“Can anyone tell me what caused the fall of the ancient Dalmona Kingdom?”

The man asking this question was none other than the former street performing mage, Carlon Glaciare. He wore a white mage cloak with a white buttoned tunic made of the finest silk. Like any other scholarly lecturer, he held a giant textbook under one of his arms. But his other hand?

“Sir!” A boy in a darker cloak, with a buttoned shirt and tie underneath, shot his hand into the air.

Carlon nodded, and he jumped out of his seat to answer.

“The Ancient Dalmona Kingdom’s main fault that resulted in its downfall was their king’s greediness. He focused too much on conquering new lands for resources rather than keeping tabs on their already occupied territories. And… and… Eh?”

A small pebble soared in the air at the speed of light, landing dead center on the boy’s forehead. He saw it coming, but had not dodged it in time.

“Ouch! What was that for?! I answered the question!” the boy yelled, rubbing his forehead.

Carlon had a hand outstretched towards the boy. But what did he do? Throw a pebble at one of his students? Horrible, but technically correct. Carlon had secretly casted displacement magic on a pebble he had in his pocket, causing it to fly in the air as fast as an arrow.

Shit, that was faster than I had expected! Although Carlon kept a calm disposition as he stared at his class, he was panicking on the inside. Because of his position being offered per the recommendation of royal court mages, the magic academy had given him leeway that they would not have given anyone else. They let him openly use magic during class, and even use his students for demonstrations in his lectures, both of which a normal lecturer was never allowed to do. But intentionally harming a student? That was a big no-no.

“Err… My apologies, Greyger,” Carlon said, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible. The boy only nodded his head and sat back down.

He cleared his throat and stared back at the entire class before him. Fifteen students in all. Six guys and nine girls in total. They were all in the sixteen year old range, so they were bound to be a harder crowd to teach, simply because magic didn’t seem as magical around that age range. That was why Carlon resorted to more unorthodox means of teaching them. That included softly pecking kids on the forehead with magic to indicate their incorrect answers.

Of course, he misread his own strength when doing that with Greyger…

“Anyways… Greyger! Your answer was almost correct! You just left out one more detail. A very important one too.”

Carlon used Accelerate yet again on the chalk in his hand. He pressed the tip of the chalk on the chalkboard behind him, and words covered the board within a blink of an eye.

“One last thing you left out was that those territories under the Ancient Dalmona Kingdom’s occupation had banded together and stormed the capital city of Troya while their military was occupied with their conquest overseas. Both the king’s aggression and lack of insight caused the whole kingdom to fall and be rebuilt anew under the management of those various territories.”

While Carlon stood at the podium in front of the class, speaking loud and with enough confidence to scare a bear, more than half of the class had fallen asleep. Carlon had always hated this part of lecture, because none of his students seemed to take a particular interest in history—apart from Greyger. Still, it wasn’t like he could just skip the topic entirely. That was because of just how important that period in history was to the formation of the nation they were all standing in now: The New Lucrez Kingdom (officially the New Lucrez Kingdom of Dalmonian Territories).

This nation was built on the variety of different cultures and backgrounds of the different territories who were previously under the rule of the Ancient Dalmona Kingdom. One could bet that each student in that very classroom had at least one ancestor who was from those rebelling territories and took part in that war. So the very history Carlon was teaching had a strong impact on the lives each kid in the classroom lived in the present.

While Greyger nodded his head in understanding, most of the class snored. Carlon noticed it too and slumped into the chair right beside his podium.

What’s wrong with kids these days?

Days like these made the magician wish he was still a street performing mage. At least there was more excitement in that job.

Just when he was about to dismiss class, the door swung open with so much force that the hinges shattered upon impact.

Another magic professor—no, the Vice-Chairman of the magic academy—burst through the doors and startled the other students out of their in-class naps. The man was dressed similarly as Carlon, yet had on a gold beret where his gray hairs seeped out of.

“Professor Glaciare, may I have a word with you?” The man was winded and sweating buckets under his beret. Something was off.

Carlon nodded his head and excused the students to leave. Only Greyger waved back to him and bowed as a gesture of respect. The others never batted an eye.

He got out of his seat and let the old, wrinkled Vice-Chairman take his spot. “So, what was it you wanted to talk to me about?”

“A letter just came in…for you…” The Vice-Chairman still was out of breath and barely able to make coherent sentences. He had his hands planted on his knees as he desperately gasped for air. “It was from Kori Soaro.”

Carlon cocked his head back. Kori Soaro, huh? The mention of such a country made him think about a certain someone that he hadn’t seen in a long time.

“Was it from my daughter?” Carlon was practically in his face now. His eyes sparkled with glee, but his posture tried to hide it well with a hint of restraint.

He hadn’t heard from his daughter since she was sixteen. She was already twenty years old by now, and he wondered if she just cut ties with him entirely, even though he did nothing wrong. He and his wife had to move back to their home country—The New Lucrez Kingdom—due to financial issues they encountered. The New Lucrez Kingdom just had a far lower cost of living when compared to Kori Soaro. But their daughter wanted to stay so bad, so they let her, but not without giving her quite a sum from their savings to help her until she could be self sustainable.

Carlon’s wife constantly would tell him that “If she’s not sending letters every day, then that means she’s doing good! She doesn’t need to be babied.” They already knew she was holding herself like an adult woman since they left her, so Carlon tried to accept that. But still, a man worries about his kids regardless. He was sure his wife felt the same way.

“No it wasn’t. Here, take a look.”

The Vice-Chairman took out a letter from his coat pocket and handed it to Carlon. The letter was in a white envelope, but what stuck out was the bright red wax seal on it. It was the seal of the Royal Family of Kori Soaro. His eyes widened in disbelief, what business do rulers of one of the strongest nations in the world want with him? He gently peeled off the seal and retrieved the letter hidden inside, unfolding it and glancing it over.

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Not a single mention of his daughter, of course. But something else that caught his breath. Something sinister was afoot.

“Provide a substitute teacher for me, I’ll have to make the trip to Kori Soaro,” Carlon said as he folded up the letter and slid it into his robe pockets.

“I figured as much.” The old man rose from his seat and bid the magic professor a farewell.

And so Carlon Glaciare was alone in an empty classroom, more than a dozen empty seats facing him. He would miss his students, but it seemed he would be gone for quite a while. Carlon chuckled and leaned against the podium stand, it didn’t seem like they would miss him, though. Apart from Greyger, the kid’s always been a teacher’s pet.

A click of a tongue bounced off the classroom walls, and a door swung open, leaving but remnants of activity behind.

X X X

My father had returned to Kori Soaro, showing up right at my front door and eyeing down Lio in a daze. No, that was just his resting face, he always looked like he was daydreaming.

As soon as he spotted me right behind Lio, it was abundantly clear he wasn’t at the wrong address. I’d sent him my address through a letter years ago, so I was surprised he even remembered it. But now that the three of us were in my house, now sitting at my dining table, it was time to catch up and find answers.

“So, Charliette’s my daughter, but who are you?” My father turned to face Lio, face to face, wana la wana. Oop! Let my Dalmonian slip! Being with my father all of sudden made me feel more Dalmonian than before, even though that phrase was just about the only thing I know of the language. But enough of me.

“I’m her friend. I was just staying over at her house, Mr. Glaciare.”

“Are you her boyfriend or something?” Father had a tone of intimidation, yet he had the brightest smile ever. What a weirdo. “Father, He’s not my boyfriend, we’re just close friends.”

Father nodded his head and leaned back from his chair. “I just hope you two aren’t sleeping in the same bed already.”

“No, he sleeps on the couch, see?” I pointed over to the blankets folded neatly on the couch and a pillow perched on its arm with perfect balance.

“Wow! Haha, you’re just like your mother. She wouldn’t let me sleep with her in the same room until our second year of dating. The name’s Carlon Glaciare.” He raised a hand to Lio, and the two locked into a firm shake.

“Elliott Meyne.”

I could tell my father was way more loose, his shoulders resting low and his posture relaxing. The front two legs of his chair were suspended in the air as he leaned far back. That was why mother always hated me doing that as a child, it was Father’s bad habit.

I cleared my throat, desperate to drown out the creaking of the chair swaying back and forth. “I’m happy I get to see you now, but why are you here?”

Father nearly fell over, but caught himself by planting his forearms firmly on the table. He also cleared his throat, like father like daughter I guess. “I got an invitation from the Soaran royal family to attend an emergency meeting to contribute my research about the undead.”

My face scrunched horribly. Since when was he a scholar? Since I was a kid, he was always a street performer, making barely enough to feed us. I feel like we’d need a lot more catching up to do.

Father must've seen my face because he was leaning closer to me and straightened his posture like that of a gentleman. “You know, I missed you a lot, Charliette. If you’d send me letters, you’d know that I was offered a job as a magic professor.”

I was stumped, caught red handed. It just never occurred to me to send a letter to him. I was just so busy most of the time that it slipped my mind. Part of me assumed he would send letters to me, though. He didn’t.

He read my mind yet again. “I wish I could send letters to you, but things have been pretty tense with Curuni and the New Lucrez Kingdom lately. Curuni just isn’t willing to send anything across their borders, not even a damn letter!”

I pursed my lips as I listened to my father rant on and on about politics. The New Lucrez Kingdom was located at the end of a peninsula, sticking out towards the vast seas, its issue was that it was solely bordered by Curuni. Both nations had bad blood with each other, since Curuni had attempted to take over the young nation in its infancy in order to gain access to its outstretched coast. They failed, though, only able to take a small chunk out of the Lucrez Kingdom. The Dalmonians (as is what its citizens are called) still held resentment towards Curuni and even launched skirmishes across the Curuni borders to get their territory back, two hundred years after they’d taken it. As a result, Curuni refused to do any sort of trade or transport of Dalmonian goods, letters included. In order to get things to Kori Soaro from the New Lucrez Kingdom, it had to go through Curuni. That’s where my father ranted the most.

Sure, he was right. I could have sent letters to the Lucrez Kingdom, since Curuni and Kori Soaro are best-buddies, but I never thought about doing so. I promptly apologized to my father for being so absentminded. But that didn’t matter for the moment. We got back to the subject at hand.

My father explained that in just under a few months of moving back to the New Lucrez Kingdom, the Vice-Chairman of a magic academy saw him street performing using magic, and offered him a teaching position on the spot. Of course, he had to get proper education for that position, so the man offered to pay my father to get a degree to be fit for lecturing. Fast-forward four years later, and here he was! Sitting right across from me with animated hands as he spoke.

“While I was working towards my degree, I happened to get into research on the undead. That’s the kind of research Kori Soaro wanted to get their hands on.”

“Do you have it on you?” I asked. Lio and I were honed in on my father, we were genuinely interested to learn about the undead. At least I can learn about the creatures that I ran into man, many times.

Father reached into his coat pockets and yanked out a plump bundle of folded papers. He carefully unfolded them and slid them to us.

The vast majority of the research was done in bullet points, no drawn graphs or any visuals. But all of it was very detailed nonetheless. Just from skimming over the research, it was very clear just how much time my father spent on this subject.

What were the contents of the research, you may ask? Oh, it was something I never even thought of doing. Father and his colleagues had undergone an experiment on a recently deceased corpse, using Displacement magic to inject magic energy into it. The original perception of Displacement magic was that it worked only on things capable of producing velocity, meaning that anything able to constantly move at a changing pace was able to be influenced by Displacement magic. A corpse doesn’t fulfill this requirement because it’s always stationary, so it couldn’t be stopped because it was already immobile, and even when thrown, the body won’t go far enough to produce significant velocity. But that perception was false, as my father proved.

His hypothesis was that anything can be influenced by Displacement magic if enough energy is inserted into it. Flux, at its core, only forces the movement of a thing capable of moving, but if the spell were to somehow be elevated, then it would be possible to use Displacement magic like Flux to force even a corpse to be up and mobile.

Father managed to elevate a Flux spell by combining the magic energy of half a dozen other mages through the use of Accelerate, much like how I use it to store my own magic energy in a tome. They got in a line and did Accelerate on one another, transferring their energy to the other all the way until the last person who had their hands on the dead body. They received all the energy from the other powerful mages and used Flux on the corpse.

The body supposedly began twitching and rising to its feet, but promptly fell back down lifeless. It worked though, it just required an insane amount of magic energy to maintain, and it was merely akin to a puppet as they controlled it. All six mages were out of magic energy just to get the body to move for barely three seconds. They still couldn’t figure out how to give the undead free will or sentience.

“What all that means is that I know for sure magic is causing these new types of undead to roam, and someone somewhere is controlling them.”

I nodded my head, still enthralled by the research he showed us. Never would we have thought these undead to be essentially puppets, but dependent on someone. In order to stop all of this, we had to stop the person in control of these monsters.

But who could it be? I shuddered at a single possibility.