Megumi was walking to the testing grounds a few days later, she was followed behind by four guards as they pledged the oath to keep her safe. She arrived shortly after the march, Alexandra had been reading a section of the newspaper of the latest news.

"I see the train ride has gone along nicely?" Alexandra began. She got up and walked alongside Megumi.

"Nothing too crazy about it." Megumi replied. She smiled a bit but she looked like she was on the edge, not even taking a moment to let her guard down.

"I heard that Yuri Nakamura blew up a train and injured several students and staff." Alexandra began with the most recent news out of the bunch.

"I bet she and the other BSM students are after me, looks like they embarrassed themselves as my train left early and I got high priority. They blew up the wrong train." Megumi replied that they must've gotten it wrong.

"I know but we're still nervous about what is going to happen. We might as well cut the tumor out when the chance is right." Alexandra pleaded with Megumi to purge the aristocratic class of students and seize their fortunes.

"What will happen to Lola then? She's a member of the upper class and she has written some of the school's most successful novellas." Megumi asked about her friend and what would happen to her. Alexandra began to think about it.

"Don't know for sure. That is something you would wish to talk to her about." Alexandra replied. They walked over to the field where Kay and Alice were standing with their new rifles.

"We've decided to make two trial Berdans with magazines running along the bottom of the rifle." Kay began. Alice walked over and showed the picture of the trial rifle on a piece of paper explaining how this rifle would work. Megumi nodded.

"You two are trying to take stuff in the right direction." Megumi began with a smile.

"Yep, now we just need to get the rifles ready and we can begin the tests." Baby Lee replied. The rifle was simple, the lever was tipped down meaning it was going to load and feed from the tube. Kay was busy loading one cartridge at a time, the tube was able to fit about six cartridges in as Kay tipped the lever up and loaded one more in. "It can also be a single shot rifle if you want it to be."

"Nice." Megumi told Alice. Kay raised the Berdan to her shoulder and fired, the pellet tore the paper target apart. Kay would tip the lever down before cycling the round out, She pushed the bolt forward which fed the next round in. Kay lined her eye up to the sight and fired, however the recoil caught her off guard as there was an explosion within the tube underneath the gun, The rounds popped out as the tube fell apart. Kay looked down to see that the tube had detonated itself and the pellets and pieces of the tube lay scattered all over the ground.

"So the tube exploded? We should use the spare rifle to continue testing." Alexandra asked. Kay opened the rifle up and ejected the second casing. She carried the out of commission rifle over to Alice and swapped the rifle for the spare one. She took more ammunition and began loading up the tube of the second one. Once the six cartridges had been loaded, she loaded the last one in and took aim and fired. There was another explosion where all the remaining rounds in the tube popped out and scattered all over the ground. Kay looked as she cycled the round out to see the tube of the spare rifle had also exploded.

"Well it was going so good but those tube feeders can be a problem, we suffered two chain detonations where the entire tubs have popped out." Baby Lee replied, Now they knew they couldn't feed from the tube as chain detonation was now a risk.

"Go ask the Portuguese about that when they made the Kropatschek." Alexandra responded before she walked away. Alice and Kay looked at each other, their experimental rifles had failed and now they were back to square one.

"So what now? We can't do tubular magazines." Kay asked.

"Where can we store the ammunition now without risking detonations?" Baby Lee asked. "Something I am going to have to look into. She began to walk away as Kay knew that they needed to step up their game.

"I think I need to ask Megumi to purchase some rifles later on and see how they will work." Kay replied before she began to walk away. The trial ended up being a disaster as the rifles detonated in the chain and therefore the progress couldn't be read. Megumi knew that the school still had to modernize but this was beginning to look more difficult to accomplish. Megumi and her guards began to walk away.


Megumi later on was walking along when she spotted Lola walking along by herself, she felt a little down about herself.

"Is something the matter?" Megumi asked Lola. She knew Lola wasn't crying but she definitely seemed to be uneasy.

"Yeah, I got kicked out of the inner aristocratic circle over the fact that I reported on the explosion of that train. Himari has stripped me of my titles and thrown me onto the street." Lola began with the fact that she had been ejected from the central circle.

"It's fine, it's what I wanted you to talk to you about but now that I heard that you're no longer part of it. I want to ask two questions." Megumi began, she wanted to see what they were.

"Go on." Lola began.

"So, the first question is, can I give you the high title of writer of the school?" Megumi asked Lola if she would like to be part of the school's writing team if she was going to put out more novellas and short stories.

"Yes, what are the benefits?" Lola asked if there would be any benefits to this.

"I don't think that there are any benefits but you have to come to the office to help us out with running the school as me and Alexandra can't do it alone." Megumi told Lola that there would be no benefits to this as much as her coming over to help run the school.

"Okay, if it means I can rest my brain up and get new ideas, I'll take it." Lola replied. Megumi smiled before she laughed.

"That's great. So the second question is, I'm planning on hosting a dinner party tomorrow, want to come?" Megumi asked Lola if she was willing to come over and have a simple evening with her.

"Sure thing, I don't think I have anything else I need to do tomorrow." Lola replied. Watching them was one of the students, she had slipped off while the two students were still having their conversation.


Later on, Himari had got the news from the student that had spied on them and was holding a meeting.

"Okay we got the news that Megumi was hosting a dinner party at her place. We have had five attempts on her life and none of them have been successful. Lola thwarted two of these and the last one was caused by Yuri getting the train schedule wrong and now we're under threat because of it." Himari began. "One more wrong move and we're done for. We need to find some way we can blow Megumi up as bullets have no effect on her." The students began to think of how they were going to take down Megumi this time. Yuri was thinking in the corner while brushing her black hair back. She then paused and got a brilliant idea.

"I got it!" Yuri called out. Himari and the others turned their heads over to see what she had to say. "How about we sneak thirty kilos of dynamite in the basement and we'll blow the room above her down." Yuri gave her a suggestion. Himari began to clap.

"She's a genius I'm telling you." Himari replied. They're plan was a go-ahead.


Meanwhile Megumi was looking at her inbox to see what was inside and what was going to be read. She then found a message, it was from Manami Himuro. She opened it which turned into a meeting.

"Hey, how are you doing?" Manami asked. Megumi wasn't one to be pleased.

"Manami, what do you want?" Megumi asked as she didn't know what her friend wanted.

"We're reforming the alliance as we want BC Freedom to have no friends. We talked to Gisela about this separately and she's in the alliance." Manami stated that the Dual Alliance group was now in an alliance with Kuromorimine. "Want to rejoin the alliance?" She offered. Megumi began to think about it as she thought about Azumi and Rumi who were pretty nice to her but Manami trying to restart the alliance was a tempting idea. After coming to some reflection. Megumi began to speak.

"I won't agree to the invitation, but we will discuss this more at the dinner party tomorrow." Megumi told Manami that she wasn't going to accept the invite, but she was willing to compromise.

"A dinner party, am I invited?" Manami asked if she was willing to come over.

"Sure thing, after all, we agreed to talk about this." Megumi told Manami about it, but she was willing to invite Manami over to make the arrangement about the alliance.

"Okay, me and Runa will be coming over. We'll talk about it more." Manami responded. Megumi nodded before she hung up and exited the meeting. Megumi was giving Minami plenty of time to compromise about this while she was going to plan the dinner date.


The next day would be the event they were anticipating. Megumi, Alexandra and Lola had gathered around, and they were decorating the dining room.

"Where do you want the flowers?" Lola asked. She was trying to liven up the room to make it look beautiful.

"In the vases by the door. You're going to be greeting the guests as they come along. If Kay decides to invite herself over, she better not complain about the food we're making." Megumi instructed Lola where to put the flowers. Lola nodded and she began putting the pink and yellow flowers into the vases.

"What's your favorite flower?" Lola asked. "My favorite are Bluebells."

"Nice to hear. I don't think me, and Megumi have favorite flowers though my favorite tank is the Budyonny." Alexandra replied.

"Aren't you sure that your favorite tank is not a horse?" Megumi asked, there was no such thing as a Budyonny tank.

"I'm not one to like tanks that much." Alexandra answered. Lola seemed a bit puzzled.

"What is Alexandra talking about?" Lola asked.

"Alexandra leads the school's cavalry and they are mostly the second year students." Megumi began. "They act like the shock groups and are made to exploit gaps when a breakthrough has been achieved."

"Oh, so you think I'll get to be a part of it?" Lola asked with excitement. She always wondered what it was like to ride on a horse.

"We'll see about that." Megumi replied. The doorbell rang as the others began to walk over to see who it was. Megumi opened the door to see Manami and her friend Runa. "Welcome you two. So, you've come over for dinner?" Megumi asked them.

"Yeah, we have but we also have a few things we need to go over." Manami replied.

"That's why we invited you over, we just need to wait for a few more guests." Megumi replied.

"Wouldn't count Sofia, she's running late as she had missed the ferry to this school and told me she had to wait for the next one." Runa told Megumi as they walked in.

"Is she on her way?" Megumi asked while Lola helped escort the two students in.

"Of course, she is, she managed to catch the next ferry over ten minutes ago so she will be arriving within a half hour from now." Runa replied.

"Perfect, I think we should also be expecting more to come over." Megumi replied.

"I would also like to say that the Tsarevich wasn't able to come, his family is busy with something that involved their cousin, and I got the text that Tatiana is trying to teach Nonna how to speak the language that she speaks, and their older sister Olga is tutoring another student." Alexandra spoke as she had received a text from Alexei.

"Okay I'll send the letter over, who is the second student that his sister is tutoring?" Megumi asked.

"I'll ask him that, he's currently attending the session despite not being invited." Alexandra replied as she began to text Alexei about the second student. Then the doorbell rang with the next two students stepping in. Megumi walked over as Lola opened the door.

"Rumi, Azumi, you made it. I see the ride over wasn't rough." Megumi began. She began to guide them into the living part of the house to relax. "The dining room isn't ready as of yet as the chefs are still cooking all of the food but that will give us enough time to get what Minami wanted to talk to us about done."

"Great. We also received threats from Earl Gray about the Great Game where the two competing schools are trying to arm themselves to see whose group can have the bigger force." Azumi began. "Either that or Earl Gray is going crazy and wants to lift up another girl's skirt."

"I think the latter. Earl Gray thinks that she can rule the waves, but she has to keep track of who the number one school is at the moment." Manami replied. The doorbell rang as Lola opened the door to see Gisela walking in. She was carrying a bottle.

"You made it." Megumi greeted her. "What's the bottle for?"

"It's sparkling cider, I've bought a bottle for tonight." Gisela replied. "I've also come to an agreement with Manami about the new proposed alliance and I was wondering if you had come in as of yet." Gisela asked. Lola closed the door behind them.

"I haven't come to a formal agreement to the alliance as of yet and that is something me and Manami are going to talk about, we're still waiting on Sofia before dinner is going to begin."

"Yeah, me and Manami were just chatting to her as of yesterday to see how their school was doing and they're doing fine for now. Tension within Eastern Rumelia is pretty high at the moment." Gisela explained to Megumi what exactly was going on.

"I wish them well." Megumi replied. The students then sat down, and they knew they had a few things to talk about. Lola was waiting at the door as the only one left to come was Sofia.

"I would like to begin this meeting with the fact that Megumi hadn't agreed to our terms as of last night, but she said she was willing to compromise with us to make the terms much fairer for Saunders." Manami began the meeting with what had happened as of last night. "I did manage to get an alliance with Gisela, but I want to figure out what Megumi is up to."

"So I don't want to say this but I'm not one to fancy with the terms but I said I was willing to come up with a compromise as I didn't want to go head first into this meeting like last time." Megumi replied.

"All right, we're willing to compromise then." Manami smiled and nodded, she was willing to get what she wanted but she needed to make sure all sides were happy with the terms.

"So, what's the compromise?" Megumi asked.

"So, the compromise that we've decided to agree upon is that you will discreetly support in case of a war with either Anzio or BC Freedom and we will help you in a war against Earl Gray as tensions between your school and St. Gloriana is high." Manami told Megumi what the terms were if she was going to join the alliance, she still wanted a connection between their schools but Megumi wasn't going to agree to a formal alliance so they were going to support each other in a war with an outside member not part of the school.

"Okay, that seems reasonable as I can be with my friends, and I will have the backing behind me in case war breaks out with Earl Gray. Now I don't have to worry about Earl Gray as much." Megumi replied as she knew that she could take a breather. Megumi took the paper and began to sign her name into it. She slid the paper back to Manami who was pretty happy with the fact that she didn't have to fight Saunders and BC Freedom at once. She also hoped that this alliance was going to last a longer time compared to the last one which dissolved over the disagreement with Yogurt Academy and where their standing was. Now with this somewhat new diminished alliance, they would support each other in case they were at war with a school not part of this alliance. For Manami, this was enough.

"I got a text back from Alexei, the girl that Olga is tutoring is named Darjeeling." Alexandra told them as she finally got a message from the tsarevich. Then a knocking sound was heard, and this could mean only one thing.

"Hey I think I know who it could be." Megumi replied. Lola went over to see who was at the door. She opened it up to see Sofia had finally arrived.

"Sorry for running late, I was held up over the fact that everyone was leaving the school to establish diplomatic ends, the school is busy and I had to leave to attend this dinner meeting." Sofia said with a pant to her voice.

"We're more than welcome to have you. We should be able to talk about the next issue as we got the one about Kuromorimine and the Dual Alliance out of the way, now the next issue lies with Eastern Rumelia." Megumi told them that was the next issue they needed to get sorted out.

"Yeah, we don't know what exactly is going to happen about them as that part of Yogurt Academy seems to be ready to explode at this point and I wanted to get this sorted out." Sofia replied.

"Of course, we can come up with a solution to all of this…" Manami began. However, something unexpected was about to happen, what the girls didn't know was that about thirty kilograms of dynamite had been stored just below the dining room. There was a fire eating away at the ropes and it was leading straight to the dynamite boxes and sticks. Suddenly, a massive explosion shook everyone in the house. Megumi and the others stopped chatting when they heard the explosion happening in the other room.

"What was that?" Rumi asked as she seemed to panic. Megumi and the others turned and began to run, they knew where the explosion came from and began to run to where the explosion was, they made their way to the spot and realized that they were in distraught.

"What happened to the dining room?" Megumi asked with horror. The dining room had been completely destroyed and left a massive hole in the floor. What seemed to be a nice evening to themselves was completely gone. Two of the people working in the area had their legs shattered from the explosion. Alexandra didn't hesitate to call emergency services to get the two workers off to a hospital.

"Someone must've set off some explosives in the room below." Azumi responded. She walked over and picked up a completely broken grape. A piece of fruit in its prime to be eaten with the food was gone.

"I don't think Saunders has much longer left before it collapses." Megumi wept over the fact that whoever was able to do this was going to completely bring Saunders to its knees. Megumi knew that the clock for her was running out. She lowered her head down as the sirens of the medical staff arrived at the area. "The dinner date has been canceled, everyone go home. I don't know how much more I can take." The students one by one began to turn and walk away. Manami was entirely shocked but Megumi was falling into a state of somber. Even Lola looked at Megumi.

"Megumi… I know you're upset but I don't know what to do about it." Lola began as she tried to speak to her.

"You've done what you could, hurry home bluebell." Megumi told Lola. Lola was the last to turn away and began to hurry back to her school. Once everyone had left. Megumi was the only one still left at the hole. She looked around and her entire day was ruined, a day where they could talk about the school and how it could be improved even further, is gone. She sat down with her legs dangling at the edge and buried her face into her hands. A beautiful dinner with the school commanders and vice commanders had been burned to ashes. She began to weep over the fact that she was being hunted down and she didn't know how much longer she had left before she would be caught. She decided to cry over this day.


News about this was quick to spread and even the other schools were taking this as a warning. Saunders could possibly be at the state of what Lola had warned them. The carriage was reaching the bottom of the hill and a sharp turn lay around the corner. Megumi had failed to restrain the horses and now the clock was ticking before the school's destruction. Kay was on a phone with Alice over the most recent news.

"How much longer?" Kay began.

"The beast has been wounded and blood is pouring from it. It is only a matter of time before it bleeds out and the school is no more." Baby Lee responded. Kay knew that she and the others were living on possibly borrowed time. She then began to pack her bags up with the clothes she was going to need. She needed to get out of Saunders indefinitely and wait the storm out.

"New plan Baby Lee. I and two other students will be leaving the school and head over to yours to wait it out, we don't know how long it will be for, it can be days, weeks, months or even years. I want to feel safe because of the uncertainty." Kay frantically spoke to Alice over the phone. Once she had packed her bags up, she continued to speak. "I'll call you back within an hour. I have to call my friends." Kay told her. She hung up before she gave Alice the chance to speak. She got onto the laptop to contact Mika and Jajka as she had some plans for them. The two students logged on to see a frantic Kay have two duffle bags packed and ready.

"Kay, is there something wrong, you look like you're going on a trip?" Mika began. Kay didn't take a moment to think before she spoke.

"We need to pack our things and get out of here. I arranged something with Baby Lee who is allowing us to stay at her school until the storm clouds clear." Kay began. Jajka and Mika seemed to be in a state of panic.

"We can't just abandon our school like this. We don't know how long this is going to last." Jajka tried to talk some sense into Kay, but Kay knew her decision was final.

"Listen Jajka, do you want to live or not? I want to live." Kay told them. "Pack your things and meet me by the airport. I'll buy us the tickets to where my friend is living." Kay laid out the instructions where they should meet. Mika was packing her belongings as Jajka was giving some thought.

"Okay then." Jajka responded, she turned and went straight to packing. Kay nodded as she had the plan in mind. She shut down her laptop and began packing her electronics up as what was left still needed to be packed away. Once everything was packed. She picked them up and began to sneak her way out of the room. Jajka and Mika were able to meet her, and she had just got the tickets.

The three girls had left the school with their belongings and had hopped onto the plane, they were off to find shelter from a storm that was bound to come over them.

[A/N]: The storm is building up to a head and Megumi's spirits have been shattered. Trapped by her duties, she is going to easily crumble within the next chapter or so. Kay and her friends have fled and now it's just her, Alexandra, Lola and their foes. The nightmare will be over in the next chapter.

A few things have been solved but there is a bigger problem brewing and whoever it was that blew up the dining room had brought no changes and only increased the stress. Next chapter will be Megumi's ultimate relief that she needed, even if she has to sacrifice something in return.

Attempts on Megumi's life: 6 out of 7. The 5th one has been mentioned though it didn't directly affect her.