Chapter XLIV (44)- Midterm Projects

Inspired by his History F midterm, Kizu decided to make the most of his other midterms, approaching them all as a means of giving himself a leg up on his expedition. Obviously, the mapping of an astronomy star chart and his proficiency playing the piano wouldn’t be much use, but he managed to twist all the other subject midterms to serve his needs.

For his enchanting class, inspired by his time trapped underground with the bloodspawn, Kizu decided to make enchanted boots that could stick to walls. He had to be careful while using them. Whenever he pressed his toe at a certain angle, it would release the foot from the surface it was stuck to - but it required his full weight. With his lame leg, he realized that, even with the leg brace, he wouldn’t be able to put all his weight down on that foot. So to accommodate the handicap, he spent an extra two days enchanting a pair of gloves as well. It felt awkward climbing with only one foot and two hands, but he got it down in time.

In Elemental F they were supposed to demonstrate their ability to manipulate a stone pebble as their midterm. However, Kizu managed to convince Professor Oasaji to let him get a head start on their next curriculum. Though, it took several days of prodding, and the professor only folded after Ione voiced her support. Oasaji went through the exact steps of how to create flames. It was similar to heating something, but instead of altering an existing object, this involved the act of creation. Kizu barely managed a few sparks on their first day, but it was a solid enough start.

For his midterm in Brewing S, he decided to try something new, in addition to the obvious brewing of several explosive fire potions - and a few fire-resistance potions, too. The crone had never let him brew transfiguration potions unsupervised, believing he would use them to escape. But now, free of her restrictions, Kizu could finally experiment with them. The portly and professional Professor Knoff was incredibly helpful as well, giving him clear advice on how to properly brew the potions. He encouraged Kizu to choose animals that he held some familiarity with to start. Non-magical creatures, as it turned out, were pretty simple to transform into. He brewed two very different transfiguration potions. One would turn the drinker into a tree frog. The other, a fruit bat. Both were animals he was familiar with from his time in the Hon Basin and also offered him a lot more versatility.

When he tested the first of the new brews, Kizu immediately suffered extreme vertigo. He had read about the difficulty of adapting to unknown senses of nonhuman creatures, but he had foolishly assumed his bond with Mort would make it easier on him. As it turned out, primates were a lot more similar to humans than they were to tree frogs and bats.

It took two hours of floundering around before he managed to even glide as a bat. Not to mention the headache that was trying to ignore the noise echoing in his ears the entire time. Apparently, bats could use sound to coordinate themselves. Kizu had yet to figure out how they managed it.

The tree frog was a bit easier, but not by much. One of the perks was being able to stick to things, though in a completely different way from the items he had enchanted. He had to relearn swimming as well, nearly drowning him in the process. And having eyes that pointed in opposite directions made him feel even more clumsy and disoriented than the rare occasions when he drank.

Later that day, he found himself climbing a wall outside, familiarizing himself with his new amphibian form as he surveyed the courtyard below. He spotted two students, a boy and a girl, and tried to figure out what they were doing with only his limited froggy eyesight. He immediately regretted the exercise. His entire frog body shifted red as he quickly retreated from the courtyard.

The next courtyard he surveyed had several students practicing combat magic. They looked to be practicing body enhancement strikes and blocks. When Kizu spotted Ulric, the brute that had mangled his leg, he nearly retreated on the spot. But then he spotted Ulric’s sparring partner.

Harvey lashed out at the older boy with a high kick aimed for the side of his chest, but Ulric caught the leg. Somehow, Harvey managed to twist out of Ulric’s grip before the far larger student could press the advantage. He broke away from the spar and fell to the dirt, panting.

Ulric reached down and offered Harvey a hand back to his feet. Then they repeated the exercise. Kizu watched on. Harvey slowly but surely improved under Ulric’s tutelage. When Harvey finally managed to land the kick, he let out a whoop of joy and Ulric actually laughed as they bumped fists.

Kizu’s heart churned in his chest at the betrayal. The anger smoldered in him as he watched them practice a different maneuver. He kept on watching, expecting Ulric to lash out or chastise Harvey. To do something that would wipe the smile off his friend’s face. Not only did he expect it, Kizu secretly longed for it. But nothing. Ulric was a patient mentor. If anything, he seemed proud of Harvey’s progress. After a few minutes, Kizu realized he couldn’t take it anymore and hopped away, storming off as much as a tree frog was capable of storming off. Nobody noticed.

All the excitement and satisfaction he’d felt after his new brewing accomplishments felt tainted and dirty. When he shifted back into a human, he packed up his potions and walked away. Not with any destination in mind. Just away.

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Kizu told himself that he had other friends. He hadn’t even really wanted to be friends with Harvey in the first place. He was loud and obnoxious. And nowadays, almost everyone in the academy wanted to be friends with Kizu. Letting one friend go in exchange for hundreds of new ones was hardly a poor trade. The problem was, despite his parentage, Kizu wasn’t a trader. No matter how he spun it, he couldn’t quite convince himself that the loss was worth the gain.

But his sister was waiting for him deep below the cobblestone steps of the academy. No matter how many friends failed him, his sister had always been there for him when she could. She dedicated her life to finding him. He owed it to her to be there for her now. He pivoted on his heel.

It was time.

There was no point in waiting for midterms to finish. He had the equipment, and he knew the way. All he needed now was food for the expedition.

After gathering up his bag from his dorm and changing into his new delving outfit, he made his way down to the kitchens. Technically, they were off-limits to students. But Basil had mentioned once that the cooks didn’t mind being bothered for the occasional snack, so long as no one student made a habit of badgering them. Of course, they never realized Basil was a repeat offender.

Kizu peeked his head inside the painting of the kitchen that hung in the hall not far from the cafeteria. A cacophony of sound and smell erupted all around him. He yanked his head back, narrowly dodging a rogue cast-iron pot as it zoomed by. When he carefully stepped through the painting, he had to dodge out of the way of more than one busy cook as they scrambled and shouted at one another.

Visiting right before dinner might not have been the best decision.

“What do you want?” A short, balding Tainted man turned on him with bulging eyes. His hands were on his hips, a wand clutched in each fist.

“Just wanted to grab a bite,” Kizu said lamely.

The man grinned at him, baring his pointed teeth. Then he lunged at Kizu, mouth open wide.

Kizu stumbled to the side, his bad leg tripping over a bag of flour propped against the wall.

“Stop that, Jim,” a different cook said, catching Kizu’s collar with one hand.

“He said he wanted a bite,” the first cook, Jim, said defensively.

“Very funny. Go check on your salmon. Last week the headmaster found not one, but three bones in his fish. Absolutely shameful.”

The cook rolled his eyes and walked away.

“You said you wanted a snack?” the new chef asked. He loomed over Kizu, arms crossed.

“Um, yeah.” Kizu’s mind raced in search of an excuse. “I’m actually going to be locking myself in my dorm for the next few days to work on my midterms. I was hoping I might be able to grab enough food to last me until next week, so I can really dedicate all my time to my studies.”

“Hm.” The chef looked past the controlled chaos of the dinner service, towards a door on the far end of the kitchen. “I don’t like offering it to students - the taste is bland and there’s not much artistry to it - but I do have something that might work.”

The chef navigated through the kitchen with practiced ease, predicting every other cook’s steps like a master diviner. Meanwhile, it was all that Kizu could do to keep pace, narrowly ducking and dodging dozens of busy cooks and their flying cooking implements. When he finally reached the door, spots of sauce and boiling soups dotted his new outfit.

“In here,” the chef told him, pulling the door open and ushering Kizu inside.

It was chilly inside. It reminded Kizu of the enchanted icebox from the hoarder’s house, only on an entirely different scale. Shelves lined the walls, several meters tall and packed floor-to-ceiling with fresh produce. There were wooden crates and barrels everywhere, consuming the floorspace. Every square inch of wall space had been etched with complex climate-controlling glyphs. Kizu stared at them, trying fruitlessly to memorize the structure of the enchantments.

“In here, we keep a supply of certain… specially requested foods. A few of the professors occasionally like to lock themselves up in their offices for days on end. Either to catch up on grading, or for their own personal research. Regardless, we came up with this solution for them.”

The chef pried open a barrel with his fingers and withdrew five vials filled with swirling liquid colors, each no larger than a child's finger.

“Are those potions?” Kizu asked.

“Yes. Each vial is designed to keep an average sized adult fully satiated for a day.” The chef studied the vial with clear contempt. “They’re wretched tasting things. As I said, no artistry whatsoever. The recipe to create them is kept secret by a trading company in Edgeland. But you can tell there wasn’t any care put into these. They’re mass produced.”

It made sense that such a potion would exist. Kizu wondered why he had never considered it before. He immediately went over in his head the possible ingredient combinations that might result in a potion like that. He came up with a few hypothetical possibilities, but he was willing to bet that there must be some key ingredient found exclusively in Edgeland. Otherwise, the witches in the Hon Basin would have abused that potion like none other. The crone wouldn’t have fed him anything else.

The chef continued to rant about the potion after handing Kizu all five vials. When he turned to lead them out of the enchanted storage room, Kizu quickly stuffed three more handfuls of the potions into his uniform pockets.

After escaping the kitchens, Kizu brought his haul back to his dorm.

Counting the potions he’d been freely given, Kizu had a total of twenty-six vials. He’d likely gone overboard. Hopefully, he would only need a few vials to get him through his expedition. He reflected that this was his first real theft. Beyond using some of the crone’s things without explicit permission from time to time, he had never actually stolen anything from someone before. He expected to feel a stab of guilt, some lingering sense of dread, but he didn’t feel much at all. No guilt, but no heady rush of adrenaline either. It felt more like finishing one of his academic tests. Draining, and maybe a bit satisfying. He wondered if there was something wrong with him.

Regardless, he had the tools required now, and he was going to use them to finally find his sister. No matter how deep he had to delve into the World Dungeon.