A/N: Had this little scene annoying me greatly. Thanks to my beta, the grumpy wombat, for his work.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

The sounds of footsteps tapping against stone reverberated throughout the hallway.

A figure nervously paced back and forth in front of the lavishly decorated double doors that separated the castle's interior from the courtyard, where most of the student body were located, as was the yearly custom around these times.

Louise was not going to lie, or at least, not inwardly. She was extremely worried. Nervous. Full of dread of what was to come. Things that were completely unbefitting her high noble status.

But there was a reason why her classmates graciously granted her the highly despised nickname of "Zero".

No matter what she tried, no matter how much she studied, no matter her own heritage, no spell ever worked as intended for her.

Anything related to fire? Explosion.

Air then? Explosion again.

Water? No, still explosion.

She didn't know why it happened, but she knew that whatever she tried, it wouldn't be enough. Deep inside, she wondered whether her sister had been right all along.

Still, it was not becoming of herself to act so nervous. Yes, she may not be a very successful mage, as much as she hated admitting it, but that didn't mean that she would just accept that she was useless after the first few tries.

Or a few hundred tries, but that's not the point.

Louise took a deep breath, fruitlessly attempting to steady her nerves.

Everything will be fine. The Springtime Summoning Ritual will pass without a hitch.

Everything will be fine.

It would have been better if she could believe her own words.

Swallowing nervously, she hesitantly opened the door and stepped into the courtyard – the Ritual had yet to start, but it felt as if Louise was the last to arrive. It appeared that everyone else was too excited to see their familiars to being late to the ceremony.

No one looked at her, and she made sure to keep near the back of the group.

She felt that her heart had crawled up her throat.

One by one, her classmates stepped forward successfully completed their summoning ritual – whether it was something as grand as Tabitha's blue Dragon or as mundane as a frog, Louise couldn't help but hope that anything, no matter what, answered her call.

She slightly lamented about the comment she unthinkingly said to the annoying Germanian. Keeping her word about summoning a normal familiar seemed like a pipe dream, let alone a dragon, as she had proclaimed she would.

Approaching the end of the ceremony, Louise noted that she hadn't been noticed by Professor Colbert.

Maybe I won't have to try?

A betraying, if full of relief thought crossed her mind.

True, that way she would avoid public mockery when – if she failed the summoning, but not stepping forward herself would be against everything she ever wanted to be.

A proud mage, worthy of the name of her family – of being the daughter of Duchess La Valliere.

As she was deliberating whether or not to go there herself, the Professor asked if all students had already stepped forward.

Louise felt her chest painfully constrict on itself, the air escaping her as a cold shiver ran down her back.

She… she couldn't do it.

But it wasn't any action of her own that decided her fate in that moment; it was that annoying harlot – like always.

"No, Professor. Louise has yet to summon her familiar." The Germanian said with her oh so unbearably smug tone. She must have noticed Louise's cowardly thoughts, and the Valliere wasn't sure whether to be grateful or pissed off by her action.

Colbert took a moment to survey the students, his eyes finally resting on Louise's small frame. The man tried to smile reassuringly, but it didn't ease the ever-growing dread on the pink-haired noble one bit.

"You are right, miss Zerbst." He acknowledged the Germanian, before his focus was again directed towards Louise. "Miss Valliere, would you please step up and complete the ritual?"

She hadn't yet decided whether it was a good thing or not that the choice was taken out of her hands, but she still directed a scalding gaze towards Zerbst, one that the redhead amusedly returned, the arrogant curl of her mouth silently provoking Louise.

It took all her self-control not to snap at the harlot . The small mage tried to steel herself with a deep breath, deliberately looking away from the redhaired Germanian.

The walkway to the podium suddenly grew from a few metres to what appeared to be the horizon, as the light of the sun quickly dimmed all around her. She could feel the leering her classmates directed at her, she could already hear their mocking remarks about her abilities as a mage, how she misused The Founder's gift that had been granted on her.

She tried to swallow the lump she felt in her throat to no avail. Outwardly, she didn't react to any comment or gaze, always acting as her mother instructed.

Show no weakness.

Rule of steel.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

Finally, after what felt like an agonizing eternity, she reached the platform to perform the summoning ritual. She held her wand in her hand with more strength than was needed, and she clenched her jaw until she felt that her temple was going to burst from the pressure.

Looking at her classmates, she didn't ponder too much on how they seemed to have multiplied many-fold, or how did the castle expand until not even the horizon seemed able to show the entirety of its stone walls and towers.

She saw the veritable sea of ridiculing and sneering expressions directed at her, though she heard not one word, as the only thing she could hear was the beating of her own heart, each time sounding louder and louder.

She spared a glance towards Professor Colbert, who appeared to have said something to her, but she couldn't hear him. By circumstances, she assumed that it was time.

She inhaled deeply in a vain attempt to calm herself down.

Raising her wand with a finesse and confidence she didn't actually feel, she started on the chant she had read over and over again, hoping against hope that she will finally be able to perform magic as it was supposed.

"My servant that exists somewhere in the vast universe,

My divine, beautiful, wise and powerful servant… heed my call.

I wish from the very bottom of my heart and add to my guidance and appear."

Her heartfelt invocation carried throughout the courtyard.

It took a few moments of nothing happening, moments that her classmates surely capitalized on to openly mock her and ask whether she was truly fit to study within the sacred halls of the Academy.

Louise, however, still couldn't hear them over the sounds of her own heart.

Suddenly, the sunlight, that from her perspective had dimmed dramatically since she passed through the doors leading to the courtyard, completely blacked out.

As if suddenly night, something had blotted out the sun, and this time, it wasn't only Louise to notice the lack of light. Dozens of eyes lifted towards the sky, perplexed by this event, only to be surprised as an enormous figure crashed with unparalleled force upon one of the nearby towers, as if a powerful Earth Mage had thrown a gigantic boulder to crash on the roof of the castle.

A thin cloud of dust was lifted by it, and the ground trembled beneath Louise's feet. As fast as it was blotted out, the sun regained its place in the sky as if the dark of scant moments before was but a lie.

Louise's thoughts ran ten miles a second as she witnessed the events unfolding, not quite sure about it, but hopeful of it being the truth.

Is… is that, my familiar?

She was yet to have a good look at it, but by the looks of its contour in the dust, it was the biggest creature in the castle… nay, the biggest creature Louise had even laid her eyes upon.

From one moment to another, she heard a thunderous growl as something shot through the dust, quickly dispersing it.

She had to cover her face with her arms for the sudden wind made by her summon was stronger than she would have expected… not that she had expected any sort of wind in the first place.

As the gust faded, she could finally see her first, and certainly the biggest accomplishment as a mage.

Try as she might, she couldn't contain the vicious, face-splitting smile that was slowly creeping in to her features as she drank the view of the enormous beast.

Two majestic wings, fully spread and able to cover most of the entire castle under its shadow. Four legs supported a truly gargantuan body covered from tail to head in bright, crimson scales, except for the few places where said scales were replaced with curved horns, a tone or two darker than the scales.

She had summoned a dragon! The biggest one she had ever seen! No, she hadn't even come across a description of a dragon of such magnitude in any of her studies.

Her own dragon dwarfed Tabitha's blue dragon many times over, and the crimson dragon emanated pure, unrestrained power from itself.

Louise couldn't quite help it, as her head snapped back towards that harlot Zerbst, her manic grin growing by the second just as her eyes, more than a year's worth of resentment coming back in full force.

Who is useless now, EH!? Who is the one who summoned an enormous Dragon!? Eat your heart out, Zerbst!

But her newfound achievement and celebration was cut short as her familiar started to move, and… well, even its breathing projected power.

It finally opened its eyelids, and the sight of the dragon's two pure-white eyes greeted her own.

Not a second later, all hell broke loose.

The enormous beast started rampaging, bringing down whole towers and walls all around them as students started fleeing in panic and some teachers jumped in to try and subjugate the Dragon.

Louise watched things unfold for a few seconds, baffled. She couldn't understand where or why things had gone to hell in a handbasket.

The hand of one of her professors grabbing her shoulder and pulling her out of the way of a piece of flying debris snapped her out of her stupor, as she stared again at her summon disbelievingly one more time, before her eyes were flooded by righteous, scalding anger.

You are my familiar! You should act as I dictate! How you DARE GO AGAINST ME, YOUR OWN MASTER!

Against the wishes of Colbert, the professor who had just saved her from the fate of being squished by a stone wall, she joined the efforts of trying to subdue the dragon.

It was her Summon, so it was her responsibility to keep it under control, after all.

She knew that her own power, compared with the other professors, would not be all that helpful in the grand scheme of things, but what mattered was that it was her responsibility.

She didn't have much time to think, but if she would've had, she might have asked herself what would have sunken her reputation more: summoning this rampaging dragon, or nothing at all.

It didn't matter which spell she wanted to unleash, the fact was that anything would be an explosion.

Those hurt badly, don't they?

An explosion went off right in the face of the enormous dragon's face. But she didn't stop there. As the other teachers bombarded it with spells of all kinds from all directions, she also did the same and started sending explosion after explosion against it.

"BEHAVE!"

She started screaming the same thing over and over, hoping that the enormous winged beast would finally calm down, and accept its submissive role. Alas, it was only wishful thinking.

She didn't know how much time it lasted, the battle against this dragon, but a good part of the ancient castle was completely ruined, and the dragon didn't seem any worse for wear.

Louise still couldn't hear much outside her own heart, but this time for slightly different reasons as before.

Suddenly, the beast let out a horrid growling scream, and all mages had to stop their spells to cover their ears and to not be knocked off their feet, the young Valliere included.

And so she didn't expect the next thing coming.

One moment, she was trying to not fall to her almost certain death between the rubble, the next her whole body felt pain, the force of the impact sending her flying a few metres until she ultimately stopped, splayed on the scorched ground and struggling to breathe.

She opened one eye, using most of her remaining strength to lift her head to try to see what had happened.

The dragon had moved faster than anyone could have predicted. By its stance, she apparently had been swatted by one of its enormous paws as if she were a mere rag.

Next thing she saw, the dragon's eyes had changed, from the white all-encompassing nothing to two fiery red eyes with slitted pupils, giving the feel that they were made out of pure fire.

No one else moved, as the dragon quietly made its way towards Louise, as everyone was surprised into almost-paralysis when the beast started speaking.

No one could really understand what it was saying, but it was a language nevertheless.

The dragon's monologue didn't last long, and it was solely focused on the small, battered mage. Louise didn't know what to think or feel about the whole ordeal, as most of her mind was screaming how much her whole body hurt.

In slow motion, she watched as the dragon lifted a single finger and bought it down upon her.

She was conscious as she saw it ripping her heart out.

And eating it.

Helpfully, her mind decided it was enough pain suffered and shut itself out, just after the dragon took off while a myriad of different spells followed after it.

Her last memory before she completely blacked out is of being lifted from the ground by someone, and though she could not discern one word from the other, she thought it was nice being able to hear the outside world again, instead of the ever-present loud beats of her heart.

This is going to stay a one-shot, as I'm wholly unqualified to even write this as I've never read or watched any of the source material on ZnT's side. I know, the summoning scene is next to the most boring part of any fic, but... well, you could imagine how this story would unfold yourself, without my unknowing self screwing it up.

All in all, thanks for reading.