The morning had that specific quality of mornings that follow a day nobody has finished processing yet.
Gareth walked into the academy with his hands in his pockets and the expression of someone who has already decided the next several hours are going to be a complete waste of time. Around him, the Mourgare effect was still in full operation — louder than yesterday, if anything. Apparently a night's sleep hadn't cooled anyone down.
Lyra found him before he reached his seat.
She fell into step beside him with that particular energy of someone who has been holding a conversation in their head for several hours and is now ready to have it out loud.
"Your mother is incredible." She said it immediately, as if it had been sitting at the front of her mind since the moment she walked out of the Thornfield residence. "She just lets people in, feeds them, and makes them feel like they've known her for years. I barely said anything and she already knew my name, where I lived, what I was studying—"
"She's like that with everyone."
"I know, but it's still impressive." A pause. "Your sister is terrifying though."
"That's accurate."
"She looked at me like she was calculating something."
"She probably was."
Lyra considered that. Decided to let it go.
"By the way." She glanced at him sideways. "I still don't understand the fountain thing. I gave you every opportunity last night to explain it and you said nothing. You just let me think—"
"It doesn't matter."
"It does matter, actually, because I went into a fountain for you."
"And I said thank you."
"You said it like you were reading off a list." She stopped walking, which meant he had to stop too or keep going without her. He stopped. "Dorian. What happened?"
Gareth looked at her.
One second.
"Some guys took my bag." He said it with the same tone someone would use to report a change in the weather. "You don't need to know the details."
Lyra stared at him.
"And you just... let them?"
"Nothing important was in it."
"That's not—" She exhaled slowly through her nose. "You know what, fine. We'll come back to that." She started walking again. "Let's talk about something more urgent."
'Is there something more urgent?'
"The core." Lyra looked at him with the specific expression of someone whose patience is being tested in a way they hadn't signed up for. "I didn't see it with you this morning. Where is it?"
Gareth processed the question.
'Ah.'
'There it is.'
He scratched the back of his head.
Slowly. With the specific gesture of someone arriving at a conclusion they don't like.
"I think I... forgot it."
Lyra looked at him.
A full second of complete silence.
"You forgot it."
"Yes."
'Falling this low. I never thought it would come to this. I will never forgive myself for this.'
"Dorian." Lyra's voice had that particular tone of someone making a conscious effort not to raise their volume. "It was the first assignment the professor gave us. The first one. How is it possible that you forgot something like that?"
"Unfortunately I can't turn it in anymore." Gareth looked at her with total serenity. "And there's nothing that can be done about it."
"B-but—!"
"—did you guys hear what happened?"
Both of them turned their heads at the same time.
Ten meters away, surrounded by a circle of students that had formed with the speed only gossip circles achieve when the topic is good enough, stood a boy. Gareth recognized him in under a second.
'Of course.'
The same one as always. The one who was always trying to provoke him. The one who had thrown his bag into the fountain that very afternoon. The same one who had been pressed against the wall with his eyes wide open while the Mastodon chased him around the chamber.
The same one he'd tossed the core to before walking out.
Now he was standing in the center of the circle with the posture of someone who has told this story three times this morning and has it perfectly calibrated.
"—it was enormous, four meters easy, and the armor wouldn't yield to anything—" The boy spread his arms wide to give scale. "And that's when Mourgare appeared."
Murmurs. Immediate interest.
"Wait, you actually saw him in person?" someone said.
"With my own eyes. We were both inside the Stronghold when the Mastodon showed up." A calculated pause. "We faced it together."
Gareth leaned his back against the hallway wall, hands in his pockets.
'Together.'
'What a fascinating reinterpretation of events.'
"Mourgare is incredible, I won't argue that." The boy — Edric, he remembered suddenly, his name was Edric Vane — nodded with the conviction of someone validating their own version of a story. "But don't think he did it all alone. That Mastodon needed to be pressured from two fronts. I kept it occupied while he found the angle. Teamwork, at the end of the day."
"Come on." A girl in the circle crossed her arms. "Mourgare defeated the first floor Tower boss solo. And you're telling me he needed your help for a kobold Mastodon?"
"These are completely different contexts—"
"Besides, Mourgare doesn't exist." A boy further back raised his hand. "He's a high-rank hunter using a fake name. My father knows every S-rank and none of them go by that name."
"Because he's not a registered hunter!" Edric pointed at the group. "That's exactly what makes him different. He's a completely separate person — operates alone, no guild, no affiliation—"
"Or it's a story someone made up so people wouldn't panic—"
"I saw him with my own eyes!"
Gareth observed the exchange with the serene attention of someone watching it rain.
"It's impressive that the whole Mourgare thing is still going strong." He said it without directing it at anyone in particular. "I figured people would have moved on by now."
Lyra looked at him like he'd said something in a language she didn't recognize.
"How would they move on?" Her tone carried that specific mix of disbelief and patience she seemed to reserve exclusively for him. "We're talking about the person who saved all of us from total extinction. That's going to be worth talking about for a very long time."
Gareth watched her.
Lyra held his gaze for a moment, then looked toward the circle.
"Although..." She lowered her voice slightly. "I do think people are starting to get a little obsessive about finding out who they are. If that person hasn't wanted to reveal their identity until now, it's because they have a reason for it. That should be respected."
Gareth didn't answer right away.
"What do you think that reason is?"
Lyra thought about it.
"I don't know." A pause. "Maybe they're just really shy. Or too introverted."
'Wrong. Understandable, but wrong. Nobody will ever know the real reason why I do things the way I do.'
The classroom door opened.
Professor Aldren walked in with the specific energy of someone who has been doing this for twenty years and has found a rhythm he has no intention of changing. He scanned the room with that contained satisfaction of someone expecting to confirm something good.
"Impressive." He moved along the first row. "I see everyone with their cores. Well done."
He advanced down the center aisle.
He stopped.
He looked toward the back.
He looked at Gareth.
He looked at the empty space where a core should have been.
The silence that followed lasted exactly long enough to be uncomfortable.
"Thornfield." The word came out with a calm that wasn't neutrality but something worse. "Where is your core?"
Gareth looked at him.
"I didn't have much luck finding a Stronghold."
A pause.
"What kind of excuse is that?!"
The laughter started from the second row and spread backward with its usual speed.
"Seriously? He couldn't even manage that?"
"The Thornfield heir, everyone."
"First rank F and now this — at least he's consistent."
Gareth didn't bother looking at them.
Professor Aldren walked slowly until he was standing directly in front of his desk. He studied him with the expression of someone who isn't satisfied with what they see but isn't surprised by it either, which in some ways was worse.
"I cannot believe that someone carrying such an important name can be this irresponsible." He said it with the deliberateness of someone weighing every word. "I expected more from you. Much more."
Gareth looked at him without changing anything in his expression.
Aldren held the look for a moment longer. Then:
"I'm going to be very clear. I will not let this go without consequence." A pause. "You have until Friday to bring me a core." Another silence, this one with more weight behind it. "But given your last name, I'm not going to ask you for the same thing I asked your classmates. I want an intermediate-high level core. At least five hundred mana units." His eyes didn't leave Gareth's. "If you are a Thornfield, prove it to me. Otherwise I will be notifying your father about all of this, and we'll see what he thinks."
'How terrifying.'
"Whatever you say, professor."
Aldren held his gaze for two more seconds. Then he turned around and the class continued as normal, as if none of the previous exchange had happened.
***
When the last class ended Gareth walked out of the building with his hands in his pockets and the unhurried pace of someone with nowhere urgent to be.
The comments started before he reached the middle of the courtyard.
"Hey Thornfield, find your Stronghold yet?"
"Careful you don't get lost on the way."
"Can't even do that right."
Gareth looked at them. Once. Without slowing down.
And kept walking.
He inhaled.
Exhaled.
"How cliché all of this is." He said it quietly, to no one. "But fine... it's the life I decided to live."
And he kept going.
Corvus landed on his left shoulder two blocks later, without announcement or explanation.
"Oh. Hey."
"How was your day at the academy?"
"Horrible." No hesitation. "I just wanted it to be over."
"I imagine so." A pause. "After all, you were reprimanded for not bringing the core. Weren't you?"
Gareth looked at him.
"How do you know that?"
"I deduced it."
Gareth studied him for a moment longer.
"You were spying from the window."
Silence.
"...Possibly."
"Then why are you asking if you already know perfectly well what happened."
"Yes." Corvus tilted his head with the calm of something that feels absolutely no shame about what it just admitted. "But it's also important to me to know what you think about it."
Gareth looked back ahead.
"The only thing I think is that the academy is the worst. Boring, predictable, a waste of time in every possible sense." A pause. "But right now the only thing on my mind is stacking buffs and completing the assignment that idiot professor gave me."
"You're actually going to do it?" Corvus sounded genuinely curious. "I thought you wouldn't care. Or did the threat of reporting you to your father convince you?"
"Please stop referring to Victor as my father." A short pause. "But to answer your question — the reason is simple. That man told me to bring him a higher-level core than the ones my classmates are turning in." Gareth smiled, just barely. "So that's exactly what I'll do. But I'll bring him a special one. A unique one."
Corvus took a moment.
"But... wouldn't that just raise suspicions about you?"
"Not at all." The tone was that of someone explaining something they consider completely self-evident. "All it takes is one look at the reputation I have at the academy. The moment I hand it over he's going to immediately assume I didn't get it myself. That I bought it, or sent someone to get it for me." A pause. "And yet I will have delivered it, which is what matters. So he'll have no choice but to swallow his anger." Another beat. "I'm very clever, aren't I?"
Corvus looked at him.
With the expression of something that doesn't quite know what to do with what it just heard.
"Sure... Only you would come up with something like that."
"Thank you."
"That wasn't a compliment."
"I know." Gareth kept walking. "So when do we go? It'll be a Stronghold, right?"
"Exactly." A pause. "And we're heading there right now."
Corvus straightened up on his shoulder.
"Huh?! Right now, seriously?!" A loaded pause. "And what's inside?"
Gareth didn't answer right away.
He just let that half-smile appear — the one that wasn't quite satisfaction but was close enough to it.
"You'll find out when we get there."