Vale moved with practiced ease as he approached the board behind him. Without a word, he picked up a piece of chalk and wrote a single word in bold, capital letters. 'DEATH.'
A subtle wave of tension and curiosity rippled through the classroom at the word on the board as the students straightened in their seats, exchanging glances.
Vale turned, a faint, knowing smile tugging at the corners of his lips.
"Confused?" he asked with a light chuckle, attempting to soften the grim atmosphere and the grim topic he was going to discuss. But no one laughed.
"What happens to your beast when you die?" he continued in a calm voice. "And what happens to you when your beast dies?"
Murmurs broke out across the room. The whispers swelled until Vale raised his hand- a simple gesture that instantly silenced the room.
His eyes scanned the class before settling on a young man seated in the middle row. He pointed towards him to answer the question.
The young man stood up and answered. "If either one of the pair, either the beast or the human dies, the other will also die."
Vale nodded.
"Correct," he said.
"I know most of you already knew this. It is not exactly some secret. But today, we will try and look deeper. why this happens? Is it a fixed rule? Or are there exceptions to it?"
He leaned back slightly, arms crossed, his gaze sweeping over the class.
"Why do you think this happens?" Vale's voice rang out, clear and deliberate, cutting through the heavy silence of the classroom.
He let the question hang, the weight of it settling in the minds of the students.
"The answer is simple," he finally said.
He turned back to the board and, in neat strokes beneath the word DEATH, wrote another word. 'MINDSCAPE.'
"The connection we share with our companions—our beasts—is the mindscape or beastscape as we call it," he explained.
Athar, seated quietly near the back, felt a spark of understanding ignite in his mind. He understood what Vale was trying to imply and what direction his teacher was going in.
Vale's voice continued, steady and measured. "We have discussed this before. Humans by themselves, have no innate space to store mana. We are not born with any supernatural space nor do we have an ability to form mana cores like the beasts of the wild."
"That is why we depend on our companions. It is through the bond with our beast that the mindscape—this unique, supernatural space is unlocked for us."
He paused, letting the words sink in before continuing,
"And in return, our companion, the beast, loses its own ability to form a mana core. They too rely on this mindscape to store the mana. The bond is mutual, at least after it is formed."
A heavy stillness settled over the class, as if the very air had thickened. Every student too had started to understand what Vale was implying.
"Now what happens when one of them die?" Vale stated. "As you might have understood in this class and in our previous classes that mindscape is the foundation of our life… of our bond."
"And when either of the two dies, they say, that this shared mindscape, this foundation, gets destroyed. And with the destruction of the mindscape comes the death of the remaining one."
"So," Vale continued. "If your beast dies and even if you remain free from any scratch, you will die."
Vale swept his eyes across the entire class. His expression was calm, but there was a sharpness in his gaze.
"Never forget this. Your life, and the life of your companion, are bound together by this invisible thread. Cherish it… protect the life of each other at any cost."
"Am I clear?" He asked to which students replied loudly in unison.
"Now is it always the case or there are some exceptions to it?" Vale continued.
"In the human history, we have a single record of one human surviving after his beast had died," he announced shocking the students in the class. They had believed this rule to be infallible but now they had someone who had gone against this said rule. Athar, too was intrigued by this.
"There was this human whose beast died in a battle," Vale started the narration. "Say… it was pure coincidence or his good fortune that at this very last moment, when his life was slipping away, he discovered a beast egg. Not having a lot of options, he poured his mana in that egg and miracle happened."
"The destroyed mindscape was replaced by a new mindscape evolved out of this new bond and the man survived," Vale said shocking the class even more.
"Is the story true?" Vale questioned. "No one knows… at least I do not know."
"Have we experimented with the same methods?" He asked again. "Yes, we have."
"Did we get any successful results?" He asked. "No. Not that I am aware of."
"The story might be a rumour or it might be that something special might have happened at that moment and we are not able to replicate that special thing," Vale continued. "But a lot of people, academics, believe that story was true and they have been conducting experiments on this since a long time."
Vale allowed his words to be settled and to be processed by the students.
"That is all for today," he said. "See you tomorrow."
It had not been a complex topic that he had dealt with but the environment because of the incident had been grim and thus he decided to end the class early.
"Are we sparring today?" Ryler asked as he exited the class along with Athar.
Athar nodded. "Yes."
"What do you say about a full fledged spar this holiday?" Ryler asked. "Should I register ourselves and get a slot booked for an instructor?"
Athar paused for few moments as he contemplated the answer after which he shook his head.
"No," he replied. "I would be going out this holiday. I have some unfinished business."
"Oh!" This word left Ryler's mouth as both of them continued walking towards the dining hall.
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