The classes at the university took place when one was ready to attend them, rather than at a set time. So long as you appeared between the hours of dawn and dusk, a teacher would be waiting and ready to instruct. I felt another break in realism, a recognition that things were not quite right here.
Although the teachers were dressed in fine robes and held themselves with a royal dignity, I couldn’t help but feel like they had a fate similar to the peasant women stuck in their houses. I eyed the stacks of papers on the desk and wondered if their in-trays regenerated every morning. An endless life of paperwork and lectures.
I wondered if they got days off or if they were stuck on repeat forever. Maybe they needed to unionize.
The teacher for my Healing class was an elderly high elf called Professor Prindous. He had sumptuous blue embroidered robes, a long-wizened beard, and the weirdest hands I’d ever seen which neither he nor Nightfall commented on. I knew it would be kind of rude to point out, especially if this was the real world and it was like… an actual disability or something but considering this whole Citadel looked like an AI creation I wondered if this guy was also just an AI generated filler-character.
My suspicion wasn’t based off nothing, there were other tells as well. He looked past us when he spoke, as though he was teaching a full classroom despite the fact that Nightfall and I were the only students. His descriptions of his class were verbose and felt like they consisted of a lot of filler content, like James had just instructed an AI model to ‘script me a class on Healing that is based on this world’ because he was too lazy to do it himself. Or he probably wanted to spend more time coming up with pervy content like succubus slime and ‘nekokin’ catgirls.
And AI art models could be notoriously bad at hands.
“Pay attention,” Nightfall hissed at me. “If Bruiser asks why you had to repeat your class, I’ll tell him exactly how frivolously you are treating his sponsorship.”
I gave Nightfall an annoyed look but returned my attention to the lecture. The wizened old man used a long, pointed stick to indicate various body parts and describing them in the most boring way possible.
When the class finished, he handed out written assignments that looked like a nine-year-old could complete them. They pointed to various diagrams with ‘fill in the blanks’ which took Nightfall and I less than an hour in the library to finish.
“Bruiser’s not sponsoring me, by the way,” I corrected the dark elf as we packed up our books. “I’m paying for this myself with the money I earned from doing a quest with Brick and Bastion.”
It was at the cost of the little dream house in Market Town, but I was certain we could save up again once the whole necromancer threat and mystery around what James’ purpose for this place was resolved.
He nodded and gestured for me to hurry up. I put my book away and followed him back to the classroom where we handed our assignments in and immediately began the next lecture.
“What happens if someone turns up during a lecture?” I asked quietly. “Or if they want the first lecture? Do they have to wait? Or do they just join in the one that’s already happening?”
“It’s never happened to my knowledge.” Nightfall gave me a curious look, then turned his attention back to the lecturer who was now droning on about different races that inhabited this world.
I took some notes, interested at the beginning, but then felt the lull of sleepiness take over. In order to stay awake I started doodling. I drew the lecturer in front of me with his beard in a knot and his robes on fire. Then I drew his strange hands that seemed to have extra hands coming out of them. It was kind of difficult to inspect them when he was gesticulating towards his diagrams, but I thought I counted at least fourteen fingers coming out of his right hand and maybe eleven on his left. Then the elf captured my attention again and I started sketching out his profile.
He really was one of the most beautiful creatures in existence. He’d put the elves of Lord of the Rings to shame any day. I shaded his hair in, then began sketching the swirling patterns on his robes. Brick had mentioned that his class was a rogue, which was unusual for a dark elf if the lecturer was to be believed. Most of them were mages, just like most orcs were warriors.
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Nightfall’s eye twitched and I realized I’d been staring at him a little too long. Blushing in embarrassment at getting caught, I dropped my eyes to my notes and continued my sketch from memory.
“Orcs are distinguishable by their large muscle mass and green skin. They also have green blood, the properties of which are largely unknown and have provoked very little study. Efficacy of healing potions is untested, but orcs heal at a slower rate than the more noble races. While their unique physiology has them considered as living fortresses of raw power, this blessing is also their curse. In the field, if an orc is damaged beyond reasonable repair, it is often the safer choice to abandon them to save the rest of the party unless all hazards and dangers have been identified and neutralized…”
My ears perked up at that description and I felt my lips curl into a snarl, but I remained in my seat. If this was the lecture Bastion had walked out on, I’d never mock him over it again.
“Dark elves are another of the lesser-noble races with a particularly cryptic and damning narrative, members of this species often flirt with the inherent temptation to return to their depraved roots,” the lecturer went on. I glanced at Nightfall, but his expression was carefully neutral, and he was holding his pencil perfectly still. “Unlike high elves and wood elves, who share an affinity to earth and nature elements, dark elves are considered an entirely different species. Cursed into existence by necromantic forces, their very existence casts a shadow on our world. The pure races are born of parents, with egg and sperm, but dark elves are born of nothing but dark power and are cursed to wander the world in pursuit of knowledge, power, and a place in this world. A dark elf’s cold blood is indicative of their cold hearts. Their existence poses one of the great moral dilemmas of our age. Should they be destroyed before their threat is realized, or would the very act curse the pure races with a darkness deeper than that of the necromancers and dark elves themselves…”
I felt sick listening to this, wondering if this was the part of the class that Nightfall had bailed on previously. It sounded totally like one of James’ overdramatic attempts at creating a plot for an utterly pointless reason. ‘Why is the evil guy evil? Because he’s evil, duh.’
I pushed my chair back in disgust, and crossed my arms but I didn’t rise from my seat. All I had to do was sit through the rest of this ridiculous class and fill in the blanks for my stupid points.
I thought of a new punishment for James; making him stand in front of all the characters of his world and explain to them exactly why he’d messed their lives up so badly.
“…Luckily the necromancers themselves have taken upon it to bear the bulk of that burden themselves, exterminating many of their own creations. However, there are many stragglers which still inhabit our world and their place is always up for rigorous debate…”
The lecturer continued to drone on about the pros and cons about committing genocide on the race of one of the two students sitting in his class for what seemed an age before he moved on and started talking about gnomes.
After I’d bashed James with a feminist textbook for all the crap I’d endured in this world so far, I might have to have a go with one about why racism and racial supremacy wasn’t fun and games.
Finally, the lecture ended, and I stormed off, leaving Nightfall to follow me. I’d already laid out my papers and was filling in my answers so vigorously I broke my pencil.
“It’s not true, you know,” Nightfall said, and I realized he was standing against the wall, watching me.
I exhaled sharply. “I know.”
“I don’t want to be a necromancer,” he continued. “I want to destroy them, and I want to discover the truth about what I am. I know I was brought into this world with dark magic, but there has to be more to it than that. I want to discover that secret.”
“You’re right,” I said fiercely. “You are more than the sum of your parts and you don’t have to be what that guy said. He’s a moron reading from a script written by a moron. You’re more than that.”
He looked at me, stunned and speechless.
“Would you… allow me to study you?” he asked, suddenly taking a step towards me.
“What?” I blinked in surprise.
“There has never been much study on succubi, other than from the necromancers themselves. Your life magic is almost the antithesis to what mine is. Dark magic. Void magic. You might be the very key I’ve been looking for. I find myself inexplicably drawn to you. Both succubi and dark elves have suffered much of the same fate. There seems… much that connects us. Perhaps our two races are in the same orbit, part of the same mystery.”
I pressed my lips together, not particularly keen at the idea of being a guinea pig. But I also didn’t want to alienate the only friend I had within the university.
“Maybe,” I said diplomatically. “Finishing these courses come first. Then we can talk.”
“Agreed,” he said, sounding satisfied. “Let us complete our assignments.”
I looked at the paper and felt my stomach go sour when I read the first task. We had to list all the pros and cons of exterminating dark elves.