Leyona half fell, half walked onto the platform, Aya tumbling behind her and Hiari following.

All three were bruised and battered, Aya probably had a concussion and a sprained ankle, and Hiari had nearly died once, but they were fine.

Mostly. 

Leyona had been paranoid the entire time after her encounter with the weird figure, sticking to Aya's and Hiari's side, a completely different person from when they entered. It had an effect on Hiari, making him more jumpy, which in turn made Aya jumpy, and then that made Leyona even more paranoid, which made Hiari even more paranoid, which then....you get the point.

Basically they all breathed a sigh of relief in unison when they got to the platform, not wanting to move. After a week of hunting, running, fighting, breathing and basically just being top-tier athletes, they just wanted to go home.

"Cement my beloved." Said Aya, pressing her face against it. 

"I am never in my life touching grass again." Hiari muttered, not wanting move an inch.

"Someone please kill me." Leyona groaned, her head thudding against the cement. Every bone in her body ached, and this was probably the closest she had wished for death. Ever.

A cough came from the right, and Leyona wearily raised her head. Four vacant stares met her eyes. Ah shit. Was her only thought, and she quickly got up, brushing off dirt and dust of of her kimono. A massive slash was down one of the sleeves, exposing a wound wrapped poorly in a green cloth. 

The cloth was from Hiari's kimono, part of it ripped off at the hem. It was the cleanest out of all of the group's clothing at the time at the wound.

Leyona looked at the group. Two of the people she had seen, the black haired boy that looked kind of like Hiari and the white haired girl with red eyes. However, there was another.

A dark browned haired boy with eyes that reminded Leyona of the wine that her mother and father used to drink on holidays, a kind of maroon colour.

Dark red hair, blue eyes and freckles cheeks, the fourth stare was nothing to be trifled with. It seemed to bore into the girl's very core, and Leyona felt uneasy at it.

However, this is not the kid that caught Leyona's eye. It was the brown-haired boy, and how kind he looked. Leyona scoffed at him, then turned to her friends, grabbing them by their kimonos and shoving them to their feet. They mumbled and Aya even swatted her away, but eventually they were on their feet and facing off against the three other attendees. 

"We're not a circus, so stop gawking." Leyona snapped, and the white haired girl looked away, followed by the wine-eyes boy who muttered an apology. The black haired boy was the only one looking them, a smirk on his face.

"You are Kanao's students? You and the short one?" Aya's jaw clenched at this, and Leyona was about two seconds from decking the kid right then and there. Aya wasn't even that short, in fact she was above average in height.

Actually, this kid was shorter than her by several inches. He couldn't talk.

Another question. How did the kid know Kanao's name? 

"Cut it out Kizu." Hiari stepped out from behind Leyona, and a quick glance towards the twins standing on the podium told Leyona that they where not going stop the fight.

One looked worried, while one looked like it was waiting for something.

Wait. 

Was the one on the right waiting for them to fight? Seriously?

"Oh shut up." Kizu glared at Hiari, and Aya stepped in front of him. She was heavily wounded, and yet she was still going to defend him if they got into a fight. Leyona tensed, she wasn't going to allow that.

She's fight Kizu.

"Why don't we all relax here? We can maybe talk it out?" Suggested the blue eyes boy, stepping between the four people currently facing off against each other, his eyes switching flipping between Leyona and Kizu. "We should get our ore and move on maybe?"

The white haired girl spoke up. "I agree with Hinata. Get the ore, then we can leave." A nervous glance towards Kizu, who sent a tight smile towards her. She cowered back a bit, while Hinata shot her a frown.

"If your all done talking, please pick an ore." The kid on the left said hurriedly, and the right one's eye twitched a bit. Both were trying to hide their emotions, and failing. Horribly. 

Man, these kids were bad at their job.

"Uh, quick question! Shouldn't wait for everyone else? You know, the others members of Final Selection?" Aya asked, leaning on Hiari for support. Kizu snorted with laughter.

"Their dead. We're only survivors."

Do you know how people usually do movie trailers and stuff for movies? I'll share several(?) paragraphs of the book after THSL. And this chapter was kinda all over the place, I wanted to introduce the rest of the squad-

Anyways, here's the teaser for the book of which I have not decided a title for yet! 

Shinobu was getting worried, her fingers briskly tapping against the wood of her desk.

Kanao hadn't come back from her mission yet. A mission that had taken place several days ago. It would have taken her Tsuguko three days to reach the village, a night to kill the demon, then another three days to come back to the estate.

It had been a week and a half.

Maybe she was being held up be something at the village? Or the demon was being stubborn and was hiding from Kanao?

Shinobu smile dropped a bit.

No, that couldn't be it. Kanao's crow would have said something, and Kanao was to good of a slayer to let a demon like the one that had been spotted killing relentlessly every night to go uncaught.

The Insect Hashira tried to not think about the other possibly, refused to in fact. 

Where was Kanao? 

If she wasn't back by tomorrow, Shinobu would go looking for her, drag her home, and give her and give Kanao an earful about late.