《The Silent Archmage [OPMC Magic School]》


 Chapter 1 - Auria

    On October 3, 2019, the world ended. Strange portals that are now recognized as Gates appeared across the world at a rate of almost a million per day, and monsters unlike anything humanity had ever seen creeped out of them in tides. The first Towers rose through the center of every major population center.


    Complex electronics began failing in the immediate aftermath. At the time, the cause was unknown, but we are now aware that this was cause due to the sudden inundation of flux particles¡ªthat which is colloquially referred to as ¡°mana.¡±


    The world ended, but humanity did not. Even as the cities broke, the nations of the world organized responses. Guns, bombs, and baser weapons served as a first line of defense against the monster tides.


    Ten days after the first Gate manifested, groups of humans gained the ability to use what we now call magic.


    Initially, humanity believed these independent groups to be superhuman; blessed, perhaps, by the Gates or Towers. Within weeks, however, the truth began to spread.


    Magic is not strictly supernatural¡ªin fact, it is everything but. It is an observable phenomenon regarding the use and perpetuation of flux particles that enforces action upon matter. Some have called for it to be redefined as a subsection of physics to little avail.


    As the monsters evolved, so did humanity. Our species is nothing if not adaptable, and we rose to the challenge. Magical technology advanced at a rate not seen since the race to the moon. We started winning. The Gates became a secondary threat, the Towers a footnote meant only for those arrogantly foolish enough to try climbing them.


    Inevitably, we reached the point where our greatest enemies were not the monsters but each other. On January 1st</sup>, 61 AFI (After Flux Integration), World War III began.


    It lasted a grand total of seventy-three days and resulted in over two billion casualties. We feel the effects still.


    Trained summons from the Gates, magically-augmented nuclear bombs, and paragon-class spell formations proved too devastating for even modern humanity, and an uneasy peace formed more out of a mutual understanding that the human race would not survive continued war than any real basis for it.


    It is now 74 AFI. The state of the world has changed so quickly that it does not even faintly resemble the world of two decades ago, let alone pre-FI. Tensions are rising once more. Territory conflicts abound, and every nation continues to stockpile unregistered paragon-class magicians, ignoring the Beijing Accords. The median lifespan of a new military-grade flux user is less than five years, and those who last longer will face hardship beyond human imagination.


    This lecture is not intended to scare you. It is a base representation of what our world is today. If you wish to abandon this life, this is one of the last chances you will get.


    Nobody? Good.


    There is a name for those of us who remain, for those of us who will fight against the dark knowing that a brutal end may wait for us.


    Mage.


    - Opening statement to the class of 74, First National Academy Auria


    #


    The thing they don¡¯t tell you about pseudo-military magical academies in Auria is how boring a threat on your life can be.


    Today was the entrance ceremony, which was a painful necessity for admission into First Academy. If his time with the country had taught Syl anything, it was that they would stand on ceremony even in the face of death.


    It was also the first time that a member of the royal family was going to enter a public magic school in almost a century, which left him on guard duty.


    He wasn¡¯t sure why she was doing it, to be honest.


    Though Auria operated as an ostensibly democratic monarchy, the royal family was still a high-priority target for any agents of opposing countries, of which there were far too many. The nation was a splinter of what the history books told him had once been the United States of America, and the other remnants were none too friendly towards each other.


    Syl, of course, kept this silent when the princess was next to him. Her last name had been changed for security purposes, but he knew from experience that there was no such thing as perfect information security. Anyone who searched hard enough would find her eventually.


    ¡°It¡¯s the first day,¡± said Bianca Ashwood, perfectly ordinary magician-in-training who was certainly not the child of a paragon-class mage and ninth in line to the Aurian throne. ¡°Aren¡¯t you excited, Syl?¡±


    ¡°No, not particularly. I¡¯m class 3, which means it¡¯s a miracle I¡¯m even here. Even if there¡¯re more resources here than the lower schools, I¡¯m not exactly going to be making use of all of them.¡±


    ¡°I keep telling you that you should have just taken the offer, Syl,¡± she said with all the politeness that being a princess demanded.


    ¡°I¡¯m not going to use royal favor to put myself somewhere I haven¡¯t earned,¡± Syl replied with a sigh. ¡°Are you trying to give us away as fast as possible? What kind of class 1 student would I be? The practical exams showed that I¡¯m not the kind of magician you want to see in the fast-track course. Also, your tone is too measured. Look around you. Nobody human talks like that.¡±


    Only class 1 students and a few class 2s had come so far, but there were a healthy number of them milling about the academy courtyard, walking or sitting around the expansive open space in the center of the castle-like shchool.


    There were separate ceremonies that both of those classes needed to undergo before the full-school one. Beyond that, it was clear that the class 1s were largely from more influential families, and wherever there was influence, there were those who were just barely relevant enough to know they weren¡¯t at the top of the totem pole. Many of the class 2s were split, trying to worm their way into existing class 1 friend groups.


    Syl could respect wanting a better position, but he had none for people abandoning existing connections in pursuit of possible new ones.


    ¡°Please,¡± Bianca said, visibly struggling to adjust her tone to sound more like the casual chatter around them. ¡°You and I both know that if the practicals were any more thorough, you¡¯d be above me in placement.¡±


    Syl shrugged. ¡°They measure important aspects of casting. I didn¡¯t meet the mark on any of them, so it¡¯s only fair.¡±


    In fact, he had done so poorly on the practicals that it was only his perfect score on the written theory aspect of the admission exams that had even qualified him for First. That was nearly unheard of, apparently, which had come as a bit of a surprise when the theory had been so surface-level.


    Almost unconsciously, his hand went to the flux casting device embedded just under the skin of his throat.


    ¡°If you say so, Syl,¡± Bianca said, hands clasped behind her back. ¡°Will you be attending the ceremony?¡±


    ¡°You know I have to,¡± Syl said.


    The entrance ceremony took place in a hall that seated all six hundred new students¡ªa hundred class 1s, three hundred class 2s, and two hundred class 3s, the latter of which Syl was in.


    Six exits, twelve potential points of entry, he thought as he took a seat towards the back. Magical ventilation, windows reinforced but not blurred.


    There were enough countermeasures to prevent basic attempts on student lives, but this was no military fortress. Syl double-checked the FCDs at his wrists, ensuring that they were both active in case of emergency.


    ¡°A little antsy, are we?¡± a voice interrupted his self-check. ¡°Is this seat taken yet?¡±


    Syl looked up to see a red-haired boy a bit younger than him¡ªeighteen or nineteen, maybe. He¡¯d unbuttoned his uniform, and his shockingly messy hair was definitely not up to standard.


    ¡°No,¡± Syl said. ¡°Feel free to take it.¡±


    The messy boy sat down, reclining as much as he could in an auditorium chair, and started fiddling with what looked like a baton. He turned to look at Syl after adjusting it a bit, smiling.


    ¡°Nice to meet you,¡± he said. ¡°Name¡¯s Lyon. Lyon Red. You?¡±


    Syl raised an eyebrow. Red?


    Reds were one of the seven great prismatic families. They were duelists, known for creating some of the most lethal single combat mages of all time. That wasn¡¯t the kind of name that ended up in class 3. Unless¡­


    ¡°Yes, that Red,¡± Lyon answered the unasked question, rolling his eyes. ¡°I¡¯m a bit of a black sheep, one might say. So, who¡¯re you?¡±


    Black sheep. Syl could guess why. Lyon wouldn¡¯t have been allowed to keep the Red name if he had failed his practicals like Syl had, so that meant unruly temperament and poor test scores.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.


    ¡°Syl,¡± Syl said. ¡°Ward of the state, so Auria¡¯s my last name. No real name, though.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sorry for your loss,¡± Lyon said automatically.


    ¡°Don¡¯t be. I was too young to remember my parents. It was quick. They were in New Oceania.¡±


    Lyon winced.


    ¡°A bit heavy to put on you during introductions,¡± Syl said. ¡°What¡¯s your specialty?¡±


    Full combat track, he guessed. Duelist, probably.


    That made the boy brighten. ¡°I¡¯m going full combat track.¡±


    ¡°Is that your FCD?¡± Syl asked, pointing at the baton.


    ¡°Sure is,¡± Lyon confirmed. ¡°I might not look it, but I¡¯ve got pretty good practicals. Just can¡¯t do theory for shit. What about you?¡±


    ¡°FCD engineer,¡± Syl said. ¡°Among others. I¡¯m quite bad at practicals. My casting speed is on the lower end.¡±


    Bianca had been correct when she¡¯d said that Syl would have ranked higher if they had measured other aspects of magical power during the practical exams, but the exact factors that made him powerful were also what hampered him.


    Syl checked his right FCD one more time as the rest of the students filtered into the auditorium, tapping the display open.


    User: Syl


    FCD: IMMP-R


    Type: Preload Multipurpose


    FCD Attributes: [Speed - C] [Precision - S] [Capacity - NOT DISPLAYED] [Power - NOT DISPLAYED]


    Age: 18


    Known Spells: 104


    Flux Particles: [NOT DISPLAYED]


    Loaded Spell: [Flash Step] (C)


    His flux pool was certainly on the higher end, especially for his age, but magic didn¡¯t like being penned up in a vessel with a less developed body like his. Over the years, the flux present within him had damaged his vocal cords beyond repair. A custom FCD let him speak, but it required constant flux supply and prevented him from using his voice as an active component in spells.


    Magic was a field of science just like any other. Humanity¡¯s understanding of it was still incomplete, but they understood enough of it to know some best practices in the realm of casting. Spells worked much, much faster with verbal components fast-tracking certain aspects of the spell, but since Syl could no longer use his voice to carry flux properly, his casting speed for a good chunk of magic had been severely crippled.


    ¡°Wow, is that a custom?¡± Lyon asked, eyes widening as he pointed to Syl¡¯s FCD.


    ¡°You also have a custom,¡± Syl pointed out. He hadn¡¯t studied the baton very closely, but he knew the Reds.


    ¡°Yeah, but that looks like an Incarnate model,¡± Lyon said. ¡°Do you know how hard those are to get?¡±


    ¡°Good eye,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯m well aware.¡±


    Before Lyon could ask more questions, a bell chimed, bringing the auditorium¡¯s attention to the front and quieting the room.


    As the highest-scoring representative of this year¡¯s class, Bianca would have some speaking part here, which was the most likely point for enemy action. Syl doubted that it would happen here, though. There were instructors and student leaders present, both of which should possess A-class or even tactical-class magic.


    The most elite students here would continue on to graduate years, entering a part-militarypart-political outfit that both participated in actual combat situations and oversaw the school. Unlike the previous equivalents in preparatory high school, said outfit had real influence, its participants universally at or above military-grade proficiency and mostly coming from influential families.


    The university would have been short on experienced instructors without them, mostly because magicians who were capable of teaching were largely on military assignments or dead.


    One of those rare retired survivors was the first to address them. Two-star General Allison Violet was pushing fifty years old but was still the same strategic-class magician who¡¯d constructed the bulk of Auria¡¯s defenses and minimized casualties during World War III.


    ¡°On October 3, 2019¡­¡± she started.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Lyon said quietly. ¡°You¡¯ve heard this all before, right?¡±


    Syl¡¯s attention was entirely on their surroundings. No student would have been able to sneak a weapon into the entrance ceremony, which was one of the few school events attended by active non-student members of the great prismatic familes. Security had been raised to the highest point that it would be at this entire semester.


    Outside, magical and technological surveillance monitored the event. While the bulk of that would be from the families themselves, there was always the possibility of an outsider looking in.


    ¡°Hey,¡± Lyon said again, a bit louder. ¡°You there?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve heard the speech,¡± Syl replied at a more reasonable volume. ¡°Not this exact variant, but I¡¯m more than familiar with the history.¡±


    ¡°Thought so. Knew you wouldn¡¯t just be a normal class 3.¡±


    That set off alarm bells in Syl¡¯s mind, but Lyon wasn¡¯t indicating that he had any more information than a hunch, so he let it slide. ¡°I could say that about you, too. A Red in class 3. No respect for conduct, and you look like you just got picked up off the street, but that¡¯s all fake. What are you doing here?¡±


    ¡°Oh you caught that?¡± Lyon asked, his voice dropping low. ¡°For your information, I like it this way. Also, that¡¯s classified.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure it is,¡± Syl said drily. ¡°What a prismatic scion¡¯s had for lunch is probably classified, too. Let me guess. Monitoring the class 3s for potential diamonds in the rough to recruit? Undermining resistance against prismatic hegemony? Maybe you¡¯re looking for a few specific threats?¡±


    ¡°Not so loud,¡± Lyon hissed, which drew some stars from the students around them.


    ¡°You¡¯re being louder than I am,¡± Syl said quietly. ¡°You¡¯re only going to draw attention to yourself if you make a scene. Relax.¡±


    Lyon relaxed.


    ¡°You know a lot about the prismatics for someone who¡¯s not on our radar at all,¡± Lyon said.


    That wasn¡¯t entirely true, but there was no point in letting Lyon know that. ¡°I¡¯m good at noticing patterns. That¡¯s all.¡±


    Syl¡¯s focus returned to the spell he¡¯d been maintaining since the ceremony had started, a simple dual-process one that he¡¯d designed for himself during¡­ a time he preferred not to think about.


    Sure enough, there were dozens of different spells and drones aimed at the ceremony from the outside, but most of them were from sources that Syl recognized, with some distaste.


    One of them, though¡­


    ¡°Lyon,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°What¡¯s up?¡±


    ¡°Tell your family or your handler or whoever your point of contact is that there¡¯s an outsider watching,¡± Syl said.


    Throughout the auditorium, mostly concentrated in the front, Syl noticed a few others tapping away on displays only they could see or fiddling with their FCDs. He wasn¡¯t the only one who had noticed, then.


    ¡°What are you talking about?¡± Lyon said after quite a large delay.


    ¡°You¡¯re not good at this whole subterfuge thing, are you? Bianca is about to speak. Just be quiet and do what you have to do.¡±


    #


    After the ceremony was finally over, Syl found Bianca talking with a couple of older-looking students with different uniforms that indicated they were in the second, graduate phase of schooling. Judging by the sigils on their uniforms, they were all from prismatic families.


    ¡°Syl,¡± Bianca said. ¡°What did you think?¡±


    ¡°It was a good commencement,¡± Syl said. ¡°Memorable enough to leave an impression on the students while staying mostly risk-free. Who do I have the pleasure of addressing here?¡±


    ¡°Jennifer,¡± a tall, glasses-wearing woman said. Her sigil marked her as coming from the Viridian clan, and her FCDs were well-tuned enough that Syl could take a reasonable guess as to her class. ¡°Eighth year, class 1. FCD engineer. Treasurer for the Graduate Reserve. Pleasure to meet you¡­¡±


    ¡°Syl.¡± He extended a hand, which she shook. ¡°First year, class 3. Unspecialized, but looking towards FCD engineering. If you ever happen to have a spare moment, I¡¯d be interested in trading notes.¡±


    The other council member scoffed. ¡°We don¡¯t need any bottom feeders trying to latch onto us. Try staying in the school for a year, then ask again. You¡¯re just going to go to the front line anyway. What kind of notes do you think you can offer?¡±


    ¡°Excuse me,¡± Bianca said, her voice polite but her expression threatening death, ¡°What did you just say?¡±


    ¡°Drew,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Not the time.¡±


    ¡°Drew,¡± Syl said, looking at the taller man in the eye. ¡°Violet, I assume?¡±


    ¡°Yes, and you would do well to respect that name,¡± Drew Violet said. ¡°Your kind won¡¯t even be in the school after your fourth year. Lieutenant in the GR. Sixth year, class 1.¡±


    So he was one of these. Syl had been ready to run into someone like this, but that made it no less irritating.


    ¡°Nice to meet you too,¡± Syl said. ¡°The same offer stands, but I imagine you don¡¯t have anything interesting if you¡¯re just a soldier. Bianca. We need to go.¡±


    ¡°Is that so?¡± the princess asked. ¡°It was lovely chatting to you both. We can continue tomorrow.¡±


    ¡°Of course,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°The president will be here then.¡±


    ¡°Hold on,¡± Drew interjected, staring Syl down. ¡°You can¡¯t tell me that you¡¯re following this guy.¡±


    Bianca raised an eyebrow. ¡°Unfortunately, I can.¡±


    ¡°Are you planning on stopping us?¡± Syl asked lightly. ¡°I don¡¯t believe you have the right to do that in your position.¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Drew said, ¡°but I would suggest that you learn your place.¡±


    Syl smiled. ¡°I know my place just fine.¡±


    #


    Three and a half kilometers from the academy, a drone settled down inside an abandoned warehouse. Romeo Seven, the alias of the masked drone operator, collected it and readied it for data transference. The drone¡¯s inbuilt FCD triggered, quickly forming a ritual circle underneath the device and the operator.


    It did not complete its process before it simply shattered, the magic pattern dissolving entirely.


    Romeo Seven had believed his operation to be uncompromised, but he prepared for emergency anyway. With his gun-mounted FCD, he activated the perception-type Transparent Scan spell, letting him see heat signatures through the walls.


    There. There was one figure walking outside, hand raised to its ear like it was calling someone.


    Without hesitating, Romeo Seven fired. His FCD automatically applied a dual-process spell to each of the bullets, removing the sound and increasing the velocity. It made his shots more precise, lethal, and nigh undetectable in an area with no sensors.


    The heat signature flashed, blinking out of sight and avoiding the bullet.


    What?


    There it was again, nearly twenty meters away. Romeo Seven fired again¡ªbut then the figure flashed again, and the spell on his rifle failed, the bullet going wide.


    Another flash, and a chunk of the warehouse wall was simply missing.


    A man walked in, apparently unconcerned by the gun still pointed at his head. He was dressed in the uniform of First National Academy and had no visible weapons of his own. If he was a magician, though, he needed no weapon.


    Romeo Seven cursed, but realized quickly that the uniform had the sigil representing class 3 on it. The lowest one at the academies, it meant that in a battle of magic, he would be useless.


    ¡°What are you doing here, kid? You shouldn¡¯t be here.¡±


    In lieu of an answer, magic swirled around the student¡¯s arm once again.


    ¡°Last chance,¡± Romeo Seven said. ¡°You don¡¯t have the mana for this, kid. You should get out of here before you get hurt.¡±


    ¡°Oh, I¡¯ve got plenty.¡±


    The operator took that as a sign to drop his rifle and draw a pistol-shaped FCD, aiming a projection-type spell at the stranger¡ªwho waved his hand, apparently causing the spell to disperse. A wave of incredible energy crashed into Romeo Seven as runic circles started working their way up both the students¡¯ arms.


    What the hell? That kind of power¡­ it was more than even the class 1 students should have been able to manage. It was more than he could manage.


    ¡°Sonic Burst,¡± the student said casually. ¡°They sent someone whose best personal defense spell is B-class? You must be expendable.¡±


    The magic swelling around his arms intensified.


    Dual casting? How can a student¡ª


    Another flick of the hand later, Romeo Seven was suddenly missing his hands.


    Even as his mind blanked with pain and terror, a small part of him realized that the stranger hadn¡¯t spoken a single component of his spell.


    ¡°Hello there,¡± the student said coldly, his eyes completely dead. ¡°Should we talk about who you¡¯re working for?¡±


    ¡°W-wait,¡± the operative said, his vision clouding as blood spurted from the stumps where his hands and FCD had been. ¡°I can¡ª¡°


    Text scrolled across his screen, flux particles swirling in his brain.


    Operator [Romeo Seven] has been compromised. Initiating self-destruct in [10] seconds.


    ¡°No!¡± he cried out, scrabbling at his neck with arms that could do nothing but spill blood over it. ¡°No! Not like this. You promised!¡±


    The student crouched down, looking into Romeo Seven¡¯s eyes¡ªbut it was clear that his true gaze was fixated far beyond the operator himself. A strange gaze bored into the FCD that had been planted at Romeo Seven¡¯s brainstem.


    ¡°More expendable than I thought,¡± the student said. ¡°Don¡¯t interfere again. You won¡¯t like what happens.¡±


    He turned away.


    ¡°Wait!¡± Romeo cried out desperately. ¡°Help me! I¡¯ll, I¡¯ll, I can¡ª¡°


    Thank you for your service.


    Self-destruct initiated.

 Chapter 2 - Arrogant Young Students

    ¡°You were out late,¡± Bianca said.


    Syl shut the door to their shared house behind him. ¡°I was. I don¡¯t suppose you have a cleaning spell on you?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t you know one?¡± Bianca asked.


    ¡°I do. It¡¯s meant to clean an entire scene of every last trace of evidence that might link a disturbance to me or my allies.¡±


    ¡°You have the flux to burn.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a matter of principle.¡±


    Bianca sighed. ¡°True enough. Hold still.¡±


    Syl did as she asked, waiting as an arcane circle formed under his feet. Flux washed over him, cleansing the blood and viscera from his uniform.


    Though the practice was unnecessary, he read the activation process anyway. Though Cleanse was a C-class spell and a fairly common one to learn, Bianca¡¯s activation of it was a more focused, precise version that ensured a significantly deeper and more effective operation than even Syl¡¯s spells could offer. It was a level of complexity that few would appreciate other than him, which made him suspect her usage of this particular spell was for that specific purpose.


    ¡°Eloquent as always,¡± he said.


    ¡°Thank you,¡± Bianca said. Her FCD, a more traditionally-shaped wrist bracer, pulsed with flux as the process finished. ¡°The calibration is perfect.¡±


    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t be here if it wasn¡¯t,¡± Syl said.


    For all official intents and purposes, he was attending First as Bianca¡¯s FCD engineer. It was a reasonable enough explanation, especially given his scores on the theory part of the entrance exams.


    ¡°Who were you following?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°You left so suddenly.¡±


    ¡°There were drones watching us during the ceremony.¡±


    ¡°I know. My¡ªthe prismatic families, I should say¡ªall have intelligence on these kinds of events.¡±


    ¡°One wasn¡¯t from a prismatic. If it was, they were hiding it. Whoever it was, they were sloppy with the signature. I traced it back to its operator. He was not receptive to questioning.¡±


    ¡°I take it that explains the blood.¡±


    Syl shook his head. ¡°Self-destructs in his FCDs. I thought I got all of them, but there was one in his brain that detonated before I could get anything out of him.¡±


    ¡°Worrying,¡± Bianca said, studying his expression carefully. ¡°Is there anything we should be concerned about?¡±


    ¡°With your magic? Absolutely not,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯ll look into them, but there are any number of groups that this methodology matches, so it¡¯s unlikely I¡¯ll turn up results quickly. Did you put on any coffee?¡±


    ¡°I did. Are you hungry? I made dinner.¡±


    ¡°Not very royal of you to make food for others, is it?¡±


    Bianca snorted. ¡°You and I both know better than that. Cooks aren¡¯t going to survive for very long in the field.¡±


    ¡°True. Thank you for the meal. I¡¯ll try to be quiet tonight.¡±


    #


    Classes began a week after the entrance ceremony. Syl had largely skipped out on extracurricular recruitment, which had taken up the majority of that time. He¡¯d only come when Bianca had, and that had been more than a little annoying.


    At First, extracurriculars could be sorted into military-oriented magic clubs, which Syl had no interest in joining, and ones meant primarily for entertainment and offered no progression in magic or social status, which he cared even less towards.


    There was apparently some ongoing issue with the disproportionate amount of class 1 students invited to the first category, but that was to be expected. Class 1s were the cream of the crop. Most, like Bianca, had been trained for magic since they¡¯d been in diapers. They would be following a faster curriculum than the rest of the students at First, and they often ended up in leadership positions in corporate or military groups. It only made sense that the magic clubs would want people like them, and if the clubs were primarily made of class 1s, then it stood to reason that they would largely be looking for people of their own kind.


    Class 2s were the ¡°regular¡± students, which was still saying a lot given that they were at a numbered academy. First through Fifth were all extremely prestigious academies, and being a class 2 at one of them put a student above the majority of high-tier aspiring magicians elsewhere.


    Class 3s, on the other hand, were the rest. They were still high scorers, but compared to the others, they were just ordinary, and that meant the fewest resources allocated to them.


    Syl couldn¡¯t deny that it was annoying to receive the least support at the academy, but that was how things were. There was a lot of undeniable talent amongst every class, and it was simply a fact that there were many who would be overlooked because of poor entrance scores, but the system would not change for a few exceptions.If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.


    He had been given access to class selection late, which also didn¡¯t help with getting good ones. Syl was in three theory classes that he only half paid attention to, focusing instead on adjusting his FCDs to work best with the range extenders he¡¯d brought. They let him cast high-cost surveillance spells through the school. Though it took a while to get complex multi-process spells up, it was well worth the cost.


    At the same time, he kept in touch with Bianca as discreetly as possible, ensuring that nothing was going wrong on a level his spells couldn¡¯t test.


    ¡°Sylvester Auria,¡± this class¡¯ professor said sharply. ¡°Do you want to be stuck at the bottom forever?¡±


    Not discreetly enough, evidently.


    His professor for Introduction to Spell Theory was a seventh-year graduate student who clearly didn¡¯t want to be here. She wore glasses, which was interesting¡ªit indicated severe flux sensitivity, which was typically valued in artillery positions in the field.


    ¡°I think I¡¯ll be fine,¡± he said genially, hoping she would leave it at that.


    She didn¡¯t, which confirmed his irritated suspicion that she was the type of student¡ªprofessor now¡ªwho desperately clung to any scraps of power they could get.


    ¡°Don¡¯t waste your time and my own if you¡¯re not going to put in the work,¡± she said haughtily. ¡°You might as well not be in this class anyway. Class 3 and not putting in the work? You might as well drop out now. Save yourself the embarrassment.¡±


    Syl looked at her, dead-eyed. She had been uninteresting and unthreatening enough to not pique much of his attention earlier, but he analyzed her now, processing her style of dress, the class emblem she¡¯d tried so hard to subtly cover, her position in the academy.


    ¡°Class 2,¡± he said, indicating her pin. ¡°Lower end of GR, I would imagine, or you wouldn¡¯t be teaching basic spell theory. Took the teaching position to avoid military duty, take some more high-level classes? You¡¯re not one to speak.¡±


    Most of the other students in this class, all of whom were class 3, either hadn¡¯t learned how to magically attune their senses or didn¡¯t have the flux to do so at all times, but the professor certainly did. Her eyes widened with obvious anger, then narrowed as she got herself under control.


    Syl smiled evenly at her, which didn¡¯t seem to help. Just because I don¡¯t care about this class doesn¡¯t mean I¡¯m going to brook disrespect towards me.


    ¡°Since you appear to believe that you don¡¯t need this class, why don¡¯t you explain the current topic at hand?¡± she asked, her voice dripping with sweet poison.


    He took a glance at the screen at the front of the class, then nodded, standing up. ¡°Of course.¡±


    Was this supposed to be a gotcha of some kind? The content was simple. Everyone in this class should have been aware about it already.


    ¡°Spells are broken up into flux and activation processes. The former is what determines the actual shape of the spell¡ªone flux pattern might create force, while another could be directed towards fire. Activation processes, on the other hand, are what direct that spell. The simplest activation processes are ¡®start,¡¯ ¡®stop,¡¯ and ¡®modulate.¡¯ The textbook doesn¡¯t cover this yet, but ¡®modulate¡¯ is the one with the greatest amount of variance in sub-directions. Speed, temperature, light¡ªanything with a vector can be changed by that instruction.


    ¡°Flux patterns can be mixed to make more complex spells, but I don¡¯t think we¡¯re talking about that either. What we¡¯re focused on for the time being are multiple activation processes. Even simple spells or unnamed magic manifestations require more than one. Transporting an item a short distance, for example, requires a start, modulate speed up, modulate speed down, and stop process in the same spell. Increasing the number of processes increases the cast time of the spell, but this can be circumvented via vocal commands or pre-programmed spells in certain custom FCDs.


    ¡°Also, while those might be the simplest activation processes, they aren¡¯t the only common ones. There are a total of fourteen. Would you like me to list them?¡±


    ¡°No, Sylvester,¡± the professor said. She crossed her arms, managing to look equal parts disgruntled and impressed. ¡°That will be quite enough.¡±


    ¡°Thank you,¡± Syl said, sitting back down and returning to his FCD.


    #


    The first problem came during lunch, which he took with Bianca. Unfortunately, she had decided to take it with the Graduate Reserve leadership. They weren¡¯t all present, but there were enough of them to set Syl on edge.


    Drew and Jennifer, the two prismatic family members, were there alongside another three.


    Bianca introduced him, which seemed to draw Drew¡¯s ire again. The last three reacted with suppressed disdain, mild excitement, and naked curiosity, respectively. That was about as much as could be expected.


    They introduced themselves in turn. Waylan Red, sixth-year, was a Commander, which put him a rank above Drew in terms of the GR hierarchy. Ashley Aurum, also sixth-year, served as military police for the GR and was a discipline officer for the academy as a whole. Uriel Indigo, fifth-year, was already a Major and served as the president for the Reserve as its ranking officer.


    ¡°With all due respect,¡± Drew said in a tone that implied that his following words would be which is very little, ¡°why is there an inept at our table?¡±


    ¡°Drew,¡± Uriel said warningly. ¡°We¡¯ve spoken about this.¡±


    ¡°Fine,¡± he said. ¡°Why is a class three first year here? I understand the class 1 representative. She¡¯s on a level that we haven¡¯t seen since the San Francisco Bay incident. Why him?¡±


    ¡°Thank you for the compliment,¡± Bianca said dutifully. ¡°You¡¯re being rude to my friend. He¡¯s my FCD engineer.¡±


    Drew scoffed at that. Though the others didn¡¯t react as much, Syl could see that both Waylan and Ashley were holding themselves back from commenting.


    ¡°I would consider myself competent as an engineer,¡± Syl said humbly.


    ¡°He¡¯d also wipe the floor with you in a fight,¡± Bianca said to Drew.


    The table¡¯s eyes shot to her in an instant.


    What the hell? Syl mouthed, using his hands to say the same in Aurian sign language.


    Bianca shrugged in response, signing you told me too in reply.


    Syl resisted the urge to sigh. He¡¯d told her to loosen up to seem like less of a princess at the entrance ceremony. This was her idea of doing that?


    ¡°Is that so,¡± Drew said, a nasty smile forming on his lips. ¡°Would you like to test that belief?¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t,¡± Jennifer interjected. ¡°He¡¯s a first-year engineer. We already know how bad you are at holding back, Drew.¡±


    ¡°Last I checked, academy regulations let me offer an official duel to anyone,¡± he replied. ¡°It¡¯s up to him if he wants to back out and prove this mouthy bitch wrong.¡±


    Bianca tilted her head quizzically. ¡°Me?¡±


    Syl stood up slowly.


    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t have said that if I were you,¡± he said coldly. ¡°If I remember First code correctly, challengers can agree upon conditions upon victory, yes?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s right,¡± Drew said languidly, shit-eating grin plastered on his face. ¡°I don¡¯t need anything out of my end other than you not trying to talk to us again.¡±


    ¡°Then my condition is similar,¡± Syl said. ¡°When I win, you will address us by our names and titles alone. I¡¯d prefer if you never spoke to us at all, but I recognize that might cause other problems.¡±


    ¡°Sure thing, inept boy,¡± Drew said. ¡°When do you want your ass beating?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not particularly fond of bullies,¡± Syl replied flatly. ¡°How does right now sound?¡±

 Chapter 3 - An Entirely Fair 1v1 That Is Not At All Rigged

    ¡°You don¡¯t have to do this¡­ Syl, was it?¡± Uriel said. She didn¡¯t look particularly happy with the state of affairs.


    Duels were shockingly easy to facilitate at any national academy. Since they were such major feeder universities for the military, there were dedicated halls meant specifically for sparring and/or dueling purposes. This particular one was meant for class 1 students only and had significantly more flexibility when it came to settings¡ªas well as fewer safeguards.


    ¡°I appreciate your concern, Major,¡± Syl said. ¡°Is Major the correct title?¡±


    ¡°My name is Uriel,¡± she said. ¡°You¡¯re a few years too young to be GR yet. I don¡¯t stand on ceremony.¡±


    ¡°Seems that makes one of you,¡± Syl replied, eyeing the sneering Violet strolling around the dueling hall like he owned the place. Given that he was a member of the main clan, it was entirely possible that he actually did, at least in part.


    Jennifer, the engineer, had cited ¡°not wanting to watch a first-year get hospitalized¡± as her reason not to attend, while Waylan, whose specialty was in duels just like this, had come for the same reason¡ªostensibly to offer medical support when necessary. Syl could tell he just wanted to watch, though. Ashley was also not attending, citing that while it was technically allowed by the rules, she did not want to be the disciplinary officer who all the blame for this would inevitably fall on.


    Bianca had come, of course, and Uriel was officiating.


    ¡°He¡¯s baiting you,¡± the latter told Syl. ¡°Rules state that he¡¯ll have to hold back on anything lethal or permanently harmful, but rules don¡¯t mean much when you¡¯re recovering from broken bones. I saw what happened to the last student who tried to duel Drew. It was over something meaningless, and it took him half a year to recover fully. That was a sixth-year, and he was Reserve. A good soldier.¡±


    ¡°I appreciate your concern,¡± Syl said. ¡°Indigo, was it? Less projection-focused than the rest of your family, though. I like your FCD. Complex but versatile. I didn¡¯t get to see you cast any spells, but at a guess¡­ long range artillery-type magic?¡±


    Uriel, who had been altogether the professional graduate student until now, paused, frowning. She tilted her head up at Syl, brushing brightly colored regulation-length hair from her face.


    ¡°You got that from a visual?¡±


    ¡°I have good senses,¡± Syl said. ¡°Judging from the complexity of your FCD, you do too. I know you¡¯ve been holding a concern back. Feel free to voice it.¡±


    ¡°Hey,¡± Drew drawled, twirling a staff taller than he was. ¡°When are we going to get on with it?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m done setting up the arena whenever you¡¯re ready,¡± Waylan said, a hint of sadistic glee in his voice.


    ¡°Your ranking officer is speaking to me,¡± Syl said. ¡°It would be best to assume she has something important to say.¡±


    Uriel glared at them, which got both of them to stop talking.


    ¡°Sorry about that,¡± she apologized, focusing back on him¡ªand, more specifically, his throat. ¡°You¡¯re only speaking because of that FCD in your throat.¡±


    ¡°Correct,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯m open with that fact.¡±


    ¡°So you, as a first year with practical scores so low that they would have been an auto-deny if not for the highest theory score we¡¯ve ever seen, interfering with your own FCD output with a disability device, and lacking the ability to verbalize spell components¡ªbelieve that a duel with a sixth year who is 23-2 in duels so far is advisable.¡±


    ¡°You know the students well,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°It¡¯s part of my job.¡±


    ¡°Again, I appreciate the concern, but I¡¯m certain.¡±


    Uriel sighed. ¡°I cannot stop a willing participant from entering a duel. I hope you know what you¡¯re doing. You¡¯re talented, that¡¯s for certain. Please don¡¯t take a loss as a sign of failure.¡±


    ¡°That won¡¯t be necessary,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯m ready to begin whenever everyone else is.¡±


    After casting one more wary glance at him, Uriel walked away, situating herself on the sidelines.


    Syl stepped into the arena.


    ¡°Arena size forty by twenty meters, acknowledge,¡± Waylan said.


    ¡°Acknowledged,¡± Uriel said.


    Drew, clearly used to this, tapped his metallic staff, which rippled with flux before a red light appeared at the top.


    A bit over the top for a dueling FCD, Syl thought but didn¡¯t say. He followed suit, taking a full second to get the casting processes in order to properly create that light.


    Waylan wasn¡¯t quite able to hide his snicker at that, though he coughed loudly when Uriel looked askance at him.


    Walls of force rose around the two of them, restricting the effects of their spells to within the arena. A moment later, the floor itself began rising in places, creating artificial cover.Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.


    ¡°Setting six. Basic cover. Acknowledge.¡±


    Syl and Drew both acknowledged again.


    ¡°The duel will end when one party is incapacitated, cannot adequately continue to cast, or acknowledges defeat,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Duelist Drew Violet. Do you accept the terms of the duel as previously stated?¡±


    ¡°In nomine virtutis,¡± Drew said. ¡°I accept.¡±


    ¡°Duelist Sylvester Auria. To be clear, the words you should repeat¡ª¡°


    ¡°In fide et sapientia,¡± Syl replied. ¡°I also accept.¡±


    ¡°Very well,¡± Uriel said, smoothly brushing away her surprise. ¡°Begin.¡±


    Syl didn¡¯t have direct line of sight on Drew because of the cover, and he had no active spells for him to track, but the arena was small enough that it wasn¡¯t too hard to play keep-away for a bit.


    ¡°I¡¯ll make this easy for you,¡± Drew said mockingly. ¡°I¡¯ll tell you the spell I¡¯ll use to beat the shit out of you.¡±


    ¡°You can make it not so easy,¡± Syl said, preparing his own magic as he crouched behind a white block half his height.


    ¡°This spell,¡± Drew said, ignoring Syl¡¯s words, ¡°is called Violet Eyes. Do you know who my family is?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d say that I¡¯m offended that you would ask, but your entire existence offends me at this moment,¡± Syl said. ¡°Violet. Third ranked of the prismatic families. Lots of battle magic, but your edge is in personal control skills. Amplification of the body and control of the mind.¡±


    ¡°Reading a description off the intranet isn¡¯t going to win you any points here,¡± Drew continued. ¡°This spell is one of my favorites. Most of the time, it disorients you by messing with your vision, but one thing it can do to little wimps like you is force your senses into mine. You¡¯re going to be pissing yourself, unable to move your body, and I¡¯ll lend you my eyes. Aren¡¯t you excited? You¡¯ll get to watch and feel me beat you. You should be honored, really.¡±


    There.


    Drew and Syl stepped out into the open at the same time, facing each other at a distance of less than five meters. The sixth-year¡¯s staff was already active, magic circles forming and encircling its length.


    He shouted a command word, and his eyes glowed his family¡¯s trademark violet, boring into Syl¡ªand then Drew staggered, his open hand clutching at his eyes wildly. he cursed in pain, stumbling around like a drunkard.


    In a flash, Syl was behind him, both bracers glowing. Instead of wasting time casting a spell, he simply kicked Drew in the back while he was disoriented, knocking him off balance. To the sixth-year¡¯s credit, he wasn¡¯t totally helpless, but he was still temporarily blind and already reeling from the loss of his spell.


    Syl¡¯s casting speed might have been no good, but his body was a different story. In a swift exchange of blows, he knocked Drew to the floor, wrenching his staff away.


    A buzzer blared. Artificial terrain began to fall, sinking back into the ground.


    ¡°What the hell was that?¡± Waylan asked as the forcewalls dissipated as well.


    The duel had been broadcast to them through any number of hidden cameras, Syl knew, which was part of why he hadn¡¯t done anything flashier.


    Besides, sometimes simplicity was best.


    ¡°The winner of the duel is Sylvester Auria,¡± Uriel said, her own shock clear in her voice.


    Only Bianca wasn¡¯t surprised. She clapped politely, beaming down at him. ¡°Told you.¡±


    ¡°You¡­¡± Drew muttered from the ground.


    ¡°Right,¡± Syl said. ¡°Your FCD. It¡¯s mistuned. Might want to have someone take a look at it.¡±


    Waylan practically bounded down the steps from the mostly-empty viewing bleachers, excitement clear in his body language. ¡°Dude. Syl, right? That was awesome. Where did you learn how to do that?¡±


    Maybe Syl had misjudged the Red. He¡¯d thought Waylan had come to watch him get beat up, but from his reaction, it was looking more like the boy¡ªman, Syl corrected himself, Waylan was a good five years older at least¡ªhad come here because he wanted to see interesting magic in action.


    ¡°I pick things up,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°What¡­ did you do?¡± Drew asked, having managed to sit up properly. ¡°My spell¡­¡±


    ¡°You did say you were going to take it easy,¡± Syl reminded him. ¡°That couldn¡¯t have helped. I counter-cast you.¡±


    Uriel gasped. ¡°But counter-casting¡­ leave the fact that you shouldn¡¯t know how to do that yet, it¡¯s something that takes even strategic-class magicians years to master.¡±


    ¡°It helps that I was given both time and a warning. Violet Eyes is on the list of public prismatic family spells. All counter-casting boils down to is fully inverting a spell pattern. Casting from multiple FCDs is usually a problem because they have a high chance at interfering with each other, but when the cast is done for the explicit purpose of interfering, it¡¯s much simpler. All I did was prepare the inverted Violet Eyes during the monologue. I imagine you don¡¯t usually practice dealing with your spell when it backfires, which is what it ended up doing.¡±


    ¡°Because that¡¯s not all counter-casting is,¡± Waylan countered. ¡°I know my fair share too. No two castings of a spell are exactly alike. Minute changes in airflow, preferences of the caster, FCD settings¡­ there¡¯s a thousand variables that modify the spell pattern of any given magic weave. Plus, the effect of Violet Eyes might be public, but the full spell sequence sure as hell isn¡¯t. Without a more advanced counter-casting FCD, you would have to be able to read a spell activation on the fly just to even try.¡±


    ¡°I read the spell activation,¡± Syl said, acknowledging Waylan¡¯s expertise with a nod. ¡°It takes less adjustment than preparing the spell in the first place, and it¡¯s not something that a verbal component can substitute, so it¡¯s not something that I have a disadvantage in.¡±


    Waylan shook his head in disbelief. ¡°To think there¡¯s a first-year like you in class 3, of all places¡­¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve been saying for a long while that the practicals aren¡¯t all that matter,¡± Uriel said. ¡°This is just proof of that. There¡¯s plenty of talent out there, just waiting for us to find it.¡±


    ¡°By the way,¡± Syl said, looking to where Drew was bracing himself against his staff to get up. ¡°This wasn¡¯t in the agreement, but you should apologize to Bianca before you stop being rude to her again. A sixth-year like you has no excuse to call the first-year student representative a¡­ what was it, again?¡±


    ¡°A ¡®mouthy bitch,¡¯¡± Bianca supplied happily.


    ¡°Fuck you,¡± Drew hissed at Syl. ¡°Don¡¯t go getting a big head because of¡­ beginner¡¯s luck. Do you know who my mother is?¡±


    ¡°I do,¡± Syl said. ¡°Not a good look for the son of the legendary Allison Violet to be such a sore loser, I would say.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll show you sore loser,¡± Drew snarled, FCD activating again.


    ¡°Drew!¡± Uriel snapped, but Syl was faster.


    Before Drew¡¯s staff could finish the spell it was activating, Syl was in front of him, plunging a fist straight into his gut.


    Drew doubled over, and Syl helped him to the ground, sweeping his feet out from under him as he expelled the contents of the lunch they¡¯d just been having. Syl grabbed the staff as the sixth-year fell into a puddle of his own vomit, tossing it aside.


    He sighed. ¡°I suppose we¡¯re going to have to meet his mother a bit early. Bianca, the mess, if you wouldn¡¯t mind?¡±


    ¡°Of course,¡± she said.


    ¡°General Violet is on her way,¡± Uriel said, one hand to her ear. ¡°How did you know?¡±


    Instead of replying, Syl took Drew¡¯s staff and started tuning it. The misalignment in the settings was bugging him, and it wasn¡¯t even his FCD.


    Ten minutes later, the door to the arena slammed open. Bianca, Waylan, and Uriel saluted, while Drew moaned, still holding his stomach on the ground.


    Syl turned, belatedly saluting after he finished up with the staff.


    ¡°General Violet,¡± he said. ¡°How can I help you?¡±

 Chapter 4 - The Reserve

    Strategic-class magicians placed second on the totem pole of rankings, a significant distance above master-class and an even more significant one below paragons. There were in the realm of one thousand registered strategic-class magicians compared to over a hundred thousand master-class and exactly fifty-two paragons, and it was commonly believed that the real number was over five times that many.


    Even then, they were a rareified few amongst the magic community. A single strategic-class magician had magic that was capable of devastating a city, with some even rising to the level of outright razing one.


    General Allison Violet, sometimes referred to in hushed whispers as the Butcher Queen, was one of the latter group. During World War III, she¡¯d used strategic-class magic to control the bodies of fallen magicians, temporarily reanimating corpses and squeezing every last drop of magic out of them. Despite her age, she looked no different than she had at thirty, a marked benefit of the effects of advanced magic. It was said that even one wrong look at her could render a magician useless, setting triggers in them that would result in instant death if they disobeyed her.


    Syl dropped the salute and made eye contact with her, offering the strategic-class magician her son¡¯s FCD back while he continued to suffer on the ground.


    ¡°I don¡¯t think Drew is going to be able to handle this for a while,¡± he said. ¡°Would you mind taking care of it for him? I fixed the alignment, by the way. It was slightly overspending on projection-type spells.¡±


    She accepted the staff, never taking her eyes off Syl. ¡°I take it you¡¯re the one responsible for leaving my son on the ground like that?¡±


    ¡°You have a tracker on him,¡± Syl said. It wasn¡¯t a question. ¡°Smart. Prismatic children are always at risk of enemy action, and this academy isn¡¯t as protected as a family fortress would be.¡±


    ¡°You didn¡¯t answer my question.¡±


    ¡°It was,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°Drew challenged Syl to a duel, ma¡¯am,¡± Bianca added, standing a respectful distance away.


    ¡°That much, I can see. What I don¡¯t is the fact that a first-year is still standing and my son appears to have suffered enough blunt force trauma that he¡¯ll need a healing pod.¡±


    ¡°General Violet,¡± Uriel said, still standing at attention. ¡°If I may?¡±


    ¡°At ease, Major,¡± Allison replied. ¡°Rank is for outside the classroom. My only relevant title while at this academy is Professor.¡±


    ¡°We should have footage of what happened after the duel,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Waylan, if you would?¡±


    ¡°On it,¡± Waylan said, scurrying back to the control panel he¡¯d used to modify the arena settings.


    Syl explained what had happened in dry detail to the general while they waited. He left out a few key points that wouldn¡¯t matter in the context of this conversation, but he covered it well enough.


    ¡°In my humble opinion,¡± Syl concluded, ¡°You¡¯re going too soft on your son in a number of different ways.¡±


    ¡°Syl,¡± Bianca hissed. ¡°Not the time or place.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll admit that it¡¯s been some time since I¡¯ve met a first-year this bold,¡± the general said. Her eyes sparked with a carefully controlled flash of free magic. Not a threat, but a warning. ¡°Do elaborate.¡±


    ¡°Professor, if I may be so rude,¡± Uriel interrupted, ¡°He¡¯s clearly already been through a fair amount. Please forgive¡ª¡°


    ¡°Of course,¡± Syl said, interrupting the senior student¡¯s interruption. ¡°First point of order. He hasn¡¯t been trained to handle his spells backfiring on him. I counter-cast him¡ª¡°


    ¡°Impossible. Even assuming you pre-emptively learned counter-casting, you¡¯re still a first year. No matter how talented, you simply don¡¯t have the resources to counter Drew. Are you carrying a jammer? Crystal interference could have done it.¡±


    ¡°No, and I¡¯m willing to be checked for one,¡± Syl said. ¡°The point remains whether or not I was illegally using a jammer or counter-casting. Our enemies don¡¯t care about our laws. What will Drew do if he tries to use Violet Eyes on a terrorist and crystal jamming sends the spell right back in his face? The answer, it seems, is die. He can¡¯t afford not to be practicing this.


    ¡°Which brings me to my second point. You¡¯ve been keeping your son out of danger.¡±


    General¡ªor Professor, Syl supposed¡ªViolet¡¯s lip curled. ¡°You make dangerous assumptions. An accusation of interference with military assignments as a member of academy faculty and a prismatic family member carries a great deal of wait.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t accuse you of anything, ma¡¯am,¡± Syl said. ¡°Just observing. He wasn¡¯t able to compose himself in a duel against a first year. I believe you¡¯ve gone on record saying never to underestimate an opponent, no wonder how weak they may seem?¡±


    ¡°Words to live by.¡±


    ¡°I agree entirely. Drew, apparently, does not. Not only did he tell me what spell he was going to use, he did so in excruciating detail, allowing me to start my counter-cast early. Imagine if this was a real battle. What if I¡¯d brought a gun? They¡¯re less effective against magicians, true, but Drew was standing out in the open and monologuing. With a standard full auto, even a non-magician just needs one lucky shot. You can review the footage yourself. He might have been in a real combat situation, sure, but he certainly doesn¡¯t act like he¡¯s ever needed to worry for his life. When he actually does, it¡¯ll be too late.¡±If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    ¡°Hm. There may be truth to that.¡± To her credit, the strategic-class magician didn¡¯t react violently. Syl had been prepared for that, given the character of the ones he personally knew, but she seemed to be on the reasonable end. That made sense, given her position.


    Waylan came with a hologram projection programmed into his FCD, copied straight from the arena cameras. They waited in silence as Professor Violet watched the entire duel and the events that had transpired afterward.


    The footage ended, and the professor turned to Syl.


    ¡°He tried to attack you outside of the ring,¡± she said, disgusted. ¡°That is a violation of not only academy rules but federal law.¡±


    Syl shrugged. ¡°He was still woozy from Violet Eyes, which I¡¯m told is a very disorienting spell, and the backfire worsened things. I can¡¯t blame a cornered rat for biting, and I imagine that¡¯s what he felt like. Given how he was speaking both before and after, I doubt losing to a first year was particularly good for him.¡±


    ¡°Are you implying that you don¡¯t wish to push charges?¡± Uriel asked. ¡°You would be well within your rights to.¡±


    ¡°It would be bad for the academy, which need to maintain the image of peace in a turbulent world,¡± Syl said. ¡°It¡¯d also put a target on my back, worsen my relationships with the general here, and generally be a pain. I broke regulations too, I¡¯m sure.¡±


    Waylan shook his head. ¡°Self-defense is allowed. Trust me.¡±


    ¡°I still don¡¯t want to bother.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s Syl for you,¡± Bianca said. ¡°He doesn¡¯t want to get involved with anything, but he somehow does, every time.¡±


    ¡°Thank you, Bianca,¡± Syl sighed. ¡°That was certainly necessary.¡±


    ¡°To be clear¡ª¡° Uriel started.


    ¡°No, I don¡¯t plan on pressing charges. As long as Drew sticks to the terms of the duel and stops disrespecting Bianca, at least. And if you¡¯re able to get him the training he needs. I get wanting to keep someone safe¡ª¡° at this, he sent an obvious look at Bianca, ¡°¡ªbut there¡¯s a limit to that. Also, someone should probably get him to the medical wing. I may have fractured one of his ribs. Possibly multiple of his ribs.¡±


    ¡°I will handle that,¡± Professor Violet said, drawing a pattern on her own wand-style FCD. A purple magic circle lit the ground under Drew. He got to his feet jerkily, as if he was a poorly-tuned animatronic. ¡°House Violet owes you a favor, Sylvester.¡±


    ¡°I may come to collect on that,¡± he said. ¡°If that¡¯s all?¡±


    ¡°It is. I look forward to seeing you succeed. My office is always open to talented students, which you evidently are.¡±


    With that, she left, taking her puppeted son and his FCD with her.


    A collective weight seemed to lift off the shoulders of the two remaining Reserve members.


    ¡°That was interesting,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Day one, and you¡¯re already making waves with the faculty. I can¡¯t say I expected any different.¡±


    ¡°If you count the entrance ceremony and pre-class events, this is day six,¡± Syl pointed out.


    ¡°How can the two of you be so calm about that?¡± Waylan demanded. ¡°That was General Allison Violet! She¡¯s a living legend, another prismatic, and a professor, and you just, what, you got away with insulting her son to her face?¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re¡ª¡° Bianca started, before glancing at Syl and realizing the second half of the sentence would have been used to it.


    She was supposed to be Bianca Ashwood here, and Bianca Ashwood, while talented, was not the kind of person who ran into strategic-class magicians every day.


    ¡°They¡¯re not military,¡± Uriel said. ¡°It¡¯s impressive nonetheless, but they don¡¯t have the same context we do.¡±


    That¡¯s right. I have more, Syl thought.


    What he said instead was, ¡°Bianca, your next class is soon, isn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°It is,¡± she said, nodding enthusiastically. ¡°Don¡¯t we have it together?¡±


    ¡°I believe we do.¡±


    Practical Magic 101 was one of the few required classes that all three classes of student shared. There was no discrimination in who was allowed in, since it was one of the rare few classes with no attendance limit.


    ¡°If you have class, feel free to go to it,¡± Uriel said. ¡°You might want to consider applying for military police, Syl. Reserve positions are technically open to all years, but it¡¯s only MPs that tend to have superstars from lower grades.¡±


    ¡°I appreciate it, but I¡¯m not interested,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°Entirely fair. I¡¯ll also extend the invitation to continue joining us. Bianca is also a candidate for certain undergraduate facets of the Reserve, and it would be a waste not to have you there as well.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll consider it.¡±


    ¡°On a more personal level,¡± Uriel said, ¡°I¡¯d like to get to know you better. Do you have any preferences for venue?¡±


    Bianca eyed the graduate student with suspicion. ¡°Aren¡¯t you a little old for him?¡±


    Uriel chuckled. ¡°All assumptions when it comes to both of you, is it?¡±


    ¡°You can select a location,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯m certainly interested in speaking to more prismatics.¡±


    ¡°Then how does the coffee shop sound? There¡¯re private booths there.¡±


    ¡°That works. Now, Bianca and I should probably get going.¡±


    ¡°Of course. Don¡¯t let us keep you.¡±


    Bianca and Syl left together, walking to the massive indoor field where PM 101 would be held.


    ¡°I don¡¯t trust her,¡± Bianca said as they walked.


    ¡°You don¡¯t trust anyone,¡± Syl said. ¡°Nor should you. Still, it¡¯s probably worth integrating with her as a regular person. She¡¯s talented.¡±


    ¡°If you say so,¡± she said. ¡°I suppose it¡¯s too early to say anything beyond first impressions.¡±


    There were already a few dozen students gathered in the field, most of them separating into their own groups. It was clear just from a glance that they had largely split up by class, which was unsurprising.


    The instructor was standing on an elevated platform. He looked to be about thirty, but given the amount of magic Syl was detecting from him, his actual age was probably greater. Syl almost mistook him for a statue, but the slight fluctuation in the flux emitting from him proved that he was, in fact, alive.


    ¡°This should be fun,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I heard that we start actual dueling practice from the first day.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯ll probably involve you,¡± Syl said. ¡°It¡¯s a first-year class, and you¡¯re the year representative.¡±


    ¡°Almost certainly, huh¡­¡± Bianca trailed off. ¡°It¡¯d be nice to be ordinary from time to time.¡±


    Syl snorted. ¡°This is as close to ordinary as either of us will ever get. Enjoy it while it lasts.¡±


    She sighed. ¡°True enough.¡±


    Since Bianca had been one of the speakers at the entrance ceremony, people started to come and speak to her, hoping to establish themselves in the circle of someone who was almost certainly going to be a leader. Syl went unfazed by the strange glances that the higher-class students kept on giving him and ignored every strong suggestion to go away. None of them wanted to piss off Bianca, who was clearly happy to have him there, so nobody tried to force Syl away.


    This class had a total of a hundred students in it, most of whom showed up in the minutes leading up to it starting.


    At exactly two o¡¯ clock on the dot, the instructor started moving. A burst of flux enveloped him, drawing everyone¡¯s attention forward.


    ¡°Welcome to Practical Magic,¡± he said. ¡°My name is Professor Adams. By the end of this semester, a third of you will no longer be in this class.¡±


    A spike of alarm shot through Syl as his awareness swept through the class. It wasn¡¯t the professor¡¯s words that had triggered it. Those were only to be expected.


    No, it was the fact that there were at least three guns in the crowd, all three of which were obscured by stealth magic.


    Nobody brought a gun to magic school to not use it.


    ¡°Now, then,¡± the professor said. ¡°Let¡¯s begin.¡±

 Chapter 5 - Hes Got A Gun

    ¡°Contrary to popular expectation, dueling is not practical magic in the slightest,¡± Professor Adams said, a passive spell woven into his FCD projecting his voice outwards. ¡°Many of you may have the vision of magician-against-magician combat being a noble art; an honorable one with strict rules of engagement, chivalry, and orderly arenas.


    ¡°Actual magical combat is anything but. Magicians and normals alike shoot at each other, use artillery-type magic and regular artillery to bomb out positions, and they kill. An average magician is part of a unit, and most common military magic is either group-cast artillery or stealth. Drop any pretensions of learning traditional combat spells of old. What need is there for a Flux Bolt when you will be carrying a rifle as often as you are an FCD?¡±


    Will be was pushing it, given that there were already those in the student body here carrying, apparently.


    ¡°I dunno,¡± a languid voice said from the crowd. Lyon Red, Syl recognized. It was the student he¡¯d sat next to at the entrance ceremony. A fellow class 3, despite being a prismatic. ¡°Last I checked, guns can miss. I don¡¯t.¡±


    Black sheep indeed. Even if they did tend towards arrogance, prismatics were still supposed to have some idea of how to compose themselves in public.


    ¡°A fair question from a Red,¡± the professor said, drawing murmurs from the crowd as they craned their necks trying to find the one who¡¯d spoken. ¡°If you could find it in yourself to allow me to finish, practical demonstrations will begin soon after.¡±


    ¡°I look forward to it,¡± Lyon replied.


    Given the distraction, Syl tapped Bianca¡¯s shoulder and signed to her as discreetly as possible.


    Gunman here.


    She had the good grace to not visibly react to that. The hidden princess signed a simple in return. When?


    Syl considered it for a bit. Shouldn¡¯t be a problem. Just be aware.


    Thanks, Bianca signed back.


    Professor Adams was still speaking. ¡°Everything else being said, you are still all first-years, and some foundation in magician-against-magician combat will occasionally be useful. For political purposes, sadly, dueling has become a critical skill, and there will be times when your residence is broken into and all you have on hand is your magic. As such, this first semester will be designed around training you in the ways of basic magical combat. Some of you will already have experience in this aspect.¡±


    Bianca and Syl shared a silent look at that. You could say that.


    ¡°Now, I believe that young master Red here is one of those who has trained in martial magic,¡± Adams said. ¡°If you would come to the front, please.¡±


    ¡°It wasn¡¯t me,¡± Bianca whispered to Syl.


    There¡¯s still time, he signed back silently. There wasn¡¯t much room for volume modulation with his vocal FCD, and the ambient sound wasn¡¯t high enough that he was comfortable talking at full volume.


    Lyon looked every bit as messy as he had before. A shock of bright reddish-brown hair that had somehow grown more unkempt in the week since the entrance ceremony fell across his face. He held two batons, one of which Syl knew was his FCD.


    The crowd¡¯s murmurs grew louder as Lyon walked to the front, eyes settling on the class 3 marking on his uniform.


    ¡°Does anyone wish to challenge this young man?¡± Adams asked.


    ¡°Thought you said there was going to be a demonstration,¡± Lyon said. ¡°Something about guns?¡±


    Stop tempting fate, Syl thought. Then again, given the fact that even he couldn¡¯t detect where the guns were spoke to the strength of the stealth spells. Nobody else would have even detected them.


    ¡°You¡¯ve been trained in the dueling arts, I presume, and your likely challenger¡ª¡°


    ¡°I volunteer,¡± another boy said, shooting up in his seat. ¡°Class 1. Trevor Rokho.¡±


    ¡°¡ªand there we have it,¡± Professor Adams said. ¡°Another one who¡¯s practiced the same. Do refrain from hurting each other, please. You two should both know your rules. First contact wins.¡±


    That was a Red branch family, Syl recognized. Judging from the speed of response and the name¡­ this was probably a family dispute. Something about the boy from the core family ending up in class 3, he was sure.


    It wasn¡¯t his place to poke into it, and he didn¡¯t care much anyway. He just watched, keeping an eye out as the two men got onto the platform where Adams had been speaking, starting about twenty meters apart.


    ¡°Ready?¡± the professor asked, eschewing the formal duel statements. After both students nodded, he tapped the ground with his foot. ¡°Begin.¡±


    Trevor shot forward in a blur, using the universally popular movement-type Flash Step spell, a C-class one that greatly enhanced speed in short bursts. His casting time was superb, as to be expected from a class 1.Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.


    Lyon leaped, his FCD activating just as quickly. While he was in the air, he swung his baton, forcing Trevor to cancel his spell and redirect backwards. As he landed, a flux circle appeared beneath him, his other baton glowing with magic.


    One command word later, that circle transferred from under him to in front of his FCD, blasting out in a colorful spray of flame that enveloped his opponent.


    Not accustomed to such violent casting, the students watching gasped, but Trevor had used a simple Shield spell to encase himself, leaving him unharmed.


    Lyon was already moving, though, using his own spell as a distraction to trigger another one on both batons, which he slammed into the glimmering force shield¡ªand straight through it, hitting Trevor and knocking him over.


    That was the end of the duel.


    ¡°Well fought, Lyon. Trevor.¡± Adams nodded at them both. ¡°This was a perfect showing of the type of magic that excels in a duel.¡±


    The students belatedly started clapping.


    ¡°Now,¡± Adams said. ¡°It¡¯s my turn. For your sake, I will refrain from using any spells above¡­ B-class. Does that sound fair?¡±


    ¡°I can handle more than a B, but sure,¡± Lyon said cockily. ¡°Same rules?¡±


    ¡°Of course. Now, to demonstrate my point¡­¡± the professor reached into his robes, withdrawing a pistol with an orange tip. ¡°A pellet gun. Not harmful. It won¡¯t break the skin, though it will be quite painful.¡±


    ¡°You got it, boss,¡± Lyon replied. ¡°You got your FCD and everything?¡±


    ¡°No magician should ever be caught without their FCD,¡± Adams said. ¡°Always have one within arm¡¯s reach, even if it¡¯s not your typical casting device.¡±


    He raised a short tablet-like device with all manner of buttons on it. That was a more traditional type of FCD, which was more versatile than many of the more modern specialized ones but couldn¡¯t be preloaded with any spells and would thus be slower to cast.


    ¡°Whenever you are ready, young master,¡± the professor said, pellet pistol in one hand and FCD in the other.


    He had scarcely finished his last word when Lyon charged forward, pre-casting a Shield spell in front of him to block the first shot.


    ¡°A good idea, using a shield spell,¡± Lyon said, blinking backward in a flash and avoiding Lyon¡¯s lunge. ¡°But do you have the processes to handle a Flux Bolt, now? Do you have the flux?¡±


    Lyon grinned, FCD glowing again. A bolt of energy shot out from it, snaking between his shields¡ªand it collided with a shield of the professor¡¯s own. Both shattered, rending the spells inert.


    ¡°Ah, but now you¡¯ve wasted your flux and your attention.¡±


    His foot tapped the ground again, and the earth under Lyon ruptured, knocking him off balance. Professor Adams fired the pellet pistol once, twice, forcing Lyon to readjust his shields, then cast again, wrapping Lyon¡¯s legs in fast-growing vines.


    All it took was one shot in the right place to make it through the shields. Lyon cursed, falling on his ass.


    ¡°This is practical magic,¡± the professor said. ¡°Control the battlefield. Use destruction for a purpose. Any idiot can point a wand at their opponent and try to blow them up. A magician understands that magic is a tool for creating an answer, not the solution itself. Thank you for participating, Lyon.¡±


    ¡°No problem, boss,¡± the class 3 student said, shaking himself out of the bindings he¡¯d gotten in. Despite his somewhat embarrassing defeat, he didn¡¯t seem too broken up about it. ¡°Thanks for the lesson.¡±


    ¡°The first of many, I should hope,¡± the professor said. ¡°For today, we will be doing basic sparring. During your time in high school, you should have learned at least some degree of offensive and defensive magic. You will only be permitted to use the following spells: Shield, Flux Stream, and Accelerate. Defense, offense, and movement. That is the core of practical magic, and it is how I will assess which of you have the correct mindset for this class. You will be assigned into pairs based on your practical exam scores, which I personally find to be almost wholly useless but will work as a starting point. Listen carefully, find your partner, and find an empty space in the field. Ten meters of space on either side at least.¡±


    He started calling names as the class devolved into conversations between each other, most of them talking about the two duels that had taken place.


    ¡°You didn¡¯t get called after all,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°Thank god for that,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I would¡¯ve invalidated that entire demonstration.¡±


    ¡°I mean, he¡¯s not wrong,¡± Syl replied. ¡°There are just certain levels of magic where you can worry about it less.¡±


    ¡°Ha!¡± a boy said from beside him. ¡°Look who¡¯s talking. Tier three shitter¡¯s got dreams? Better pick up a rifle, buddy.¡±


    Syl glanced over to the class 2 student, processed that he wasn¡¯t anybody important, and rolled his eyes. ¡°It¡¯s the first week of class. Shouldn¡¯t you wait until you know someone¡¯s actually weak before you start trying to pick on them?¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Look¡ª¡°


    Syl paused in the middle of his sentence. At the front of the class, Professor Adams had just called for Lyon, and the Red had walked up.


    Two of the stealth spells had gone down.


    ¡°Bianca,¡± Syl said urgently, pointing to the front left, about three rows back from where Lyon currently was.


    ¡°On it,¡± she said.


    Both of them stood up abruptly and sprinted out of their seats. Syl shoved the would-be bully a little harder than he needed to, then activated his pre-loaded Flash Step, overcharging it and sending himself hurtling forward at blinding speed. Bianca was only a step behind, though she used a significantly flashier warp-type A-class spell, Fiery Rebirth. She disappeared from her original position then reappeared next to Syl, a wave of fire and force bursting out and nearly bowling Syl over.


    He was prepared for it, though, and he channeled the momentum into his Flash Step, which he¡¯d started casting while still in the middle of his first one. It was ordinarily wasteful to simulcast like this, but Syl had all the flux he needed. He slammed straight into the first student who¡¯d already gotten halfway through drawing her rifle, knocking her to the ground.


    The second one, gun already out, fired at Lyon, but flame snapped into the air and detonated the three-round burst in mid-air. Surrounded in an aura of fire, Bianca walked towards the shooter as the students around him scrambled away.


    Syl turned to assist her, then noticed the one on the ground was casting a spell. Not even bothering to look back, he fired the preloaded sequence in his secondary FCD. A crack followed by loose flux particles dissipating into the air told him that he¡¯d shattered her casting device. He started programming another spell sequence as he walked on, trusting that she was no longer a threat.


    The only active shooter was focusing on Bianca, who was still snatching his bullets out of the air like she was popping bubbles, but he turned as he heard Syl approaching.


    Syl tilted his head, and his eyes glowed violet.


    The gunman met his eyes, startled¡ªand then his grip slackened, his senses suddenly forced into Syl¡¯s body.


    Binding magic formed around both shooters moments later as Professor Adams finally arrived.


    The flame around Bianca died down, as did the spell Syl was using.


    ¡°So,¡± Syl said. ¡°Looks like this year isn¡¯t going to be as calm as we hoped.¡±

 Chapter 6 - Questioning

    Class wasn¡¯t even cancelled for an attempted shooting, though it did get delayed by a bit while members of the military police from the Reserve came to take statements and investigate for potential other threats. This was First Academy, after all. With a student attrition rate of just under twenty percent a year, most of which were dropouts but many of whom died¡ªbe it in a Tower, from a military activity, or just plain bad luck in a class¡ªdanger was an accepted part of life.


    More cynically, Syl figured that none of the prismatic families valued their first-years enough to shut down classes for them. If there had been a credible threat to the life of one of their prodigies in the Reserve, it might have been a different story.


    Whoever the other shooters would have been had either left beforehand or concealed their guns better, because Syl no longer sensed them.


    The Reserve that came were professional, their identities hidden by face-obscuring visors and nearly-identical uniforms. Their group of twenty locked the arena down, setting crime scene boarriers at each of the numerous entrances to the colosseum-like arena. They moved with clinical efficiency, scanning each remaining student and speaking to those they identified as most affected.


    That did, unfortunately, include both Syl and Bianca. Other students corroborated the stadium footage that displayed the two of them abruptly standing to charge the two shooters. Said shooters had been taken into custody already and would likely never see the light of day again, but the Reserve wanted a full and complete image of what had happened.


    The interrogation, if it could even be called that, took place right there on the stadium. The Reserve had brought a privacy screen, an engineered flux device that spread out on the ground and created an opaque dome of white light around Syl and two Reserve members.


    ¡°Sylvester Auria,¡± one of them said, not unkindly. ¡°First year. Class 3. Do I have that right?¡±


    Woman. On the taller end. Unfamiliar voice, but her flux is marked. Not quite gene-optimized. Servant of a prismatic family, probably. She¡¯d be more lenient to Syl than her companion, who carried himself like he was god¡¯s gift to magic. Servants knew what it was like to be on the bottom.


    Syl nodded. ¡°You do.¡±


    ¡°As a preface, this conversation will be revisited by perception-type lie detection spells. You are entitled to leave at any time.¡±


    ¡°I understand,¡± Syl said. That was always a trap. Anyone who left instead of answering a question was universally treated as guilty, often of more than they actually were. ¡°Let¡¯s just get this over with.¡±


    The female Reserve officer tapped her FCD, her visor lighting up as a digital file appeared in front of her. ¡°You and your¡­ friend? Partner? Acquaintance?¡±


    ¡°Friend and client,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯m her FCD engineer, assuming you¡¯re talking about Bianca Ashwood.¡±


    ¡°As a class 3?¡± the shorter man asked dubiously.


    ¡°She¡¯s not from a prismatic family or any of its offshoots,¡± Syl explained. ¡°Many less fortunate families can¡¯t afford to find engineers that are also talented otherwise. We grew up together, and I had a knack for FCDs, enough that her family decided to take me in and have us work together.¡±


    All true enough to avoid most common types of lie detection magic. If they forced him to clarify, Syl had other options to cloak his words, but he didn¡¯t want to do more than he had to. His true identity needed to remain secret for his, Bianca¡¯s, and the entire academy¡¯s sake, and letting too many clues slip now would be detrimental in that regard.


    ¡°Very well,¡± the woman said. ¡°You and Miss Ashwood noticed the shooters before even the target did. Your reaction time is commendable, as were your actions themselves.¡±


    ¡°A little too commendable, one would think,¡± the man said. ¡°How did you know they were going to be there? How did you react so fast? You¡¯re a class 3 with terrible practicals. How did you take down two class 2 students with rifles?¡±


    ¡°One question at a time, please,¡± Syl requested. Fortunately, for these questions, he¡¯d at least partially prepared answers. ¡°I can¡¯t answer everything at once.First: though my practical scores were low, I have strong detection skills and a degree of paranoia. Perception-type wide-range A-class spell, Safety Net. With range extenders, it is capable of finding weapons in areas approximately the size and shape of a practical magic stadium.¡±


    ¡°Safety Net is not taught until third year,¡± the woman remarked. ¡°For someone with poor practicals, you¡¯re quite advanced.¡±


    ¡°And it¡¯s an expensive spell,¡± the man added. ¡°You can¡¯t tell me that you¡¯re in class 3 and somehow powering a continuously refreshing mana-hungry spell.¡±


    ¡°Yes I can.¡± Syl smiled. ¡°My flux pool is a bit larger than average, but I am lacking in other places, like casting speed, which you also asked about. My FCDs can pre-load one spell apiece, and they also have the capacity to overcharge them. I choose the C-class Flash Step, which integrates with martial arts nicely. That enabled me to move as quickly as I did.¡±


    ¡°And the last question?¡± the man asked impatiently, clearly unsatisfied by the answers he¡¯d gotten. ¡°How did you do it?¡±


    Syl¡¯s smile grew wider and colder. ¡°By applying the principles of the very class we¡¯re in, sir. Practical magic.¡±


    There was something in his expression that gave both of the Reserve officers pause. Syl paused himself, adjusting his face back to as pleasant a facade as he could.


    ¡°Thank you for your cooperation, Sylvester,¡± the female officer said, clearly a little more wary of him now. ¡°One last thing. At the moment you and Miss Ashwood successfully subdued the shooters, the cameras appear to have experienced a slight glitch. Would you happen to know anything about that?¡±The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.


    ¡°Heavy FCD interference can jam digital cameras,¡± Syl said. ¡°It may have been that.¡±


    ¡°Thank you once again. That will be all.¡±


    Syl expressed his thanks and left, noting the male officer¡¯s visor locking onto him as he walked.


    They didn¡¯t specifically ask about Violet Eyes. The camera play had worked, but he was going to have to be careful. He wouldn¡¯t always be able to get away with casting spells he had no business knowing.


    Bianca was already out of hers. That one must have been easy. She was the star student of their year. They had probably expected something like this out of her.


    ¡­hm. There was an idea there that Syl didn¡¯t terribly like but found entirely too plausible.


    ¡°Are we good to talk?¡± Bianca asked.


    Syl didn¡¯t detect anything picking up sound at the moment apart from the arena cameras, but those weren¡¯t precise enough to catch and isolate individual conversations.


    ¡°Yes,¡± he said. ¡°Class should resume soon, but I would tread with caution.¡±


    ¡°You think so?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°You are likely correct, as always.¡±


    ¡°This was too sloppy of an assassination attempt to actually work,¡± he said. ¡°I think someone might know about us, or at least have an inkling that there are hidden figures in this year¡¯s class.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re not wrong,¡± she agreed. ¡°You found a drone operator during the entrance ceremony, too.¡±


    ¡°Not something we can track down immediately, but I have my suspicions,¡± he said. ¡°Be careful.¡±


    ¡°You too,¡± Bianca said. ¡°More than me, even. They expect me to be strong. It¡¯s unjust that you not be evaluated for what you actually are, but it also means that expectations are lower.¡±


    ¡°I will be cautious,¡± Syl replied. ¡°Class is about to begin again. Let¡¯s go.¡±


    The student body was significantly warier of each other after what had just transpired, but they returned to their seats anyway. Professor Adams cleared his throat, commended Bianca and Syl¡ªmostly Bianca¡ªfor their role in stopping the two shooters. He made eye contact with Syl during his monologue, at which point Syl suddenly grew very interested in a slightly discolored panel in one of the stadium walls.


    ¡°That unfortunate incident took up more time than I would have liked,¡± the professor said, ¡°but there should still be enough time for one to two practice duels between the listed pairs. The rules are simple. As stated before, you have three spells that you may use. The first to be marked by the other loses. Credit for today¡¯s class will be assigned by number of successful duels.¡±


    ¡°Heartless, isn¡¯t he?¡± Lyon asked, sauntering over to Syl¡¯s side. ¡°I get shot at, and I still have to go to class?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m glad you¡¯re alright, Lyon,¡± Syl said without looking up at him. ¡°Don¡¯t you have an assigned partner?¡±


    ¡°Yep, but he¡¯s taking his sweet time. I wanted to thank you personally. I might¡¯ve been fine, but then again, you never know. It¡¯s a good day to not be shot in the skull.¡±


    ¡°As most days are,¡± Syl replied drily. ¡°It¡¯s not a problem. Keep an eye out for yourself.¡±


    ¡°Will do. Now, if you¡¯ll excuse me.¡±


    Syl had to wait a while for his name to be called, though not as long as he¡¯d expected. Since his practical scores were at the bottom of the barrel, he¡¯d thought that he would be called dead last. Instead, he was paired with a class 2 girl with blue-tipped black hair and a factory-issue FCD in a tablet configuration strapped to her arm.


    When he asked Adams, the professor just stared at him. ¡°Do you think I can watch something like that and unleash you on some poor unsuspecting class 3?¡±


    That was fair, though it also told Syl he should be a bit more circumspect about his power.


    ¡°Liabell, but I go by Lia,¡± she said, extending her off hand.


    ¡°Syl,¡± he replied, shaking the offered hand and looking her over briefly.


    Above average height for a baseline woman, but just about average for a gene-edited one. Flux flow was normal, and being class 2 despite bearing no family¡¯s emblem meant she was certainly naturally talented, but she didn¡¯t seem comfortable at all with the FCD she was using. Combined with the definition in her arms and her micromovements, he could take a guess as to her typical role.


    ¡°Heavy melee fighter?¡± he asked. ¡°Kenjutsu, aegis, fulminata, that kind of deal?¡±


    Lia startled at that. ¡°You can tell?¡±


    ¡°You carry yourself like one. Every step you take feels measured to modulate the distance between us, and you have the build of someone who¡¯s trained martially. You¡¯re clearly not as familiar with that FCD, which leads me to believe your usual casting device isn¡¯t this one.¡±


    ¡°Oh, wow,¡± she said. ¡°You really know your stuff, huh? Yeah, I usually use a sword, but it¡¯s way to big to take to a friendly duel. I know my way around a standard FCD, though. Looks like you do too.¡±


    She fingered the class emblem on her uniform unconsciously, as if reminding herself where she was.


    ¡°You know, you¡¯re really intelligent,¡± Lia blurted, unprompted. ¡°Why are you in class 3?¡±


    Syl shrugged. ¡°You¡¯re about to find out, I¡¯d guess. Is here good?¡±


    Lia looked around, confirming that they¡¯d found a relatively empty area. ¡°Sure.¡±


    With just three basic spells, one of which was an offensive spell that inflicted little more damage than a light shock and obvious coloration, there were a startling amount of ways to win duels. On the other hand, Syl didn¡¯t want to break any of Lia¡¯s bones with his fists, nor did he want to accidentally kill her by overcharging Flux Stream, and she was at a handicap in terms of FCD anyway.


    Besides, he had just told himself he was going to be more discreet.


    Instead of rolling over her in the fight, Syl took the time to practice his multi-process spells. That was one of the aspects he lacked thanks to his non-functional vocal cords and massive flux pool. Whereas other magicians might be able to get up to dozens of simultaneous processes, he could rarely manage more than five.


    Syl attempted to use all five at the same time, dedicating himself primarily to shields. These weren¡¯t single-process spells, though, which meant he was constantly modulating spells on and off just in order to keep them on. Instead of constantly keeping a shield spell up like Lia was, he had to flicker them on and off only when she attacked him. Syl challenged himself by trying to make his shields as small as possible while still protecting him, practicing his accuracy.


    Lia was a decent opponent. Sure enough, she was more than capable of handling a regular FCD, but she was clearly disoriented with it. Eventually, she got the hang of it, and they ended up hitting each other once each¡ªSyl¡¯s tiny shields weren¡¯t quite able to precisely block a Flux Stream that she bent midair, while her focus on offense left her open to a one-process Flux Stream that barely touched her.


    ¡°Good duel,¡± she said afterward. ¡°Just goes to show that the classes really aren¡¯t everything you think, huh?¡±


    ¡°Maybe, but you were holding back,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯d like to see what your techniques actually look like.¡±


    ¡°Only if you show me yours,¡± she said. ¡°You¡¯re not the only one who can tell experts from novices. Come to my dojo sometime. You seem interesting.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d be honored,¡± Syl said. ¡°Class is about to end. Would you like to share contact information?¡±


    He wasn¡¯t sure how genuine her offer was. If she accepted and messaged or called him, he¡¯d accept it. If it was just for face, he would have to tell her that her efforts were better directed towards a prismatic family.


    ¡°Sounds good to me,¡± Lia said, holding her FCD out. She grinned lopsidedly. ¡°See you around, genius boy.¡±


    Syl nodded. ¡°And you as well.¡±


    Day 1 and at least three people have appointments with me, he thought. Bianca might get jealous.


    Speaking of which, Uriel had wanted to get coffee with him. It would be rude of him to turn her down now.

 Chapter 7 - Coffee

    Like everything else at First, the coffee shop made good use of flux-integrated technology. There was no actual barista, the role instead taken by a factory line-like set of mechanical flux-assisted components that met any orders they made.


    ¡°Supposedly, there was a time where this,¡± Uriel said, gesturing at the coffee-making machine, ¡°was capable through electronics alone.¡±


    Syl nodded, accepting his black coffee from the machine. ¡°Lost alongside Taiwan and our ability to produce semiconductors without flux, I assume.¡±


    ¡°Just like everything else,¡± Uriel sighed, warming her hands around her drink, a pink concoction of sugar and milk that could barely be called coffee. ¡°Every now and then, I wonder what our world would have been like if we had all the technology of the world before.¡±


    ¡°Not that different, I¡¯d imagine,¡± Syl said. ¡°Flux engineering is as advanced as what we had then. Things might be different if we still had a global internet, but there are other reasons why that won¡¯t happen again.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s true,¡± Uriel said. ¡°You¡¯d know best, as an engineer. You seem to know a lot about a good deal of fields.¡±


    ¡°I try to stay updated,¡± Syl said. ¡°Engineering is what I¡¯m best at, anyway.¡±


    Uriel frowned, pausing to take a sip from her drink. ¡°Ah, I love this stuff, but it¡¯s not quite the same without real milk. I find it hard to believe that engineering is all you¡¯re good at. I watched your duel, remember?¡±


    ¡°I already told you, I didn¡¯t win that,¡± Syl said. ¡°Drew lost it.¡±


    ¡°Still, you have an undeniable talent for practical magic,¡± Uriel said. ¡°I¡¯m told you and Bianca stopped a shooting from occurring during your class.¡±


    ¡°That was mostly Bianca.¡±


    Uriel put her drink down, giving Syl a look. ¡°Are you sure about that?¡±


    ¡°I am. Seems to me that you¡¯re not.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not convinced that someone like you is only what you say you are,¡± she said.


    ¡°I won¡¯t deny that I¡¯m talented,¡± Syl said. ¡°Nor will I say that the class system is anywhere near perfect.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s what we have,¡± Uriel said automatically. From how robotic the response was, she¡¯d been through this song and dance before. ¡°There¡¯s nothing the Reserve can do about it. Decisions are made above our heads by¡ª¡°


    Syl waved a hand. ¡°I¡¯m not here to be an activist. I¡¯m telling you that I¡¯m not that much more talented than any given class 1.¡±


    ¡°Now that¡¯s the first blatant lie you¡¯ve told me,¡± Uriel interjected. ¡°In terms of natural talent, maybe. In terms of combat intelligence? No class 1 first-year would have had the combat intelligence and wherewithal to countercast Drew Violet. You have the intuition of a trained soldier.¡±


    Syl didn¡¯t flinch at her not-quite-an-accusation. ¡°Bianca has that in spades as well. We train outside of class. Take Lyon Red or one of the other combat-oriented first-years and stick them in a ring, they might manage something similar.¡±


    Uriel leaned forward over her drink, seemingly uncaring that strands of her dark blue hair were dipping into it. ¡°I don¡¯t think so.¡±


    A pre-loaded spell pattern snapped into existence, traveling up from Uriel¡¯s shoulder into her fist, and she lunged at him.


    She stopped a mere inch from his face, freezing her magic and her body just moments from hitting him.


    Syl pushed her glowing fist away with one finger, lifted his cup, and drank deeply from it.


    ¡°Projection-type A-class spell. Major Illusion. It¡¯s a lot of flux, and it¡¯s impressive that you can control it so well when it¡¯s not even your specialty, but it wouldn¡¯t have done anything to me.¡±


    Uriel rolled her eyes, falling back into her seat and blowing her hair out of her face. ¡°That¡¯s exactly what I¡¯m talking about. You read that spell pattern while I was throwing a punch at you and didn¡¯t even blink. Hell, almost nobody in Reserve can do that, let alone year one. Look, Syl¡ªhonestly, I think it¡¯s fantastic that you¡¯re doing what you are. Have you looked into the tournament circuits?¡±


    ¡°Is that what you asked me here for?¡± Syl asked. ¡°Bianca wanted to take a look when she was looking for extracurriculars, but they didn¡¯t want anything to do with class 3s.¡±


    ¡°That can be fixed,¡± Uriel said. ¡°A good chunk of class 1 and some of class 2 participate, and the Reserve joins in for certain events as well. There are a number of intra-academy tournaments that feed into the National Circuit.¡±


    ¡°That, I do know about,¡± Syl said. ¡°Competitive dueling, Gate-breaking, and Tower climbing. Non-combat roles.¡±


    ¡°But very suited for someone specialized like you are,¡± Uriel said, tapping her leg under the table. ¡°Some of our country¡¯s foremost engineers are also National Circuit competitors. It gives power and resources in a way that just being Reserve or even achieving leadership on the front lines doesn¡¯t.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s also meant for people who are good at casting, which I¡¯m not,¡± Syl pointed out. ¡°I would also draw unwanted attention as the only class 3 on First¡¯s team, which wouldn¡¯t be helped by the very real fact that I waould be strong-armed on.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t seem to be concerned by what people think of you,¡± Uriel said. She batted her eyelashes at him in what was presumably supposed to be a flirtatious manner, taking another long sip. ¡°And you don¡¯t react to people the same way someone of your age would.¡±


    ¡°Then you have the wrong impression of me,¡± Syl said. He drained the rest of his coffee. It was just the right richness, helped along by the flux still maintaining the temperature and conditions of the liquid at exactly what it needed to be after coming out of the machine. ¡°I do care. I¡¯m just better at not showing it.¡±


    Being on the circuit team would be a subpar idea in terms of keeping his power hidden, which made it a generally poor idea. Syl stood, ready to thank Uriel for the offer and decline it.


    ¡°Bianca is also joining,¡± Uriel said. ¡°She confirmed it with me earlier. With her scores, there¡¯s no doubt she¡¯ll be able to pass the entry requirements.¡±


    Syl stopped short, sitting back down.


    Her eyes twinkled. ¡°There it is. I knew you couldn¡¯t be that stoic about everything.¡±


    Syl sighed. ¡°Of course Bianca would want to get involved. I suppose I¡¯ll have to join either way, then. She won¡¯t take anyone else as her engineer.¡±


    ¡°Fantastic!¡± Uriel clapped her hands together. ¡°I hope you¡¯ll be there next week, then?¡±


    ¡°What?¡±


    ¡°Didn¡¯t you know? I¡¯m the student head of our circuit team.¡±


    ¡°¡­Of course you are.¡±


    She beamed at him.The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    ¡°Ah,¡± Syl said, remembering the reason why he¡¯d come here in the first place. ¡°About the gunmen.¡±


    Uriel¡¯s expression grew serious. ¡°Of course. I assure you, that shouldn¡¯t be a concern in the future. The Reserve¡¯s security¡ª¡°


    ¡°Save the excuses for someone that¡¯ll be satisfied by them,¡± Syl said.


    The Reserve officer winced. ¡°That¡¯s fair. We experience this kind of event from time to time, but fatalities are usually avoided.¡±


    ¡°Do you know who it was?¡± Syl asked. ¡°It was a targeted hit on Lyon Red, but I don¡¯t think he was the only target. There was at least one other shooter who got out without their gun being detected.¡±


    ¡°I have a number of guesses,¡± Uriel hedged. ¡°There are a good number of groups that would pay good money to see a member of a prismatic family dead.¡±


    ¡°Do your guesses include the Red family themselves?¡± Syl suggested, only half-joking. ¡°They have a history of not being the kindest to members of their family they consider to have failed.¡±


    Uriel tensed. ¡°That¡¯s dangerous talk, Syl. I don¡¯t mind, but it¡¯d be best if you avoided it around the Reds.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m well aware,¡± Syl said. ¡°Besides, this isn¡¯t their usual method. If I had to guess¡­anti-academy group Sanguine?¡±


    If she¡¯d been tense before, that went double now. ¡°How do you know that name? That information is¡ª¡±


    ¡°Classified,¡± Syl finished. ¡°Behind weak security. It just takes a bit of effort to get past that. If the prismatics and Auria itself wanted it to be more secure, they would have used more protection. Besides, Sanguine is only a moderate threat. They have, what, a few tactical-class magicians? One or two masters?¡±


    Though there were more specific delineations of power within the ranks, they were broadly described as the letter tier¡ªF through A¡ªand then the titled tier, more formally known as ¡°the only kind of magic that can win wars.¡± That was composed of tactical, master, strategic, and finally paragon.


    ¡°One or two masters is more than a lot of groups can manage,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Out of everyone in the reserve, we only have five.¡±


    ¡°You, Waylan, Jennifer, and who else?¡± Syl asked, counting off the names he remembered from seeing them before.


    ¡°How did you¡ªI shouldn¡¯t be surprised by this anymore. Anyway, yes, Sanguine is our current leading theory for the event. We can¡¯t confirm anything yet, but the Reserve, at least, is moving them up the threat list.¡±


    ¡°The Reserve,¡± Syl said. ¡°Not the police or the military. You function as your own isolated unit.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s not a question, but yes. We serve the Aurian military, but for campus purposes, we do our best to resolve issues internally before involving the government.¡±


    ¡°Then I¡¯ve got a request for you,¡± Syl said. ¡°In return for having me join the circuit team.¡±


    ¡°Oh?¡± Uriel raised an eyebrow. ¡°I was under the impression this would be a favor to you.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s more for you than it is for me,¡± Syl replied. ¡°I wouldn¡¯t even consider it without Bianca being there. You¡¯re good at keeping a consistent facade, but you do have tells. If you want to see more of my magic, you¡¯re going to have to make concessions.¡±


    ¡°Tells, hmm?¡± She leaned closer to him, giving him a close-up view of the flux pattern in her eyes. ¡°You¡¯ll have to explain that to me. After you tell me about these concessions, of course.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s simple,¡± Syl said, once again ignoring her attempt to distract him. ¡°Keep me informed. Don¡¯t tell me the same half-truths the student body gets. If Sanguine or one of the other militant groups starts getting active on campus, I want to know. If the Reserve takes action, I want to know.¡±


    ¡°It sounds like you¡¯d want to be there,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Bold, from someone who was just telling me he wouldn¡¯t be talented enough to be in in circuit.¡±


    ¡°I never said that. I can handle myself just fine in a battlefield. I don¡¯t expect anything more than information, anyway.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll need to see proof that you¡¯re capable of surviving first,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Come to the trials this weekend, and we¡¯ll talk about this more.¡±


    ¡°Acceptable,¡± Syl said. ¡°Thank you for the coffee.¡±


    ¡°You paid for both of us,¡± Uriel said drily.


    ¡°See you tomorrow,¡± Syl said, already leaving.


    #


    After the excitement of the first day, whoever had ordered the initial attack seemed to decide that it was better to leave it alone. No further shots were fired during any of the classes Syl was in, at least.


    The theory classes proved to be wholly uninteresting. After getting embarrassed by him on the first day, the class 2 student professor had decided to act like he didn¡¯t exist entirely, which was completely fine by him.


    His magical engineering class, on the other hand, did provide something of value. Since most magicians at First were going on combat tracks, there were few enough on the engineering track that even a class 3 like him was able to get into the class, though there had been a bit of a waitlist. He suspected that Uriel might have had something to do with his presence here now, but he wasn¡¯t complaining.


    Creation was where his interests truly lay. He was a combat magician by necessity and by design, but it had always been the idea of magic as a tool to fix, not destroy, that had captivated him. Maybe that was just a constant amongst humans¡ªwanting what they couldn¡¯t have.


    FENG 301¡ªFlux Engineering and Energy Production¡ªwas a workshop-style class that had a total of thirty students in it. The actual principles that the professor spoke about were ones that Syl already understood more thoroughly than the professor himself, but the resources were top-notch, and they offered significantly more lab equipment than he had at his current residence. Sure, if he went on site into Incarnate halfway across the country, he could find material that was roughly equivalent, but he didn¡¯t quite have the liberty to do that at the moment.


    It was the fourth day of engineering class, and Syl had chosen to ignore the ongoing lecture to focus on his current project. He¡¯d started designs for this during the last assignment he¡¯d been on, but by the time he¡¯d had the time to get working on it, he¡¯d lost access to the resources necessary to.


    ¡°Mister Auria,¡± Professor Lyle, an older tactical-class magician, said warningly. He¡¯d finished up with the lecture and was now circling the class, pointing out beginner mistakes in projects. Most everyone was working on a basic FCD mod, but Syl had wholly ignored it in favor of his project. ¡°What exactly are you working on?¡±


    Syl looked up, maintaining his hold on the single-process Shield and Vacuum spells that were currently making it possible to cold weld his flux device. ¡°Disposable FCD. Those already exist in some cases if you stretch the definition of the term. Most modern hand grenades, for instance¡ª¡°


    ¡°Have an isolated magical component, yes,¡± Lyle said. ¡°Your assignment was not to build a hand grenade.¡±


    ¡°No, it was to make an FCD overcharge battery,¡± Syl recited. ¡°A simple flux container that can inject further mana into a given spell to increase its power without damaging the device.¡±


    ¡°Very good,¡± the professor said. ¡°But that is not what you¡¯re creating.¡±


    ¡°Finished it before you started the lecture,¡± Syl said, taking his second FCD off and sliding it over to the professor. ¡°Would you mind letting me work here? I¡¯m trying to make a one-use FCD that doesn¡¯t require a flux charge to activate. Wholly self-contained. Ideally we get to rechargeable ones eventually, but progress is measured in steps, not leaps.¡±


    Lyle clicked his tongue disapprovingly, picking up the FCD. ¡°You talk a big game, Mister Auria, but speed is the enemy of¡­ wait¡­ what?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s more efficient than a standard overcharge battery,¡± Syl said. ¡°It saps wasted flux from any spell fired in the area to recharge itself and activate more intense spells. It¡¯s a good twenty, twenty-one percent increase in spell effectiveness on average.¡±


    ¡°This is a patented Incarnate design, Mister Auria,¡± Lyle said eventually, setting it down. ¡°I don¡¯t know how you got an Incarnate FCD, let alone a custom one, but I can¡¯t let you use it for this assignment. Furthermore, your design is theoretically impossible to make with a full lab, let alone on person.¡±


    I know the theory here better than you, Syl thought. Instead of saying that, he said, ¡°Both of my FCDs have the overcharge batteries already, but I¡¯m more than willing to make a second one. May I borrow one of yours?¡±


    ¡°I have backups for this case,¡± Lyle said, shaking his head and drawing a tablet-style FCD from inside his coat. ¡°All you need to do is ask, Mister Auria. Be honest with your assignments.¡±


    ¡°Is this one of your old ones?¡± Syl asked. ¡°It¡¯s used. Don¡¯t bother answering that. Give me twenty minutes or so.¡±


    The professor laughed out loud at that, drawing the eyes of everyone in the class. ¡°Kid, if you can make even a regular overcharge battery in less than half an hour, I¡¯ll let you teach the class.¡±


    ¡°Sure,¡± Syl said. ¡°Let me set a timer.¡±


    Lyle crossed his arms, looking down on Syl¡¯s well-organized lab table with a haughty, unimpressed look.


    That look slowly slipped off his face as Syl¡¯s hands worked with blinding speed, using magic in combination with tools and flux wiring to construct the most basic Incarnate overcharge battery he could make.


    ¡°Twenty-two minutes, thirty-seven seconds,¡± Syl said eventually, passing the FCD back. ¡°A bit more than I expected.¡±


    He went back to his personal project, noting with some irritation that he¡¯d dropped both spells facilitating it during the process of enhancing the test FCD.


    That irritation was mostly wiped away by the look of sheer gobsmacked awe on Professor Lyle¡¯s face.


    ¡°Excuse me, Professor,¡± Syl said politely. ¡°If you don¡¯t mind, I¡¯m going to continue working now.¡±


    A silent buzz from his FCD informed him that he¡¯d gotten a message. While the professor was busy losing his mind, Syl opened it.


    [RANK HIDDEN] [IDENTITY HIDDEN]: Informant points to a attack on First Academy within the next month from Sanguine. Almost certainly targeting the princess.


    Syl frowned, typing a quick response back.


    [RANK HIDDEN] Syl: Not going to preempt this?


    [RANK HIDDEN] [IDENTITY HIDDEN]: They have cards up their sleeve. This will be the best time for them to play them early. Keep Bianca safe. Handle what you can. The Reserve already knows.


    [RANK HIDDEN] Syl: Do they know about Bianca?


    [RANK HIDDEN] [IDENTITY HIDDEN]: No. Do not compromise your mission. That is all.


    Syl frowned as the messages hid themselves, then shrugged, returning to his FCD.


    There¡¯s nothing I can do for the time being. I¡¯ll cross that bridge when I get to it.

 Chapter 8 - Engineering

    ¡°Have you heard about the new Gate opening up?¡± Bianca asked Syl.


    Classes were out for the day, which meant the two of them were headed home now. To keep up appearances, they took public transportation, which was heavily monitored enough that the chances of someone taking action against the princess were near zero. That chance was further decreased by the fact that the bulk of students took similar paths out. Only prismatics and very rich families had the luxury to use private drivers, and even class 1s tended to take the trains back.


    That meant that this particular rumor had spread like wildfire.


    ¡°It¡¯s hard not to,¡± Syl replied. ¡°Upper C-class, right?¡±


    ¡°Yes. It won¡¯t even be that far from the academy,¡± Bianca said. ¡°One of my professors is talking about a practical excursion.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a class 1 course for you,¡± Syl said. ¡°This early in the semester? All freshmen?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a history class,¡± she replied. ¡°I¡¯m sure it¡¯s not the only one that¡¯ll go, too. The professors are either Graduate Reserve or already tactical-class or higher level magicians. It shouldn¡¯t be a problem.¡±


    Syl thought back to the warning he¡¯d been given earlier that day. There were a number of chokepoints where he could expect enemy action¡ªthe Tournament Circuit tryouts, for instance, were sure to be a somewhat exposed period with a number of high-value targets. This was another one of them.


    He had given Bianca a brief warning about it, but Syl didn¡¯t trust the academy network enough to send anything further. His own incoming line was heavily encrypted, but intra-academy transmissions were almost all filtered through the academy network. Also, he had no way of knowing whether someone would be peeking over Bianca¡¯s shoulder at her FCD, so he¡¯d avoided any real details.


    Still, he was sure she knew enough for his concerns to come through.


    ¡°The group that attacked our first day of practical magic is still active,¡± Syl said. ¡°If I were them, a Gate would be a perfect point to target any students.¡±


    ¡°That does sound feasible,¡± Bianca said. She made a face before Syl could tell her that she was beeing too formal again. ¡°If they¡¯re as incompetent as they were the first time, though, we should be fine.¡±


    ¡°Do you know who¡¯s going in?¡± Syl asked.


    ¡°A number of classes at different times, I believe,¡± Bianca said. ¡°The Reserve is the one that¡¯ll actually mop up the boss and close the Gate. Everyone else wants to get in practical exercise.¡±


    ¡°They want to show off what years of pre-academy training can do, you mean,¡± Syl said. ¡°The only unprepared people are going to be there so that the class 1s can demonstrate what they can do to them, but it¡¯s most likely for the sake of forming connections with professors who have actual power.¡±


    ¡°That sounds right,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I haven¡¯t had a live-fire practice in some time. A C-class Gates seems reasonably safe.¡±


    ¡°A lot of Gates seem reasonably safe,¡± Syl warned. ¡°You never know what¡¯ll happen until it does.¡±


    ¡°Then you should come with me,¡± Bianca said.


    ¡°I¡¯m not in any of your classes. How do you expect me to?¡±


    ¡°The first-year Tournament Circuit team is going to go,¡± Bianca said. ¡°About half of the team has already been drafted, and they¡¯re planning on making an excursion. It¡¯s GR and faculty sanctioned.¡±


    ¡°When will that be?¡± Syl asked. ¡°If it¡¯s still forming, then this is good timing for them. Refresh my memory on this one. A C-class Gate takes¡­ a week? Assuming it¡¯s detected, of course.¡±


    ¡°Nine days is the average,¡± Bianca confirmed. ¡°Just in time for the new circuit team to participate.¡±


    ¡°So you¡¯re not going with your history class, then,¡± Syl guessed.


    ¡°Of course not. You¡¯re not in that one.¡±


    ¡°You make it sound like I¡¯m going to be on the circuit team with you.¡±


    ¡°Uriel told me that you¡¯re going to be applying,¡± Bianca said. ¡°You should be.¡±


    ¡°You make it sound like you already know I¡¯m going to pass.¡±


    Bianca laughed. ¡°That joke doesn¡¯t work with me, Syl. If you don¡¯t make it on, I¡¯ll know that you failed just to spite me.¡±


    ¡°I would never do that,¡± Syl said. ¡°Not when you¡¯re planning on going Gate-diving.¡±


    ¡°I knew that would convince you.¡± Bianca beamed. ¡°You were going to try not to make it, weren¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°In all honesty, I was initially planning on just doing well enough to be your engineer,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°The engineers aren¡¯t going into the Gate.¡±


    Syl sighed. ¡°That¡¯s that, then.¡±


    At length, they arrived at their station and returned home, where Syl continued what he¡¯d been working on during class. His home laboratory was limited even compared to what the academy had, but the resources were valuable.


    ¡°Still working on that pipe dream of yours?¡± Bianca asked him over his shoulder as he tinkered with an otherwise standard-looking tablet-style FCD.


    ¡°More of a pipe bomb than a dream,¡± Syl said. ¡°It would be a major step forward in magical understanding.¡±


    ¡°I still don¡¯t entirely understand what the point of this project is,¡± Bianca said.


    ¡°I¡¯ve told you before,¡± Syl said. ¡°Simple pre-programmed disposable spell activation FCDs. Current FCDs are pre-loadable, but those are customized to one user and still require careful tuning of the spell as well as both flux and mental load during activation. In essence, the only step a pre-loaded FCD skips is the initial spell process creation, and that doesn¡¯t work with more complex spells anyway.¡±


    ¡°Will meeting your target here not have the same issue of complex storage?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°As far as I can tell, the best usage you have is as a force multiplier for less talented magicians or even normals. You¡¯re not usually one for that kind of movement.¡±Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.


    ¡°I¡¯m not,¡± Syl said. ¡°It does strike me that inferior magicians could use this as a crutch, but I don¡¯t find that too disappointing. More magicians finding shortcuts might finally kick the prismatics out of stagnation. That aside, the actual use case is for myself. Many of higher-level spells that I can¡¯t use involve a number of sub-spells with individualized spell processes.¡±


    ¡°So your goal is to use portable FCDs to daisy chain for spells? More complicated FCDs can already do that.¡±


    ¡°More complicated FCDs can take the load off for one spell,¡± Syl said. ¡°My Horizon Breaker is one of those, but it can¡¯t cast anything else. Having modular spellcraft would be a game-changer for me.¡±


    ¡°If you say so,¡± Bianca said dubiously. ¡°Good luck with that.¡±


    ¡°Thank you,¡± Syl said. ¡°I understand your doubts. It¡¯s not like a generational genius like you would need it.¡±


    ¡°You flatter me,¡± the princess said. ¡°You remember why I¡¯m even still here, right?¡±


    Blood everywhere. The smell of smoke and burning flesh. A crater where there used to be a city.


    Syl winced. ¡°Unfortunately. Have you made any progress on your front?¡±


    ¡°My mother is apparently still unwilling to provide ¡®classified material¡¯ to me,¡± Bianca said unhappily. ¡°I do not know what she plans for me, though that much is expected given I can barely remember what she looks like.¡±


    ¡°Figures that even an active terrorist threat wouldn¡¯t count as enough to break the rules,¡± Syl said. ¡°We¡¯ll have to make do with the military and our own resources, then.¡±


    ¡°So we will,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I trust you.¡±


    ¡°Likewise.¡±


    #


    After the duel he¡¯d had with Syl, Drew stopped sitting together with Uriel and the rest of the Reserve leadership at lunch. Syl retained the slightest shred of respect for the prismatic graduate student for that. He was clearly unable to control himself around someone he saw as lesser, an effect that was worsened by the fact that Syl had dusted him in an actual fight, so he¡¯d removed himself instead of putting them both into an awkward situation.


    Then again, it was also possible that General Violet had made that decision. She was a pragmatic woman, which made Syl assume that she hadn¡¯t had much of a hand in Drew¡¯s life growing up given how different they were. She recognized Syl¡¯s potential as a student, even if she had no suspicion as to his true identity, and she¡¯d known that sending him and Drew on a collision course was a bad idea.


    The side effect of that was that there was one less annoying voice at lunch, which Syl couldn¡¯t complain about.


    ¡°Your FCD is an interesting one, Auria,¡± Jennifer said, adjusting her glasses. She was an eighth-year engineer, and she¡¯d seemed somewhat ambivalent on him from the start. Him still being here and Drew being gone had raised Syl¡¯s value in her eyes, though, which meant she was taking him seriously now. ¡°Not one you see a new student using often, let alone a class 3.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯d appreciate if you used my name,¡± Syl said politely. ¡°I prefer Syl, but Sylvester works if you find that too informal. I share my last name with every other war orphan, and I¡¯m sure they like being reminded of their loss as much as I do.¡±


    ¡°My apologies, Sylvester,¡± the engineer said. ¡°As I was saying. Your FCD.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s an Incarnate,¡± Waylan said. ¡°I¡¯ve seen some similar models in the dueling circuit. They¡¯re a nightmare to go up against.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a relatively basic model,¡± Syl said. ¡°This one doesn¡¯t have much beyond good flexibility, capacity, and the standard overcharge capture battery.¡±


    ¡°Basic is underselling things when it comes to Incarnate,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°I¡¯ve had the pleasure of working with a member of their teams once or twice, and the magical research they¡¯re doing is nothing short of consistently groundbreaking. Which makes me curious as to how a first-year ends up with one.¡±


    ¡°Isn¡¯t yours similar?¡± Syl asked, gesturing at the tablet sitting next to her.


    Jennifer¡¯s FCD wasn¡¯t very suited for dueling, but it suited her well as an engineer. Syl had recognized the design when she¡¯d taken it out today.


    ¡°This is a modified Incarnate that I got in exchange for my assistance on that one issue,¡± she said. ¡°As futile as it was. It works perfectly for my purposes. It has higher efficiency and quicker response times for adjusting magical tech than anything on the market, and its additional features go above and beyond even the Reserve¡¯s technology.¡±


    ¡°Futile?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°What were you working on?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s classified.¡±


    Syl sighed. ¡°Maybe to some students. It¡¯s not. Free casting, was it? One of the unsolved conjectures of magic?¡±


    The engineer startled. ¡°What? How do you know that?¡±


    ¡°How do you know that?¡± Uriel asked, eyeing him critically.


    ¡°That FCD,¡± Syl said. ¡°It¡¯s calibrated for your purposes, yes, but it¡¯s got an edge to it meant specifically for creating unconstrained magical processes. That isn¡¯t something that you would be doing if you were working on regular magitech, since an unconstrained process has no use in a regular spell process. Since you mentioned groundbreaking research, it can really only be that. Free casting is the only thing I can think of that would use that in any sense.¡±


    ¡°You can tell what an FCD specializes in just from looking at it?¡± Ashley, the sixth-year MP said. ¡°I don¡¯t know anyone who can do that.¡±


    ¡°I can do it with my glasses off,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Sylvester doesn¡¯t have severe flux sensitivity, though. Unless I¡¯m missing something.¡±


    ¡°I do not,¡± Syl confirmed.


    ¡°I¡¯m a little behind here,¡± Waylan said. ¡°Someone catch me up?¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t know about the fundamental unsolved conjectures?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°Aren¡¯t you a sixth-year?¡±


    Waylan scratched his neck sheepishly. ¡°I¡¯m a duelist and a battle magician, not a theorist. I didn¡¯t pay much attention in those classes.¡±


    ¡°A set of six unsolved problems that demonstrate humanity¡¯s lack of full understanding about the magical arts,¡± Uriel recited. ¡°Free casting, the one the engineers are talking about, is one of them. Early on, certain magicians were capable of using magic without an FCD at all, and there are some who still manifest magical phenomenae without using a device.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s unreliable, though, and not usable in the same way modern magic is,¡± Syl said. ¡°Obviously, FCDs are one of many chokepoints in magic. Finding a way to use certain types of spells without having to rely on a device that can break, be sabotaged, or fall victim to human error would be a game changer.¡±


    ¡°Does sound like it,¡± Waylan said. ¡°I¡¯m sure Auria would love that.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure they would use it for the best,¡± Syl said.


    Enough corpses to make a mountain out of. Bodies repurposed as bombs. Parents burying their children before being buried themselves.


    Syl didn¡¯t let his facade slip.


    ¡°We weren¡¯t the only ones working on it,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°There¡¯s a lot of people who would kill to know how to free cast.¡±


    ¡°Why not just engrave the activation and spell processes into the air?¡± Waylan asked. ¡°FCDs just handle some of the load for you, right?¡±


    ¡°They tried that in England last year,¡± Syl said. ¡°Pretty large experiment. Used a paragon-class mage for it and everything.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re very up to date on magical theory,¡± Jennifer said approvingly. ¡°Yes. Their approach was simpler than ours, but it didn¡¯t work. The amount of calculations an FCD performs in a nanosecond outstrips what a human can do in hours. The level of precision required to manually shape flux into not only a spell process but also a proper activation one is simply too high. I believe they managed to get the start and stop processes for a simple movement spell to activate, but it was too unstable to activate.¡±


    ¡°Their process was flawed,¡± Syl said. ¡°Free casting has two primary theory branches¡ªcasting magic that a magician¡¯s body is already attuned to and casting a pre-defined spell. They took the worst of both. No human will ever execute a computer program better than a human would. Anyone working on the latter should know that, but their experiment seems to not have taken that into account.¡±


    ¡°You seem to really know your stuff,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°I suppose I shouldn¡¯t be surprised, since you clearly have a connection at Incarnate. Let them know I send my best, if they still remember me.¡±


    ¡°You want to work there someday?¡± Bianca asked.


    ¡°Of course I do, Jennifer said, almost sounding affronted. ¡°They¡¯re one of a very few organizations actively pushing for the betterment of the world instead of just finding more ways to kill people with spells. I¡¯m an engineer, not a warrior, and anywhere else, my ideals aren¡¯t much more than empty words, but at Incarnate? There, I could make a difference.¡±


    That actually warmed Syl¡¯s heart. He hadn¡¯t liked the other engineer much at first, but she was growing on him. Jennifer was very genuine in her passion for this. Whether or not that translated to her actual engineering was a different thing, but there was plenty of time to see to that.


    ¡°I¡¯ll make sure the sentiment is passed along,¡± Syl said. ¡°Maybe it¡¯ll reach the ears of their leader.¡±


    It will, he thought as Bianca gave him a knowing smile. It already has.

 Chapter 9 - Breaking New Ground

    Tryouts for the school Tournament Circuit team were to take place in two days, which meant that Syl had a free weekend for once.


    It was probable that Sanguine was going to be setting up for whatever raid they planned on making in the coming week, but without proper intelligence on where their local headquarters were, Syl couldn¡¯t act on that.


    The group hadn¡¯t been that big a threat in his mind until recently. Sanguine had originally been a multinational group with the stated purpose of eliminating the magician-first status quo. That group had rapidly disintegrated around 40 AFI when mass-produced FCD technology had been disseminated to the masses. Even non-magicians had enough of a mana pool to make use of certain kinds of magic, and with one of their primary goals achieved, Sanguine had splintered into pieces, each of them trying to use the group¡¯s resources for their own means.


    This current iteration in Auria was a distant descendant of one of those splinters. The ¡°main¡± Sanguine group was in Seaboard, the country that had emerged from what had been southeastern North America, and it had little to no affiliation with the one in Auria. The stated goal of this particular group was to dismantle the academy system, which they claimed placed too great a focus on a certain subset of magicians and not enough on merit.


    Which, Syl knew, was mostly untrue. As far as his intelligence had made him aware, the group was mostly a glorified magician gang. They stole equipment, occasionally abducted magicians, and committed murders from time to time, but they were largely little more than a nuisance. A nuisance with access to stolen magic jamming and FCD disruption equipment, yes, but they hadn¡¯t done much with it until now.


    Their current target was the princess, and that could not be tolerated.


    That said, it would do Syl little good to muse on that now. For the time being, he had magic to experiment with.


    With his current assignment and schedule, he didn¡¯t have an open window to go to the primary Incarnate laboratory for almost another month, but he had an encrypted line to his device there that allowed for transportation of research notes between locations.


    Syl had reached a wall with his disposable FCD project. Though he had gained new insights while working here, it would take time and more precise tools than what he had available as a first-year class 3 at the academy to make more progress. He sent his notes over to the primary research team, then checked to see what else they¡¯d looked at.


    One particular file caught his attention.


    Fundamental Unsolved Conjecture 3 ¡ª Zero¡¯s Conjecture of Free Casting.


    Syl had done some cursory work on that, but he¡¯d never formalized much of his research. Many of the conditions that made limited free casting possible for him weren¡¯t replicable amongst others, and putting down what he could do in writing was more dangerous for him than it was beneficial to the outside world.


    After his conversation with Jennifer, though, he was considering it again.


    Zero¡¯s Conjecture was named after a man codenamed Zero, a paragon-class mage considered to be the first confirmed emergence of a particular set of otherwise unrelated powerful mages once known as the Power Seven and now simply called the Seven Sinners.


    He was long dead, one of the many casualties of World War III, but when he¡¯d been alive, he had been a true free caster. Though the conjecture hadn¡¯t been made by him, Zero was the epitome of a type of magician that humanity had been trying to recreate since. He¡¯d been capable of clearing gates without so much as a tablet or a wand. On more than one occasion, he¡¯d been witnessed performing acts of great, complex large-scale magic that shouldn¡¯t have been possible even with a regular FCD.


    Syl had always found the story fascinating but hard to believe. Propaganda was at an all time high, and when half the currently functioning nations in the world had ¡°confirmed¡± that Zero had originally come from their country, it was no great step to assume that some of the stories had been exaggerated.


    His personal favorite conspiracy in that respect was that Zero had been an artificial intelligence. Those had run rampant in the years after humanity had successfully suborned the majority of the Gates until things had come to a head and they¡¯d started collapsing societies. A collective human effort had sealed the bulk of them into magically trapped datacenters in Taiwan, which had promptly been glassed out of existence in the early 30s AFI. Any research on computing power that got too far had been summarily demolished.


    If an intelligence had escaped the wreckage, though, it was entirely possible it could have possessed magical abilities like nobody else could ever replicate. The AI had been making progress leaps and bounds faster than most of humanity, and there were still magical discoveries being made by those brave research teams willing to delve into the death trap that was post-destruction Taiwan.


    To most, none of that mattered anymore. Zero was dead, and his secret of free casting with him.


    Syl, however, mused on that a bit more. The biggest roadblock to spell-oriented free casting¡ªas opposed to the raw, uncontrolled free magic of early magical humanity¡ªwas that humans simply weren¡¯t equipped to do the kind of calculations that FCDs did. Syl was capable of doing so, to a certain extent, but he was a rare exception. Even then, he couldn¡¯t match the speed of a well-made FCD.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.


    Knowing the exact calculations, huh¡­


    Syl frowned. Calculations were performed to ensure that a spell worked for its given circumstances and statistics, but there were also a trillion lesser parts that an FCD calculated and recalculated each time.


    ¡°What if¡­¡± he said out loud. ¡°No, that wouldn¡¯t work. Would it?¡±


    #


    ¡°Syl,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Syl!¡±


    Syl blinked, looking up from the device he¡¯d been tinkering with.


    ¡°Syl, it¡¯s Sunday afternoon,¡± she said. ¡°Have you slept once?¡±


    He furrowed his brow, running through his memories of what he was now realizing had been several dozen hours. ¡°A couple hours, I think.¡±


    The princess sighed in exasperation. ¡°You¡¯re not a robot, Syl.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m also not as reliant on biological functions as most people,¡± he pointed out. ¡°My body¡¯s broken in useful ways.¡±


    ¡°That doesn¡¯t mean you get to kill yourself working on this,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Come on. Out. You¡¯re going to eat, and then you¡¯re going to sleep.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s¡­ four in the afternoon,¡± Syl said, pausing a second to take a look at the time in the display his FCD presented. ¡°I was just about done anyway. I can sleep later, but a meal would be good right about now.¡±


    ¡°Honestly,¡± Bianca said. ¡°You need to take better care of yourself.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s what I have you for,¡± Syl said. ¡°Like remoras and sharks.¡±


    ¡°You have too much of a passion for extinct species,¡± Bianca said. ¡°That was almost romantic, then you had to go and ruin it. Am I the shark in this analogy, or are you?¡±


    ¡°Does it matter?¡± Syl asked. He got up, exiting the workspace he¡¯d constructed for himself. ¡°You already cooked. It smells good.¡±


    The air was rich with the scent of spices and meat, the real kind that you could only get at the store once every other week. Even Syl, who was normally fine subsisting on nutrition bars and water, had to admit the aroma made his stomach growl.


    ¡°Of course it does,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I think I¡¯m the remora, by the by. It¡¯s you protecting me, after all.¡±


    ¡°Protecting is a strong word,¡± Syl said. ¡°Working alongside, maybe.¡±


    She waved a hand dismissively. ¡°Come and eat. You can tell me what you¡¯ve been working on in the meantime.¡±


    Food was a spicy beef noodle stew with egg and savory vegetables paired with fluffy fresh-baked bread. It smelled heavenly, and it tasted even better. Syl didn¡¯t say much as he devoured the generous serving on his plate.


    ¡°What¡¯s the occasion?¡± he asked eventually. ¡°We¡¯re supposed to be undercover. Procuring this many luxurious ingredients is rare even amongst the wealthy.¡±


    ¡°It was a good harvest month, apparently,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Our first week of class is over. I believed some celebration was in order. Was I mistaken?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Syl said appreciatively. ¡°You were not.¡±


    ¡°Also, you hadn¡¯t eaten in two days.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s also fair.¡±


    ¡°Enough about that,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Every time you get into one of these engineering fugues, it is for the purpose of something significant. What is it this time? Did you make an FCD to outstrip Horizon Breaker?¡±


    Syl laughed. ¡°In here? Absolutely not. I did make good progress on the project. Would you mind holding onto my FCDs for a moment?¡±


    Bianca looked momentarily confused at that. To a magician, an FCD was everything. Most lived, ate, and slept with their FCD either equipped to them or within arm¡¯s reach. To casually hand one over was not just a display of immense trust but also potentially suicidally idiotic.


    Her expression softened as she clocked the former part of that statement, and she smiled. ¡°Of course.¡±


    Syl unclipped his two primary FCDs, both the one that he primarily used for class and the one that carried quite a bit more firepower in its pre-loaded spell, and handed them off to Bianca.


    ¡°Step away a bit?¡± he requested. ¡°This is my first time trying the latest version, so there¡¯s still going to be a fair few bugs to work out.¡±


    Bianca acquiesced, eyeing him with curiosity.


    Careful to not accidentally knock over any of the furniture they had gone to great pains to set up normally, Syl got to his feet.


    Mentally, he settled on a specific configuration, then acted. Flux gathered around his body, emerging from his body as he willed it out. Instead of an FCD assisting him with crafting the spell, he simply wrote magic onto the air.


    Activate. Process zero.


    Start - modulate (speed, up). Process one and two.


    Modulate (body, subprocess i3). Process three.


    Modulate (speed, up). Process two, recycled.


    Modulate (speed, down, harsh). Process one, canceling process two at the same time.


    Stop. Process three now, ending the body enhancement.


    Activate, end. Process zero, the activation sequence, finishing the spell.


    All of that done within zero point six seconds created Syl¡¯s favorite C-rank spell Flash Step.


    He blurred forward, abruptly stopping some six meters in front of where he¡¯d started. Syl stumbled as he landed hard, his feet having appeared about half a metere off the ground, but the spell had worked.


    Syl wasn¡¯t usually one to celebrate his victories, but he did allow himself a clenched fist and a quiet whoop.


    ¡°That¡¯s incredible!¡± Bianca exclaimed, observing him. ¡°That was free casting, wasn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°Almost,¡± Syl said. ¡°It does some of what free casting wants. The only way to interfere with that spell is to target the flux pattern itself, which is orders of magnitude harder than just disrupting the FCD.¡±


    ¡°How did you do it?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°Like you said, the calculations are too complex even in a simple Flash Step to manage with a human brain.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t use a human brain,¡± Syl said. ¡°I recorded the exact statistics of several dozen different Flash Steps and identified which parts of the spell could be eliminated from recalculation. For those that couldn¡¯t¡ªlooking at environment, terrain, and the like¡ªI took common use cases and created spell processes that would match those exactly.¡±


    ¡°How did you cast those?¡± Contrary to her duelist-like demeanor, the princess was also a flux scholar, and she seemed entranced by the spell he¡¯d just used. ¡°The problem isn¡¯t just in finding the spell process you need to use. It¡¯s also in casting.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s where the tricky part comes in,¡± Syl said. ¡°It¡¯s also why this isn¡¯t a generational breakthrough. It¡¯s a workaround. I used FCD technology to implant the exact magical processes I needed into my mind. It¡¯s still a struggle to shape the magic, but with a blueprint, it¡¯s much easier.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s genius,¡± Bianca gasped. She stopped, frowning. ¡°Auria may not like that, though.¡±


    ¡°I should stress that this isn¡¯t free casting,¡± Syl said. ¡°Not true free casting, at least. The process needs to be repeated for any spell I want to cast this way. It¡¯s slow, and if I encounter a situation where one of the pre-prepared spell processes isn¡¯t working, it won¡¯t work at all.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s still a major leap forward,¡± she argued. ¡°You should be proud of what you¡¯ve done.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t worry,¡± Syl grinned. ¡°I am.¡±


    Sanguine weren¡¯t going to have any idea what hit them.

 Chapter 10 - Tryout

    Intro to Spell Theory was still about basic casting principles today. It was all review content even for the less well-educated students in the class, but there would always be one or two people for who this would be helpful review for.


    Alexis Lance, the graduate student running the class, did not seem particularly enthused about this particular part of the topic.


    ¡°Vocal components are a key part of spellcasting,¡± she recited, not bothering to look at the slides projected on the screen. ¡°Does someone want to tell me why?¡±


    Lance made direct eye contact with Syl there, as if challenging him to speak up. He wasn¡¯t sure why she was singling him out. After establishing that he was well aware of magic principles on the first day, he hadn¡¯t spoken up in class at all. He¡¯d done the work properly and had been a fairly decent student otherwise.


    Maybe her ego was still hurt.


    She looked over to where someone else had raised his hand, rolled her eyes, and pointed at him. ¡°You. I forget your name.¡±


    ¡°Jackson,¡± the class 3 boy said. Syl had seen him and marked him as a potential threat early on. Though his FCDs were standard and his magic seemed to be on the weaker end, Jackson had some level of combat ability and was from a mostly unnotable family, which meant he was a potential attack vector for disenfranchised groups like Sanguine.


    ¡°Jackson, then. Explain.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s because they¡¯re command phrases to make a spell¡¯s components complete,¡± he said. ¡°Like a spark from a lighter.¡±


    ¡°I see someone has taken high school casting,¡± Lance said drily. ¡°You are correct, but the explanation is incomplete. Magical command phrases are often phonemes in languages that don¡¯t exist, but they also resemble real words or phrases occasionally. The reason for this lies in how spells are actually formed. The shape of a spell is greatly affected by the magician that casts it. You will notice that magicians who lose and replace limbs tend to change their method of casting, because the body matters when it comes to flux. Certain phonemes stress the vocal cords in ways that are particularly conducive to the effects of certain spells, accelerating the casting process or enhancing the spell.¡±


    That was an apt explanation. It was also what frustrated Syl the most about his own casting. He had always been forced to keep a careful eye out for every detail. Vocal casting was less precise than what he could manage, but it was fast.


    ¡°As a practical example, I am going to cast the F-class spell Glimmer Spark,¡± Lance said. ¡°If you have sensitivity to light¡­ then you probably shouldn¡¯t be in this class. See the doctor about it.¡±


    She held her wand-style FCD out, and the class watched with expressions ranging from idle curiosity to sleepy boredom to perfect focus as flux circles formed around the FCD one by one, representing the start, modulate, and stop parts of the spell. Unlike Syl, she didn¡¯t craft them on the fly, instead opting to create the activation process last.


    A brief shower of harmless blue sparks blew out from the tip of the FCD, lighting up the classroom for a moment before fading into nothing.


    ¡°From start to finish, that was about six seconds,¡± Lance said. ¡°Obviously, I slowed down for your benefit, but you can see the difference in concentration required compared to this¡ªaux flage.¡±


    At her snapped incantation, the spell circles formed seamlessly, and the exact same spell flashed out immediately.


    Syl was above jealousy for something as simple as this. He¡¯d grown used to his lot in life a long time ago now.


    Still, it was a reminder of what had been taken from him.


    ¡°There¡¯s not much more material for today, so I guess we¡¯re doing an exercise,¡± Lance said. She tapped something on the screen up front, and displays flashed into existence at everyone¡¯s desks. ¡°There are a list of F to D-class spells in front of you. Try each of them with and without vocal components. Partner up to get through them faster. Don¡¯t get in each other¡¯s way¡±


    This was what was to be expected out of an introductory spell theory class for class 3s. Even future years would suffer from some of the same issues. They were taught by dregs, students on punishment duty, and others that just didn¡¯t care that much. For later classes that were designed to shape them into magical soldiers, they would receive better instruction¡ªthough to be fair, even this lackluster teacher was doing better than most non-Academy programs would.


    Syl didn¡¯t mind. He was partnered with a long-haired class 3 boy by the name of Len Jeksen. He was a swordfighter, Syl had noted, and his FCD was a custom like so many other students here had. Somewhat abnormally, it was a sword¡¯s sheath.


    ¡°Let¡¯s go with the harder spells first,¡± Len said, all business. As was his usual, he wore his hair tied behind his back, ensuring it wouldn¡¯t get in the way of his sword. ¡°I¡¯d rather get proper practice out of this class if we¡¯re just going to be doing inane practice.¡±


    ¡°Sure,¡± Syl agreed. ¡°Finding the other classes useful?¡±


    ¡°Of course,¡± Len said, picking his way through the spell list in front of him. ¡°First offers opportunities you can¡¯t get anywhere else. Now, here we are¡ªthesq praes!¡±


    Absorption-type D-class spell, Simple Shield. It was a common spell to learn early on in one¡¯s education, and it was even more commonly used in combat upcast to a higher class. It was brute-force but simple, and simple worked when you were also managing six other spells to fight back.


    A shimmering wall of force appeared in front of Len in a half-dome, and he nodded with apparent satisfaction.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.


    ¡°It could still use some work,¡± he muttered to himself.


    ¡°It¡¯s a solid cast,¡± Syl offered.


    ¡°Not solid enough to get me out of this class,¡± Len said. ¡°No offense, of course.¡±


    ¡°None taken. There¡¯s a second part, yes?¡±


    ¡°Right. Here we go¡­¡± It took a much longer time for the swordsman to cast without a vocal component, but he managed in about ten seconds. A bead of sweat slid down Len¡¯s forehead as the second shield popped into existence. ¡°Ugh, that feels wrong.¡±


    Then it was Syl¡¯s turn. Not wanting to expose too much of his bag of tricks while in a relatively pointless class, he took his explicitly non-verbal cast nice and slow. Even then, it was hard to intentionally throw a D-class spell to the extent of taking nearly as long as Len had. Syl had gotten so used to casting like this that even intentionally slowing it down took it only to three point six seconds.


    ¡°Wow,¡± Len said. ¡°You cast really fast non-verbally.¡±


    ¡°I have practice,¡± Syl said. ¡°You do martial arts, right?¡±


    ¡°You can tell?¡±


    Syl pointed at Len¡¯s sheath.


    ¡°Fair. Yes, I do. I practice fulminata. You might know my sister, Lia? She does the same, just better.¡±


    Syl did recall that name. ¡°I was partnered with her in practical magic, I think. We chatted some.¡±


    ¡°I imagine she invited you to our dojo already, but I¡¯ll extend that offer too,¡± Len said. ¡°You¡¯re an interesting fellow.¡±


    ¡°All this from one spell?¡± Syl asked, shaking his head. ¡°Let me try the second part of this, at least. I might change your mind. Thesq praes!¡±


    The pronunciation felt off coming out of his throat, which was partly because it was. There were no vocal cords moving, just a throat-mounted FCD identifying what he wanted to say and replicating the words in the voice he should have had.


    His spell was just a hair slower than Len¡¯s vocal cast had been, but that had nothing to do with the words. No vocal casting had been involved, just smoke and mirrors and a quickened non-verbal formation. This spell was simple.


    ¡°Impressive still,¡± Len said. ¡°Do you take constructive critique?¡±


    ¡°I take all kinds,¡± Syl said drily. ¡°Most of it isn¡¯t constructive.¡±


    ¡°Your pronunciation is awful,¡± the other boy said frankly. ¡°Honestly, I think that speaks more to your flux control than anything else. I¡¯m sure if you fixed that, you¡¯d be incredible.¡±


    Syl smiled, pushing down the ghost of his past that wanted to be irritated at anything less than perfection. ¡°Thank you for the compliment. Let¡¯s keep going.¡±


    #


    The end of the school day rolled around soon enough, and with that came tryouts for the circuit team.


    Syl had never been terribly interested in sports, but he was aware enough of the tournaments to at least have a general understanding of the basic events that would be occurring. Dueling was one of the major ones, of course, but there was also a three-on-three terrain-based knockout duel, a seven-on-seven capture-the-flag style competition, and a whole host of other one-on-one contests that checked other kinds of combat competency apart from who was more effective at killing their opponent.


    Tryouts were open to most class 1s and 2s and would try to fit people into the optimal event for them. There were very few class 3s, but there were always a few¡ªsome of them turned out to be more suited for the circuit than for magical life. The years varied substantially as well¡ªonly well-performing competitors got a free ride to the next year, while the weaker fifty percent of the team would have to try out with the rest.


    ¡°I hope I get into the trio duels,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I would be bored to tears in the regular one.¡±


    ¡°You should be able to,¡± Syl said. ¡°We¡¯ll see if I even get into one.¡±


    They, alongside about a hundred other students, were milling about the dueling arenas, which had been repurposed for this specifically. The first stage of this would just see them rotating through accelerated versions of the standard events for a while, team captains judging them in the meantime.


    Uriel was officiating alongside Waylan, which was not a surprise. Jennifer¡¯s presence, on the other hand, was.


    In terms of people from his year, Syl recognized Lyon Red, Lia Jeksen, and Trevor Rokho, the class 1 boy who¡¯d tried to duel Lyon at practical magic. Any other familiar faces were only like that because he had done a threat assessment on them.


    ¡°I¡¯ll be disappointed in you if you don¡¯t,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Don¡¯t throw this, okay?¡±


    ¡°I would feel uncomfortable letting you go into a Gate with an active terrorist threat,¡± Syl said. ¡°I won¡¯t.¡±


    At four o¡¯ clock on the dot, Uriel clapped her hands together, the sound resounding throughout the entire arena, and the ongoing chatter died down.


    ¡°I¡¯ll keep this brief!¡± she called out. ¡°Welcome to the tryouts for the twelfth Intra-Academy Tournament Circuit. In a moment, the assignments for your first round will be sent to your FCDs. Please proceed to your assigned arena as stated or to the designated waiting area if you have a bye round. That is all. Good luck, have fun, and don¡¯t die.¡±


    Syl and Bianca both had bye rounds for the first cycle, which was more than a little suspicious given that there were only twelve people who had byes thanks to the restrictions on the number of arenas they could use at once.


    He wasn¡¯t going to complain if Uriel showed him some favoritism, but if she kept doing this, it was going to become too obvious for others to not notice, which would bring its own set of problems.


    There were five of each type of main dueling event active, though the seven-on-sevens were on arenas that were only about a hundred meters across¡ªsubstantially smaller than the regulation fields that it would normally be played on. The time for the event had also been shortened.


    Syl¡¯s attention was drawn towards one of the three-on-threes in particular. A hulking berserker of a man was dual wielding FCDs, one on his wrist and one on his club-like baton. He stood nearly a head taller than either of his teammates, and even from the stands, Syl could sense the flux coming from him.


    ¡°Looking at Wildcard?¡± one of the other bye-round students asked, leaning forward to follow Syl¡¯s gaze. A class 2, it seemed. Not a first year.


    ¡°Wildcard,¡± Syl repeated.


    ¡°James Rokho,¡± the student¡¯s friend jumped in, apparently eager to share circuit gossip. ¡°He¡¯s a fourth-year and should already be on the team¡ªhell, he picked up the name because that¡¯s what they call him when he¡¯s shown up on the National Circuit. He still does the tryouts every year.¡±


    ¡°I hear it¡¯s to scare us,¡± the first student said. ¡°Make us realize we¡¯re not shit compared to the real titans.¡±


    When the call was made for the first round to begin, Syl could see why. Despite looking like a living giant, James¡ªWildcard, apparently¡ªmoved like the wind, using A-class and even tactical-class magic with ease to reposition himself. Notably, he never directed one of his spells at the other team, instead opting just to knock them over physically and disarm them of their FCDs, ending the match in a matter of seconds.


    The student behind him whistled. ¡°Impressive.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s taking candy from babies,¡± Bianca said dismissively. ¡°I¡¯ll put stock in him when I see him get into a real fight.¡±


    As it turned out, the time until they would get to witness that was less than they might have thought.


    After the first round ended, there was a rest period for everyone to recover their flux and any physical injuries they¡¯d sustained. Second round assignments went out shortly afterward.


    Syl¡¯s FCD flashed.


    Match determined.


    Type: 1 vs. 1 Standard Duel


    Arena: 3


    Opponent: James ¡°Wildcard¡± Rokho


    He sighed, looking over to where Uriel had just finished judging one of the seven-on-seven events. She caught his eye and winked at him.


    Sure enough, he thought. There it is.


    ¡°Well then,¡± he said. ¡°I¡¯ll see you all in a bit.¡±

 Chapter 11 - Another Very Fair 1v1

    The arena settings for today¡¯s duels, at least, had changed from the duel Syl had taken part in against Drew Violet. Tournament standard was different from what amounted to an honor duel, and the artificial scenery was proof of that.


    A magically-generated stream ran through the middle of a forest-like arena, separating it into two halves. Artificial trees that were more flux than wood provided ample cover, though Syl was sure that the cameras here wouldn¡¯t take those as an obstruction.


    This duel was being overseen by Waylan. He grinned at Syl, a bit nervously.


    The two duelists started just under ten meters apart, facing each other with their FCDs in hand.


    ¡°Class 3,¡± the giant said. ¡°You don¡¯t see that here everyday.¡±


    ¡°I assume not¡­ James,¡± Syl said. ¡°Do you prefer that address or your circuit name? Your family name, perhaps?¡±


    James snorted. ¡°Polite, are we? You don¡¯t need to call me by the clown names, either of them. Just James is enough. Though I would recommend you back out of this one.¡±


    ¡°Hey,¡± Waylan said. ¡°There¡¯ll be time enough to chat once the duel has started. I appreciate your concern for his safety, but we do have a schedule to stick to.¡±


    ¡°Yeah?¡± James asked, tilting his head to meet the officer¡¯s eyes. ¡°Even you¡¯re saying this is acceptable? I expect better out of you, Way.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve seen the kid move before,¡± Waylan replied. ¡°It won¡¯t be as easy a victory as you think.¡±


    ¡°You have a high opinion of me,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯m flattered.¡±


    James sighed. ¡°If you say so. Medics are on standby, right? No offense, kid. Sylvester, was it?¡±


    ¡°Syl works.¡±


    ¡°Syl, then. Hey, no hard feelings about this, understand? I¡¯m here to make sure you know what you¡¯re getting into. Circuit¡¯s tough, and the situations you get in because you¡¯re a Circuit pro are tougher. Ain¡¯t sunshine and daisies up here.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure of that,¡± Syl said pleasantly.


    Waylan cleared his throat. ¡°Anyway, since we¡¯re already two minutes over the start line¡­ as a regulation circuit duel, this will end when one party is incapacitated, cannot adequately continue to cast, acknowledges defeat, or suffers a technical loss by three points. Duelist Sylvester Auria. Do you accept the terms of the duel as previously stated?¡±


    ¡°In nomine virtutis,¡± Syl acknowledged.. ¡°I accept.¡±


    ¡°Duelist¡ª¡°


    ¡°In fide et sapientia, yeah, yeah,¡± James interrupted. ¡°I also accept. Let¡¯s get this over with.¡±


    ¡°We were having such a nice conversation, though,¡± Syl said, instinctively raising a Simple Shield with much more flux than the spell normally took, elevating the Absorption-type spell from D-class to A.


    It was much less efficient than a number of other spells he could have used, but it was fast. For Syl, magic was a game of tradeoffs, and he was willing to use a clunkier spell if it meant that it could negate the lightning-fast bolts of sickly green energy that came from both of James¡¯ FCDs.


    Syl stopped maintaining the spell the moment it absorbed the flux from James¡¯ spell.


    ¡°Offensive magic,¡± he said. ¡°Flux Bolt? Are you taking this seriously?¡±


    ¡°At A-class,¡± James said, amused. ¡°What kind of first year chooses to tank an A-class spell?¡±


    ¡°One who can¡¯t tell what class it is,¡± Syl said, pacing back around the stream. ¡°Or one who can block it.¡±


    #


    ¡°What is he doing?¡± Lyon asked, having gotten a bye for the second round. He was watching Syl and Wildcard intently, eyes flicking between the two of them.


    ¡°They¡¯re just¡­ talking,¡± the student next to him said.


    ¡°What the hell does he have to talk about that Wildcard cares about?¡± Lyon frowned, remembering how Syl had found out his mission almost immediately after meeting him despite the fact that it was supposed to be one of the best-kept secrets of his family. ¡°Does he know something Wildcard doesn¡¯t? Why aren¡¯t they attacking?¡±


    The student beside him shook her head. ¡°I don¡¯t know, but he¡¯s brave. I would have been a paste on the ground by now.¡±


    #


    ¡°I¡¯m interested in the National Circuit,¡± Syl said. ¡°You chose to enter it instead of military service. You¡¯re not even in the Reserve, right?¡±


    Magic pattern forming. Movement, creation, destruction, perception base types¡ªah. A-class warp-type spell, Shadow Stride.


    Instead of counter-casting the spell, which he was pretty sure was supposed to be classified, he cast a simple one of his own. Just to make it a bit more believable, he added the incantation as well.


    ¡°Aux flage!¡±


    His pronunciation was better that time, he was pretty sure, but that was besides the point. Raised from F-class to C-class, Syl manifested multiple instances of Glimmer Spark freely in the air around him, illuminating the dark spaces that James could have teleported to with that spell.


    The fourth-year laughed, his flux fizzling out as his only targets were far out of the arena. ¡°Oh, so you aren¡¯t just here for no reason, eh?¡±


    ¡°I like to think not. Now, about my question¡­¡±


    ¡°Who wouldn¡¯t?¡± James asked. ¡°You¡¯ve got fame, riches, influence. Everything a man like me could ask for.¡±


    ¡°Except you¡¯re one of a small handful who aren¡¯t involved with the military at all,¡± Syl said. ¡°Ninety-six percent of the league holds a reserve position of some kind, and that includes the people in Graduate Reserve.¡±


    To punctuate his own sentence, he fired a spell of his own. It was no real offense¡ªin actuality, it was the exact same spell James had used against him.


    ¡°Xyph praes,¡± the fourth-year snapped, a complex seven-process spell forming almost instantly.


    Syl recognized the spell. Absorption and its opposite, conjuration. Movement. Reflection-type spell, Reflect Attack.


    It amplified the attack as it sent the bolt flying back, but Syl had been prepared for that. His countercast was already in the process of activating when James sent it back, and the flux dissipated in midair.Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.


    He thought he might have heard gasping from somewhere far off, but over the din of everyone else carrying out their tryouts, he couldn¡¯t be bothered to confirm it.


    #


    ¡°What the hell?¡± Lyon hissed. ¡°That was tactical-class magic that Wildcard just used there, and¡­¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s a class 3, right?¡± the student beside him asked, her voice just as confused as his.


    ¡°Same year as me,¡± Lyon said. ¡°No prismatic affiliation, either. How is he doing that?¡±


    ¡°Once-in-a-generation genius?¡± the girl suggested flippantly. ¡°Or he¡¯s cheating.¡±


    ¡°I sure hope he¡¯s cheating. The other possibility is too scary to consider.¡±


    #


    ¡°Are you seriously suggesting that my talents would be better suited for the military?¡± James asked. His tone was jovial, but his eyes were narrowed into slits.


    Syl recognized the gaze. He knew this song and dance, the careful tiptoeing around words as one tried to figure out¡ªwhat does he know? And more importantly, how did the other party feel about it?


    Not knowing James¡¯ thoughts on the matter, Syl wasn¡¯t going to commit to much either. ¡°Many would say that it¡¯s an honor to serve Auria against her foes, both inside and out.¡±


    The fourth-year¡¯s frown deepened, but he nodded. ¡°Many would say that. This sounds like something you and I should discuss in more detail.¡±


    That gave Syl more hints than James probably wanted to give away. He could guess as to which way the upperclassman leaned now, especially given the implication that he wanted to speak away from the plentiful cameras and other recording devices currently analyzing their duel.


    ¡°Sounds good to me,¡± Syl said. ¡°Now, then¡ª¡°


    James blurred with speed, two separate spells activating at the same time, and Syl found himself on the back foot for the first time. He processed that they were movement-type and projection-type, respectively, which meant repositioning and an attack.


    Instead of attempting to countercast magic that was nowhere near as clearly signalled as Drew Violet¡¯s had been, Syl used his own spell, casting Flash Step twice in quick succession to move himself backwards. His back foot came up on a tree that marked the edge of the arena as red lightning crackled from James¡¯ form and ignited the entire river, flash-boiling it and kicking up so much mud it looked like a volcanic explosion.


    Syl wasn¡¯t able to entirely avoid the devastating attack¡ªit was simply that large. Fast-moving steam and clods of rock buffeted him. He threw up a shield instinctively, but he was hit a couple times. A loud buzzer sounded, indicating that he had lost one points. An actual solid hit would probably result in a loss by technical defeat.


    ¡°Halt!¡± Waylan called out from the side, his voice projecting over the arena. ¡°James! Why are you using tactical-class offensive magic against a first-year?¡±


    ¡°He can take it,¡± James said. ¡°Besides, I was holding back. That wouldn¡¯t have killed him even if he didn¡¯t move.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t need to call an end to this,¡± Syl said, dusting himself off. He made a face. ¡°You tore my uniform.¡±


    ¡°Are you sure?¡± Waylan asked. He was standing on the edge of the arena, FCD at the ready. ¡°I have a medical team on standby, but they can¡¯t fix dead.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure,¡± Syl said. ¡°I trust James not to hurt me.¡±


    More importantly, he trusted himself not to get hurt.


    ¡°Right then, newbie,¡± James said. ¡°Let¡¯s do this.¡±


    Syl was ready for the speed the second time, having adjusted to the arena, and he deftly avoided James¡¯ berserker rush, counter-casting his B-class wide-area termination-type spell that would have cut off Syl¡¯s ability to move outside the bounds of it. He would have been able to break it easily, but he didn¡¯t want to deal with what that would entail.


    In return, he fired spells of his own, sticking to spells that a particularly motivated student with a large flux pool and access to private libraries should know¡ªupcasted Flux Bolt, Earth Tremor, the like. He strayed away from annihilation-type spells, knowing that anything that involved actual matter elimination would probably be too powerful in his hands.


    James was much better at dealing with spells backfiring than Drew had been. He took them in stride, often even repurposing the backfire into a flux recharge for himself.


    In Syl¡¯s estimation, the fourth-year was quite possibly a master-class magician. The official definition of that was just someone who could cast a spell of that level without exhausting more than 50% of their flux pool. Though James¡¯ max so far had been tactical-class, he clearly wasn¡¯t using everything he had.


    That was fine by Syl. That just meant both of them were handicapping themselves.


    With the frustratingly shallow pool of spells he could draw from, Syl was able to avoid taking any direct hits and even counter the majority of the wide-area ones with areas of effect larger than the arena itself, but he couldn¡¯t stop himself from getting hit entirely. Eventually, a buzzer sounded as James scored a second technical point.


    ¡°Seriously,¡± Syl said drily as both of them came back to a standstill, the arena burning around them. ¡°You¡¯re going to ruin my entire outfit at this rate.¡±


    He was sorely tempted to just win the duel on the spot, but unlike Drew, James wasn¡¯t overconfident and wasn¡¯t making any easily exploitable mistakes. James was the type of magician that would actually be valued on the battlefield, which meant he was a thinker.


    That was probably also why he didn¡¯t want to join the military.


    Well, Syl had a few tricks that he could reasonably have as a merely exceptional student.


    James had started conserving his flux over the course of the duel, but Syl knew that didn¡¯t necessarily mean he was running short. They both had larger flux pools than the average student, so this could go on for a while.


    Syl needed to make an impression here to ensure that he would be accepted onto the team, but he couldn¡¯t make such a big one that he blew his cover.


    He started charging a spell on one FCD, holding it out to one side.


    James smirked, seeing the spell processes slowly form. ¡°Trying not to give up the game by staying silent. Not bad, but if you¡¯re going to be that slow, even a kid could read the spell.¡±


    The fourth-year¡¯s eyes weren¡¯t on Syl¡¯s primary FCD, though. Instead, they were on the second one, which Syl hadn¡¯t done anything special to hide. James saw through the first layer of the feint with ease, which meant his guard would be let down. People always thought they were safe after they found the first trick.


    James currently thought that Syl was going to let him cancel out his big spell¡ªwhich was a simple A-class projection spell that would seek to overwhelm him with a great deal of force¡ªand use the moment of distraction that it afforded to cast the spell currently forming in his second FCD.


    He must have also figured out by now that Syl had a limited number of spell processes that he could manage at any given time in his FCDs. That meant that if James forced Syl into canceling his spells prematurely, he would cancel his efforts.


    Syl saw the moment the other duelist decided his plan of action.


    ¡°Klyst flage!¡± James said, sharp and quick. Another strategic-class spell. A wide-area flame burst.


    ¡°Thesq praes!¡± Syl shouted in reply, holding up the FCD he¡¯d hidden.


    He did not cast the simple shield. His voice, after all, did nothing to help the spell along. Instead, he let the shield spell he¡¯d been casting on the second FCD fall and cast Flash Step.


    James counter-cast the shield, assuming¡ªlike he probably always did¡ªthat the spell he heard was the right one.


    Syl flashed forward, avoiding the scorching heat. James wheeled, already switching gears to try blocking Syl¡¯s A-class spell¡ªand then, without using the FCD, Syl projected flux inside of him.


    To any outsider, it would have looked like he had just cast two Flash Steps with no cooldown, which was a feat in itself. Only Syl and Bianca knew what he had truly accomplished.


    Free casting couldn¡¯t be counter-cast, and when done the right way, like he¡¯d just done¡ªit was nearly undetectable.


    Syl moved, and James wasn¡¯t ready in time to defend against Pulse Wave, which sent him flying backwards straight into one of the few remaining tree constructs, shattering it with the force of his impact.


    A further two buzzers sounded, indicating that this counted as two points towards Syl.


    James rolled to a stop, transferring his momentum to get back on his feet, but he made no move to attack.


    Instead, he just stared at Syl, slack-jawed, then started laughing.


    ¡°You landed a hit on me?¡± he guffawed. ¡°Really showing me my place, eh?¡±


    ¡°Just doing what I can,¡± Syl said politely.


    ¡°Oh, stop it with the modesty. Waylan!¡±


    ¡°Yeah?¡± Waylan asked. He had a white-knuckle grip on his own FCD, ready to intervene at a moment¡¯s notice.


    ¡°This duel is over. If this kid doesn¡¯t get put on the team, you have my resignation.¡±


    ¡°Oh,¡± Waylan said. ¡°Uh. Alright. That¡­ concludes the duel, I guess?¡±


    Syl saluted. ¡°Thank you for giving me that victory.¡±


    That trick wouldn¡¯t work twice in a row. Without using his full set of powers, Syl probably would have actually lost that.


    ¡°Pay me back by coming with me after school some time,¡± James said. ¡°I look forward to seeing you around.¡±


    ¡°You too,¡± Syl said honestly.


    #


    Lyon looked at the dueling arena in horror.


    James was his cousin, a few times removed. He¡¯d grown up hearing stories about the Rokho. Lyon was the youngest to master the Red family¡¯s signature Phoenix Blade¡ªexcept for James. Lyon had been the second best swordsman for his age at any given time during his life¡ªjust behind James.


    And he¡¯d forfeited? Moreover, he¡¯d been hit.


    ¡°What the hell¡­¡± he whispered to himself. ¡°Who are you, Sylvester Auria?¡±


    #


    ¡°So,¡± Syl said to Bianca, aware that the entire room had fallen quiet and were mostly looking at him. ¡°I think I¡¯m on the team.¡±

 Chapter 12 - Extracurricular Discussion

    Of the hundred or so students who¡¯d tried out for the team, twenty-one were selected for the Circuit team. Normally, that number was supposed to be twenty, but James Rokho was one of the twenty with free passes into the team. Overall, there were forty accepted into the team. Originally, the idea had been for there to be ten per year, but since there were no divisions between upper and lowerclassmen in the Circuit, that ended up skewing more towards the high end.


    Five first-years had qualified, which was about average. What wasn¡¯t was the distribution between courses. Bianca had been a shoe-in from the start, and she was class 1. Syl hadn¡¯t been, but he was in as a class 3. Lyon Red made it, which didn¡¯t surprise Syl. Lia Jeksen also qualified, which did. She¡¯d been a competent duelist, but he hadn¡¯t seen the full extent of her abilities.


    Trevor Rokho, a class 1 and prismatic-adjacent, did not qualify. The other class 1 first-year to qualify was someone Syl had yet to see in any of his classes by the name of Adama Shin. The name had registerd as odd to him, and he¡¯d looked through his records to confirm that the Shins were a relatively notable group of stealth-type magicians who had once been refugees from Lingdao, one of the fractured states on the Asian landmass.


    That made the final split two class 1s, no class 2s, and three class 3s. Even one class 3 first-year qualifying for the team was uncommon. Three of them was unheard of.


    To be fair, Syl knew that Lyon was no true class 3. He was there for a reason, but since it was a prismatic family matter, he didn¡¯t want to bother getting tangled up in it until it started directly affecting him.


    Lia Jeksen was an abnormality like Syl himself, though. She must have seriously impressed the people proctoring the entrance tests, because she¡¯d been active in all seven rounds of testing, ranging from more practice rounds to physical exams to a mental reaction game that Syl had seen once before in a laboratory.


    More curious was the fact that when Syl went to James to follow up on his request to speak in a more private location, Lia came as well.


    ¡°Jeksen,¡± James said, looking like he¡¯d barely broken a sweat during the tryouts. To be fair, he probably hadn¡¯t. Syl certainly hadn¡¯t. ¡°Auria.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve told you I¡¯d prefer you use my real name,¡± Lia said. ¡°You of all people should appreciate that.¡±


    ¡°I as well,¡± Syl added. ¡°I am not the country that raised me.¡±


    ¡°Force of habit,¡± James said. ¡°Good to see you both.¡±


    Lia saw the questioning glance that Syl directed between the two of them and took it upon herself to explain. ¡°We train together.¡±


    James laughed. ¡°That¡¯s a generous way to put it. She beats the shit out of me with a sword taller than I am and I learn to take it a bit better each time.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t train with your own facilities?¡± Syl asked.


    ¡°I know us Rokhos have plenty of our own places,¡± James said. ¡°Doesn¡¯t mean I want to owe them everything I am. You should come out to the dojo. It¡¯ll be a good place to talk.¡±


    ¡°Tonight?¡± Syl asked. ¡°I should have some time. I have nothing scheduled.¡±


    Nothing that couldn¡¯t be pushed back, at least.


    ¡°That would be lovely,¡± Lia said. ¡°We¡¯re usually pretty empty around now.¡±


    ¡°Would it be a problem if I bring Bianca?¡± Syl asked. ¡°I¡¯m her engineer, and for the time being, we live together.¡±


    ¡°Not if she¡¯s not a problem,¡± James said, the joviality fading from his voice just a touch.


    ¡°She won¡¯t be,¡± Syl said. She¡¯s both more and less of one than you know.


    #


    The dojo that Lia and James apparently both trained at was well out of the way of the capital. It took them half an hour to get there by private car, though much of that distance was spent in the winding curves of the mountain road that led to the secluded facility.


    At first glance, it looked more like a shrine than a training facility, but a quick scan of the flux in the area showed the truth of things. Everything in this shrine was imbued with powerful magic, not all of it classifiable under the modern Five Systems.


    ¡°This dojo uses unprogrammed magic,¡± Syl said as they entered the gate, the weight of a hefty stealth-type spell settling over his shoulders. ¡°Is it powered by an artifact?¡±


    ¡°You have good eyes,¡± Lia said. ¡°It¡¯s run by a master from the Order of the Lost, so there are all kinds of artifacts here. Tower artifacts.¡±


    Humanity had gained a strong understanding of certain types of magic, but even scientists like Syl were fully aware that they hadn¡¯t even scratched the surface of the entire field. Though they could overpower most of what came through the Gates, the Towers were a different story. They didn¡¯t break, but much of the power they held inside them was not explainable by the current system of magic¡ªwhich simply meant that the current system of magic was incomplete.


    ¡°Quiet, too,¡± Bianca said as they disembarked the autonomous vehicle, making their way to a courtyard lit by pure flux. ¡°There must be five or six layers of stealth-type spells on this.¡±


    ¡°Seven,¡± Syl said. ¡°There¡¯s two that look very similar since they¡¯re both also conjuration-type¡ªthe one that interferes with radio signals and the one that redirects flux in the opposite direction of the barrier. They look like one spell, but they¡¯re not.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s kind of creepy,¡± Lia commented. ¡°Just how good are you at this stuff?¡±Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    ¡°I¡¯m a good engineer,¡± Syl said. ¡°This is what I¡¯m best at, not dueling.¡±


    James laughed, but there was little humor in it. ¡°If combat is your weak suit, I know I¡¯d like to never get on the wrong side of something you make.¡±


    Syl fell silent at that, though Bianca helped save him from having to respond with a weak chuckle.


    They were both thinking about Horizon Breaker. James¡¯ statement was truer than he realized.


    ¡°I never said combat was a weak point,¡± Syl said. ¡°You didn¡¯t bring us here to chat about me, though. I doubt you wanted to spar¡ªat least, not only that, or you wouldn¡¯t have come somewhere this secure.¡±


    ¡°I did not,¡± James said. ¡°Earlier, you asked about why I¡¯m not with the military.¡±


    Oh, fantastic. They were going to have this conversation immediately instead of dancing around it.


    Judging from the spells that were under his feet, James had a backup plan in case this went south. That alone was enough for Syl to guess where this was going.


    ¡°Does she know?¡± Syl asked, nodding towards Lia.


    ¡°Do I know what?¡± she asked, confused.


    ¡°What¡¯s Auria¡¯s relationship with Cascadia?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°Or Polaris, for that matter.¡±


    ¡°Um, a history question? Now?¡± Lia asked nervously.


    James did not move, but Syl could sense the flux around his FCDs agitating.


    ¡°Yes,¡± Syl said. ¡°You should know the basics, at least.¡±


    ¡°Er, after World War III, northern Auria rebelled and split off from the country,¡± Lia cited. ¡°Then in the years after, they tried to take more of our territory, but our paragon-class magicians drove them off. Polaris allied with us to drive them off, but our magicians prevailed before the Polarian forces could engage in true combat.¡±


    Textbook answer. The way she fidgeted during the explanation was a clue, but not definitive.


    ¡°Then what happened in San Francisco Bay three years ago?¡± Syl asked.


    Lia¡¯s eyes widened for a split second before she fixed her expression. ¡°You¡ªthat was¡­ an accident. A nuclear reactor.¡±


    That was enough.


    ¡°So she does know,¡± Syl said. ¡°You can put the FCD down, James.¡±


    The fourth-year did, but the tension didn¡¯t leave his shoulders.


    ¡°So we are all aware that the kingdom is lying to us,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Excellent. That puts us on the same footing.¡±


    Dangerous sentiment coming from a student, but even more so from a princess. It was for that reason that Bianca, who had originally been second in line to the throne, had been demoted to a designated survivor. She didn¡¯t play well within the lines that her family had drawn, and though she was too talented to waste, they were sure to give her as little as they could get away with.


    James exhaled deeply. ¡°I was worried this would go differently.¡±


    ¡°A bit too worried, I think,¡± Syl said, glancing down. ¡°Pre-prepared spells, I understand. But landmines? You¡¯re standing here too, aren¡¯t you?¡±


    ¡°How¡ªperception-type spells shouldn¡¯t work properly through consecrated ground,¡± Lia said. ¡°You sensed them?¡±


    ¡°Simpler than that,¡± Syl said, pointing at a crack between two tiles. ¡°Wire laid in the cracks. It¡¯s cleverly hidden, but to anyone who knows what they¡¯re looking for, it¡¯s obvious. Someone¡¯s going to have to turn them back on, by the way. I¡¯m not familiar enough with this design to risk re-priming them myself.¡±


    ¡°You disarmed them?¡± Lia asked in disbelief.


    ¡°Of course he did,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Why else would we still be standing here?¡±


    ¡°Unimportant,¡± Syl dismissed. ¡°I¡¯m more interested in why a member of a prismatic family has this kind of sentiment.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m no prismatic,¡± James hissed.


    ¡°You¡¯re a Rokho, whether you like it or not,¡± Syl said. ¡°A branch, sure, but a prismatic nonetheless.¡±


    ¡°So you think that because of who I popped out of, I have to be a brainwashed moron?¡± James asked.


    ¡°Be careful what you say,¡± Syl said, not giving him a reaction. ¡°Even in the safest places, the walls have ears.¡±


    ¡°Are you threatening me, Auria?¡±


    ¡°For someone who claims to wish to disengage from his family, you do quite enjoy pointing out others¡¯ affiliations,¡± Syl said. ¡°And no. If I wanted to threaten you, this conversation would have gone very differently. I¡¯m pointing out that most people who buy into Auria¡¯s story are still intelligent. It¡¯s hard to find another when all you¡¯ve known is what you¡¯ve been told.¡±


    ¡°You don¡¯t know what it¡¯s like out there, do you?¡± James asked.


    ¡°I do,¡± Syl said coldly, stopping the bigger man short. ¡°But not everyone does. When was the first time you left Auria?¡±


    James tilted his head. ¡°First year. I made third place on the National Circuit that year. We had an exhibition match against the Cascadian national team at neutral ground near our border. It¡¯s nowhere where the maps say it is.¡±


    ¡°About sixty kilometers south of where it was after the war,¡± Syl said, nodding. ¡°Now, how many others can you name that went there with you? Of those, how many are prismatics? How many were told from birth that they were our sword and shield, mightier than any barbaric Cascadian magicians? How many of them think the same way you do now?¡±


    ¡°More than you might think.¡±


    ¡°They saw the world outside,¡± Bianca interjected. ¡°Most will not until they are called upon to be that sword.¡±


    ¡°And we all know what happens then,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°You know an awful lot about this country for someone who shouldn¡¯t be involved,¡± Lia said.


    ¡°Did I ever say I was?¡± Syl asked. ¡°I¡¯ve seen and heard a lot of things. I¡¯m unfortunate enough to know of the world past our walls.¡±


    ¡°Then if you know what¡¯s happening, why do you accept it?¡± James asked. Despite the amount of power he¡¯d demonstrated before and his seniority, the master-class magician sounded to Syl like little more than a lost, angry child. ¡°You¡¯re obviously strong. Way stronger than you should be. Why are you still here?¡±


    ¡°Why are you?¡± Syl challenged. ¡°What would you have me do? What are you doing? Do you want to incite a revolution against a nation run by paragon-class mages? Let¡¯s say you win. What do you plan on doing when Cascadia sees a very real weakness?¡±


    ¡°Then what are you doing?¡± Lia asked. ¡°I didn¡¯t know about any of this until recently, but¡­¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m at the Academy because it¡¯s a good place to learn magic,¡± Syl lied. ¡°I would like to become an engineer that can work on instruments of peace, and the Academy provides valuable connections in that respect.¡±


    ¡°There isn¡¯t anywhere better for people like me to learn how to fight,¡± Bianca said. ¡°We all know a storm is coming. When it does, I would much rather be able to weather it. Whether that education comes from a broken kingdom or not is immaterial to me.¡±


    Syl didn¡¯t say his true thoughts. James might have seen the combat theaters during a time of relative peace, but he didn¡¯t know the first thing about what it actually meant to be out there.


    If that storm never came, Syl would be perfectly content living in a nation that tried to pretend that there were no clouds at all.


    If it did, then there was nothing he could do but burn.


    #


    Gate 74FA-C16 opened at 3:22 AM. It manifested three kilometers due west of First National Academy, forming just off the coast under a natural bridge. Seismographs picked up its presence immediately, but flux detectors in the area wouldn¡¯t trigger for at least fifteen minutes.


    During that time, seven people using A-class stealth-type spells entered the Gate, prematurely initiating the Gate¡¯s defense mechanisms.


    The severity of a Gate was measured by its flux impact, but increasing them was possible through triggering their ¡°immune response¡± by using great deals of high-class magic without clearing one. From the outside, it would appear the same, but on the inside, a C-class Gate could easily be raised to tactical-class and even beyond.


    Aurian scientific institutes did not have a way to detect this because this method of attack had never been formally recognized by the country despite its frequent usage by Cascadian operatives.


    At 3:49 AM, the laboratory at First National Academy detected the Gate opening. With nobody currently on duty, it sent an automated message.


    The Tournament Circuit team, made up of magicians who were largely high B or low A-class, was due to enter in fourteen hours and eleven minutes.


    Nobody was detected entering or exiting the Gate. The Circuit team would be the first group authorized by Auria to enter.


    They would not be alone.

 Chapter 13 - Gate

    Syl and Bianca got the notification that the Circuit team would be entering the Gate at six PM on the morning of the day they were due to explore it. As a C-class Gate, he didn¡¯t expect much out of it. It wouldn¡¯t be his first Gate, after all¡ªthe interesting parts would come from evaluating what others were capable of doing in something approaching an actual fight and the near-certainty of enemy action.


    His contact from his special unit had sent a few more updates, but they had been sparse. The informant must have been preparing for Sanguine¡¯s movement. In the days leading up to an operation, security always tightened. Nobody wanted last-minute decisions leaking.


    For his part, Syl just attended class as usual. He was no more on edge than he was usually. Since his passive state was already one in which he was very aware of his settings, he didn¡¯t have to change much to be mentally prepared for combat.


    There was a fairly significant difference in engineering, though.


    Since the first class, Professor Lyle had given up on trying to reign Syl in, so he¡¯d been looking forward to an hour and a half of uninterrupted time to tool around with one of his two projects. He¡¯d put the disposable FCD on hold for the time being because he¡¯d made a breakthrough in the free casting project, which he wanted to refine as much as possible.


    It was the latter that ended up biting him in the ass. About fifteen minutes into class, a sharp knock at the door interrupted the lecture and also his focus, which was annoying when he was trying to hand-solder a part that required molecular precision.


    ¡°Enter,¡± Professor Lyle said, not moving from his spot at the front of the class. ¡°For your own sake, I hope you have a good reason to be interfering with my class.¡±


    The door swung open, and a tall woman with dyed-green hair and circular glasses walked in.


    Syl clicked his tongue. Well, there goes my engineering time.


    ¡°Miss Viridian,¡± the professor said, surprised. ¡°It¡¯s not like you to come at this hour.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m looking for a Sylvester Auria,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°He¡¯s in this class.¡±


    ¡°Yes, I am,¡± Syl sighed, standing up. ¡°Have I done anything wrong?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°But I see you¡¯ve finished today¡¯s assignment. Dynamic focus lens, huh? That takes me back.¡±


    That was the main reason Syl had been allowed to just screw off and do his own thing. He read ahead on the material and finished the assignment before class began. If there was something he hadn¡¯t prepared for, he would just take a few minutes in the beginning to fix it up.


    Unfortunately, that also meant that he couldn¡¯t argue that he needed to stay in class.


    ¡°What do you want?¡± he asked.


    ¡°Your presence,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°I¡¯ll tell you the rest on the way.¡±


    Syl took another look at the work-in-progress. He hadn¡¯t been making much progress anyway, and enhancing connections with other engineers wouldn¡¯t be a bad idea.


    ¡°Sure,¡± he said. ¡°Lead the way.¡±


    Jennifer wasn¡¯t wearing the standard Graduate Reserve uniform, instead favoring a practical magic-dampening bodysuit and coat, the likes of which Syl was quite familiar with in the lab. He was unsurprised when she took him to a part of campus that he didn¡¯t have authorization to visit, swiping her way through three separate ID-locked gates to get them into a graduate lab.


    This lab was any engineer¡¯s dream. It was significantly larger than anything the undergraduates got to play with, and with three separate floors to work on, it had more equipment than even Syl¡¯s setup at Incarnate did. It was missing certain pieces of proprietary technology, of course, but it more than made up for that by having access to samples and machines that the prismatic families would only grant to certain institutions¡ªones like, for example, Auria¡¯s national academies.


    Jennifer¡¯s particular workstation took up a space larger than the master bedroom in Syl¡¯s apartment. It was striking how haphazardly placed everything that wasn¡¯t essential was. Files were all over the place, practically burying a free-standing display screen and the desk it was on, writing utensils were scattered like she¡¯d never bothered to pick up a pen after putting it down, and there were a few food wrappers that hadn¡¯t been properly disposed of.


    The equipment, though, was perfectly well-kept. Everything was in its right place, and that meant a lot when she had so much delicate machinery in this office.


    One of the fabricators was running a process right now, which Syl looked at curiously.


    ¡°Side project,¡± Jennifer said when she caught Syl looking at it. ¡°That¡¯s not why I brought you here.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure it¡¯s not,¡± Syl said. ¡°You¡¯re not worried about me being here? There¡¯s no way in hell I have the needed authorization.¡±


    Jennifer barked out a harsh, cold laugh. ¡°Authorization? Do you even need this place?¡±


    ¡°What¡¯re you talking about?¡± Syl asked.


    She activated the display screen, creating a 3D holographic projection of a familiar arena above her desk. It depicted Syl and James during their duel, with Syl a few feet in the air with the A-class conjuration-type Pulse Wave spell forming around his left FCD.


    ¡°Waylan wanted me to review the footage of your fight because he saw a discrepancy that he couldn¡¯t explain,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Normally, I wouldn¡¯t have bothered, but you apparently tore Drew a new one badly enough that he doesn¡¯t even talk to undergrads anymore, so I figured it was worth examining.¡±


    Syl clicked his tongue. He could guess where this was going.


    Jennifer made a complex set of gestures at the hologram, and the recording continued playing in slow motion.


    Syl¡¯s body blurred, and Jennifer paused it with another gesture.


    ¡°Are you familiar with the concept of FCD fatigue?¡± she asked Syl.


    He looked back at her, faintly offended.


    ¡°Right. Of course you are. FCDs can¡¯t activate the same spell patterns one after the other without some cooldown time because of residual magic, and yet here you are, activating Flash Step again.¡±


    Syl sighed, guessing where this was going. ¡°I have two FCDs. You can avoid the worst of FCD fatigue by using a second casting device.¡±


    ¡°Good explanation, but your left FCD is visibly casting Pulse Wave,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°The right is fatigued. Now, I was curious about this, so I checked all the instruments we had recording the fights. There aren¡¯t many that are terribly specialized at the exact task I wanted them for, but the ambient flux detector is precise enough to check what happened.


    ¡°I looked at the FCD first, since I wanted to see if you had a way to overcome the fatigue, but since there wasn¡¯t much there, I was about to call it a rest¡ªthen I looked at you.¡±


    The recording continued playing. Jennifer froze it as Syl released Pulse Wave from behind James.


    ¡°Your body is registering as emitting zero point zero zero seven percent more flux after that sequence of spells completed,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°I¡¯d chalk that up to a minor fluctuation, except you just cast a ton of magic in a short period of time. That¡¯s residual magic inside you.¡±If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    ¡°Why do you think that is?¡± Syl asked.


    ¡°That was what I was hoping you could explain to me,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°The only working theory I have is that you were free casting. If you want to disabuse me of that notion, feel free to.¡±


    Syl raised an eyebrow. ¡°Of all the possible explanations, you conclude that a first-year class 3 solved one of the fundamental conjectures of magic?¡±


    ¡°No, which is why I¡¯m hoping you can tell me otherwise,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°That¡¯s the only explanation I have for this exact set of circumstances. I evaluated nine other possibilities. None of them work.¡±


    ¡°Equipment error?¡±


    ¡°Checked the calibration myself. It¡¯s fine.¡±


    She actually was a good engineer. Few would do their due diligence to verify something they were looking at on a whim. Syl could see why one of his Incarnate teams had decided to have her work with them.


    He would have to look more into her. Good engineers were the worst kind of enemy to have.


    ¡°It¡¯s not true free casting,¡± Syl said. ¡°But yes, it¡¯s magic cast from outside an FCD.¡±


    Most of this conversation so far had been spent weighing his options with respect to what he was going to say. This, at least, was information that he was okay with spreading to another student. Her family was almost certainly going to hear about it soon, but the Viridians didn¡¯t tend to be engineers. It was unlikely that they would be able to replicate his work for years at the minimum.


    ¡°Interesting,¡± Jennifer said, her eyes practically burning with curiosity behind her glasses. ¡°Care to explain more?¡±


    ¡°If you don¡¯t leak the details to everyone you know, yes,¡± Syl said. ¡°I have no illusions about this not escaping to your family, but this is a capability I¡¯d much rather not let our enemies know about, especially when they¡¯re actively trying to attack our academies.¡±


    ¡°Done,¡± Jennifer said immediately. ¡°You have it on my word as a magician.¡±


    Syl knew just how little that meant, but the immediacy of her response helped. Her attention was so laser-focused on him that he doubted she was thinking about anything except the magic itself.


    He explained the system to her in broad strokes, skimming over particular details.


    ¡°It¡¯s still imprecise,¡± he finished. ¡°You can even see it in the fight. I travel exactly six meters at a pre-determined angle. If the conditions were a bit different, the spell might have failed entirely.¡±


    Jennifer shook her head. ¡°It¡¯s still genius. How did you even think of this?¡±


    ¡°We were talking about it last week, right?¡± Syl said. ¡°You brought up your efforts on it, and it got me thinking on an old project of mine. Classes helped with inspiring this angle of attack.¡±


    ¡°Fuck,¡± the eighth-year said. ¡°What am I doing here?¡±


    ¡°I was just about to ask you that,¡± Syl said. ¡°You had something in your fab.¡±


    ¡°Oh, that? I mean, it¡¯s promising, but it¡¯s nothing compared to what you¡¯ve accomplished here.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t bother comparing,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯ve almost certainly been doing this longer than you.¡±


    ¡°What? I¡¯ve been doing this since the first year of high school.¡±


    So it wasn¡¯t even close, then. ¡°You said that your project was promising. What is it?¡±


    ¡°Ah, that¡­¡± Jennifer¡¯s eyes flicked over to the fabricator. ¡°You must¡¯ve noticed by now that I have pretty bad flux sensitivity.¡±


    ¡°I do,¡± Syl said. ¡°It¡¯s situationally useful, but that must be challenging as both an engineer and officer.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve been trying to work on better mitigation than simple blocker glasses,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Find a way to make the useful cases more obvious and the hindrances less so. I got the idea from when I was working on¡­ well, free casting. Hypersensitivity also stems from non-FCD flux manifestation, so the relevant groundwork was already there.¡±


    ¡°Very interesting,¡± Syl said. ¡°Would you mind if I took a look?¡±


    ¡°If you allow me to examine your work more,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°I¡¯d say you¡¯re a diamond in the rough, but I¡¯m pretty sure you¡¯re just a diamond.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re proposing a partnership, then?¡±


    ¡°Something like that. I¡¯m sure you¡¯ll benefit from it less than I will, so let me sweeten the deal. Access to this lab whenever I¡¯m on or around campus contingent on us working together.¡±


    This was going a lot better than Syl had expected. ¡°One more condition. Silence on the projects. In writing, ideally. I have a lot of unfinished research that I¡¯d much rather not see in any other hands.¡±


    ¡°I assumed that would be the case,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Deal. When can you start?¡±


    ¡°We have some time now,¡± Syl said. ¡°Shall we?¡±


    #


    Syl ended up skipping Practical Magic, which wasn¡¯t much of a loss. They were just going over fundamentals again today, and he had those down to a science. Quite literally. He texted Bianca to let her know he¡¯d be late coming out of his academic obligations.


    Jennifer was a damn good engineer. She was as competent as many of the professionals Syl had worked with, and she had more drive than most of them did. It helped that she was a bit worked up by someone like Syl doing something she couldn¡¯t even dream of.


    There was a saying that had emerged sometime around World War III. The bar of impossibility becomes the floor once the first person reaches it. Seeing that Syl had done something she had never even dreamed of pushed Jennifer to make connections she wouldn¡¯t have thought of because she¡¯d assumed that what she knew was possible was all there was.


    They didn¡¯t finish anything by the time the Circuit team was called to enter the Gate, but they¡¯d made solid progress on Jennifer¡¯s project and discussed ideas for more. Since she was part of the oversight council for the team alongside Uriel and Waylan, the two of them made their way to the rendezvous point together.


    The method of transportation was rather unspectacular, but Syl recognized how much magic had gone into the bus they would be using. Early magicians had understood that it was more efficient to enhance existing vehicles with existing supply chains than create new ones from the ground up, so the bulk of ground transportation looked like it had in the early 2010s. With teleportation and similar long-distance travel spells an exclusive trait of artifact magic, a bus was the most reasonable way to move large numbers of people across ground.


    Bianca waved the two of them over as they joined the group of Circuit team members milling around. Her eyes narrowed as they got closer, though, flicking from one to the other.


    ¡°Syl,¡± she said, the hint of a warning in her voice. ¡°Is this why you weren¡¯t at Practical today?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± Syl replied.


    ¡°Already?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°At least pick someone your own age.¡±


    ¡°I believe you may be under the wrong impression, Miss Ashwood,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Please. If I was romantically or even particularly socially interested in your¡­ friend here, I would die of shame.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s rude,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°I thought you preferred honesty. I called Sylvester out of his class to discuss certain aspects of his engineering with him.¡±


    Bianca¡¯s fingers twitched ever so slightly at that sentence¡ªnot a tell that someone else would notice, but Syl had been around her for a long time. ¡°Is that so?¡±


    She looked at Syl, discreetly signing. Does she know?


    Just about the last project. ¡°That¡¯s how it went,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°Then I apologize for my misunderstanding,¡± Bianca said pleasantly. Continue as is, question.


    Syl nodded, answering both her words and her fingers. ¡°It¡¯s fine. We¡¯re leaving soon, aren¡¯t we?¡±


    ¡°We are. Debrief will be on-site,¡± Jennifer said. She surveyed the gathered students. ¡°Not everyone chose to come. This should be enough, though.¡±


    #


    ¡°For those of you unfamiliar with the verbiage,¡± Uriel said to the assembled team on a beach fifteen minutes from the academy, ¡°This is Gate 74FA-C16, short for 74 AFI First Academy C-class gate sixteen. Preliminary readings have determined a likely hostile count of around a hundred C-class and one to three B-class creatures.¡±


    Uriel, Waylan, Jennifer, and six other members of the Graduate Reserve stood at attention with their backs to the sea. Four of them made up the oversight committee for the Circuit team, while the other five had come along as security. This was ostensibly to ensure nobody did anything stupid, but Syl knew they¡¯d been informed about Sanguine¡¯s threat to the student body.


    ¡°The manifestation is approximately one hundred meters off the coast, so we will be entering via Jennifer Viridian¡¯s creation and fortification-type magic,¡± Uriel continued. ¡°For those of you who have not entered a Gate before, the collapse of the Gate will be triggered by the killing of its anchor being or ¡®boss,¡¯ whichever name you prefer. Staying within a collapsing gate will result in you being vomited out the entrance, which I assure you is a thoroughly uncomfortable experience.


    ¡°One additional note¡ªif you use a high-class spell, ensure your target dies. Gates are adaptable, and creatures that survive high-class magic will gradually become capable of using that magic. Finally, on your way to the entrance, we will be pushing a brief software package to all of your FCDs in order to form a communication and early warning network. It is not invasive and will not track you. Jennifer, if you would.¡±


    The engineer didn¡¯t wait for questions before using her specialized FCD to create translucent platforms above the water out to the swirling mass of dark energy hovering over the ocean.


    Some of the other students were so entranced by the sight of the Gate that they must have not been listening, but Syl had grown used to seeing it. It was still fascinating, of course, but exposure weaned the dazzling wonder away and replaced it with a grim anticipation.


    He joined Bianca as the team started filing into the portal. The Reserve minus Jennifer took the front, prepared for any potential strange activity on the other side. Syl and Bianca were somewhere in the middle of the pack, Lyon and Lia ahead of them.


    Entering a Gate was always strange. There was an instant of gut-churning movement, the sensation of falling, and then they were somewhere else. Syl wished that Auria had better materials to study Gates with, because their magic was still near totally unexplained.


    He found his footing inside a dark, wet cavern illuminated by something bioluminescent in the thin layer of water coating the rocky floor. Water dripped down from stalactites, lighting up briefly as it did.


    This would be a bad place to fight a Cascadian, Syl thought as he continued forward past the entrance, giving room for the next person to enter. The nation to the north did love its water.


    The next person never came.


    The second he and Bianca stepped into the cavern, a harsh keening noise rang through the cavern, the sound of nails on chalkboard magnified a thousandfold.


    Flux tore through the air, and the sound ceased abruptly.


    Syl turned to see a spell he was passingly familiar with blanketing the entire Gate, solid green magical patterns flashing bright.


    Sabotage-type wide-range master-class spell, True Seal.


    They were trapped.

 Chapter 14 - Gate II

    ¡°Gate door is sealed,¡± Waylan called out from the front of the pack. He blurred, sprinting to the sealed gate in a flash, inspecting it. ¡°We might have capped the dungeon out early. It¡¯s not impossible when it comes to a Gate this weak.¡±


    Voices overlapped each other as all twenty-odd people who¡¯d made it in . The second-years were the most panicked, surprisingly. Neither Lyon nor Lia, the other two first-years who¡¯d made it through, seemed to be particularly worried about their situation. Syl couldn¡¯t tell if that was because they didn¡¯t know what being trapped in a Gate would entail or if they were just that fearless.


    Syl was eighty percent sure that this was enemy action. It would have been lower under normal cirumstances. After all, Gates played with magic in strange ways, one of the most common of which was locking magicians inside until they completed it.


    The fact that the seal had triggered the moment Bianca had entered, however, was too significant to be coincidence.


    It also meant that their enemies were sloppy. If it had been Syl, he would have waited until someone insignificant had come in before springing it. Doing it like this just raised suspicion for people in the know.


    The nine Reserve members present didn¡¯t have the same information that Syl was, so they saw little to no significance in Bianca being the last in beyond her being the class representative of year 1, but they had also been warned about potential enemy action. Syl could already see them organizing, Uriel whispering quickly to the others around her. Jennifer was setting up a defensive formation already, using overlapped B-class spells to prevent physical objects above a certain speed from passing through a designated barrier and diffusing any flux sent that way as well.


    ¡°Doesn¡¯t one of the Sinners do this?¡± one of the second-years ahead of Syl was saying, her voice quaking with fear. ¡°Gluttony? I heard she locks her targets in Gates and devours the entire place. She¡¯s Cascadian, isn¡¯t she? It could be them.¡±


    The Reserve isn¡¯t looking at how the team¡¯s functioning at all, Syl thought. There were too many unblooded people in here, and some of them were starting to panic. If they started jumping to conclusions as absurd as a paragon-class mage choosing to seal a Gate, people were going to start acting out. The only thing worse than a strong enemy was a panicking ally.


    ¡°Everyone!¡± Bianca called out, recognizing the same thing Syl had. She casually enhanced her voice with a D-class conjuration-type spell, projecting it loudly enough to overpower the panicked back-and-forths. ¡°Calm down. You were all accepted to this team¡ªand indeed, to this academy¡ªfor a reason. You are the prodigies amongst the best. Think logically. Nothing is gained by venturing baseless speculation. There are twenty-seven of us, including nine members of the Graduate Reserve. This is a C-class Gate.¡±


    The last two sentences seemed to bring the people panicking the worst back to their senses. Syl appreciated how deftly she had just stepped around the fact that the spell sealing them in was master-class and poked at the egos of the students, most of whom were class 1. No real magician would feel this threatened by C-class threats, she was implying.


    It was a good way to take control of the narrative. Though the panicked girl had calmed down, she wasn¡¯t entirely wrong. The paragon-class magician referred to by the designation Gluttony was Cascadian, though not affiliated with the country in any official capacity, and she had been known to simply cause entire Gates to disappear.


    Not that he would be here. The last Syl had heard of him, Gluttony had been in Manchuria for reasons unknown. He highly doubted she had a reason to go after Bianca.


    ¡°Thank you, Miss Ashwood,¡± Uriel said, inclining her head towards Bianca. ¡°The first-year representative is correct. This situation is still within bounds of what we can expect from a Gate. Nathaniel here is going to work on trying to dispel the seal. Those who are concerned about their safety may remain here. Jennifer will also stay behind to defend against potential monster manifestations.


    ¡°For everyone who wishes to venture further, stick together and ensure that you are always within visual range of a Graduate Reserve member. We should be identifiable by our uniform, but if things get chaotic, you can find us by the flux signature on our sigils.¡±


    To demonstrate, Uriel started glowing, flux manifesting from a badge pinned to her chest and surrounding her in a red halo. ¡°I should stress that you are not mandated to come forward. I actively advise against it if you are at all unsure about this situation. Though the situation is under control, the Gate¡¯s parameters are evidently not precisely what our readings stated they would be. This is a situation that involves real danger.¡±


    This wasn¡¯t a speech she would be giving if she had just assumed that the Gate had sealed itself, which was as much as confirmation that the Reserve also thought this was enemy action.


    ¡°The goal of the Reserve contingent is to clear the Gate,¡± Uriel finished. ¡°By defeating the Gate boss, the dungeon will be automatically purged, destroying any seals with it. Please make your decision within the next minute. If you have to think about it, I would advise staying back.¡±


    That was unsurprisingly a poor deterrent. The end split favored the group that was going deeper into the Gate, composed of seven Reserve members and eleven Circuit competitors. Syl and Bianca hadn¡¯t even taken a moment to think before joining them.


    This split left seven competitors and two Reserve members back at the sealed Gate. They had enough massed firepower and defensive spells from Jennifer that Syl figured they would be fine.


    James not being here did mess with the total amount of magic they had to offer. He¡¯d been bringing up the back and hadn¡¯t made it into the portal, which meant they were down a master-class magician. Uriel, Waylan, and Jennifer were all master-class, but Waylan was the only one of those who was equipped to fight in close quarters. Uriel specialized in artillery-type magic, while Jennifer was an engineer.Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    With this many people around, Syl couldn¡¯t use the full extent of his power, but depending on the nature of the enemy, it was possible that what he was able to bring to bear would be enough.


    They advanced in a loose group, splitting off into three sub-groups when they hit intersections. Syl found himself with Bianca, two Reserve members, Lia, and a third-year man he didn¡¯t recognize.


    The cave didn¡¯t get any brighter as they advanced deeper into it, still lit only by bioluminescent bacteria or algae in the water. Bianca lit their exploration with the D-class Dancing Wisps spell, creating points of light at set, random distances from them. True to the spell¡¯s name, they drifted around them in an eerie dance, casting the wet cavern into ominous shadow.


    Their first encounter came in about a hundred meters past the first intersection. One of the lights rounded a corner and instantly snuffed out. Splashing noises followed, accompanied by a pack of what Syl could only describe as overtly murderous bunnies jumping around a corner.


    Instinctively, Syl cast magic that every Gate-diver learned and drilled every time they ran¡ªD-class perception-type spell, False Analysis. A much lesser copy of its big brother, the A-class perception-type Analyze, this was a simple three-process spell that examined broad strokes of flux signature and compared them with whatever database had been loaded into the FCD.


    Text scrolled in front of Syl¡¯s eyes, his integrated FCD piping the information to his visual circuits.


    [Murder Rabbit]


    Class: D


    Recorded Sightings: 19,759


    Size: 0.5-1.5 meters long


    Description: Commonly found in cave-type and plains-type Gate biomes. Most common in Cascadia. Though incapable of consciously casting, their stride and bite is enhanced by their internal flux. If bitten, seek immediate medical attention or cauterize the wound. B-class or higher fortification and purification-type magic is advised.


    There were six of the unimaginatively named animals, rabidly leaping forward with reckless abandon. They closed the distance to Bianca, who was spearheading their group, in just under a second¡ªright in time for her reactive shield to trigger, sending fire snapping out at the one headed straight for her. It was less effective given the water that it was dripping in, but the raw force of the flux pushed it aside, giving Lia time to call her FCD into action.


    Hers was a sword taller than she was, though she swung it like it weighed nothing. She infused it with a simple D-class enhancement spell as the blade fell, splitting the rabbit in two.


    The two Reserve students were quick on the uptake as well. Both of them had ongoing defenses already active, and they layered B-class projection-type spells with pinpoint accuracy, forming a zone of intense gravity that crushed two more of the rabbits in an instant.


    They were deliberately holding back to give the others time to practice, Syl realized. He didn¡¯t cast an offensive spell, instead reaching into his belt for a pistol. He¡¯d decided to start bringing one to class after noticing that others had managed to sneak guns through, just on the off chance he might need to apply pressure without using his spells. There were three passive detection spells that applied to every point of the school¡ªone that detected metal, one that detected flux emissions, and one that searched for items that were shaped a certain way. Bypassing those had been easy with an unconventionally shaped polymerase gun, though there had been some more finagling involved for the more specific ones.


    He didn¡¯t need to get involved. The third-year chose this as his time to show off, gesturing towards the three surviving rabbits. They were all soaking wet, and that came to bite them in the ass as the third-year created a magical circle under them. One and a half seconds later, they flash-froze, rabid screeches dying out in an instant.


    Lia finished them off, crumpling the frozen D-class creatures to bits with her sword. Chunks of bloody meat spilled into the water, staining the blue lights a dark red.


    ¡°Well done, Wyatt,¡± one of the Reserve members said. ¡°A bit slow, though.¡±


    ¡°I wanted to make sure I got it right,¡± the third-year¡ªWyatt, apparently¡ªsaid. ¡°I can do it faster if we need to.¡±


    Syl cast his perception wider, using a spell that he was reasonably sure was undetectable even if he cast it in broad daylight, let alone in a dark, poorly-lit cavern.


    The other groups were encountering similarly easy D or C-class fights. So far, everything was going as planned. Syl couldn¡¯t see that much further forward since he didn¡¯t have targets for the spell further ahead of him, but he could tell that all three groups had steamrolled through their first encounters. This was what they had come to do¡ªbuild confidence, destroy some monsters, and bond as a group.


    That rapidly changed, however, when their paths converged again, the members of the Graduate Reserve using mapping and communication items to get all eighteen of them regrouping in a wide cavern that all three groups could get to easily.


    The water was a bit deeper here, enough that every step submerged Syl¡¯s shoes almost up to his ankle. Splashing was unavoidable without magic, most of which he didn¡¯t want to spend the resources on. Some others were walking on the surface of the water, Bianca included, but he didn¡¯t have the processes to do that and also react to a fight.


    At the center of the cavern, lit by an array of assorted illumination spells, was a pulsing brain the size of a large car. The bioluminescent lines in the water led up to it, thrumming with each of pulse.


    [Domain Brain]


    Class: B


    Recorded Sightings: 938


    Size: 5-10 meters long, 3-7 meters high


    Description: Found in any biome. Effects may vary per biome. Capable of casting with flux, but only along the domain it controls, which is usually identifiable by the bioluminescence it casts out. Spells cast depend on the biome.


    ¡°That¡¯s an early Gate boss,¡± Waylan said. ¡°It¡¯s also weirdly dormant. Shouldn¡¯t it have noticed us by now?¡±


    ¡°Killing the B-class should eject us,¡± Uriel said. ¡°It not attacking yet makes this easier. Prepare spells. Spread out to prevent interference. Focus fire on my count.¡±


    Seventeen different spells ignited. Syl didn¡¯t participate, instead keeping an eye out on their surroundings. There was something just a bit off about this Gate. He¡¯d been in enough to tell that this was wrong.


    The brain didn¡¯t even stand a chance. There were two master-class magicians firing tactical-class magic at it, which would have been entirely overkill even before fifteen others attacked in their own ways. In the span of half of a second, it was frozen, had spikes grown through it, detonated, burned down, boiled, blasted by pure flux, torn apart by raw force, and otherwise annihilated in a dozen different ways.


    The bioluminescent lines faded¡ªbut not all of them.


    And nothing else changed.


    The Gate stayed stagnant just long enough for Lia to ask, ¡°So what is a gate opening supposed to be¡ª¡°


    A wave of flux rippled through them, the air weighing heavier on their shoulders.


    ¡°That¡¯s not the Gate closing,¡± Uriel said, a note of alarm in her voice. ¡°That¡¯s an aura.¡±


    The early warning system that Jennifer had pushed to their FCDs triggered, sending the same notice to all eighteen of them.


    WARNING: Multiple tactical-class flux signatures detected. Do not engage.

 Chapter 15 - Gate III

    ¡°Retreat,¡± Uriel called out. ¡°Anyone not at tactical-class or higher, you need to RTB now.¡±


    ¡°Something¡¯s wrong with the Gate,¡± Waylan said. ¡°That¡¯s an order, not a request. Jennifer, flares.¡±


    A small diagram appeared on the same corner that the warning had appeared from, roughly mapping out the paths that the three groups had traced out over the course of their delve. The entrance was marked with a large red dot, helped along by bursts of bright light from spells that Jennifer must have created back the way they¡¯d come.


    The sudden, sharp change of tone pushed them to get into action immediately. Uriel and Waylan were good leaders given that they were still students.


    We should go, Syl signed. Not our fight.


    This was almost certainly a trap intended to catch Bianca, but it was entirely possible that she wasn¡¯t the only target. There were a good deal of prismatics here, and the possibility that someone knew what Syl was and wanted to flush him out didn¡¯t escape him.


    Agreed, Bianca signed back.


    The majority of the undergraduate competitors left alongside Syl and Bianca, leaving a total of ten in the area; six Reserve and four undergraduates. One of the seven Reserve members split off to escort the undergraduate group back.


    Good tactics, Syl thought. They were also aware that this was likely enemy action by this point, so sending off their weaker links was as good as presenting a free target to anyone who wanted it.


    He was a bit curious to see how they would function in combat, but he could use a perception-type spell to monitor the situation instead of watching them himself.


    Contrary to the beliefs he¡¯d once held, Syl didn¡¯t need to involve himself in everything. Graduate questioning would be as effective as his own¡ªpossibly more, given the tendency of people facing him to die.


    Waylan and Uriel were both master-class magicians. Though the latter might not be in an area where her talents could truly shine, this was a powerful lineup even into an ambush.


    Later, Syl would reflect that he should have never trusted reassurances from Aurian leadership.


    #


    ¡°Stay close,¡± Uriel said. ¡°The Gate is manifesting monsters far above its level.¡±


    ¡°The enemy might have enhanced it,¡± Waylan suggested.


    ¡°That¡¯s not possible,¡± Ashley Aurum, military officer and a member of one of the prismatic family offshoots, dismissed. ¡°Gate-affecting magic doesn¡¯t exist.¡±


    ¡°Don¡¯t speculate on how this happened,¡± Uriel snapped. ¡°Look at how we¡¯re going to make it out of this. Waylan, take point. Ashley, Steven, back him up and switch-hit if you need to. Lawrence, Nora, watch our six and above us. I¡¯m sensing signatures from deeper into the Gate, but there¡¯s always the possibility of flux masking and cloaking.¡±


    ¡°What should we be doing?¡± asked Wyatt, a third-year who¡¯d stayed behind to fight.


    ¡°Surviving,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Form ranks as well as you can, but be aware that the moment an enemy attacks, we¡¯re going to break. No formation survives contact with magical warfare. Stay out of each other¡¯s way. There are no second chances here. We¡¯re not going to be able to bail you out.¡±


    ¡°Understood, ma¡¯am,¡± he said.


    ¡°It¡¯s not too late to leave,¡± Uriel said. ¡°I don¡¯t want any¡ªWaylan! Two o¡¯ clock, forty-five up!¡±


    Waylan didn¡¯t reply verbally, instead igniting with flux as multiple fortification-type spells activated at once.


    According to the Aurian magician registry, the Reds were the best single combat family in the world bar none. Their signature fighting style revolved around extremely complex spell chains, and their magicians were lethally flexible because of it. Waylan had been training in the art of dueling since childhood, and his movement showed that. He maintained five separate spells of various classes at once¡ªone to enhance his speed and strength, another his perception, a third to infuse every strike he made with flux, a fourth to summon the Red family¡¯s Phoenix Blade, and a fifth to balance all of those effects without damaging his body or flux channels.


    He added a sixth spell into the mix as the monster Uriel had detected sprang out at him. The python the diameter of an oil truck drilled through the cave rock, a second equally enormous snake emerging from within its maw and spitting a deadly green beam of force at Waylan.


    Most Reds would have used a quick movement spell to get behind the easily tactical-class creature at this point, dodging the beam and trying to counter-attack, but Waylan had taken a more unconventional route.


    A-class reflection-type spell, Silent Mirror. It was another spell that only Reds had access to, but this one had only been passed down the main family line. Mastery of the spell often skipped generations, with many choosing to pick a more conventional duelist path. When Waylan had learned it, his grandfather and teacher had been the only Red who had known the technique. He¡¯d died shortly after passing it on.


    Silent Mirror was difficult in more than one way. Not only was the spell terribly complex, it also operated on a level deeper than just the spell process. The user had to draw from deep within, and he had to know the way of the warrior intimately. When used in battle, this spell was often believed to be tactical or even master-class for how effective it was¡ªbut in actuality, that perception came from how impossible it was to cast correctly.Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings.


    Silent Mirror created a flux pattern that was conceptualized not as a mirror but as a sword. By hitting a spell in just the right place at just the right time¡ªa window that got increasingly difficult as the spell being reflected increased in complexity and power¡ªit redirected it, changing the owner of the spell and its target all at once.


    The magical process the giant double python had initiated was a simple but powerful dual-process A-class magic manifestation. At this level with this complexity, Waylan¡¯s window to parry was a cube of space about fifteen centimeters to each side for roughly five hundred milliseconds.


    His manifested sword, a crimson red blade that shone with bloody light even in the darkness of the cavern, made contact with not just the spell but a specific part of its flux component, redirecting it into the snake¡¯s maw. The green beam sizzled through flesh and stone without even slowing down, searing a fist-sized hole through the back of the python¡¯s head.


    Waylan finished the fight in under a second, blitzing forward and chopping off one head, then two.


    ¡°That shouldn¡¯t have been here,¡± he grimaced, letting his sword dissipate as he returned back to the group. ¡°Stay on guard.¡±


    One of the students had gone slack-jawed, her eyes widening at the sight of the brutal, sudden violence in front of them. Without another word, she turned tail and bolted.


    ¡°Shit,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Hopefully they¡¯ll be too focused on your spectacle here to chase after her.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s not going to be a target,¡± Waylan said. ¡°Class 2 nobody, if you forgive my disrespect. Nothing special about her, no big family ties.¡±


    Uriel nodded. ¡°Good point.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re assuming that there¡¯s people behind this,¡± Ashley said. ¡°The Gate is stronger than it should be, but nothing else has been extraordinary so far.¡±


    ¡°If you say so, then it must be true,¡± Waylan said, bitter sarcasm dripping from his voice. ¡°Keep moving. Gate hasn¡¯t ejected us, so that wasn¡¯t the boss.¡±


    Uriel was the ranking officer here, but this wasn¡¯t the kind of battlefield where she excelled. Artillery-type magic was incredibly useful when it took specialized equipment and high-class spells to even see the enemy.


    Here, where engagements would be taken at ranges where even a particularly sharp stick could be lethal? It was a different story. She was little better than a low-end tactical-class magician here, though her insight into magic proved her to be higher than that. She spent the majority of her focus and flux on maintaining a surveillance net around them, warning the group when a monster approached.


    The double python was the first of many similar creatures¡ªall A-class or tactical-class beings that could potentially have spawned in this biome but not within a C-class Gate. After the surprise of the first one, they were more prepared for further instances. Waylan still fought a handful of them one-on-one, but he was no longer the only one participating. Ashley wasn¡¯t quite a duelist, but her annihilation-type proficiency made her a deadly threat once she was able to set up.


    Wyatt, one of the few underclassmen present, proved to be capable of pulling his weight by pre-casting area of effect slow and ice spells every time Uriel¡¯s detection net pinged on something. Nora and Lawrence were relatively normal tactical-class magicians, but they were still of First National Academy. When they worked as a unit, their raw destructive potential was amplified. They established a deadly crossfire on their flankwatch, repeating drills they had done again and again and again.


    Despite Ashley¡¯s words, there was a general understanding between Uriel and Waylan, the two other prismatic Reserve members, that every aspect of this was a planned-out attack. That sentiment percolated, though not in its entirety. Their tight unit was growing steadily more efficient at killing even the tactical-class monsters that showed up as they got deeper, but amongst the Reserve, everyone knew that there were almost certainly undetected magicians within.


    The underclassmen, critically, had not been informed of this. They¡¯d been told to be on guard, of course, but they did knew even less about this situation than the Reserve did.


    That meant that when they stepped into another potential boss room, the water now knee deep, it was only the Reserve who had pre-emptively cast shields against types of magic other than annihilation and projection, which had seemed to be the theme of the Gate so far.


    Wyatt Bridges was the last magician to step into the room, having lagged behind to reclaim his previous spell pattern to regain a portion of the flux he¡¯d been expending. He walked on top of the water instead of through it, each step crystallizing ice under his feet.


    Nobody else was using an active spell, so the perception-type Flux Radar placed two millimeters above the waterline triggered the second a flux process formed under Wyatt¡¯s boot.


    Uriel¡¯s eyes widen, and she shouted, ¡°Trap!¡±


    A fair distance away, a silent magician intercepted a wide-range message sent on a hidden frequency, one of many he¡¯d been monitoring.


    [4] triggered. Activate all?


    Problem, Syl signed to Bianca. We should return.


    A much closer distance away, seven mundane land mines detonated underwater. Reactive shields went up, the majority of the First Academy unit having prepared for this, but for some, they didn¡¯t come up fast enough.


    Wyatt Bridges, who did not possess a reactive shield for the purpose of non-magical explosives, ¡ªa threat he would never have to face in the Circuit¡ªnever stood a chance. In less than a tenth of a second, he went from promising future prospect to chunks of bloody charred meat.


    Four magicians emerged from the point that their mines had detonated, finally revealing themselves.


    For a brief, tense moment, the nine remaining students stood silently, suddenly surrounded by the hostile force some of them had been preparing for.


    Then an undergraduate¡¯s body hit the water, an errant piece of shrapnel lodged firmly in the base of her skull, and all hell broke loose.


    #


    Leaving was harder than returning to the relative safety of the group near the door.


    ¡°Where are you going?¡± Jennifer asked Syl quietly.


    ¡°You felt the Gate vibrate, didn¡¯t you?¡± Syl replied. ¡°We see a problem. We¡¯re going to solve it.¡±


    ¡°What are you¡ª¡° Jennifer paused. ¡°That¡¯s a distress call.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re late,¡± Syl said grimly. ¡°I made the wrong call.¡±


    ¡°You didn¡¯t,¡± Bianca said. ¡°You didn¡¯t have all the information. Let¡¯s go.¡±


    ¡°I can¡¯t let you two go,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°You¡¯re going to get yourself killed.¡±


    Syl affixed her with a dead-eyed stare.


    ¡°No,¡± he said. ¡°We aren¡¯t.¡±


    He set off to go, Bianca following, and Jennifer didn¡¯t stop them.


    ¡°I should come,¡± she said.


    ¡°You should not,¡± Bianca said. ¡°You have people to protect, and you¡¯ll only get in the way.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re a good engineer, Jennifer,¡± Syl said, flux forming around his legs. ¡°Don¡¯t dirty your hands with a soldier¡¯s life.¡±


    ¡°How can you say that?¡± Jennifer asked. ¡°You¡¯re¡ªyou¡¯re also an engineer. Shouldn¡¯t you be doing the same?¡±


    My hands are already dirtier than you can even imagine, Syl thought.


    Instead of replying, he moved.

 Chapter 16 - Gate IV

    Two students were dead. Nora had sacrificed part of her shield to protect a third and been knocked prone for her efforts. Everyone else had managed to keep themselves largely safe from the explosions, but that didn¡¯t meant they were ready for the follow-up.


    Nine¡ªno, eight¡ªagainst four should have been an unfair fight in First Academy¡¯s favor, especially when two of the Reserve members were master-class, but when it came to magic, raw numbers mattered less than situations. Paragon-class magicians had been killed by D-class magicians with a pistol and a great deal of patience before. With a much closer match like this and the benefit of the ambush to play off of, the cirumstances heavily favored their attackers.


    Waylan, Ashley, and Uriel, all members of prismatic families as well as Graduate Reserve leadership, were well aware of who they were dealing with. This iteration of Auria¡¯s Sanguine didn¡¯t have a consistent modus operandi beyond their willingness to use underhanded tactics, of which this certainly was one.


    All four magicians began the fight with B-class spell jammers.


    Banned in ninety-nine percent of the functional magical states in the modern world, spell jammers relied on a rare material formally recognized as tetraplanarchaonite or 3P-chaonite but more commonly known simply as chaonite. Found only in high-class Gates and in upper levels of a Tower, said material was capable of producing heavy flux interference, disrupting any spell cast in the area. Given their ban and their incredible rarity, even a B-class one had to cost in the millions of dollars.


    The Reserve was drilled on how to deal with these devices. Ashley, a member of one of the branch clans of the Gold family, specialized in wide-range area-of-effect fortification effects, so she moved to counteract the spell for all of them while the other Reserve members used A-class spells to bypass the interference, focusing their efforts on protecting Ashley and lighting up the area.


    The undergraduates, however, were only supposed to be sent into combat theaters where the sheer distance of engagements made jammers impractical. One of the two surviving undergraduates managed to realize what was going on, but the other tried to counter what he assumed was a hostile area-of-effect conjuration spell with his own B-class magic, a sabotage-type single-target spell.


    His spell fizzled, failing to form a magic process properly. Not understanding what was happening, he poured more flux into his spell attempt. The flux he¡¯d spent initially hadn¡¯t dissipated, though, and his spell process came no closer to completion.


    ¡°Allen!¡± Uriel cried, spotting out the undergraduate trying to cast through it. ¡°Stop!¡±


    Rather than casting spells, the ambushers drew assault rifles. Uriel threw up a set of A-class shield spells, warding off the bullets, but the din of supersonic projectiles in an enclosed area drowned out her words, panicking the undergraduate more.


    Realizing his first spell wasn¡¯t working and seeing the bullets coming his way¡ªa situation he had never had to deal with in the tournaments¡ªAllen tried to protect himself with a shield, not realizing that Uriel had already covered him.


    One of many reasons why the refinement and sale of chaonite was banned was because of what it actually did to jam magic. If it was just a magical negator, that would be a powerful equalizer but not terrible. After all, one of the Five Systems of Modern Magic was Enhancement, which was comprised of fortification and sabotage magic. The latter was entirely focused around shutting down flux and negatively influencing energy, and it was significantly less regulated than chaonite.


    What spell jammers led to was failed spells below a certain barrier of complexity and power simply bunching around the users, externalizing their internal flux and exposing it to the elements. When more flux was added to the mix, activation processes attempting and failing to formulate them into actual spells, magicians who cast into jammers became very potent sources of energy.


    Energy, like most beings, sought to be free. When combined with a panicked magician, the results tended not to be pretty.


    Waylan recognized this, cursed, and dashed not towards the enemy but Allen.


    He tackled the undergraduate, slamming the butt of his manifested Phoenix Blade into Allen¡¯s FCDs. It was a risky play, but his only other option in this moment was letting the student die.


    The moment Allen stopped controlling his already chaotic flux, it exploded outwards, turning the competitor into a living bomb. With his FCD broken, it at least didn¡¯t reroute through him, which would have guaranteed death.


    Quarter second window, Waylan thought to himself. Three and a half feet.


    He parried the explosion, redirecting the mass of detonating energy towards the nearest source of hostile flux he could sense.


    It wasn¡¯t perfect. The uncontrolled magic still seared Allen¡¯s skin, charring it as it exploded out of him. It was the best Waylan could manage, though, and it proved to be enough. The magician he targeted had a gun in one hand and a spell jammer in the other, and he wasn¡¯t able to reach his FCD fast enough to attempt to counteract the mass of energy. The backfired spell scorched the air, creating a seemingly red beam of force that tore through the ambusher like a knife through hot butter.


    ¡°Dome up!¡± Ashley called out, controlling her voice. ¡°Spells good to go!¡±


    Her tactical-class spell, Shrouded Veil, created an area where designated allies within it were surrounded by a layer of stable flux. Its primary use case was to activate as a countermeasure against spells that targeted flux specifically, but it was also effective against spell jammers. While within the area of her ¡°dome,¡± her allies would be able to cast any spells without worrying about their flux being interfered with.


    That marked the turning point of the ambush. Sanguine hadn¡¯t sent the best of their best, and though the enemy magicians were tactical-class and had the jump, the Reserve had trained how to deal with this type of force. With the guns and spell jammers rendered not a threat, a dazed Nora and Lawrence put further defensive measures up together, using standardized spells to construct a defensive zone.Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.


    Steven and Waylan played offense while Uriel focused on cycling her shields to keep her flux capacity up. Bullets drained magic quickly, so she couldn¡¯t afford to lose focus.


    ¡°Allen!¡± the undergraduate girl who¡¯d managed to get into the safe zone cried out. ¡°He¡¯s hurt really badly!¡±


    Uriel¡¯s eyes shifted to the ground, where Allen lay on his back in the water, barely breathing. ¡°Start retreating once we¡¯ve pacified this threat.¡±


    Lawrence and Nora both drew guns of their own once they finished their one-way defenses, firing back. Their help drew the attention of the three surviving magicians, who were forced to throw up shields of their own¡ªjust in time for Steven and Waylan to materialize from the shadows and kill them, blades passing through body armor like it was made of paper.


    The only conscious undergraduate watched two magicians die in horror, eyes widening as bodies toppled over.


    ¡°Last one,¡± Waylan said grimly. ¡°Come on and¡ª¡°


    The water under them twisted, and they looked down, each of them wondering if they¡¯d imagined it.


    Only Waylan and Uriel had the presence of mind and experience to know what that sensation meant.


    Cascadians.


    Both of them leapt upwards, Uriel burning extra flux to use a movement spell. Their shouted warnings weren¡¯t quick enough for others to react to, though, and with a series of splashes, the water itself dragged everyone else from First Academy down with a mind of its own.


    From the knee deep water that they¡¯d been fighting in, three more figures emerged, dropping their stealth spells in favor of conjuring weapons. All three wore pristine casual outfits that didn¡¯t seem to have gotten wet in the slightest.


    The one in the lead waved as he appeared, pistol in his other hand, and he shot twice.


    Lawrence and Nora, both of whom were too busy struggling not to drown to focus on defensive spells, abruptly stopped squirming, dark red mixing into the water around them.


    ¡°Retreat!¡± Waylan called out, casting his seventh simultaneous spell to form a platform in the air to kick off from. ¡°I¡¯ll hold them off!¡±


    Uriel nodded, dropping her protection spell to one that focused on repositioning large numbers of people. It was one of her secondary spells, intended to be used to get to vantage points that her group could then rain artillery magic down from, but it would work in this instant.


    One of Waylan¡¯s perception-type spells enhanced his flux sensitivity, giving him a better idea of what he was up against. These three were all tactical-class, he guessed, but they¡¯d used the water, which meant they were almost certainly Cascadians. Magical battles weren¡¯t strictly linear in terms of which power could beat which, and if this was their element, Waylan didn¡¯t like his odds. His magic worked best when he was the aggressor, not the defender, but he needed to keep the others safe.


    As the lead magician went to counteract Uriel¡¯s movement spell, Waylan dashed forward, using the seventh spell slot to redirect his aerial momentum as geysers shot up in an attempt to bring him down.


    A tactical-class spell surged from under him, water shooting up towards him in hyper-pressurized jets.


    His window was ninety milliseconds and roughly three centimeters. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn¡¯t even have dreamed of trying to use Silent Mirror on it, but he knew where this spell would be going if he didn¡¯t try. Waylan was a sword, and his purpose was to protect.


    He parried the stream, redirecting it at the magician who¡¯d fired it. Said magician simply held his hand up and caught the water, letting it splash harmlessly beneath him, then cast again.


    At the same time, one of the other magicians raised an FCD, contesting Uriel¡¯s movement spell. With his other hand, he pointed at Ashley, who¡¯d been submerged underwater but hadn¡¯t broken focus on her spells. The third fired a pistol at her heart just as Uriel passed a surge of flux into her spell, jerking Ashley just out of the way enough for the shot to hit her shoulder instead of a lethal spot.


    It was still enough. Ashley bubbled out a pained cry, and her spell went down. As Waylan went to move again, three spell jammers switched on, limiting what he could cast to very high-level spells that would exhaust him in a single go.


    ¡°I can¡¯t believe this is how I¡¯m going to go out,¡± he muttered, preparing one of his three master-class spells¡ªSupernova. It was a Red signature, and it was very rarely used given its tendency to exhaust the user to the bridge of death, but anything less powerful wasn¡¯t going to work against them.


    Uriel had managed to win her tug-of-war, but though she was telekinetically dragging the survivors, there were still three First Academy students here who¡¯d be in the area of effect.


    Waylan raised his FCD to cast anyway, hovering with the last of his movement spell¡ªand a jet of water shot out from above him, cleanly severing his arm at the elbow.


    The master-class duelist fell, his spells abruptly no longer active. As he fell, he tried to manifest his flux anyway, hoping he could provide enough of a distraction with a backfire that would be sure to kill him¡ªand then, suddenly, a burst of flame appeared right next to him. His gut twisted as he suddenly felt as if he was falling upwards, and then he was elsewhere.


    Next to him were Uriel, Ashley, the undergraduate girl, Steven, Allen, and, for some reason¡­


    ¡°Bianca?¡± he asked, shock numbing his mind to the pain of his arm. ¡°Syl?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re still bleeding,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I cauterized the wound to a certain extent, but you need medical attention immediately. Uriel, can you move them?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± Uriel replied. ¡°You two shouldn¡¯t be here.¡±


    ¡°No, we should have,¡± Syl said. ¡°Go. They¡¯re going to be pursuing, and you don¡¯t want to be in water when they get here.¡±


    Before Waylan could ask any more questions, Uriel was moving them again. He jostled, the pain and overstrain of everything that had just happened to him finally catching up to him, and he passed out.


    #


    ¡°Good play on the movement,¡± Syl said. ¡°I don¡¯t think I could have gotten all of them out in time.¡±


    ¡°I was late,¡± Bianca replied. ¡°There are four dead because I didn¡¯t get there fast enough.¡±


    Before Syl could reply, they heard other voices.


    ¡°I¡¯ll leave you to this one,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I¡¯ve shown too much as it is.¡±


    Syl nodded quietly, advancing.


    ¡°¡ªbecause your people couldn¡¯t get the job done,¡± one person was saying. ¡°We¡¯re all still stuck in here until the Gate opens, anyway. There won¡¯t be witnesses who can confirm who we are.¡±


    ¡°Witnesses?¡± Syl asked, stepping into the open.


    He¡¯d already mapped this area out through his allies who¡¯d just been here, so he was unsurprised by the bodies floating in the water, nor by the four surviving enemy magicians.


    ¡°And who the fuck are you supposed to be?¡± asked the magician who must have been from Sanguine, judging by the black and red on his outfit.


    ¡°Good question,¡± Syl said. ¡°I was going to ask you the same thing. One of you, to be exact.¡±


    ¡°One?¡± one of the Cascadians laughed, his rough accent coloring the words. ¡°Yeah, right. You¡¯re just some kid. Did you think you were going to play the hero?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not much of a hero,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯ll let you live if you surrender yourselves right now.¡±


    That got all of the Cascadians laughing, much to the annoyance of the surviving Sanguine operative.


    ¡°You look like you¡¯re barely out of high school,¡± one of the Cascadians¡ªthis one a woman¡ªsaid. ¡°Do you think you¡¯re stronger than me? Than us?¡±


    ¡°No, I don¡¯t think that,¡± Syl said. ¡°I know it. If you want someone I think I¡¯m stronger than¡­ Maybe Gluttony.¡±


    Even the Sanguine operative laughed at that one.


    ¡°The Cascadian Sinner,¡± the woman whooped. ¡°Look at this kid go.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m going to assume that¡¯s a no to the surrendering, then,¡± Syl said. ¡°That¡¯s fine by me.¡±


    He snapped his fingers, releasing the spell he¡¯d been pre-casting from his other FCD.


    Master-class wide-range absorption-type spell, Cocytus.


    Every droplet of water in the cavern they were in froze.

 Chapter 17 - Gate V

    Cascadian magicians had a particular specialty in liquid water, but that didn¡¯t mean that they couldn¡¯t control other forms with similar amounts of proficiency. Given that these were tactical-class magicians, Syl assumed that they would be able to control the ice given a moment to adjust.


    Thus, to win, he simply had to not let them have that moment.


    The Cascadians managed to free themselves of the ice quickly, but the Sanguine member didn¡¯t have the same specialty and struggled, trying to shake himself free of the ice trapping him in place.


    ¡°You shouldn¡¯t be here,¡± Syl said, looking at the former. ¡°There¡¯s a treaty in place, in case you¡¯ve forgotten.¡±


    They all knew exactly what was going on here, but conversation was always a good tactic to distract. All four of his opponents recognized this, and they weren¡¯t idle. As Syl was still in the process of forming his voiceless spell when four spell jammers switched on.


    He¡¯d had some level of oversight over the ambush thanks to the surveillance spells he¡¯d planted on Waylan and one of the undergraduates, so he¡¯d known to expect chaonite, but even Syl had to admit to being surprised by just how much raw power they were packing. The Sanguine member¡¯s jammer was B-class, which was within the expected range of jammers given the amount of chaonite they¡¯d been confirmed to have, but the Cascadian trio were all equipped with tactical-class jammers.


    Their jammers were also more specialized. While the Sanguine member had a wide-range one that excluded its user from the area of effect, tactical-class quantities of chaonite had to be directed lest they end up affecting the user as well. That was good for Syl. It meant he could make windows.


    All in all, neither opposing group had sent their best. This might have been an honest attempt on a life, but Syl doubted it was the final attack.


    ¡°This is more of a probe than anything else,¡± he thought aloud. ¡°Disposable magicians, no uniforms for plausible deniability¡­ yeah, this is bait.¡±


    Bait that he was going to take, of course, but it wasn¡¯t like he had that many other options. Keeping the princess¡¯ secret was important, and little data would make it out of the Gate anyway if he eliminated all of them.


    As one of the Cascadians opened their mouth to reply, Syl interrupted the cast of his first tactical-class spell to use another.


    Free casting had a great deal of advantages over traditional FCD casts. For instance, spell jammers operated by using chaonite to disrupt flux fields around people. They did not, however, interfere with a magician¡¯s internal flux, which was exactly where Syl cast the spell.


    Okay, he didn¡¯t want to actually call his technique free casting, since that wasn¡¯t precisely what he was doing. Memory casting, maybe?


    Syl decided he could think of the answer later. He leapt upwards as he cast the spell, knowing that the conditions he was in were less than ideal for the parameters he¡¯d injected into his memory.


    Sure enough, he moved off target, sending him hurtling halfway to the ceiling in the wrong direction, but it was enough to get him out of the path of the tactical-class jammers.


    Syl wasn¡¯t sparing the processes to check his intelligence spells, so he didn¡¯t know if there was anyone spying on him, but given the cirumstances, it was safe to say at least one friendly was watching. Revealing his signature spell¡ªhis true power¡ªwas an obvious no-go, but a less obvious one was the sheer breadth of his spell list. There were a good deal of tactical and master-class spells he knew that would be perfect for an environment like this one but were hidden behind many, many layers of security. Being detected using one of those spells would result in more questions that he was comfortable with.


    A spell he could use, however, was the tactical-class spell Magnetism. It was a very simple spell, involving only an activation and start process. The cost was the only prohibitive part of it, but Syl had flux to spare.


    He overcharged the spell as he twisted in midair, controlling his fall. The Sanguine operative yelped in surprise as he lost his gun, spell jammer, and almost his FCD. He caught the last one before it could slip off his wrist.


    Syl caught both as he landed and shook his head, looking from the struggling Sanguine operative to the unaffected Cascadians. ¡°It¡¯s 74 AFI, and you still make your equipment frames out of metal?¡±


    Ice erupted under his feet as the other magicians got their bearings again, and a jammer turned onto him. Syl dispelled the Magnetism before his flux could be suppressed. He had no need for it anymore.


    As he leapt upwards again, manipulating his weight with a simple single-process movement-type spell, he aimed the assault rifle with one hand and fired, barely controlling the recoil of the three-round burst.


    Two shots hit the ice, the third striking the Sanguine operative on his FCD arm.


    Non-lethal, and it would take him out of the fight. As Syl arced towards the stalactite-filled ceiling, grabbing onto a particularly low-hanging one to avoid the ice under him, he hoped the rest would give themselves up as easily.


    They didn¡¯t.


    #


    Operatives Lance, Andrea, and Zane were used to missions where they would be given callsigns, but for their integration into the subverted local anti-establishment group, they had been told to use their first names. One less link to Cascadia benefited everyone involved, even their enemy.


    Lance was their unofficial leader, but they hadn¡¯t needed much direction in this ambush. During the brief minute of violence, they had eliminated a few names that someone back home probably cared about, but they had also dealt a crippling blow to a magician from one of Auria¡¯s great houses. That was a victory worth celebrating on its own.


    Unlike Zane, Lance had no illusion that they would be able to fully eliminate the students within the Gate. He was the one who¡¯d activated the sealing spell, and though he was using external flux batteries to support his own, it wouldn¡¯t last forever. There were multiple master-class magicians in play, and even if they had the advantage of the water here, their group of three tactical-class specialists would be far less capable attacking a fortified position.


    If the local Sanguine group had stayed alive for longer, this may have been a different story, but Lance had found himself disappointed in Aurian power once more. If a group this incompetent was causing the country real problems, then they deserved to be overrun by Cascadia.A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.


    They had accomplished one of their objectives, which he was starting to think would have to be enough. The most important task here had been to find, identify, and capture or kill an abnormally powerful woman who was supposed to be linked to the Aurian royal family, but nobody Lance had seen so far seemed to fit the bill. The master-class prismatic woman with the blue hair and perception spells had been strong, but not in a way that deviated from the norm.


    Lance clicked his tongue in disappointment as the latest pain in his ass clung to the ceiling by one hand, flux patterns beneath his feet keeping him from falling.


    Somehow, a young student who couldn¡¯t have been past his first year of university had taken it upon himself to take revenge upon the ¡°Sanguine¡± strike force for what they¡¯d done to his classmates. Even more amazingly, he¡¯d used some trick to freeze the entire shallow lake and cast spells while apparently evading the effect of spell jammers that should have been able to shut down anything a student of his like could even think of casting.


    And he¡¯d disabled the last Sanguine operator, who was clutching a bloody arm in disbelief.


    Stars above, are these natives good at anything?


    During mission debrief, they had been told that this form of Sanguine had been operating for over a decade without being shut down by the Aurian kingdom, and yet here a student had just managed to overpower one that had a spell jammer.


    Casting another disgusted look at the domestic terrorist, Lance looked up to where the student was still brandishing a stolen rifle.


    ¡°You¡¯ve got balls, kid,¡± Lance said. ¡°Look, nobody has to get hurt here. We¡¯re just about wrapping up here. We can give you a pass.¡±


    ¡°I just heard you four discussing how you were going to kill all the witnesses,¡± the student replied.


    Lance shrugged. ¡°Plans change. Enough of a stalemate here and we¡¯re probably just going to go.¡±


    The Sanguine operative managed to break himself free of the ice, not knowing that Andrea had helped him along. To his credit, he did have the presence of mind to pull his bloodied FCD off his injured arm.


    From above, the student¡¯s eyes flashed violet, and the Sanguine man stumbled, dropping his FCD onto the ice.


    Lance sighed again. Useless. That spell was an interesting one, though. Hadn¡¯t he read about that in a briefing somewhere?


    The student was still hanging from the stalactite by one hand, gun in the other, which brought a question to Lance¡¯s mind. How had he cast that spell without using his FCD? Regular Aurians weren¡¯t supposed to possess innate magic.


    ¡°You¡¯re not doing a great job of hiding that you¡¯re not actually with him,¡± the student said, gesturing at the reddening ice. ¡°Shouldn¡¯t you at least pretend to care?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s more convenient for everyone involved to assume that this is an Aurian problem caused by Aurian groups,¡± Lance said.


    ¡°Lance,¡± Zane drawled. ¡°We¡¯re wasting time. This kid¡¯s green. Why don¡¯t we just kill him?¡±


    That got a frown out of the senior magician. Why indeed? Lance didn¡¯t like wasting talent, but he¡¯d been willing to kill the previous group of students without compunctions. On some level, this student felt different.


    Lance cast a quick FCD analysis spell, frowning as he parsed the data it returned.


    Name: Syl Auria


    Class: C (estimated based on flux output and speed)


    ¡°Lance, is it?¡± the student asked.


    A C-class wasn¡¯t worth losing sleep over. The others were right. Lance dismissed the nagging feeling in his stomach and cast, shouting out a command word that triggered a deep tremor above them, his attraction-type spell using veins of water in the cave rock around them to trigger a partial collapse.


    A massive section of rock collapsed, centered around the student. He fell alongside several tons of granite, which immediately crushed him into the ice below.


    Silence.


    ¡°See?¡± Zane said. ¡°Look how easy that w¡ª¡°


    A chunk of the rock shifted, and Lance felt the telltale sensation of ice sublimating near him.


    ¡°Vapor!¡± he said sharply. His control was strongest over water in its liquid state.


    ¡°He¡¯s moving fast,¡± Andrea said. ¡°There¡¯s a shield surrounding him. I¡¯m going to try and¡ªcare, back up.¡±


    Next to the Sanguine operative, part of the bloody ice started glowing with heat before abruptly evaporating. The student shot out of the new hole, using the same spell he¡¯d used to move towards the ceiling.


    ¡°Looks like negotiations have broken down,¡± he said, uncaring of the fact that three spell jammers turned on him immediately. ¡°You could stand to be less of a pain.¡±


    ¡°Glad you lived,¡± Zane said, a vicious smile on his face. ¡°Thought I wouldn¡¯t get the pleasure of tearing one of you apart myself.¡±


    Zane was much better at using ice than either of the other two of them, and that showed as the element immediately shot up towards the student, who blocked them with magical shields.


    ¡°The fuck?¡± Zane asked Lance. ¡°Is my jammer broken?¡±


    ¡°No,¡± the student said, blasting free of the icy cage Zane had created with simple force spells that sent shards of ice flurrying towards them, all of which stopped short of them. Zane sent those shards flying back at lethal speeds just for the student to emit a sharp directional heat that melted the flurry and nothing else.¡°You¡¯re just not very good at thinking about how to work around them.¡±


    Lance took control of the melted water, drawing it to him instead of throwing it at the student. A refreshing chill spread through him as he absorbed the water, his innate magic empowering him.


    The student took that opportunity to aim his gun at Andrea, who reacted on instinct.


    ¡°Thesq praes!¡±


    Lance made to take advantage of the opening before realizing that the student hadn¡¯t shot yet. Instead, a wave of raw flux swept the room, perfectly disrupting Andrea¡¯s simple shield.


    Only then did he shoot. The rapport of the gun was deafening in an enclosed area, but its echo wasn¡¯t quite loud enough to overpower the sound of her body hitting the ice.


    ¡°You dipshit fuck!¡± Zane shouted, kneeling down and letting ice envelop him. ¡°You¡¯re going to pay for that.¡±


    ¡°Syl!¡± A new voice shouted. A woman, likely the same age as this first student.


    Lance cast a perception-type spell instead of turning to see where she was, but there was a block of some kind preventing him from pushing beyond the confines of the cavern.


    ¡°What is it?¡± the male student asked, not even bothering to look at Zane as the tactical-class magician charged, the ice increasing his strength and power with each step he took.


    ¡°There¡¯s no eyes on you,¡± the woman called out. ¡°Just confirmed it. Uriel took hers off too.¡±


    ¡°Oh,¡± Syl said. ¡°Fantastic.¡±


    Zane lunged, the temperature around him dropping so quickly that his breath crystallized and joined the flurry of ice around him¡ªand then he stopped, going dead still.


    The ice cracked. A second later, Zane¡¯s FCD hit the ground in pieces. The man himself followed, cold shock setting in as he suddenly lost immunity to the aftereffects of his own spell.


    A chill ran down Lance¡¯s back. What the hell?


    This was no C-rank magician. Not by a long shot. Nobody had that type of magic. Nobody except¡­


    ¡°Don¡¯t do that,¡± Syl said, pointing at the downed Sanguine operative, who was desperately clutching at his throat. A wave of flux burst out from Syl¡¯s hand, and the operative fell still.


    He knows about the self-destructs?


    Lance had to end this now. Even if this hadn¡¯t been their initial target, this boy was clearly an abnormality for Auria. Eliminating him now was a number one priority. He could not be allowed to grow any further.


    He drew deep within him, burning reserves that shouldn¡¯t have been touched. Lance could sense his life seeping out of him as he drew far more than he should have been able to. He wouldn¡¯t be able to use a full manifestation of his bloodline¡¯s signature master-class spell, but he could pull off an imitation that would come close enough.


    The ice shook beneath their feet, melting in fast motion.


    Syl just looked at Lance, rolled his eyes, and shot him.


    The Cascadian threw up a shield the moment he saw the trigger finger actually pull back, not wanting to repeat Andrea¡¯s mistake, but as his activation process fizzled out and his own flux clung to his body, he realized with horror that Syl had picked up the spell jammer.


    Hot, mind-numbing pain spread from his core. Lance put a hand to it. Wet. Too wet.


    His spell wavered, then shattered entirely as another wave of flux assailed him. Lance dropped to his knees.


    ¡°Oh, come on,¡± Syl said disdainfully. ¡°I didn¡¯t even shoot you that lethally.¡±

 Chapter 18 - Interrogation

    It had been a fair bit since Syl had found himself in the awkward position of having to interrogate living prisoners, but he could make do with what he had.


    The Sanguine operative was likely going to be unresponsive for some time. Syl had shot him first, so he¡¯d already had some time to lose blood. It wasn¡¯t impossible that he¡¯d bleed out entirely if nobody did anything. Bianca was certified in first aid, but the less she got involved here the better.


    He made his way to the insensate operative. The Sanguine magician had been mid tactical-class¡ªa solid bet for dealing with most students, but not for the elite Reserve that had come here. The group must have assumed that they could get away with doing a hit-and-run, leaving before the Reserve¡¯s master-class magicians could mount a proper counteroffensive.


    Except that hadn¡¯t been the end of it, because the Sanguine operators weren¡¯t the only ones who¡¯d been sent here. Two dead Cascadians and a dying third were proof of that. They weren¡¯t in the perfect environment for their powers¡ªif Syl¡¯s intelligence and memory served him correctly, Cascadians worked best with running fresh water, not the stagnant water of this lake¡ªbut they were still overkill.


    More to the point, they were exceptionally illegal. They must have been aware of that, since they had gone to some length to disguise their identities as regular mercenaries, but their spell signatures were too distinct. Syl recognized Cascadian magic when he saw one.


    He¡¯d killed the first one intentionally, but he hadn¡¯t fully expected the ice wielder to die as well. Usually, they wore some kind of equipment that protected them from aftereffects of allied spells in case regular magical defenses failed. The lack of that must have been what had done him in once Syl had smashed through his active skill.


    The sole survivor out of those three was keeping himself alive, using his remaining flux to roughly manipulate his own blood, stemming his gunshot wound. It was taking all his concentration, so Syl deemed him a non-threat for the time being.


    He was also going to live longer than the Sanguine magician, so Syl lowered him on the triage list. Though he wasn¡¯t particularly invested in keeping them alive, there was no known spell that could extract a confession from a corpse.


    Rather than use valuable resources or reveal more trump cards to anyone who might have been watching (and there were always people watching, even if Bianca had cleared out all the official sources), Syl used a more basic spell.


    There was no true field of healing magic. While there were spells that could modify the body and mind¡ªtypically combinations of the Enhancement and Manipulation systems¡ªthey often worked by hijacking existing senses and reinforcing biological processes, such as the Violet family¡¯s signature Violet Eyes or the Red family¡¯s Phoenix Time. Accelerating the body¡¯s ability to heal itself was technically possible, but every true healing spell was prohibitively expensive and inefficient. Syl had been working on some of his own, but even he had been forced to admit that reproducible healing was largely a dead-end task.


    What he could do, however, was the same thing that medics had been doing since humans had fought with particularly sharp sticks. The only difference was that he had far more resources. The difference between a medic from World War II and III was as severe as the one between that 1945 medic and their ancient predecessor staunching bleeding with sap and leaves.


    Syl tore off a piece of the Sanguine magician¡¯s uniform, though ¡°uniform¡± was a strong name for it, then placed it on the worst of the bleeding. Using Hemosynthesis, a standard C-class transmutation-type spell that combined both the fortification and sabotage elements of the Enhancement system, Syl converted a portion of the cloth and the blood soaked into it, synthesizing a compound called kaolin.


    A second spell of the same class and type was less standard, but very effective for the medics who used it. This one was more temporary, but for some time, he could have his target¡¯s body convince itself that a certain externally designated item was part of it. In this case, it was the kaolin-infused piece of cloth, which fused with the Sanguine operative¡¯s skin, stemming the bleeding.


    Since he¡¯d probably damaged something internal, the kaolin mattered too. This was one of the spells that had been developed from pre-magical principles. Field medics had already used equipment that could deploy this compound through chemical processes to stabilize bleeding¡ªall that had changed was how precisely and effectively it could be delivered.


    As much beauty as Syl found in the world of magic, he continued to realize time and time again that humans had been just as ingenious before the Gates had opened as after.


    Once he was sure that the Sanguine guy wasn¡¯t going to die immediately, he reared back and kicked him in the side hard enough to crack a rib.


    The operative jarred awake, panicking and reaching for his FCD before realizing it wasn¡¯t there.


    ¡°I wouldn¡¯t do that if I were you,¡± Syl adviced, his own FCD active and visibly manifesting magic. The spell he was manifesting was harmless, of course¡ªthe real threat he held came from his second, hidden FCD. Everybody always expected the obvious weapon. ¡°Your FCDs have been disabled, including the one implanted in you by your organization. I would strongly advise that you start talking, or you might find that I¡¯m not inclined to give you as kind an end.¡±Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.


    Syl really was rusty. Though he had a fair variety of magic, he wasn¡¯t well versed in the techniques nor the precise applications of spells that Aurian specialists in enhanced interrogation used. He wasn¡¯t going to start practicing now, so he figured threats would have to do.


    ¡°F-f-fuck you, kid,¡± the operator snarled.


    Threats didn¡¯t tend to work if they weren¡¯t backed up by something, so Syl opened his hand, casting Magnetism once again. It was a petty display of power, since he¡¯d put the gun down not too far away, but sometimes that was what worked. At least, he thought that was it. He wasn¡¯t accustomed to leaving survivors.


    ¡°Look, I¡¯m not asking for much,¡± he said, aiming the AR at the operator¡¯s head. ¡°I know your affiliation, so I just need your name, purpose, and who you report to.¡±


    Funnily enough, the gun got the operator¡¯s attention more than the FCD did. Recounting the fight, Syl did recall that he hadn¡¯t done much impressive in the way of magic before knocking this guy out of commission¡ªoh, wait, no, he¡¯d frozen the lake. Then again, given the generally lackluster intelligence sported by this group, it was entirely possible that the operator had just assumed that was his Cascadian allies.


    Speaking of which. ¡°One more thing. Why are you working with Cascadia?¡±


    No, this definitely wasn¡¯t good interrogation procedure. Over-pressuring people with too many questions was a good way to force a false confession, Syl finally remembered. It wasn¡¯t the best for getting real information.


    ¡°Hold on, lemme start this over. Name?¡±


    ¡°Claudius,¡± the operator finally said, clearly less confident now that he was more lucid and more understanding of the shit situation he was in. His eyes flicked over towards the bloodied corpses.


    ¡°That¡¯s not your name,¡± Syl said, annoyed. ¡°That¡¯s an operator designation.¡±


    ¡°What? How do you¡ªshit.¡±


    ¡°Your group isn¡¯t as secret as you pretend to be,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯m going to ask one more time. Name.¡±


    Honestly, he didn¡¯t care that much about the name as much as he did establishing that he was only going to accept correct answers.


    Also, he wanted something to refer to this magician as other than ¡°the operator¡± or ¡°this guy.¡±


    ¡°Isaac,¡± the operator finally said. ¡°Isaac¡­ Nashton.¡±


    ¡°False last name, but at least we¡¯re getting somewhere,¡± Syl said. ¡°Purpose. Why are you here?¡±


    Isaac remained silent, his expression twisting.


    ¡°Do I need to shoot you again?¡±


    ¡°No no no,¡± Isaac said, trying to hold his hands up before realizing that one of them had had its nerve endings severed and was functionally useless. ¡°I¡­ this was supposed to be a smash and grab. Kill a few students, shake them up. There was a target we were looking for.¡±


    ¡°Who were you looking for?¡± Syl asked. ¡°Who are you reporting to?¡±


    He was starting to regret having tried this. His initial plan had been to question them, then kill them before they could potentially speak about the power he¡¯d unleashed to others, but it was looking like he¡¯d have to involve his team on this.


    ¡°Please,¡± Isaac said. ¡°I have a family. They¡ªif I talk, they¡¯re dead.¡±


    Syl rolled his eyes. ¡°I wish it was that easy to get people to shut up.¡±


    He sent a message to Bianca. While they were inside a sealed Gate, there was no way to send information out without actually leaving the portal, so he would have to wait until they left before he contacted anyone else.


    For the time being, he would content himself with knocking the two of them out and taking them out. The fight was functionally over, after all.


    While healing the body was difficult, temporarily disabling it was a different story. It was much easier to turn natural processes off than it was to activate new ones, after all. C-class sabotage-type spell Cut Consciousness did about what it said on the label. It used flux to reduce the amount of information and energy transmitted by certain nerves, rendering a target immobile and mostly unconscious. It was rarely usable against higher-class opponents, even before taking counter-casting and similar defenses into account. Just flooding one¡¯s own body with flux was often enough to flush out spells that sought to modify it.


    Fortunately for Syl, these two were a bit too busy bleeding out to counter his spell. The Sanguine operative keeled over, out like a light. His head hit the ice with an unhealthy-sounding thunk. Syl didn¡¯t bother to check for a concussion. Play stupid games¡­


    Lance might be more of a problem. That man wasn¡¯t master-class, but he was a much better magician than Isaac. The fact that he was still crawling forward despite the bullet wound in his stomach was proof of that.


    Syl had dismantled the Cascadian¡¯s FCD as part of taking him down, but fully eliminating an FCD¡¯s usability was a tricky thing. For a casting device to work as intended, there were a great deal of delicate pieces of technology that needed to be intact and assembled. Its components, however, still held power. Misuse of a broken FCD to act as a casting aid had been commonplace during the days of terror that had marked World War III and all subsequent conflicts.


    Lance, apparently, knew about that. He scrabbled for the largest intact chunk of his FCD¡ªthe process control element¡ªand wrapped bloody fingers around it, immediately beginning another cast.


    Syl had to give the magician props. Even in a situation like this, he was trying to leave a final mark, no matter how fruitless.


    The momentary amusement faded as Syl realized the tactical-class spell Lance was casting wasn¡¯t aimed at him. That lethal blade was going right for the Cascadian¡¯s own neck.


    "I don¡¯t think so,¡± Syl said, shoving a great deal of flux into a signature technique that had been registered in some classified documents as Ruin.


    The spell fizzled out, and Lance¡¯s head hit the ground, his fingers going slack.


    ¡°That was a mistake,¡± Syl said. ¡°I didn¡¯t particularly care about if you lived or died beforehand, but if you¡¯re willing to kill yourself to hide your information, you¡¯re definitely worth taking in alive.¡±


    He realized a bit awkwardly that he was talking to an unconscious body. Syl rushed over to the prone man, applying another round of first aid to ensure he wouldn¡¯t bleed out, and frowned as he looked around the iced-over lake.


    ¡°This is going to be a lot of paperwork,¡± he muttered.


    ¡°The seal¡¯s down!¡± Bianca shouted. ¡°Let¡¯s get moving!¡±

 Chapter 19 - Prisoner Transfer

    It proved to be easier than expected to explain away what had happened. Uriel and Waylan already suspected that there was more to Syl¡¯s power than he had explained, but they were also aware that Bianca was a possibly generational talent. Combined with the fact that the Reserve group had been able to weaken the ambush force, it was within reason that Bianca and Syl had been able to pull something out of their back pockets to win it.


    More importantly, most of them were just glad to be alive. Four students were dead¡ªLawrence and Nora from the Reserve, Wyatt and a student Syl didn¡¯t know named Veronica from the undergradautes. Two more were in critical condition¡ªAllen, who was suffering from burns across his entire body thanks to a flux overload and Ashley, who had been shot and partially drowned. Everyone who had been in the advance party was injured, Uriel and Waylan included.


    Syl did at least confirm that there likely weren¡¯t any others here. After eliminating and capturing the remaining magicians, the seal spell on the Gate had gone down, indicating that one of the magicians who¡¯d ambushed them had cast it. Since that had been a master-class spell, whoever cast it would have been at a notable disadvantage while fighting thanks to having to dual cast while using up flux at incredible rates. The fact that they¡¯d fought anyway indicated to Syl that there were no further magicians, and a cursory sensory sweep seemed to agree with him.


    Fortunately, most of the paperwork wasn¡¯t going to be on him. Their first priority after lugging the prisoners and wounded back was to evacuate the Gate as quickly as possible, which was made easier by the sudden influx of the rest of the Circuit team. Once the seal went down, the highest-power magicians from the Reserve stormed in. They¡¯d seen the Gate close off in real time and had prepared to strike the moment it had gone down.


    As it turned out, they missed the actual action. Still, the organization of the Reserve was such that after a few barked commands by the leadership, they pivoted entirely to evacuation. Syl could give Aurian military organization some credit. At least they were capable of triaging and medevacing the students who¡¯d been hurt the worst. By the time he was finally out of the Gate, he saw hovercraft with clearly indicated hospital iconography on them.


    Not that it would help in an actual battle, he thought. These were regulation medevac craft¡ªvery useful for the purposes of getting wounded soldiers out of a fight and also a high-priority target for any magicians who happened to have a spare tactical-class spell on their hands. By international regulation, targeting medical craft was a war crime¡ªbut so was the application of spell jammers, and Syl knew damn well how well that went over. People only started caring about what counted within the rules after the dust was settled.


    Dealing with his two captures was a bit more annoying. He¡¯d stripped them of their weapons and FCDs, pocketing a particularly high-tech pistol for himself, but there was still the matter of getting rid of them. Syl opened the text interface on his FCD.


    [RANK HIDDEN] Syl: Found the attack you were warning about. Sanguine + what I¡¯m reasonably certain are shallow cover Cascadians. Seven total, five now dead, two unconscious. Do you have jurisdiction?


    [RANK HIDDEN] [NAME HIDDEN]: Central command is already in my ear. They want the ¡°water mage.¡±


    [RANK HIDDEN] Syl: They¡¯re still trying to protect the veil? Seems to be getting increasingly pointless.


    [RANK HIDDEN] [NAME HIDDEN]: Seems so. Not my place to question it. Special forces get control over special ops. This doesn¡¯t count.


    [RANK HIDDEN] Syl: Delaying the inevitable only hurts them.


    [RANK HIDDEN] [NAME HIDDEN]: It does. Our preparations are in place already. Incarnate stands?


    [RANK HIDDEN] Syl: You know that better than I do. I¡¯ll attend to this situation myself. Stay updated.


    [RANK HIDDEN] [NAME HIDDEN]: Received. Sending a transport over.


    Sure enough, after twelve students with varying degrees of injuries had been whisked off by paramedics and a separate group in an all-black vehicle entered the Gate for body retrieval, a separate official emerged from the same place, casually displaying her power as she hovered towards where the students who had yet to be dismissed were.


    ¡°General,¡± the remaining Reserve members said in unison, saluting her and standing.


    ¡°General,¡± Syl echoed, inclining his head. He did not stand, instead refreshing the spells rendering both of his captives unconscious. In addition, he placed the finishing touches on a couple of extra spells, all of them to facilitate a simple protective one. It wouldn¡¯t hold up under heavy fire, but he didn¡¯t need it to. All he needed was for it to go unnoticed, which his spells


    The last time he¡¯d seen strategic-class magician and two-star general Allison Violet had been when when she had come to question him after he had resoundingly beat her son Drew in a duel. If Syl had thought she had looked ready for a fight then, she was moreso now.


    As befitted a strategic-class general, she had several layers of both perception and absorption-type spells surrounding her, searching the area for further ambushes and preparing herself for the possibility of a sudden attack. Syl tamped down on the sudden spike of jealousy that she could casually passively cast more spells than he had processes to work with. That wouldn¡¯t be productive for anyone.


    She addressed a group of six; Bianca, Syl, and a portion of the survivors of the group that had walked into the ambush. They were, Syl noted, the only people who had seen exactly who was on the enemy side. The others who¡¯d been there were either dead or hospitalized.


    ¡°What happened today was an unforeseen tragedy,¡± she said heavily.


    Lie, Syl thought. He was unsurprised that General Violet would be the vector for this, though he was surprised to see that they had bothered to use a strategic-class magician to get the point across. The perks of being at First Academy, apparently¡ªAuria chose stronger magicians to make up stories to you.


    ¡°This senseless act of violence was unexpected and could not be prepared for.¡±


    Lie. Syl could see how the three Reserve members grimaced ever so slightly at that. As members of one of the organizations that had gotten the warning, they had to know that this was damage control. How much they individually knew, he could only speculate. Given James Rokho¡¯s general distaste for the situation and Syl¡¯s own knowledge of the prismatic families, he assumed that Uriel and Waylan both knew a good deal more than they let on. Ashley, who was from a branch family, likely knew some, but she¡¯d been wounded enough to require immediate hospitalization.The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    ¡°We have reason to believe that members of a terrorist organization known as Sanguine tampered with measurement equipment to make a tactical-class gate appear to be much weaker than it was,¡± the general continued.


    Lie. Syl had to admire how much she sold the idea that she believed it. Then again, that was basically a prerequisite to rank high in Auria¡¯s magical forces.


    ¡°Rest assured that your bravery did not go unnoticed. Thanks to your efforts, terrorist efforts to eliminate Auria¡¯s best and brightest failed. These attackers will face justice, and their extremist organization will meet the full force of our magic.¡±


    That was possibly the first truth she¡¯d told, though like all truths Auria begrudgingly used, it was incomplete. Judging from the way Waylan couldn¡¯t quite hold back his frown, Syl wasn¡¯t the only one irritated by that.


    ¡°General, if I have permission to speak?¡± the third Reserve member¡ªSteven, Syl recalled¡ªasked.


    ¡°Speak.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ve, um¡­ heard about Sanguine before,¡± he said, trying to dance around the fact that the Reserve had, in fact, been warned. ¡°Those last guys¡­ they weren¡¯t Sanguine, were they?¡±


    ¡°The record will show that they were,¡± the general said.


    The first full truth.


    ¡°Recover your flux and tend to your injuries. A funeral will be held for the deceased within the week. You are dismissed.¡±


    The poor undergraduate looked shell-shocked. Syl guessed that this was the first time she¡¯d seen any real violence. Somebody lucked out during the war.


    Uriel gently guided her away alongside the other Reserve, returning to the buses that they¡¯d come in from.


    ¡°Bianca Ashwood and Syl Auria,¡± General Violet said.


    The two of them, expecting this, had not moved yet. Syl met Bianca¡¯s gaze briefly. She rolled her eyes and sighed.


    ¡°You are not who you seem to be,¡± she said simply.


    ¡°You seem very open about what you say,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Do you only stop caring when you are not lying for Auria?¡±


    The general¡¯s flux shifted, one of her spells fluctuating out of existence.


    ¡°I would advise that you tread carefully,¡± the strategic-class magician said, the raw manifestation of her magic weighing down on them, invisible pressure magnifying her presence. ¡°I am well aware of what spells are cast here, Ashwood.¡±


    The way she said the name made it very clear that the general was at least somewhat aware of who Bianca actually was.


    ¡°Threats are beneath you, General,¡± Syl said lightly, pushing out with his own magic.


    Using Ruin had burnt out a chunk of his magical circuits, but a lack of spell processes did not necessarily mean a lack of power. He was just as well versed in non-structured magic as he was in spellcraft, and he still had a good amount of flux to spare.


    There were multiple problems with simply using raw flux as a suppressant. First, it was inefficient; why use raw flux when there were a dozen low-class spells that could achieve a similar effect? Furthermore, it also increased the risk of miscasting if the person doing it then attempted a new spell while their raw flux was just circling them. Also, it was an easy way to reveal how powerful you were, which was not something you wanted to broadcast if you weren¡¯t sure of your superiority over the other.


    Essentially, the only purpose to do it was to establish dominance.


    Seeing a student, General Violet must have figured that even a prodigy like Bianca wouldn¡¯t have the flux capacity to counter raw magical pressure. Syl doubted he¡¯d even entered the equation.


    Thanks to a variety of factors, his emotions had been dulled for some time now, but even he had to admit to a vicious satisfaction when he simply threw off the flux like a heavy blanket.


    It wasn¡¯t even hard, not even with his reserves as depleted as they were.


    ¡°What?¡± the general asked, confused. Seemingly by instinct, she drew her FCD, a short baton-style device with a spiral of crystals at its tip. ¡°What are you?¡±


    For the first time, Syl saw an emotion in the general that hadn¡¯t been carefully crafted and practiced. This was someone who was used to operating within parameters, even in the midst of chaos. She knew how to follow orders, and had done so to great effect during the third world war¡ªwhat she didn¡¯t know was how to react to someone like Syl. A true wild card.


    ¡°That¡¯s not for you to know,¡± Syl said. ¡°Let me guess. You were here to pick up the Cascadian?¡±


    ¡°There is no Cascadian present,¡± General Violet said, settling back into the role she was meant to play. ¡°Cascadia and Auria are at peace with each other and have a strong non-aggression¡ª¡°


    ¡°Stop,¡± Bianca interjected. ¡°Save your words for those who believe them, General.¡±


    ¡°A Cascadian magician that shouldn¡¯t be here,¡± Syl said. ¡°I suppose you would deport them? Save their government a few uncomfortable questions in exchange for a favor or two? An extension of our ceasefire, maybe?¡±


    The uncomfortable shift in the general¡¯s posture told Syl that he was probably right on some of those points. It was more likely that she simply didn¡¯t know. A lower strategic-class magician wasn¡¯t important enough to involve in the secret negotiations that this would entail, and a magician didn¡¯t become a two-star general without learning to look the other way.


    ¡°That¡¯s not going to happen, General,¡± Syl said. ¡°If you need to relay a message to your superiors, tell them I did their job for them. If there are no Cascadians here, there¡¯s no reason their government should question the sudden absence of three of their magicians.¡±


    While the general was still off-kilter from his magic, he drew the pistol he¡¯d stolen and shot the unconscious Lance twice in the head.


    Blood exploded from the impact point, and the body jerked before abruptly going still.


    As a veteran of the deadliest war in history, the general did not flinch, but she did curse in the way that one did when they knew they were going to have to file a lot of forms.


    ¡°There,¡± Syl said. ¡°No more issue with prisoner transfer.¡±


    As if on cue, the sound of a supersonic transport slowing down to a sudden stop reached them, a thunder-crack ruffling Bianca¡¯s hair as a familiar special forces jet decloaked not a hundred meters above the beach. A bay opened, preceding two fully suited-up strategic-class magicians. Neither of them were identifiable as such¡ªtheir power armor made it so that it was difficult to even tell them apart, let alone that they were powerful magicians.


    ¡°SDU-9 reporting,¡± a distorted voice said, identity hidden by the sound-warping magic built into the suit. ¡°You should¡¯ve been informed of our arrival.¡±


    The general looked like she¡¯d bitten into a particularly sour lemon. ¡°I was.¡±


    ¡°The Sanguine prisoner is ours,¡± the operative said. ¡°And¡­ I do believe the agreement was that central command gets one live prisoner. This one seems dead, so I¡¯m going to void that agreement and take it with me. You can have the other one, if you¡¯d prefer, but I don¡¯t think Command particularly wants to interrogate a second-rate terrorist.¡±


    The chagrined look on the general¡¯s face hadn¡¯t changed. She seemed unaware of the fact that the Cascadian was still alive and that the blood had been part of a conjuration spell set to activate upon Syl¡¯s protection breaking. If she¡¯d been focusing on the ¡°dead¡± prisoner, she might have noticed, but her focus was shot right now.


    ¡°That won¡¯t be necessary,¡± General Violet said. ¡°I have completed my duty here.¡±


    ¡°General,¡± the same operative acknowledged, saluting before gathering up the unconscious prisoners with a wall of force. ¡°Thank you for your time.¡±


    Both operatives rose into the air, firing movement-type propulsion spells from their packs to force themselves into the air. They returned to the ship without any further incident, and then they were gone.


    General Violet left without another word.


    Bianca sighed. ¡°I had hoped that would be less bloody.¡±


    ¡°Is what it is,¡± Syl said. ¡°It¡¯ll be bloodier by the end.¡±


    His FCD buzzed.


    [RANK HIDDEN] [NAME HIDDEN]: Well handled. It won¡¯t hold up for that long, but it¡¯ll be enough for us to get the necessary information.


    [RANK HIDDEN] Syl: Excellent. Let me know if there are any more imminent threats on our lives.


    ¡°You¡¯re just heading back?¡± Bianca asked, watching Syl as he started walking back. ¡°That¡¯s not your style.¡±


    ¡°Scorching the earth wouldn¡¯t do much more than spill more blood,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯ll deal with them if and when they come. That fight gave me some ideas. I have some engineering to do.¡±

 Chapter 20 - Experimenting

    Replicating a spell after seeing it once was one thing. Syl had done it a handful of times, but it usually wasn¡¯t very productive. Most spells weren¡¯t worth copying since he already had something with a similar or better effect, and the ones that were worth replicating often had so many spell processes that he had to make significant modifications in order to even cast them.


    Taking principles of a spell was another. Syl did that much more, but it was significantly harder to do. This was the first time he¡¯d seen a real Cascadian spellcaster in some time. They had adaptedtheir spellcraft to work in close quarters, it seemed. The last tiem he¡¯d seen them, they¡¯d been a terror when there was a great deal of fresh water lying around, but that had been at the scales of full reservoirs or lakes.


    Though they had ultimately been ineffectual against him, he¡¯d seen enough of their magic to be impressed. There was a level of efficiency to their spells that had stemmed from their activation processes, not just the general level of polish in the spell itself.


    Syl didn¡¯t have much to work with since he¡¯d broken the FCDs enough to render their history unreadable. All he had as a base was the memory of what they¡¯d cast from the outside, which meant he would be missing a few critical pieces.


    ¡°What are you working on?¡± Bianca asked.


    Members of the Circuit team had been given two free days off class, ostensibly to mourn and recover. Syl knew at least some of that time was going to be spent ensuring information security, which left a bitter taste in his mouth, but it wasn¡¯t something he could deal with short of inciting a revolution against Auria, which he didn¡¯t particularly have plans for at the moment.


    That was fine, though. School life was his break time. Since he wasn¡¯t there, he would do what he always did.


    ¡°Trying to mimic an activation process from memory,¡± Syl said, typing and deleting another few lines in his FCD console before shutting it off for the time being. ¡°The Cascadians had ridiculous response times on their spells, not all of which even used verbal magic.¡±


    ¡°Is that not because they are innate water casters?¡± Bianca asked, tilting her head. ¡°I believed that was the scientifically accepted explanation.¡±


    ¡°It is,¡± Syl replied. ¡°Yet I somehow doubt that Cascadia just happens to have the perfect combination of genetics and environment to make all of their mages such powerful innate casters. We were part of the same country not fifty years ago.¡±


    ¡°Not all of their mages are innate casters,¡± Bianca suggested.


    ¡°That would make innate casters elites, and they wouldn¡¯t send elites to do a base job like this,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°Are you sure?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°If they knew they were taking a shot at you and me, they probably would have sent stronger people.¡±


    ¡°True,¡± Syl allowed, ¡°but the deployed magicians didn¡¯t know who either you or I were, which tells me that we weren¡¯t dealing with the best of the best. My best guess is that they knew they were going for a tertiary princess.¡±


    ¡°Bad luck for them,¡± Bianca said, nodding.


    ¡°And also not a reason to burn elites,¡± Syl said. ¡°Especially not if they were false-flag operators trying to operate with an incompetent local terrorist group.¡±


    ¡°Then what do you think it was?¡±


    ¡°I think Cascadia might have found out how to integreate the principles of innate casting into their spells,¡± Syl said.


    Innate magic and free casting were two sides of the same coin. Syl had made some significant process on the latter, which just entailed any process of using a spell without an FCD. Though his workaround wasn¡¯t true free casting, it could pretty handily eliminate the need for an FCD under very specific circumstances.


    Innates, on the other hand, were people born with a specific proficiency towards a type of magic. They could sometimes free cast basic spells, though this was considered less of an answer towards the great unsolved conjecture and more of an exception to it.


    More important was how their affinity modified their relationship with their magic. While in their element or using it, innate casters were far more effective in speed, efficiency, and power with their spells. They were a terror to face on the battlefield for exactly that reason.


    Syl had been told that he had once upon been an innate. His affinity had broken a long time ago, lost in the same incident that had severed his vocal cords, and if it had any effects on him now, he didn¡¯t notice them.


    He¡¯d tried reopening that door once or twice, but the results had been disastrous, to say the least. As such, his time was better spent trying to replicate spells he¡¯d seen already rather than trying to awaken any hidden potential.


    ¡°That¡¯s a bold claim to make,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Do you truly think so?¡±


    ¡°If nothing else, it¡¯s worth testing,¡± Syl said. ¡°I need more data, but I doubt we¡¯ll find our Cascadian captive very cooperative for our purposes.¡±Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.


    ¡°You could always get into war with Cascadia.¡± The suggestion was joking, but the princess¡¯ eyes were not.


    ¡°I like living in a country where most everyone is alive,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°I do too. Do you truly think you will live out your life without them making an attempt?¡±


    ¡°No, but I know what my interference will mean in any conflict,¡± Syl said. ¡°I will do what I must when I must.¡±


    ¡°That is as much as I can ask out of you, I suppose. I will leave you to your work.¡±


    Said work was not as productive as Syl had hoped it would be, though it bore more fruit than expected. He hadn¡¯t expected to crack the secret of Cascadian magic after just closely examining one spell that had been cast towards him, though of course he¡¯d hoped for that. What Syl got, ultimately, were a handful of insights.


    Cascadians structured their magic differently, though the differences might not have been apparent to anyone not well versed in magical theory. That much, Syl knew¡ªpublicly available spells from both countries had minute differences.


    When he tried to replicate the ones that had been thrown his way inside the Gate, however, he kept on getting the sensation that he was ever so slightly off. The timing between activation and the first process was just a little longer than it should have been.


    Syl¡¯s first conclusion was that the Cascadians had been simultaneously forming activation process and process one, which was a technique that a good deal of elite duelists used to hasten their spells at the cost of precision. He himself couldn¡¯t properly mimic that just thanks to his lack of ability to simultaneously manage processes. Though Syl could form them extremely quickly one after the other, he didn¡¯t have the extra cycles nor the vocal cords to spare to make two at once.


    When he got Bianca to try it out, though, he realized that conclusion had been wrong. Even when she cast the conjuration-type Manipulate Water¡ªa D-class spell that was elementary for both of them¡ªwith perfect simultaneous activation and opening processes, he could tell there was a difference between this and what he¡¯d fought against.


    Are they pre-casting their spell processes? That sounded¡­ wrong. There was a reason the activation process was cast before the rest of the spell processes in most countries¡¯ magic theory. Syl knew better than nearly anyone in the nation that Aurian spell theory wasn¡¯t the only way to apply magic, but this was something that was almost universally accepted.


    Without the activation process to direct the spell and create a container for it, forming a spell sequence caused the flux in the air to dissipate almost immediately. Even if the magician made an activation process immediately afterwards, there was no guarantee that they would be able to keep the spell¡¯s form the same.


    Syl was pretty sure he could do it, but that would be sloppy casting and more effort than it was worth. The Cascadian magicians had been casting seemingly effortlessly. How had they bridged that gap?


    For the time being, he supposed that there was nothing to do but to experiment with it. Using a lower-class version of the same spells that the Cascadians had used against him, Syl spent a day trying various timings, formulating the spell process first before surrounding it with the activation one.


    He could feel that this was closer to what his enemy had used against him than the simultaneous activation, but it still felt wrong. The spell wasn¡¯t coming along any easier, and it was significantly less stable. Placing power into it an empty shell just wasn¡¯t working to formulate a spell with any modicum of coherence.


    Maybe he was coming at this with the wrong approach. Just because their activation process was triggering after their spell processes didn¡¯t necessarily mean that was the only difference¡ªin fact, given current results, it was almost necessary that there was something else.


    Had Syl been wrong? Was Cascadia using innate magicians on a job as haphazard as this one?


    That would have been pretty strange. Unless the neighboring country had figured out a way to breed innate magicians¡ªtheoretically not possible, though Syl could never discount the impossible becoming simply improbable¡ªthose should have still been too valuable a resource to use like this.


    While it was possible that they had figured out how to breed innates, Syl highly doubted it. That was a decades-long program, and Cascadian information security was not tight enough to hide a plan like that from before the great magical war.


    For the time being, he would continue assuming that he wasn¡¯t going to have to abruptly develop an innate proficiency for water magic to make his spells marginally improve their efficiency.


    It was possible that there had been something in their FCDs, but Syl had annihilated their casting devices in the process of taking them down. If his special unit found anything there, he was sure they¡¯d let him know.


    While taking them down¡­ there was a thought. Syl thought back to the methods he¡¯d employed himself during that brief stint of violence. His ¡°free casting,¡± so to speak, had employed his technique of copying a spell pattern into his brain and activating it from memory. There was the possibility that they were doing something similar. Syl wasn¡¯t so arrogant as to think he was the first to ever think of any given magical theory.


    Except this also seemed to work in different ways from his implanted magic. If they were downloading magic into their brains, it wasn¡¯t to activate a pre-prepped spell.


    Syl kept experimenting, though he didn¡¯t want to try anything too invasive at the moment. He ruled out possibilities one by one, trying various techniques he was reasonably sure the Cascadians had access to.


    He hadn¡¯t expected to reach success in the first few hours, but Syl had to admit to at least hoping that he would make some headway. Instead, he had a couple dozen false starts that he was fairly sure the Cascadians hadn¡¯t used and a whole lot of excess flux lying around.


    Syl was about to go and ask the people at Incarnate if they had any leads on it when his FCD buzzed.


    It wasn¡¯t someone he¡¯d been expecting. He¡¯d thought it would have been either Bianca asking him what he wanted to eat or someone from the special unit reporting back on something they¡¯d gotten out of their new captives, but it was neither.


    It was from Uriel, which was surprising. He had removed the software that Jennifer had downloaded onto everyone¡¯s FCD before the Gate as well as anything the school had left on it. She shouldn¡¯t have had his FCD identifier.


    Mj. Uriel: We need to talk as soon as possible. Off campus. No cameras.


    He raised his eyebrows.


    Syl: This sounds like the least creative setup for an ambush I¡¯ve ever seen.


    Mj. Uriel: As if that¡¯d stop you. Two hours from now. You can pick the location.


    This was certainly an interesting development. Syl had noticed that Uriel had at least some pre-existing knowledge about Auria¡¯s state of affairs. What business she wanted with him, though? That was a different question.


    Syl: I¡¯m at my house. I¡¯ll send you the address.


    Mj. Uriel: Copy that.

 Chapter 21 - Uriel

    Syl hadn¡¯t actually expected Uriel to come to his address. It was pretty apparent that she was growing more curious about who he actually was. As a member of a prismatic family, it was entirely possible that she¡¯d gained access to intelligence on him far beyond what an ordinary student or even administrator should have been able to see. While it was true that most of his information was hidden behind several layers of security, he knew better than anyone else that there was no such thing as a perfect secret.


    Then again, he supposed that he could probably assume she hadn¡¯t seen anything. Finding even one or two of his least classified documents might have led her to give that initial offer, but equally likely was her showing up unannounced with a tac squad. It definitely wouldn¡¯t have seen her accepting an offer to come over to talk.


    Uriel arrived in an armored hovercraft, which was possibly one of the least efficient ways to move around. When inter-Auria mass transit was so ubiquitous, using one of the most fuel-consuming and expensive to maintain vehicles was a status symbol as much as it was a practicality. Only a prismatic would have such a flux-expensive vehicle, and only a prismatic would need one.


    This one didn¡¯t come with the standard suite of security officers that Syl would have expected it to, but then again this was supposed to be a clandestine meeting. Besides, Uriel was a master-class magician. For someone of her level, it was rare that security provided any purpose beyond delaying an enemy magician. Syl decided to take it as a good sign that she hadn¡¯t brought any.


    The Reserve Major Uriel Indigo could¡¯ve been mistaken for any other talented woman of her age today. Her hair and eyes identified her as a prismatic, but there were those who were only tangentially related to the great clans with similar physical features, and besides, Uriel¡¯s was cut to a practically short length and covered under a wide-brim hat. The rest of her wear was casual enough to be clearly civilian while still giving her some air of dignity. If Syl didn¡¯t know better, he would¡¯ve placed her as a researcher on a work holiday.


    ¡°Uriel,¡± he greeted her out front. ¡°I¡¯d say it¡¯s a pleasure, but I¡¯m a bit busy at the moment.¡±


    ¡°I understand that,¡± she said politely. ¡°I wouldn¡¯t have interrupted you if it weren¡¯t important.¡±


    For you, maybe, he thought. Uriel was as composed as ever, but Syl had identified her tells a while ago. The way she idly rubbed a thumb over a spot on her wrist that he knew contained a concealed FCD, the slight twitch when she blinked, a number of other microscopic changes in flux that no normal magician would¡¯ve caught¡ªthey were clear as day to him.


    ¡°Come inside, then,¡± he said, opening the door wider with a gesture.


    ¡°You¡¯re not alone,¡± Uriel said.


    ¡°I assure you, Bianca¡¯s not a problem,¡± Syl said.


    Judging from the moment of chagrin on Uriel¡¯s expression, she was.


    ¡°Let me guess,¡± Syl said. ¡°A document carrying a few names telling you that there were, I don¡¯t know¡­ secret connections to prismatics? Maybe some other explanation? At least some level of understanding that there are prodigies to watch out for.¡±


    ¡°I shouldn¡¯t be surprised that you know that,¡± Uriel sighed, shaking her head, ¡°but I am anyway. You seem to know everything, which is suspect as it is.¡±


    ¡°You should already know by now that we are slightly more than we seem,¡± Syl said. ¡°As a member of the Reserve leadership¡ªhell, a prismatic, especially, surely you¡¯ve been notified.¡±


    Uriel shook her head. ¡°That¡¯s part of what I had wished to speak to you about.¡±


    That did actually surprise him. Thanks to his special contacts, he knew that the Reserve was aware of Bianca¡¯s presence, though not the details of who she was. Were the higher-ups who actually ran the academy segmenting what information went to who?


    ¡°Then you can speak to both of us,¡± Syl said. ¡°You already know that we live together. Even if she doesn¡¯t hear you, I would tell her about our conversation anyway.¡±


    ¡°Two can keep a secret if one is dead,¡± Uriel said, grimacing. ¡°As you say, then. If you don¡¯t mind.¡±


    Syl nodded, letting her follow him into the house.


    ¡°Uriel,¡± Bianca greeted her senior in similar practical casual wear, having been warned by Syl about her arrival. ¡°Please, have a seat. Would you like a cup of coffee?¡±


    ¡°If you don¡¯t mind,¡± the Reserve Major said. ¡°So. Syl.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s me.¡±


    ¡°You were the one who killed the Cascadians, am I correct?¡±


    Bianca looked at Syl, a warning in her eyes as she passed a steaming hot mug to Uriel.


    ¡°I¡¯ll take that as a yes,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Thank you for the coffee.¡±


    ¡°I did tell you that I was confident in my abilities on the battlefield,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°Not so much as to kill three innate water casters in their native environment,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Much less so from an ambush.¡±


    ¡°You were ambushed,¡± Syl said. ¡°I was not. Cascadian magicians are also best in running water, which this wasn¡¯t.¡±


    ¡°Three tactical-class magician and a master-class specialist are dead,¡± Uriel said neutrally, careful not to let her voice reveal emotion. ¡°On your practical exams, your scores placed you at D-class.¡±


    ¡°They did,¡± Syl said. ¡°I am uniquely unsuited for certain aspects of the practical.¡±Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.


    ¡°You are still evading my central point,¡± Uriel pointed out. ¡°You are stronger than you appear to be. Though you might have an explanation for everything, that remains true. You are also significantly more knowledgable about the state of the world than the average Aurian is.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ve been around,¡± Syl said.


    His non-answers weren¡¯t obtuse just to be annoying. Just like he¡¯d done with James Rokho, he wanted to scope out what exactly Uriel was getting at.


    It was becoming increasingly apparent that the policies that the Aurian government used to keep order were fostering dissent amongst their best and brightest¡ªbut since nothing had broken yet and it had so far seemed isolated, Syl had not considered it cause for concern.


    Now that he was at the academy, though¡­ that was a different story. Syl hadn¡¯t spoken to the newest generation of prismatics much if at all, mostly because they hadn¡¯t been near his level during the time he¡¯d been most active. Here, he was seeing a generational difference in action. Those who had been fighting since before the war kept the peace at any cost, even knowing how false the pretenses they were protecting were.


    This generation of Reserve, though, was just young enough to not have reached magical viability during World War III. They wouldn¡¯t have been drafted, and they¡¯d grown up in its aftermath as the first generation to be subject to this kind of Aurian information control. The cracks were starting to show, and that meant people were going to be taking sides.


    Syl would have preferred a different situation, to put it lightly. It seemed that Uriel was trying to scope out which side he wanted to take, so he was doing the same.


    ¡°You¡¯re being deliberately obtuse,¡± Uriel ventured.


    ¡°I¡¯m being reasonable,¡± Syl countered. ¡°Communication calls for caution.¡±


    ¡°Is that why you keep lying about your capabilities?¡± Uriel asked.


    ¡°I haven¡¯t been,¡± Syl said, shrugging. ¡°And you still haven¡¯t gotten to the point as to why you¡¯re here.¡±


    In fairness to Uriel, she was probably running the same song and dance in her head. Both sides were withholding information, and both sides knew they were doing so but couldn¡¯t tell what was safe to share.


    ¡°You were aware that those were Cascadian magicians,¡± Uriel said.


    ¡°It would have been hard not to,¡± Bianca said, sitting down with a coffee of her own. ¡°For anyone who¡¯s seen a Cascadian, at least.¡±


    ¡°Which is a vanishingly small number of living Aurians,¡± Uriel said.


    ¡°I was a klick from San Francisco when it blew,¡± Bianca fired back. ¡°We were in the area for a competition at the time.¡±


    True on all counts, though still lacking a critical amount of detail.


    Uriel leaned forward. This was evidently new information to her, which meant that if she had information on the two of them, it was surface level. Syl and Bianca¡¯s involvement in the San Francisco Bay incident was classified, but it wasn¡¯t exactly top-secret either. That classification went towards a number of his other aspects.


    ¡°You were in SF?¡± she asked. ¡°You saw what happened, then? The¡­ reactor?¡±


    Syl gave Bianca a dead-eyed look. ¡°The Cascadians, yes.¡±


    Uriel sighed. ¡°We don¡¯t even have a reactor there.¡±


    Well, there was no reactor there that Auria was aware of, so that was as true as Uriel knew.


    ¡°I am curious, though,¡± Uriel said. ¡°I¡¯ve read reports at varying levels of declassification, and the differences in the stories they tell are vast. Could you describe what happened?¡±


    They were slowly poking at each other¡¯s boundaries now, which was the exact kind of situation Syl had hoped to avoid.


    ¡°We are bound by a number of laws to not reveal that, which you surely already know as an officer of the Reserve,¡± Bianca said. ¡°If you wish to violate statutes, you should make your point.¡±


    Syl winced. Bianca was an element that he could never account for¡ªone of his few blind spots, even with how much time he¡¯d spent with her. Despite being a lady of literal royal manner, she had a tendency to be inflammatory in a way that had gotten her cut out of succession. This wasn¡¯t unsalvageable, but he found himself running through his quick-cast spells just in case. He¡¯d prepared, of course, but a master-class magician was never to be trifled with.


    ¡°That¡¯s¡­ fair,¡± Uriel said, dropping the composed facade. She took a deep breath, clearly steeling herself for something.


    Hm. Syl supposed his assessment of people had never been his strongest suit. He could guess how they acted under mortal danger, but Bianca had always been better suited towards dealing with people.


    He did, however, have a general understanding of social engineering as well as a passable knowledge of interpersonal relationships. It was trivial to take this as confirmation that Rokho was not in with the rest of the leadership. Secrets tended not to hold well, and if he¡¯d had an organization that matched his thoughts instead of a scant handful of people in his training center run by self-secluding religious extremists, everyone there would have at least gained the knowledge that Syl was aware of as much as Uriel.


    The fact that she was probing as much as she would and this unsure of herself pointed towards one of her or Rokho working on their own. Given the latter¡¯s general disenchantment with the Reserve, Syl suspected that the latter was more likely. Granted, he had no way to tell whether or not Uriel was on her own here, but he suspected she wouldn¡¯t have been confident enough to come into the residence of someone she suspected was stronger than her without anyone backing her up.


    Uriel visibly steeled herself, huffing outwardly before standing up. ¡°What we saw in the Gate was not an isolated incident.¡±


    Syl was a bit disappointed that this was what she was working herself up towards, but it didn¡¯t seem like that was all she had to say.


    ¡°That¡¯s obvious to anyone who can think past the orders,¡± Syl said. ¡°The standing status quo is that we and the military proper will deal with what comes next. It¡¯s been that way for a long time.¡±


    ¡°What comes next isn¡¯t going to be something we just deal with,¡± Uriel said, seizing on that word and blazing on with an unsteady fire. ¡°This was a test, and we only passed because we got lucky with who happened to be in the Gate at the time. When Cascadia comes calling for real, it will not be three of them accompanying four patsies. It will be from the seas, from our rivers, from the skies above, and we will fall.¡±


    ¡°Alarmist speech,¡± Syl said. ¡°I believe that¡¯s what this would be classified as. It¡¯s a misdemeanor, no?¡±


    ¡°It is obvious to anyone with a functional brain, which I know you possess,¡± Uriel said.


    ¡°It is,¡± Syl said. ¡°I don¡¯t think you¡¯ve made a point that requires me to be here yet.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re powerful,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Don¡¯t even try denying that, because whatever the tests you failed for Auria say, I know what I sensed. You clearly have a reason to operate on your own, and when push comes to shove, I¡¯d rather have you on our side than not.¡±


    And here was the real pitch. Our, she said. That was as good as a confirmation that there was some level of organization to¡­ an anti-government organization? Syl wasn¡¯t sure on the details. His special unit could have investigated, but they weren¡¯t particularly interested in the activities of others that had a similar goal as theirs.


    ¡°Our,¡± Bianca repeated. ¡°That¡¯s revolutionary talk.¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Uriel said. ¡°It¡¯s realist. When the storm comes, and it will, I don¡¯t intend on being blown away.¡±


    ¡°Very vague,¡± Bianca criticized. ¡°Do you have the slightest plan for what you¡¯ll do if Cascadia does invade?¡¯


    ¡°Do you think I would explain anything I have to two people who didn¡¯t know of its existence until just now?¡±


    I didn¡¯t need to, Syl thought.


    This was a bad sign, and not the first one in recent memory. That was¡­ cause for concern, at the very least.


    ¡°For the time being, all I want to do is let you know the door is open,¡± Uriel said. ¡°And¡­ one more thing. Syl.¡±


    ¡°Yes?¡±


    ¡°I want you to compete in the only important circuit tournament.¡±


    ¡°That seems unnecessary,¡± Bianca said. ¡°That¡¯s always just been for show.¡±


    Uriel shook her head. ¡°Your information is good, but it¡¯s out of date. I want you to compete against Cascadia.¡±

 Chapter 22 - Black Ops

    The mixed group of Reserve, undergraduates, and fully graduated adult magicians in the room right now had little in common at first glance. Almost every single magician had a different type specialty, and there were a few who were specifically elementalists who would be nearly useless outside a very specific set of circumstances. Most were from First Academy, but there were a few that had come from others.


    Syl had already realized the connection by now. They were all Circuit competitors of some kind¡ªsome on the collegiate level, others above. Despite the prevalence of Aurian graduates going directly into the military, whether as an assault mage or a researcher, not one of them was displaying military insignia beyond that of the Reserve.


    There was a reason the Graduate Reserve had the latter half of their title. They dealt with internal Aurian problems and importantly were nearly never deployed onto an active front. Auria was theoretically not at war with anyone, but their territories and allies further east absolutely were. Add on their critical relationship with Oceania and Lingdao, both of which were perpetually fending off regional disputes, and the result was that a fair chunk of those who had been in the military had seen action. Even those who hadn¡¯t were on constant vigilance for it.


    The Reserve, on the other hand, rarely went further than training.That made them ideal for circuit tournaments, which were one of the few ways to use offensive magic without being drafted in Aurian society.


    It had made more sense after Syl had heard it from Uriel and confirmed it with his special unit. This was a practice that had become more common since World War III, quietly done for the most part because parts of it would be inconvenient for Auria¡¯s image as a proud, powerful military state to continue functioning.


    Border disputes were extraordinarily common. Cascadia, Auria, and Soliland were very close neighbors and had had something of a rocky relationship in the decades since their establishment. Since all three countries recognized just how devastating all-out warfare could be for them, they had settled on a different way to mediate relatively minor border disputes.


    Syl had been somewhat familiar with the circuit rules, but Uriel adding him to the team had convinced him to look a little more deeply into it. There were a few sets of games that Auria played against her fellow countries, using a handful of elite to represent themselves. By necessity, said elites couldn¡¯t be the military officers that would so often be deployed in combat situations or otherwise assigned to critical positions.


    One of the few problems, it seemed, was that typical circuit¡ªthe kind that was played for fun, profit, and propaganda¡ªwas regulated. There were official judges as well as artificial restrictions placed on FCDs that would prevent lethal incidents from occurring during regular competition. In land contests, those regulations weren¡¯t there at all. Games were played to unconsciousness, surrender, or death. According to the data he¡¯d gathered as well as Uriel¡¯s word, Syl had surmised that typically there weren¡¯t too many casualties due to both sides¡¯ magicians being interested in their continued survival, but when someone pushed it too far, it escalated fast. Apparently, last year, that had happened.


    Syl hadn¡¯t been informed about much of this because it simply hadn¡¯t been important to him. When he¡¯d been active, he had been dealing with situations a lot bigger than border contests. This wouldn¡¯t even have registered on his radar with how insignificant a few kilometers was.


    That said, he had actually loosely heard of what had happened last year. There had been a brief period where a number of tactical and master-class magicians had been massacred near the border, including two prismatics. After confirming that there had been no further incursion and that the Cascadian government had quietly taken credit for it, Syl had decided it wasn¡¯t worth breaking his cover to go for it.


    ¡°Some of you in this room are aware of what I am about to tell you,¡± Uriel said, eyes panning over the secured conference room. ¡°Thank you for answering on such short notice.¡±


    ¡°Get to the point,¡± James ¡°Wildcard¡± Rokho said brusquely. ¡°There¡¯s maybe three people in here that aren¡¯t aware of what¡¯s happening already. Trying to rip the bandage off slowly isn¡¯t going to change anything.¡±


    Earlier, Syl had evaluated James¡¯ relationship with Uriel and assumed that the two of them either weren¡¯t on good terms or weren¡¯t in the same organization. From here, it looked like the answer was both.


    Ostensibly, Syl should have been reporting the existence of splinter factions within the Graduate Reserve, but he hadn¡¯t been explicitly ordered to, and he was reasonably sure that they weren¡¯t going to take action in the same way that Sanguine or some similar extremist group. Add in the fact that they were largely prismatics or at least from branch families¡­ this looked more like an option that Syl wanted to keep open. Besides, initiating a purge on some of the most powerful, promising young prospects in Auria was more likely to lead to a quick, messy collapse than not.


    It wasn¡¯t only prismatics in here, though. As far as Syl could tell, there were two unifying factors. One was the aforementioned fact that everyone was a circuit competitor. The other was that they were all from backgrounds that lent themselves towards being aware of the reality behind Auria. It didn¡¯t take much to realize that they¡¯d been selected at least in part for that reason¡ªUriel had some level of discretion as to picking the participants from the Reserve side, and there was no reason she should have picked someone as inexperienced as Lia Jeksen, the class three swordswoman whose training center Syl had met with James on.


    Uriel¡¯s explanation was brief and was met with very little surprise, essentially confirming Syl¡¯s suspicion. A few people seemed a bit concerned about the details, though.


    ¡°You said this could be life-threatening,¡± Lia said. ¡°I¡¯m noticing that we don¡¯t exactly have strategic-class magicians.¡±


    ¡°Neither nation wants to waste strategics on a border dispute,¡± Uriel said with a tone that said she had gotten used to this. ¡°And even a strategic is defeatable, especially within the confines of the circuit.¡±


    There were a grand total of eighteen magicians in this room, twelve of which were still in the academy system¡ªSyl and Bianca included, of course. Out of the sixteen magicians not named Bianca or Syl, he recognized eight master-class magicians, four of which were from the Reserve.


    Said Reserve masters were Uriel, Jennifer, James, and Waylan, leaving out only Drew. That wasn¡¯t terribly surprising, given how close the Violet seemed to be closely monitored by his mother, who¡¯d tried to take the Cascadian prisoner from Syl and his group.Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.


    ¡°Just throw if you think you¡¯re going to lose,¡± James said gruffly. ¡°Your life¡¯s worth more than a couple kilometers of Aurian land. Nobody important even lives on the border.¡±


    One of the post-graduates, a master-class sabotage-type specialist by the name of Natalie ¡°Mishap¡± Irving who¡¯d made waves by winning the national solo duelist title in eight consecutive seasons, bristled at that. ¡°Watch your damn tongue, kid. Don¡¯t go thinking you¡¯re hot shit just because of your name.¡±


    Right. Syl was tangentially aware of her since she ranked somewhere in the top fifty most effective magicians in Auria. If memory served him correctly, she¡¯d been born and raised in Knights Landing a small town northwest of Sacramento¡ªand there was the connection. They¡¯d taken that entire area in a major offensive that had ultimately resulted in the San Francisco incident.


    Syl sometimes wished his memory wasn¡¯t as effective as it was.


    ¡°What¡¯d you say?¡± James replied, suddenly pissed. ¡°I didn¡¯t pick who I popped out of, Irving.¡±


    ¡°Neither did I, Rokho.¡±


    ¡°Quiet,¡± Uriel said evenly. Though she used no flux to augment her voice, the tone that she used got even the senior circuit champion to shut up. ¡°Wildcard, Mishap, you should both know better. After the untimely demise of both the Indigo and Red scions as well as nearly the entire team usually dedicated to these games, we need all we can get to¡­ serve our country with honor, so to speak. It is almost certain that Cascadia will be hungry for blood this year.¡±


    It was also almost certain that she didn¡¯t give a rat¡¯s ass about honor for her country. Syl knew as well as anyone else did that despite the tragedy that had befallen the previous group¡ªa group that would have included Uriel¡¯s and Waylan¡¯s blood siblings, he realized¡ªthis was an opportunity for certain prismatics to gain a new axis of power.


    That said, it could have been the opposite¡ªif the prismatics were already aware of their own splinter factions, they didn¡¯t have that much to lose if all of them died fighting a relatively pointless fight.


    Syl decided not to think about it too hard. As long as it wasn¡¯t directly obstructing his and Bianca¡¯s now-peaceful life, which it wouldn¡¯t once he won, he didn¡¯t particularly care.


    When the storm came, he would be able to weather it.


    ¡°There¡¯s also another point of concern this year,¡± Jennifer said, adjusting her glasses over tired eyes. ¡°We¡¯ve been pushed back far enough that the venue¡¯s going to be next to the Santa Rosa Tower.¡±


    There was a collective grumble at that. They all knew what being near a Tower meant. There was a reason so many of them had become de facto exclusion zones.


    ¡°There¡¯s not much we can do about it.¡± Uriel¡¯s expression was grim. ¡°If you¡¯re in this room, then you know that we are on the back foot against Cascadia. They have the power to pick their fights, and they have the liberty to choose when. We have four weeks.¡±


    ¡°You want us to walk into a bloodbath,¡± one of the tactical-class graduates said. Arrel Nebbins, apparently. ¡°You¡¯re asking us to lay down our lives?¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not going to be one,¡± Uriel said with a confidence clearly not shared by anyone else present. ¡°The country was going to ask your life of you either way. Would you prefer to take a ceremonial fight for land or go overseas to the Lingdao front?¡±


    ¡°Is that a threat?¡±


    ¡°Would you like me to make it one?¡±


    Bianca poked Syl, then signed instead of speaking.


    This movement is dead in the water.


    Syl cracked a smile, signing back. Then it¡¯s not our problem.


    Jennifer, who was similarly ignoring the rising tensions in the room, flagged Syl down.


    ¡°I haven¡¯t seen you around for a couple of days,¡± she said.


    ¡°Took the offered time off,¡± Syl replied. ¡°Did you want to see me?¡±


    ¡°Didn¡¯t think you were the type to take an off day.¡±


    ¡°I was working.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s just about what I was going to ask you about,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Working. I have an idea that I¡¯ve been putting every waking hour into.¡±


    ¡°The flux sensitivity project?¡± Syl asked. They had been making slow but steady progress on that front ever since Jennifer had convinced him to work with her in exchange for not leaking his own developments.


    Jennifer shook her head. ¡°Related, but not quite. I have a lot of notes. I can show you them after this.¡±


    ¡°The service is not long after this,¡± Syl said. ¡°Entire school¡¯s being called to it.¡±


    She clicked her tongue. ¡°Right. Poor kids. Well, it was bound to happen at some point or another. After the funeral, then.¡±


    ¡°That works with me.¡±


    Syl nodded, bidding her farewell.


    His FCD buzzed. Bianca frowned beside him, her FCD doing the same.


    From the captain, she signed.


    It is. Syl sighed. I am going to go back on something I said earlier.


    What is it? Bianca¡¯s hand motions were careful, measured. Even after years of experience, she still took the time to double-check everything she said.


    S-A-N-G-U-I-N-E, Syl spelled out. They want to interfere.


    What are you going to do?


    Cover for me, Syl signed. I¡¯m going to burn them down.


    #


    Sanguine was not a group that had a proper headquarters, but they were open to co-opting a space to use as a staging ground from time to time. Few groups of their like had any permanent fixtures; doing so without being detected was a herculean task. Groups that sought separation from the Aurian kingdom and could also withstand the might of the country tended to just end up splitting off into sovereignties of their own.


    This branch of Sanguine had been bolstered by recent successes, though. While they had lost a fair few operatives during their recent Gate subjugation, they had also confirmed the effectivity of the technique provided by their allies over the Aurian border and eliminated a handful of tactical-class academy students.


    With their own tactical-classes and the two master-class magicians who had masterminded the previous assault, Sanguine¡¯s Auria branch was riding the high of an operation well done. With the weaknesses they had exposed, it was only a matter of following through on it to twist the knife, ensuring that the public would see how little the academies could actually protect them.


    Their current staging ground was the same one they¡¯d used for their previous outing. Fifty kilometers from the capital, it was close enough to deploy forces out towards the necessary targets while also evading the dome of surveillance that permeated the academies.


    They had expected to be discovered at some point, of course, but they¡¯d taken precautionary steps to ensure that said point wouldn¡¯t be too early. Right now, with some thirty-odd magicians ranging from A-class to both masters, that went double. Besides the standard stealth-type spells, the entire building was also fully subterranean, hidden at the bottom of a reservoir that had gone unused since the ground had been irradiated during World War III.


    Their strike today was going to be quick and effective, using a limited-use teleportation device retrieved by their Cascadian allies from partway up one of the Towers. Said technology was yet a unknown by Auria officials¡ªin fact, it was largely unknown to the world as a whole, where the consensus was still that true teleportation was flat-out impossible. Warp-type spells all involved space compression, which was defensible against, but there was no reason to worry about teleportation when that wasn¡¯t supposed to be humanly possible.


    This was a game changer, to put it lightly, and the Sanguine masters intended to use it to its fullest potential.


    Even taking into consideration the possibility of inside interference, the plan was almost airtight.


    Almost.


    None of them accounted for a single-passenger aircraft screaming towards their reservoir at twice the speed of sound, nor had they thought said vehicle would come to a complete halt directly inside the lake, the heat of its landing vaporizing hundreds of thousands of litres in an instant.


    External cameras flicked on throughout the Sanguine base, revealing a single uniformed figure emerging from the inside of the aircraft, which seemed to be completely unharmed by its massive deceleration. The remaining lakewater surged in to replace what had been destroyed, but the student held it back with a gesture.


    The figure¡¯s fingers moved. If any Sanguine member had been versed in the most popular English sign language variant, they would have been able to identify that he only expressed three words.


    I warned you.


    The roof of the base disintegrated.

 Chapter 23 - I Warned You

    When fighting against a greater threat, standard procedure as a magician was to assess the situation as quickly as possible and find weaknesses. Being a higher-grade magician didn¡¯t necessarily mean that one was invincible. There was almost always a critical flaw. Exploiting it with ambushes, superior positioning, and spellcraft that the greater magician was unprepared for¡ªa single well-placed spell could turn around the entire fight.


    Every member of Sanguine knew this, having trained to fight enemies with better magical foundations and practices than they did for the years they¡¯d existed. There was a reason they¡¯d stuck around.


    It was not very often, however, that their organization was the one on the back foot in these situations. In prior confrontations, they had known that they were being hunted. Sanguine had enough sympathizers in relevant locations for them to get a general understanding of when Auria was closing in on one of their encampments. They had never been the highest priority for the kingdom to remove, anyway.


    This time was different. Rather than an organized military coalition, it was a single man. A student, at that, but that made little difference when the higher-level members of Sanguine knew exactly what kind of monsters Aurian students could be.


    They could not ambush this student because he was the ambusher. Their positioning was similarly terrible because of the circumstances, and as for spellcraft¡ª


    A few of the less intelligent A-class magicians tried to take the student attacker on directly, goading the hovering student into challenging them one-on-one, but he simply stopped hovering and allowed the lake to surge back in around them, pressurizing millions of litres of water and pouring them into a base whose defenses against this much water had just been obliterated by a spell that nobody had seen.


    In the resulting chaos, every single magician who¡¯d sent a spell hurtling at the student died; some crushed by the sheer pressure of the water, others by brief, intense bursts of magic that few were able to witness and fewer still were capable of surviving.


    The flood itself was survivable. Most of the tactical-class magicians and both master-classes had contingencies for if the base was breached like this, and they were able to recover quickly, establishing backup fortification-type water-breathing and movement spells on themselves to navigate the flooded base like they were on land.


    The teleportation device that they had meant to use had been flushed out of its original position. Identifying that as the highest priority, the two master-class magicians triggered a perception-type spell and a movement one, respectively, dragging themselves toward the device.


    They found their path blocked by a figure who glided through the water as effortlessly as it had through the air.


    Recognizing their enemy, the master-class magicians cast offensive magic, their extraordinary talent and nonstop training sending their instincts into overdrive.


    At roughly that exact moment, an airstrike delivered by a black ops unit composed of nine people including Sylvester Auria and Bianca Ashwood detonated its payload¡ªa one-kiloton creation and annihilation-type nuclear fusion missile.


    Offensive magic died out, quickly repurposed into master-class shielding spells. The missile carried a suppressed strategic-class payload, capable of devastating cities with minimal effort at maximum output. It was not something that the unit was supposed to have, but it was one that a certain magical engineer had been capable of providing the power and designs for.


    The tactical-class magicians died instantly, neither aware enough of the incoming detonation nor powerful enough to stop themselves from the shockwave.


    Three beings remained alive in the wreckage, their water-shielding spells dropped in favor of radiation and force protection. Most if not all of the water had become superheated steam, anyway. There was little point in trying to avoid drowning in less than a centimeter of water.


    Both master-class Sanguine magicians had worked together for long enough to collaborate as second nature. One spell fed into another.


    Master-class wide-range detection-type spell, Detection Net. It extended half a kilometer out, identifying the student instantly.


    Master-class wide-range conjuration-type spell, Sharpen Gravity. In that same area, gravity intensified tenfold. In the region that they saw the student in, that number spiked up to two hundred times. Even with a self-fortification spell, that would be lethal for anyone short of a strategic-class magician.Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.


    Yet somehow, the student seemed to ignore the spell as if it wasn¡¯t there at all. He simply walked forward, barely leaving footprints atop the devastated earth even as the gravity around him forced the ground to collapse in on itself.


    Rather than continuing to detect the student, the first master-class magician turned his attention instead on jamming the student¡¯s magic with a master-class jammer¡ªthe only one of its kind that Sanguine had in their possession.


    Not that there would be much left of Sanguine after this, even once they killed this student. They¡¯d lost the bulk of their best magicians in a moment. Logistics personnel and A-class magicians alone did not make an effective resistance movement.


    The student stopped in his tracks, his feet suddenly slamming into the ground as gravity took its effect on him.


    Both master-classes pushed their advantage. The one who had been sharpening gravity used another trump card, sucking the oxygen out of the air around the student mage, while the first one used a conjuration-type spell to create something like an ordinary sniper rifle.


    Despite the amount of magic pressing down on him, despite the fact that he wouldn¡¯t be able to cast anything short of a strategic-class spell without blowing himself up with his flux, the student seemed calm. He didn¡¯t show a hint of panic.


    Not even as a second projectile landed in their midst, detonating with a blast of raw disruption-type flux.


    Master-class artillery-type spell, Antimagic Railgun. A favorite of high-level artillery specialists, including one Uriel Indigo. It was favored for its precision and the sheer range that it could be fired from. Thirty kilometers was nothing for a spell like this, especially not when its caster was being fed constant data by someone at the landing site.


    The gravity and oxygen effects both disappeared, giving the student room to breathe, move, and most importantly¡ªcast. When he¡¯d been dealing with the ongoing effects with just five spell processes, it had taken everything he needed in order to maintain his continued survival.


    Syl did not say a single word as he cast his signature spell once again.


    The spell jammer had not stopped its focus on him, but it didn¡¯t affect him at all. This spell, after all, was significantly above the master-class magic that the jammer was focusing on.


    strategic-class annihilation-type spell, Ruin.


    Two FCDs hit the ground, their owners reduced to a bloody mist.


    #


    By the time Syl got back, the funeral service had mostly concluded. He decided against attending. His uniform was a bit of a mess since he¡¯d prioritized his continued survival and intact equipment more than he had keeping it clean, and he figured that arriving to an official service for four deceased students in a bloody uniform.


    Bianca had given him the necessary updates anyway. The service had gone about as well as Syl had expected. They had provided the same platitudes as always¡ªan unforeseeable tragedy resulting from a Gate that had gone rogue after its detection, promises from leadership to prevent this from happening again. By all accounts, it had been a beautiful service for four people who had died in the equivalent of a freak industrial accident.


    There had been nobody contesting those claims. Everyone who¡¯d been at risk of talking had had their worries addressed during their days off. Whether said worries had been addressed satisfactorily or not was another question, but that wasn¡¯t Syl¡¯s problem.


    Bianca found him after the service was over and most people had been dismissed for the day, waiting for her in an alleyway a bit out of the way.


    ¡°You¡¯re a mess,¡± she said, signing at the same time. You eliminated them?


    ¡°I had hoped you would be able to help with that.¡± All of the ones I saw at their operating base, yes.


    ¡°Of course.¡± She didn¡¯t use her hands to sign this time, instead drawing out the pattern necessary to cast a Cleanse on him.


    ¡°Thank you. I trust everything went well here.¡±


    ¡°No interruptions,¡± she confirmed. Did you overexert yourself?


    ¡°Good to hear. Uriel did her job well.¡± Slightly. I¡¯m out of flux for the next day or two.


    Ruin was a costly spell, and without Bianca by his side, using it on the scale he had depleted even him for a while.


    Getting Uriel involved had been easier than expected. Since she was aware that he had connections that went beyond the usual as well as very effective perception-type spells, it had been trivial to convince her to strike at a certain target at a certain time, especially since her skillset was uniquely suited to giving her insight into targets at long range. By all official accounts, she would be the one credited with the destruction of the Sanguine strike force and likely the entire organization.


    ¡°She did.¡± I should have been there.


    ¡°Are you headed back now?¡± Not worth the risk.


    ¡°No. I have a club to get to first, and we haven¡¯t canceled.¡± What risk?


    Syl smiled. ¡°That¡¯s good. I¡¯m glad to see you¡¯re fitting into school life well.¡± Your secrecy matters much more than mine.


    ¡°You should try it sometime.¡± If you say so.


    ¡°I am,¡± Syl said, vaguely offended. ¡°I have a meeting as well.¡±


    ¡°With Jennifer, correct?¡± Bianca asked. ¡°Be careful around her.¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s fine,¡± Syl said. ¡°Stays in her lane but creative. Not terribly surprising coming from a prismatic, but she seems to have meet Uriel¡¯s standards, at least. She can¡¯t take me in a fight, either.¡±


    ¡°That is not what I was referring to.¡±


    ¡°Then what were you?¡±


    ¡°Never mind. Have fun.¡±


    Syl frowned, puzzled. ¡°You too?¡±


    He shrugged it off and made his way to the lab. Bianca had always been the people person, anyway.

 Chapter 24 - A Slightly Different Perspective

    ¡°Syl,¡± Jennifer greeted him curtly, scanning his expression. ¡°You weren¡¯t at the service.¡±


    Someone had noticed? He wasn¡¯t surprised that his lack of attendance had been noted, but he hadn¡¯t expected a student, even a member of the Reserve, to call him out on it so fast.


    ¡°Had places to be,¡± he said vaguely.


    Jennifer eyed him with increased suspicion at that. ¡°Do I want to know?¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re the one who can tell me whether or not you¡¯d like that,¡± Syl said. ¡°You have something new in your fab today.¡±


    After the service, the mood around the campus had become sharply subdued. Very few students had wanted to continue working after they¡¯d just buried four of their classmates, which meant Jennifer and Syl were alone in the graduate lab now.


    ¡°This exact thing is what I¡¯m curious about,¡± Jennifer said, gesticulating towards him. ¡°Four students are dead, Syl.¡±


    ¡°I am well aware,¡± Syl said. He¡¯d seen some of them die, too.


    ¡°And yet you¡¯re more interested in what I have in my fab?¡±


    ¡°Aren¡¯t you?¡± Syl asked, arching an eyebrow. ¡°You forgot that there was even going to be a service while we were at the circuit meeting.¡±


    ¡°That was¡­ unrelated,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°I¡¯ve had a lot on my mind.¡±


    ¡°Let¡¯s ignore the excuses for the time being,¡± Syl suggested. ¡°You¡¯re used to losing people, aren¡¯t you?¡±


    She started at that, adjusting her glasses to buy time before she spoke. ¡°You¡¯re certainly direct.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m an engineer and a soldier,¡± Syl said. ¡°We have that in common. You¡¯re an eighth year. That would have made you twelve during the war. As a prismatic, too? I can¡¯t imagine you¡¯re unfamiliar with loss.¡±


    ¡°You get used to it,¡± she admitted.


    ¡°Not everyone does,¡± Syl said. ¡°But it seems we have.¡±


    ¡°We? You¡¯re seven years younger than me. You were five during the war.¡±


    That wasn¡¯t strictly true, but the actual answer was a can of worms that Syl didn¡¯t want to open. It was also ridiculously classified, which was another point against explaining.


    ¡°I¡¯ve had my fair share of loss too,¡± he said instead. ¡°You know how people end up with my last name, right?¡±


    Jennifer¡¯s eyes widened. ¡°I¡ªthat was insensitive of me.¡±


    Syl shook his head. ¡°I don¡¯t mind. Just trust me when I say I know what it¡¯s like.¡±


    That got a nod out of the older engineer. She fidgeted with her glasses, then the buttons on her uniform blouse.


    Flux hypersensitivity, Syl thought. It wasn¡¯t uncommon for that to manifest itself as an inability to sit still even when the worst of it was suppressed by specialized glasses.


    ¡°You were working on something,¡± he prompted her.


    ¡°Ah, yes,¡± Jennifer said, putting her hands down and leading him to her fabricator. ¡°It¡¯s still a work-in-progress, obviously, but I¡¯m hoping to get a prototype done by the time we have to face Cascadia in their games.¡±


    ¡°This isn¡¯t eye equipment,¡± Syl said, giving her fab a once-over. ¡°You¡¯re modifying an FCD.¡±


    ¡°I am,¡± she confirmed. ¡°One of my own, in fact. Originally, I was thinking about some kind of surgical implant in the long run to manage symptoms, but the incident at the Gate changed things. I got a lot of data.¡±


    There it was again. Syl could recognize when someone else had been as hardened to death as he¡¯d been. Though she¡¯d said all the right things in terms of expressing sympathy, there wasn¡¯t an ounce of trepidation in her voice when discussing the incident that had ended the lives of four of her classmates and colleagues. It was just data.


    ¡°You had measurements going?¡± Syl asked.


    Jennifer shook her head. ¡°Benefit to being Reserve leadership. I got recordings from all the active FCDs in the area.¡±


    Syl fronwed. ¡°That would just get data from Reserve members, though. Shouldn¡¯t you already have that?¡±


    ¡°Ordinarily, yes, but Uriel was running a constant routine to analyze the ambush after it started,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Here, look at the monitor.¡±


    She gestured, tapping at a holographic interface until she had detailed readings from a certain FCD.


    ¡°Mind if I download it?¡±


    Jennifer considered that for a moment. ¡°You¡¯re acting in official capacity as my lab assistant, so it should be fine.¡±


    Syl downloaded the data, then scanned through it. The readings were mostly noise¡ªtens of thousands of lines of raw input, most of which hadn¡¯t been sorted through.


    Jennifer had highlighted the parts she¡¯d found interesting, so Syl skipped to those. If he was reading the report right, Uriel¡¯s perception spell had found details of certain water-based projection, conjuration, and transmutation-type spells.


    ¡°Cascadian magic,¡± he said. ¡°That¡¯s what you were looking at?¡±


    Well, he couldn¡¯t blame her for that. He¡¯d been doing much the same himself anyway.


    ¡°Yes,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Their school of magic is substantially different from ours, but¡­ hm.¡±


    She caught herself halfway through launching into an explanation, and Syl sighed. This again. Aurian standards around their research really did make things so irritating. It had taken him so long to assemble a group of engineers who were willing to see beyond what they were told to think, and Incarnate had risen from that.


    It hadn¡¯t been him doing most of the assembling, to be fair, but it had still been a pain nonetheless.


    ¡°Do you believe that Aurian magic theory is the only magic theory?¡± Syl asked tiredly. ¡°I¡¯m assuming not, since you¡¯re working on this.¡±


    ¡°No, and it¡¯s frankly ridiculous that we pretend otherwise,¡± Jennifer hissed. ¡°It¡ªexcuse me. Revolutionary talk isn¡¯t good for the lab.¡±


    Syl wasn¡¯t terribly surprised by her position. It was growing increasingly clear that while he¡¯d been active in the field, the newest generation of prismatics had grown steadily more bitter towards the system that benefited them the most.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.


    He had read banned history books about this phenomenon before. Studies of society before flux integration. This wasn¡¯t the first time that educated, wealthy students had spoken defiant whispers to each other, and it was certainly not going to be the last.


    Finally seeing it in action was¡­ worrying wasn¡¯t quite the right word, but it was a wake-up call.


    ¡°Then we¡¯re on roughly the same page,¡± he said, realizing he¡¯d been silent for too long. He was still too used to being around people who didn¡¯t expect him to speak and understood his silences. Jennifer, however, had never known Syl before an FCD had replaced his voice. ¡°I¡¯ve been studying what I remember of it as well.¡±


    ¡°What you¡ªdon¡¯t tell me you memorized spells that were being cast at you.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s besides the point. What have you been trying?¡±


    Jennifer shook her head in amazement. ¡°I can¡¯t believe you haven¡¯t been snatched up by some black ops program yet.¡±


    Syl resisted the urge to laugh. I wouldn¡¯t be the one getting snatched.


    ¡°So?¡±


    ¡°Right,¡± Jennifer said, brushing down her blouse. ¡°I was looking at how the Cascadians cast their spells. They¡¯re fast, aren¡¯t they?¡±


    ¡°Extremely so,¡± Syl said. ¡°Efficient, too. I can replicate their spells, but I¡¯m stuck on their exact process.¡±


    ¡°Wait a second,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°You can replicate their spells? After just seeing them once?¡±


    ¡°Do you want to see one?¡± Syl asked.


    ¡°What¡ªI mean, sure, but I can¡¯t replicate them even with these readings! Like, for instance, this one¡±¡ªJennifer pointed at a highlighted chunk of lines¡ª¡°I can¡¯t even figure out what this one did.¡±


    Syl glanced at it, the reading bringing back a memory of one of the spells he¡¯d seen cast. ¡°I can¡¯t perfectly replicate this spell. I don¡¯t know the specific activation process because it was already fully cast by the time I got there.¡±


    ¡°You say that like you can partially replicate it,¡± Jennifer said.


    ¡°I probably can. Do you have a glass of water?¡±


    The green-haired engineer raised her wrist, tapping away at her FCD, and a sphere of water appeared hovering in front of Syl.


    ¡°That¡¯ll do.¡±


    Closing his eyes, Syl ran through the spell processes that he did remember. It wasn¡¯t too hard to backfill what had probably been there, though he knew he was almost certainly wrong. This wouldn¡¯t be as effective or efficient as the actual spell without refinement, but he had enough pieces for something of a replica.


    He cast silently, as always. There was no point in using a command phrase. He didn¡¯t know what it would be, anyway.


    Jennifer¡¯s water sphere suddenly exploded outwards, then froze in place. Syl¡¯s spell had turned it into a structure made entirely out of spikes, swirling in on itself.


    ¡°It¡¯s a water shaping spell,¡± he said. ¡°I assume they upcast a tactical-class spell. I don¡¯t know the actual name of it, but it would have been used for fine control of surrounding water. Compared to regular Water Manipulation, this seems to emphasize beating anyone else trying to take control of it¡ªlike, for instance, a drowning magician fighting back.¡±


    Jennifer huffed out a disbelieving breath. ¡°I got maybe sixty percent of that at most when I was looking through it, and that took me hours. You¡¯re a genius, Syl.¡±


    ¡°I appreciate the words,¡± Syl said, ¡°but it¡¯s more of a party trick than genuinely useful. Also, I don¡¯t think you¡¯ve explained what you¡¯ve done yet. Again.¡±


    ¡°Of course.¡± Jennifer sighed. ¡°It¡¯s not particularly impressive compared to that stunt you just pulled, but it does show promise.¡±


    She took the FCD she¡¯d been working on out of the fab. Unlike her regular one, this one came in two parts, one of which looked something like a monocle.


    Jennifer took her glasses off and winced, looking down and blinking hard before putting the monocle on and looking back up, still squinting.


    Syl tamped down on the amount of flux he was passively circulating. There was a lot of flux in his body, and it was probably best if he avoided getting that spotted out. It also couldn¡¯t hurt to extend someone with hypersensitivity a bit of courtesy to not blind her.


    ¡°Like you can see, it¡¯s two-part,¡± she said. ¡°It reads the flux reflected in my eyes and calculates accordingly. It¡¯s much leaner than a detection device this precise would normally be. A win for having to risk blindness every time I open my eyes.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s an interesting workaround,¡± Syl said, leaning forward. ¡°Very flexible design, too.¡±


    ¡°Thank you,¡± Jennifer beamed. ¡°I was looking through the readings, and I noticed something pretty interesting when they were casting. At first, I thought it was just flux fluctuation, which is very typical in a reading like this, but it wasn¡¯t.¡±


    Syl raised an eyebrow. He had memorized a great deal of the spell pattern thrown at him, but he had still been fighting. It was very possible Jennifer had found insights that he hadn¡¯t.


    ¡°Now, keep in mind that I¡¯m not sure if my theory is anywhere near the answer here,¡± Jennifer said, ¡°but I did find an interesting method that has some limited usage. Would you mind taking a quick detour?¡±


    ¡°Not at all,¡± Syl replied.


    They didn¡¯t even have to leave the lab for her detour. Jennifer took them both to a testing pool fifty meters long, twenty wide, and five deep. It was apparently for offensive spell testing and was a near exact mirror of a similar pool used in the practical portion of the entrance examination.


    ¡°The special aspect of the FCD isn¡¯t on yet,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Here we go. Aqu exlr!¡±


    That was the standard command phrase for Manipulate Water, which she cast with perfect form. Upcast from D to A-class, it was enough to lift a significant portion of the pool up into a simple cube before she let it drop back down, using the spell to keep the water from splashing them.


    ¡°By my measurement, that was about four and a half seconds,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Took extra time to do everything because I was working with more flux and more water, yes?¡±


    ¡°A solid time,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°Sure, but nothing special. I was never great at conjuration magic.¡±


    The monocle flickered to life, a green light blinking on its frame.


    ¡°And here we go again,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Aqu exlr!¡±


    She executed the same set of motions with the water¡ªexcept this time, it seemed to play in fast motion, finishing the entire process in under two seconds.


    This, too, wasn¡¯t the exact process that the Cascadians had used. It was, however, far closer than anything Syl had managed so far. Judging from the current rate of information exchange between the two countries, it was likely closer than he¡¯d ever get.


    Syl whistled, clapping twice before speaking. ¡°Very impressive. Why are you still in the Reserve with engineering prowess like that?¡±


    Jennifer¡¯s cheeks colored. ¡°Thank you.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not saying that just to compliment you,¡± Syl added. ¡°I would understand if you needed the resources, but you¡¯re a prismatic. You could get a job anywhere. I¡¯m sure Incarnate would take you with skills like this.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s exactly because I¡¯m a prismatic,¡± she said unhappily. ¡°There¡¯s a very specific life path set out for the Green family, and I¡¯m on it. I have years before I can start serving my country a different way.¡±


    She practically spat the words serving my country out.


    ¡°But that¡¯s besides the point,¡± she said, recollecting herself. ¡°The point is that I identified a pattern. You get used to doing that when you have eyes like mine. It¡¯s a bit strange, but the gist of it is that when the conditions are right, the natural flux moves in a way that makes certain areas very amenable to being used for magical purposes.¡±


    ¡°Hence the pool,¡± Syl realized.


    ¡°Yes. The flux here is more likely to naturally form water-based patterns. That must have been the case in the Gate, too. More than just forming those patterns, though, what¡¯s important is that it holds them really well.¡±


    Syl had read scientific literature on this point before. It wasn¡¯t a very well-studied phenomenon¡ªat least, not in Auria.


    ¡°You exploited that, then.¡±


    ¡°I did,¡± Jennifer said, her eyes burning bright with passion and possibly also the flux emitting from her. ¡°This FCD runs a program to identify the most effective location to hold a pattern for a given spell and pre-renders an activation process there. Since the flux itself is holding the pattern, it doesn¡¯t take processes away from me, and I can have multiple active at the same time. I have five separate activation process windows available for Manipulate Water right now, for instance, but all of my processes are still available.¡±


    Syl blinked, processing that.


    Then he processed it some more.


    ¡°Jennifer, you are brilliant,¡± he said. ¡°This is going to change a lot.¡±


    ¡°You think so?¡± Jennifer asked, unable to stop herself from smiling. ¡°You¡¯re not so bad yourself, Syl.¡±


    ¡°Save your design,¡± he said. ¡°If you¡¯re into patents, you should get one, but I don¡¯t particularly care. I¡¯m going to work on your project.¡±


    He filed everything she¡¯d just said away. How had he not thought to look at it that way before?


    Because I don¡¯t see the world the same way she does.


    ¡°I¡¯m honored,¡± Jennifer said, deactivating her FCD and putting her glasses back on. ¡°I¡¯ll send you the designs. Oh, and by the way¡ªwould you be free to meet outside of school sometime before the circuit? Just the two of us.¡±


    ¡°Why not in the lab?¡±


    Jennifer stared at him, a complex and somewhat confused expression on her face. ¡°Uhhh¡­ because I want to?¡±


    Syl had some ideas for what he could do with this and get back to her on. Doing so inside or outside the lab was immaterial. Doing it outside would be a good practical test, anyway.


    He briefly wondered if this extracurricular meeting was what Bianca had warned him about with respect to ¡°being careful,¡± then dismissed the concern. He could handle himself.


    ¡°Of course,¡± he said. ¡°Let¡¯s do it.¡±

 Chapter 25 - Sinners

    Bianca sighed, placing a hand on her forehead. ¡°Of course. I do not know why I expected anything different.¡±


    ¡°This is groundbreaking research,¡± Syl said. ¡°Why wouldn¡¯t I want to participate in it?¡±


    ¡°That is not the point,¡± Bianca replied. ¡°You have a blind spot when it comes to engineering, Syl.¡±


    ¡°I have a blind spot when it comes to dealing with people who aren¡¯t trying to kill me,¡± Syl said drily. ¡°You of all people should know that.¡±


    ¡°In fairness, you still do not know whether or not Jennifer has hostile intentions.¡±


    ¡°Everyone has hostile intentions. She has more to gain from working with me than trying anything.¡± Syl paused, tilting his head. ¡°I¡¯m starting to think that this isn¡¯t what you were taking concern with, though.¡±


    ¡°This conversation is helping,¡± Bianca said, face slumping further into her hands. ¡°You may not notice any advances she makes in the first place.¡±


    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s what you¡¯re worried about,¡± Syl said. ¡°She¡¯s too young for me.¡±


    ¡°Syl, she¡¯s seven years older than you.¡±


    ¡°Biologically, maybe,¡± Syl replied. ¡°But that¡¯s not the only point. She¡¯s lost a lot of people, just like us, but she¡¯s never actually been in the field. In that respect, she¡¯s little more than an infant.¡±


    ¡°What does that make me, then?¡±


    ¡°You know better than me,¡± Syl said. ¡°If you were concerned about this, you could have just directly told me.¡±


    ¡°That would have been embarrassing,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Especially in the environment we were in. I am certain that you are aware of how many people are surveilling us at any given time. We attract enough attention as the year one prodigy and dark horse, respectively. Telling you directly would draw more.¡±


    ¡°You say that like more attention would be that damaging,¡± Syl said. ¡°I think we have bigger problems to deal with.¡±


    ¡°Prismatics are not only using their children to surveil,¡± Bianca said. ¡°If word gets around that a class 1 is trying to keep her class 3 engineer from dating, cracks start to show. Those families are not informed into our situation, and I would much rather not have the elder Reds getting on our backs about our status.¡±


    ¡°You certainly put a lot more thought into it than I did,¡± Syl admitted. He had some experience with navigating the political side of magic, but this kind of minor detail was something he had never bothered with.


    ¡°I grew up having to put thought into this,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Our¡­ situation did not change that.¡±


    ¡°In any case, I don¡¯t particularly think that she¡¯ll give you anything to worry about,¡± Syl said. ¡°There¡¯s very few Reserve members who operate in the same world as us, and Jennifer isn¡¯t one of them.¡±


    ¡°I never said I was worried,¡± Bianca said crossly. ¡°Just that you should be careful.¡±


    ¡°I am not risk at subversion by route of seduction, if that was your concern,¡± Syl said. ¡°Is that coffee I smell?¡±


    ¡°It is,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Are you planning on staying up again tonight?¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m going to check in on the status of our interrogation and see if I can¡¯t preempt whatever the next thing Cascadia is going to try.¡±


    Their house was one of the few locations where he was comfortable speaking so candidly. Apart from a select few black sites run by Aurian royalty and prismatics, this house was one of the most fortified against perception-type spells in the country.


    Syl had designed many of the defenses himself, most notably an extremely illegal strategic-class spell jammer that utilized a good chunk of chaonite from a certain special operation unit¡¯s archive of confiscated materials. That jammer only applied for about half an inche inside the house¡¯s walls, roof, and foundation, but he made up for the lack of thickness with raw coverage. It was enough to catch most anything, even half the surveillance spells he had designed himself.


    ¡°Would you like company?¡± Bianca asked, levitating two cups of coffee over to them both with a few clicks on her FCD. ¡°I have nothing planned for the night.¡±


    ¡°No homework or club activities?¡±


    ¡°Handled already.¡±


    ¡°There¡¯s a good chance that there¡¯s nothing of note. If there isn¡¯t, I¡¯m just going to work on a project until daybreak.¡±


    ¡°I know the deal.¡± Bianca¡¯s flux fluctuated with nervous energy, a pattern Syl recognized from his own.


    They had fought for so long to get their own peace, and now that they had it, they had told themselves that they would fight for it¡ªbut that wasn¡¯t the full story. On some level, both of them had left parts of themselves on the killing fields; parts that could only make them whole when they fought.


    Syl reached out to his contact in the special unit. They had engaged in a fairly standard enhanced interrogation well out of range of any detection equipment in their own black site a hundred kilometers off the Pacific coast.


    This special unit tended to operate on these with a suite of spells that resulted in a subject being eviscerated alive, their internal organs and part of their nervous system removed from their body while retaining sensation and a slight connection to it, a master-class fortification-type Biostasis spell keeping them from bleeding out immediately. While torture was demonstrably not the most effective way to obtain accurate information, a combination of this high-threat scenario as well as a suite of spells ¡°borrowed¡± from the Violet family to increase suggestibility tended to result in reasonably accurate information.This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.


    While Syl himself wasn¡¯t participating in this one, he was intimately familiar with the process, having taken part in one or two of them himself. The last time he¡¯d been involved, he¡¯d done the disassembling part. He¡¯d been twelve at the time.


    This Cascadian hadn¡¯t been very cooperative, going so far as trying to cast without an FCD using his own blood as a medium, but the unit had still squeezed some information out of him.


    Unsurprisingly, Cascadia was going to try to pull something during their war game this time around. The exact details of that either hadn¡¯t been transmitted to this specific prisoner or his resistance to enhanced interrogation was abnormally high.


    That wasn¡¯t the interesting part. Even the Reserve members who hadn¡¯t been involved in the Gate incident were pretty certain that Cascadia was going to commit some form of aggression here.


    What did catch both Syl and Bianca¡¯s attention was who the Cascadian had identified as being involved with this year¡¯s.


    [RANK HIDDEN] [NAME HIDDEN]: He claims that Gluttony is going to host it.


    ¡°A Sinner,¡± Bianca said, looking at the name. ¡°She has not operated under Cascadia in quite some time, has she?¡±


    ¡°Sinners aren¡¯t particularly beholden to anyone, no,¡± Syl said, ignoring the pointed look Bianca gave him at that. ¡°I¡¯ll pull up the file.¡±


    While most people regarded the Seven Sinners more as natural disasters than human beings, they were very much real people that most nations and special interest groups had been able to collate a good deal of information on. Universally paragon-class magicians, they were one-person armies, appearing without rhyme or reason and almost always leaving chaos in their wake. Though they had been regarded as unrelated at first, their similar methodologies and active times as well as power levels had seen them gain a common myth.


    Syl loaded his unit¡¯s report on his FCD and threw it up onto a monitor.


    [CLASSIFIED] Seven Sins Digest


    Zero


    Alexander Petrov. Attributed casualties: ~12.8 million. Last active: 61 AFI, New Zealand. Presumed dead as of World War III [See Sinking of New Zealand].


    Lust


    Unknown magician. Attributed casualties: ~4.6 million. Last active: 73 AFI, Taiwan [See Taiwan Flesh Amalgamation Incident (73 AFI)]. Alive.


    Gluttony


    Katelyn Lesling. Attributed casualties: ~1.3 million. Last active: 74 AFI, Manchuria [See Harbin Tower Evisceration]. Alive.


    Greed


    Jeffrey Wagner. Attributed casualties: ~3.1 million. Last active: 72 AFI, England [See London Blood Collection]. Alive.


    Sloth


    Unknown magician. Attributed casualties: ~25.9 million. Last active: 73 AFI, Lingdao [See Beijing Chronostasis]. Alive.


    Wrath


    Dinesh Bhargava. Attributed casualties: ~9.4 million. Last active: 68 AFI, Okinawa. Presumed dead as of 68 AFI [See Okinawa Fallout Report]. Presumed to have been killed by Envy.


    Envy


    Tang Yu-Ming. Attributed casualties: ~1.8 million. Last active: 71 AFI, Switzerland [See Destruction of Geneva]. Alive.


    Pride


    Unknown magician. Attributed casualties: ~1.1 million. Last active: 61 AFI, Middle America. Presumed dead as of World War III [See Middle America Chronostasis]. Presumed to have been killed by Sloth.


    ¡°Lovely,¡± Syl said, typing a bit more. ¡°It¡¯s been a bit since the last incident this side. I suppose we¡¯re overdue.¡±


    ¡°He could be lying,¡± Bianca suggested. ¡°Even under the influence of suggestibility spells, an implanted impulse or false memory could have been placed to give the illusion of greater Cascadian strength.¡±


    ¡°They don¡¯t need illusions to prove that their strength is greater,¡± Syl said. ¡°If they were taking that path, why not imply that they had Gluttony on their side? She¡¯s Cascadian, after all.¡±


    He expanded her file.


    Gluttony


    Katelyn Lesling. Cascadian. Paragon-class. Date of Birth: August 8th</sup>, 47 AFI.


    Specialties: annihilation, fortification, seal-type spells.


    Recorded unique paragon-class spells: Devour. Samsara. Apophis.


    Gluttony typically appears in Towers and Gates. It is believed that she has a unique affinity that enables her to gain flux capacity from those she kills and consumes with certain spells. Though Cascadian, she continues the Sinner pattern of showing no affiliation towards her original state.


    This Sinner¡¯s appearances are not always hostile. Recent appearances have largely included an evacuation period before she consumes the contents of a Tower or Gate.


    Syl and Bianca read through the rest of her rather expansive file. He¡¯d only seen her personally once, and that had been a decently long time ago. She seemed to have changed some since he¡¯d had the displeasure of running into her, which was promising in some ways and less so in others.


    ¡°If the information is true, this is going to be a fairly major pain,¡± Syl said. ¡°I suppose we can find a way to let this slip into the Reserve¡¯s hands so we can start making preparations.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m not opposed to that,¡± Bianca said. ¡°The presence of a Sinner will modify our response no matter her actual affiliation.¡±


    One more pain point, Syl supposed. He wasn¡¯t sure how anyone else was supposed to take this into account when training, but directing the Reserve¡¯s response wasn¡¯t his role. That went to Uriel.


    ¡°Nothing immediately actionable,¡± Syl said. ¡°Looks like they were using Sanguine as their in.¡±


    ¡°Eradicating them was very useful, then.¡±


    ¡°I would imagine they were going to pull resources back for their next move anyway,¡± Syl said, shrugging. ¡°I¡¯m going to get some work in, then.¡±


    #


    The next few weeks passed quickly. Classes were easy, and Syl often found that he was more proficient than the professor at their own subjects. The limitations of finding professors or teaching assistants who could competently teach Aurian spell theory was that they often only knew Aurian spell theory, which was woefully incomplete in the more advanced spell types. Syl was a generalist magician for the most part, but he had a particular interest in the intersection of creation and annihilation type spells that Aurian spell theory didn¡¯t even acknowledge as a legitimate field of magic.


    It was nice to be frustrated at his teachers. Though he still felt detached from the entire deal, he found it overall pleasing to at least experience the facsimile of a normal life.


    If all went well¡ªor at least not disastrously poorly¡ªhe would be able to return to it.


    Through the avenue of a faked data leak from the remnants of the Sanguine base that Syl had demolished, his unit was able to spread the information about the potential presence of Gluttony to the Reserve. Uriel handled it better than Syl had projected she would, to be honest. She¡¯d emphasized surviving and evacuating during their training more than anything else, trusting everyone to know their games well themselves.


    The details of the actual circuit were to be hidden until they met with Cascadia at the base of the Tower they now controlled, which meant that everyone just practiced a variety of events that they were suited for. Syl had tried everything; he was reasonably sure both he and Bianca could be slotted into anything so long as they weren¡¯t required to defend their teammates.


    When he wasn¡¯t in class or training, Syl was working, upgrading old gear and creating new ones utilizing the breakthrough Jennifer had found.


    The day of their departure crept up on them with startling speed, and eventually, Syl remembered that he had promised to meet that woman outside of class.


    Since he had a decently functional prototype now, he took it with him.


    She met him outside the academy on the day before they were scheduled to leave. Bianca gave Syl a meaningful look before announcing she would go home to study as if she wasn¡¯t about to embark on a potentially lethal mission that would never be acknowledged by the Aurian kingdom despite one of their own royals being involved.


    ¡°Last night before things go to shit,¡± Jennifer said, pointing Syl towards a private hovercraft. ¡°Let¡¯s not do anything stupid.¡±

 Chapter 26 - Tread Lightly

    ¡°I don¡¯t know if I would consider this as ¡®not doing anything stupid,¡¯¡± Syl said, amused.


    Jennifer whooped, hair whipping back in the wind as the hovercraft blasted down an empty highway reserved for military and agricultural supplements. ¡°What do you mean? This is perfectly safe.¡±


    Syl also wasn¡¯t sure about her assessment of what was safe or not given the fact that they were screaming down a sparsely lit highway at speeds in excess of three hundred kilometers an hour. Enchantments covering the exposed exterior of the craft shut out the worst of the wind and sound, but Jennifer had intentionally lowered the power on said spell for little reason other than her own amusement.


    To be fair, he¡¯d survived a lot worse than a hovercraft crash, but that didn¡¯t exactly mean he wanted to go through one again. Putting his body back together had been annoying enough when he hadn¡¯t had to account for an FCD in his throat.


    ¡°Relax a bit sometime,¡± Jennifer told him. ¡°There¡¯s thirty-six failsafes built into this for anything short of a strategic-class magician.¡±


    Syl didn¡¯t relax, mostly because that wasn¡¯t entirely out of the question. While his intelligence was good, he knew better than most how unreliable even the best spy units could be. In a post-flux world, there were too many variables to ever be sure of a forecast even one day out. When a single missed variable in one otherwise unassuming magician could mean the difference between a hundred thousand people living or dying, it was never safe to believe that you knew everything that was going on.


    He would know. Syl¡¯s job had entailed being that missing variable for years.


    ¡°Where are we going?¡± he asked.


    ¡°An empty space,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°It¡¯s technically Green property, but we haven¡¯t touched it in ages. The ground is salted from the war so nothing grows there and it¡¯s not great for building, so it¡¯s just a patch of desert in the middle of Auria.¡±


    ¡°I didn¡¯t take you for someone who would have a particular enjoyment for the desert bioscape.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s not about what¡¯s there,¡± she replied. ¡°It¡¯s about what¡¯s not. Ah, here we are. It¡¯s half a hundred kilometers from here, all straight.¡±


    Their surroundings blurred as the craft accelerated further. Syl hadn¡¯t frequented this part of Auria for roughly the same reason he assumed that Jennifer enjoyed it. It was quiet in more than one way. There were no Gates and no Towers in this area, which meant ambient flux was relatively static. A lack of soft targets also meant that there had never been external interest in conquering or undermining this land except if it was part of taking over the entirety of Auria.


    It was one of the few parts of the country Syl had never spilled blood on.


    ¡°I can see why you would like this,¡± he said quietly.


    Jennifer glanced at him and smiled. ¡°It¡¯s a nice change of pace. Hold on.¡±


    The craft started decelerating once the lights went from sparse to nonexistent and the foliage and fields gave way to rocky hills and desolate sand.


    With the raw speed the craft had hit, it hadn¡¯t taken long at all to arrive. Night had fallen by the time the two of them settled to a stop shortly off the road. The stars were almost painfully bright here, neither smog nor flux obstructing the view of the sky.


    The temperature was temperate as always, but Syl cast a basic warmth charm for both of them anyway.


    ¡°Sorry to bring you out this far,¡± Jennifer said, grabbing a backpack from the craft. ¡°I needed something to center myself.¡±


    ¡°No worries,¡± Syl said. ¡°I¡¯ll catch up if you strand me.¡±


    She chuckled. ¡°I believe that.¡±


    Jennifer took her glasses off, gently folding them before placing them in her backpack. ¡°It¡¯s beautiful out here, isn¡¯t it?¡±


    ¡°It is.¡±


    The engineer side-eyed him. ¡°You¡¯re not always the best liar, you know.¡±


    That was true. Syl was a fantastic liar for what mattered. When it came to trying to muster up genuine excitement for a sight, he didn¡¯t have the energy to patch over the parts of him that had been irreparably broken years ago.


    ¡°I know,¡± he said. ¡°You didn¡¯t have to take me this far to confirm that.¡±


    ¡°I came here for me,¡± she said. ¡°I can see more magic than stars even here, but in this desert, it doesn¡¯t hurt.¡±


    ¡°The glasses aren¡¯t your favorite, I¡¯m taking it.¡±


    ¡°They make a chronic problem manageable, but they¡¯re quite literally blinding. Their flux pattern suppresses the occipital lobe.¡±This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work.


    Syl nodded. There was a reason that so many people with flux hypersensitivity risked going blind.


    ¡°The FCD mod also doesn¡¯t work with them, right?¡±


    Jennifer shook her head. ¡°It¡¯s one or the other. I¡¯ve been building my resistance to the hypersensitivity for a while, but that just means the pain isn¡¯t entirely crippling. I¡¯ll be using it during the games, of course, but¡­¡±


    ¡°I had hoped to speak to you about that, actually,¡± Syl said, bringing the FCD add-on he¡¯d been tinkering with the past few weeks. ¡°I¡¯ve made a bit of progress recently, most especially with this.¡±


    The eighth-year prismatic looked at it in wonder. ¡°Is this what I think it is?¡±


    ¡°Magic can¡¯t read minds. I don¡¯t know what you think it is.¡±


    Jennifer snorted. ¡°These are modified blocker glasses.¡±


    ¡°I automated more of the process,¡± Syl said. ¡°It fed into finding a better solution with blockers. I had wanted to artificially replicate the sensitivity to feed the design you created, but that wasn¡¯t feasible with the amount of time I had. I decided on examining the blockers themselves. We have three people with hypersensitivity on our anti-Cascadia circuit team, which means this would be a pretty solid force multiplier in the event everyone has to participate in combat.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re feeding the blocker with ambient flux emissions,¡± Jennifer said, examining it more closely. ¡°Like an insanely efficient overcharge battery¡­ can I touch it?¡±


    ¡°Go ahead,¡± Syl said. ¡°I have enough prototypes for everyone with a replacement or two. The shielding isn¡¯t very strong yet, though.¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s fine,¡± Jennifer said absentmindedly, lost in the design. ¡°I have a few shields meant specifically for blockers. I¡¯ll distribute them.¡±


    ¡°Try them on,¡± Syl suggested.


    She did, gasping when the program kicked in. ¡°How the hell?¡±


    ¡°Your design helped a lot,¡± Syl said. ¡°I used a bunch of the principles you refined or pioneered to create a overcharge loop with basically nothing. It also further automates what you started so that it primes your casting process for spells you¡¯re most likely to use given your surroundings.¡±


    ¡°I can understand that part,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°How did you make it a sliding scale? Blockers are an all-or-nothing. Always have been.¡±


    Syl shrugged. ¡°I¡¯m good at what I do.¡±


    The actual explanation was far too long to give without the help of a good deal of equipment. It involved several techniques that standard Aurian spell theory did not examine as well as a touch of very illegal chaonite.


    ¡°This is incredible,¡± Jennifer breathed.


    ¡°Keep it,¡± Syl said. ¡°I have the designs.¡±


    The engineer sighed. ¡°This is why I brought you here, Syl. No cameras. No monitoring, not even from my family. It¡¯s no consecrated site, but there¡¯s nobody who even turns an eye here.¡±


    Those were dangerous words¡ªor, at least, the indication that there would be dangerous words. Syl made no indication that he was prepared for a fight, of course. All his quick and lethal spells were preloaded.


    ¡°A bit ominous,¡± he said.


    ¡°I¡¯m going to be up front with you,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°You¡¯re too good at what you do.¡±


    ¡°Thank you,¡± Syl said drily.


    ¡°That wasn¡¯t a compliment,¡± she said. ¡°Or it was, but it wasn¡¯t only a compliment. Contrary to what you might think of me, I know my shit.¡±


    ¡°I never implied otherwise.¡±


    ¡°Be that as it may, I know what I¡¯m seeing. You¡¯re a combat prodigy, which is absurd enough in its own right given the limitations you have and your age, but it¡¯s your engineering that¡¯s giving it away. No normal eighteen year old has the amount of insight you have into even basic principles, let alone the capacity to repeatedly make groundbreaking magical discoveries.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s a bit of a stretch to call them groundbreaking.¡±


    ¡°No,¡± Jennifer said, shaking her head. ¡°It isn¡¯t. I don¡¯t know how you¡¯re doing it. I know you have a connection to Incarnate, so I guess it¡¯s feasible you¡¯re getting information from them¡ªbut again, that¡¯s not something a regular eighteen year old does. Incarnate isn¡¯t a company that just hands their secrets out to people period, let alone a student. Are you even eighteen years old?¡±


    ¡°You can check my records and scan me,¡± Syl said. ¡°No, I¡¯m not lying about my age.¡±


    Technically. His original birthdate was the one thing that wouldn¡¯t line up, but those records had been well and truly lost during the war.


    ¡°Then my other points stand,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Who are you, Syl? I¡¯ll be up front with you and say that I¡¯ve been looking into who you are. You know of my family, I¡¯m sure.¡±


    The Greens were notorious for their information collection, that was true¡ªthey were the second half of Auria¡¯s best subterfuge, with the Violets taking the more violent half of it.


    ¡°I am,¡± Syl said lightly. ¡°Was what you found satisfactory?¡±


    ¡°Not in the slightest.¡± Jennifer sighed, hands going to fidget with her glasses before realizing they weren¡¯t her own at the moment. ¡°By all accounts, your Aurian ID checks out. Everything¡¯s clean. You¡¯re not a secret terrorist or anything, which the country should be grateful for. Once I started digging deeper, though, I started finding things.¡±


    Syl did not show surprise, but he certainly felt it.


    He knew the Greens had held some level of information on him, but for a young, potentially subversive member to get that information? That was another situation entirely.


    ¡°It¡¯s all classified,¡± Jennifer continued. ¡°Black marks, entire archives of documents consigned to the ether with little more than fragments of titles remaining, redactions everywhere, security so tight that you¡¯d think you were a royal.¡±


    ¡°I see.¡± That wasn¡¯t great. He had hoped to go longer before anyone started growing suspicious beyond a basic level.


    ¡°So I¡¯m going to ask you this one more time. Sylvester Auria¡ªif that¡¯s even your real name¡ªwho are you?¡±


    Syl breathed in, closing his eyes. ¡°I¡¯d appreciate if you didn¡¯t use that name. I don¡¯t always like being reminded of what I¡¯ve lost.¡±


    ¡°Syl, then. The question stands.¡±


    When he opened his eyes again, his flux was entirely stable. Motionless, just like the air around them.


    ¡°To be clear, this is not a threat,¡± he said. ¡°I do not want to give that impression.¡±


    Jennifer frowned, shying away from him, fingers twitching as if reaching for her FCD. ¡°And yet you are.¡±


    ¡°I would advise that you tread lightly,¡± Syl said simply. ¡°Nobody will like what happens when you dig deeper.¡±


    Though it was dark, he knew Jennifer would still be able to see his flux. She¡¯d turned the blockers off, looking into his eyes with a faintly horrified wonder.


    Syl also knew what she would see there¡ªthe same that so many others had. It was, as he said, not a threat. To call it a warning captured the idea better, but it was still imperfect.


    It was a promise of what lay ahead, an answer to an unasked question.


    Jennifer gulped, stepping away again. ¡°I will¡­ keep that in mind.¡±


    ¡°Thank you,¡± Syl said. ¡°Then let¡¯s enjoy the time we have left. Tomorrow could change the trajectory of our country.¡±


    Slowly, somewhat reluctantly, Jennifer nodded.


    Good, he thought. It¡¯s better that you live not knowing what you just avoided.

 Chapter 27 - Unknown Variables

    Syl could tell that Jennifer was holding herself back from asking questions throughout the rest of their time in the desert. That was concerning enough for him to wonder if he needed to take further preventative measures, but from the way her passive flux control fluctuated each time she looked in his general direction, he was pretty sure that would be a non-issue.


    He decided he¡¯d put some feelers out. Depending on how the next few days shook out, it was entirely possible that this would never be an issue for any number of reasons, not all of them necessarily involving Jennifer¡¯s death.


    They were, at least, eventually able to return to something like normal conversation. It was still mostly about engineering, of course, but they also spoke a bit about Jennifer¡¯s own background.


    Both of them were hiding secrets. Syl had more than her by a fairly significant amount, of course, but she wasn¡¯t exactly an open book.


    She was from the main branch of the Green family, the third child of two strategic-class magicians. Jennifer had taken an interest in FCD engineering young, slightly deviating from the family¡¯s typical path of making and manning external artillery-type devices.


    Even for a Green, she¡¯d been abnormally good at what she did. Of course she had been¡ªshe was master-class now, after all, and it was rare that an engineer made it there on their own without significant combat experience.


    There was a lot of detail missing from both of their accounts of their childhoods. Neither of them were being fully honest with each other, and they knew it. They skimmed over details; friends and family lost to war, involvement in conflicts, the timing and location of where they were raised, and so much more information that was needed to truly understand someone.


    Syl couldn¡¯t say that he¡¯d gained a full understanding of the other engineer through their conversation, but he did gather enough context about her life to slot her profile into what he knew of the prismatic families and put together a reasonable explanation for why Jennifer had joined Uriel, Waylan, James, and a number of others in the Reserve and outside in their alienation against Auria despite operating in a family that could stay behind allied lines and largely avoid combat participation.


    One critical issue that Auria had been suffering since the war was a lack of truly great magicians. They¡¯d lost the bulk of their strategic-class magicians and their only two paragons to the war, facts that had both been obfuscated to the public. The prismatic families, who had produced the bulk of those magicians, were thus employed to repopulate. Jennifer was the third of at least ten children, most of whom had been born after the war.


    The cold truth was that high-power magicians tended to produce high-power magicians at a higher rate than normal people. Thus, the prismatic families had all shifted towards establishing their own magician pairing and breeding programs¡ªboth artificial and organic¡ªin a deliberate attempt to increase the number of viable children who could replenish Auria¡¯s ranks.


    Based on Jennifer¡¯s mannerisms around the topic, Syl assumed she had been selected for the Green family¡¯s program and hadn¡¯t been given much of a choice. That would explain why she¡¯d stuck to the Reserve for so long, at least. It was a good reason to not go back.


    It would also explain why she wanted to burn this country to the ground.


    The seams are splitting, he thought as they headed back. I don¡¯t know how much longer Auria has.


    Hopefully at least a little longer. His preparations weren¡¯t complete yet.


    #


    ¡°Welcome back,¡± Bianca said not half a second after Syl opened the door. ¡°Did you have fun? ¡±


    ¡°You didn¡¯t need to wait in the doorway for me,¡± Syl said. ¡°It was fine. Jennifer has suspicions.¡±


    Bianca frowned, sipping what he assumed was tea from a steaming mug. ¡°I had thought this would be a private excursion of a different kind.¡±


    ¡°I did too,¡± Syl said. ¡°It¡¯s a bit of a shame. I didn¡¯t get to say any of the lines I practiced.¡±


    Bianca chuckled, then grew serious once more. ¡°Was it resolved, then? If not¡­¡±


    ¡°Somewhat,¡± Syl said. ¡°Even if she grows more suspicious, she¡¯s not going to be able to find anything. I¡¯ll have some of our people monitor her, but for the time being, I think she¡¯s well aware of the risks of continuing to poke around.¡±


    ¡°It lightens my heart to hear that,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I suppose much does ride on the results of the coming circuit.¡±


    ¡°Yeah. There are way too many variables to make any assumptions. We¡¯ve prepared as well as we can for this. One way or another, we¡¯re coming out the other side in one piece. Whether or not everyone else does depends on far too much.¡±


    ¡°You decided on bringing it, then?¡± Bianca asked, flicking towards a certain unmarked section of the floor.


    ¡°I will be,¡± Syl said.


    He¡¯d put in the order for the most up-to-date model of Horizon Breaker that Incarnate had a week ago, and he¡¯d finally gotten it recently. It was more compact than it had been the last time he¡¯d had to use it.


    If all went well, it would return to Incarnate headquarters without firing a single spell. If it didn¡¯t, a lot of other people would not be returning.


    That was a problem for tomorrow and beyond, though. He could have asked Bianca if her own preparations were done. She was a prodigy in her own right, after all, but she was restricted by the size of her flux pool, which wasn¡¯t much more impressive than your average A-class or tactical-class¡¯. Picking and choosing the best spell for a given situation was equally important to both of them for entirely different reasons, but they both knew this already. There was no point in further badgering the point when they were some of the most experienced magicians in this field.


    ¡°You put on some tea,¡± Syl said instead. ¡°Did you save me a cup?¡±


    ¡°Of course I did,¡± Bianca sniffed. ¡°You must think me a savage to even ask.¡±This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.


    Syl laughed, accepting a proffered cup. ¡°Thank you.¡±


    They settled on the couch in front of their monitor, Bianca curling up and resting her head on his shoulder in an entirely unladylike manner.


    ¡°You seem unnaturally sentimental today,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°I¡¯m feeling unnaturally sentimental,¡± Bianca replied. ¡°It¡¯s been a while since the two of us went on a mission like this.¡±


    ¡°The last time we did, a city disintegrated,¡± Syl reminded her.


    ¡°Even so. It reminds me of simpler times. We knew where the enemy was. All we had to do was fight.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯m sure this time around¡¯ll be pretty similar,¡± Syl said.


    ¡°You say it yourself,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Unknown variables.¡±


    ¡°Unknown variables,¡± Syl agreed. ¡°Tomorrow¡¯s work is tomorrow¡¯s work, though.¡±


    ¡°So it is. For the time being¡­ I¡¯m in the mood for a mediocre romcom flick, tea, and some snacks. We have some real fruit, yes?¡±


    ¡°Bringing back some old classics, I see.¡± Syl grinned. ¡°We do.¡±


    This time, he didn¡¯t have to dig at all to find the scant warmth he had left in his heart.


    #


    Jennifer¡¯s mind burned with possibility as she arrived back at the academy. She had as good as confirmed that Syl wasn¡¯t just a random prodigy. Whether he was using age manipulation magic¡ªwell, he would¡¯ve had to invent that in order to use it, but every option here was preposterous¡ªor had been a very young child soldier or any number of other possibilities, it was clear as day that he was something special.


    The warning weighed heavy on her mind. She¡¯d seen death in those eyes reflected a thousand times. That flux had been colorless and so very cold, anathema to her own sight in a way she¡¯d never seen before.


    But she was an engineer and an investigator, and knowing the stakes didn¡¯t stop that spark of curiosity from burning.


    She would never risk trying to share her hypotheses with the rest of the Reserve, which he suspected was what Syl wanted anyway. Still, she couldn¡¯t help but want to know more.


    Her investigations had dipped into her family¡¯s resources, and those had proved fruitless, but it was possible the academy had more information on the strange supposedly C-class magician. The Aurian academy system was influenced by the prismatic families, but it was most directly controlled by the royals themselves. It was entirely possible they would have a more comprehensive file on this man.


    It was getting late at night. Given the timing of when Cascadia wanted to start their games, Jennifer knew that she would best be served by going to sleep now so she could be well rested for their transport the next day, but she hadn¡¯t reached her current position and power by not answering her questions.


    There was every chance she would die before the year was out. Though her role in the games was supposed to be as an engineer only, there were too many possibilities that put her directly in harm¡¯s way. She had accepted that, but she refused to die without learning this answer.


    The academy archives were closed and behind several layers of automated security, but the prismatic families all had keys to get through that.


    What differentiated Jennifer from some of the others was that she knew how to get into the next level down. Every academy was a military target for a reason, and part of that came from the fact that they were treated as secure sites to store certain classified pieces of information¡ªlike, for instance, the unredacted records of a certain Sylvester Auria.


    That one was theoretically only accessible by a very select group of people, but Jennifer had spent a year reverse-engineering the lock to it based off of chance contacts with the door, never drawing suspicion to herself.


    As she strode through the institute, she ran a pre-set program she¡¯d installed half a year ago, looping the footage and sensor data on the security system in specific parts of the halls¡ªthe fastest possible way into the archives.


    She knew this place like the back of her hand now. It was where she¡¯d spent the second most time as a student, only behind the lab. Jennifer found the gated door to the second level easily, passing by shelves of data cards with varying signs of use. She typed in a certain code and passed her flux signature in, hoping dearly that her bypass still worked.


    It did. The door clicked open, notifying her that she was the first to enter this in¡­ seventy minutes?


    Suddenly on guard, Jennifer tapped her FCD and prepared the new item Syl had just gifted her, turning the blocking down slightly.


    Flux was everywhere. Even in places where most would expect it to be less prevalent¡ªsay, in a dark, dry archive room intentionally kept stable to avoid data corruption¡ªit still pervaded the place.


    Here, however, there were clear signs that there had been a spell activated in the area. The brightness wasn¡¯t intense enough to hurt her even with the blockers fully off, but it was still enough that she would have had to squint if not for the partial reduction in her sensitivity.


    Someone else was here, and they¡¯d cast. Hypersensitivity wasn¡¯t so kind as to give an intuitive sense as to what kind of flux was visible. Jennifer could guess that this was a perception-type spell of some kind, but that came from context and years of experience guessing at the intricacies of the flux only her eyes could see.


    Is it Syl? There was no way he would have been able to figure out how to enter this place without triggering an alarm, but then there was no way he should have been able to do a lot of things.


    Jennifer cast a protective spell on herself silently, taking the full extra five seconds to wordlessly cast in case there was still someone here.


    She crept along quietly, her eyes showing her the path even if this area was unlit. This second layer of archives went deeper than the rest of the area did. They were also organized in a way that Jennifer was unfamiliar with, but given context, she could guess that whoever else was down here was likely searching for the same thing she was.


    There were perception-type spells to find this type of thing, of course, but they were all quite easy to spot even from someone who had a particular antipathy towards flux detection. If she had to guess, the previous person in here had used a similar type of spell.


    The spell got brighter as Jennifer drew deeper into the archives, leading her towards a dark corner of the area. As she traveled, she started seeing physical evidence of someone being here¡ªdust kicked into the air, slots where data cards had been taken out and replaced improperly, and the sort.


    Before long, she heard the person who must have been checking these, the magic growing so bright she had to turn the blockers all the way up.


    ¡°Piece of shit,¡± a male voice said. ¡°Fucking finally.¡±


    That was a familiar voice. How the hell did he get into the archives?


    Drew Violet was ostensibly on the same side as Jennifer, but she knew he wasn¡¯t. He was the exact kind of pig that she wanted to avoid. He blindly put his full faith in the Aurian kingdom¡ªand even worse, he was a damn good magician. When the dice were down and war was on the horizon, she knew where he¡¯d be.


    In this moment, though, they were still allies. If he was looking for the article she thought he was, then that was true in more than one sense.


    ¡°Violet?¡± Jennifer asked.


    She heard a muffled curse, followed by the unfortunately familiar sound of someone tripping and crashing into a shelf of data cards.


    ¡°Jennifer?¡± Drew asked. ¡°What the shit are you doing here?¡±


    ¡°What are you doing here?¡± Jennifer replied. ¡°How do you even have a key?¡±


    ¡°Mother,¡± Drew said. ¡°I¡¯m here because there¡¯s a fucking master-class mage pretending to be a class 3 shitter for some reason, and I want to know why.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re talking about Syl.¡±


    ¡°Syl? You have a pet name for that guy?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s¡­ just his name, though?¡± Jennifer shook her head. ¡°I was looking for information about him too.¡±


    ¡°You are?¡± Drew¡¯s face appeared, illuminated by his FCD. ¡°Why?¡±


    ¡°That¡¯s none of your business.¡±


    ¡°It¡¯s plenty of my business when you¡¯re in a top-secret part of the archives without permission.¡±


    ¡°Did you get permission?¡±


    The silence that followed was deafening.


    ¡°Anyway,¡± Drew sighed. ¡°You¡¯re not going to find anything of use.¡±


    That sent a strum of fear through Jennifer. ¡°What makes you say that?¡±


    The Violet tapped his FCD, projecting a file onto the dust in the air.


    Sylvester ¡°Syl¡± Auria


    Birth Date: [removed]


    [Removed]


    The supermajority of the document was similarly blacked out.


    There was, however, one line that wasn¡¯t.


    Death Date: March 14, 61 AFI.

 Chapter 28 - War Games

    The distance from the academy city to the Santa Rosa Tower¡ªnow part of the border with Cascadia¡ªwas less than Syl thought anyone should have been particularly comfortable with. Evenif the buses they were using were significantly faster than any of the diesel-munching monoliths that had been the primary design for this type of vehicle pre-flux, it still shouldn¡¯t have taken only an hour to get from an academy¡ªmilitary though it might be¡ªto the border.


    There were some discomforted murmurs amongst the people within the transport at that. At higher speeds, Cascadia had a straight shot from the border to the heart of the country within half an hour.


    To minimize the risk of a well-placed bomb or similar trap from inhibiting their movement, each of the three buses had multiple tactical-class sabotage-type specialists aboard. Uriel and Syl also both had wide range surveillance nets up, keeping an eye out for potential ambushes. This wasn¡¯t officially sanctioned by the kingdom, of course. Auria didn¡¯t want to be on record allocating records to fight a quiet conflict that they weren¡¯t even supposed to be involved in. That meant little to no military intervention and zero magicians backing them up or even scouting ahead of them.


    Somewhat surprisingly, they didn¡¯t encounter any major issues on their way into Santa Rosa. Nothing manmade, at least.


    Syl¡¯s bus was entirely people he knew already¡ªWaylan, Jennifer, James, Lia, Bianca, and Syl himself. Two Reserve members and four undergraduates, though James was already a national circuit competitor. Lia was the odd one out here, the only magician under tactical-class in this bus. Syl wasn¡¯t sure if she was the lowest-ranked across all eighteen participants, but it was very possible she was. Officially, he was probably the lowest, but that illusion was quickly slipping away.


    ¡°I haven¡¯t been to a Tower before,¡± Lia muttered as they got closer, the bus¡¯ inertial dampening enchantments making up for the increasingly rough roads. ¡°Only ever saw an exclusion zone from afar.¡±


    They had to slow down as they entered the region surrounding the Santa Rosa Tower.


    Unlike Gates, which formed and closed with somewhat regular frequency, the Towers had largely remained static since their formations during flux integration. There were currently some six thousand or so of them scattered throughout the world, though some were significantly more notable than others.


    No Tower had been climbed to completion yet, and it was unlikely that it would ever happen. They grew increasingly esoteric as they grew higher, and though they were mostly between two to ten miles in height, their interiors did not reflect that. It was also impossible to break in from the outside as far as modern magic was considered.


    While Towers didn¡¯t hold the same issues as Gates¡ªnamely, the issue of altered creatures escaping from within and wreaking havoc on their surroundings if not cleared¡ªthey came with their own issues.


    Jennifer clicked her tongue. ¡°I¡¯m very glad I have blockers. Towers are always miserable.¡±


    She seemed unusually nervous today. Syl would have chalked it up to the high-stress environment they were entering, but from the way she kept glancing at him when he wasn¡¯t looking (with his eyes, at least), there was something bothering her about him. He wondered if it was just from the conversation they¡¯d had last night or if she¡¯d somehow managed to find something new.


    Whatever the case, he hoped she¡¯d figure out how to address it by the time they needed to fight.


    Her complaint about the Tower was fair, though. The primary issue with Towers was that they were frankly incredible sources of power. Even nuclear reactors couldn¡¯t compare to the amount of raw energy they put out¡ªbut while reactors worked with radiation and steam, Towers just put out flux.


    Even those without hypersensitivity could see the magic in the air. Threads of it radiated out from the miles-high tower looming over the horizon. Having a lot of ambient flux was usually not that much of a problem. With how activation and spell processes worked, there was never the risk of actually causing an explosive reaction like there was when a spell was jammed. The problem came from long-term exposure to it.


    A regular amount of ambient flux tended to barely affect a magician, who was generally constantly cycling it in and out. Near or in a Tower, that cycling process would be substantially enhanced thanks to the amount of raw flux available. The sheer amount in the air, however, meant that over months or years of exposure, their flux channels would start to warp. Syl had seen articles comparing it to nuclear waste pre-integration, though that kind of radiation never caused issues anymore.


    Nobody lived near a Tower. Most preferred not to even approach one if they weren¡¯t going treasure hunting inside. Doing so for an extended period of a time was a sure ticket to an early, painful death.


    That much flux also had a deleterious effect on non-magical structures. Santa Rosa had been a relatively normal suburban city before the integration and had held research facilities from some time, but you would be hard-pressed to tell that now. The city had been worn down to nubs. Most of the original structures had been ground down into desert dust a long time ago. Post-integration facilities, built before humanity had realized that they had needed to regulate how much time they could spend in these conditions, only stood in fragments.


    Brutalist flux-reinforced building foundations and skeletons marked the dour landscape around them, slowly battered down by the constant wave of flux.


    ¡°This isn¡¯t going to be dangerous, is it?¡± Lia asked. ¡°Not the combat, I mean. The exclusion zone.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯ll be fine,¡± Waylan reassured her. ¡°They¡¯re pretty popular for notable duels because they let people recharge faster. It takes at least a month for you to start noticing actual problems.¡±


    ¡°We¡¯re going to be here for at least a week,¡± James said gruffly. ¡°Your honor duels last an hour at most.¡±


    Waylan shrugged. ¡°There¡¯s not much we can do about it. If you wanted to back out, you had your chance.¡±


    James grunted. ¡°That¡¯s true. You know the deal, Lia.¡±


    ¡°I can handle myself,¡± the class 3 first-year said. ¡°If I can¡¯t, I¡¯ll just forfeit and get out. You can stop fussing about me. You¡¯re not my dad.¡±


    Waylan chuckled. ¡°Stay sharp out there, everyone. This is what we¡¯ve been practicing for. Cover each other¡¯s retreats if necessary. Everyone knows the evac plan?¡±


    ¡°We¡¯ve only gone over it ten thousand times,¡± James said. ¡°Anyone who doesn¡¯t know it by now deserves to be left behind, really.¡±


    ¡°Wildcard,¡± Jennifer said warningly. ¡°We¡¯re about to enter a potentially live combat situation. Cooperate with us here.¡±


    ¡°You got it, boss,¡± the master-class magician said in a way that left no illusions as to how much he cared for that.


    The bus slowed to a stop a mere half kilometer from the Tower, having reached the coordinates that prismatics and the royals had received from Cascadia.The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.


    They weren¡¯t the first ones there. The opposing Cascadian force had arrived a few hours ago, by the look of it. They had more people in their entourage than the Aurian side, and their transports were more clearly military than the repurposed buses that the Reserve and circuit group was using.


    Their engineers had been hard at work setting up an impromptu arena for each of the primary circuit events. They were nothing like the custom holodecks that would simulate any number of environments¡ªthese were basic ones that were just barely competition legal. That said, it wasn¡¯t like competition rules actually mattered when it came to an off-the-books game, but still.


    ¡°Earpieces in, everyone,¡± Waylan said.


    Syl had already had his in and patched into an isolated channel on his FCD.


    ¡°This is Uriel speaking,¡± a tinny voice came through the earpiece. ¡°Acknowledge.¡±


    Everyone in the bus tapped a display on their FCD to acknowledge. It looked reasonably natural on Bianca, who just used a tablet, but did look a bit stranger on Lia, who had brought her full FCD¡ªa sword too tall to properly hold inside the confines of this vehicle.


    ¡°Receiving,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Doing final checks now. Please state your name or designation when prompted to.¡±


    ¡°Natalie Irving. Mishap,¡± a woman¡¯s voice came in. She already sounded pissed.


    ¡°Receiving,¡± Jennifer replied, nodding as she checked a more detailed display of the network. ¡°Next.¡±


    ¡°Hannibal Aurum. Lifeline.¡±


    ¡°Receiving. Next.¡±


    They proceeded through the list of names one at a time. Every national circuit competitor had an alternate designator, but the ones in the Reserve had only competed in inter-academy competitions and thus lacked said titles. They just included their ranks instead.


    Syl, Bianca, and Lia were the only undergraduates here who also had no experience in the national circuit. They had neither title nor rank¡ªat least, not officially.


    Jennifer¡¯s brow furrowed after she confirmed that she herself was sending and receiving properly.


    ¡°There¡¯s supposed to be eighteen of us,¡± she said. ¡°Operator nineteen, confirm receipt?¡±


    ¡°Confirming,¡± said an irritatingly familiar voice. ¡°Captain Drew Violet.¡±


    ¡°Receiving,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Bus three, confirm presence?¡±


    ¡°Lifeline receiving, presence confirmed,¡± Hannibal said over comms. ¡°It¡¯s new. Kid definitely wasn¡¯t here five minutes ago.¡±


    ¡°Watch who you¡¯re calling kid, draft dodger,¡± Drew replied easily. ¡°If you¡¯re so blind to your own senses being modified, then you really do need me anyway.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re on the open network, Drew,¡± Uriel said. ¡°Why are you here?¡±


    ¡°Figured I¡¯d participate,¡± he said casually. ¡°Now, it does look like our friends on the other side here are waiting for us to get out, so why don¡¯t we get on with it?¡±


    Jennifer¡¯s fingers flew over her keyboard, presumably sending off messages to Uriel since she was ostensibly in command of this entire thing. After a few moments of that, she sighed.


    Unknown variables, Syl thought.


    ¡°We don¡¯t have the time or resources to turn him away,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°Watch your backs. Let¡¯s go.¡±


    ¡°I¡¯ll kill him if he tries anything funny,¡± James said nonchalantly. ¡°I¡¯m good.¡±


    They disembarked into the flux-infused atmosphere of the Tower¡¯s surroundings. To magicians, it was like suddenly being underwater with how dense the magic in the air was, but they acclimated quickly.


    The arenas were set up across the span of about a kilometer. The Cascadian workforce had mostly retreated back into their transports by now, leaving thirty or so magicians facing the Aurian nineteen.


    Syl hadn¡¯t been to one of these before, so he wasn¡¯t actually sure how they were supposed to handle this. Most of his dealings with Cascadians in the field had involved a great deal of flux and violence, most of which began within minutes of arrival.


    This time, though, they just stood there. Uriel was doing some kind of communication, he was pretty sure, but he couldn¡¯t see what she was typing.


    To sate his curiosity, Syl cast a stealth spell and then the A-class perception-type spell Projected Self, which essentially just connected his senses to a separate source of input that he could move around. He sent his second sensor suite towards the Cascadian group, looking for anyone he might recognize.


    ¡­nope, no hits. To be fair, he¡¯d eliminated or captured most Cascadians he would have recognized, and there¡¯d been quite a few years of new talent being integrated into their system. There were quite a few of them that had the same colors as Cascadian leadership he¡¯d dealt with before, so he sent the sensor suite towards them, increasing the flux on the stealth aspect.


    ¡°¡­here, so we should call her in,¡± someone wearing a patch that Syl was pretty sure was roughly equivalent to Uriel¡¯s rank was saying. ¡°The artifact is ready for her, anyway.¡±


    ¡°She said she would know when to come,¡± another, lower-ranked person said. ¡°Shouldn¡¯t we wait?¡±


    ¡°She¡¯s a Sinner,¡± the first said. ¡°Do you really want to trust the word of someone with a body count higher than the population of the capital?¡±


    ¡°With all due respect, sir, why are we having her oversee this, then?¡±


    ¡°Oh, that¡¯s simple,¡± a frail, emaciated young woman a head shorter than the officer said, smiling with too many teeth. ¡°I felt like visiting home.¡±


    Syl didn¡¯t curse, but he was very tempted to. He had nearly forgotten just what it was like to be on the wrong side of a paragon-class magician¡¯s abilities.


    I need to up my passive sensory spells. With his normal suite, it had just seemed like Gluttony had appeared out of nowhere. It was quite possible she had, but it wouldn¡¯t have been true teleportation. More likely it was a stealth spell of some kind.


    From the way the officer jumped, they hadn¡¯t noticed her either.


    Syl¡¯s spell wavered in the presence of a paragon-class mage. Her very presence had a gravity to it, crushing and compacting the flux around her.


    Gluttony. Katelyn Lesling. She looked just as he remembered her¡ªmagic preserving a certain youthful innocence that didn¡¯t quite succeed at hiding the vicious hunger underneath. Though she was on record as being almost as old as the flux integration itself, she didn¡¯t look much older than Syl.


    This woman had killed one point three million people.


    A monster in the flesh.


    Someone like me.


    ¡°Shit,¡± Uriel said belatedly. ¡°She¡¯s actually here.¡±


    Gluttony turned towards the Aurians, hollow smile still plastered on her lips, and Syl¡¯s spell flickered out. That was fine. He had no more use for it anyway.


    The Sinner inhaled softly. By all rights, only someone standing right next to her should have been able to hear it, but the sound pierced through a kilometer of flux-rich air to reach everyone¡¯s ears. A cold shiver went down Syl¡¯s spine.


    It had been quite some time since he had witnessed true power.


    As she breathed in slowly, Syl heard a handful of the Aurians and a decent few of the Cascadians shouting in panic. The flux around them was moving, stripping down materials and bombarding people on its way as it traveled towards a single source.


    ¡°Shield your FCDs!¡± Jennifer called out. ¡°It¡¯s going to¡ª¡°


    Her voice cut out, though Syl could hear her finish with ¡°break them all¡± since she wasn¡¯t standing far from her. They hadn¡¯t adequately shielded their comms, and they were going to pay for it.


    Amateur mistakes, Syl thought.


    His own FCDs were shielded and his body was used to flux bombardment, so he figured that he would be fine¡ªflux didn¡¯t have that much of a physical presence when not being shaped, and most of the people stumbling were doing so out of surprise more than sheer force.


    And then his throat started burning, and he remembered the one device that he possessed that wasn¡¯t¡ªcouldn¡¯t¡ªbe adequately protected.


    ¡°That¡¯s annoying,¡± he tried to say. Instead, he felt something crack.


    Bianca was shielding herself against the flux storm beside him but noticed Syl touching his throat. She turned toward him, realizing what was happening in an instant. She motioned with her FCD, preparing to enter a program.


    Syl shook his head, signing quickly.


    I¡¯ll be fine.


    His throat FCD was at pretty high risk of malfunctioning explosively in a situation like this, but he had accounted for the possibility. There had been a time where fighting the Sinners had been a real concern of his, after all.


    Unfortunately, like he¡¯d wanted to say, it was annoying.


    He pointed his primary FCD at his own throat.


    Master-class transmutation-type spell, Augoeides.


    The FCD dissolved into his bloodstream, active components becoming inert biological components in an instant. It had been designed to be receptive to this spell in particular. It had always run the risk of someone using said spell on him, but it was very rare to find this in the battlefield, so he didn¡¯t mind too much.


    Still. Annoying. He wouldn¡¯t be able to get it replaced anywhere but Incarnate, which meant that he didn¡¯t have access to his voice for the foreseeable immediate future.


    The flux storm came to a gentle stop, the majority of the Tower-enhanced flux simply vanishing from the area and into Gluttony¡¯s gullet.


    The skies had been grey when they¡¯d come in. Now, weak beams of sunlight shone down onto the hastily constructed arenas where both sides stood, the clouds pulled down from a portion of the sky and vacuumed straight into her body.


    She smiled wider, stepping forward and suddenly vanishing.


    The Sinner reappeared high in the air, hovering on an invisible platform. When she spoke, it reached everyone at the same volume.


    ¡°You have some games to get to, don¡¯t you? Don¡¯t let my presence discourage you. Let¡¯s play!¡±

 Chapter 29 - Sin

    Despite her slight frame, Gluttony cast a dark shadow across the entire battlefield. Everyone in the region felt her presence even if they weren¡¯t looking up to her¡ªand most were looking up.


    Sinners were the stuff of legends. Nightmares come to life. They rarely made an appearance with less than ten thousand casualties. Nobody could ever tell if those casualties would be monster or human, let alone which side would end up dead. The most consistent metholodogy amongst the Seven Sinners was a complete lack of one. They emerged like natural disasters, rarely explained themselves, and vanished into the ether after.


    And now there was one looking over less than a hundred people, of which there wasn¡¯t a single strategic-class magician. It was entirely possible that there was one of those on the Cascadian side, but Syl doubted it. Nobody wasted strategics on something like this, even if they were planning something deeper.


    The first steps from both sides were hesitant and wary, checking both the enemy and the Sinner high above. There was always the threat of sudden unchecked hostilities from either side, of course, but that seemed to shrink in the face of someone powerful enough to act as a localized flux black hole.


    A message flicked over Syl¡¯s FCD as Uriel stepped forward to meet the leader of the other one.


    Mj. Uriel: Voice comms are down. We can try to re-establish, but it looks like Gluttony went specifically after comms. Intranet access is also gone. FCD to FCD is still up, but that¡¯s about it.


    A flurry of messages from others came back soon after, questioning what was going on. There was some fear that Gluttony had done this just to devour them all, but that was a silly concern. If she wanted to do that, she would have just done it to start with. It wasn¡¯t like any of the Reserve would be able to stop it. It was also one that they couldn¡¯t particularly prepare for anyway. Their most conservative evacuation plan would only start triggering in an hour when Uriel missed check-in.


    Neither Bianca nor Syl bothered to send messages through. The main channel was getting a bit clogged, anyway.


    ¡°She isolated us,¡± Bianca said. ¡°Why?¡±


    Syl signed back, unable to speak now that his FCD was little more than fresh blood for his veins. Good question.


    ¡°I would imagine she is not doing this as a service for Cascadia,¡± Bianca continued. ¡°If she wanted to, she could stomp her way through the countryside in days.¡±


    That was also very true. While most countries had paragons, bio-engineered Tower and Gate monsters, and nuclear bombs as deterrents against other countries from full-on pushing in, Sinners didn¡¯t care about what a country could bring to bear. They lived for themselves and themselves only.


    Has to be something else, Syl signed. Think she knows?


    ¡°That is not information we are currently capable of knowing,¡± Bianca said. ¡°I believe it is not something worth worrying about. If she wants the people here dead, they will be.¡±


    Not you, Syl signed. He didn¡¯t finish the sentence, but Bianca got the message loud and clear.


    ¡°I would prefer for that scenario not to come to pass,¡± she said, answering both herself and Syl¡¯s unspoken implication at once. ¡°If all goes well, it will not.¡±


    Doubtful.


    ¡°I do not disagree.¡±


    Up ahead, Uriel found herself flanked by Waylan and James, which Syl found interesting. The circuit competitor seemed to have a different flavor of anti-Auria sentiment when compared to the other two, enough that he suspected they belonged to two separate factions entirely, but they seemed to be perfectly fine now.


    Better the devil you know, he thought. Those were the two most powerful duelists that she had access to that she regularly worked with. Drew was here too and arguably better than one of them, but he wasn¡¯t even supposed to be here and was horrendously unreliable, especially given how closely entrenched he was into the Aurian system. Though all the prismatics leveraged their family connections, Drew was the only one that Syl would consider to be a proper Aurian¡ªthe kind of unthinking warrior mage that the programs were supposed to churn out.


    Speaking of which, that master-class Reserve mage was one of the few who had recovered quickly from the shock of seeing a Sinner. His attention was now focused on Syl. Far removed from the arrogant magician who¡¯d thought to use a point-blank spell at ten meters in a serious duel the first time Syl had met him, Drew was now an arrogant magician who was at least somewhat aware of what he was up against. The spells he was projecting now were significantly better thought-out.


    Even Syl had to admire the subtlety that Drew used. He had the makings of a great magician and a phenomenal assassin in him if he could just curb his ego and stop listening to what Auria told him and¡­ well, actually, he could think of quite a few things.


    Of course, that wasn¡¯t enough to actually successfully probe Syl. This wasn¡¯t his first outing, and he wasn¡¯t just going to give up valuable information about his body or magic for free.


    He slowly turned to one side, making eye contact with Drew, and shook his head slightly.


    Drew Violet quickly found something else to do, doing his best to hide his surprise.


    Mj. Uriel: Initial meeting complete. We¡¯re going to do seven games today. Two three-on-three capture the flags, four duels with varying numbers, one twelve-on-twelve Tower delve.


    That was quickly met with actual vitriol from the Aurian side, mostly from the people who were on the national circuit.


    Syl had to bite back disgust at their complaints. He understood not wanting to fight for the Aurian kingdom, but they were also acting as if back-to-back arena fights that they could rest between was a problem on the scale of the end of the world.


    These people knew nothing of war.


    Then again, he reflected, that wasn¡¯t so bad. Countries built by people who only knew war ended up running themselves like Auria.


    They¡¯d practiced a number of configurations for the possible circuit games that Cascadia would offer, though there was now a wildcard in the form of Drew Violet. The three-on-threes would all be taken by the actual national circuit competitors, most of whom had been training for these exactly. As more details came from Uriel, cutting through the sea of complaints, it became clear that the three-on-threes were specific circuit events that could be more easily performed non-lethally. The duels weren¡¯t, but that was fine¡ªmost of the non-circuit competitors were much better at handling themselves in duels than they were in competition settings with other goals.


    From the look of the Cascadians, the same was probably true for them.


    Syl wasn¡¯t planning on participating on anything except the duels and the large-group Tower climbs anyway, so he settled back and reduced his passive spells to a bare minimum as the three-person squads assembled to take their turns.


    Hurry up and wait, he signed to Bianca.


    She laughed. ¡°I¡¯ve heard that one before.¡±


    On both sides, the majority of the magicians present were tactical-class or higher. Though they weren¡¯t exactly an army, they were still all the results of decades of research and years of training. Pitted against any armed force from before flux integration, they would have wiped the floor with them. Though most of them didn¡¯t look much more than bored, everyone here was a killing machine¡ªand that wasn¡¯t even taking into account the walking nuclear weapon above them.The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    They waited. They watched.


    #


    Lia Jeksen¡¯s grip on her sword hadn¡¯t relaxed in at least a good forty-five minutes.


    ¡°Relax, Lia,¡± James said, resting a hand on her shoulder.


    She flinched, instincts nearly sending her hurtling the blade at him. ¡°Easy for you to say. I¡¯m the lowest rank magician here by a long shot.¡±


    ¡°You¡¯re not the worst fighter,¡± he said. ¡°You¡¯ve wiped the floor with me before.¡±


    ¡°You weren¡¯t using master-class spells,¡± Lia snapped. ¡°These people will be.¡±


    ¡°The first duelist isn¡¯t going to be their strongest magician. You know how these things work.¡±


    ¡°Of course I do. That¡¯s why I¡¯m first.¡±


    If she somehow held her FCD any tighter, she was pretty sure she was going to crack the handle.


    ¡°I won¡¯t lie to you,¡± James said. ¡°But I do know that your chances against the opposing magician are pretty good. You just need to get out of your own head. Remember¡ªwe¡¯re ahead. If you have to, you can just quit out.¡±


    They had pulled ahead, in fairness. Though Lia hadn¡¯t been terribly familiar with the circuit before this, she¡¯d gotten a crash course over the last month and had been able to identify most of what the three-man teams had been doing. The first team Auria¡¯s side had sent had been significantly more competent than the other team had been at the capture-the-flag style event they¡¯d been doing, earning them a clean victory.


    The second one had been much closer. They were just wrapping up now, but each side had already had one person go down unconscious, with the other two not faring much better. According to Uriel, they were going to call it a draw if nobody else went down in the next couple of minutes.


    Please be a draw, she thought. If it wasn¡¯t, and she was up next, then whether or not she won would actually matter for their overall results. To be fair, it mattered anyway, but Lia wouldn¡¯t feel bad walking away if she knew she wasn¡¯t actively dragging them down.


    The sun had faded behind gathering clouds, grey fog gradually returning to the area surrounding the Tower in the wake of Gluttony¡¯s entrance. That, Lia reflected, was a pretty accurate representation of how she was feeling now. She¡¯d been ready to do this from the start, and she still was, but reality was closing in. Her senses and combat intuition was pretty good, and it was telling her that when she was facing off against an array of magicians like this as well as one of the most powerful magicians to ever exist, her best course of action was to run.


    Slow down, she told herself. Breathe.


    This wasn¡¯t the first time she¡¯d operated in a high-stress environment. She knew how to handle herself.


    Centering herself involved a quick breathing ritual that she¡¯d practiced so many times it was practically ingrained into her lungs. Her grip relaxed, and though this was no true calm, she could at least push off the physical effects that being anxious brought down upon her.


    Lia focused on herself and only that. The sword, her casting device, was an extension of her body and could only be considered as such.


    Like this, she could fight. Even when a misstep from the Aurian trio resulted in one of them failing to counter a tactical-class spell that set the air around them on fire, even when the second game was ruled conclusively in favor of Cascadia, she did not flinch. Lia was here to carry out a single task, and she would not let herself get in her way.


    ¡°Next,¡± Gluttony said, her voice still audible at a normal volume no matter where they were.


    She sounded bored, which was terrifying enough to shake Lia¡¯s fresh composure. If there was anything you didn¡¯t want a Sinner to be, it was¡ªshe¡¯d probably say angry, but bored was a close second.


    ¡°There¡¯s nothing you can do about it,¡± she whispered to herself. ¡°Control what you can control. Accept the rest.¡±


    Mj. Uriel: Lia Jeksen, first-year class 2. A-class duelist. Are you ready?


    Lia walked towards the arena.


    ¡°As ready as I¡¯ll ever be,¡± she muttered. Lia wasn¡¯t sure if Uriel heard her as she passed, but the acknowledgement was received either way.


    The arenas this time around were the most basic ones¡ªstandardized, featureless cover that would resist anything short of a master-class spell and about forty meters on each side to work with.


    This was where Lia excelled. It was one of a scant few places where her expertise in dueling outweighed an opponent¡¯s affinity for magic. She¡¯d trained on setups like this since childhood, and she was not going to start losing now.


    Her FCD buzzed one final time before she stepped in.


    Mj. Uriel: Your opponent is a tactical-class duelist. Uses spears instead of a sword. No other information past that.


    Lia didn¡¯t send back a thank you, too focused on entering a battle mindset. She hoped she would be able to acknowledge the information by winning.


    A small, round speaker rose out of the ground between Lia and her opponent, who stood in ready positions, FCDs and weapons a moment from flashing out with violence.


    ¡°The duel will end when one party is incapacitated, cannot adequately continue to cast, or acknowledges defeat,¡± a pre-recorded voice spoke from the speaker.


    Uriel¡¯s voice came next. ¡°Duelist Nathan Sanders. Do you accept the terms of the duel as previously stated?¡±


    ¡°In nomine virtutis,¡± Lia¡¯s opponent said gruffly. He didn¡¯t sound much older than her. ¡°I accept.¡±


    A male voice Lia didn¡¯t recognize emerged from the speaker next. ¡°Duelist Lia Jeksen. Do you accept the terms of the duel?¡±


    Deep breath.


    ¡°In fide et sapientia,¡± Lia replied. ¡°I also accept.¡±


    The speaker counted them down, and the duel began in a flash. The opponent seemed to want to make use of the terrain, reaching down and immediately churning the earth beneath him, sending a wave of unstable ground towards her.


    Lia evaded, familiar with this kind of fighting style already. Even if he was a tactical-class magician, it was no exaggeration to say that she had been training for this moment her entire life. She¡¯d practically been raised by the Order of the Lost, the extra-governmental group who¡¯d acquired access to Tower artifacts and training regimens that the Aurian kingdom would never think of using.


    Drawing on years of practice, she bounded over and between every spell Sanders used. With a spell passively lightening her sword, she could make incredible use of the momentum it offered to simply hurtle herself around obstacles as well as use it to block spells. She fired off a few of her own, but those were more probing attacks to keep Sanders from being able to properly set up than they were actual attempts at knocking him down.


    Lia was using significantly less flux than her opponent was, which he recognized after a couple of minutes. He switched to using his spear as well, hurtling it forward with one spell and calling it back with another. Lia was nowhere near as good as that other first-year was at telling what enchantments a given weapon had, but the way that spear buzzed through the air told her that she did not want to get hit by it.


    I thought that this was supposed to be non-lethal.


    She shook the thought away and continued dashing from one piece of cover to another, waiting and watching for a gap in her opponent¡¯s pattern.


    There. Every now and again, he overcommitted to attacking and didn¡¯t reestablish his defensive perimeter quickly enough. It wasn¡¯t something any normal duelist would have seen, and most duelists likely wouldn¡¯t have punished him for.


    Lia was no normal duelist.


    She had no faith in Auria, knowing what they had done and what they had hidden, but this was still her homeland. Her brother, her family, everyone she cared about¡ªthey were all part of this kingdom, and she was going to protect them if it took everything she had. Whether or not Auria itself wanted a part in that was immaterial to her.


    So when she saw a risky opportunity, she took it.


    Lia pirouetted through an overcommit¡ªa combination of a tactical-class earth manipulation spell, one to throw the spear, and a third one to find where she was.


    ¡°Right here, asshole,¡± she hissed.


    One of many reasons why Lia had ended up in class three was her lack of major spells. All three spells she used in response to his three were B-class or lower¡ªone to lighten the FCD in her hands, one to augment her movements, and a third to increase the density of specifically the point of contact she would be using.


    They were practical spells. Combat spells. They were low-impact, which meant she could put all of her focus into this one blow.


    Non-lethal, she remembered. Killing an opponent would almost certainly result in more aggression, and even if nobody wanted this to become a war, it was entirely possible if things got out of hand.


    Still, this man had been trying to kill her. There was no way a spear that sharp and that powerful wouldn¡¯t have simply ended Lia¡¯s life, even taking into account the medics standing by.


    She turned the blade onto its flat side at the last second, striking Sanders¡¯ head with the force of a wrecking ball instead of an executioner¡¯s blade.


    The impact knocked him to the ground, unconscious in a single strike.


    ¡°That was easier than I expected,¡± she said to nobody, adrenaline suddenly sloughing off her in waves.


    Lia laughed nervously. She¡¯d won. She¡¯d won. Maybe it wouldn¡¯t matter in the long run, but this one time, she¡¯d done it right. Finally. In some small way, she was making a difference.


    She took a step towards the outside of the arena, then stopped in her tracks. A drop of water landed on the back of her neck. Then another.


    The now-bloodied sword buzzed with a notification as Lia looked up.


    Mj. Uriel: It¡¯s not over yet! Turn around!


    Lia¡¯s stomach churned, then dropped as she realized what was happening, more water hitting her hair, the sword, the ground, pitter-pattering with rapidly increasing intensity.She¡¯d been warned about this. Told to run in this eventuality.


    She turned back to confirm that the enemy Cascadian had stayed down just in time for his spear to catch her in the throat.


    It¡¯s raining, she thought distantly. It¡¯s fucking raining.


    What a stupid last thought.

 Chapter 30 - Rain

    Syl sensed Lia die three times. Once through a master-class surveillance spell he had placed around the area to ensure that no further cloaked individuals would just pop out of nowhere, one through the loose flux release signifying a magician¡¯s lack of ability to control their internal flux, and once when James Rokho roared in fury.


    Uriel confirmed the death not a minute later, adding the fact that by standard rules, they had in fact lost that round, putting them down one to two. Syl wasn¡¯t sure what that meant in terms of how much they were going to lose of the country in real terms, but it was insult to injury.


    It was still raining.


    Syl looked up towards Gluttony once he¡¯d confirmed that Wildcard wasn¡¯t going to accidentally cast something at his own people. That anger was almost certainly going to result in someone else getting killed¡ªthat, he was almost certain of. Whether that was James or a Cascadian was anyone¡¯s call, but Syl knew who he had his money on.


    The rain couldn¡¯t have been natural. Gluttony had devoured the clouds themselves less than an hour ago. Even taking into account the unnatural weather effects that would thanks to a great deal of flux rushing in to fill a gap, there was no way it should have been raining this quickly. Wide-area effects that would have been required to regenerate the clouds and re-seed them would have been detected not only by Syl but by the half-dozen other perception spells that both sides had placed across the battlefield.


    Unless, that was, if it had been a paragon-class spell activated on a scale that regular detection would have just clocked as atmospheric changes.


    Why would she do that? Syl wondered. Changing the weather on such a broad scale was certainly possible for a paragon-class mage¡ªthough to be fair, that went for nearly anything. It was likely faster to list what a paragon-class mage couldn¡¯t do than what they were capable of, especially when it came to devastating broad-range spells.


    If she¡¯d wanted to demolish the Aurian side, though, it would have been far easier for her to just use one of her signature spells to depopulate the entire region. It wouldn¡¯t even have been that difficult to do it without hurting too many Cascadians if that was what she had wanted.


    She didn¡¯t even seem particularly excited about the fact that she¡¯d just granted a boon to every magician on Cascadia¡¯s side, providing running water for them to passively draw flux from and empower their spells with. It wasn¡¯t the most dangerous she could have made them¡ªthat would come from river rapids or something similar, but Gluttony didn¡¯t seem to want to open it up.


    Nobody else had noticed that it was her, it seemed, which was a crucial piece of information. Paragon-class spells were extraordinarily subtle or ridiculously powerful¡ªsometimes both, but very rarely so.


    That she didn¡¯t seem to have reacted to it was a clue in itself. The purpose of this spell couldn¡¯t have been just to give Cascadia an advantage¡ªno, the fact that it had to stay silent meant that she was playing a different game.


    If there was a spell at all. Syl was fairly certain there was, but there were so many confounding factors that it was possible Gluttony hadn¡¯t even acted. If Cascadia had pre-seeded the clouds or even just activated pre-prepared spells from a distance far enough that Syl¡¯s standard detection suite couldn¡¯t catch them¡ªhell, if they had used their own paragon-class for some reason¡ªthen it would make sense why the Sinner didn¡¯t care.


    Too many possibilities, he thought. At the rate things were going, there were going to be a lot more deaths before he was able to conclusively state anything.


    James was going next, and he looked like he was ready for blood. He was up against a tactical-class magician, but in the rain, it was very possible that a tactical-class Cascadian would be able to match him.


    Under normal conditions, that was. The master-class Aurian¡¯s flux was pulsing with a rage palpable even by those withoug any sensitivity to it. Syl suspected that his mindset had fallen in alignment with the nature of his flux cycle. If anger was his trigger, this was not going to go well for someone.


    His FCD buzzed as James stalked towards his duel.


    Syl frowned, which drew Bianca¡¯s attention.


    Private message, he signed to her. The secret princess nodded.


    Lt. Jennifer: Syl. Gluttony is casting.


    Syl: What?


    Lt. Jennifer: I have my blockers set to about ninety percent, which means I can still see a bunch of the ambient flux. I wouldn¡¯t have noticed it if she hadn¡¯t gotten rid of basically everything in the region, but my program¡¯s still going on. She keeps on forming activation processes in the air. I can tell because I have it geared towards water-based spells and I can see that there¡¯s a ton of spaces where activation processes could go around her right before they disappear.


    Lt. Jennifer: Under normal circumstances, that could be environment changing, but it¡¯s going way too suddenly for it to be anything but a spellcast. I¡¯m not a hundred percent certain, but I¡¯m pretty sure of it.


    Syl: That confirms one theory I¡¯ve had, then. Why come to me about this, though? Why not Uriel or the others? I¡¯m not leading this operation.


    Lt. Jennifer: You¡¯re the only one that I think can manage this.


    Syl: What makes you think that?


    Lt. Jennifer: I found your file.


    Over in the arena, James had started dueling his opponent. Both were using high-class spells right off the bat, modifying the arena conditions. The tactical-class magician would have normally been instantly overwhelmed, but the rain surrounding them both allowed him to cast faster and more effectively, contesting the raw power of an infuriated magician a full class above him.


    Syl: What file? My student entry?


    Lt. Jennifer: A different one. You¡¯re not who you claim to be.


    Syl paused, watching the duel continue to play out. James had recognized his opponent¡¯s advantage through his rage, and he was trying to block it out now with an attraction-type spell that was mimicking what Gluttony had done on a much, much smaller scale, drawing air and water towards him and turning it into energy that he spat right back out with a projection and transmutation-type spell.


    He could already tell who was going to win this, so he went back to his messages.


    Syl: I told you that you wouldn¡¯t like what you found.


    Lt. Jennifer: You¡¯re not Sylvester Auria.


    Syl: On the contrary. Surely you have a DNA scan of me somewhere. It fits.Stolen novel; please report.


    Lt. Jennifer: Those can be faked. Sylvester¡¯s file has him on record as dying in 61 AFI during the war.


    Syl: Your records may be incomplete.


    Lt. Jennifer: Do explain. I¡¯m getting the impression that you¡¯re hiding something, but you¡¯re doing a very poor job at it. You haven¡¯t been limited like you claim to be at any turn of the road. I¡¯m not going to ask you what you are again, because I know you won¡¯t answer honestly. All I can ask is this: can you deal with this situation?


    That was a fair point. Syl thought on it. Secrecy had been a priority for him, but it was true that he¡¯d been unable to resist showing off a few times¡ªand that was if he didn¡¯t count the engineering, which he was abjectly unwilling to pretend to be terrible at when he had some of the brightest new minds and newest technology available to him at the academies.


    The arrogance of the powerful, I suppose. There was nothing Syl could do about that now. Multiple dice had been cast already. He was starting to form suspicions about what exactly Gluttony was doing here, and if any of them were close to true, he suspected he would have much less to worry about with regards to secrecy soon.


    Syl: I can¡¯t tell you whether or not I¡¯ll be able to. I will do my best, as I hope you do. Thank you for the information.


    Lt. Jennifer: If you¡¯re going to do anything, do it soon. I think this is about to get messy.


    As if to punctuate her statement, Syl heard a cry of angry victory ring out from James¡¯ voice as he overpowered his tactical-class opponent, his spell combination having successfully reduced the surrounding moisture to zero.


    The Cascadian scrabbled back, trying to surrender. He held his hands up and towards James, mouth open to call it quits.


    James finished his spell and the tactical-class Cascadian¡¯s skin tore from his flesh, leaving exposed bloody muscle, organs, and skeleton behind.


    ¡°Poor guy,¡± Bianca murmured. ¡°Nervous system¡¯s still active.¡±


    Not for long, it seemed. The gory corpse splattered across the ground, painting the cracked grey of the arena floor red.


    The arenas weren¡¯t cleaning up properly. The resets weren¡¯t at full efficiency, so cracks weren¡¯t getting mended and bloodstains weren¡¯t getting cleared. Syl wondered if they¡¯d bothered putting in the reserve fuel to finish resetting. Had that been a power play of some kind?


    At this junction, it no longer mattered.


    Us next, Syl signed to Bianca.


    She nodded. The next duel was two-on-two, and they were both aware of how to take down a tactical or master-class magician pair without giving too much away. Granted, it was entirely possible that the spectators would grow to understand, but Syl had greater priorities at the moment. Secrecy was a nice thing to have, not the first priority when Gluttony was still in the sky.


    Lt. Jennifer: Hey, I got some comms back up. We have evac coming in five. Shouldn¡¯t be immediately necessary, but it¡¯s a good backup option.


    Interesting. Comms had explicitly gone down earlier, but now that things were heating up, the Sinner had stopped focusing on suppressing them. Her motives remained unclear.


    Was Gluttony trying to bait Bianca out? A Sinner shouldn¡¯t have been interested in Aurian politics, but they¡¯d been known to do stranger things. If knowledge of a member of the royal family had leaked to the Cascadian side or Gluttony herself, it would be devastating for Auria. Their country stood on tradition. Even if that tradition had emerged in the wake of flux integration and was not yet even a full century old, it was valuable, and the loss of a royal family member would mean the loss of a propaganda machine, a powerful magician, and a vessel that could have been used for their eugenics program.


    Not that all of those were things that Syl particularly cared about, but he recognized Bianca¡¯s value to Auria¡ªand besides, she mattered to him.


    But Gluttony being here for Bianca didn¡¯t make sense. As a motivation for Cascadia, it might have, but would Gluttony really care about the princess? She was powerful yes, but to a Sinner¡­


    Mj. Uriel: We¡¯ve got a problem. We selected two, but they¡¯re saying now that this is a three-on-three¡ªand that one of us requested that.


    ¡°Yeah, that would be me,¡± Drew Violet said, strolling towards Syl and Bianca with the casual arrogance of a noble even in these circumstances. ¡°They¡¯re using stealth-type illusion and subversion specialists. You¡¯ll need a Violet to counteract them. Can¡¯t go losing good magicians, after all.¡±


    That has to be a lie, Bianca signed.


    Syl didn¡¯t disagree.


    Lt. Jennifer: Drew is clear to join. It does look like he fits this fight¡¯s profile well.


    He turned back to where he knew the engineer was running operations, looking in the approximate direction of her eyes. She would understand the gesture. She had the eyes for it.


    This is a setup.


    Syl no longer knew whose hands he would be playing into here. There were too many players on both sides¡ªall three, including Gluttony¡ªand every action he took would almost certainly be a factor in someone¡¯s larger plans for this.


    Or maybe that was the magician¡¯s arrogance speaking. It was entirely possible that these plans involved the country itself, not any single magician.


    That same arrogance was what was going to carry him through this duel either way, though. In the absence of knowing which option was the best, Syl would play along. If things got too bad, secrecy was a secondary concern.


    Nobody would question the deaths of everyone here if a Sinner had made an appearance, after all.


    ¡°We¡¯re wasting time,¡± Drew said once they were out of earshot of the others and waiting before a larger version of the same arena . ¡°Shall we get moving, princess?¡±


    Neither Bianca nor Syl stopped in their stride, but a flash of understanding passed between them.


    Drew knew. How much he knew was unclear, but he¡¯d gone poking in classified enough records to find out about Bianca at the very least. If that was the case, given the cooperation from Jennifer, it was highly likely she¡¯d obtained the same information.


    That was bad, to put it lightly, but Syl could forsee it going worse.


    ¡°I have a name, you know,¡± Bianca said as they stepped into the dueling arena.


    ¡°Bianca, second in line to the throne,¡± Drew said. ¡°Once upon a time, at least. A pleasure to meet you for the first time.¡±


    Around them, the forcefields went up, cutting them off from outside interference and vice versa.


    ¡°You got my name wrong,¡± Bianca lied. She didn¡¯t look at Syl, but the awareness was there.


    ¡°Turns out that when your family is full of brainwashers and assassins and you have a world-class engineer on your side, you get really good at finding information that¡¯s not meant to be found,¡± Drew said casually. Opposite from them, the Cascadians were getting ready themselves, their FCDs loading. ¡°A rogue element. That¡¯s what the royals called you. A danger to the future of Auria. Worth executing if not for your power and blood.¡±


    This time, Bianca did look at Syl. She didn¡¯t sign or speak, but the message in her eyes was clear. What do we do?


    ¡°And you,¡± Drew said, turning towards Syl. ¡°Don¡¯t even get me started. Your files might be burnt too far to find properly, but don¡¯t think your trail is perfect. People can still talk, and they do.¡±


    Ah. It was getting worse. Syl loaded a program on his FCD, eyeing both the Cascadians in the arena and Drew himself.


    ¡°The Silent Archmage,¡± said the prismatic, clearly relishing his words. ¡°You think you¡¯re untouchable. You think that just because you have some power, you¡¯re indispensable. Well, let me tell you something.¡±


    Syl signed in the middle of Drew¡¯s sentence. You talk too much.


    Drew, of course, didn¡¯t read it and continued. ¡°I have power of my own. Allies. Contacts. Do you take me for a moron?¡±


    ¡°Yes,¡± Bianca said.


    The prismatic snapped, and flux exploded from not just the Cascadians in the arena but the ones outside as well¡ªand then from the Tower itself.


    ¡°You say a lot about loyalty for a traitor,¡± Bianca said quietly.


    Flux flickered over them both. A spell, cast quickly and meant to affect the mind and senses simultaneously. Bianca¡¯s form flickered, then righted itself. Syl purged himself with his own flux, preventing the master-class spell from taking hold.


    ¡°A temporary alliance is a small price to pay for an end to your kind, simpleton,¡± Drew snarled, trying to hide his surprise. ¡°Don¡¯t you see¡ª¡°


    Syl finally finished the spell he¡¯d been holding. He¡¯d seen enough.


    Strategic-class transmutation spell. The Wedding of Cana.


    This spell was an infamous one most known for its use by a magician most commonly known as Greed.


    Syl had seen it cast once. He¡¯d never forgotten a single detail.


    Its range was short when cast like this on the fly, but it didn¡¯t need to be very long. With the amount of flux he was capable of supercharging it with, he could target an area the size of a basketball, which he did.


    This spell was situational in that it required a great deal of flux, its range was short, and it only showed any major effects when it had been ritual cast for a good deal of time or was cast in its native form at paragon-class. At this level, at close range, anyone who could see it coming could simply avoid the area it damaged.


    Drew Violet had not been paying attention to the area of effect.


    Drew Violet, who was not a strategic-class magician, did not have the internal flux to defend himself as four-fifths of his brain melted into still water.


    Then, as spells flashed out and fresh forcefields snapped into place behind them, as flux exploded from a sudden portal in the side of the tower spewing out Cascadians by the dozen, a single, terrifyingly calm voice reached Syl¡¯s ears.


    ¡°Finally,¡± Gluttony said. ¡°It¡¯s starting.¡±

 Chapter 31 - Tumbling Down

    Jennifer¡¯s last fifteen hours or so had been tumultuous ones. She hadn¡¯t expected to encounter Drew in the secret archives, and she certainly hadn¡¯t thought that he would have possessed access to information gathering methods that her own family didn¡¯t.


    It hadn¡¯t even been through his family. As far as she was aware, Drew¡¯s mother, strategic-class magician General Allison Violet, was either still unaware of the precise details of who the two most dangerous magicians in the entire national academy system were or had simply turned a blind eye to it.


    Despite his seeming buffoonery, Drew had proved to be remarkably adept when it came to navigating prismatics¡ªand more importantly, in finding who was important to them. They¡¯d been running on limited time and very little data, but he¡¯d pieced together connections quicker than anyone had seen. They¡¯d made their way to no fewer than three separate private residences in the middle of the night, woken up people who officially had no relation to the kingdom, and obtained fragments of information from them, chaining their way to the person who actually knew things.


    Watching Drew work had been frankly terrifying. He¡¯d proven that it wasn¡¯t just Syl who was hiding the true extent of his power. The Violet had been born and raised for this purpose, and he had carried out spell-assisted one-sided interrogations with a clinical efficiency that made Jennifer wonder if she should consider investing in protections against the type of body control magic herself. It would be a late to do so now, but still¡­


    She had wondered how the hell someone like this man had gone unnoticed for so long. Despite being ¡°only¡± master-class, he had navigated the situation with the ease of a paragon. If he continued to grow in power, which was very possible at their age and development, he was going to be a true terror.


    He would have been a true terror, she thought distantly, watching his corpse hit the ground.


    How had it gone this horribly wrong?


    She hadn¡¯t been able to help but believe the master-class when he¡¯d said that he was going to operate in his official capacity as a kingdom liaison. Prismatics were occasionally selected for royal positions, sometimes without the knowledge of their family, so for someone of his power and versatility, it made sense that he would be a quiet asset.


    In reflection, she had to wonder if he¡¯d been manipulating her the same way he had everyone he¡¯d questioned in the process of learning that the woman with the highest scores on the entrance exams was the least acknowledged member of the royal family. Jennifer had checked herself for magical influence after, but though she was a master-class engineer, the same didn¡¯t necessarily apply towards the esoteric school that the Violets were best at. She could have missed something.


    Whatever the hand had originally been, the cards were now on the table. Jennifer lost sight of them almost immediately as the arenas themselves morphed.


    Where there would normally be reserve fuel tanks to continue powering the arenas when the ambient flux proved to be insufficient for normal function as well as to clean and reset their configurations after a duel completed, instead there had been drones, automated capsules that spilled out and grew legs before executing a pre-coded spell process that, judging from the sheer size and raw flux density of the spell, was either high master or fully strategic-class.


    Somehow, her mind still hadn¡¯t quite caught up to reality. Even as Jennifer watched a blinding display of coordinated spells going off simultaneously to trap three¡ªtwo, now¡ªmembers of this unit, she could only think, he must have been a pretty bad liaison if he was working with Cascadia.


    The ground shook with an explosion, shaking Jennifer back to reality. Whether or not Drew had been a true liaison or not was immaterial. He was dead. Nobody would ever find out, especially not her if she died here and now.


    Uriel was shouting orders, using a basic voice amplification spell to be heard over the sudden din.


    ¡°Do not advance!¡± she was calling. ¡°I had eyes on somewhere in the range of a hundred tactical-class magicians. Can anyone confirm?¡±


    Jennifer¡¯s devices were going absolutely insane with notifications. Her tools had been used for general oversight in addition to monitoring vitals and a number of other logistical functions for the Aurian team, and they were pinging everything that had just occurred.


    She hurried through the logs. This machine was the result of years of engineering, a project that she¡¯d had the fortune to work on but hadn¡¯t been the creator of. It had originally been designed for war, then repurposed to use for the circuit.


    It had then been repurposed a second time.


    Pattern identified: Strategic-class projection-type spell, Changcheng.


    That would be the kilometer-long forcefield cutting the battlefield in two. How long had it taken them to set this up? How much preparation?


    Why?


    Pattern identified: Strategic-class stealth-type spell, Flux Veil.


    That spell would have been what had stopped them from detecting so many abnormal flux signatures from the Tower. Jennifer scrolled through the notifications at speed, ignoring literal hundreds of minor spell activations being noticed, then found the map of blinking red dots that counted flux signatures.


    It was harder to read than usual. The entire area¡¯s diagram was fritzing out, covered in a hue of red thanks to the sheer amount of flux coming off Gluttony.


    ¡°Two hundred thirty-one confirmed signatures!¡± Jennifer shouted back. ¡°At least thirty coming our side!¡±


    ¡°Defensive spells,¡± Uriel ordered. ¡°Fall back! Evac is on its way!¡±


    Everyone still standing was happy to acquiesce. They could see the sheer volume of spells forming, feel the pouring rain still dripping down on them, and see the writing on the wall.


    Everyone except, apparently, James Rokho.


    He couldn¡¯t make it over the wall that had formed to cut them off from the center area, but he certainly could run at the Cascadians spilling out of the tower on their side.


    Either he knows something I don¡¯t or he¡¯s just lost it, Jennifer thought. From the way he¡¯d been acting after the loss of his companion, it was likely the latter.


    ¡°Leave him,¡± Uriel said, directing her voice towards the general group before turning towards Jennifer. ¡°Jen, do you need a hand?¡±


    ¡°Fuck,¡± Jennifer muttered, messing with the settings on her device. This couldn¡¯t fall into enemy hands. This, at least, was Aurian technology that Cascadia couldn¡¯t rival. If it came down to it, she would trigger a failsafe and atomize it, but that was much less preferable to getting away with it. ¡°No, don¡¯t. You might break something.¡±


    There was valuable data in here even if it was resoundingly clear that the Aurian team was in way over their heads. Jennifer had to preserve the recordings¡ªeven just having a surviving measure of a Sinner¡¯s power and flux patterns could potentially push the institute ahead by years when it came to magical research.Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work!


    And she still needed the device setup to function from a distance.


    ¡°Jen,¡± Uriel warned. She barked out a spell command, forming a simple shield wide enough to cover a loose group of three of the circuit magicians from debris conjured by one spell and accelerated by another. ¡°Running out of time here.¡±


    ¡°One moment,¡± Jennifer said, fumbling with a small device¡ªan Incarnate design, actually. Once she got it set up, she got to work closing up the rest of the devices into a form more capable for travel. ¡°Start falling back. Evac should be arriving soon. I can handle myself.¡±


    ¡°Not leaving you,¡± Uriel said.


    Elsewhere, one of the circuit competitors¡ªLifeline, if Jennifer had the name right¡ªcried out as a spell hit him directly in the chest. The Aurian to his fight reacted quickly, using a low-class explosive spell to detonate the pattern in Lifeline¡¯s chest before it could finish triggering. Lifeline stumbled, a chunk of his heart suddenly missing, but he got back up, gaping wound sealing itself back together.


    ¡°Still behind you,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°I have data on evac. Forty seconds out. Go.¡±


    ¡°Hurry the fuck up!¡± Waylan shouted from ahead, changing tack from a fighting retreat. ¡°Wildcard and I¡¯ll buy some time!¡±


    Pattern identified: master-class fortification-type spell, Supernova.


    To Jennifer¡¯s eyes, Waylan glowed bright crimson. Far too bright.


    She couldn¡¯t waste time on sentimentality here. The recording device was down, and she¡¯d packed the equipment up. Whether or not it would survive fleeing was no longer up to her.


    Jennifer cast a look over towards where Waylan and James were engaging the Cascadians, then froze as she realized her own FCD modification was still working.


    She could see the Cascadian magicians¡¯ activation processes.


    ¡°Change of plans,¡± she shouted, augmenting her voice in such a way that it would reach exactly Uriel. ¡°I¡¯m going to run interference. Take the sensor suite. No questions.¡±


    To her credit, the Indigo knew how to operate under pressure. She picked up Jennifer¡¯s sensor suite as the engineer cast a Flash Step, cursing herself for her own stupidity.


    They won¡¯t even put this on my grave. It¡¯ll be an engineering accident or some dumb shit like that.


    Rain poured down on her as she drew closer to Waylan. James was already deep in the midst of the Cascadians, flashing with flux and raw energy, water evaporating in his presence.


    ¡°What¡¯re you doing here?¡± Waylan hissed, holding a hand forward to let off a blast of uncontrolled flux. He flashed forward, knocking back an enemy magician that had stumbled out of position before returning.


    In lieu of an answer, Jennifer projected her own spells, using the combination of her and Syl¡¯s FCD upgrades to identify where activation processes were forming. Rather than try to fully create a spell, she just filled points in space with directionless flux that would make casting a spell with those pre-formed activation processes much more difficult, if not entirely possible.


    She saw results immediately, water manipulation spells backfiring on their users, providing more windows for Waylan and James to fight.


    It was strange. Even though all three of them were higher-class than the magicians arrayed against them, there were still a lot of Cascadians, and it was raining. They should have been pretty handily outmatched.


    Mj. Uriel: Evac is here. Starting boarding. Lost three more on our way out. One Reserve. Two circuit.


    Jennifer realized belatedly that for all the spells they¡¯d been casting, these Cascadians were mostly focusing on keeping each other alive and drawing attention to themselves than they were killing the Reserve. Even after being in the thick of the melee, James was still alive and so were most of the Cascadians. That should have long since not been the case.


    She put two and two together quickly. Whatever was happening here, it was a distraction from what was transpiring on the other side of the wall. It was also just lethal enough that it was a genuine threat on their lives that could not be ignored.


    Their true goal involved Syl and the princess. That much was clear. What it was¡ªJennifer couldn¡¯t focus on that. Distraction or no, these Cascadians were still going to kill them if they didn¡¯t do anything about it.


    James was starting to slow down, the weight of dozens of lingering spells starting to drag him down.


    Mj. Uriel: Fall back now or we¡¯re leaving without you.


    Waylan got the same message, apparently, because he turned to Jennifer.


    ¡°No last stands for us,¡± he said. ¡°James!¡±


    Wildcard didn¡¯t hear them.


    ¡°Shit.¡±


    ¡°Leave him,¡± Jennifer said. ¡°It¡¯s two of us or none of us.¡±


    Wildcard was also, as the name suggested, a wildcard. If that had been Uriel in the midst, this would have been a different story. Jennifer could deal with losing Rokho. He was on the right side, but he wasn¡¯t an element they could control.


    ¡°We can still save him,¡± Waylan grunted, throwing the entirety of his master-class spell into diverting a flurry of attacks aimed at the less well defended Jennifer. ¡°We have time.¡±


    Another message came to them.


    Syl: Leave.


    Syl: For your own good.


    ¡°Go, Waylan,¡± Jennifer hissed.


    ¡°Fuck,¡± Waylan spat. ¡°Fuck.¡±


    He wrapped the engineer in a bear hug and moved, Jennifer¡¯s vision and inner ear going haywire as Waylan¡¯s spell granted him superhuman speed until they stabilized just short of a fast-deploy aircraft marked with prismatic colors.


    They were five short of their original eighteen.


    Jennifer stumbled inside the entrance ramp, dizzy beyond belief, and vomited on the floor.


    By the time she could see again, the ship was already taking off.


    #


    A recording device on the scale of the one left by Jennifer Indigo was not strong enough to penetrate through the strategic-class spell Changsheng, but it did not need to. Gluttony did not obstruct the Aurian group evacuating, nor did many of the Cascadians.


    They hadn¡¯t come to kill that group, after all. It was all too easy to simply murder magicians. That could be done at their convenience, not with a setup like this.


    The Cascadians had come for the princess. Their intelligence had been more than sufficient to identify who she was, and the value she could provide to their programs would mean the most painless possible takeover of Auria in coming years.


    Gluttony was faintly interested in her, but that was not why she had come to officiate. She remained in the same position she had been hovering in since the start. She was still watching.


    After the evacuation, the portion of the Cascadian operation intended to look like an indiscriminate attempt to slaughter their enemies finished, and they collapsed on the one surviving non-critical Aurian. James Rokho lasted for a fair amount of time, his rage propelling him through the magicians around him, but he wasn¡¯t the only master-class magician here. He also wasn¡¯t the only one benefiting from the circumstances.


    The spells that struck him didn¡¯t kill him immediately, but they would. His efforts bought him a few bodies of his own, but it was a hollow revenge.


    The Aurian evacuation ship took them from the site of the ambush, each of those on board aware that their loss would lead to nothing. Their country would not risk attempting to punish Cascadia for their transgression even if this should have been grounds for open war¡ªexactly because it was grounds for war. The higher-ups would do anything to avoid anything like that, even if it meant letting their own die.


    As they escaped, a few occasional potshots splatting against the aircraft¡¯s shields, a sensor detected the descent of the barrier spell that had blocked sight and magic between Auria and three of their magicians.


    When the veil dropped, there were still two Aurian magicians alive and active. Syl and Bianca were still mostly standing in the same location. They¡¯d made micro-movements, but there were too many opposing magicians to do much other than defend and dodge. It helped that their opponents had been focused on the rest of the circuit teams.


    It also helped that, unbeknownst to them, neither the assembled Cascadian forces nor Gluttony wanted them dead.


    ¡°They¡¯re gone,¡± Bianca said, flickering back and forth with flux, counter-casting spells in the same breath they were cast.


    Syl nodded, looking up at Gluttony as he sent a tactical-class spell to eliminate a magician that was trying to get close enough to commit to melee combat.


    He had finally figured out what she wanted.


    The silent archmage shook his head, then gestured towards Bianca.


    Do it, he signed.


    Gluttony¡¯s rictus smile grew wider, and she started laughing.


    ¡°I knew it,¡± she laughed, throwing her throat back. ¡°You¡¯ve been here the whole time, haven¡¯t you?¡±


    Rather than reply, Syl held a hand out, tossing his still-intact uniform off. On his back, clasps sinking into his flesh and shielded so perfectly that nobody had seen it, was something resembling a backpack, neon blue lines crisscrossing it like a nerve system.


    Bianca threw her flux into the system, using a total of thirty-seven spell processes to unlock and calibrate the device.


    It expanded, criss-crossing links sliding over Syl¡¯s back, his arms, his legs.


    A Cascadian must have realized what was happening, because a strategic-class spell slammed into their location a second later.


    ¡°No,¡± Gluttony said, absorbing the spell with a flick of her fingers before the silent archmage could do it himself. ¡°I¡¯ve waited far too long to see this.¡±


    The final piece of the full-body FCD snapped into place, covering Syl¡¯s face in its entirety. The steel at his arms extended and warped, a rifle-like structure emerging from the device.


    Paragon-class custom FCD.


    Horizon Breaker.

 Chapter 32 - FOR YOUR EYES ONLY

    Sylvester ¡°Syl¡± Auria


    Birth Date: March 17, 45 AFI.


    Alternate Aliases: Project Unum Magus. The Silent Archmage. [Removed].


    Death Date: March 14, 61 AFI.


    Early Life


    45 AFI


    March 17: Born to [removed] and [removed], a strategic-class and a D-class magician hereafter referred to as UM-1 and UM-2, respectively. UM-1 suffered severe complications from childbirth despite her strategic-class designation.


    March 19: Sylvester¡¯s flux pool manifests, severely injuring UM-2 during routine childcare.


    July 2: UM-2 is killed by a wild magic manifestation, a phenomenon often seen in premature flux attunements. Sylvester¡¯s care is moved to the recovering UM-1.


    July 19: UM-1 is called to the front in the territory currently known as Lingdao. She leaves Sylvester in an enhanced care facility in Las Vegas (currently Polarian territory).


    49 AFI


    May 24: UM-1 is killed by the 32nd</sup> emergence of Zero [See Chongqing Conflagaration]. Sylvester becomes a ward of the state.


    May 27: Sylvester¡¯s abnormally expansive flux pool is detected by caretakers at the enhanced care facility. Automated systems report this to Aurian high command.


    December 1: Sylvester is moved from an expansive care facility to an Aurian black site [See McKean Facility 008].


    Project Unum Magus


    Beginning in 49 AFI, Sylvester¡¯s abnormally large flux pool and increasing signs of showing an affinity set him up as the primary candidate for Project Unum Magus, a secret program run without the knowledge of the Aurian kingdom.


    This project aimed to use a new technology developed by a team of strategic-class engineers utilizing unreplicable resources from the highest explored level of a Tower at the time (31) to record memories from strategic and paragon-class mages both dead and alive and transplant them into a vessel. Project Unum Magus, hereafter referred to as Project UM, had been active for 9 years at the time. Previous attempts involved using cloned biomatter as well as infant orphans with few other memories. Imprinting succeeded to various degrees, but cloned beings were found to be incapable of awakening flux pools while orphans often lacked sufficient flux, expiring upon an overload of information and magic in their mind.


    Until Sylvester, the longest survival time of a subject of Project UM was 153 days.


    Preparation began immediately upon his arrival. Physical supplements, stasis pods, and mental magic were used to shape his development.


    In 52 AFI, Sylvester was one of 12 candidates to receive Project UM¡¯s treatment. All 12 were rendered comatose for a 7-day period, during which their memories were augmented and their flux pools temporarily suppressed. 9 died during the treatment. An additional 2 lost control of their flux pools and died within the following 90 days.


    At 13:07 on September 26, Sylvester¡¯s flux pool remanifested alongside full motor control and an intuitive understanding of magic that surpassed a baseline strategic-class¡¯.


    76 hours later, he displayed five separate high-concept affinities: absorption, annihilation, perception, termination, and sabotage. This coincided with unstable wild flux fluctations and uncontrolled manifestations of magic that destroyed over half of the black site. There were 82 casualties, including 26 master-class magicians and 7 strategic-class magicians. A more detailed record of events may be accessed at [Archmage Awakening Incident 7].


    Strategic-class spell jamming proved to be insufficient to prevent the continued manifestations. They ceased after 104 unbroken hours of magical manifestation, coinciding with Sylvester¡¯s body and flux pool failing. Several suites of surgical and magical operations were able to save his life at the cost of his vocal cords [See Vocal Cord Replacement FCD Project] and the loss of his affinities. It is still unknown how his affinities were removed.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.


    Sylvester was moved to a separate black site for training.


    Special Unit 317


    This special forces unit, also known as [removed], was founded for the explicit purpose of using unorthodox magicians that operated outside the boundaries of known Aurian magic theory as well as standard magical conventions in order to carry out secret operations, sometimes without the direct authorization or acknowledgment of Auria¡¯s royal family.


    Other notable magicians in this unit included [removed] (joined 49 AFI), [removed] (joined 51 AFI), [removed] (joined 51 AFI), and then-Crown Princess Bianca (joined 58 AFI).


    Sylvester joined SU-317 in 52 AFI and was trained in practical magic and basic use of firearms [See Flux-Augmented Firearms for Child Soldiers] by military magicians. He was first deployed in 53 AFI at the age of 6 in Taiwan [See Anti-AI Retrieval Mission 19] against multiple strategic-class targets. SU-317 suffered one non-lethal casualty. Sylvester was credited for 7 strategic-class kills.


    For a more comprehensive list of Sylvester¡¯s missions from 53 to 61 AFI, please see [SU-317 Deployments]. He was credited with a total of 224 full-length missions during that time as well as in excess of 200 Gate clears.


    During the course of SU-317¡¯s most active period, they developed an identity separate from those of Auria¡¯s values. While the organization remained loyal to the country, it has been noted in documentation from the time that they were steadily drifting towards a more independent operation. Due to the presence of multiple superweapons in the special unit, it was deemed more efficient to keep them loosely attached to the country than to attempt eliminating them.


    Incarnate


    During the course of regular operations, the engineering team that Sylvester joined after demonstrating a remarkable aptitude for the field expanded to the point of impracticality. Concealing it proved to be a more demanding task than expected. The decision was made to spin off this team into a functioning corporate body titled Incarnate, initially for the purpose of continuing to create and enhance SU-317 FCDs [See Horizon Breaker. See Light of the Abyss. See Swiss Army Warhead. See List of SU-317 FCDs]. However, due to rapid commercial success, the company expanded into other pursuits as well.


    Pairing


    In 58 AFI, shortly after a routine Gate clear near the Oceania, Sylvester demonstrated signs of flux poisoning. Examinations pointed towards his the extreme modifications made to his mind and body as the most likely inciting factors. As a temporary measure, SU-317 attempted to render his flux pool more inert by adding a neutralizing agent through a more stable magician. As most potential candidates either lacked a large enough flux pool due to their young age or had flux that was already too personalized, the pool of compatible partners was few.


    Ultimately, the most optimal partner was the sole remaining member of SU-003, Crown Princess Bianca. Though her flux pool was not as large as Sylvester¡¯s, it was sufficient to absorb his excess flux while injecting her own into his pool through an internally shielded FCD [See Project Symbiosis]. She was added into SU-317 and initially only took a non-combat rule. Due to the increased power from using Sylvester¡¯s flux, however, she was capable of combat roles and proved so against the wishes of the royal family.


    The Bianca-Sylvester pair is credited with a total of 109 full-length missions.


    World War III


    During World War III, several members of SU-317 were credited with unofficial paragon-class designations, including Sylvester. SU-317 was instrumental in preventing Lingdao, Oceania, and Auria from being wholesale eliminated.


    On March 14, 61 AFI, a portion of SU-317 deployed to Middle America to contain several gigaton-yield flux-nuclear devices. Sylvester and his paired partner were included amongst this group.


    During their containment efforts, one device detonated. Before escape, death, or other responses could be undertaken by SU-317, the unknown magician known as Sloth appeared for ~0.5 seconds and activated a paragon-class spell that reduced the passage of time in a 253-kilometer radius to a speed too slow to be properly messaged, containing the device.


    All who were caught in the effect are considered to be lost. A total of roughly 125,000 casualties resulted from the [Middle America Chronostasis Incident], including Sylvester and Bianca.


    He was 15 at the time.


    Postscript


    I would say that this part is unnecessary given who you¡¯ve worked with, but it has been quite some time since SU-317 has deployed together. This is, as far as I am aware, the least redacted version of this file that exists. We are going to preserve that.


    Syl is not dead, and neither is Bianca. The royals are aware of the latter fact, but they never knew Syl as anything other than the Silent Archmage or¡ªyou know the other one. As we have seen from recent developments, keeping our cards close to our chest can only be in our favor. We will not disclose this information.


    It has been just over ten years to the day that they were stricken by Sloth¡¯s spell. They manifested multiple paragon-class spells to remove themselves from it. The only reason they¡¯re still alive is that their trackers still function¡ªthey were hours from dying from exposure when we found them.


    They were awake and aware while they were in that place. Their perception was accelerated enough to match our time. They have been sitting there doing nothing but evolving and building flux for ten years.


    SU-317 is being reactivated. We have official recognition from the kingdom on the technicality that they forgot to dissolve us when most of us died in the war.


    The winds are blowing flame towards us once more. Syl and Bianca are a decade out of time, but they may be exactly what we need now more than ever.


    We deploy to San Francisco tomorrow April the 17<sup>th</sup>, 71 AFI.


    That is all.