Hitoshi's “secret” mission wasn't so secret anymore, now that so many of the students and teachers from the academy had been shrunk down, and they'd arrived in Ant Town. The three professors they were speaking to, along with Houjo gave them strange looks as they told them of what all they'd been through on their journey thus far. It took quite awhile to get the entire story out and for the conversation to continue onward, but they did what they could, not wanting to spare any details for anything that could help them.

“I see...Ayuka sent you on this mission, herself?” asked one of the professors, a silver-haired man at the back of the table with a partially helmet over his head called Ichiro. They were obviously curious as to why others were not informed of this venture that had been set up by Principal Ayuka. Hitoshi simply nodded, trying to explain to him about the secrecy of the mission. “Yes, sensei. Ms. Ayuka considered this a covert matter and ordered us to refrain from discussing the specifics with anyone.”

Tarou questioned their curiosity as they spoke further. “Are you suggesting that even the faculty were completely unaware of the true nature of these disappearances, Ichiro-sensei?” Ichiro could do nothing but agree with that statement, and spoke of how the principals that were in charge before Ayuka came in dealt with the matter. “We merely had a passing awareness of the disappearances. Before Ayuka took charge a few years ago, the principals always had some sort of reason or excuse on why the students were missing. Expulsions, transfers, any number of things.”

“You can hardly blame them” spoke Izoku, sighting and closing his eyes as he leaned back further again the crates. “Without any sort of coverup, the academy would be disbanded, marked unsafe. Ayuka is only doing what she believes is best for the school.” Sei threw his input out, realizing that they needed to have spoken to her about all of this, themselves. “What she believes is best for the school is the absolute worst for us. We never had a chance to tell her what we found out, the true cause of these disappearances. We're on our own, without her help.” Sei was stressing that they needed to have told Ayuka..

Tarou took his statement in the context of the here-and-now, thinking about their situation. “If there were some way that we could alert her to our presence, we could have an ally of normal size. She could rally the girls to stop Masako and the mikos.” The idea sounded pretty wonderful. To them, they'd have a skyscraper-sized person aware of them, and they could all rally the rest of the academy and take down Masako. Surely, she couldn't take down the entire academy, all at once, right? She took down the three of them, but not dozens of students at once.

Izoku, however, didn't see as much hope in that plan, thinking on what he'd gone through in years past. “That strategy is something I have, personally, tried countless times over the years. Every single time I've attempted it, I've either been unsuccessful or mistaken for a bug, nearly getting crushed.” Another one of the professors didn't like this plan. They didn't want to live out their lives like this. Something had to be done. “Argh, then what do we suggest we be doing? These lads and I are ill-content to be spending the rest of our lives hiding. A plan be needed. Have ye one?”

Izoku had an answer, but then again, he didn't have an answer. He spoke back, explaining that he was formulating a plan, but didn't have it all worked out, as of yet. He spoke that survival was their number one priority as of right then. “We can't be of any help to the remainder of the academy if we get ourselves killed out there.” His calm attitude was just, but didn't have enough to satisfy Hitoshi. He couldn't just sit by and do nothing. He couldn't. “That is not good enough! Sure, it's dangerous, but Principal Ayuka needs to know what's going on! We can't just sit around and waste time, thinking. Let's go get her attention!”

Izoku didn't appreciate Hitoshi's current tone-of-voice. He immediately spoke to him, trying to get him to calm down. “That is enough! Reckless thinking like that will get you flattened, or something much worse. The mikos and Masako are out there, Hitoshi, and they will be watching for us to make a move.” The mentioning of Masako brought forth another question from the table of teachers. “...and just who is that girl, Izoku-san? Why is she taking this horrific course of action?” They were curious about Masako, and they wanted to know who she was and why she was doing this.

They didn't seem to really get an answer from him. He merely just spoke about the situation, and his lack of faith in their ability to stand against her. “All we need to know is that we do not stand a chance at stopping her. Not as we are now, at least. I've seen her stomp others flat for the sheer laugh and amusement of it.” No one liked how this was going, but something needed to be done. Sei stepped up, trying to find out what they could do. “Well, if we cannot get anyone's attention and we can't go after Masako, what options are left? What can we do?”

The entire group was trying to think about what they could do. Tarou was thinking about the situation, specifically between Masako and the shrine. “Izoku-san...what would happen if we were able to halt the revival of the Red Queen? Without her goddess around, Masako might lose her power as well.” Izoku thought about this, but knew they couldn't do anything to the Red Queen, or anything at the shrine. “The altar is guarded by the maidens of the shrine. I'm not sure whether they're mind-controlled or just fanatically following her, but they will let no one near the site.”

One of the professors then thought about things, and threw together some input. He was the main professor for the mages and was thinking about how they could get over there. “...but if they had another objective, would the altar not be vulnerable? We could create some sort of diversion, and then send in a small force to dispel the revival.” Izoku shook his head at this idea as well. It almost seemed like he was just trying to push out all of their ideas, but they soon found out he had an idea as well. “Masako would suspect it was a trap. There is only one course of action that I can give my approval on. I can't say it will work, but we have few options left.”

He looked to the group and shared with them something that he had in mind, that might give them an upper edge on the situation. “We should find the shards of a macroforce crystal that I shattered 12 years ago, while I was struggling against Masako.” The three of them looked shocked at the fact that he wanted to look for and possible reassemble a macroforce crystal, the very thing Masako had used to shrink the three of them. Could that really save them from this disaster? None of them dared guess, but all were thinking about what he had just told them...