Vitaliara finally settled down, curling herself into a perfect white circle on his pillow.
Her tail wrapped over her nose.
Her golden eyes blinked once... twice...
Then a long, delicate yawn escaped her.
...ahh—
Her ears twitched.
She flattened her head into the blankets and murmured one last thought, faint and sleepy:
[Don’t stay up too late.]
Lucavion huffed a soft laugh. "I’m going to wash. Go sleep."
[Already am.]
And just like that, she was gone—breathing slow, steady, whiskers twitching as if still annoyed at him even in dreams.
Lucavion stood for a mont, looking at her curled form, sothing unreadable flickering through his expression.
Then he peeled off the last of his clothing, grabbed a towel, and stepped into the adjoining bath.
The mont he slid the door open, warm mana-lit steam greeted him—soft white mist rising from the tiled floor. The Academy’s personal bath chambers were a ridiculous luxury: self-cleaning marble, embedded runes along the walls, temperature wards, and—most importantly—the functional glyph that had many different functions.
Lucavion touched the rune with two fingers.
It pulsed beneath his skin—
a low hum, warm, familiar—
and then spread across his chest and shoulders like liquid heat.
The ache in his muscles eased imdiately.
The bruised tension in his ribs loosened.
His mana pathways, overstrained and still faintly burning, cooled into sothing manageable.
He let out a quiet breath.
Not relief.
Just... equilibrium.
Lucavion stepped into the water, letting it rise up to his shoulders. The heat soaked into him, turning the faint glow of his mana refinent into a soft shimr beneath the surface.
For a long mont, he simply sat there.
Silent.
Still.
Then the thoughts ca back.
Unwelco, but persistent.
"You disappeared."
"She wasn’t with us either."
He sank deeper into the bath, water rippling around him. His jaw tightened—not visibly, but in the way only he would notice.
Elara wasn’t with them.
Elara disappeared at the sa ti he did.
If that is the case...
He closed his eyes.
Did she et soone?
A new one?
A new male lead?
The idea slid through his mind like a stone across still water—smooth, light, but leaving a widening ripple behind.
"...It is early," he muttered under his breath.
The steam curled around his words, swallowing them before they touched the air.
But early or not—
this world didn’t follow his pacing.
Elara was the main character of a romance fantasy harem.
The original structure was built for it.
Accidental encounters.
Mysterious etings.
Sudden disappearances aligning with fateful first contacts.
He ran a wet hand through his hair, pushing it back as the heat traced down his spine.
"Did she already cross paths with soone?"
He refused to admit how much that thought bothered him.
But it did.
Lucavion sank deeper into the heat, letting it lap at his collarbones.
The recovery glyph pulsed again, warm threads knitting through his muscles.
He dragged a hand down his face.
"...Another exam added," he muttered.
The water rippled around him.
There was no such thing in Shattered Innocence.
No oral assessnt.
No sudden eighth exam.
It was a new developnt.
One not written.
One that shouldn’t be there.
He let his head fall back against the smooth stone wall, eyes half-lidded in the rising steam.
"It wasn’t in the novel," he said quietly. "Not anywhere."
His fingers traced idle patterns on the water’s surface.
"Of all the changes they could’ve made... this one?"
He snorted under his breath.
Not that it mattered.
Not in the way Cedric’s words had.
But logically—
It did make sense.
A new compulsory test announced the exact evening he disappeared from the public corridors.
A test scheduled to hit students individually, Magister-level, no warning.
"Because of ," he murmured.
It was almost obvious.
Instructors had already been paying too much attention.
His performance in the illusion zone didn’t help.
Another exam added.
Effective imdiately.
He let out a slow, controlled breath.
"They’re being pretty obvious now."
Pushing.
Testing.
He closed his eyes again.
And Cedric’s voice resurfaced—
"She wasn’t with us either."
Lucavion’s fingers curled under the water.
"Did she really et soone...?"
A new male lead.
"It’s early," he said again, but it didn’t sound convincing even to himself.
Too early for major flags.
Too early for rival route triggers.
But the world had already been shifting away from what he knew.
Characters he influenced acted differently.
Events warped.
Arcs flexed.
Why wouldn’t her encounters shift too?
His brow knit—subtle, restrained.
"...If she did et soone," he murmured into the steam, "the narrative won’t wait for ."
A soft clink echoed through the bathing chamber.
Lucavion straightened.
Not danger—
Just Vitaliara’s mana signature brushing faintly against the edge of his awareness.
The door slid open a crack.
A small white paw nudged sothing onto the tiled floor.
A sealed envelope.
Then the paw vanished again.
Lucavion blinked once.
"...You weren’t asleep," he said.
A half-asleep grumble drifted through his mind, faint and smudged with drowsiness:
[Hated the sound of your thoughts. Take your letter.]
Lucavion huffed a laugh. "You just wanted an excuse to peek."
The door was already shut, but her reply drifted lazily into his mind—unbothered, unashad:
[...Maybe.]
He stared at the closed door for one long, incredulous second.
"...Of course," he muttered.
Not even a flicker of embarrassnt.
Not even the courtesy of denial.
He shook his head, droplets sliding down his hair to his shoulders. "Unbelievable."
[...And your fault,] she added, voice sleepy but firm.
Lucavion snorted under his breath. No effect whatsoever.
He should’ve known by now she wasn’t easily teased.
Or flustered.
Or anything resembling normal, really.
He grabbed the envelope from the floor, water dripping off his fingers as he stepped out of the bath. A towel wrapped around his waist, steam curling off his skin as he padded back into the room.
The letter’s wax seal glimred in the lamplight.
He broke it with a thumb.
A single line of elegant ink unfurled:
LUCAVION
WEDNESDAY — 12:00
Magisterial Annex Hall C
He exhaled—quiet, steady.
No surprise. No irritation. Just acknowledgnt.
"An oral interview..." he murmured.
Not part of the original tiline.
Not sothing he rembered.
But changes were changes.
If the world wanted to rewrite itself, he wasn’t about to waste ti worrying over it.
His thoughts flickered for a brief mont toward Elara—
her schedule,
her absence,
Cedric’s stare,
the question hovering between all three of them.
But Lucavion pushed it aside.
Thinking circles around sothing he couldn’t confirm wasn’t his style.
If Elara t soone, she t soone.
The narrative shifted?
It shifted.
He’d deal with the fallout the sa way he dealt with everything else:
By moving forward.
Still, as he laid the letter on the desk, a quieter thought brushed the edge of his mind—so soft it barely registered, more mory than intention:
"...A promise is a promise."
A voice from years ago.
A hand on his shoulder.
"Please look after her if you can."
Elara.
The one person he was sworn to guard, whether she ever knew it or not.
Vitaliara, half-asleep, shifted on the pillow.
Her tail flicked once.
[Did you say sothing?]
Lucavion looked over his shoulder.
"Nothing important."
[...Whatever...]
Her consciousness faded again—warm, soft, drifting—as she sank fully back into sleep.
Lucavion leaned against the desk, arms folded, the lamplight catching the faint shimr along his mana pathways.
Wednesday. Twelve o’clock. A new exam.
A new shift in the story.
He closed his eyes briefly, letting the room’s silence settle around him.
Tomorrow would co with its own chaos.
And he would et it—as always—
on his own terms.
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