demonic and unrecognizable. Others in the room joined her.

  I looked around. Every person who was shouting at me was bedridden. Not everyone who was bedridden was shouting at me, but that detail didn’t make the scene any less confusing and disturbing.

  Whatever they said was enough for the nurse to usher us out of the room. She closed the door loudly. I don’t believe she meant to slam it, but I still felt a little hurt.

  That might be the first time I felt relieved I still had this language barrier.