When the time ran out, Scar, Julien, and Purple began their exit from Area 17. Purple's wounds prevented walking, so she leaned heavily between her companions, who helped her along carefully.
Joel floated behind them on his board, its yellow light cutting through the mist to illuminate their path. He looked far from pleased. His expression suggested he was barely restraining himself from slitting all their throats in one motion.
Joel's hatred for Akumas and the Supreme Academy ran deep. What made it worse: his superiors, Amber and three others, had not only let these demons infiltrate their hidden training base, but they'd given them food, and now forced him to guide them to safety.
He wasn't wrong.
Their punishment stemmed from losing three consecutive duels. Now corpses surrounded them… fresh kills, shattered skeletons, rotting bodies, some showing signs of final desperate pleas. Any of them could have ended up like this. All of them might have. Yet they were supposed to help.
