As the lights from the spell died down, Alec's eyes adjusted to his surroundings. Many were in the same situation as him, with their arms or hands blocking their faces and their pupils changing sizes in an attempt to adjust.
Next to him, he found some of the professors to be lying on the ground, and Professor Miriam was among these people. Alec could see some sort of black-purple smoke coming off from her. He turned his head to the other side and noticed about half of the student body to be lying on the ground.
What he found more noteworthy was, however, the uncaring attitude of those who hadn't fainted. They were straight-faced, standing with their back straight and their eyes looking directly ahead. Occasionally, one or two would look at the fainted ones briefly before looking ahead again.
'This... It must be what the journal me talked about. The students seem to become more calm and collected during moments of crisis. It might also be related to the anti-meme being weaker. Maybe it suppresses some parts of their personality when active, Alec calculated while his gaze wandered about the crowd.
While he was busy thinking what the spell had done, Professor Emma left the octagon and approached their side.
"This many tainted people... It's too much," She muttered with a frown. Alec quickly picked up on it. They were the tainted. Professor Howard nodded and caressed his beard thoughtfully.
"Indeed. There is no way some potion dealer could affect this many people. Not to mention, even the professors were affected," he said. It made sense. No matter who the kingpin was, there was no way someone could deal that much under the authorities' noses.
"Then what? There are invisible demons in the academy?" Professor Emma asked sarcastically. Alec barely held himself back from flinching. It was a pretty close guess. Especially for a joke.
"Demons that use anti-memetic magic are pretty rare. Not to mention, our anti-memetic specialist professors would have noticed by now," Hunter Howard answered with his hands joined behind him. He didn't register the woman's words as a joke.
'That's interesting. Don't the demons copy whatever spell they specialized in while they were a human? Anti-memetic is a pretty rare branch, so that should be the reason,' Alec thought to himself. A moment later, Professor Howard started announcing again.
"I would like every conscious student to distance themselves from the unconscious ones immediately. I will ask you to let go of your personal spaces for a moment and form a circle around the central clearing," he said. The students obeyed and huddled closer to each other while distancing themselves from the unconscious ones. Quickly, a couple of professors spread and started piling the unconscious students side by side. It took them about ten minutes to gather.
Hunter Howard erected a bunch of earthen cabins from the ground and asked the professors with experience in healing to purify the tainted. Still, they kept silent about the taint itself and made sure the students didn't start talking to each other. This was the best they could do to stop them from causing discord and raising concerns.
Alec understood this decision. Overflow of unstable emotions could cause demonic incursions. The main reason behind the professors trying to hide the whole potion ordeal was this. If the potions actually caused demonic taint, telling the students about it would only cause them to get even more nervous.
As the Professors started treating the tainted one by one, The rest gathered into a circle. About fifty people. The only students in the fray were Alec and Edward. Professor Howard erected seats for everyone with a flick of his hand. Once the people had settled, a few sound-isolation barriers appeared around them at the same time.
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"This is an unprecedented crisis. One that has to be resolved as soon as possible," Professor Howard started by saying. He sat straight and looked at everyone's faces one by one before continuing. "I'm sure all of you have heard about the 'potion dealer'. Although there are indeed demonic substances inside the potions, we have noticed them to be perfectly bound. From the tests we made, they had no demonizing effect."
His words attracted many gasps from the audience. Whispers rose and mixed into each other. Alec coughed, feeling tight in his throat for some reason. 'Interesting. This was hidden from us too. Did Edward know it?' Alec thought. He briefly looked at Edward, who seemed unimpressed. 'He knew it.'
"Why was this hidden from us?" Professor Enoch asked, causing the commotion to die down. His arms were crossed, giving off an aggressive vibe. Still, Alec attributed that to his general demeanor rather than a particular emotion.
"The main reason was that we had no clue for the reason behind the taint spread. We didn't want to cause more discord amongst professors. Now, however, this has scaled beyond what we can hide," Professor Howard responded calmly. He didn't get agitated by Enoch's aggressive attitude. "We have to figure out what this is being caused by."
Alec frowned. Things were getting complicated. First, the professors had thought that the potions were the main reason behind the spreading taint. Alec himself was pretty sure that it was caused by the demonic incursion at the end of the previous semester. But was that really the case?
'I would get it if only the students were being affected. After all, we were much more limited in combat capabilities at the time. Many had to engage in close combat. But the professors? They knew. They had kept their distances according to what it said in the journal. There was no way for a quarter of them to get tainted, especially considering how they could have fought against the taint’s corruption and expelled it in real time. Which leaves only one choice,' Alec thought. He supported his head with his hand, his eyes looking at the ground. 'It is caused by something anti-memed. It has to have settled slowly, with time. In a way that stops the professors from noticing. It has to have been going on for some time. Since when?'
"Mr. Alec," Alec was woken up from his daze by Professor Howard calling his name. He quickly straightened his posture and raised his eyes. Many professors directly turned toward his direction, while some had to follow the other's gaze to find who he was. "Can you please tell us about your investigation into the dealer?"
"Oh... Yes," Alec said before taking a deep breath. "We have been looking into the dealer for about... 10 days. I noticed some kind of taint on Edward Spellson's arm during training and forced him to go get it checked out. It was really nasty, and I didn't want something bad to happen to him. Then we talked to Professor Emma and learned about the demonic potions."
At his mention of the woman, some people gave her a brief look before tuning back in.
"From there on, our research began. I did most of the investigations with disciplinary committee member Evan Coates. We went around interrogating students who bought potions. Unfortunately, the dealer was careful. They used face and voice-changing spells and acted really careful," Alec said. Some professors nodded, some frowned. "Finally, understanding that we weren't getting anywhere, we moved with Edward's orders. We managed to secure a trade with the dealer and went to the meeting place, somewhere in the inner forest. Unfortunately..."
Alec took a breath, noticing that he was left breathless after speaking in one go. He was getting unreasonably nervous. That was weird. He wasn't one to get nervous because of public speaking. Especially if he had nothing to worry about. Why would that happen?
"We couldn't catch the dealer. One moment, we were standing. The next moment, the credit in my student card was gone—replaced by a potion. It was eerie," he said. Then he stopped. There was nothing else to say. They hadn't had the time to investigate any further. Ten days was too short, especially considering how secretive they had to be with it.
"There is no way of denying, it was an anti-memetic feat," Professor Enoch said. Many seemed to agree, nodding their heads. Alec wanted to state that he would probably notice if it was anti-memetic, but held himself back from doing so.
"That makes sense. But I find something really interesting," Professor Howard said. His gaze locked onto Alec. Again, Alec felt that stinging worry in his heart, warning him of something. "But then, why did the dealer suddenly change from using face and voice changing to anti-memetic magic? Especially right when Mr. Alec and student Evan decided to confront them?"
'Oh...'