Leaving the training hall, Emily sends a small spark of mana into the crystal within her robes to end the recording, pleased that she’d had the presence of mind to take the recording crystal to the lesson with her. After checking The Clock quickly, taking note of the time, she heads towards the transportation rooms, lost in thought.

I can review the fight and work out how he cast without a magic circle later. As for finding out who’s collecting crests as trophies, my best bet will be Oscar and Jenny. I’ll go to Jenny first since she’s been here longer.

Stepping into the teleportation circle, Emily thinks of the teacher’s dorms while injecting mana. After a quick displacement, she finds herself in an unfamiliar hallway. A lush crimson rug stretches down the centre of the long corridor. The ceilings are arched, with decorative patterns carved between the glowing crystal lights.

Each door is two metres of silver metal with a name and number etched delicately in the centre, separated by at least fifty metres from the next. The first door starts at ‘101’ and Emily slowly walks down the empty hall until she arrives at ‘118’, Jenny’s room, without spotting a single person.

I guess the teachers don’t like roaming the halls much. I don’t often see them between classes either. It’s slightly unsettling.

Clearing her thoughts, she reaches up and knocks politely, hoping Jenny’s in. After a dozen seconds, as Emily’s hope begins to die, the door fades from existence, revealing Jenny standing before her with a raised brow and a quizzical smile.

“Emily, what a surprise. Please come in,” she says lightly while stepping aside.

Emily enters the room, looking around with curiosity. To her right, as she steps in, are a few sofas arranged around a low coffee table and a burning hearth set into the wall. Inside, she sees a small red magic circle carved into the ground with a few small red crystals powering it.

Moving her gaze away, she looks to her left and sees a small kitchenette with a counter and a few raised chairs in the centre.

It’s a lot more homely than I expected.

Unsure what to do, Emily awkwardly looks to Jenny, who walks past her into the kitchen.

“Take a seat over there,” Jenny says while gesturing towards the fireplace. “Would you like any tea? Coffee? Hot Chocolate?”

“Um, tea please,” Emily answers as she settles down on one of the soft sofas.

Looking around, she notices three doors leading further into the residence. All of them are dark wood with silver handles, the same as the bathroom door in Emily’s own room. After a short wait, Jenny walks over carrying a tray that she places down on the coffee table between them as she sits on a sofa herself.

“It’s a simple herbal tea. Sorry there’s not any choice: I don’t drink tea myself. There’s milk in the jug and sugar in the bowl if you’d like. As for the cookies, help yourself!” Jenny cheerily explains as she takes a sip from her own mug, containing a dark brown liquid that Emily assumes to be coffee.

“Thank you. I’m honestly surprised you even have a kitchen in your room.”

Emily pours some tea into her cup and adds a small drop of milk as she speaks.

“Haha, yes. A small bonus of teaching here, I guess. We get to customise our rooms, and I wanted a kitchen since I enjoy cooking. I even baked these biscuits myself,” Jenny answers with a cheeky grin while taking a bite from a chocolate chip cookie she has dipped in her drink.

Maybe it’s hot chocolate.

“Anyway, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?”

Emily considers the question for a moment, unsure how to approach the topic of the trophy collector without mentioning the black market and her own law breaking. She wants to focus on getting answers not answering questions.

I guess I can skirt around the issue at first and see how she reacts.

“I just wanted to ask you a question.” She pauses to take a sip of her tea before continuing. “Have a lot of mages gone missing within the city?”

Jenny flinches slightly before responding.

“Are you asking about recently, or in general?”

“Both.”

“Well, there haven’t been a lot recently. In fact, we haven’t had a disappearance for the last three years. But yes, we do have the occasional vanishing mage. Why do you ask?”

“I was in the city this morning,” Emily begins, watching closely for Jenny’s reaction, “and I noticed somebody following me.”

Jenny places her mug down with a slight quiver that Emily wouldn’t have noticed if not for the enhanced eyesight from her awakening.

She knows something.

“At first, I assumed it was just a normal mugger. It wouldn’t be the first time I was attacked for my money on the lower levels. However, when I allowed them to follow me into a deserted alleyway, they used some strange incense that blocked my mana flow. I was able to defend myself thanks to my hand-to-hand combat training, but it seemed like a targeted attack, and I can’t help but wonder if it has happened to others before.”

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Finished setting her bait, she calmly sits back and takes another sip from her tea as she watches Jenny hesitate before speaking.

“Yes, that would make sense for the past cases as well.” Jenny nods solemnly before continuing with a sigh. “I don’t know much about it myself, but there have been certain… rumours… around The Dome for a while about a group of mage killers acting within the city. I’ve seen a few of their victims myself, all of them appeared to have been killed with a close-ranged weapon. I did always wonder why they didn’t defend themselves with magic, but if the killers had inhibition incense that would explain a lot.”

“You saw a few victims? Did they still have their crests?” Emily asks without a thought.

“No, they didn’t. How did you know that?” Jenny narrows her eyes at her.

Whoops. I probably shouldn’t have asked that yet. Ah well, I think that’s everything she’ll tell me anyway.

“I just guessed,” Emily calmly states.

Jenny nods slowly, her look of suspicion still present.

“Interesting guess. Anyway, I’ll inform the other faculty members about this and submit a report to my superiors about the worrying use of inhibition incense. They will likely visit you within a few days to ask for a more detailed account.”

Not if this conversation never happened.

“Thank you for bringing this to my attention, Emily,” Jenny continues. “Is there anything else you would like my help with?”

“No, that’s all. Thank you for your time,” Emily says politely while standing up and bowing her head.

“Nonsense! I told you to come to me for anything, especially if you’ve been attacked in the city.” Jenny stands up and walks with her to the door. “Be careful out there, I’d advise not travelling into the city alone from now on.”

“Thank you, I’ll keep your advice in mind.”

Leaving her words of thanks behind, Emily swiftly makes her way through the corridor back towards the teleportation circle.

That just leaves asking Oscar. He seems to be keeping track of things happening in The Dome. I’d be surprised if he didn’t know something about these mage killers.

Stepping through the teleportation circle, Emily once again arrives in a new corridor. Similar in design to the staff apartments, the A-grade dorms also boast a plush red carpet and stylish ceilings. However, the scale of the hallway is reduced, and the doors are all closer to each other. She quickly makes her way down the corridor, passing a few people before she arrives at room A19.

After a few firm knocks, the door vanishes, and Oscar greets her with a smile.

“Hey Emily, what’s up?”

“I want to ask you about something. Can I come in?”

Oscar raises a brow, but still steps aside and quickly ushers her in. The room is twice the size of hers, with several pieces of expensive-looking furniture and a few doors leading to side rooms. Emily quickly chooses a large sofa and drops onto it, facing Oscar as he walks over to sit opposite her with obvious curiosity.

“So, what do you want to know?”

“What do you know about mage killers in the city?” Emily asks straightforwardly, unconcerned about skirting around the truth like with Jenny.

Oscar’s eyes narrow instantly, glinting coldly as he focuses on her.

“Why are you asking?”

“I went to the black market earlier and was baited into entering a tent with a crystal skull embroidered on the front. Inside, I met someone with a collection of crests from Covenant mages. They used inhibition incense to try and kill me. I want to know who they are and why they’re killing mages.”

Oscar relaxes slightly, leaning back in his seat and placing his head on his fist as he nods.

“I see, and are you asking this personally, or as a mage of the Mandrago family?”

Emily narrows her eyes slightly and tilts her head in confusion.

“Personally, but why would that matter?”

“Well, if you were asking this for your family, I wouldn’t answer,” Oscar replies with a derisive grin, surprising Emily with his shift in demeanour. “Of course, your family would be able to tell you themselves if they weren’t so greedy.”

“What do you mean?”

Oscar looks slightly surprised by her question.

“Don’t you know? Your family can’t give you information on the mage killers because they haven’t had a mage within The Covenant as staff or student since they sent their last members on a suicide mission into The Glade ten years ago. Everyone knows that the only way to gain information from within The Dome and capital is to leave a member of the family as staff in The Covenant. It’s just common sense.”

I didn’t know, but it’s nice to find out they have no way of getting information from within The Dome anymore.

“Okay, ignoring my family’s incompetence, are you willing to give me any information or should I leave?” Emily asks, breaking Oscar out of his mocking laughter.

“Oh sure, I’d be thrilled to help you!” His quick switch to a beaming smile sends a slight shiver down Emily’s spine. “The group you ran into refer to themselves as The Crystal Skull, quite an obvious name from their emblem. They popped up in the capital about thirty years ago now, five years after the last truce was signed with Morzea. They’re a group of highly trained individuals who kill low-level mages in training within the kingdom, but mostly focused on the capital. The royal family has tried to get rid of them a few times, even putting together a squad of third circle mages to capture a few of their members three years ago, but they always spring back up, like the weeds they are, whenever they get wiped out. Unfortunately, they had several contingencies in place to kill themselves before revealing much information as well, so we didn’t find out much.”

He pauses for a moment to let Emily process everything before continuing.

“Now, as for the information we do know, they aren’t mages, and kill purely with traps and close-quarters combat. Hence why hand-to-hand combat is such a popular lesson these days: it makes it far safer to travel within the city if you know you can defend yourself against them after having your magic blocked. They also have access to a plethora of magical oddities, like the inhibition incense you mentioned, and we don’t know their source. However, I suspect that they are trained and supplied by Morzea for the sake of weakening us during peacetime.”

Emily nods thoughtfully for a moment before asking:

“Wasn’t our last peace treaty meant to end the wars for territory on this continent?”

“Ha, is that what they told you in geopolitics? No, the peace treaty was only set to last one hundred years. It may seem like a lifetime to commoners, but to us mages it’s only a temporary ceasefire to gather strength.”

“I see. Thanks for the information,” Emily says absentmindedly, considering the consequences of Oscar’s words.

If they exclusively fight in close quarters, I should be relatively safe. The thought of war brewing is troubling, but it’s still seventy-odd years off, so I’ll toss that to the back of my mind for now.

“Why are you so willing to tell me all this?”

“I feel like it’s in my interest to stay in your good graces,” Oscar replies smoothly. “By the way, are the explosives ready for sale yet?”

“Not quite, I have the ratios finished now, but I still need to design and make my final prototypes before I can sell them. Give me two days and I’ll show you my final test before we can decide on a price and how many you want.”

“Sure, I look forward to it!”

***

Emily spends the evening designing her explosives, then the next day doing spell creation tests. Carefully watching the time as she does, she pulls out The Clock and resets at the exact time she left her magical combat lesson twenty-four hours prior.

With her inquisitive conversations wiped clean, she finds Oscar and lets him know about the final test in two days' time, before returning to her room. Finally, she has time to review her recent magical duel.