BLOOD CURSE ACADEMIA - PREVIOUS DRAFT EDITION -

Chapter XXV (25)- Spellsense

Kizu took a page from Ione’s daily strategy and napped through History F. Despite the professor’s many faults, Krimpit’s monotonous tone was exceptional for helping others drift off into sleep. And the room was so warm and humid. Kizu didn’t remember anything beyond that for the entirety of the class.

Harvey woke him up when class ended, and they exited together. Harvey smiled and waved at everyone they passed in the corridors.

“Why are you always so nice to everyone?” Kizu asked after a couple of girls scowled and told Harvey to beat it. “Most of the students here don’t want anything to do with anyone else.”

Harvey tilted his head and thought for a minute while they walked.

“I suppose,” he said. “When you grow up in as small of a town as my own, you can’t afford to make people mad at you. You won’t be able to ever get away with them. And there’s a very small number of people to be friends with. I think maybe people in small towns are nicer by necessity.”

“You’re from a small town?” Kizu asked. He realized he didn’t know anything about Harvey’s life back home.

“Yeah, on the west coast. Pretty much as far from civilization as you can get. Guess you can’t tell from my accent because of your earring but I’m not exactly from the prestigious Edgeland cities of my other kinfolk here. And no beaches like the ones here, let me tell you. We have an abundance of cliffs and jagged rocks. Trying to swim out in the ocean results in death more than not.”

“But now you’re here,” Kizu said leadingly.

“A cousin owed me a favor. He’s an alumnus who graduated with honors. Managed to pull a few strings and get my first year’s fees waived. My family will have to find the money by the start of next year though. I think they’ve already started saving. Luckily, business has been really good this summer.”

“What kind of business?”

“Wool. We got sheep out our ears. Absolute abundance of the stuff. My family trades it across Edgeland. We do good for ourselves. Just not Wave Edge Academy good. What about you? What do your folks do?”

“They’re silk traders,” Kizu said. “I don’t know who or where they sell to or really anything about the business beyond the fact that they trade silk. And that they’re pretty successful.”

Harvey whistled. “Silk, huh? Now that’s lucrative. Back home I could probably trade a dozen sheep for a single silk shirt. And that's the sheep, mind you, not just the wool.”

“I guess so.”

They split up after that, Kizu heading off to Combat F. As he sat, watching the students again running around the courtyard, he wondered about each of their backgrounds. Were the majority from trade families like him and Harvey? Or did he attend alongside actual nobility? It was a nice distraction from thinking about his sister.

But, of course, as soon as the thought occurred to him, his mind snapped back to her letter. The cryptic message bothered him. What deal could end with her expelled and disowned? What had she gotten herself into on his behalf?

“What are you thinking about?” Arclight asked him.

“My sister,” Kizu said honestly.

“Ah, the one that got expelled?” Arclight chuckled as he gave her an incredulous look. “No need to look like that! I never met the girl. Left before my tenure. Oasaji and I only arrived a few years back. But she’s a bit of an infamous legend amongst the student body. Less now that most of her peers have graduated, but still. All the professors are extremely hushed on the subject.”

Kizu wanted to pry more about his sister, but something else caught his attention as well. “I didn’t know you and Professor Oasaji arrived at the same time.”

“Only makes sense for the academy to hire both of us! Think about it. Keeps incentive to stay on the island and devote ourselves to our work. If they only hired one, then we’d spend half our time and resources meeting with the other! Absolute waste of time and money! Of course, there’s always a risk that we’d fight or, gods forbid, get divorced. But the academy assessed our relationship and judged it as stable. And I’m inclined to agree.”

Kizu blinked. Divorced? That would mean they were…married. Well, suddenly his Awakened animal theory felt a lot less plausible.

Arclight’s laughter boomed across the courtyard, causing several of the students running to turn their heads and glare enviously at him.

“You didn’t know? And Oasaji always goes on moaning about all the students gossiping about us behind our backs! Ha!”

Arclight appeared extremely smug about the revelation of his ignorance.

“But…he’s a turkey,” Kizu said carefully.

“And a damn fine one at that!” Arclight threw her head back and laughed again.

After a few more attempts to get more information out of her about her husband were met with little more than outright laughter, Kizu gave up. He and Ione would get to the bottom of the mystery. They just needed a bit of time.

Kizu tried to steer the conversation back to his sister, but that proved as fruitful as getting information about Oasaji. Arclight claimed to know even less about the situation than he did and actually turned the conversation back at him, asking him questions about his sister. Most of which, he shamefully didn’t know the answers to.

When the bell rang, most of the students collapsed in the dirt, panting. Kizu’s heart went out to them. Even just sitting on the sidelines watching, the heat from the sun sapped his energy away. He couldn’t imagine trying to run in the thick academy uniform. Evie, though, walked up to him. At first, she looked like she wanted to say something but then her large chestnut eyes dropped to scan the dirt at his feet.

“Want to grab some lunch?” he asked her.

She nodded and the two of them left the courtyard.

“Are you okay?” she asked him as they walked to the cafeteria.

“I don’t understand. Why wouldn’t I be?” His mind went through half a dozen reasons why he might not be okay. Being attacked in the dungeon under the academy. Not being able to locate his sister. The frustrating fact that his brother tried to get him sent to prison. Being signed up for the combat test at the end of the week. The mysterious artifacts he was led to in the middle of the night. Or just the fact that he ranked as the second lowest overall student in the entire academy.

“Everyone says you sat out for medical reasons.” Evie sounded uncomfortable as she spoke.

“Oh, that. I overdid a divination spell. It sucked too much blood out of my system, so I have to sit out of classes like combat for the week. But I’m fine, just need to recuperate for another day or two.”

“Oh good,” she said softly, sounding genuinely relieved. After a moment of silence while they walked, she continued. “Next week we’re supposed to go back to shield training.”

“I didn’t hear Arclight tell us that,” Kizu said. “How do you know?”

“Someone in administration told me.”

“Oh yeah, you also run errands for Roba. Sorry, I forgot.”

“Roba? Do you mean Ms. Jackal?”

“I think so,” Kizu said. “Old lady who works for the headmaster, right?”

Evie nodded and then the cafeteria’s noise drowned out anything she might have said.

They sat at the end of a table that looked slightly less filled than the others. He spotted a few other people he knew from his classes, but they all looked preoccupied. Then he noticed Emilia walking by with her two usual friends. Kizu met her eye and gave a little wave. Her eyes darted to Evie, and she frowned before continuing on her way.

Kizu wondered if Evie was somehow unpopular. But that seemed bizarre. The girl only just got to the academy two weeks ago and she hardly spoke a word her entire time here. Maybe she had some sort of prior baggage.

“Where are you from, Evie?” he asked her.

She looked startled by his question.

“Tross,” she said. He barely heard her over the noise in the room, but that was the equivalent of shouting for Evie.

Not Edgeland like Emilia then. He wondered what relationship they had with one another then to provoke a glare from the normally laid-back Tainted girl. Maybe some form of racism towards Evie’s species?

He was still thinking about it as he parted ways and headed to the painting entrance into Enchanting C.

A random person plopped down in the seat next to him and Kizu knew without even glancing at him that it was Basil. This time he recognized the shapechanger’s perfume. He wore a similar one a few days back. It smelled like melons. A glance at him showed him to be a striking young man with smoldering eyebrows and a chiseled chin. Kizu couldn’t help but to think Basil was overdoing it with the guise. He looked like an idealized painting a noble would have commissioned, not a real person.

Class began but Kateshi looked half dead as she spoke to the class. She told them to work in groups of two or three and practice vocabulary.

“You know,” Basil said. “I’m no expert, but your uniform looks a bit wrong.”

“Basil, no need to act humble,” Kizu said with a sigh. “You know clothes better than anyone I’ve ever met. I think it’s fair to call you an expert. What is it? Is my collar messed up?”

“No, not with the actual uniform.” Basil stared at him. “Ah, you got rid of the cooling enchantment. That’s it.”

“Cooling enchantment?” Kizu said, perplexed. “I didn’t turn anything like that off.”

“Here, allow me.” Basil pressed a hand against his back. A shiver went up Kizu’s spine at the touch. Sure enough, when he took the hand away, the uniform cooled him off immediately. It felt like a cool breeze caught under the cloth, soothing the heat.

“Thank you,” Kizu said. He already felt significantly more alert. He hadn’t realized just how much the heat and humidity sucked out his energy.

“Yeah, no worries. Weird you didn’t notice it yourself. You know how to use your spellsense, right?”

“Spellsense?” Kizu asked.

“Seriously? You don’t know how to use your spellsense? Amazing you made it so far without using it. It’s like sight, touch, smell. A sense. It’s the first thing most mages learn. Usually as a child long before ever casting a real spell.”

“No. Nobody ever taught me that.” The crone had skipped past the teaching part of magic and just jumped straight to ordering him around. Everything he had learned was from watching her and reading her books.

“You must be the only one in the entire academy who can’t use your spellsense. Here, close your eyes.”

Kizu did so. He hated being blind to everything around him, but it was fine so long as he knew he could open his eyes whenever he wanted.

“It helps if you’re floating in water,” Basil continued. “That’s how I learned. If you let go of your other senses, it will be easier to locate the inborn sense in you. Every living creature has it. Some just innate sense it better than others. Like how a dog can smell things you never would be able to naturally.”

“What does it feel like?” Kizu asked. He had no idea what to look for.

“Describe color to a blind man for me. Or what a sound feels like to a deaf man. The closest you’ll get are the emotions they provoke. Now I’m going to keep talking, but you need to block me out. Block out all sound.”

If he said more, Kizu didn’t notice. He removed his earring and let the noise all become an incomprehensible buzz. He pushed even that away, trying to reach out mentally. Trying to touch something beyond the wooden seat. As he did, he touched his bond with Mort. The owl monkey napped under his pillowcase in the medicine wing. He stirred under Kizu’s perception and Kizu got the brief impression of his dreams. Bananas. Of course, the monkey was dreaming about bananas. Kizu pulled himself back and tried to ignore his familiar. Then he felt it. Emitting a spec of energy, he zeroed in on it. An earring. It must be a student’s translation earring based on the size.

He opened his eyes to tell Basil about it and immediately became disoriented. As if blinking and transporting somewhere else entirely. Suddenly, the entire room erupted with energy. As if the spec from an earring expanded everywhere.

“Overwhelmed?” Basil asked. “Whoops, that’s my bad. I should have thought of that. Usually, you first try with just a tiny bit of magic present. Then, as you get better, you can filter more out.”

Kizu resolved to practice that later. At the very least, it seemed like he could still practice the sense with the antimagic bracelet still on. It must not count as an actual spell.

After a bit of practicing, he noticed people also left behind a specific trace through the spell sense. It reminded him of how people had specific smells associated with them. Likely the uniqueness had to do with the person’s individual blood. Not two bloods were exactly the same after all. And he suspected he sensed the blood in a person, not the actual body or soul.

All through the night he practiced the new sense in the medicine wing. Just turning the sense off and on. When he really focused, he could see areas that had magic. Whether on student’s robes or the tools the assistants used. He could even sense the students through their bed curtains. It was a sense that didn’t rely on line of sight. He wondered how he might be able to use that.

He decided to test out what he’d done earlier as well. He sent Mort off to explore the academy hallways. Then he reached out through their bond. He activated his spellsense and could see the painting glowing with magic. It was still disorienting, but after some practice, he felt like he had a pretty good grasp on the technique.

When the morning bell rang and woke him up, he dragged himself off to class. He kept telling himself he just needed to get through that day before the weekend. But the thought wasn’t as comforting when he remembered that tomorrow he would have to retake all his tests and the next day he had to compete in what amounted to a pit fight with people jeering at him from all angles. In fact, he became so lost in his thoughts, it wasn’t until after class that he realized Harvey had hardly said a word to him in Astronomy E. An oddity for the Tainted boy, but Kizu shrugged it off and returned to thinking about his own problems.

The rest of the day wasn’t much better. He went over strategies on how he might be able to scrape by in the combat test without utterly embarrassing himself like the other low-level combatants. He had a few aces up his sleeve, but that didn’t stop his worrying. He wished they at least told him who he would be competing against. But they withheld that information until the day of the competition.

After his last two classes, he returned to the medicine wing to find Kateshi waiting for him. She performed a few final tests on him, taking a blood sample even, much to Kizu’s discomfort. But she informed him his blood level was almost back at a safe amount. Even still, she assigned him to eat more of the lackluster diet for dinner and recommended that he continue it after his release as well.

Kizu nodded along, internally looking forward to eating something sweet again. Then, while gnawing on one of the food bars assigned to him, the bracelet finally unlocked. It popped off and fell in his lap. He let out a sigh of relief.

Once back in his dorm, he unceremoniously dumped his stuff at the foot of his bed. He looked under the bed and found the wooden box, unmoved from where he had shoved it before. Opening it, he looked through the things inside. The necklace gave off no sign of magic, but the book and knife shone like beacons to his new awareness. He wished his spell sense could tell him what they did though. Anything beyond just saying ‘magic.’

Kizu set the translated letter in the box and then picked up the necklace. He decided it was time to test out its limits.