I do not own Negima in any form or any character or concept borrowed from an outside source. Any such idea from the latter will be marked by and accredited to its rightful holder(s) in the chapter it was introduced. Warning this chapter contains events that warrant an M rating including domestic violence, assault & battery, attempted murder, and justifiable homicide when I post the next chapter I will include a summary for those that skip this chapter. Sorry, but it is too central to major plot elements and character development to leave out.

Chapter 4: Facing Truth

It was almost 8:00 as the assembled members of the white wings escorted their new 'guest' back to their room at the grand arena to be used for the finals. Escape was not an option at this point even ignoring the great difference of power and numbers the narrow halls of the arena now made it impossible for another member of their team to fight, leaving just Lynn and Christian against four powerful opponents on either side. "So what are you going to do with us now?" Lynn asked to their captors on ether side of the treasure hunter as they were led back to the white wings' base.

"If your story is true then the only one you need to talk to is shield, they will be here tomorrow, two of us will take one of you to talk to her when she is alone we will decide our next action on how friendly you seem with each other." The child leader replied hastily, not even giving them a glance, or more like trying not to look at them.

Gem's residence sector 9:00am

Master and apprentice sat across from one another about to start their training. Nodoka's was filled with anxiety as she her mind raced recalling the terrors that befell her the last time her sensei 'instructed' her in this technique, and that was just to introduce it to her, now she was suppose to not only do it herself but overpower and take control of the illusion from her teacher. She doubted that he'd use his full strength, but still the things he did over course of her training were intimidating to say the least.

She remembered the day after she learned to form her shield. He was testing how strong it was, so he threw a few things at her, at first just rocks, and then magic arrows increasing in number and focus as they went, but after that he formed some sort glowing orbs of light in his hands. She could tell right away those orbs were not normal the energy they gave off was like noting she ever felt before. She poured all had into blocking the first, but the shield soon began to fade, and her entire life flashed before her eyes, everything and everyone held dear fading away. What happened next still freaked Nodoka out it was like every part cried out and an enormous power flooded her. She poured the power into shield, her mind focused only on blocking the attack. The shield held, but the blast was still incredibly powerful literally sending her flying for miles to the last island in the sector.

The landing tore up her cloths and even some of her skin, her sensei appeared moments after landed; she was hesitant to let him near her, but the pain of sand getting into the second layer of skin and rate she was losing blood gave her no choice. He healed her at once, bringing relief to her pain, but not her mind as he still held the second orb. She panicked at the possibility of facing such power again, until he put on a proud smile and spoke up.

"Excellent Apprentice, see what you can do when you truly put your mind to it." Gem cheered happily a genuine sense of pride evident on his face. Then he pointed the hand holding the orb towards one island barely in sight. "This is the power you are capable of standing against when you commit everything you are to it! This is how much power you truly have!" With that he fired the orb at the island and immediately put up a bubble like shield around the both of them. Then they both watch as the island vanished in a blinding flash of and then a towering wall of water that swallowed everything in all directions leaving only a handful of islands in its wake.

The thing that scared her most about that event was not the power shown, but the power she lost. After that power flooded her she felt nothing for a week, even though she could remember everything that happened and could even move no emotion would come.

She felt like…well how she pictured a robot before meeting Chachamaru, just going though the motions. To have such a piece of her missing was something truly frightening, and something that she hoped to never experience again.

Unlike that time the fight would be in their minds released from the constrictions of the laws of physics and mortality, there would be nothing to hold her teacher back, nothing shielding her from what he might do. She so wrapped up in her own the fears that she barely heard her sensei's words. She quickly refocused attention on the train, reassuring herself that it was to help her friends, linked minds with her sensei and began journey into the certain hell that awaited her.

Negi's base 11:00

Negi and Asuna sat at a table watching over the captive treasure hunters a few feet away in the corner of the room. Tension was heavy between the leaders of both sides as they stared at each other since the boy and Asuna took his shift an hour ago. Finally Asuna had enough and voice her frustrations. "Un! Negi, would you say something already!"

"Hu?" The boy responded with a slight jump, turning his head to see what his partner wanted.

"It's about time you said something! You've been giving that guy who had Bookstore's badge since we got here!" Asuna scolded the boy, before taking on a softer, more understanding tone. "If what Konoka said is still bothering you, I don't think they would do anything like that to Nodoka- san so…"

"Then why did he have it!?" Negi yelled distraught with himself over the idea, eyes beg for another answer, any answer that seemed like it might be true.

"I already told that bastard stabbed me with that to make me let go of the ledge when I tried to stop him from taking Jou-chan!" Craig yelled in outrage at the implications, although he could understand how they had a hard time believing him, even he had a hard time believing that just after some how surviving being thrown for an hundred foot fall, an entire island that appeared out of nowhere hours earlier just vanished with their friend.

"Then how did he find it? Negi asked while trying to hold back the hatred still evident in his voice.

"We told you she took off that breastplate to help carry some of the books and scrolls Ryuikes had her take, it was under there." Craig objected again.

Negi trembled with anger. Anger at what could have happened to Nodoka, anger at Sword, and most of all anger at himself. Not only was this whole mess his fault, but how he was acting it was so unlike himself in itself infuriated him. "Asuna-san, I need some air." The boy said heavily, needing time to think enough for even the redhead to not fallow.

Negi simply started walking to nowhere, trying to calm himself down and figure out why he couldn't do just that. Any other time he would have at least considered the treasure hunters' story it fit how Sword did things so far, and they didn't seem to be bad people not from what Nodoka wrote in her letters or how they acted now. Then why was he acting this way? He was at least able to think straight when Sword took Ako and the others, he even think when Fate attacked and scattered them across the world, then why not now, at a time where he needed to think clearly the most? Negi was so caught up in his own thoughts that he was not watching where he was going, and soon found himself on the floor after colliding with what felt like a walking pillar. He looked up to see what he hit and saw his father's rival.

"Hey kid watch where you're going." Racan scolded the boy, before seeing the look on Negi's face. "Well looks like you got something on your mind. Still worried about that girl? Well we'll have to change that if you're going to beat this guy, come on we got to get you off of this for a bit." Racan then grabbed the boy by the collar dragged him off.

"Racan-san, where are you taking me!?" Negi shouted in objection.

"Come on I got something I want to show you." The man said in replied.

In the illusion world

Nodoka was struggling to keep her sanity, as Gem tried to force her to take control of the illusion away from him. Images of her greatest fears appear before her eyes too real to believe, things she had knew to be possible but hope to never have to experience: Yue kissing Negi right in front her not even looking as Nodoka ran off in tears; Negi killed taking a stone spear meant for her, his blood drenching her face and torso; and even the image of her and Negi's children slaughtered right in front of her. Even now she was being shown another battle going badly the white-haired boy had broken though the frontlines and went for Konoka ripping though Haruna and her defenses to get there. One by one she watched as her friends fell before her eyes, unable to do anything but cry. The only way that she was surviving such things was telling herself that her friends wouldn't let it happen, but what would come next would shatter that one glimmer of hope.

"You've held up well so far apprentice, but this can't go on!" Gem declared furiously, clearly agitated with the girl now on her knees, breathing harshly, and covered in a cold sweat. "I did not want to do this, but you give me no choice! I show you the horrors that could happen if you act and yet just tell yourself that other would let it happen. If you will not take the responsibility to act based on the idea that others will prevent it, then I'll just have to force you face something happen before you knew any of them!"

As soon as she heard it, she knew what her teacher meant. A memory that she had tried to forget, but in truth laid at the heart of who she was, the day that her fear of men truly took root, the day that she learned her place in life. All her life her mother went from one boyfriend to another.

"No…please…" Nodoka asked in barely a whisper, too shocked to manage anything more.

Nodoka could never understand what her mother saw in them, all they only took her money giving only yelling and beatings in return. Over the years her mother made several visits to the emergency room, broken arms, bruised ribs so many different injuries, and yet they were never enough to keep her away for long. The one thing that her mother never took was violence towards Nodoka the minute things got near that point they always walked straight for the door, but that day the door cut them off, and her mother went to the emergency room for more then just a broken arm.

"If you don't like it then make me stop!" Gem dared the girl coldly.

She watched as she again found herself in that run-down apartment that greasy man who reeked of sweat watching TV in a lounge chair, and her mother at that old stove while her five year old self sat at the table. All seemed normal until she got up go to the bathroom. When she came back her mother had just finished setting the table and had called everyone to the table. She hurried to get to the table, and ended up tripping over her feet, landing on her face in the middle of the, right in the path of that man. He tripped over the girl and came crashing down landing a few feet away from the girl. Nodoka's mother ran to her.

"Stop! Please!" the cried desperately as she realized the most terrifying even in her life was just seconds away. She tried again to shake her Sensei's control, but found it fruitless. I'm just not strong enough. I'm just not strong at all!

"You have the power; remember what you did in the beginning when you truly wanted it! The only thing that is holding you back is that you don't see how strong you really are!" Gem yelled at as if he knew what she was thinking and was scolding her for it.

Then voice rang out from the illusion that filled the girl with indescribable fear and horror, the voice of that man almost growling in furry as he cursed girl while picking himself off the floor.

Not thinking the young Nodoka made the biggest mistake of her life, sent walked over the man to apologize. She stopped by his right shoulder, and before Nodoka could even open her mouth the man whipped his hand around smacking her in the face, and sending her flying into one of the table's legs knocking it over and spilling the meal onto the floor. Nodoka's mother ran to her, unintentionally stepping on the man's hand on her way, and invited catastrophe.

Nodoka clenched her eyes to block out the sight of that man's fist hitting her mother, but found it as useless as if she didn't even have eyelids.

"This is in your mind pretty much your entire body is just a representation of your perception and right now I control what you perceive. The only way to get out of this is to stop it yourself."

The first punch connected with her mother's face sending her to the ground.

"STOP IT!" Nodoka screamed shaking her head desperately trying to get the image out of her head.

Another punch hit.

"STOP!" The girl cried again, tears flowing steadily.

Three more punches rammed into the woman's face, and then the man stood up.

"No." Nodoka gasped as her legs gave out on her. "STOP!" begged the girl as the man's foot collided with her mother's ribs. Over and over the man kicked her mother, while she scream the whole time, then finally something snapped she didn't care who stopped it, she did care what hellish illusion she saw next, she just didn't want to see this anymore. With that one thought echoing in her mind a surge of power erupted from the girl sweeping the memory away like a sand castle in the way of a tsunami, the sheer of force of the wave throwing Gem what seemed like a hundred feet.

'Finally! Thank you, apprentice. You have no idea how much that hurt me to have to do.' Gem thought to himself as he let the power carried him, as tears flowed down the man's face, tears of pride, of pain, and of relief. Having to watch a mother in pain the child had a hand in causing was too close to home, even if it was to teach the girl something important. He landed roughly, but picked himself up and made his way back over to the crying girl.

"How could you?" Nodoka asked as Gem stopped a little more then an arms length from her.

Gem took a deep breath and braced himself for the impending backlash. "Sorry, I really am, but as long as you only rely on others to do things for you will never grow."

"Then why that!?" The girl screamed at him. "I couldn't do anything."

Nodoka was to upset to even look at her teacher at the moment, but if she did she would have found an expression she had never seen him display over the course of her training, one of surprise and confusion. "I can't believe it." He said in honest astonishment, before letting out a heavy sigh. "I can't believe left the fact that you blocked it out, out of the summery. "Now I see how you got that idea if you only remember him shaking you off very time you tired stopping him after shook off the daze, and the fight that neighbor got into to stop couldn't have helped your opinion of men. However I wonder how you explain the impression of that piece of crap in the wall since the neighbor lost the fight?"

The news shocked Nodoka she only remembered up to a little after the neighbor came in then nothing, the next thing she remembered she and her mother were on their way to the hospital.

"You really are pretty amazing apprentice; even after all the things you endured that day the thing that scared you the most was what you did to stop it."

"What do you mean? How can you even know all this!?" Nodoka whispered in shock and fear of what he could mean.

"What mean is how in one burst of desperation your entire will flared, releasing enough energy to send that shack of crap within an half an inch of going through the outer wall of the building and shattered every bone in his body." He told her coldly closing the distance between them.

The level of shock, horror, fear, disgust, and so many other emotions that Nodoka felt towards herself was indescribable. She felt like she was going to puck. She wanted to say it wasn't true, but it was all coming back; The man getting up after beating down the neighbor that tried to save them, him picking up the knife off the floor and heading over to her mother, her mind just going blank except for stopping him, and even the sound of cracking as he was thrown into the other wall, she remembered everything. How could she have done this? How could have forgotten it? How could she have let herself be so happy after doing such a thing? She was no different then the white-haired boy, the only word she could think of for herself was…monster. Then she felt someone embraced her, it was Gem.

"I know you think this makes you some kind of monster, but that thought, those tears, that pain, and the screams of anguish echoing throughout your mind right now, all prove you aren't. Sorry apprentice, but this should show you how important it is that you learn to control a power like yours, a power you control if you don't fully acknowledge." His voice had a sense of compassion, sadness, and understanding that she could tell was genuine and came first hand. "If you were even a fraction of the monster you think yourself I would've killed you long ago instead of taking you as my apprentice. You saved your mother and the man that tried to save you with what you did, you defended them, shielded them, monsters don't act for others. You let out that pain and stop thinking those thoughts; in here time is completely on your side, so cry to your heart's content."

These words brought great relief to Nodoka's heart, even her anger towards her sensei for making her endure such pain seem to fade as she listened to his words. The more she thought about it the she found them true, and the more she felt her grief fade. It was like all the self-hatred drained out of her with the tears flowing down her cheeks, sadness was still there, but could accept that.

After what seemed like hours Nodoka found herself out of tears and got to her feet.

"Do you want to stop? Even by my standers that was a bit much." Gem asked the girl as he got up.

Nodoka shook her head silently, and then looked her teacher in the eye with a pleading look. "Please, I don't ever want that to happen again."

"Good, respect towards such power is essential, but never let it turn to fear" Gem replied solemnly with a proud smile. "You must never fear yourself, as long as you learn how to use that power responsibly there is nothing to fear from it. Now lets get started you will need to do this to an attacking opponent without them being able to tell the difference, by tomorrow, and I know you are strong enough to do it."

11:45 Somewhere overlooking the ruins of the old capital.

Negi stood in astonishment as he listened to Racan's story of the deserter that caused the great city to crash beneath the clouds. The part that amazed him was the owner of the power that caused it, The Twilight Imperial Princess, a person who Racan's story left no doubt was some dear to him, his student, his partner Asuna Kagurazaka. He just couldn't comprehend how such a thing escaped him, how many people must have been hiding this from him.

"See boy no one can protect everyone all the time. We were called the greatest heroes in the world, managed to end the Great War, but could protect one city or even one little girl." Racan finished disappointment clear in his voice. "You just got to try and figure out what you can do to fix your mistake."

Negi found a great deal of comfort in the words of his father's rival, even with the questions this raised about Asuna it did give him some relief to know that even a man as strong as his farther could make a similar mistake.

"Racan-san, will you please help me think of a way to beat Sword?" Negi asked loudly with a renewed sense of determination in his voice.

"Sure kid." The war hero answered. Waiting a minute before giving a smile that crushed the boy's moment of joy. "We can discus the consultation fee after we see what we are up against."

Author's Note: I am very sorry that it has taken me this long to update. First halidays then a computer got crash by a virus masquerading as antivirus update (even had the windows colors), and the I forgot email address I used to login, so all that plus collage (yes I know my skills in English make it hard to believe, I am working on it) kind made it hard to update. I hope this chapter was not too…extreme, but this go to what I have planed for Nodoka's past, which will play a big part later, if need be I may raise the rating, but this should be the worst of it.

Next time: Camo knows something about the temple that may shed some light on gem's identity and darken Negi's hopes of wining. Also Gem helps his apprentice make plains to help out a friend in need, and he talks a few things over with someone.