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It was hard to describe the sound. Part jet of pressurized air, part vibrating membrane, with a faint crackling of electricity underneath it all.
Luo Wei held her breath and listened. The sound was getting closer.
She scanned the area and finally tilted her head up. A strangely shaped little bird was passing directly overhead, making for the bulletin board wall.
She watched it, astonished. Its body was encased in a metal shell, coated with some kind of matte black paint that swallowed the darkness almost perfectly.
What astonished her wasn't that a metal bird could fly. It was what was powering it.
No magic element fluctuations. None at all. Whoever built this thing hadn't injected a drop of magical energy into it. The bird flew entirely on the tiny spinning rotors beneath its wings and the faint flickers of electricity visible through gaps in its belly.
Who in a magic academy had thought to light the torch of science?
Curious, Luo Wei pressed flat into the grass and watched the bird hover in front of the bulletin board wall. How was it going to find the right self-criticism essay? Did it have some kind of intelligence built in? Was someone controlling it remotely?
The questions were still stacking up in her head when a blaze of orange light filled her eyes.
The metal bird opened its pointed beak. A thin tube extended from inside. Scorching flames poured out and hit the wall.
Luo Wei: !
Out of every scenario she'd run through, she hadn't predicted this. Whoever sent that bird wanted to burn the whole bulletin board down.
The parchment sheets went up instantly , no fire treatment, no resistance. One blink and the entire wall was ablaze.
Too late to do anything about it now. Luo Wei stayed calm and stayed hidden, watching the metal bird finish its work and wheel away. Then she quietly stood and followed it.
The bird was heading toward the girls' dormitory. High on the castle rooftop, a slender figure stood watching its approach.
She didn't need to see the face.
Intermediate-level alchemy apprentice. Hessel Calansis. The senior student who'd burned down a classroom in an alchemy accident.
She was right there. Luo Wei still couldn't go after her , an ordinary first-year magic apprentice couldn't fly. By the time she climbed all those stairs, Hessel would be back in her room looking innocent.
She could afford to miss one credit. She couldn't afford to have credits docked for dereliction of duty.
Luo Wei eyeballed the bird's altitude and distance, swung her landing net a few times to get the feel of it, took three running steps, jumped, and hurled the net in a wide arc.
The net came down over the metal bird with a CLANG and drove it into the dirt.
She looked up at the castle rooftop. The slender figure was already gone.
She walked over and picked up the bird. Catching it was as good as catching the person. One more credit, secured.
She wasn't in any rush to hand in the evidence. She slung the net over her shoulder, went back to the bulletin board wall, and swept up the ash and charred scraps. Once it was clean, she reached under her skirt, pulled out the stack of self-criticism essays she'd copied, and nailed them back up.
First-year students had only been here half a year. They didn't fully grasp yet what it meant to have your self-criticism posted on this wall, so most of them wouldn't risk coming out to steal theirs.
The intermediate and advanced students were a different story. They were cagier. Luo Wei was fairly sure they'd come out for a last-minute gamble.
Sure enough, around five in the morning, just before the sky began to lighten, several shadowy figures crept toward the bulletin board.
There they are. Her credit points.
She gripped the landing net, perched high in the sycamore tree, and waited. When they had nearly all clustered together, she let out a sharp shout and dropped from the branches , landing right in the middle of them.
"Senior students," she said pleasantly, "since you're already here, why not come with me?"
"Don't run. The academy supervisor is watching from upstairs. Fleeing counts as an additional offense. That's a full deduction."
The five seniors stared at her.
A full deduction. That was brutal.
A little past six, Luo Wei stepped out of the student council office into the gray pre-dawn light.
One full night. Eight credit points. Not as many as she'd hoped, but not bad.
The one questionable move was threatening Vina into spreading the word. In hindsight, that was unnecessary , and it had cost her the gentle, magnanimous image she'd been quietly building. A wasted move.
Then again, her image in front of Vina had never been good to begin with. Losing it there didn't matter much.
The real prize from last night wasn't the credit points. It was the owner of that metal bird.
Hessel Calansis had built a flying machine with no magic whatsoever, working with whatever scraps of basic physics knowledge this world had to offer. If she ever got her hands on more advanced theory, she might actually build an airplane.
People without magical talent couldn't use magic-based tools or artifacts. Teleportation arrays were accessible to almost no one. If ordinary people were ever going to move freely across this world — if Luo Wei was ever going to transport settlers to the Misty Plain , she couldn't count on magic to do it. She needed ships. She needed aircraft.
She needed Hessel Calansis.
She needed to figure out how to get her.
Dawn broke across the southern sky. The morning bell rang out.
The vast academy stirred awake. Bird calls layered over urgent, scrambling footsteps, all of it rising together outside the church building.
Second day of the new semester. Morning classes as usual, teacher-student assembly in the afternoon.
Luo Wei had Magic Rune class first. After a month away, Professor Mike's brown hair had gone a shade or two whiter.
Mages who stayed stuck at the same level for too long aged faster. That was just how it worked.
"Good morning, everyone!"
"Good morning, Professor Mike!"
He walked in with a thick Magic Rune textbook tucked under his arm, set it open on the teaching desk, and looked up.
"Alright. Let's begin."
"Last semester we covered basic Magic Rune calculation and engraving. This semester, we move into enchantment."
"Enchantment cannot rely on external tools. You'll be using your own magical power to engrave the runes directly, which demands a very high level of precision in how you control that power."
"So the first step is learning to control it precisely."
"Each of you, come collect a wooden stick. Today's goal is simple: condense your magic, release it, and cut the stick clean through."
"Once that feels natural, we'll move on to engraving characters on wooden boards, and then to enchanting harder and softer materials..."
By the time class ended, Luo Wei could barely hold her eyes open. The all-nighter had fully caught up with her. She'd nearly fallen asleep twice and had only narrowly avoided Professor Mike noticing.
"Luo Wei, shall we go eat?"
Qin jogged up from behind and linked her arm through Luo Wei's.
"Sorry, Qin." Luo Wei stifled a yawn. "I'm exhausted. I need to go sleep first."
"What were you doing last night?" Qin asked, peering at her.
Before Luo Wei could answer, a shriek cut through the crowd ahead.
"I got picked! The academy selected me for the magic competition!"
"What? You?"
"Jack was right — they posted the team roster!"
Qin's eyes lit up. She grabbed Luo Wei's hand and started pulling her forward. "Come on, come on — maybe we're on it!"
"What team roster?" Luo Wei asked, stumbling after her.
Qin didn't answer, too busy shouldering through the crowd. They squeezed their way to the front and both looked up at the bulletin board.
Qin's face fell.
"That's... not right. How is this the list?"
"Athena, Jack, Thorne..." She shook her head slowly. "Fine, I'm not on it. But why aren't you on it either?"
➤ Next: This Time, I Will Take Back Everything That Is Mine!
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