[Congratulations]
The light and the floating notification faded, and I immediately regretted not staying blind.
My stomach felt like I'd been turned inside out, shaken vigorously, and stuffed back together by someone who was having a bad day . I was on my hands and knees, gasping, my breakfast threatening a hostile takeover of the floor beneath me.
Around me, similar sounds of distress. Groaning. Retching. Someone—Kenji, my seatmate maybe?— actually was throwing up.
"What the hell just happened?"
"Where are we?"
"Mrs. Tanaka? Mrs. Tanaka!"
I blinked hard, forcing my eyes to focus. Stone floor. Cold, smooth stone beneath my palms. The smell of incense and something else—something metallic that made my skin crawl.
Not the classroom. Definitely not the classroom.
I pushed myself up to sitting, my head spinning. We were in some kind of massive hall. Vaulted ceilings stretched high above us, supported by pillars carved with intricate symbols I didn't recognize. Stained glass windows filtered colored light across everything, creating an almost dreamlike atmosphere which gave me goosebumps.
Beautiful, really. Would've been nice under different circumstances.
"Is everyone okay?" That was Sakura's voice. Our class rep, ever responsible. Even mid-crisis, she was doing a headcount.
"Define 'okay,'" I muttered, getting to my feet on shaky legs.
That's when I noticed we were on some kind of raised platform. An altar, maybe? Made of white marble veined with gold, which seemed excessive for—
Wait.
My brain stuttered to a halt.
There were bodies.
I counted. Ten of them, sprawled around our class like discarded dolls. They wore robes—deep blue and purple, embroidered with silver thread. Their skin was pale like they had been drained of colour, too pale, and their eyes stared at nothing.
Very, very dead eyes.
"Oh my god." Yuki's voice, high and terrified. "Oh my god, oh my god—"
Then everyone saw them.
The screaming started.
High-pitched, raw panic that bounced off the stone walls and came back twice as loud. Students scrambled backward, away from the bodies, crashing into each other in their desperation to get away from the corpses.
I couldn't move. Couldn't look away. I'd never seen a dead person before. Not in real life. Not like this.
Ten of them. All dressed the same. All with the same expression of frozen horror.
What the hell had we walked into?
"MURDERERS!"
The shout cut through our panic like a knife. I spun around—we all did—to find we weren't alone.
The hall was filled with people. Dozens of them, wearing white and cream-colored robes, their faces twisted with rage and grief. Priests? They looked like priests. And nuns. An entire congregation of very angry religious figures.
Oh, this was bad. This was so, so bad.
"It failed. You killed them!" A priest near the front pointed at us with a shaking finger. "You killed the mages! Heretics! Blasphemers!"
"We didn't—" Sakura started, but her voice was drowned out.
"Seize them!"
"Wait, no, you don't understand—"
More shouting. Our class was backing up, clustering together on the altar like cornered animals. Some of the girls were crying. Tanaka—still looking green from earlier—looked like he might pass out.
I wanted to say something. Do something. But what? What do you say when you're suddenly in a weird temple with dead bodies and angry priests who think you're responsible for something you knew nothing about?
The priests were advancing now, their faces hard with righteous fury. This was going to get violent. This was going to get very violent very quickly.
Then there was a quiet commotion in the back , different from the ruckus going on and then the crowd parted.
It wasn't a dramatic thing. They just... moved aside, like a wave pulling back from shore. The angry muttering died down to silence.
Someone was walking toward us.
She was maybe our age, maybe a year or two older. Long blonde hair that caught the stained-glass light and turned it into liquid gold. She wore a dress that probably cost more than my house—deep green velvet with silver embroidery, the kind of thing you saw in period dramas.
But it was her face that made me stare. Not just beautiful—though she absolutely was—but commanding which was surprising for someone so young. Like she was royalty.
She walked with the kind of confidence I'd never seen in any girl in my school. Hell, she was prettier than Yuki.
A princess. She had to be a princess. Nobody else walked or looked like that.
She reached the base of the altar and stopped, surveying our terrified class with cool blue eyes. Then she turned to the priests.
"Back off." Her voice was quiet but absolute. "All of you. Now."
The priests hesitated. One of them—older, with a long gray beard—stepped forward. "Your Highness, these children—"
"I said back off, High Priest Aldric." Still quiet. Still absolutely terrifying in its certainty. "I will handle this."
The High Priest's jaw worked like he wanted to argue, but something in her expression made him think better of it. He bowed stiffly and retreated. The others followed, though their angry glares remained fixed on us.
Great. So we'd traded immediate violence for... whatever this was.
The princess turned back to us, her expression unreadable.
Sakura, bless her, stepped forward. I wouldn't want to be in her position. Even terrified and covered in marble dust, she managed to look composed. Class rep to the end.
"Excuse me," she said, her voice remarkably steady though her knees told a different story. "I apologize for the confusion, but we—my classmates and I—we don't know where we are or what happened. One moment we were taking a test, and then—" She gestured helplessly at the temple around us. "This."
The princess's expression softened slightly. "You were summoned—"
"Look, we don't have time for your whole mysterious princess routine."
Oh no. Oh no no no.
Daichi. Our assistant class rep. Also known as the guy who thought showing off his intelligence and arguing with teachers was cool.
To be honest, I still don't know how the guy got the post since he always pissed off people.
He pushed forward, pointing at the princess like she was Mrs. Tanaka and he was disputing a grade. "Just tell us what's going on. Where are we? Why are there dead people? And what gives you the right to—"
"Daichi, shut UP!" This from multiple people simultaneously.
"Seriously, read the room, man," I hissed.
Even in our situation—especially in our situation—you didn't talk to someone who commanded instant obedience from angry priests like they were your personal customer service representative.
Daichi's face flushed red, but he stepped back, mumbling something under his breath.
The princess watched this exchange with what might have been amusement. Might have been. Her face was hard to read.
Sakura bowed—actually bowed. "Please forgive my classmate. We're all very frightened and confused. If you could help us understand what's happening, we would be extremely grateful."
Smart. Polite, humble, not demanding. This was why Sakura was class rep and I was the guy who forgot to do homework.
The princess studied us for a long moment. Twenty terrified teenagers in school uniforms, surrounded by corpses, in a world that definitely wasn't our own.
When she spoke, every eye was on her. Every ear straining to hear.
She opened her mouth—