The screen blinked insistently at the edge of Kael's vision, pulsing like a heartbeat.
[Subtask Status: 1/3.]
[Daily Task Reminder: 1hr 20min remaining.]
[Penalty for Failure: Induced nausea for 6 hours.]
Kael stared at the rapidly ticking timer, watching the minutes drain away with the slow, inevitable dread of someone watching sand slip through an hourglass.
He definitely didn't want to find out what "induced nausea" meant.
The phrase alone conjured images of him doubled over a toilet for the next six hours, which sounded like the exact opposite of sleep.
So, reluctantly—very reluctantly—he decided to actually try and complete the stupid task.
He turned toward Theo, who was sitting at the desk, calmly flipping through a leather-bound book.
The pages turned with soft, precise whispers, each movement deliberate and controlled.
"There isn't a curfew, right?" Kael asked.
Theo didn't look up. "Why do you ask?"
"I plan on doing some sightseeing."
Theo's hand paused mid-turn. He glanced at the time-rune embedded in his bracer, the glowing script pulsing faintly against his skin.
"It's nearly midnight."
"Yeah." Kael shrugged, leaning back against the wall with studied casualness. "I like the moon."
Theo stared at him for a long, silent second, his expression unreadable behind his glasses.
The lenses caught the dim light, reflecting it back in flat, emotionless circles.
"Right." His tone was perfectly neutral. "Well, you can go if you want. Curfew won't be enforced until after the exams."
"Nice." Kael pushed himself off the bed, already making for the door.
"Wait."
Kael stopped mid-step, turning around slowly with his best 'What now?' expression.
Theo still hadn't looked up from his book. He gestured with a quick nod toward the floor.
"Your uniform."
Kael followed his gaze.
The black uniform lay in a crumpled heap where he'd dropped it earlier, forgotten and slightly wrinkled.
He sighed. "Right…"
He grabbed it and changed quickly, pulling the thick fabric over his head. The moment it settled against his skin, he felt it shift—subtle, almost alive—adjusting itself to fit his frame perfectly. The sleeves tightened just enough. The collar sat flush against his neck. The length corrected itself without input.
"Huh." Kael tugged at the cuffs experimentally. "Cool."
He supposed he'd better start mentally preparing himself for more magic nonsense.
Uniform on, system message still glowing faintly beside his head like an annoying mosquito, Kael stepped into the hallway.
◆ ◆ ◆
The dormitory was… big.
They'd mentioned during the brief orientation that the academy separated students only by gender.
Each dormitory was a massive, fortress-like tower made of stone and mana-imbued ironwood, stacked over thirty floors high.
Kael's room was on the fourth floor.
He moved down the stairs slowly, his footsteps echoing in the empty stairwell.
The sound bounced off the stone walls, hollow and lonely, swallowed by the silence pressing in from all sides.
Fourth floor… nobody.
The hallway stretched out in both directions, lit by flickering lighting runes that cast uneven shadows across closed doors. Not a sound. Not a whisper. Just the faint hum of magic threaded through the walls.
Third floor… still empty.
He descended another flight, the air growing cooler as he went. The stonework here was older, more worn, the edges of the steps smoothed by decades of footsteps.
"Don't tell me everyone's actually asleep," he muttered.
Second floor… silence.
His voice didn't even echo anymore. The quiet swallowed it whole, leaving nothing behind.
First floor… dead quiet.
He pushed open the heavy main door and stepped outside.
The night air hit him immediately—cool, crisp, carrying with it the faint scent of night-blooming flowers and damp stone. Above him, a deep ocean of stars stretched across the sky, vast and endless, their light cold and distant. The moon hung low and full, washing the entire courtyard in pale, silvery blue.
The wind whispered through the trees, rustling leaves in soft, rhythmic waves.
It was… peaceful.
Eerily so.
Kael tilted his head back, staring up at the sky.
'Well… at least the moon looks nice.'
The screen blinked.
[Subtask Status: 1/3.]
[Timer: 1hr remaining.]
Kael exhaled slowly, his breath misting faintly in the cool air.
"This is going to be the longest hour of my life."
◆ ◆ ◆
'Where in the world is everybody?'
Kael had been walking for nearly twenty minutes and still hadn't seen a single soul.
Not one.
He'd left the dormitory area, wandered through two courtyards—one with a fountain that glowed faintly with enchanted water, the other filled with stone benches arranged in perfect circles—and passed under an archway of floating runes that hummed softly as he walked beneath them.
Now he stood at what looked like the edge of the main campus, staring out at a sprawling expanse of pathways, gardens, and distant buildings silhouetted against the starlit sky.
But still… nothing.
No students. No guards. No wandering faculty.
Just him, the wind, and the oppressive weight of silence.
He knew the academy was massive.
He'd seen maybe one percent of it.
But with the sheer number of students gathered earlier that day—thousands of them, packed shoulder-to-shoulder in the plaza—there should have been someone out here.
Groups sneaking out. Couples hiding in corners. Nervous first-years too anxious to sleep.
Instead, it felt like the place had been abandoned.
Kael sighed, feeling the sting of cosmic injustice.
'Of course. The one time I actually need people, they all decide to follow the rules.'
And then, as if answering his silent complaint, he saw movement.
In the distance, just beyond a row of neatly trimmed hedges, a flicker of motion caught his eye.
'Finally.'
He hurried toward it, cutting through a curved walkway lined with glowing lanterns that floated at shoulder height. The path opened into a wide, open space—a statue garden.
And at the center of that garden, a peculiar scene was unfolding.
◆ ◆ ◆
A girl stood balanced on top of a stone statue—a stern-looking old man with a long beard and robes—holding something metallic in her hand.
Spray paint.
She was tagging the statue.
In a fantasy world.
With magic spray paint.
Kael stopped walking.
His eyes flicked around the garden, taking in the damage.
There were at least a dozen statues scattered throughout the space, each one depicting what were probably famous figures in the academy's history—great mages, legendary knights, war heroes immortalized in stone.
And every single one had been vandalized.
Some had mustaches drawn on them in bright neon colors.
One had flowers carefully painted in its ears.
Another was wearing drawn-on sunglasses and a monocle, somehow managing to look both ridiculous and oddly fashionable.
A particularly stern-looking warrior had been given cat ears.
Another had the words "SMILE MORE" scrawled across its chest in glowing pink letters.
Kael blinked.
He stood there for a moment, genuinely unsure how to react.
On one hand, it was objectively hilarious.
On the other hand, this felt like the kind of thing that got you expelled.
Very slowly, he turned around and tried to tiptoe away.
"Hold it right there, mister."
He froze.
Sigh.
'Here comes trouble.'
Kael turned slowly—painfully slowly—to find a green-haired girl standing just inches away from his face.
He hadn't even heard her move.
She had short, razor-cut hair that curved sharply around her cheekbones, the edges so precise they looked like they'd been cut with a blade.
A streak of silver was dyed through the front, catching the moonlight like a knife's edge.
Her eyes were a sharp, piercing yellow—not amber, not gold, but yellow, like a predator's—and they were currently locked onto his with the intensity of someone deciding whether you were prey or just annoying.
She had a look that screamed "don't test me."
Everything about her radiated rebellion.
Her blue mage uniform was half-zipped, the collar loose and careless.
Rune-inscribed headphones hung around her neck, faintly glowing with stored mana.
Her hands were stained with flecks of paint.
She was pretty.
Terrifyingly so.
The kind of pretty that came with a warning label.
"Uhm… hi?" Kael said awkwardly.
She didn't move.
Her yellow eyes bored into him, unblinking, weighing him with the precision of someone who'd already decided he was guilty of something.
"Who are you?" she asked flatly.
"Uhm... Kael."
"Kael…?" Her eyes drifted down to his chest, where his badge was pinned.
The word CADET gleamed faintly in the moonlight.
She finally stepped back, a predatory curiosity flickering across her face.
"A Cadet, huh?" Her tone sharpened. "And what are you doing out this late, Cadet?"
Kael squinted at her. "Aren't you also outside?"
Her expression twisted—a flash of annoyance cutting through her earlier amusement.
"Are you stupid or something? Can't you tell who your senior is when you see one?"
'Senior?'
Kael's eyes flicked back to her badge.
It wasn't labeled CADET.
It had a different mark, etched in silver thread: ADEPT.
'So she's a second-year?'
'Great.'
Deciding it was time to get the hell out of there before he ended up as a test dummy for an angry mage with spray paint and poor impulse control, he raised both hands slightly in a placating gesture.
"Look, I won't tell anyone what I saw. I promise."
Her eyes narrowed to dangerous slits.
"What you saw?" Her voice dropped an octave, cold and sharp. "What exactly did you see, Cadet?"
'The fuck? Is this one of those legendary tsunderes? Why is she so aggressive?'
Kael cleared his throat. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing."
The girl stared at him for a moment longer, her yellow eyes glowing faintly in the moonlight.
Then she turned with a sharp toss of her green hair, the silver streak flashing like a blade.
"I'm going to have my eyes on you, Kael." She said it like a threat, her voice low and cutting, each word deliberate.
And then she walked away, disappearing into the shadows of the hedges with the grace of someone who'd done this a thousand times before.
Kael stood there, frozen, as the silence returned.
He breathed a sigh of relief.
"Finally…"
And then his brain caught up.
'Wait.'
The timer flashed in his vision.
[Subtask Status: 1/3.]
[Timer: 32 minutes remaining.]
'Shit.'
"Wait!" he called out, his voice echoing across the empty garden.
She stopped.
Turned around slowly.
She looked even more irritated than before, her arms crossed, one eyebrow raised in dangerous curiosity.
"What?"
Kael took a deep breath.
And then he forced out the best, most awkward, obviously fake smile he could manage.
It felt stiff. Unnatural. Like his face was made of wood and someone had tried to carve an expression into it with a dull knife.
His lips pulled back too far. His eyes didn't crinkle. His cheeks hurt.
It was, objectively, the worst smile in recorded history.
The girl's expression shifted.
From irritation.
To surprise.
To confusion.
And then, finally, back to annoyed—mixed with a healthy dose of disgust.
"…Weirdo," she muttered, her voice dripping with disdain.
Then she turned and vanished into the night, her footsteps silent against the stone.
[Subtask Status: 2/3.]
[Timer: 30 minutes remaining.]
Kael stood alone in the statue garden, bathed in moonlight, his forced grin still plastered across his face.
He let it drop.
"…Well, that was a pleasant experience."
The screen blinked cheerfully.
Kael glared at it.
"Shut up."