Chapter 44 – Soul Searching

When it came time for the study session with Nicolus and Xipuatl, Mirian’s first move was to get the two boys to argue about if Baracuel or Tlaxhuaco’s magic was better. After their spat, she was ready with summaries of some of the books, critiques of some others, and a ready-made list of what they should study.

“Huh. You really know your stuff,” Nicolus said. “When did you…?”

“Probably frittered away less time drinking,” Sire Nurea muttered.

“Frittered my ti—hey, that’s called building social capital. It’s useful.”

“Only if they become useful. And judging by your friends’ grades….”

“Ouch,” Nicolus said. “Anyways, that… huh, that cuts short our session.”

Xipuatl shrugged. “Fine by me.”

As they were leaving, though, Mirian said in a low voice to Xipuatl, “Hey, actually, can I talk to you about something?”

“This is one of those rhetorical questions where my response doesn’t matter, yes?”

“Yeah,” Mirian said. “You know soul magic, right?”

Xipuatl went still and looked at her. Nicolus and Nurea had already departed, and it was just the two of them in the study room.

Mirian continued. “That was also a rhetorical question. Listen—can you teach me?”

Xipuatl kept staring at her. Finally, he said, “Hypothetically, if you were right, what would I gain? Besides exposure to criminal heresy charges.”

“A research partner. You think Baracuel’s arcanists are a tier below your nagual. That our researches are missing key information. I can help you prove it, but only if you teach me the basics.”

“Who’s your source?”

“I overhear things,” she said, because saying ‘you are’ would lead to too many questions.

The other student ground his jaw lightly, still considering Mirian. As before, she knew he wanted to work on his theory, but she’d also moved a lot faster than she normally did, and he was understandably cautious.

“I don’t need a research partner,” he finally said, and closed the buckle on his bag. He put on his cloak and headed for the door.

“Did you get into Arcane Mathematics with Professor Jei?” she asked.

Xipuatl paused at the door, then turned.

“I did. You need a mathematician. That’s me. I just want the basics.” It was her best in. Offering money to Xipuatl would be silly. Despite her credit from Tower Trust and the stolen coins from the spy, her finances still paled compared to someone in the nobility, even with a minor family like the Yanez. Xipuatl hadn’t moved from the door, so Mirian opened up her notebook. “This is my cartography device design. Here’s the four dimensional arrays we’re using to calculate true mana paths. Here’s my notes from calculus—that was my second year here.”

Xipuatl closed the door and sat down. “You’ve certainly been hiding in the shadows. I’d never even heard your name before Nicolus told me about you. Said you were some sort of ‘weird little genius in alchemistry.’ Then it turns out you’ve already read half of the spell engine books we were planning on dividing up.”

Mirian scoffed. “I’m no genius. But I work hard, and I don’t give up.”

“That’s more valuable than intelligence. But better still if combined. What are you willing to commit to?”

“I can build or modify detectors, or any device you need. Unless they have something super expensive, I can finance them myself. And I’m… well, I’m skeptical. But I’m willing to listen. And I never stop learning.”

He stood again, then paced around the room. He wanted to—Mirian could tell. “I need time to think,” he said. “Talk to me tomorrow.”

Well, it wasn’t a ‘no.’ She could live with that.

***

The next day, Mirian snuck in a few questions about miniaturizing glyphs in Artifice Design. Torres briefly diagrammed the mechanical devices needed, which Mirian enthusiastically jotted down. One type was purely mechanical, and like a primitive printing press, could only draw one glyph at a time. The newer kinds mimicked the movement of a person’s hand by reading their actions and then reducing the force-output applied to a small pen inside the device. Of course, an arcanist was still needed to operate the device to get good mana flow. The attempts to create automatic glyph scribing machines using spell engines failed because the engines were incredibly wasteful, and the entropic mana radiating off the device damaged the glyphs as they were being scribed. Mirian was pleased to note that the devices used similar principles to her cartography device that was currently languishing in the catacombs.

In Illusion Spells, Professor Marva was repeating the lessons from last loop. Mirian doodled conceptual designs in her notebook and thought about how she could move to the more advanced illusion classes. Mid-quarter transfer, maybe? But she’d have to prove she was good enough to skip a core prerequisite class. Given that the apocalypse always cut the quarter short, it was going to take more than a few more loops for her to get that good.

After Spell Engine Alchemistry, Mirian caught Xipuatl’s eye from two rows over and raised her eyebrows questioningly. In turn he mouthed “more time.” Dammit, don’t back out, Mirian thought.

In Combat Magic, Mirian and Daith partnered up again.

They got right back to the practice grounds with the detectors. Midway through the session, Mirian felt particularly good about one of her minor lightning spells. But when she looked to Daith, he announced, “36 myr.”

“Five hells, is that it?”

Daith was regularly getting in the 40s, and lightning wasn’t even his specialty. They weren’t supposed to be using magnetic spells, but he’d cast warp metal and gotten a high of 54 myr on the detector—at point of target, too, not even just at the spell origin.

“It feels like you’re holding back,” he said.

“I’m not,” she said, but after class, it got Mirian thinking. Was she holding back? She’d been taught to hold back a lot as a child. Her fierce temper as a kid had gotten her into trouble until she learned how to control it. There’d been the… that thing that had happened, and she’d been a barely contained tempest of emotions. She could still remember her fists flying at school, and then Dad taking her aside—only the memories were all jumbled. One of them was Dad, and one of them… she shook her head to try to clear it. She’d heard the same thing in dueling class, where if you were afraid of hurting your opponent, your attacks would never be fast enough. Was she afraid of losing control? When she’d first started at the Academy, she’d been afraid to unleash a spell she couldn’t control, or break a capacitor by overwhelming it with mana. Unfounded fears, but did they still linger in her subconscious?

As a result, Mirian didn’t take very many notes in Arcane Physics.

Xipuatl met her after class. First, he checked to make sure no one was listening in. Then he said, “I’ve made up my mind. I need a drop of your blood, though. That’s the only way I’ll agree to it.”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

“Why?” Mirian asked, suddenly suspicious.

“Insurance. To make sure you don’t double-cross me.”

“I haven’t crossed you once, so it’d be single-crossing, actually. But how does blood help with that?” She’d heard tales of blood being used for sinister spells as a girl. As far as she knew, they were all just that: tall tales that were part of the ‘necromancers are scary’ genre. None of their studies had covered blood being used in any ritual or glyph. But then again, necromancy was banned in all forms, and that included discussion of it. Would any of her professors even know?

“Hopefully, by the time you find out, we’ll have established enough trust that it won’t be necessary.”