Saving the school would have been easier as a cafeteria worker

Chapter 107

Cal lay awake in bed, squinting from the morning sun's rays. He'd showered, changed, and was now running dangerously low on excuses to avoid starting the day. A groan left his lips, and his arms stretched further across the fluffy comforter.

"Who just caves someone's face in without saying anything?" he griped, blowing hot air from his mouth. He mulled over his words a moment later, frowning at himself. "A lot of people, myself included."

In hindsight, he should have thrown those important out of the arena the moment he realized what was happening. While the general chaos gave him some leeway, it had taken him too long to organize his thoughts. He should have created a plan of action within the first few seconds of the fight. Prodigy, Mask, and Aegis would have done so.

Oracle… didn't count.

"She's faster than I thought," he said, acknowledging the woman's prowess.

Cal couldn't say how long the fight had lasted—more than a minute, fewer than five. Regardless, he hadn't expected her to cross the horizon that fast. And then there was her speed on the ground. Most of his experience with opponents of that caliber came from Prodigy, and those spars had always been rough on his end.

The Right was stronger than Millie.

He'd only fought the Hand for a few seconds, but that was enough to see the gulf between them. Millie couldn't break through his shell in a single strike, nor could she essentially teleport in front of his augmented eyes.

"Speaking of teleportation," he said with a sigh, reaching into his pocket and raising the compass above him. He watched the needle slowly rotate, jostled by his movements. "What am I going to do with you?"

It did not answer.

"Piece of junk," he added, watching to see if the insult had any effect. The only thing he saw was his broken reflection through the fractured glass. "What about you? Anything to add?"

Red eyes stared at him, offering nothing.

Cal supposed that was better than what he'd encountered in the tower. One of the mirrors there had seen through his deception, portraying the old him before gaining a life of its own and snarling at him. Behind that mirror had been the sanctum, where he'd found the withered tree and a new conundrum.

"And you're innocent in all this as well," he asked the seed in his pocket. It had cooled overnight, appearing like a mundane nugget of gold once more. "Don't all speak at once now."

Cal tossed the compass up, playing with the national treasure. The stupid thing had sent him to the cabin once already, and it might have tried a second time yesterday. Whether it had changed its mind or something had interfered, he didn't know.

"If anyone asks, I found you like this," he said, stuffing the relic into his pocket.

His thoughts promptly returned to his encounter with the Right.

A fundamental aspect of his ability had been rewritten, and he couldn't help but wonder if anything else had changed. His connection to the void hadn't. He'd squeezed it nearly shut since his return, keeping his metaphorical distance from it.

Cal briefly lamented the night's expenditure of magic, but those feelings fell by the wayside as he traced his jaw, cheekbones, and nose.

The lie had become that much more real.

He was tempted to put it to the test—to tear his face off and see what returned. Sanity prevailed, but it was a close thing.

Cal reached to his side, grabbing his phone. Leaving it at the dorm proved to be a smart move, and he used it to check the time. It showed there was more than an hour before his first class, but he would not be attending it. Evergreen had given him the opportunity to skip the entire day, and he'd be a fool not to take her up on it. In exchange, he would have to learn some growth manifestations.

He tried to think of what he'd seen in the book the deputy headmistress had given him. Would any of those have helped him survive against the Right?

His educated guess laughed at the question.

However, they would help his cooking, and that was reason enough for him.

Cal rose from his bed, spying the book lying on the dresser. He retrieved it, tucking it under one arm before making his way toward the door. He hesitated there, gripping the brass knob.

Try as he might, he could not justify staying in his room all day.

He opened the door, stepping into the shared space.

Alice was there, seated at the table and fully dressed for the day. She didn't immediately meet his eyes, typing on that laptop of hers. Cal approached the table, sliding out a chair opposite her and settling down as she tapped away.

"Good morning," she greeted in a slightly distracted manner. Her fingers sped up, and with a final click, her eyes flicked to him, concern present. "I missed your return. Did all go well?"

He grimaced, flashes of a ruined colosseum appearing at the forefront of his mind.

"What?" she asked sharply, eyes narrowing. "Was something amiss? I warned—pardon. What exactly occurred?"

She had stopped herself mid-sentence, schooling her face.

From what she was told, the purpose of his late-night adventure was to scare off some riffraff chasing after Olivia. Needless to say, nothing like that had happened.

"I learned how rude certain people could be," he said, still annoyed at the unprovoked attack. "Also, my uniform got dirty. Emily offered to wash it and should be by sometime today."

While none of them predicted the Right or the Blessed Order crashing the party, the Federation team was operating on the assumption that there would be a fight. To limit the possibility of discovery, they'd agreed not to rendezvous later that night.

Alice didn't quite frown at that, but it was a near thing, her jaw tightening as her red eyes searched his expression.

"Do issues between you two persist?"

Undoubtedly.

But Cal had decided against running in circles about it. He'd give the agent a single chance, and if she screwed it up, then that was that.

"That's not important right now," he said honestly. Hefting the book from his lap onto the table, he pushed it to the girl. He'd unlocked it previously. "This, on the other hand…"

Confusion fell over her as she reached for the book. She gently pulled at the bark-like cover, opening it to find the colorfully decorated pages. Her fingers froze in reaction, and her head snapped to him.

"Where did you—" she began, swallowing her words and continuing in a lower voice. "Did you vandalize the deputy headmistress's office?"

Cal reeled back, cocking his head.

Why would she…

"Did Lily rat me out?" he asked hotly, irritation heavy in his voice. He lightly slapped the table. "That's it. The snake is becoming dinner."

That only added to her confusion, and Cal leaned over, dragging the book closer to the center of the table. He wouldn't want her to burn it by accident.

"We joked about vandalizing her office," Cal continued, attempting to clear things up. "And by 'we' I mean she did."

Because Cal hadn't been joking.

From the look on her face, Cal determined Lily hadn't shared that. Which meant Alice had jumped to that conclusion all on her lonesome.

"Apologies for assuming you'd become a delinquent," she responded dryly, implying it was more his fault than hers.

That was an unfair label. If he were a delinquent, he'd do things like not wear his uniform, skip classes, fight his teachers, bully other students, and… huh. Was there any box he didn't check?

Vandalism. He hadn't… no, he had done that too.

"I'm surrounded by bad influences," he hit back, shamelessly shifting blame. Alice had broken a wall on their first day, and Lily was Lily. "But that's beside the point. I didn't steal this. She gave it to me."

His alleged connection to Evergreen was a problem waiting to happen, and Cal was going to nip it in the bud.

Alice's eyes turned wide, bewilderment returning with greater force than before.

"Callum," she said urgently, preempting his explanation. "Do you have any idea of what this is?"

A book of manifestations. Duh.

"One giant misunderstanding," he prefaced, resting back in his chair and crossing his arms. He'd thought over how to approach this and kept returning to brutal honesty. "Your aunt's crazy and thinks we're related."

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It was short, to the point, and yet Alice stared at him as if he'd spoken in another language.

"I'll rephrase," he offered. "Evergreen is under the delusion that she and I are related via your mom, Claire. This is not the case. She's crazy."

That was as plain as he could put it. So why did she keep staring at him with that look on her face?

Cal rose from the chair, snapping his fingers in front of her face. She swiped at the hand, scowling at him.

"I'm struggling to comprehend what led to that impression. Mother…"

She trailed off, face growing darker by the second.

"Did nothing wrong," Cal finished for her, knowing where she was headed. If she hadn't seen her father's unfaithfulness coming, her mother's would similarly blindside her. "This is Evergreen being dumb."

Reclaiming his seat, he waited patiently for her to digest that information. Since the moment he woke up, he'd been planning what needed to be done. As far as the list went, this should have been one of the easier ones. Suffice it to say, this didn't bode well for the rest of the day.

Alice sat there, brow furrowed and lips quirked downward. Her eyes had drifted to the table, and she idly rolled a lock of her hair with one of her fingers. Eventually, a look of realization dawned on her, and her gaze settled back on him.

"Is this because of your growth magic?"

That simple string of words flipped the script, making him the one with locked-up limbs.

She knew about the plant? How? When? And why was she only bringing this up now?

While he was getting lost in his own head about what this meant, she looked at him with mirth, an awkward chuckle escaping her lips.

"Did you forget? You used it during our visit to the botanical garden."

The gardens… that had been the same week the clubs went nuts. He remembered a kid falling off a tree during the outing and having to catch him. Had he used growth magic then? He couldn't remember.

"You were tending to a plant," she continued, sighing to herself. "I recall you claimed to give it a boost. In the context of—"

Alice paused, eyeing him critically. She raised an open palm toward him, waving it in a circle.

"—you. I surmise that the plant has taken over the garden. Perhaps laying siege to the city itself."

Was he being made fun of? It felt like he was being made fun of.

"To be candid, your level of control is absurd," she said in a level, almost clinical tone. "A normal fire mage would find using water manifestations difficult, let alone the blend of water and earth required for growth magic. However, a normal mage wouldn't use a fire manifestation to bake pastries in their hands or utilize suppression cuffs as training materials. No, I think we left the realm of normality a long time ago with you."

Cal was torn on whether that was a compliment or not. He returned her critical look, his hand grasping for a sheet of paper on the table. He didn't know what it was, but he crumpled it anyway, throwing the ball at her face.

She didn't break eye contact as she blew on it, turning it to ash. Unfortunately, the ash continued on a straight path, scattering across her face and in her hair.

"Maybe you should learn wind—"

"Don't you start," she interrupted, coughing lightly and brushing ash off her nose. He could feel the heat from her hair rising, attempting to rid herself of the remaining soot.

Cal reached for another slip of paper, only for her hand to slam down on it. He eyed the book next. A few pages wouldn't be missed, right?

"Not even as a jest," she warned, swiping the book away and holding it close. "This should never have left House Evergreen grounds. It's a collection of knowledge that growth mages would kill for. Even Mother doesn't have one."

He'd known it was valuable, but that was a level above what he had predicted, and it gave him ideas.

"Does she want one?" he asked, seeming to startle her. "We can totally plagiarize it. Actually, get your phone out. We can take pictures of every page. It won't take more than an hour or so."

Did the Academy have public printers? He'd never seen them, but Alice got her documents from somewhere.

"I—no," she said, aghast at the suggestion. "That would be completely improper. Do we need to review etiquette again?"

He'd rather not.

"We are not stealing house secrets," she said, tightening her hold on the book. "Why did you even go along with her suggestion?"

'Go along' was a funny way to phrase it.

"I tried to fight it, but believe me when I say smiling and nodding was the only way out," he explained, stroking his chin. "Personally, I think the woman needs a hobby outside of work, and it can't be gardening."

The faculty member had also caught him with her records, but he wasn't going to mention that tidbit.

"You're going to return it," she declared.

Cal looked at her oddly, raising an eyebrow.

"One, it's just a book. Two, you're drastically overestimating her reasonableness. If I say no, she's just going to dig her heels in. Just think of it as borrowing the book. I'll give it back soon enough."

His words of wisdom did little to soften the scolding expression on her face.

"All in favor of my plan," Cal said, raising a hand. He waited about thirty seconds before determining she wouldn't be joining him. "Rounding up, that's a fifty-one percent majority. The motion passes."

"I'm conflicted between asking for your math or civic scores."

He had a civics class?

"And I'm marking you as complicit," he rebutted, satisfied with the strength of his argument.

Alice set the book back on the table, staring at it with a wrinkled nose. There was conflict on her face as she pushed the bundle of manifestations toward him.

"It's wrong," she said with finality in her tone. "You can't lie about being related to her."

All joviality vanished from his face, a curated blank expression replacing it. She was right. It was wrong. There was no escaping that, nor the comparison to his situation with the Arderes.

Guilt clawed at him, but not regret.

Cal hadn't created the hole, but after being thrown into it, he'd picked up a shovel and dug. It was a mistake, but given the chance, one he'd repeat. If that made him a horrible person, then it could be added to his list of crimes.

"I'll make it up to her," he said solemnly, meeting her red eyes with his. "Even if I have to burn the world for it."

Despite his utmost sincerity, she scoffed at him, rolling her eyes.

"Dramatics, you're sounding like—Lily?"

No, Lily's speech was way more embarrassing than his.

A banging from the balcony door attracted his attention, and he turned, seeing the girl in question rapidly knocking on the glass. He motioned for her to try the handle, remembering he didn't lock it last night.

She understood the message, yanking it open and almost falling inside. She caught herself, pushing back against the door to shut it. Her uniform was a mess. Only one arm was through the blazer, the buttons for her shirt were misaligned, with some left unfastened, and she was missing an entire boot.

The girl took ragged breaths, swinging her head back and wiping the sweat from her forehead.

"What's wrong?" Alice asked with alarm, standing and peering behind the girl. "Did you run outside like that? Lily! Have some propriety."

Judging by her ragged breaths, she'd run fast enough for most not to notice her.

"Did—" she said, pausing to take a deep breath. "No. You wouldn't have. I just found out."

Cal didn't let his mind go off into tangents, focusing on the recovering student. He remained seated, steadying himself for whatever came next.

"The Blessed Order's on campus," she rushed out, waving her hands erratically. "Vic wants us at the clock tower now. Like right now."

Expected and accounted for. It was nothing to lose his head over. He just needed to keep a tight lid on his magic.

Naturally, her next words spat in the face of the confidence he'd built.

"The messenger told me they already executed someone on campus."

Freaking corpse worshipers.