Two days out from the demonstration, and everything had that quiet-before-the-storm energy. The school halls whispered like they had lungs. People walked faster. Teachers pretended to be casual. Nobody was casual.
Especially not Haku.
'Come on, man, think you can do this? These novel troupe-like people rely on magic and other means, but haven't reached the moon yet. You should be able to fool them if you try!'
Alex found him in the library at 5 a.m. Not reading. Not meditating. Not even pretending to be arcane.
No, he was doing math.
Real math.
notes full of variables, spectral decay models, weird notations that looked suspiciously like chemical formulas, and a hand-drawn graph labeled "mana dissipation over degenerate field harmonics (bogus)." Underlined.
"You know, I don't know what spell you are trying to use, but do you need help again?" Alex asked, stepping over a pile of scribbled papers and half a bag of rice crackers.
"I prefer solutions that don't hallucinate their own rules," Haku muttered, pencil between his teeth. "I will show them my magic this time."
Alex opened his mouth. Closed it again.
"Okay."
Yue walked in the next morning to check up on Haku, took one look at the notes, and visibly short-circuited.
"This is... not how normal people prepare for a demonstration."
"Correct," Haku said, circling something with a gleam in his eye that definitely wasn't safe. "We're doing a synthetic construct that mimics spell decay under chaotic interference. But we're not using actual chaotic interference."
"What are we using?" Yue asked, suspicious.
Haku grinned. "Sound."
Pause.
"You're going to blast it with noise?" Alex asked.
"Infrasound, actually," Haku corrected. "Specific frequency. Causes sympathetic resonance, and since mana qi and even aura are a waveform, it should work. Mana signatures should react like they're being destabilized. Totally harmless. Mostly. But it looks like a magical overcharge. Everyone will think I'm holding it together with effort and guts. Very heroic."
"That's evil," Yue said, impressed.
"I'm efficient."
The day before the demonstration, Haku handed Alex a pair of gloves lined with silver wiring and something that looked suspiciously like copper tape. "Don't worry about it," he said when Alex asked. "Just don't take them off or touch any birds."
"Why birds?" Yue asked.
"Don't worry about it," Haku repeated, walking away.
Alex didn't ask again.
Yue, naturally, asked three more times.
That night, Haku didn't drink alcohol and made tea, sat by the window, and quietly rewrote reality using only caffeine and spite. He didn't touch magic once. No glyphs. No chants. Just equations, handmade tools, and a terrifying grasp of science that even surprised himself, not knowing how he remembered all this.
Demonstration day.
Crowds packed the balconies. Professors lined the edge of the arena like hawks at a feast. Rumors buzzed like insects.
But at the top, seated in a throne-like chair carved from blackwood and smugness, sat Bernard Van Keunen, Vice Headmaster, beard carved with precision, eyes sharp enough to shave steel. He watched like he was already bored and ready to be disappointed. Next to him, some people from the capital have come to see Haku.
Haku stepped onto the stage in his original Indigo cloak, zero magic flaring from him. No aura. No presence. Just silence.
In the audience, Lyra for the first time saw the embroidery on Hakus back, or for the second time if she was to include that strange book.
'What? How can that be ?'
Alex followed in the gloves.
Yue followed him, ice-primed and smiling too sweetly.
"Begin," Bernard said, voice like a gavel.
The Golem construct from last time was activated.
A golem, sleek and angular, rose from the center, a fake core implanted inside, pulsing with stored mana. Alex fed mana into it slowly, making the process look delicate. Balanced. Noble.
Haku raised a hand, acting like he was syncing his spell.
Then Haku triggered the sublayer.
The frequency dropped low. Below hearing. The construct shivered.
The crowd leaned in.
"It's destabilizing," a professor whispered.
"Watch the containment," another muttered.
Haku braced, sweat beading on his forehead, not because it was hard, but he had to act like it was.
Yue sent a spiral of frost across the frame, locking the limbs with just enough drama to get gasps.
The golem convulsed.
Flickers of false feedback. Crackling sparks. A perfect imitation of a magical overload, except none of it was real.
Haku hadn't used a single spell.
He just made the thing look like it was falling apart using sound, heat variance, and well-timed particle scattering from powdered crystal filaments he'd hidden in the arena overnight.
Bernard narrowed his eyes.
The golem lurched one last time and froze mid-motion, perfectly suspended, held by Yue's ice and Hakus fake "core stabilization."
Silence.
Then thunderous applause.
Students cheered. Professors scribbled notes. Even Bernard gave the smallest of nods.
But Haku didn't smile.
He never looked at the crowd. He looked at Bernard.
And Bernard was already looking back.
Later, in the quiet of the garden, Yue stared at the gloves.
"That wasn't magic," she said.
Alex blinked. "What?"
"The gloves. The resonance. That wasn't spellwork. That was... something else."
Alex frowned. "You sure?"
"I'm never sure," Yue said. "But Haku's lying, as usual."
Alex didn't say anything.
In the window above, Haku sat with a glass of wine, watching stars that didn't belong to him, in a world that never asked him to come.
He wasn't from here.
But now, this world was paying attention.
And so was Bernard Van Keunen.
'Hows that you overpowerd fucks now I must seem like a mage with limits to some degree right so get of my back until im done with this school willya.'
After Hakus' last sip of his wine as he was getting ready for bed, he thought to himself.
'Now Ricardo should be happy, the Vice headmaster should be content, but haven't I met the Principal yet? It's almost like he doesn't care about me, but that should not be possible since it's he who allowed me to come here. Maybe I'm overthinking things.'