The bitter cold air nipped at my skin, the wind blew against my chest in a calming way.
The sun had long reached its peak height of the day, Harsh rays of orange bled across the campus.
With one last glance toward the sun I started heading to my next class from the roof.
I walked slowly, my feet heavy as my thoughts. My mind was not my own. The threads. The haunting girl. Akari. The thoughts spun in my skull fast enough to make me nauseous.
By the time I reached the alchemy wing, The halls had already begun emptying themselves of students. Alchemy Theory wasn't known for leniency, and I was already two minutes past the hour.
Thankfully I happened to be friends with the teacher.
I stepped into the lab quietly, making it my job to not disturb class more than I already had.
Glassware clicked students accidentally hitting beakers off of each other. Burners hissed like hungry beasts. The smell of sulfur and heat filled the air. Twenty students stood at their stations, performing delicate transmutations on elemental shards, trying their best to not destroy the shards.. The room was dim, with cozy fragments of light thanks to the stained glass. alchemical lamps hung off the walls and the soft bioluminescent moss that lined each workstation gave off enough light to be productive.
Valerie stood at the front, her hair tied back in a tight braid, dark eyes glancing up from a marked textbook seemingly ensuring the students are following the textbook. She paused as she noticed me enter despite my attempts to be inconspicuous. Her brow creased as she looked to see me walking into the classroom late.
"You're late."
I nodded, not even attempting to excuse myself. "I got caught up in something."
She didn't press. Instead, she gestured toward the empty chair beside her own.
"Work with me today."
"Okay"
Whispers flickered at the edges of the room.
I didn't bother listening to them.
Taking the seat next to her I listened as she caught me up on the instructions she had given the class.
====================================================
The lesson was precise, requiring levels of concentration I am not sure I had in me. Today, Class today was a combination between salt-grade crystal cores and iron-infused mana paste. It was quite the difficult procedure. Something even more advanced second-year students could at most pretend to understand.
Valerie moved with ease. She ground ingredients with surgical care, balancing ratios and moving her quill drawing up ink-runed calculations without pause. I followed her lead or at least tried to, hands steady but distant. My focus lagged. The thread's sensation still caused phantom pain as if it was still clung to my finger, even though it had long vanished.
At one point, I moved my hand to grab my quill and knocked a flask over. She caught it in a smooth manner without looking.
"You're distracted," she muttered, In a caring way.
"You noticed that, huh?"
"You're never clumsy."
"I-"
I struggled to find the words to describe how I was feeling so I just stayed silent. Words felt unnecessary.
She didn't pry further, just her being here with me was enough. I appreciated Valerie. She didn't dig deeper when I only showed my surface. She only moved closer.
====================================================
Midway through the lesson, Valarie gave out the next step in the process which was adjoining the ingredients.
The room brightened slightly as all students prepared for the delicate moment of fusing volatile elements. Burners illuminated the room as students began to move their beakers above the flame.
One wrong ratio, and a fire would erupt.
Valerie passed me a pair of gloves. "You do the drop," she said.
I stared at the violet liquid. It splashed around the glass like the sea's tide.
Its violet beauty shimmered in a way that reminded me of something.
Her eyes were on me. Simply watching, not expectant. Just a present.
I dropped the last ingredient from its vial into the beaker with the rest of the liquid.
The beaker flared as the droplet dissolved into the violet, purple mist rose almost instantly in response. My breath hitched but thankfully It stabilized as we put heat under it.
"Good," she said softly.
We finished the assignment in silence.
==========================================================
After class, I lingered. The other students filed out quickly seemingly in a hurry to make it to their next class. Some glanced at us. A few whispered making sneaking jabs at the relationship between us. But Valerie said nothing until the door closed.
Then she asked in a calm voice, "What happened?"
It wasn't accusatory. Just... honest and curious.
I sat down on one of the spare stools. My hands struggle to find a position that is comfortable.
"I saw something," I murmured. "Someone."
===========================================================
I made it back to my room just as the lamps along the corridors were dimming.
For the first time since the run in with her, I felt something like stability settle over me.
It was so fragile, this calm..
I was walking over thin ice with an abyss below me every step felt like a gamble.
The system didn't ping again.
The threads didn't twitch.
But I knew It was only a matter of time.
Waiting for it was never over.
And I know It wasn't done with me yet.
The pressure on my ring finger lingered. Residing beneath my skin, but the message lingered far longer in my soul.
"You're awake now."
A riddle in and of itself, It was not a question. It was a fact to her. A chilling certainty that made my skin crawl.
==========================================================
[System Message: New Stimulus Detected.]
[Aberrant Thread Fragment Residue Traced. Path Interference Logged.]
[Initiate: System Alignment Period?]
[Y/N]
=============================================================
"No," I muttered under my breath.
If this girl was able to alter my world with no hesitance, I would never tie myself to her.
The system went quiet again after my decline of alignment.
The feeling of disappointment washed over me swiftly.. As if the system was voicing its disappointment at my decision. As if I had declined an invitation it was considered critical.
I leaned forward, elbows resting on my knees.
I couldn't understand what her goal was.
Was that... a threat? A warning? A twisted confession?
I didn't get the chance to parse it further as the daylight had already bled dry.
By the time I made it back to the dorm, the world had already turned pale with moonlight.
I didn't have any time to get dinner.
Not that I was hungry anyways. I Couldn't eat. The pit in my stomach made it hard to do anything but panic..
I sat on the floor of my room, back pressed flush against the wall, staring at the system interface I had summoned in front of me. The threads now coiled around me even when I didn't intentionally want to see them. Their colors grew deeper shades of black. With time more threads had begun to show themselves as if they had finally grown out their shyness.
I felt as if none of them led to safety.
I was worried that that girl would be at the end of one or all of them.
I laid my head back.
Whatever was coming, it wouldn't wait for me to be ready.
I had no choice but to face it, no matter how many lives it would take.
===========================================================
Someone was watching him.
The feeling clung to Albert like goosebumps on his skin, quiet but unsettling.
Uncomfortably so.
He walked the tiled corridor in silence, shoulders relaxed but his muscles tense with anxiety. His uniform fit better now, not because it changed, but because he had. A healthy strength had returned to his body. His steps were firm, weight settled naturally in his hips and ankles.
No need for any assistance while walking.
It had taken a while but over time he had grown to adapt to walking again.
While healing from crippling injuries wasn't unheard of, it certainly was rare even more so for someone who didn't belong to a noble family.
Let alone someone who was only able to attend Saint's academy off of scholarship alone.
Someone noticed.
Above him, tucked in the shadowed arch of the third tower's overlook, stood a cloaked figure cloaked in gray. A person covered in clothes obscuring them. Their faces were veiled in a thin glamor, almost as if they were a blur rather than physically present. Eyes followed Albert not with malice, but curiosity.
Beneath their breath, a single word was muddled.
"Impossible."
A finger tapped the edge of a monocle filled with glyphs.. A faint chime echoed in the air before being swept away.
The device responded.
=====================================================
[Observation Target: Albert Renn.]
[Classification: Unmarked / Anomaly.]
[Ancestry: Commonline. No divine register.]
[Physical Status: Full recovery from non-regenerative injury.]
[System Activity: Concealed. High interference.]
========================================================
"High interference?" they whispered.
A finger ran in front of their face as they lowered the monocle. A look of amusement and intrigue filled their face as a pleasant surprise displayed itself in front of them.
So this was the ripple.
We were discussing the possibility of you.
Just a theory, a folk-tale existence described in our group as a thought exercise.
Yet here he was. Walking. Breathing. A walking calamity. A tide barely restrained by skin.
The cloaked figure vanished into the high fog without a sound.