It wasn’t difficult to follow the flow of mana back to its source. As Cael drew nearer and turned corners, the flows became more intense and thick in the air. If he had to compare it to anything, he’d say it was like streams feeding into rivers and then finally into the ocean.

The source of the song was pretty obvious. Especially once he saw it with his own eyes.

Two performers stood on a raised stage in the center of some kind of indoor arena. The mana around them appeared to dance to two separate songs.

On the left, a rat played the flute, surrounded by a writhing shield of fat silver mana snakes that constantly moved in an effort to keep the flutist protected from the relentless onslaught of lashing whips and drills from their opponent.

The opponent in question buried deep beneath a wild storm of dancing blue mana so dense Cael couldn't see them through [Mana Sight].

He turned it off and the entire scene disappeared. The flutist continued to play and shift their weight nervously, but he was a little surprised to see an actual human standing where the mana storm was.

‘Yeah, the System calls her a human. I was beginning to wonder if this universe even had those.’ The girl smiled cheerfully as she played her instrument. It looked a lot like a violin.

‘And she uses real sound magic.’ Ava was particularly approving of this fact. Apparently, Ava wasn't a fan of the strange pseudo-sound that the rat was using.

But that meant the mental aspect was all a result of the rat. The one who was clearly losing here had enough power to mess with Cael’s head so easily.

‘You need magic resistances.’ Tar concluded and Ava sent something like an agreement.

Cael nodded and switched back on his [Mana Sight] in time to watch one of the mana snakes be harpooned by the girl's magic, dragged out of the defensive formation, and into the mana storm. There it was systematically shredded and cast away to disperse into the halls.

Was that remnant magic all it had taken to screw his brain up that much?

That was kind of embarrassing, but he took comfort in the fact he wasn’t the only one who had fallen victim to the call of the song.

In a crowd around the stage, almost a dozen individuals were clearly under the effects of the same magic.

At least he was pretty sure that was what was going on.

They all looked completely blissed out and had a bunch of small mana snakes twisted around their heads. Like clusters of parasites.

It was pretty revolting. The smaller snakes just looked like worms when they were that small.

Aside from himself, there were four people not affected by the brain worms.

That was two individuals in teachers' uniforms and the two battling students. One instructor was something akin to a fish person, with three webbed fingers on each hand.

Their face was somewhat trout-y. That wasn't exactly the best description for it, but Cael wasn't sure what the significant features were for fish people.

In theory, though, they were the more ordinary of the two present instructors. The other was a sentient pile of rocks.

“Is that an elemental?”

‘No, that’s a golem. Elementals are way better than golems.’ Tar chided him in a jokingly indignant tone.

‘I’m sure that’s racist in some way.’

‘I don’t think it is. Elementals are far more powerful and much less vulnerable.’ The familiar bond was making it feel like Tar was making good points.

“Stop being racist in my head, it’s hard to separate my own thoughts from your feelings of superiority.”

The elemental sent the impression of rolling his eyes before dividing his thoughts from Cael's.

Presumably to think racist thoughts to himself. And it felt weird. Kind of like wearing the wrong prescription glasses. Cael could still somewhat tell what was coming from Tar’s side, but it felt foreign and oddly distant. Unfamiliar, no pun intended.

‘Stop that.’ Cael felt Ava snap the dividing line and he was grateful.

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He hated that feeling of Tar not being right there. It felt sore in a way he couldn’t really explain.

Cael shook his head and refocused himself. “How do you know they’re more vulnerable? It kind of feels like you’d be more susceptible to, like, fires and stuff.” You couldn’t really burn away a stone person as easily as you could a shadow.

‘They have these cores that are pretty brittle. I could probably spear right through one of them without much trouble.’

‘Are you using Cael’s knowledge of golems to assume they have cores?’

‘No. [Evaluate Target] highlights weaknesses like that really easily. I can see the core right now.’

To demonstrate, the silhouette of the core flashed briefly in Cael’s vision. A fist-sized sphere buried deep in the center of the golem’s thick chest. He kept forgetting that these two had abilities of their own outside of the inherently magical stuff they did all the time.

Perfect elemental manipulation apparently wasn’t enough for them.

‘The only skill I got to keep in the transfer is [Runic Circuits].’

‘Oh, yeah. The only one.’ Tar poked her. ‘You’re made of metal, just cover yourself in runes.’

‘Well, obviously I’m already doing that,’ Ava flicked open a wing to reveal a large complex pattern already engraved into the inside of her wing. Tar fake rolled his eyes again.

“Is that whole thing one rune?” The pattern itself was vaguely circular but as large as Cael’s whole hand.

‘It’s a circuit made of almost twenty runes.’ Ava highlighted the runes in order, which revealed the shape of the circuit to be a kind of compact spiral.

“What does it do?” He asked curiously.

‘With enough mana, it can fire a beam of heat so intense it can melt away a mountain in a day.’

‘You don’t have that much mana.’ Tar pointed out.

‘Maybe not, but if you need to light a campfire, I’m the girl to call.’ He didn't need any campfires at the moment, but he would keep that in mind.

“Wouldn’t it be better to have something that makes you more durable?” Maybe not an enchantment for self-repair since she was already able to shift her form at will.

Wait. Could Cael heal himself with the proper application of his natural changeling abilities? His missing ears tended to imply he could.

‘We can test your healing capabilities later. And I already have a circuit for durability. It’s inside me.’

On the stage, the violinist harpooned the final snake and dragged it away from the rat, rendering it defenseless.

"So, the rat lost, right? Why don't they just give up before they get hurt?"

‘He can’t surrender. She’s blocking his voice.’

Cael had to squint to see the sound magic covering the rat’s mouth, but it was definitely there. Also, the rat-person was a ‘he’? Cael wasn’t sure how Ava knew that, but he trusted the elementals enough to just go with it.

“Is that allowed?”

‘If we can see it, the instructors can too, so I guess it is.’

That was true. The instructors were both pretty close and watching with rapt attention. Presumably, their skills were also at a higher level than his own. If the elementals could see it from as far as they were, the instructors certainly knew.

The girl dropped her violin. Even before hitting the ground, it shattered into mana shards and dispersed into the air like fog. Where the haze spread, the rat’s brain worms shriveled and popped which was really gross, but at least it was preferable to being mind controlled.

He didn’t think the students would be all that grateful though. As soon as the worms had all gone, they fell to the floor like puppets with their strings cut.

Some of them must have landed pretty heavily with some unfortunate thuds and hollow bonking. He could literally feel a small tremor travel through the floor.

The girl flicked her bow once and the remaining whips rushed forward all at once to restrain the rat.

Unlike many of the other species he’d encountered recently, Cael could read the girl’s expression quite clearly. Her distaste was evident in a way that he could practically feel all the way at the back of the room.

She paused for a moment beside the rat, said something disgustedly, then stomped off the stage.

She threw down the bow and the rest of her magic faded from the hall.

“Ew.” Cael frowned at the rat’s hand on the stage, suddenly separated from the rest of his body. “When did she even do that?”

He was also pretty sure the rat was shouting. Probably because they’d just lost a hand.

‘It’s definitely because of the hand. What the hell do you mean ‘probably’?’ Tar jabbed him in the neck.

"Don’t poke me, Bastard.” Cael did his best to shake the elemental off of his head, but the sticky creature wouldn’t let go.

‘Don’t call me a creature, you prick.’

“I didn't call you that, I just thought it.”

‘Can you two cut it out?’ Ava poked him too, which hurt considerably more on account of her sharp metal wings, ‘People are watching.’

They both froze like scolded children and Cael looked up. Once again, she was right. Now that the entertainment was gone, all four of the conscious individuals were focused on him.

‘Three conscious individuals. The rat passed out from panic or something.’

‘Shouldn’t the instructors be handling that?’ Ava gestured vaguely with one wing to the dozen-odd students on the floor.

As if on cue, the pair sprung into action and began carting off the victims of the impromptu concert.

‘They weren’t listening, were they?’

‘Maybe. You need to start being careful about what you say.’ Cael could feel Ava flicking Tar in his soulscape. ‘Let’s keep exploring. Maybe try to get our ears back while we’re at it.’

“Cool.” Cael crossed through the room to get to the hallway on the far side, giving the unconscious students a wide berth. It would be bad if he accidentally stepped on someone. “More exploring it is.”