Chương 18: Chapter 17: You cannot just pretend I don’t exist

The Academy had spent centuries allowing each generation of scholars to 'improve' its lecture halls. This one in particular had survived six centuries of renovations and three budget crises, and looked poised to survive several more renovations whether it approved of them or not. The original stone amphitheater had been commissioned by practical Earth thaumaturges who believed a classroom should withstand an avalanche if necessary.

That was fair enough, but it was also a brand of fairness that encouraged people to ask increasingly unfair things of a building. Fire wanted smokeless braziers. Light replaced every window with crystal because knowledge benefited from expensive transparency. The Air researchers claimed the acoustics were flawed, spending forty years to fix them. To this day, Fabrisse remained uncertain whether anyone besides the Air researchers could hear the difference.

By the time the Water department submitted plans for ornamental fountains in the aisles, the administration had finally mastered the rare magical discipline of telling professors no. The Water magi had filed claims for discrimination afterward. Unfortunately, nobody had ever discovered the equally miraculous discipline of numbering buildings sensibly. Every renovation had either added annexes or quietly absorbed another department.

Lecture Hall Four wasn't beside Lecture Hall Three, the East Wing existed mostly to the west, the West Wing existed mostly to the North, and there were two rooms officially designated Auditorium B because neither faculty would concede ownership. Fabrisse had once arrived at an advanced geomancy lecture only to discover he'd accidentally attended three-quarters of a symposium on aquatic rune filtration. Today had been another casualty of academic urban planning.

By the time he slipped into the Lecture Hall Four (which was next to Lecture Hall Seventeen), he was only thirty-nine minutes late, meaning there were still a whole eleven minutes of the first lecture left. He chose to count it as punctual enough. He activated every concealment spell he knew: Veil of Shame, Liminal Presence Drift, Auditory Dissipation Field, Aetheric Veil: Echofold, everything. It usually worked. Today, it bought him only three seconds.

The professor's stare stopped just behind him, resting a handspan off his left shoulder. Echofold always misplaced him by just enough to be irritating.

"… and resonance collapse occurs when intention outruns structure," Ake kept lecturing. Fabrisse heaved a sigh of relief. Maybe—"Mr. Kestovar." Never mind. Ake called.

"Impressive showing of the disposition spell. You may deactivate it now. It has done everything it reasonably can for you." There were spells one could interrupt halfway through. Shadowed Reposition Protocol was not among them. A second later, he reappeared beside an empty seat at the back row, just in time for everyone to turn. The concealment spell couldn' t do much about wet robes or muddy knees, and it certainly had no answer for the duck feather.

At least fifty-two pairs of eyes from two different classes stared at him. He sat down. Professor Ake sighed, turning back to the diagram.

"… As I was saying, structure must always precede ambition." The students were still staring. The w hispers had commenced.

"That's him."

"Did you see the notification post? He actually unlocked the Eidralith."

"Why does he look like he lost a fight with a duck?" Fabrisse considered burrowing into the floor. If this was what being extraordinary felt like, it seemed wildly overrated. But still, he patted the satchel. The Stupenstone was warm. Fabrisse kept his eyes down, trying to will himself into the cracks between floor tiles. The murmurs kept multiplying; he was certain they were breeding now. Professor Ake picked up his chalk.

"Before we examine the effect of emotion on spell structure, let us first revisit the foundations." Mercifully, everyone remembered there was a lecture taking place. He drew a simple circle on the board.

"Every spell asks the same question: how much of your intention reaches the world?" He added another circle outside the first.

"Some workings resonate naturally with their caster. Others resist. The environment helps or hinders. Dense aether encourages a spell. Hostile conditions suppress it." His chalk tapped the outer ring.

"Think of spellcasting as a balance. Stronger resonance and richer ambient aether push a working forward, while resistance pushes back." Right. Same framework as last lecture. Fabrisse rewrote the model he' d pieced together from previous sessions: 𝓔 = (R × A) / T Beneath it, he labeled the variables in neat script. 𝓔 — Spell Effectiveness R — Resonance A — Aether Density T — Thaumic Resistance Ake continued, " In ordinary conditions, a spell benefits from strong resonance and dense available aether.

This is why certain workings are easier near leylines, reservoirs, charged materials, or properly prepared circles." His chalk found its way to the outer circle.

"But every spell also encounters resistance, both material and environmental. Can anyone provide another example?" Fabrisse knew this one. Counter-wards. Active suppression fields. Resonance-disruptive alloys. There are so many sufficient answers. He kept his hand exactly where it belonged: on his notebook. Correct answers attracted follow-up questions, and follow-up questions inevitably became conversations. A hand rose three rows ahead. As usual, it was from Aldren Ranan.

Unlike Fabrisse, Aldren possessed the unusual combination of actually knowing the answer and being able to cast the sort of spells the Academy considered worth asking questions about.

"Mr. Ranan." Aldren stood.

"Competing spellforms, Professor. Existing enchantments create thaumic interference. Even if they' re unrelated, they still increase resistance by forcing the new spell to negotiate with an already-established structure." He was also articulate. Fabrisse would' ve stopped after' competing spellforms.'

"Excellent." Ake inclined his head.

"A complete answer. Existing magic rarely vanishes simply because you wish to introduce more. Every active spell, ward, or enchantment becomes another variable your working must overcome. Well done, Mr. Ranan. Now, let' s move on to the final portion of today' s lecture: emotion." Ake returned to the board.

"Understanding magic requires understanding what you bring into it. You have been told that emotion empowers magic." Fabrisse knew the equation was incomplete. He tapped the quill against the margin for a moment before drawing two tiny symbols beside the expression. 𝓔 = (R × A) / T ± Mₑ He underlined the addition. Mₑ — Emotional Modulation A placeholder for now. He had absolutely no idea whether emotion belonged in the numerator, the denominator, or somewhere else entirely. But it certainly belonged somewhere.

Satisfied that his model was now at least honest about what it didn' t yet explain, he looked back up. Ake continued, "Without feeling, a spell lacks force. This is incomplete. It biases it. Depending on the emotion you choose, it can alter timing and tolerance for error. Some emotions work wonders with the spell you choose; others do nothing; some actively work against your spell. Let me give you an illustration." Even the chronic whisperers stopped gossiping. This was the part they liked.

People enjoyed Ake's lectures because he frequently applied live spellcasting during theory. Fabrisse understood the appeal: theory became considerably more interesting once it started catching fire. Unfortunately, it also vividly reminded him of everything he could not do. Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. The Eidralith gave him a quest.

[Tutorial Quest Received: Emotional Modulation: A Comparative Study] Objective: Observe the same spell cast using the same emotion, performed by two different spellcasters with different levels of Emotional Understanding. Reward: +100 EXP Was this a different tutorial quest? He could have sworn the Eidralith had given him a different, unfinished tutorial quest before. Ake turned.

"For this, we will require a spell sufficiently complex that emotional interference is visible." The room collectively forgot to slouch.

"Fire," Ake continued, calm as ever.

"Rare variant. Controlled output." A few students inhaled sharply. Fabrisse did too, before he could stop himself. Rare Fire spells left very little room for mistakes. Ordinary fire was stubborn enough. Rare variants expected precision bordering on obsession. Ake raised one hand and made no other gesture aside from the bare minimum. He didn't even chant. [Spell Cast: Pyric Formulation, Rare, Rank IV] Oh? Eidralith could tell me what spells are cast, and the spells' level of sophistication as well?

The fire took the form of a suspended spiral column, no wider than Ake's forearm, composed of interlocking arcs that never touched. Each curve held at a fixed distance from the next, rotating at a speed just slow enough for Fabrisse to gawk at its ingenuity. Axial symmetry, maintained by counter-rotational torque. Radial spacing constant to within, what, two grains of chalk dust?

The gaps are buffered too, very possibly inert aether channels acting as thermal breaks so the arcs couldn't merge even if the resonance wobbled. The spiral wasn't actually continuous. It was a stack of micro-loops, each one a closed pyric circuit, nested and offset along the vertical axis. If one failed, it wouldn't cascade. The rest would persist. Fault tolerance in a fire spell. His finger tapped furiously on the side of his satchel. Who does that? That's so clever.

Ake let the spiral persist for another breath, then dismissed it with a precise flick of intent. The fire collapsed.

"Now we introduce emotion. This, is calm." The spell reformed. [Spell Cast: Pyric Formulation, Rare, Rank IV] [Emotional Modulator Detected: Calm] The spiral column returned in the same configuration—same axial symmetry, same nested micro-loops, same elegant counter-rotation—but this time it was accompanied by twinkling motes of beige light. They drifted lazily along the outer boundary of the spell, never quite touching the fire itself. He could see how the edges had crisped.

Where the previous iteration had occupied its full permitted radius, this one pulled in. The inert aether buffers thickened. The variance between the gaps dropped to something absurdly small.

"Observe," Ake said, gesturing toward the spell.

"Calm biases a spell toward sustainability. It reduces bleed and increases tolerance for minor structural imperfections." He glanced at the spiral.

"Note the reduced edge turbulence. The cost is output. Calm discourages excess. A spell cast this way will rarely exceed its minimum necessary expression. You gain duration and control. You surrender force." [Modulator Effect: Calm (96% Understanding)] Casting Duration: +69% Spell Stability: +69% Aetheric Bleed: −29% Peak Output Modifier: −11% Ake was right. Calm traded one quality over another. There was no longer a single coefficient to calculate.

His quill struck through the crude ± Mₑ he had added only minutes ago. He had absolutely no notation elegant enough to capture what he' d just witnessed. One thing he did know, though, was that this emotional modulation would be a net positive. However, Ake was operating at a 96% understanding of the emotion. What if someone with a lesser understanding cast it? This must be what the Eidralith was trying to teach him. Ake studied the calm-formed spiral for a moment longer, then let it dissolve.

"Now we change the variable. This is rage." The spell ignited. [Spell Cast: Pyric Formulation, Rare, Rank IV] [Emotional Modulator Detected: Rage] The girl in front of Fabrisse gasped. The spiral reappeared, though only in the loosest sense. Its arcs were thicker now and no longer evenly spaced. Several micro-loops drifted dangerously close together, close enough that Fabrisse instinctively braced for them to merge.

Instead the entire structure accelerated, not smoothly but in uneven surges, while the gentle beige motes vanished beneath erratic sprays of red-orange flame. The elegance was gone.

"Rage prioritizes release." Ake said in a voice calm enough to be almost ironic, "It accelerates ignition, amplifies output, and pushes energy aggressively. But it does not care for patience or symmetry." The micro-loops were collapsing into partial arcs. Fault tolerance was gone. If one failed now, it'd cascade straight down the stack. [Rage Modulation Detected (80% Understanding)] Peak Output Modifier: +55% Ignition Speed: +49% Structural Stability: −25% Aetheric Bleed: +24% The spiral shuddered.

One arc blazed brighter than the rest before Ake dismissed the spell entirely. Even a professor, who should at least be a High Instructant or even Exemplar-level mage, could only manage an 80% in Rage? He wondered why that was the case. In any case, the trade was absurdly lopsided: a surge in power and casting speed for comparatively modest penalties. No wonder experienced thaumaturges almost never cast emotionally neutral spells when they had the luxury of preparation.

If there was time to manufacture the right emotion, the numbers made the choice embarrassingly obvious. Emotionless casting only existed for quickcasting, or for when one was lazy or incompetent, like himself.

"Rage is not incorrect," Ake said.

"It is simply ill-suited here. You will see it far more often in battlecasting, where immediacy matters more than longevity." He glanced over the hall and concluded.

"You must remember this: emotion is bias. Choose poorly, and even a perfect spell becomes a liability." Ake dismissed the residual heat with a curt gesture, and the lecture hall slowly exhaled. The tension bled out of the benches in a series of quiet shuffles and whispered breaths.

"We'll reconvene in ten minutes," Ake said, already turning back toward his notes. The spell residue faded. He knew this. He had known it since second term. Emotional bias matrices, modulation curves, the way calm damped variance and rage spiked output at the cost of coherence—this had all been on the midterm. He'd scored well. He still had the notes. But the notes had never sparked, and never came with percentage points.

Seeing the modifiers move in real time, stitched directly onto spellform, made something click uncomfortably into place. Maybe this was why Ake demonstrated instead of just lecturing. He'd always thought Ake's demonstrations were… indulgent. Pedagogical theater. Maybe he'd been wrong after all. The instant the benches began to scrape and people started doing that dangerous thing where they remembered he existed, he slipped for the aisle. Cool. Great lecture. Learned things. Quest progress. Time to vanish.

Outside, the corridor air was cooler and smelled of damp wards. Fabrisse leaned his shoulder against the wall and let himself breathe. Okay. That was… actually really cool. He replayed the spell in his head. The quest was halfway done. He frowned. Observe the same spell cast using the same emotion, performed by two different spellcasters with different levels of Emotional Understanding. Ake counted as one. There was absolutely no one else in there who could do that.

This was the kind of thing students wrote papers about, not something they casually demonstrated between lectures, even the overachievers. Especially the overachievers—they tended to blow things up. You couldn't just ask someone: Excuse me, could you please demonstrate a high-tier rare pyric construct with emotional modulation for my mysterious glowing artifact? He looked up and realized there was this one particular overachiever who could probably cast every single Rare Fire spell in existence.

And she was walking towards his general direction. Severa Montreal. He stifled a groan. No, I can't ask her. She's going to tear me apart just from daring to open my mouth. Her mentor had looked one minor inconvenience away from murdering me. I can't just—what—walk up and volunteer myself for public execution? No, no, that'd be—"Kestovar. Do you have a moment?" The name didn't register at first. It hit his ears, bounced, and slid off. A second passed.

"Kestovar. You cannot just pretend I don't exist this time." Then the voice replayed at exactly the same pitch. His brain finally completed the necessary recalculations. Severa was standing directly in front of him. His shoulder squared.

"I—" His mouth engaged before his thoughts finished lining up. He stopped himself in time.

"Yes." Severa looked calm. That was dangerous. She was also standing closer than necessary. He registered the distance and concluded it was probably intimidation. The best course of action was to stand still.

"We need to have a conversation." She folded her arms.