A/N: This is the second chapter updated for today, and it's the longest one so far! There is a filler chapter before this one with important background information, so you're gonna wanna read that one before you even think about touching this one. Oh, and here's the Ezra and Rojas interaction that you wanted, anonymous commenter! Then again, it's probably not at all what you wanted, so sorry.

"That's so cool!"

"No, it's a veil breach that's been a thorn in our side for an embarrassingly long amount of time."

"Well, I still think it's cool that he's been able to survive for so long."

"They."

Hours had passed since Nadia and Aaron's trek into the old library, and Kimora and Chavez were busy helping August and Takahashi as they had been, though the places and chores had varied. For their last "job" of the day, they had been relegated to sentry duty over Argus. Kimora and August were currently in the midst of a slight argument over a beastkin sighting somewhere in the Black Forests of Germany. Takahashi grinned as August's increasing annoyance with the boy made itself clearer and clearer through his tone of voice.

"He's like some kind of Rogue! Hunting the globe, darting around the ranges, searching for-"

"Yes. I'm sure he's having a wonderful time," August said before Kimora could break out into another long-winded spiel about creatures. "Though, if you ask me, I think he's just fled the kaiju realm for somewhere safer, at any rate." He went back to the screens, chuckling at a bit at his own joke. Kimora now diverted his attention to Hector, who was sitting on the ledge of the war room, staring at his flip phone with a worried expression.

"You alright?" Kimora asked, walking over to him. Hector didn't look up, but responded flatly with "She hasn't called me back yet. She should have said something by now. Where is she?" This didn't really seem to be an answer as much as it was him talking to himself.

"You mean your sensei?" Takahashi asked, hearing wind of the half-conversation. "She may very well just be a bit caught up in her own studies, with everything going on right now." He tried to adopt a fatherly tone with that last sentence, hoping to calm the boy's nerves.

"But, it's late!" Chavez responded, looking at him, his expression growing sadder by the minute. "She usually says something by now, she'd get worried, call me a million times asking if I'm okay, and send a few texts…" His voice cracked and trailed off, and Kimora placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

"It could have something to do with her other job! Spring break is about to start," Kimora said. The words hung in the air a bit for him. It'd been already two months that he'd been training as an acolyte, and it hadn't felt like anything to him. He continued, not wanting to show any sign of unsureness. "So, she might just be grading the last of the tests… and stuff."

Hector hopped off the ledge and back into the room. "I know, but… I have to be sure. Permission to be excused?" Takahashi nodded, and August waved a hand vaguely in his direction with a small grunt. He bounded down the stairs and straight into the room with the way lines, positioning the platform to intersect with a purple line. Touching it, he was transported directly into the school's basement, and he rushed up and out towards Headmaster Rojas' office.

From outside the office, all he could hear was a soft moaning, scarcely audible unless you had your ear directly up to the door. Taking a deep breath, he opened the door to see her huddled over her desk, her head in her hands. She looked up at him, her eyes bloodshot and tired and her hair unkempt. Hector couldn't say or do anything, he just stood in front of her door with his eyes wide and his mouth agape.

"Close the door," She murmured, wiping a thin trickle of blood from underneath her nose. When he didn't respond, she immediately screamed it again. "I said, close the door! What the hell is wrong with you?" He scrambled to grab the handle, and closed it behind himself as he quickly zipped into the room, rushing to her side.

"How did this happen to you?" Chavez asked, trying to push to her back off of her face. She grabbed his hands, and gently placed them down on the desk before her. She took a deep breath and said "Alright. First thing in the morning," she pointed to a wooden box, tied up in chains. "We are taking that accursed thing and destroying it. Don't let me forget it, don't you forget it, and god above, don't tell anyone else about it unless your life depends on it." She sat back in her hair, still sniffling from her bloody nose. "Got it?"

Hector, feeling a twinge of déjà vu, nodded. He exited the room, remembering to close the door behind him as he did. He slowly walked all the way back to his room, still scared out of his wits as to what exactly could have been in that box that had caused her to explode like that. Whatever it was, he was now grateful that she hadn't called him back.

The next morning came with a sharp knock on Hector's door. He'd been in the midst of packing for going back home to his parents at spring break, and had all but forgotten last night, brushing it off as a fever dream. But, when he opened his door and saw Rojas with the wooden box tucked under her arm, the feeling of dread quickly made itself at home back in his head. The two of them made their way to the way line, and as they entered, the young boy could have sworn he saw a silver light shining from inside the box.

When they'd gotten to the temple, Rojas grabbed Hector's arm to keep him from running off this time, as she marched directly to the room with the temple's council seats. Takahashi and Ezra were already there, and looked over at the almost hysterical Water specialist as soon as she entered. She released Hector's arm with a quick flick of the wrist, and slammed the box down on the table.

"What is the meaning of this?" Ezra asked, still taken aback from her sudden intrusion. Rojas proceeded to respond by taking a key from around her neck, unlocking the lock, slipping off the chains, and sliding the lid of the box. She pulled out the gauntlet, and slammed it on the table. Ezra stared at it for a few seconds, even more shocked. "Where did you find that?" She asked, in an almost angry tone.

Takahashi, more horrified than surprised, picked up the gauntlet, examining it all over. "I… I thought it was only just a legend! You've found the First Gauntlet! This is…"

"The biggest mistake I have ever made." Rojas interrupted, Chavez tried to get a closer look, but this was made nearly impossible when Rojas snatched it from Takahashi's hands, and placed it back in the box. "I need you two to help me get rid of it. For everyone's sake."

"And how do you propose we go about doing that? Gauntlets can only be fully destroyed with total mana overloads!" Takahashi said. "You've heard the stories. If this one was made to withstand the full power of the entire kaiju realm, then how on earth can the three of us even hope to dent it?"

Ezra spoke up this time. "Though we can't destroy it, I do know of a place where we can store it. In my travels of the Nature realm, I've come across an old Water Civilization laboratory hidden underground. It hasn't been touched in hundreds of years, and it's barely hospitable to anything from the outside world. If anyone comes looking for it, they'll give up before they can reach the inner sanctum."

Rojas took a deep breath, and thought over the pros and cons of Ezra's offer, as well as Takahashi's statement. She sighed, and then said "If it's the only chance we have, I'll take it." She then turned to Hector, and knelt down to his level. "Stay here. I don't want anything happening to you." And then, the three masters went off to the Nature Civilization, taking the box with them.

Hector went downstairs and back to the library, where Nadia was already waiting, reading a Light tablet with the name "Sasha, Channeler of Light" written across the top. He sat down next to her, stewing in his own uncertainty.

"I heard about your teacher," Nadia said. "Is she alright?" She looked over at Chavez, giving him a sort of half-smile that gave off a friendly vibe. He shrugged, and went back to pondering about what exactly that gauntlet could have done to his Headmaster. Just then, his thoughts were cut off by Kimora entering the room.

"I knew that I would've found you two here!" he cheerily joked. But, his demeanor mellowed a bit when he saw their serious expressions. "Oh no, what happened? Is Master Rojas alright?"

Hector gave an annoyed sigh. "Why does everyone keep asking me that? Yes, she's okay! She's just really on edge because she found some weird artifact and now she wants to destroy it with the other masters, I don't know!" After his little outburst, he realized exactly what he'd just said and covered his mouth with both hands in horror. "Sorry."

Nadia dropped the tablet, a dawning horror also peaking in her. "Uh, asking for a friend. What exactly was the artifact, again?" Hector, deciding he'd nothing left to lose today, cleared his throat and quietly said "A gauntlet." Nadia leapt off the bench. "Where is she? We need to find her before it's too late!"

The Water Civilization's laboratory was pitch black, the bright blue lights and metal faded and burned out from years of disrepair. The walls were coated in bodily fluids, as well as blast and claw marks, possibly from escaped experiments. There were massive glass windows peering to the outside, where one of the Water Civilization's smaller cities could barely be seen in the distance, glowing brightly in stark contrast to the rest of the biome.

The masters had made their way into the deserted lab via a cleverly hidden porthole from inside of a tree stump, and had scaled the long ladder descending into the central hub with a dull metallic thud. Lighting up all three of their gauntlets, the masters proceeded to gaze upon their surroundings and came across three pathways. While one was quite visibly blocked off once the three had neared it, there still remained two that seemed to stretch on forever into the unknown.

Takahashi gazed upon the two paths. "It appears we'll have to split up," he said, taking the box from Rojas. "I'll take the one going east, you two take the one going north."

"You're not seriously thinking of going alone, are you?" Rojas rebutted, but Ezra placed a hand on her shoulder soothingly. "If Master Takahashi thinks that he knows what he's doing, we should let him. Besides, it'll be a good chance to walk clear out your head from all this stress." Ezra stated. She nodded reverently towards him, and he did the same for her as they both went their separate ways. But, Rojas couldn't help but feel a bit guilty as she turned for a second to look at Takahashi leaving with the box.

As Takahashi went down the corridor, his gauntlet a lit and the box firmly in one hand, he couldn't help but shake off the feeling like he was being watched. He turned to look behind him, and saw nothing but the endless darkness behind himself. He turned back around, still a bit paranoid. And that's when he started hearing muffled murmuring coming from right next to him. He jumped, looking around himself again and dropping the box.

The box clattered to the floor, its lid coming off and the murmuring becoming louder, so much that Takahashi could hear the whispers clear as day. They blended into each other, some harsh, some soft, mostly harried and frightened as they filled the corridor with noise. Takahashi looked down at that gauntlet, which was giving off an even brighter shine than the one from his, and felt compelled to put it on. It would be helpful in this darkness, and what with its unforetold powers, could easily banish any beast left over from a failed experiment.

"No!" He suddenly yelled out, to nobody in particular. He wasn't going to let his minds play tricks on him, he just needed to find his way to wherever Ezra had told him to put the damn thing, and just be done with it. And then, a much louder noise, most certainly not coming from either Takahashi on the gauntlet sounded off behind him. Scraping metal and rumbling growling emerged from a rather horrific stitched together creature, and it wasn't alone. Around 5 other patchwork creatures, horribly destroyed beyond any resemblance of their former selves surrounded him, one grabbing him up by the throat and holding him up against the wall. Straining to breathe, he desperately scrambled to get his walkie-talkie off of his belt, but it had clattered off and hit the ground about a foot away.

A psychic blast repelled the creature off of him, and the Nature master gasped for air, and looked up to thank his savior. However, instead of it being from one of Rojas, Ezra, or even August's creatures, it the blast had come from Rusalka, who was joined by…

"Children? What are you doing here?" he asked, staring up at Kimora, Nadia and Chavez. Kimora was using a Three-Eyed Dragonfly to blast the other creatures from attacking him while he was down, and Chavez was diverting them from the gauntlet with Gilaflame's flame trails.

"We're saving you!" Kimora confidently called out, as he commanded the dragonfly to wallop one of the Chimeras hands away from him. "And we need the gauntlet!" Nadia added, as she ran over to him and helped him up. Gilaflame snatched it up in his teeth and deposited it in Hector's hands, and the boy placed it in his blazer.

"I don't think you quite know what you're doing," Takahashi said, picking up his walkie-talkie. "That's the-!"

"First Gauntlet!" Nadia finished. "And if anyone gets their hands on it, they'll be turned into a mindless killing machine! That's why we have to study it before we can just throw it away." She ran down the hallway and back into the main room, with the other kids following suit. Takahashi was about to say something, but decided it was better to save it until after they'd escaped, and followed the three down.

When they got back to the start, however, they were in for quite a shock. They'd alerted the other experiments to their presence, and they'd been swamped with nearly triple the amount of creatures. Even with Master Takahashi summoning Steel Hammer to help, the four were hopelessly outgunned by the time they'd banished the fifth one, low on mana and on physical energy themselves.

Hector stumbled backwards, panting heavily as he bashed another beast in the face. He was running low, and so was Gilaflame, who'd lost most of his vigor and was much more sluggish with his attacks. There had to be something, anything that could help. An idea then hit him; The First Gauntlet. He could use that to give himself enough firepower to escape with all of his friends and teachers safe. But, what Nadia had told him and Takahashi rung in his head that he would become a monster of a duelist. But, maybe it was just a metaphorical warning that was transcribed incorrectly?

Whatever was going on with Chavez's psyche, it just ended up in him putting on the gauntlet, and peeling off his own. It fastened itself around his wrist, the gems whirring around and glowing in all the colors of the civilizations. He yelled in pain and fell to his knees as a massive mana wave surged through him. He lifted his hand, and in a loud voice "Gilaflame! Show no mercy!"

Now, whatever had happened to Chavez did more damage than he knew, and a massive fireball coated the entire area. By the time it had cleared, every single creature save Gilaflame was gone, wither having been ripped to shreds, incinerated, or banished back to their Civilization. The Drakkon had no idea what had just happened, and looked down at his paws, trying to make heads or tails of this attack. Chavez quickly ripped off the gauntlet and shoved it back in his jacket, swapping it out for his real one.

Nadia rushed over to him. "What just happened?" She asked in a horrified voice. Hector couldn't speak, already too flabbergasted himself to even realize what he'd done. Kimora, just as scared, looked all around the room and saw a very large crack in the glass wall looking out into the Water Civilization.

Takahashi noticed it as well, and immediately began to push the kids towards the ladder. "We can talk about this later. We have to go now!" As if on some horrific cue, the crack expanded on the last 'now' and began to slowly flood the room. The four of them rushed up the ladder, and Takahashi pulled out his walkie-talkie. "Ezra! Rojas! The building is collapsing! Where are you? You need to escape!"

Ezra and Rojas, meanwhile, had gotten separated from each other, and Ezra was currently searching a supply closet for any sort of Water Suits. She opened the first closet and saw there were many of them already filled and ready to be applied, which she started to tear up and pop as fast as she could. She continued this for every single case, until she was down to only two. Before she could pop them, she hear Rojas' voice calling out to her.

"What are you doing in there? Get out, we don't have much time!"

"I... I know!" She said nervously. She held up the two suit pods. "I was getting us these in the case that we don't quite make it in time!" She ran out of the room, with Rojas following her hurriedly.

Rojas, nearly tripping on her heels and the spilling water, turned to Ezra with a look of extreme dread. "The children followed us here. Thank god that Takahashi was able to get them out in time, who knows what could have happened."

"T-takahashi?" Ezra questioned.

"Yes, he-he's waiting for us above the lab. Come on, then!" Rojas said, but Ezra paused, clapping a hand over her mouth in fear. "What is it?"

"This isn't going out how I'd hoped," Ezra whispered. "He wasn't supposed to get out." She looked up at Rojas. "You. Go. Now! I'll stay here."

"I'm sorry?" Rojas asked. "What do you mean, he wasn't supposed to get out? What's gotten into you?" She walked towards Ezra, confused and angry.

"This was the perfect place for it, and I've failed… I have to do this now. It's only fair, I suppose." She smiled sadly, and pushed Rojas from her. "Leave while you still can."

"No! I refuse to go anywhere until you tell me what you're talking about!" Rojas yelled, pushing her back. Ezra grabbed onto her brooch, trying to keep ahold, but the brooch gave way and knocked her into the rapidly rising water.

Ezra darted past Rojas and to the hub, clutching onto the ladder with all of her strength. Rojas followed suit, wading through the now waist deep water. "I have to die. It's the only way!" Ezra called out to her.

"No, you don't!" Rojas yelled back. "I can save you." Mounting horror covered Ezra's face as she looked between the suits, the brooch, and her friend. She took a deep breath and shakily said. "I know," She sliced open the second suit with the brooch, and activated the first on herself. "But nobody can save you."

Rojas' eyes widened, but before she could say anything, the crack ripped open onto a massive hole, sucking out Rojas and submerging the entire lab. The four duelists above gazed in horror as a typhoon of water sprayed from the hidden passageway. A deafening silence hung in the air until Ezra came out of the passageway, sobbing inconsolably. In her right hand, which she has been holding so hard that she'd sliced her hand open, was Master Rojas' brooch.