Aurora Over a Dead World

"Well, students, I’m actually surprised! Your improvement this past month has been remarkable," I say to my students gathered in the gym’s training area.

Their progress has been excellent. We’ve been using the simulator every single day. The first 15 days were pure chaos — most of them kept dying, messing up, and only Rouge handled it well. But over time, they got better.

They started dealing with monsters more effectively, even with the one I always controlled, which was a different type each time. Of course, their teamwork is still kind of bad.

It boiled down to pairs, and Tanya couldn’t improve at all in teamwork even with her partner trying to help. But I can’t complain — after that, they even managed to complete two successful rescue missions in the simulator before I upped the difficulty.

"Professor Zenith, why did you bring us here? Shouldn’t we be using the simulator again?" Eirwen asks in a tone exhausted from the painful lessons, and I can see a pretty dark look on all of their faces. Dying so many times in the simulator can’t be pleasant.

"Not today. Today I decided to reward you for the excellent work. Your progress is something I’ve liked — it was fast, practical, and even Tanya improved a lot, even though her teamwork is shit." Tanya grinds her teeth, glaring at me with hatred.

"All of you have improved in using your powers, and your overall capabilities too. I like how you’ve all started to react to unexpected attacks. Rouge and Charlotte achieved the greatest results." Rouge I expected, since she’s shown herself to be skilled from the start.

But Charlotte’s progress was scary. On the first rescue mission, she was incapacitated by a mere vehicle being pushed against her, and now she comes out of rescue missions without even getting wounded or suffering a single scratch during fights.

"But powers aren’t everything. Today my gift to you is that I’ve decided we’re all going to fight. Of course, I plan to train each of you individually in hand-to-hand combat."

"However, I believe you’re all stressed and angry with me, so today, specifically, your reward will be a 1-against-6 fight, where all of you will face me. No powers allowed, of course, just hand-to-hand combat."

"After that, I’ll start training you on how to use hand-to-hand combat against monsters and how to use your powers in hand-to-hand combat." I give a big smile while some of them seem excited at the chance to hit me.

"Oh, right. And if anyone uses their powers, I’ll break your legs or your arms — whichever is closer to me. So I suggest you don’t get impulsive. If you use your powers, I’ll notice, and I’ll punish you with violence!" I already threaten them beforehand to prevent such a situation from happening.

"Understood, Tanya?"

"Hey!!! Why are you singling me out for that?" I don’t know why she’s asking. She’s literally the worst in this regard — the most impulsive of them all, almost blatantly so.

"Let’s begin..." I just start the fight, ignoring Tanya. Instead of just charging at me like they definitely would have before, they all shift positions to surround me, and even Tanya, despite her irritation, moves to become part of the encirclement completely.

’Good strategy... it’s an improvement. They didn’t charge in stupidly getting in each other’s way.’ Since I’m just one and there are six of them, surrounding me in a circle is a good strategy.

’I should break this encirclement... the easiest one is...’

"!!!" I rush straight at Edith and kick her with force, trying to incapacitate her. Edith even manages to react, blocking with both arms in front of the blow, but she’s literally hurled against the wall dozens of meters away, though she wasn’t knocked out.

"P-Professor?" Eirwen says, surprised.

"You think I’m going to wait? You should have learned that monsters don’t wait to be surrounded." Before I can advance on another, Rouge already understands that she can’t count on me being passive and charges toward me. She throws a high kick, but I grab it, pulling her.

"Too high. Next time, lower the kick, and don’t leave your guard so open." My tail strikes hard toward her back, but she uses her grounded leg to jump and spin, trying to land a kick to my face while dodging.

I just release her leg and take three steps back, letting her fall to the floor. Charlotte comes at me from behind, but I drop completely into a perfect split, dodging her attack.

’Charlotte will never lose that manipulative way of only attacking others from behind... though she rushed in, it was a good attempt.’

I spin my whole body skillfully while pulling my legs together, forming a "ball" with my body and rotating backward. I touch the ground with both hands, ending up upside down, and use the position as a spring to deliver a double kick with my legs.

"!!!" Charlotte even reacts well, defending with her hands instead of taking the kick directly to the face, which was my target, but the blow launches her upward, and my tail grabs her leg, slamming her hard against the ground.

Ashlyn takes advantage of my more vulnerable position to grab my leg and pull me, breaking my balance, while Eirwen grabs my arm.

’Immobilization...’ I smile, because instead of just trying to win any way they can, they’re working as a team. I see Rouge’s ears perk up and her tail wagging at the sight of this opportunity to strike me.

I contract my muscles and then spin my entire body. The movement knocks Ashlyn down and literally lifts Eirwen, throwing her against the ground.

"Charlotte, don’t defend attacks that are dangerous — dodge them. Ashlyn and Eirwen, that kind of immobilization doesn’t work on someone with limbs as free as mine. Don’t forget to assess the enemy’s physical advantages." Tanya approaches me head-on.

’Haa... she had the chance to attack me stealthily... arrogant even in fights, wanting to face me directly.’

She throws a kick I try to grab, but before I can, she stomps hard on the ground and shifts to a punch. When I grab the punch, she twists her body, forcing my arm into a position where it "hugs" her, and with the spin, she lands an elbow strike to my face.

"!!!" I’m pushed back, a drop of blood dripping from the corner of my mouth, as she breaks free and steps back with an arrogant smile.

"Looks like you’re not so great after all." As she gloats, I’m genuinely surprised.

’She learned just by watching the others fail?... Seems I underestimated her.’ It’s not like I’m giving it my all, or they’d all be dead, but I’m not holding back and I’m taking the fight seriously — it’s genuine merit on her part to have hit me.

"Your hand-to-hand combat is intuitively great. You have natural talent for it, Tanya." When I praise her, she blushes, but I use that to close the distance and punch her in the stomach. The forward-bending motion she makes allows me to return the elbow strike to her face, which breaks one of her teeth and throws her to the ground, knocked out.

"That’s how you do it. Don’t hit near the jaw from below — hit higher next time to cause a concussion and knock the target out." I give advice even though she can’t hear me and look at Rouge, who approaches alongside Ashlyn and Eirwen.

Eirwen throws herself at me, grabbing me in a hug to immobilize me. Doing this against a monster would be a bad idea because it would put her life at risk, but in this situation, it was a good choice. As Ashlyn advances from behind me and Rouge leaps into a kick aimed at my head, I think about what to do.

"You’re going to lose this, Professor Zenith!" She says, looking at my face while I see her hands trembling from how much strength she’s using to try to hold me in place.

I grab Eirwen’s hands, and in a "dance" movement, I guide her whole body, tilting her completely downward until her head touches the ground, then I lift her, spinning and throwing her against Rouge’s kick, which hits her head, knocking her out. My tail grabs Ashlyn’s leg and pulls her, throwing her against Rouge, who catches Ashlyn, protecting her.

"Rouge, you’re skilled, so let me teach you something interesting. Many dance movements between a man and a woman were designed for the man to guide the woman’s body."

"That means certain dance movements serve in combat to literally force the enemy’s body to change rhythm completely, which makes simple grabs like jumping and hugging useless." I snap my fingers, stretching a little.

’I would have liked to have knocked out Rouge...’ She seems to be the toughest and has the best combat skills. Even if her combat is simpler, it’s already refined combat.

"Whoa there, hot stuff, that was a dangerous hit." Edith manages to take advantage of my brief distraction while explaining to Rouge and grabs me from behind, groping my breasts.

I had forgotten about her because she was the first one I took out of the fight, but she hadn’t passed out.

"Stay still, hot stuff!" Rouge’s wolf ears are once again fully upright at the sight of the opportunity.

"If you don’t surrender, I’ll—" I strike backward with the back of my palm, hitting her nose, while my tail delivers a hard blow to Edith’s stomach, and I spin, landing a kick that knocks her out completely.

"Haaa... she had such a good opportunity." I sigh, disappointed that this misandrist lesbian preferred to grope my breasts instead of properly immobilizing me.

I run a hand through my hair, pushing it back, a little disappointed with Edith’s stupid reaction.

"Professor... I surrender." Charlotte speaks from a distance, sitting on the floor near the wall, perhaps realizing that continuing will only mean she’ll be violently knocked out. Ashlyn stands up, looking between me and Charlotte.

"Professor... I-I give up." She backs away, retreating, while Rouge casts a dirty look at her.

"Rouge, your two colleagues over there did the right thing. I know it may seem pathetic to give up, but understand something: there are fights you can’t win. If this were to the death, continuing would be your end. Sometimes it’s necessary to flee."

"Even if it’s cowardice, a living coward is better than a dead brave one. Of course, don’t abandon your comrades — that would be beyond cowardice, it would make you scum and someone detestable. But in this situation, where you’re alone facing death, fighting on would just be foolish courage." Rouge looks at the two of them.

"They’re the ones who abandoned me, but I won’t die. And you’re good to train with — I have a lot to gain if I continue this fight." Rouge’s answer makes me smile.

"They didn’t abandon you, they just saw that it made no sense to keep fighting. But you’re right. I liked your answer. One-on-one, then. We’ll see how far you can go."

"Of course, Professor. You only had such ease in this fight because you’re already experienced in combat fighting complete novices, but I believe I have some experience with this, so please take me more seriously." Her gaze is extremely cold and determined.

"..." I smile. It’s true that this fight was easy for me — I have immense advantages in experience and because of my prosthetics — but it’s also true that Rouge has something more to show.

"Holding out until the end is something only idiots do while their comrades fall. I’ll teach you this harsh lesson by beating you far more than the others." I flash her a dangerous smile for deciding to do something so stupid.

"I wouldn’t expect anything different." She just accepts it, stepping toward me.