210 (II)

Campus [I]

Shiv wasn't sure what that was about, but his attention was divided by another matter, namely, how the students were cheering and laughing as more of them were launched into the air. It was a surprising scene, witnessing dozens of Pathbearers cheering as they were flung every which way. Those struck dead-on by the massive hulks of falling ice were unharmed as well.

Chunks of frozen substance burst against them, and rather than inflicting harm, it encased them in additional layers of protection. Soon they were colliding with each other in midair. Puffs of white swelled wide, and flakes of snow began to fall.

As Shiv looked up, he saw a midair snowball fight taking place, and joyous laughter rained down in an incessant chorus. Teams were forming in the air, separated based on the color and insignia of the coats and capes flowing behind their backs. Shiv saw capes of purple and green, black and gold, red and yellow, and all of them were pelting each other with chunks of ice, having a merry time, even as other students below simply walked on, utterly indifferent to the mock combat taking shape overhead.

Beyond the aerial snowball fight, observers flew to and fro, as did members of the Prismatic Guard. They scoured the Academy grounds, patrolling with lances pointed high and clawing at the ground with their mana fields. As the students played, there were others on guard, others prepared to do violence on their behalf. And so it suddenly felt like this Academy was a refuge, a place that was made to delay the point where one had to face all the strife and death beyond these walls.

Shiv came to a halt just a few steps away from the gate. He watched as a girl curled into a ball in the air, taking snowballs from all sides. She laughed, and though she was a young woman, the way she expressed her mirth was that of a child. Shiv tried to remember when he ever laughed like that, if he ever did. And he couldn't. He had never been this carefree. He had never been this loose, this untroubled. His entire life, there was the hint of violence, the hint of starvation, the hint of struggle.

These weren't Pathbearers. These were still children, even if they were the same age as he.

He caught up with Irons a second later, no longer interested in the snowball fight. The novelty faded. A feeling of alienation returned to him, and Shiv was himself again. The wonder didn't last. For a moment, he thought he could have acclimated to this place, that he could have considered himself one member among the other students. He was wrong. Even if he hadn't been the Deathless, there was too much separation between him and the unscarred ones who lived here.

Another block of ice fell, but Irons swatted it aside as if it were a pebble rather than a person-sized chunk of matter. It crashed into a few more students, and they let out surprised yelps before tumbling off into the air. The two of them strode on, walking down a red brick path, flanked by verdant lawns ripe with blooming flowers, and cleaved down the middle with something loosely approximating a trench line. Within the trenches were nice wooden panels and a set of doorways leading to a subterranean structure of some kind. Shiv was interested in what lay down there, as he could sense a great deal of students coming in and out.

He guessed there was a teleportation station down there, since some of the students suddenly manifested. That begged the question: if they had a circuit of jump stations here, why couldn't they have directly teleported within the university? Security, probably, he thought to himself. Too much risk. It's a closed-loop system. Private transportation network for the academy and the academy alone.

"Don't judge them too harshly," Irons said. There was a softness to his voice, and he tilted his head to give Shiv a brief look. Irons was a hard man to read, but in that moment, Shiv realized he had more in common with the captain than he imagined. There was a sense of alienation that came with Irons as well.

He didn't belong here any more than Shiv did.

"They're not Pathbearers," Shiv said. It was more observation than accusation.

"No," Irons agreed. "But in time they might be."

"Might," Shiv said. "Seems all this is a playground of some kind. Not so different from all the ones we've passed by getting here."

"It is. All individuals are made for games," Irons said. "We play games to simulate the circumstances of strife without tasting the full bitterness of its consequences."

"Seems to me that just leaves you ignorant and unprepared," Shiv shot back.

"Or it leaves you un-traumatized and fresh." Irons turned to him once more. "If you had a child, would you want them to live your life?"

That made Shiv's mind grind to a halt. The answer, quite immediately, was no. Though Shiv thought his experiences made him resilient, imagined himself to be unbreakable and implacable; the thought of having someone he cared about suffer everything he did made his stomach twist. He was fine with his own experiences. This was his life. It made him stronger. But not everyone was him. He knew that. And not everyone was meant to endure that much violence.

"So you do understand," Irons said. "Good. It took me a little too long to learn that lesson. And there were consequences that came with that."

Stolen story; please report.

"What lesson?" Shiv asked. "That not everyone can live up to your namesake?"

Irons almost grunted a laugh. "That not everyone should. And that sometimes what makes you a formidable Pathbearer leaves you a ghost of a person."

"Yeah," Shiv replied, slightly haunted by those words. Ghost of a person.

They simply walked for a few moments, leaving Shiv's thoughts to drift. Finally, Irons sighed. "I am worried about you. I am uncertain if I can stop you if you intend to harm my students."

This came out of nowhere, but Shiv took it as a sign of comfort as well. Irons didn't trust him, but he wanted certainty. And that gave Shiv a chance to oblige him. "I'll try not to start anything here. Don't wanna hurt any of these ki—uh, students, either. But I won't bullshit you, the System has it out for me something bad, and it will probably have it out for you soon too. You best be prepared for that."

Irons grunted in acknowledgement. He knew. With his encounter with Daughter, he knew. "You are blooded. They are not. Remember this."

"I'll do what I can to keep them safe," Shiv reassured him, understanding what Irons was trying to stress.

"And exercise more diplomacy and subtlety," Irons added.

"Magnolia started shit. Wasn't the other way around. I was soft enough with her. The easy thing would be to twist her head backward and paste her body."

"Mhm. But we have a duty to be responsible—even against those who mean us harm. You don't need to be soft. But consider what kind of resolution you wish to reach. There is always consequence. We might be able to pay, but other people will not."

"Then they should be a bit wiser too, shouldn't they?" Shiv said, scoffing slightly. "She was there looking for a bruising. Hell, I would have been justified to put her down. She was planning to murder a crippled Adept."

"Yes," Irons said. "But this is not about her. Magnolia of Lutherbrook does not matter. This is about us. What kind of Pathbearer do you want to be? The academy may not be able to give you greater power, but perhaps it can give you something to desire in peace, young man."

The Deathless thought about that for a beat. "I love cooking. I already have something."

"That's good. But you will likely have more. Sometimes, virtue is its own reward."

Philosophy 32 > 33

Shiv breathed in and looked up. Spell patterns arced and twisted above them. They clashed together as waves of mana unleashed new waves of cascading ice. While the massive tsunamis of frost fell, people carried on to their classes and chattered away around Shiv and Irons. Even while they did that, they focused on dodging and avoiding the falling chunks of ice. And Shiv understood why. Irons spoke of play. Getting hit was fun, but it also levied a slight consequence of weightlessness rather than the usual pain. If one could dodge a rain of heavy hail, then one could increase their Reflexes skill. It wouldn't be like actual combat, but Shiv had to admit, it wasn't a bad substitute either.

"You might be right. I guess we are made for games," he muttered to himself, smiling slightly. Instead of dodging the ice, Shiv used his feeble Hydromancy to try to push the spraying shrapnel and falling chunks aside. He didn't have that much power, so the chunks usually still hit his face. But as they did, he forced himself to remain grounded, using his Shapeless Tides to parry the Dynamancy set to sever him from the floor.

A few hundred meters away, a tower-sized building began to descend. As it approached the soft grass, he watched in surprise as the vegetation retreated, leaving a 400-meter-wide patch of soil for the descending edifice to impale itself upon. As it finally landed, Shiv heard a loud ping echo from atop and saw that there was a ring jutting out from the apex of the building. A quivering haze of unattuned mana bled from within the ring, and just then a shriek tore through the air as an automaton student blasted through the center of the ring with flames trailing from its hands and feet.

"And Dynamo is in the lead!" the building declared. Passing through the ring gave the automaton a boost of speed, and folds of air resistance wrapped around it. A second later, a second and third Pathbearer passed through the ring as well, and the chase was on. Shiv realized it was part of a racing circuit. The place truly was a larger playground, but that wasn't so bad. Not so bad at all.

As they walked further inside the academy, Shiv saw the tip of a massive archway peeking over another set of buildings. From it came great pulses of mana. Mana that fueled the spells constantly shifting above. Mana connected to the four mithril spires that lined each corner of the academy. Mana that flowed forth from a gate beneath that arch, where the preserved remains of a fallen coliseum lurked. And there, Adam and the others lingered. It was strange to be so close, to know a secret about the university that none of the students and most of the faculty didn't.

As that thought weighed on Shiv's mind, he watched as more people filtered into nearby buildings. The interior of the academy was comprised of semi-circular buildings. They were pointed inward toward the gate, and their curves seemed like a defensive bulwark. Trench lines trailed into them as well, connecting to their sides, and Shiv guessed that the subterranean jump points connected to each of the buildings as well.

"We're going there," Irons said, pointing to the first arching structure before them. It seemed to be a thing made from glossy marble. It had two large panes of glass dotting the outer edges of the building, but the rest was cold and repulsive. A few colonnades stuck out from its top, rusted and cracked. It stood apart from the rest of the campus and seemed to belong more on a battlefield.

"Miriam Hall," Irons said. "The administrative quarters. It's also where the faculty conduct their sessions."

"Why's it look like hammered shit?" Shiv asked.

"Tradition and history, mostly. It was one of the few remaining hard points left over from the time this place was a fortress and not an academy. The Avatars at the time made their stand here with what remained of the prismatic guard. It was held at a brutal price. The other structures were flattened, but though Miriam Hall sustained brutal damage and most of the Pathbearers assigned to its defense were slain, it didn't collapse, not even after a mana bomb of great power was detonated within its depths."

But as Irons finished speaking, the Deathless felt a force build within himself. It rattled through his body and tore out from his mind, and he gritted his teeth. "Shit. Great. This again. Been a while."

He stumbled. Iron caught Shiv's arm.

"What's wrong?" the captain asked.

Shiv didn't reply. Couldn't. This close to Miriam Hall, he felt an overwhelming wave of causality rip into him, and the vulgar hand of the System laid a finger upon him as it triggered a long-dormant aspect of his Non-Sequitur Skill and inflicted a vision upon his mind…

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