Chapter 113: The List (33)
The hum of dormant constructs filled the air like a distant choir, faint sigils etched into their frames pulsing with slow, rhythmic light.
Rain lashed against the windows, thunder muttering beyond the glass like something weary of being awake.
The lamplight cast long, wavering shadows over worktables crowded with brass limbs, skeletal torsos, and half-finished machines.
Tools lay scattered like constellations of old ambitions.
Lucien stood in the middle of it all, a single candle flickering beside him.
Its flame trembled whenever a cold draft pressed through the warped panes.
Across the table, Professor Taiga adjusted a delicate gear assembly beneath his jeweler’s loupe.
His sleeves were rolled to the elbow, the linen stained with oil and age.
The quiet clink of metal on metal mingled with the faraway growl of thunder, marking the rhythm of their shared silence.
At last, Taiga set his tools aside and looked up.
His eyes, bright despite the hour, settled on Lucien.
“So,” he began, voice calm and steady, “what do you make of all this? The clatter, the smoke, the little sparks that try to act like souls?”
Lucien hesitated, glancing at the rows of unfinished constructs.
“It’s… different,” he said finally.
“Not what I expected from a class about magic.”
Taiga smiled faintly and turned toward a dormant copper bird resting on the shelf, its wings folded with impossible precision.
“That’s the usual complaint,” he said.
“People come expecting fireworks. Instead, they find patience. Frustration. Silence. This-” he gestured to the room “-is where magic learns to breathe before it can speak.”
The thunder rolled again, low and unhurried.
Lucien nodded.
“I think I understand,” he said.
“Or… I’m starting to.”
“Good.”
Taiga leaned back, studying him for a moment.
“You mentioned you had made something of your own. I’d like to see it.”
Lucien blinked, startled.
“It’s not much. Hardly worth-”
“Show me,” Taiga interrupted gently.
“Humor an old man, will you?”
Lucien hesitated, then reached for a piece of paper.
He placed it on the table between them.
For a few seconds, nothing happened.
The candle flickered, the thunder sighed.
Then, without a word or gesture, the paper stirred.
One crease shifted, then another, folding itself with slow, deliberate motion, as if remembering what it once was meant to be.
When it was done, a small crane stood on the table.
Its wings fluttered once before it lifted into the air, circling the candlelight before settling gently on Lucien’s shoulder.
Taiga watched in silence.
When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet with wonder.
“No spell, no verbal command… and yet it obeys. Remarkable.”
Lucien shrugged slightly.
“It just happens. I didn’t even tell it what to become. The first time I tried, I thought I’d failed, then it folded itself.”
“And why a crane?”
“I am not entirely sure…,”
Lucien said after a pause.
“Maybe it’s just what my mind remembers best.”
Taiga’s gaze lingered on the tiny creature, its paper wings trembling in the candle’s breath.
“Memory as instruction,” he murmured.
“That’s rare.”
He turned away, rummaging through the clutter until he produced two rough wooden figures, blocky and crude.
He set them on the table with a soft thud.
“Well, Mr. Lucien,” he said, tone returning to its measured firmness, “before we get to the fun parts of automatons, the ones that talk back and bite fingers, you’ll need to master the dull parts.”
Lucien eyed the figures warily.
“How dull, exactly?”
Taiga’s lips twitched.
“Make it walk.”
Lucien frowned.
“Walk?”
“On its own,” Taiga confirmed.
“No improvisation, no lucky accidents. A proper construct obeying a precise command.”
“That sounds… complicated.”
“It will be,” Taiga replied, already stacking a pile of notes and sketches into Lucien’s arms.
“You’ll document every step, how it moves, what fails, what you think might fix it. I expect it on my desk tomorrow evening.”
Lucien stared, horrified.
“Tomorrow? As in-”
“Yes,” Taiga said, ushering him toward the door with a gentle but unyielding hand.
“The same tomorrow you wake up in.”
Lucien opened his mouth to argue, but the professor only smiled.
“You’ll find creation isn’t built from brilliance, but persistence. And persistence, my boy, begins with tedium.”
The door clicked shut behind him.
Outside in the dim corridor, Lucien stood listening to the muffled rhythm of hammer and thunder.
The paper crane shifted on his shoulder, paper rustling softly.
He glanced down at the wooden figure in his hand and sighed.
“Walk,” he muttered.
“Of course.”
From behind the door came Taiga’s voice, low, steady, and amused even through exhaustion.
“Walk before you run, little craftsman. Walk before you run.”
***
The hallway was nearly silent at this hour.
The storm outside had reached its crescendo, battering against the tall, arched windows of Twilight Crown Academy like the fists of some ancient being trying to get in.
Rain streaked down the glass in long, jagged rivulets, illuminated now and then by veins of lightning.
Each thunderclap rolled through the corridors with a deep, vibrating hum that made the lamps along the walls flicker.
Lucien trudged down the hall, his satchel hanging low on one shoulder, the two small wooden figurines that Professor Taiga had thrust into his hands now tucked awkwardly under his arm.
The flickering lamplight gave the marbled floor an uneven glow, stretching his shadow long and thin before him like a second, weary traveler.
“Make it walk,” he muttered under his breath.
“Just make it walk, he says. Sure, I’ll just… magically make this block of wood develop a sense of balance and spatial coordination overnight.”
He sighed, the exhaustion weighing on him like a damp cloak.
His thoughts drifted between panic and disbelief, mostly disbelief.
How did he even end up in Taiga’s workshop in the first place?
He’d gone there on a whim, out of curiosity and hunger, and somehow stumbled into a research assignment that could make or break his academic standing before he had even properly enrolled.
“Walk, record the details, make a report…”
He murmured again, his tone growing more sarcastic with each repetition.
“Sure, let me just consult my extensive knowledge of how humans move their legs while also-”
He stopped.
A faint sound echoed ahead, the soft click of a latch turning.
Lucien froze.
The corridor bent slightly to the right up ahead, and at the corner, barely visible in the dim lamplight, he caught the silhouette of a figure opening a door.
His door.
Every sense sharpened in an instant.
The figure’s movements were smooth but deliberate, careful.
Whoever it was, they weren’t stumbling around or looking lost, they knew exactly which room they were going for.
The door creaked open, and the figure slipped inside without a sound.
Lucien’s heart thudded once, hard.
Someone’s in my room.
He ducked back against the wall, pressing himself flat against the cold stone.
The rain outside provided a steady rhythm for his quickening heartbeat.
He peeked just slightly around the corner, the door had closed again.
No light leaked out from under it.
Dozens of possibilities shot through his mind.
Was it a thief?
A prankster?
Maybe one of the other students was doing this as a joke?
Or worse, a faculty member doing one of those ‘random inspections’ he had heard about, the kind that could get you in trouble for as little as leaving a sock on your desk?
He rubbed his chin.
No.
Too deliberate.
Too quiet.
That wasn’t an inspector.
He thought about running to get someone, the dorm supervisor, or maybe a guard.
But that would mean leaving the figure alone in his room with his belongings.
His satchel was light, but there were things in there he couldn’t risk losing, notes, his charms, even one of the cranes he had folded earlier for good luck.
Besides, he had already had enough of feeling helpless lately.
The ache in his shoulder flared, his body gently urging him toward the reasonable, adult choice of “get help and don’t be stupid.”
But his pride, his stubborn, reckless pride, was louder.
Lucien clenched his jaw.
“No,” he whispered to himself.
“I have had a long night, I’m tired, and if someone’s trying to rob me, then at least one of us deserves a proper beating.”
He set his satchel down carefully beside the wall, along with the two small wooden figures Taiga had given him.
They clattered softly against the floor, an odd, almost ceremonial sound in the otherwise silent corridor.
He took a breath.
Then another.
‘Alright. Quietly now.’
He tiptoed forward, keeping close to the wall, the cold stone numbing his fingertips as he brushed against it.
The rain outside muffled his steps, the thunder rolling in distant approval.
He reached the door, placed his hand gently on the knob, then stepped back to line up his footing.
“Okay,” he whispered to himself.
“On three.”
He bent his knee, flexed his ankle once, psyching himself up.
“One…”
A crack of thunder answered, loud enough to make the lamps shiver.
“Two…”
He steadied himself, inhaling through his nose, imagining the dramatic scene that would follow, the door flying open, the intruder caught red-handed, him standing there victorious and terrifying despite his sleep-deprived eyes.
“Three!”
Lucien kicked the door with everything he had.
The result was… immediate.
A sharp THUD reverberated through the hallway, not from the door opening, but from his foot meeting an immovable, merciless slab of oak.
The impact jolted up his leg like a lightning bolt, exploding pain through his calf, thigh, and straight into his spine.
Lucien’s mouth opened in a silent scream as his balance betrayed him.
He stumbled backward, lost his footing, and collapsed unceremoniously onto the cold marble floor, clutching his throbbing leg.
“AAAAAAH-!! … ow ow ow ow-!”
He hissed through gritted teeth, his voice breaking between curses and pained wheezes.
“It’s- it’s locked?! It’s locked?!”
He lay there for a few seconds, staring at the ceiling in disbelief, his foot still pulsing with agony.
The lamps flickered overhead as if laughing at him.
The storm outside offered no sympathy, another roll of thunder boomed through the walls, mocking in its timing.
Lucien groaned, sitting up and rubbing his shin.
He leaned against the wall, catching his breath, while the two little wooden figures Taiga had given him watched silently from where he’d left them, their carved, expressionless faces tilted ever so slightly, as if judging him.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Lucien muttered bitterly at them.
