Startling Discovery

On high alert, Azrael, Jurina and Jun walk toward the East Wing of dorms. Walking down a hallway with Lila’s designated door, Azrael sees some students attempting to carve something on her door.

“Hey! Don’t you dare move!” Azrael commands.

A few female human and elf students take out their wands and try to flee, but Azrael points his wand and illuminates a strong white flash towards them. Upon its fast impact, the students disappear with their wands dropped to the floor.

Jurina and Jun pick them up and hand them over to Azrael. He puts the wands away in his robe’s pocket, and observes some nasty markings etched onto the door.

“I swear, the kids these days are getting worse. They're going to be on suspension for the next month. Let me fix her door first.”

Azrael raises his wand and with no words, all markings erase. He lowers his wand seeing Lila’s door return to its original state.

“Okay, let’s go.”

Azrael and the two Hope Protectors enter, they see the room all clean and tidy. Jurina flies up to the second floor of her room, observing a private study and personal books. Eying all items and furniture, nothing pops out to her.

“Hmm, nothing's off here Jun. How about you, though? Find anything?” Jurina looks down in midair.

“Uh, no. So far, everything is in shape. Besides some strange chocolate here, everything is fine.”

Jurina flies down and checks everything on the lower level. Glancing everywhere like a hummingbird, she flies along the wall.

“Okay, I think every…thing…is…” Jurina stops speaking, the moment she faces the cracked wall where Lila and the others saw the writing.

“Azrael and Jun sweetie, something is off with this wall here.” She places her palm on the wall, feeling something hot.

“Ma’am, please get away from the wall.” Azrael orders, making Jurina fly and hug Jun’s cheek.

Pointing his wand at the wall, Azrael closes his eyes and a long strand of blue energy in the form of a hand lays on the wall. Jun and Jurina see the wall begin to emit blue energy along its cracks, along with something spilling out.

“What in the gods?” Jun says.

“Jun, this is scaring me. Please hold me.” Jurina goes to Jun's collar, with him covering her body with his palm.

Azrael’s closed eyes clench, with some visible strands of sweat dripping from his head. In his inner thoughts, he sees a revolving wall and a dark area with a large blue sphere. In it, it’s full of glassy like orbs, but they begin to turn dark purple.

The sphere shows itself about to crack, with its blue energy fighting back against the purple disease it has. Outside of it, a hooded individual aims its wand, further weakening the structure. Shards of its blue exterior fall to the floor, with purple streams of light further going in it.

Azrael’s hand tremble, making his wand fall to the floor. Jun and Jurina go towards the dean.

“Sir, are you okay?” Jurina asks a heavily breathing Azrael.

“This is worse than I expected. Something is trying to destroy this school from within!”

Jun and Jurina remain frozen from Azrael’s comment.

“Azrael, you need to tell us specifically what you saw.” Jun states.

Azrael recollects his thoughts and picks up his wand.

“This building is alive and it's hurt; someone got to its core being and is infecting it with despair. No matter how hard it tries to fight back, it’s way too much. That’s why students are using despair, it’s slowly affecting them to become the worst versions of themselves, and this building can’t protect them anymore.”

Azrael wipes his face in agony, all the while Jun and Jurina look with fear.

“We need to notify The Elite Hope Guardians about this. The staff and students here are at stake here!” Jurina adds.

“The thing is, do we know who is doing this or why?” Jun asks Azrael.

“No, whoever it is hides their face well and can somehow access the central core of the building.”

“Let’s get to the central core of the building then. We need to fix it immediately.” Jun demands.

Azrael however shakes his head.

“We can’t. We physically can’t go there like through stairs; it’s in a whole other dimension where we need massive amounts of hope to enter. Merlin is the only one who can, not even I can go in.”

Jun and Jurina turn visibly shocked with this claim, while the latter flies in front of Azrael.

“Okay, let’s get Merlin then. In fact, we need all the Hope Protectors we can get to find out who’s causing this.” She pleads.

“I’m going to do that now.” Azrael says as he points his wand upwards to the ceiling.

A bright blue beam of light shoots up to the ceiling, making its way to the nearest rooftop spire.

“Okay, before we go, let’s heal this wall.” Jun adds.

“Wait, is there any way we can speak to the building first?” Jurina asks.

“Yes, let’s make it quick though. The poor building is going through too much.” Azrael moves out of the way for Jurina to fly near the wall.

“Excuse me, but why didn’t you alert us or Azrael in his office?”

The wall begins to leak blue mist, forming letters, it spells out “Too Risky”.

The trio looks on with confusion as Azrael steps forward.

“What do you mean too risky? Your assailant knows if you can contact us?”

More blue mist starts appearing, twisting and shaping itself, it spells out “Yes”.

Jun stands next to Jurina, the latter hugging his ear.

“Why this room though? Why did you make a mark here?” Jun asks through the cracks.

Rumble

A tremor is felt by all three, making everything in the room vibrate. Jun hugs Jurina close to him while Azrael stands still with his wand at the ready. The tremor quickly stops as a large essence of blue mist expels from the wall, spelling out the words “Hope Is Strong Here”.

The mist quicky vanishes, with the three of them looking on in pure confusion.

“Hope is strong in this very room? Hey Azrael, this room belongs to that girl Lila, right?” Jurina asks as she flies towards him.

“Yes.”

“That makes way too much sense, that girl and her wand have the most powerful feel of hope I ever felt. Azrael, please protect her. It’s extremely rare to come across anyone with that amount of hope.” Jurina clasps her hands, in a begging manner.

“Lila is under my protection, so is everyone in this building while Merlin is away for now. Come, I need you and Jun to help fix this wall and to heal the building as much as we can.”

Azrael, Jurina and Jun face the wall side by side. With their wands, they all point and close their eyes, releasing pure hope into the building. Its comfort can be felt by not only the central core, but everyone in their rooms or around the building.

All students, staff, and Hope Protectors are embraced by pure happiness and comfort. The central core’s infection begins to recede any despair it can feel. Lila’s wall shifts, as its cracks begin to dissipate little by little.

Azrael, and the two Hope Protectors open their eyes, seeing the wall fixed.

“Is the building better, Azrael?” Jun asks.

“Yes, but it’s still in trouble. We just gave it temporary relief. Merlin needs to come back and permanently heal the building himself.” Azrael puts his wand away, walking to the exit with Jun and Jurina following behind.

“I hope that girl will be protected, Jun. This is getting too serious.” Jurina whispers.

“Same here Jurina. This is way bigger than we expected.” Jun says as the small fairy lads on his head.

With the situation observed and taken care off, a worst issue has arisen for the academy. Azrael and the others walk out with a feeling of dread in them. The dean worriedly thinks about the safety of the students, especially Lila and Haruto.