“What the fuck happened to your place?” I heard as I woke up bleary and confused. What time was it?

“Trey! Get up, we gotta be at school in an hour.”

Ah, Liz was here. Right. I had asked her to make sure I woke up in time. I groaned and rolled over; I really didn’t want to get up.

“I’ll go tomorrow, let me sleep,” I groaned. I still had one more absence left, right? I could use that today and go tomorrow. The moment I decided that freezing water splashed onto me.

“Holy fuck, I’m up! I’m up!” I shouted as I jumped up, shocked out of my stupor. I jumped around trying to shake as much water off as I glared at Liz while cold and uncomfortable. Liz was staring at me looking extremely amused.

Annoyed, I quickly changed into my uniform as she plopped onto the dry part of my couch and waited for me. Our school was in the southeast end of uptown, about a thirty-minute walk from here. After throwing on my clothes, Liz and I headed to school.

Something nice about walking with Liz was how much safer it felt. Something I had to deal with when alone was people harassing me for cash or just causing trouble. Liz had a reputation. Not exactly hotheaded, but quick to defend herself and competent. Besides, most people here wouldn’t report any fights so if it came down to it, she would use mana to resolve any issues. Last dude to fuck with her ended up broken in a dumpster and eating from a straw for months.

I thought about this as some guys stared at us and one of them pointed and whispered, but ultimately left us alone. We finally got to the edge of uptown and were stared by more benign types. Around the edge of uptown, people were far more aware of small things that made us stand out. The way we spoke, our body language, small details that marked us as something other. I usually passed for the in-group while alone, but Liz staunchly refused to. She was proud of how she was brought up and wouldn’t hide it.

My musings ended as we finally made it to school. Liz and I split up about fifteen minutes before classes started. I walked into my homeroom and sat in a corner. About two minutes later, someone else entered the room.

I looked up, mildly surprised to see a familiar face. It was the girl from yesterday who gave me the card to that club. She walked over to me with a wide smile on her face.

I paid more attention to her this time, knowing she was one of my classmates. I wasn’t the most personable person in school and barely attended but it was still pretty fucked that I forgot a classmate’s face, I hope she didn’t take offense.

“We meet again! By the way, I didn't catch your name yesterday,” She said as she stole the chair in front of me and sat in it backwards. Well, I felt better knowing both of us were bad with recognition.

“Name’s Trey, how long have you been coming here?” My voice was muffled by my arms as I continued lying on my desk, it was rude and not respecting people wasn’t my M.O. but I was tired.

I was thinking she might’ve been a transfer, I hoped so at least. She leaned in close, propping herself up on my desk, and stared at me. “Ella. And I tested into this school during winter admission season. Surprised to someone from Blacklight here.”

It was rare that those in Delmar Academy came from Blacklight. Most of the kids were children of merchants and others from the rapidly developing middle class who lived around the outskirts of uptown. A couple of aristocratic kids also came here. As far as I knew, out of the whole student body, only me and Liz were from Blacklight. At least until Ella showed up.

"Same, not many bother to try to test in here, and the few that do fail typically. What track you on?"

"Wardcraft, with a secondary in gemcraft. How bout you?"

"Artifice, wardcraft is my second. how do you feel about Professor Lington?”

Her face immediately soured at the mention of that bastard. A smile touched my lips

"What sort of psycho tests us by having us draw our wards on sticky notes?!" She shouted in exasperation. I chuckled recalling his “unique” methods.

“I remember I messed up the venting sigil once and he straight failed me. Not a single point given.” It was far behind me at this point. Honestly, I stopped feeling slighted by it long ago. I saw the value in such strict grading. While that particular ward wasn’t much of an issue if you had a venting ward incorrect on a stronger ward array you'd be on an express ticket to the afterlife. I haven’t forgotten one since.

“How come I haven’t seen you around?” She asked.

I sighed, “I tend not to show up,” answering honestly, “I’m using most of my preparation days to work on personal projects. I’m planning on getting into Northridge Academy after graduation. Or hoping to at least.”

Ella let out a low whistle, “Northridge? It’s rated the highest academy for wardcraft, fifth in combat, second in gemcraft, and third in artifice right?” I nodded in response. “Lofty goal, I’m guessing you're preparing for the practical exam.”

“Something like that,” I responded, as my mind drifted back to last night. The crystal I reclaimed was integral to my design; I needed a fairly large power source and the gem was just large enough to make do. Hopefully, it’d be there when I went to check.

People were starting to file in as Ella and I continued talking about random, inane topics, she finally got up as the girl who was assigned the seat in front of me finally returned. Finally, our professor showed up and I zoned out as soon as class started. I didn’t care much for the history of wards, making this class fairly worthless. Besides, the final was a month ago, as most students are starting to prepare for academia proper and need time and the ability to focus on preparing for specific entrance exams.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

Mine was a crafts demonstration. I finished getting my rough design documents a while ago and now I just need to acquire all the materials for mine. I had most of the essentials down, just needed to get the licenses and stuff to make my ownership of them legal.

I sat through the rest of the class glossy-eyed, not having much interest in the subject matter. Before I knew it, the class was over and I had actual warding class, something that mattered. As I walked off to class, Ella sauntered up next to me, a warm smile still stapled to her face.

“What class do you have next?” she asked me, standing a bit too close to me. I took a half step to the side.

“Lington’s, you?”

“Same. Work with me, we have a group assignment today.”

Ah, so she was hoping for that. I gave her a once over, and she gave off a good enough vibe. Not lacking in self-confidence at least “Sure,” I responded.

We reached the class to see people already in groups of two to three people. I followed Ella to her seat.

“What’s the assignment?” I asked her.

“We have to create a mana-sealing ward with an eighty-percent efficacy rate.” Mana sealing, huh. My mind started compiling the different wards that could seal mana inside, and we started creating the ward array.

Ella was good at this, she had several wardbooks worth of information stored in her head that shined through as we iterated through designs. She did most of the heavy work, while I sat around feeling pretty damned useless. Instead, I focused on watching her decisions to see why she made them while also pointing out small technical errors such as ward spacing. She immediately had an extremely effective design though. It not only kept most of the mana in, but she had a multilayered design that caused the mana that escaped the inner layer to be vented inward. I typed the rough details of her ward into my phone. I would have to recreate a decent part of it, but copying good outlines can always save a bunch of time in the future.

Ella finished up a bit before the class period was up. We waved down the professor and had him look over our work. He reviewed it, testing its integrity and to see if mana would leak out. He then forced an insane amount of mana in it rapidly, causing the ward to start rapidly degrading. It managed to hold until the mana inside stabilized.

“Roughly eighty-two percent of the mana was maintained. Good work. Design is a tad over-engineered but you’ll have a future in ritualism at this rate.” He then walked off to review the next group’s work.

Ella and I left class early. As we left, I remembered the wardbook that the thief had given me.

"Hey Ella, can you look over a wardbook of mine? Bought it off someone for cheap and I'm not sure if it's a counterfeit or sabobook."

"Sure. Though you really shouldn't be buying from people who you think may be pawning off sabobook. Those fuckers sell ‘em to actual children and shit too for a quick buck letting them get killed or maimed."

Ella's voice sounded strained and tinged with anger; it was the first time since I met her that her tone wasn't laced with a placid amusement.

It caught me off guard, probably a story that was better left unearthed for now. I decided to push the conversation forward before she had a chance to dwell on it.

"Aight thanks, mind following me back to my place? I left it there."

Immediately Ella's step stuttered and she glanced at me with suspicion flashing on her face before her usual smirk returned. This time it looked a bit forced.

"Mmm, how about we meet at Raul's in ten actually? I need to grab some stuff from my place and we can grab lunch while we’re there.” She asked. I cringed internally as I noticed my faux pas but decided not to acknowledge it.

Ella and I walked together, talking a bit about school and other things until we reached Blacklight, where we split off.

I headed back to my place but ended up being cut off by the guys Liz and I ran into earlier. Did I forget to mention I knew them?

“Hey Trey, it's been a minute. Where have you been?” Leo shouted. I sighed and locked eyes with him.

“Yo Leo, how have you been? Haven’t seen you around.” He laughed at my response.

“Fuck you mean haven’t seen me around? you’ve been avoiding me like the plague since you stopped selling shit to Martha. Too good for me or something?” Leo sounded angry, which was fair. I did cut him off intentionally. Leo was a bit of a wild card; he was an angry, frustrated, restless person who had way too much time on his hands. This was a dangerous combination for the ward of a smuggler who often had illegal and highly dangerous things to have. Too volatile.

It was weird that he felt slightly by me cutting him off. I wasn’t particularly close to him, and he had people come in and out of his posse all the time. I didn’t think that he gave enough of a shit about others to be bothered by someone blocking him out but I seems I was wrong.

“We should hang out more man. My bad though, been busy with school and stuff lately. Haven’t had time to hang out often.”

“Yet you still have time to hang out with that bitch every day huh?” He responded. I was confused for a second before it clicked. This wasn’t about me and him, it was about him and Liz.

He and his cronies stepped closer to me, with the half-dozen of them forming a semi-circle around me.

I don’t know what went down between the two of them but it looks like that I just got caught in the middle of some beef.

It was obvious where this was going, I wasn’t known for my combat prowess like Liz, most knew me for being sticky-fingered and quick at the mouth. Those traits weren't very good for fighting six dudes at once. I felt my heart start racing as I analyzed the situation. I could fight them, beating the dogshit out of the first one to touch me before they could jump me but then they’ll probably only beat me far worse than originally planned.

I pivoted on my foot and sprinted away. They chased me immediately, obviously ready for me to run. I rushed as fast as I could, gaining a bit of ground before turning into an alley. I quickly looked around, finding the best route to run. Bingo.

I vaulted up the side of a dumpster and used the dumpster to grab onto the bottom of a fire escape ladder. I managed to start pulling myself up out of reach before the boys caught up to me and started filing into the alleyway. I caught my breath for a second. They started yelling at me before Leo shouted at the largest guy among them to lift him up. The boy grabbed Leo by the bottom of his legs and hoisted him high enough to reach the ladder as I started running up the stairs toward the top. I reached the highest point of the fire escape as they rushed after me. Leo was the closest with a gap between the rest of them about a story below. I looked to see if I could reach the roof from here.

The jump would be sketchy. Even if I did it from the safety rail, it’s pretty unlikely I could reach the jump consistently. I glanced back down to notice that Leo almost caught up to me. Maybe I should fight him before his friends catch up? No, it’s stupid to fight this high up. Besides, he could just try to grapple me for a few seconds, just long enough for someone else to catch up. Then I’m just as fucked as before. I ran up here thinking the jump to the roof was easier, but misjudging that distance may have fucked me.

As Leo started rounding up the last staircase before he reached me, I had a brilliantly stupid idea.

I slowly hopped over the safety railing and placed my feet between the bottom of the bars. Leo reached the top and looked at me confused. “The fuck are you doing?” He sounded a bit scared. “Don’t fucking jump, fucking hells man.” His friends stopped on the staircase below him hearing his words. Perfect.

I let out a deep breath that I didn’t fully realize I was holding. I jumped down and hoped for the best.