Chapter 106: The List (26)
Lucien exhaled as if he’d just escaped a battlefield rather than a medical ward.
His arm was strapped tight in a support bandage that smelled faintly of herbs and antiseptic, and every movement sent a muted ache down to his elbow.
The corridor stretched ahead, long, sterile, and far too quiet for this hour.
“Remember,” came the sharp voice of the head nurse from behind, echoing down the tiled hall, “healing spells can’t be used at the drop of a hat.”
Lucien half-turned, grimacing.
The nurse stood in the doorway, arms folded like a commander addressing a particularly disobedient soldier.
“The overuse of healing magic interferes with natural tissue repair. You want your arm to mend, not mutate. If we keep patching you up with spells, your body will forget how to heal itself. Detrimental sickness can follow, weakness of the blood, magical fever, and in rare cases, tissue degradation.”
Lucien blinked, eyebrows shooting up.
“Wait, mutate?”
“Good night, Mister Lucien,” she said firmly, and slammed the door shut before he could ask anything else.
He stared at the door for a beat.
“…Great. So, no magic, no questions, just pills…just pills”
He adjusted the strap of the sling and began walking.
The infirmary wing was still.
Only the faint hum of mana lanterns lining the corridor kept him company, their soft glow reflecting on polished floors.
Outside, the sky was melting into dusk, the world beyond the high windows dipped in tangerine and violet.
Lucien’s footsteps echoed, oddly loud in the emptiness.
For a place attached to a school of thousands, this side of the academy felt abandoned.
The walls were lined with portraits of long-dead healers and alchemists, their eyes following him in that unsettling, painted way.
Every so often, a floorboard creaked, not from his step, but somewhere further down the hall.
He brushed the feeling off with a quiet scoff.
“It’s an old building. Old buildings creak. Perfectly normal. Not haunted at all.”
By the time he reached the student quarters, the sunset had given way to early night.
His assigned room was at the far end of the corridor, its brass numberplate dulled with age.
The lock clicked softly as he entered, and the familiar scent of parchment and faintly burnt candle wax greeted him.
He dropped his satchel by the desk, wincing as his shoulder twinged.
The bed looked like paradise, neat sheets, plump pillow, the promise of lying down and not being used as a medical prop.
As he began unbuttoning his academy jacket, Lucien’s mind drifted to practical matters.
‘Now that the duel mess is over… I need to figure out what classes to take. Combat theory’s out of the question with this shoulder. Maybe magical ethics, or historical enchantments… something that doesn’t involve getting punched.’
He glanced at the little pile of booklets he’d collected from the orientation fair.
‘Maybe I should ask Balt what he’s taking. Or Vaelira, no, she’d mock me for going soft. Still… I can’t just coast. I have to get my bearings before the semester starts in full.’
As he mulled over his schedule, something flickered at the edge of his vision.
Lucien turned slightly, half-dressed, and looked toward the window.
For a split second, just a blink, he could’ve sworn he saw a figure walk past.
A person.
A woman, maybe, silhouette faintly traced by the orange glow of the dying sunset.
He froze.
The window was open to the outer courtyard.
And his room was on the first floor.
Which meant whoever, or whatever, that was would have to be walking above ground level.
“…What?”
He stepped closer, heart beating a little too fast.
He pressed a hand to the cold glass and peered outside.
The world beyond was swallowed in a deep blue twilight.
The last light had faded, and the courtyard below was shadowed, silent.
The lamps hadn’t flickered on yet, leaving only outlines, the railing, the faint shimmer of wet leaves, the vague promise of movement that might have been nothing at all.
Lucien stared for a long moment.
The only sound was the slow creak of the wooden frame as the night breeze brushed past.
“…It’s nothing,” he muttered finally.
“Probably a reflection. Or a hallucination. Or both.”
He turned away, then froze again.
Creak.
The unmistakable sound of wood under pressure.
This time, from inside the room.
Lucien spun around, pulse jumping.
His eyes darted toward the door.
It was shut.
Locked.
Just as he’d left it.
Silence.
Only the faint patter of rain beginning against the windowsill.
A slow drizzle that built into a steady rhythm.
Lucien stood there for several seconds, waiting for another sound.
Nothing came.
The room was still again, too still.
Finally, he sighed, rubbing his temple with his good hand.
“Right. Definitely hearing things. Wonderful. Either I’m haunted or I’m high on herbal medicine.”
He shut the curtains, stripped off the rest of his uniform, and sat down on the bed, the bandage tugging uncomfortably at his shoulder.
The rain outside grew heavier, tapping against the glass like insistent fingers.
Lucien glanced at the small vial of pills the nurse had given him sitting on the desk.
Two dull brown tablets, suspiciously unmarked.
He eyed them with deep mistrust.
‘…These better not be the same ‘painkillers’ they gave soldiers in World War II. I’m not looking to hallucinate trench ghosts tonight.’
He popped one into his mouth anyway, grimacing at the bitter taste, and lay back on the bed.
As the rain deepened and the room dimmed, his eyelids began to grow heavy.
Still, somewhere at the edge of his thoughts, the memory of that fleeting silhouette lingered, vague, shadowy, and just human enough to make him wonder.
Before long, he drifted off to sleep, the faint sound of rain blending into his dreams and the quiet, rhythmic creak of something shifting just beyond the window.
***
The storm had swallowed the academy whole.
Rain battered against the windows like a thousand impatient fingers, thunder grumbled somewhere in the distance, and every flash of lightning carved out silhouettes along the dorm walls.
Lucien blinked awake to the sound of it all, a soft rumble beneath his ribs that he first mistook for thunder, until he realized it came from him.
He groaned.
Lying still for a while, staring up at the ceiling.
The shadows of rainwater trickled down the glass and danced faintly across the ceiling beams every time lighting stuck, illuminating the room through the thin curtains.
The storm outside was relentless now, the kind that made even the stone walls of the academy seem to shudder with each gust.
And yet, despite the exhaustion pulling at his limbs, his mind refused to quiet down.
He rolled over, pressing his face into the pillow, but his stomach protested again with an angry growl.
Lucien sighed, defeated.
‘So that’s why I can’t sleep…’
It had to be past midnight.
Still, lying there starving wasn’t going to fix anything.
He sat up, wincing slightly as his still-tender shoulder twinged under the bandages.
Maybe the cafeteria had closed hours ago, but if he remembered correctly, the academy sometimes kept a small midnight counter open for the night-shift staff.
“Worth a try,” he muttered to himself, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed.
The floor was cold beneath his feet.
He grabbed his coat, one of those thick woolen ones that Richardson had insisted he pack, and slipped it on over his shirt.
As he opened the door, a rush of chilled air brushed against his face, and he shivered involuntarily.
The corridor was drenched in moonlight and shadow, the kind of quiet that made every footstep sound uncomfortably loud.
Rain hissed faintly against the outer walls, the echo traveling down the long stone hall.
Lucien started walking, his hand brushing along the wall to keep balance as he descended the stairs.
He could feel the faint hum of mana coursing through the building, the steady rhythm of enchantments protecting the academy from the storm outside.
Each thunderclap vibrated faintly through the old stone, like the heartbeat of something ancient.
As he moved through the dimly lit hallway, his thoughts began to wander.
‘Lumiere.’
He hadn’t been able to get her off his mind, not because of any romantic impulse, far from it, but because she was important.
The heroine of this world’s story.
The sun around which everyone’s fates revolved.
And now that he was in that story, survival depended on how well he played along.
He frowned thoughtfully as he walked, watching his reflection ripple faintly in the rain-streaked windows.
‘She was there during the infirmary lecture. Meaning she’s either studying medicine, or something adjacent to it… probably a healing curriculum. Which means theology, or divine studies, or one of those faith-based classes.’
It made sense.
Lumiere had been wielding healing magic from back during the entrance exams, considered skill enough to help the staff with the injured candidates even when she was just a student and she always spoke in that calm, reverent tone that came with temple-trained healers.
So, he mused, ‘if I can find out which theological course she’s taking, I can “coincidentally” sign up for it too. Sit near her, strike up conversation, maybe even offer to study together.’
He smirked faintly to himself, boots echoing against the marble floor.
‘Step one: identify her curriculum. Step two: join the same class. Step three…’ he trailed off as his stomach growled again, snapping him out of the thought spiral.
“Right, food first. Politics later.”
He reached the main hallway leading toward the cafeteria.
The lamps there burned low, casting pools of flickering gold on the floor.
The faint scent of something sweet, warm bread, maybe cinnamon, drifted through the air, making his mouth water instantly.
Lucien quickened his pace.
The sound of low chatter reached him before he even rounded the corner.
To his surprise, the cafeteria was open.
Soft lamplight spilled from the doorway, illuminating the corridor.
Inside, a handful of students were scattered across the long tables, night owls in aprons and work uniforms, laughing quietly over cups of tea and late-night snacks.
The warm aroma of sugar, baked goods, and roasted nuts wrapped around him like a welcome blanket.
Lucien stopped at the threshold, momentarily disarmed by how alive it felt compared to the cold emptiness of the dorms.
“Well,” he murmured with a small grin, “looks like the night shift’s still kicking.”
He tugged his coat tighter around himself and stepped inside, the warmth and sound washing over him as he entered the soft glow of the cafeteria.
