'Oh...'

Alec froze. He threw a quick glance without turning his head in Edward's direction, hoping for help. Unfortunate. He had his arms crossed, curiously eyeing Alec. No help from him. Alec fought an internal battle. A quick fight, a quick win. He didn't frown. Didn't flinch. His heartbeat threatened to quicken, but he held it back. He kind of cheated though. The mana brain rotated furiously, fighting against the emotions being rained down upon it.

Maybe a second had passed since Professor Howard's question. He had to answer, and he had to be quick. He had to un-incriminate himself somehow. If not, he had to divert the suspicion. Who else could be suspicious? Other than himself and Evan, of course.

"There weren't many people who knew of our plan," Alec chose his words carefully. He made sure not to sound agitated as if he hadn't understood he was being implicated at all. As if there was no way for him to be the culprit. He cursed his luck inside his head. 'I can't believe that I'm trying to weasel my way out of a crime I didn't commit.'

"We would appreciate it if you stated who those people were," Professor Enoch said. Alec turned his head, waiting to see a victorious, shit-eating grin on the man's face. He had been pretty antagonistic in the review committee meeting, after all. However, that wasn't the case. Instead, the man was distraught, his face a deep frown. Maybe he had wanted to fight Alec fair and square—to take a hard-won revenge. Not the way whatever this was.

"The other two who knew of it were Evan Coates and Edward Spellson. Other than that, there should be two more people," Alec said, trying to remember Evan's explanation with his hand scratching his cheek. Edward, who was sitting next to him, was surprised. His brows rose. He didn't know. They hadn't told him after all.

"Should be?" Professor Howard asked to confirm. Alec's voice was indecisive.

"Yes. I myself haven't interacted with them before. You see, to avoid alerting him, Evan reached out to two other students to set up the meeting with The Dealer," Alec said. His eyes were looking slightly up, as if he was trying to watch his memories on the air. "Then we disguised as them and went to meet The Dealer. You know how that ended so..."

"Huh... So you are saying that these two might be our culprits? These two students, whom Evan picked randomly?" Professor Howard pressured. Wasn't he supposed to be taking Alec's side? At least that was the situation during the review committee meeting. 'It must be that when it comes to demons and heresy, there are no favors and friendships,' Alec thought.

"Not really. It might also be that they have leaked it somewhere and The Dealer got a hold of it," Alec said. He sighed and continued. "There is no real way to stop them from doing so. It's not like we could have exposed the nature of our operation to warn them."

"Mm," Professor Howard nodded. Straight-faced, he looked around and checked the other professors' expressions. Some seemed to find Alec's explanation reasonable. Still, none were too satisfied with it. They kept whispering and shaking their heads. Alec felt as if he was being sucked into a black hole. Once near the event horizon, because of the bending of space-time, wherever you walked was the same direction. To the middle, into the meat grinder.

"I think it would be best for us to call Mr. Evan and talk to him. We would like to learn the names of these people, and consider running a deeper investigation into their contacts," Professor Howard said. Alec gulped. He wiped his clammy hands on his uniform and exhaled a sigh. 'Crisis averted. For now,' he thought. Then, however, he remembered—'I sent Evan off! Oh my fucking god, please act fast!'

Fortunately for Alec, Evan wasn't the type to dilly-dally. Just as Professor Howard was about to open his mouth to call for him, a buzz. The air seemed to become stale, and a deafening buzzing noise assaulted everyone's ears. Ethereal threads seemed to become visible, hanging in the air. They came from wherever and went to fuck all. To say, Alec could see neither their ends nor their start. However, if he had to guess, he would have guessed them to be hanging down from the barrier over their heads.

Then, those ethereal threads started vibrating in different frequencies, eventually conglomerating into a voice.

"Umm... Can anyone hear me? Wait no. Uhhh..." Evan's voice, albeit with a lot of parasites resounded. The people's reaction was varied. Some brows rose, some frowned. Still, Alec felt relieved. "Ehem... Anyway. Today. I am going to be sharing a story—no. The continuation of a story many of you already know."

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

Alec's head rose. His eyes unnaturally rolled into his head. So much so that his pupils almost disappeared. Then, they settled down. 'That was too big of a memory package to suddenly receive.'

Still, Alec sunk into his chair. He finally remembered why he had sent Evan away. 'These contingency plans sure come in handy.'

"This is the first volume of... Uhh..." Evan hesitated for a moment. It was easy to hear the confusion in his voice, so much so that Alec could imagine him reading the paper with a horrified expression. "This is the first volume of 'Academy's Genius Anti-Anti-Memer'," he read in one breath. Then, a moment of silence. "Holy shit that's such a bad name," he whispered, thinking that his voice wouldn't register. That was a mistake. Chuckles and gasps rose from the crowd. Negative emotions didn't seem to have much of an effect on them, but positive ones sure did. Alec could even catch some professors coughing, plucking their lips in an attempt to not laugh.

"Anyways. I will read the thirteenth installment, which is titled, 'This Book Doesn't Exist," he read. With that, the audience was starting to calm down. They were curious about what would happen, even in this abhorrent situation. So much so that it would be weird if Alec hadn't set them up with memetically enhanced volumes distributed around the academy. Memes were infectious. They jumped from one person to another. Once someone knew about it, they were a host, waiting to infect someone else with the information.

Before Evan started the next sentence, a short telepathic whisper was exchanged between Professor Howard, Enoch, and Andrew. Then, Enoch and Andrew got up from their seats before blasting off in a seemingly random direction. However, Alec knew their goal. They were going to detain Evan and bring him back here. Hopefully, they would let him go far enough into the story to help Alec's plan.

"The Noital Magic Academy was calm as always. However, Alex himself knew that wasn't the case. After all, that horrifying thing was prowling around," Evan read. Now things were getting interesting. The blatant way Alec had written the story was easy to see. Many noticed it and frowned. What was Evan trying to achieve?

Nevertheless, a sudden, second buzz came from the magical comms. This time, the ethereal threads changed in color, ever so slightly. They were easier to notice now.

'The second beat,' Alec thought. He was happy that the spell was enough to affect the entire comms. He would have rubbed his hands together like a sinister fly, ready to annoy the shit out of someone trying to sleep—If he wasn't being implicated with treason and heresy, of course.

"I still remember how that thing ate away Memetic Magic..." Evan's voice resounded, penetrating deep into the entire academy's mind. Immediately, Alec felt a surge of mana. He looked around. Everyone, the professors, and the students, had blue sparks blasting off of their heads in every direction. A grating noise reached his ears. Like the rumblings of a gargantuan, steampunk mecha. Countless clockworks folded into each other, gears rattling, geyser-like copper pipes stretching and screaming under the pressure of scalding hot water vapor...

"And how it would eat our memories if we knew too much. And how it would stop the professors from helping us. And how it would stop us from remembering the outside world. Say, what had happened there?"

By that time, Evan's voice, too, was starting to trail off. These questions were too dangerous. The anti-meme was messing with his head. It was messing with everyone's heads. Still, this was too much. Not the entire school, it couldn't.

Then, the shackles broke. Once again, crimson red. Students looked ahead blankly for a moment, then came to themselves. Professors shook. They fought. Mana's boiled inside their bodies. Countless measures against mental interferences activated. Some fainted, but some stood. Among those who stood was Professor Howard. His eyes widened in surprise at first, then narrowed into a decisive frown. He stood up and raised his hand. Suddenly, a wave of mana, an amount that would surpass Alec's entire pool by orders of magnitude poured effortlessly. It traveled and applied gentle pressure on the students' heads.

"No one!" He shouted. This time, his voice was more grating, guttural even. "No one looks up! No matter what happens! Keep your heads down!"

Alec was slightly confused. 'So he knows of the crimson sky, the dead sky?' However, he was more confused by the students' responses.

"Sir, yes sir!" They shouted, perfectly synced. Thousands of students, a rumbling chant. "The sky bleeds! And we stand steadfast! The land rots, and we burn! Heavenly flames rain down to cleanse the taint!"

Alec's heart quickened at the chant. It was filled with vigor. He felt the amount of conviction in that chant. Edward shouted, his roommates shouted... He saw Iris shout too. If Evan was there, he would have done so too. Alec was the only stranger to it. Still, he joined in and repeated their chant. At least he acted as if he did, moving his mouth.

"Fellow Mages! This taint can not be explained by anything else than a break in the Purification Array," Professor Howard bellowed. This was a completely new side of his. His calm demi-god and perverted old man persona duality was gone. The gritty commander had joined the fray. "This moment of clarity shan't last more than a few minutes! Please repair the array."

Alec sighed. This was the main reason behind him sending Evan over and using this plan. Whatever was causing the taint, they weren't finding out any time soon. Unless the anti-meme broke. He couldn’t sit and wait for the entire school to become demonized while they walked in circles around the problem because of the anti-meme.

'What was it? The... Purification Array? Maybe the outside atmosphere causes demonic taint? Holy shit... Doesn't that mean—' Alec's thoughts were cut in half by Professor Howard's next words.

"In the meantime, we have to execute the heretic!"