Chapter 2: Unexpected Orientation

At first Suria could only sit in stunned silence, her mind racing with explanations that didn’t make any sense. Had it been some sort of nightmare? A delusion brought on by her nervousness? Had she been teleported away from the fight?

None of that really felt right, and her mind kept returning to the tapestry: she remembered it falling before. When she stared at the fabric, she saw that the folds were identical to her memory. Or was she deceiving herself? It had seemed like an irrelevant detail before, but now… she raised a hand to her forehead and found no injury or even blood.

“What the hell?” Lirngelf pushed himself away from the table, knocking over his chair as he stumbled back. “Where are they?”

“Don’t make a scene,” Maut-mai said from her chair. She didn’t look at all concerned, she was just staring at Lirngelf like he was some sort of repulsive insect. “What are you babbling about?”

“You don’t remember?” he demanded, eyes bouncing between them. “Either of you?”

Part of Suria wanted to answer, but she remained silent. After several seconds, Lirngelf let out a cry and rushed out of the room. In his absence, Maut-mai gave a scornful sniff, glanced briefly at Suria, and then returned to her reading.

That left Suria alone, trembling in place as if reality couldn’t find her if she didn’t move.

Her breaths were coming too quickly and she had to force herself to maintain control. She reached for the healer’s calm she had drilled into herself when a patient came in with a bleeding injury or terrible illness. She needed to think.

All evidence suggested that they had been thrown back in time, though it seemed that she and Lirngelf had retained their memories while Maut-mai forgot everything. Suria hoped that wasn’t the case and scrambled for other explanations. This could all be some sort of illusion. Maybe this was actually a spell that was testing her and she would wake up to find out whether or not she was accepted into the university.

Yet she didn’t really believe it. The memories felt too real… Suria forced herself to keep in mind all possibilities until she had more evidence, but the truth seemed obvious enough: she had been thrown back in time.

And that was a problem, because advanced time magic was forbidden across the world.

She wasn’t familiar with all the laws because they didn’t impact the life of normal people: sorcerers being executed for time magic was the sort of thing that happened in stories, not real life. It varied by nation and there were some exceptions – a spell to keep a noble’s food from spoiling wasn’t forbidden. But a spell that threw back time like this would be prohibited anywhere.

Most likely this had nothing to do with her and she had just been swept up in some spell that rolled back time. Yet even that was little comfort, because time magic wasn’t any less anathema when professors were using it. Apparently they had been fighting inside the great hall, engaged in some conflict she couldn’t begin to understand. If there was anyone who had the capacity and audacity to engage in forbidden time magic, it would probably be the professors of Darkmoon University.

All of this was far too big for her, but there was a simple solution: just leave. Suria didn’t know when the wards had gone up, but if she had really gone back in time, she had walked into the waiting room not long ago. Taking a deep breath, she stood up and tried to walk out as if everything was normal.

As she maintained a steady pace, Suria’s mind was whirling with thoughts. She couldn’t help but glance at Maut-mai on her way out, wondering if the other woman was also faking. It didn’t seem so, but she might be a much better actor than Suria. In the hallway, the lone guard seemed to regard her skeptically, perhaps suspicious of her behavior or perhaps just thinking that she was an unwashed peasant who didn’t belong.

Those thoughts fell away as Suria found herself alone in the corridors. She wondered what kind of conflict the professors were involved in and how it had led to a “flawed” ritual. Was the time aspect the flaw, or her memories, or was it actually unrelated?

But what was the actual effect? Had time been rolled back just once, for a second chance at the battle? Was she marked by it, or would the professor remember her? Suria realized she didn’t even have enough information to speculate, and her mana senses had no experience with time magic, so she just wrapped her cloak around herself and walked faster.

“Let me out, dammit!”

She could hear Lirngelf shouting in the foyer, so she hesitated and pulled back. Better not to engage with him right now when he was so volatile. Instead, she began investigating side corridors, finding mostly locked doors. It seemed at this time of day, before the term properly started, the grand hall was largely abandoned.

There had to be other entrances, so Suria tried to make a mental map of the building. She knew the offices were to the north and the main entrance was to the south, so she headed west. It was difficult to keep everything straight, since there were so many nooks and crannies, or even passageways obscured by ornate marble sculptures, hidden in shadow due to the sparse mana lamps.

Soon enough she reached a hallway that led all the way to the outer wall, where she spotted a window. Suria broke into a run and pressed herself against it, staring at the landscape so close and yet so far away. She struck the glass in frustration, but her fist barely even made a sound. There was no mechanism that seemed like it could open the window, and if the doors were warded, she doubted that the windows were a weak point.

Sighing, Suria pulled back and resolved to keep searching. With the light from the window, it was easier to see the side passages. She spotted a smaller door and, no matter how irrational it was, rushed to try to push it open.

The door didn’t budge, just like the main entrance, and her limited mana senses seemed to detect pressure when she pushed against it. That made sense, since wards designed to lock down the building wouldn’t simply forget about a side entrance. Still, it was good to know the smaller door existed, and perhaps the defenses were weaker there.

Could she break down the door, even theoretically? Suria knew that her runes could support a destructive spell, the problem was that she didn’t know any destructive inscriptions. It seemed unlikely that her meager power could break down a barrier like this in any case.

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Resolving to keep looking, Suria touched the left-hand wall and began tracing the edges of the building to make sure she didn’t miss any twists. She discovered a small alcove she had missed earlier, but no new entrances, and the path eventually wound her back around to the entrance in the south.

Lirngelf was gone now, but there were burn marks and even a few chunks hacked from the doors… none of which seemed to have gotten through the warding barrier. If a second year student couldn’t break out, she’d been right not to bother with force. Suria realized that she had been dismissing Lirngelf as panicking, but he had rushed to the doors even more quickly than she had, so she shouldn’t underestimate him.

If there was no way to break out, what she needed next was information. She turned back to the foyer and looked at the statue speculatively. On her first visit she had been over-awed, and on her second she had been nervous and overwhelmed, but now she had more time to interrogate it.

“Hello, welcome to Darkmoon University.” When it spoke, the statue’s mouth didn’t move, but it did turn its head so the bronze eyes were focused on her. “Can I help you?”

“Why is the door locked?” Suria asked.

“Is it?” The statue actually blinked, a heavy motion that resulted in a clink of metal. “Yes, it seems that the wards have been raised. They are designed to defend any students within the building, so do not fear, this is only a minor incident.”

“When were the doors locked?” Suria pressed. Even if the statue didn’t know much, it seemed to be connected to the building, so it might have information for her.

“I am not sure,” the statue answered. “It cannot have been for long, because students were entering and departing not long ago. Do not fear, the faculty will soon take care of this minor incident.”

“How many exits are there to Convocation Hall?”