The night sky was always a constant darkness, many people would believe that the endless night sky is just nothing, just a cold void that holds nothing to look at or explore.
But yet within those night skies, there was a moon that was always constant, that shed light down here, and along with it snow that came from the dark skies that had no clouds.
To everyone, it has always been a mystery.
And yet… The snow shines bright on the ground, not bright in the sense that it can blind the eye, but a light that shows that even in darkness there is always light.
Even the moonlight shines to us which gives even the snow and us a light of comfort.
"It's always so strange…that the snow always shines in the dark…" A voice that was feminine and soft and a mix of serene velvety in her tone.
I glanced at the girl next to me who had the highest shade of red hair that could be mistaken for white, and bright blue eyes that matched my own serenity.
We were currently sitting on the edge of a cliff looking at the vast field of snow that never ends, but yet the landscape of nature with the mix of the eternal snow is beautiful, the night atmosphere made it even more ethereal.
Scarlett leaned forward slightly, her small hands resting on the cold stone of the cliff's edge. Her white dress shirt was crisp against the dark backdrop of the world, and her black pants and shoes disappeared into the shadows beneath us. She looked like a piece of the moon that had fallen and taken the shape of a living being, only burning with an inner warmth that the moon could never possess.
"Do you think there is anything up there, Isaac?" she asked, tilting her head back to look into the abyss above. "In all that dark? Or is it just... empty?"
I followed her gaze. The sky was a heavy blanket, devoid of stars tonight, just an endless stretch of velvet ink. "I do not think it is empty, Scarlett. Emptiness is just a space waiting to be filled. Perhaps there are things up there we simply cannot see yet. Things that are waiting for us to look closer."
"But if we cannot see them," she whispered, her brow furrowing in a way that was both childish and ancient, "how do we know they are not monsters? How do we know the dark isn't hiding something that wants to hurt us?"
I looked at her, at the way the pale light from the snow below reflected in her eyes. "Why would you assume they are monsters? Why must the unknown be fearful?"
"Because we do not know it," she replied simply, pulling her knees up to her chest. "People fear what they cannot name. If I cannot see the bottom of a lake, I fear what touches my feet. If I cannot see into the dark, I fear what watches me from it. Isn't that natural?"
"Perhaps for others," I said, my voice calm, barely rising above the whisper of the wind. "But fear stops you from looking. If you close your eyes because you are afraid, you will never see the beauty that might be hiding there. Maybe the dark isn't hiding monsters. Maybe it is hiding friends who are just shy. Or colors we have never named. How can you fear it if you haven't tried looking?"
Scarlett looked at me, her expression unreadable for a moment, before a small, serene smile touched her lips. "You always look, don't you? Even when it is dark."
"I look because I want to know," I said. "And because if I look, then the dark is no longer unknown. It becomes... familiar."
A flake of snow drifted down from the nothingness above. It spiraled slowly, caught in a gentle updraft, dancing between us. Scarlett reached out, her finger extending with a delicate grace. The snowflake landed on the tip of her index finger.
It was a perfect, intricate star of ice.
"It's beautiful," she breathed.
But the moment the words left her lips, the snowflake vanished. It didn't just melt, it dissolved instantly into a tiny bead of water, extinguished by the heat of her skin. The perfect structure was gone, replaced by a simple wet spot.
Scarlett's smile faltered. She stared at her finger, a flash of hurt crossing her blue eyes. "It... it went away."
Another flake drifted down. I reached out my hand, palm open, fingers relaxed. The snowflake landed gently on my middle finger.
It sat there. Pristine. Unchanging. The cold crystal structure held its form, resting against my skin as if it belonged there.
Scarlett leaned in, her eyes widening. She looked from her wet finger to my dry one, where the snowflake remained a perfect star.
"Why?" she asked, her voice trembling slightly. "Why does it stay for you? Why did mine die?"
I looked at the snowflake, then at her. "It didn't die, Scarlett. It changed."
"It melted," she corrected, her voice thick with a sudden, overwhelming doubt. "It touched me, and it broke. Yours is still there. Yours is perfect." She pulled her hand back, tucking it against her chest as if her touch was a curse. "Is it... is it because I am too warm? Is it because I burn things?"
"Scarlett..."
"I try to be gentle," she whispered, looking out at the endless snow, avoiding my gaze. "I tried to hold it softly. But it didn't matter. It touched me, and it couldn't survive. Am I... am I bad for it? Do I destroy the things I want to hold?"
The pain in her voice was not the tantrums of a child denied a toy. It was the existential dread of a soul realizing its own power might be incompatible with the fragility of the world it loved. She saw herself as a sun that scorched the world, while I was the moon that let the tides be.
I watched the snowflake on my finger. It was starting to lose its sharp edges now. The very tip of one arm turned to water, then another. Slowly, agonizingly slowly, it began to fade.
"Look," I said softly.
Scarlett turned her head, her eyes teary. She looked at my finger. The snowflake was no longer a star. It was a slushy mound, and then, a drop of water.
"It is melting," I said. "Just like yours. It just took a little longer."
"But it stayed for you," she insisted. "It lets you see it."
"It stayed because my hands are cold," I said, offering her a small, sad smile. "That is not always a good thing, Scarlett. To be cold means things do not change when they touch you. They stay frozen. But life... life is changing. Your warmth... it didn't destroy the snowflake. It accepted it. It turned it into water. And water feeds the world. Water gives life."
"But I wanted to keep it," she said, a tear slipping down her cheek. "I wanted it to stay perfect."
"Nothing stays perfect forever," I told her. "Not the snow. Not the dark. Not us. We change. We melt. We become something else."
She looked at her hands, then at mine. "But it feels like... like I ruin things. Like I am too much. Too bright. Too hot. And you... you are so quiet. So calm. The world likes you better."
"The world does not choose favorites," I said. "The world needs both. It needs the sun to wake it up, to warm the soil, to make the flowers grow. And it needs the moon to let it sleep, to pull the oceans, to cool the air. You are the sun, Scarlett. Your passion, your warmth... It is fierce. It is fast. It changes things instantly. That is a power."
"A scary power," she whispered.
"Only if you fear it," I replied. "I am the moon. I am slow. I am cold. Things stay with me longer, yes, but sometimes... sometimes I worry they will never change. That they will stay frozen forever. Neither is better. They are just different comforts."
She looked at me, searching my face with an intensity that belied her age. The doubt was still there, swimming in the depths of her blue eyes. She felt dangerous to herself. She felt like a hazard to the beauty she admired.
I moved my hand. I reached out and gently placed my palms on either side of her face. My skin was cool against her flushed cheeks. She froze, her eyes locking onto mine, her breath hitching.
"Scarlett," I said, my voice steady, an anchor in her rising storm.
I held her gaze. I let her feel the coolness of my hands, the steady beat of my presence. I let her see that I was not afraid of her warmth. I was not afraid of the fire that burned inside her.
"Look at me," I whispered.
She did. She looked at me as if I were the only thing in the universe that made sense.
"Did I melt?" I asked.
The question hung in the cold air.
Scarlett blinked. Her hands came up, tentatively covering mine where they rested on her face. She felt my solidness. She felt my skin, unbroken, unburnt.
"No..." she whispered.
"I am still here," I said, brushing my thumbs gently under her eyes, wiping away the wetness there. "You touched me. You are holding me. And I am not gone. I am not water. I am Isaac."
A sob broke from her throat, but it was a sob of relief. "You didn't melt."
"I will not melt," I promised her. "Not for you. You can be as warm as you need to be. You can burn as bright as you want. I will always be here. I will always be the cool air that catches you. I will always be the shadow that lets you rest."
She leaned into my touch, closing her eyes. "I was so scared," she confessed. "Scared that if I loved anything... really loved it... it would disappear."
"I am right here," I said. "And I am not going anywhere."
We sat there for a long time, the snow falling around us, me holding her face, her holding my hands. The silence wasn't empty anymore. It was filled with a quiet understanding, a balance struck between the fierce heat of her soul and the soothing cold of mine.
Eventually, she pulled back, wiping her eyes with the back of her sleeve. She looked out at the darkness again, at the cliff's edge where the snow dropped off into nothingness.
"It is still dark down there," she said, her voice small again. "We cannot see the bottom."
"No," I agreed. "We cannot."
Considering that we always come here when it is our time to sleep, we never truly see what was below this cliff despite the horizon landscape being snow, but that doesn't mean something different could be below us.
"What if... what if we fall?" she asked. "What if we slip and the unknown catches us?"
"Then we see what is there," I said.
She shivered. "But we don't know. It could be... it could be hard. It could hurt."
"Or," I said, standing up and brushing the snow from my black pants. "It could be soft. It could be a cloud. It could be a whole new world."
I extended my hand to her. She took it, letting me pull her to her feet. We stood on the precipice, two small figures in our attire against the vastness of the night. The wind whipped at our white shirts, tugging at our hair.
"Do you trust me?" I asked.
She looked at me, surprised. "Always."
"Do you trust the snow?"
She hesitated. "I... I don't know."
"Then trust me," I said. "The unknown is only scary when you stand on the edge of it. When you are in it... it is just the world."
I stepped closer to the edge. My toes hung over the abyss.
"Isaac?" her voice pitched up in panic. "What are you doing?"
I turned to her, my expression serene, my smile warm and inviting. "showing you."
"Showing me what?"
"That there is nothing to fear."
And then, without a countdown, without a warning, I pulled.
"Isaac!" she screamed, a sound of pure terror.
I stepped back, into the air, and I took her with me.
We fell.
The wind roared in our ears. The cliff face rushed upward, disappearing into the dark sky above. For a second, there was that stomach-churning sensation of weightlessness, the primal fear of gravity taking hold. Scarlett squeezed my hand so hard I thought she might crush my bones. Her eyes were squeezed shut, her face buried in her shoulder, bracing for the impact, bracing for the pain, bracing for the end.
But I kept my eyes open. I watched the snow swirl around us. I watched the darkness embrace us. I felt the rush of the air, the freedom of the fall. I held her hand tight, not to crush it, but to anchor her.
It is okay, I thought, projecting the calm toward her. I have you.
And then, we landed.
It wasn't a crash. It wasn't a thud.
It was a poof.
We hit a massive drift of snow, accumulated over centuries at the base of the cliff. It was deep, soft, and powdery. We sank into it, buried in a cloud of white. The world went silent and muffled.
For a moment, we didn't move. We were just shapes beneath the snow.
Then, I sat up, shaking the powder from my hair. I looked over at the mound beside me.
Scarlett burst out of the snow, gasping for air, her eyes wide, her red hair plastered to her face with white flakes. She looked around, patting her arms, her legs, her chest.
"I'm... I'm alive," she breathed.
"You are," I said, brushing snow off her shoulder.
She looked up at the cliff, towering high above us, disappearing into the night. Then she looked at the snow we were sitting in. It was soft. It sparkled even brighter down here.
"We fell," she said, her voice filled with wonder. "We jumped into the dark."
"And?" I asked.
She looked at me. A slow grin spread across her face, replacing the terror. "And it was soft."
She scooped up a handful of snow and threw it into the air, watching it rain down on us. She laughed, a bright, clear sound that echoed off the cliff walls.
"It was soft!" she yelled. "Isaac! It didn't hurt!"
"See?" I said, smiling at her joy. "The unknown wasn't a monster. It was just a bed of snow waiting to catch us."
She crawled over to me through the drift and tackled me in a hug, burying her cold nose in my neck. "You're crazy," she mumbled into my collar. "You threw us off a cliff."
"I showed you the truth," I said, hugging her back. "That falling isn't failing. And the dark isn't death. It's just a different place to land."
She pulled back, looking at me with eyes that shone brighter than any star I had ever memorized. "I'm not scared," she whispered. "If you are with me... I am not scared of the dark."
"Good," I said. "Because there is a lot of it. And we have a lot of exploring to do."
"Did I melt the snow?" she asked, looking around at the crater we had made.
"No," I said. "You just made your mark on it."
She smiled, the most beautiful, serene smile I had ever seen. "Then let's make more."
We lay back in the snow, side by side, looking up at the distant top of the cliff, two small royals in a kingdom of ice and night, no longer afraid of the shadows, because we knew that even in the deepest dark, we had each other, and that was light enough.
Scarlett and I heard the crunching sounds in the snow that came from someone or something coming close, since we saw a simmering low light that would come from a lantern in the dark.
"It seems we are caught…" Scarlett sighed softly. "And our favorite place has been seen…"
The person in question was now in view as the person, a woman wearing a black thin coat and was wearing a long-sleeved black shirt with a corset high waist skirt, a modest black drawstring under skirt, and a black hat that was expected for a head maid in the eternal winter as she had short red hair and eyes that were red with white rings and a white star pupil in the middle as she spoke softly.
"Indeed you two are, and how sneaky you two have gotten…"
As Scarlett and I sat up in the snow, I decided to greet her. "A pleasant night to see you, Madam Wilhemina, I hope the search for us wasn't too much of a trouble."
"How did you find Isaac and I?" Scarlett tilted her head in curiosity.
Madam Wilhemina began to explain. "When I noticed you two were not in your chambers sleeping," She paused as she helped both of us slowly. "I went to your mother in her study room and told her that both of you weren't in bed. She calmly told me that you two would be somewhere where you two found serenity and comfort and told me that is where you two are, I didn't know what she meant until I remembered both of your eyes that held an ancient wisdom in them that searched for an infinite vanity that is searching for fullness, and recalled this cliff provides a perfect view of that infinite vanity of snow of the and the endless dark skies. And that is when I realize you two would most certainly be here." She finished.
It seems mother has never changed her speaking language when it comes to her cryptic riddles, but that is expected of her as a magician, well a former one.
Scarlett and I were fruits in her life tree, and we cherish her a lot.
Scarlett, brushing off the snow from her shoulders. "It seems you know us more than we know ourselves… and that mother speaks in riddles, even when it's her own children missing…"
Madam Wilhemina shook her head in humbleness. "It's all thanks to Mistress Moon, she knows you two more than I, so all credit should go to her."
"Don't sell yourself short Madam Wilhemina," I said. "That was amazing that you knew we would be here just by our depths of the eyes and the connection in this area," I reassured her as she sighed softly.
"A highest compliment from you Master Isaac," She softly chuckled. "How can I refuse such a compliment?" She then gestured for us to follow her. "But it is quite late for you two, so it's time for you two to sleep."
We nodded as we followed her.
———
It seems my magician principle and my memories that are not of the rewritten seems to always integrate together, it is something I always welcome.
And that was also special memory number five… that was when she and I were only five years old.
"That..." I said, my voice calm, unaffected, despite the red mark forming on my jaw. "... Was quite a kick, Milicia."
Silence.
It was not the silence of a library, nor the silence of an empty room. It was the silence of a vacuum, the kind that exists immediately after a catastrophic explosion before the sound waves catch up to the devastation.
My jaw throbbed. A dull, rhythmic ache that synced perfectly with my resting heart rate of sixty-two beats per minute. The blood inside my mouth tasted metallic, a familiar copper tang that I had grown accustomed to over the years. It was warm, contrasting with the cool air of the gymnasium.
And it does well for the aesthetics too!
Milicia stood there, her leg slowly lowering to the floor. The kinetic energy she had unleashed a force capable of shattering concrete, of ending a life, of atomizing the very concept of resistance, had been delivered. It was connected.
And I was still standing.
I watched her eyes. The malicious amusement that had fueled her rampage, the boredom that had driven her to treat our classmates like NPCs in a video game, vanished. It didn't just fade, it shattered completely, replaced by something far more volatile.
Her pupils dilated, swallowing the iris until her eyes were abyssal pools of black and blue. A flush, violent and deep, crept up her neck, staining her cheeks a vibrant crimson that matched the blood trickling down my chin. Her breath hitched, then accelerated, coming in short, shallow gasps that racked her entire frame.
"Isaac..." she whispered. The name didn't sound like a designation anymore. It sounded like a prayer. Or perhaps, a revelation.
Then, she laughed.
It started as a low rumble in her chest, bubbling up through her throat like magma finding a fissure. It erupted into a full-blown cackle, manic and giddy, echoing off the high ceilings of the gym. It wasn't the laugh of a tyrant gloating over a conquest. It was the laugh of a starving explorer who, after years of wandering a barren desert, had stumbled upon an oasis that wasn't a mirage.
"You took it..." she gasped, stepping closer, her movements jittery with adrenaline and dopamine. "You took it all... and you're still standing... you're still smiling..."
She didn't give me time to respond. She didn't give the class time to process the impossibility of my survival.
She lunged.
It wasn't an attack. There was no killing intent, no desire to harm. It was a tackle born of pure, unadulterated need.
I allowed it. I let my center of gravity shift, let the momentum take us both down. My back hit the gym floor with a thud, and before I could even feign a wince, she was on top of me. She straddled my waist, her powerful thighs, the same ones that had generated the sonic boom earlier, locking around my torso with a possessiveness that bordered on a vice grip.
"Milicia?" I asked, keeping my voice gentle, though my mind was already racing, flipping through the mental Rolodex of the probabilities I had thought of prior to stepping in front of Miss. Naomi.
The first one was that she denies the hit connected properly, claiming a misfire to protect her ego.
The second one was that she doubled down in a rage, viewing my survival as an insult to her strength, and attempting to finish the job. Which would be highly unlikely for her.
The third one was that she lost interest, viewing me as a durability test dummy that served its purpose.
The fourth being that she views me as a threat to be eliminated immediately, escalating beyond hand-to-hand.
The fifth being that she demands an immediate rematch under different rules.
The sixth being that she becomes suspicious of my physiology, demanding to know 'what' I am.
The seventh being that she laughs it off as a fluke, returning to her arrogant boredom.
The eighth was that she felt humiliated, retreating to regain composure… which would never be like her at all, but it is a thought to consider.
Then there was the ninth possibility that she breaks psychologically, unable to reconcile an immovable object with her unstoppable force.
And then, Probability Ten.
The one I had banked on.
The one I had engineered this entire performance to trigger for one of many purposes.
Obsessive Reverence.
But even I, with my theater of the mind and my understanding of the human heart, was surprised. Not by the reaction itself, but by the sheer, overwhelming magnitude of it. I had expected interest. I had expected a spark.
I was looking at a forest fire.
But it didn't ruin what I hoped for, in fact, it helped me greatly to understand the Milicia Milosevic in front of me.
Because now, after seeing this, this now made my fifth possibility about who she really is be from just an abstract concept, to an actual possibility that can be put on the table.
"Mine," she murmured, her hands grabbing the collar of my gym uniform, yanking my face up to hers. Her voice trembled, a terrifying mixture of adoration and madness. "You're mine, Houdini. Only mine."
She leaned down and kissed me.
It wasn't a soft kiss. It wasn't the tentative exploration of a first romance. It was her claim to me. It was raw, messy, and filled with a desperate hunger that sought to devour. She had a taste of adrenaline and sweat.
Then, she pulled back slightly, just an inch, and did something that made the entire gym freeze in collective horror and fascination.
She licked the blood from my lip.
Her tongue traced the cut she had made, savoring the metallic taste as if it were ambrosia. She hummed, a sound of pure satisfaction vibrating against my mouth.
"The chemistry line," she panted, her hands roaming over my chest, feeling the heartbeat that refused to race, the sixty-two beats per minute that mocked the chaos she brought. "I told you, didn't I? Back at the park? But I was wrong, Isaac. I was so wrong."
She laughed again, giddy and breathless, her forehead resting against mine. "It's not just a line. It's a chain. It's a shackle. From the moment I saw you... Orientation day... sitting there like a lost puppy among wolves... I knew. I knew you were special. But this? This is... oh, this is better than the War of Kings. This is real."
She squeezed her thighs tighter around me, pinning me to the floor, creating a physical cage of her own body.
"You're the only one who can take it," she whispered, her eyes searching mine, looking for fear and finding only my serene reflection. "You're the only one who doesn't break. You're my equal, Isaac. My perfect, durable, beautiful equal."
"W-what is happening?!" Adrien shrieked in the background, his voice cracking. "Get off him! That should be me! I saw him first! I named him Lord Apollo!"
"Shut up!" Milicia growled, not even looking away from me. The command carried enough venom to kill a small animal.
She looked back at me, her expression softening into something that looked disturbing like love, filtered through the lens of a narcissist who had finally found a mirror that didn't shatter.
The moment I saw that disturbing form of love, the fifth possibility became a certainty to an extent due to the lasting conclusion rather than the process.
That Milicia used to have someone that she considered an equal, not a friend given the fact that she was unable to go to an actual public school given her physical training and most likely was homeschooled, but someone close, someone of blood…
A sibling, not an older one and not a younger one, since she said she was considered the heir of her family's marksmanship at the age of five, she had a twin sibling. I'm entirely unsure if it is a brother or a sister, but given what my theorized conclusion of this possibility can be, I leaned towards the sister theory.
And I already figured that it wasn't the psychopathy itself that was false within Milicia, but the grandiose seemed so perfect for a Milicia Milosevic that it is artificial, like merging a soul in the metaphorical sense to integrate it within yourself.
That's why I wanted to talk to Mr. Huntsman, to see if he knows more about Milicia's family and the personal dynamic, and also to know what he thinks about his father's death.
If going by this premise, then her desperation and new obsession for me must be derived from the twin sibling no longer being present which sent her to a mental state that got her to become the grandiose psychopath that she is playing as.
Or… Milicia had a mixture of love and jealousy for the sibling and could have murdered them for not agreeing Milicia's way, so she decided to not only kill them, but also integrated the soul, or in this case the perfect personality of this sibling.
But then again that wouldn't make sense if Milicia was already granted the heiress role, so why be jealous of the sibling? No, why fake the grandiose?
Because in truth, this possibility is not so simple, it is madness mixed with abstract and complexity.
Because what if that twin sibling killed Milicia and 'became' her out of her own form of love and jealousy?
That is the real conclusion of the fifth possibility that needs more context, and or, a risky idea of asking this Milicia, which will likely end badly on my part, but that is exactly why I currently positioned myself in this situation.
Even though my rational side of me made an internal promise to not pry into Milicia's life directly, but myself, the magician, will always find ways around my rationalism, and the magician of myself will always be prepared for the unknown.
"I am glad I could meet your expectations, Milicia," I said, wiping a stray drop of blood from my chin with my thumb.
"Expectations? You crushed them!" She beamed, leaning down to nuzzle her nose against mine. "Happy Birthday to me... best present ever..."
I smiled. The timing was impeccable.
"Srećan rođendan, Milicia. Želim ti svu sreću i dominaciju koju tvoje srce želi."
(Translation: Happy birthday, Milicia. I wish you all the happiness and dominance your heart desires.)
Her head snapped back, her eyes widening to the size of saucers. For a moment, the madness paused, replaced by genuine shock.
"You... you speak Serbian?" she breathed. "And not just the language... that dialect... that's the Vojvodina dialect. The one that I speak to… You speak it so naturally..."
"I bought a book yesterday," I said smoothly, maintaining the serene mask. "A folklore book about love and destiny from a small bookstore in this school's campus. I thought... if I am to be your friend, it would be polite to learn the language of your heart."
The book was called 'Legends of the Balkan Heart,' which contained phonetics for specific regional dialects. I had memorized it in three hours last night, since I wanted to surprise Milicia that I learnt Serbian for her as a birthday gift.
"Friend..." She tasted the word, rolling it around her tongue. Then she shook her head, a fierce possessiveness returning to her gaze. "No. More. We are more, Houdini. Friends don't take bullets for each other. Friends don't stand in front of trains. You are... you are my partner."
I didn't correct her. I couldn't.
This was damage control that I am preparing for in advance.
When Milicia told me how she took over Mr. Huntsman's company and the reaction she had, I anticipated that me and her would have a confrontation soon.
But I knew that if the aftermath leaned me in favor of winning and in doing so, it may cause a rather explosive and dangerous reaction from Milicia.
If Milicia had lost in our anticipated confrontation, if she had failed to fully win against me and I had rejected her, she would have had nothing left.
Her pride, the only thing holding her fractured psyche together, would have shattered. A shattered Milicia wouldn't just be sad, she would be apocalyptic. She would have burned this gym, this class, and potentially this school to the ground to hide her shame and nothing was stopping her rampage.
By allowing her to "win" by claiming me, I contained the explosion. I became the vessel for her obsession. I became the designated target for her intensity, sparing the student body, the administration, and the whole school.
I was the lightning rod. And the storm had just made landfall.
It should also be said that I did not win nor lose, a magician has no care about the dichotomy of winning or losing, since a magician only needs to perform for their audience and reach their audience since a magician and the audience truly connect to believe the magic and the illusion, because that is the most authentic connection humanity can have.
And a magician is never immortal, we have our grand finales, the only thing we magicians need to do when that time comes is to perform our greatest illusion and create the most beautiful encore for not only ourselves but also our audience as well.
That is what a true magician is.
Further back, I saw Miss. Dolfuss. She wasn't shocked. She wasn't horrified. She was staring at me with a look of profound, almost religious reverence. Her lips moved, barely a whisper, but I read them perfectly.
'It really is him…'
Ah, as I suspected, Miss. Dolfuss is someone from my past after all.
I would have looked at Mr. Maximiliano of his reaction, but given his short term fight against Milicia, I'm sure he would use a form of exhaustion to hide his true expression, so Miss. Dolfuss was the better one to see, and I don't think she is aware that I could tell what she said.
"Is... is she going to eat him?" Miss. Vexley asked, hiding behind Miss. Winchester, her voice trembling.
"I think she's trying to merge with him," Mr. Mercado observed, fascinated, adjusting his glasses. "Biologically speaking, her dopamine and oxytocin levels must be critical right now. She is imprinting. Like a duckling. A very dangerous, nuclear-powered duckling."
"It's romantic!" Miss. Bosque cheered, clapping her hands together, creating mini shockwaves of her own. "Look at them! The Titan and the Unmovable Object! A match made in heaven! ¡Qué romántico!"
"Heaven?" Mr. Beckham choked, looking pale. "This looks like hell! She's licking his blood, Sinclair! That's not romance, that's vampirism!"
"It's passion!" Miss. Bosque insisted.
I looked back at Milicia, who was currently tracing the line of my jaw where she had kicked me, her touch tender, reverent, completely at odds with the violence she was capable of.
"Does it hurt?" she asked softly.
"A little," I admitted.
"Good," she grinned, leaning down to kiss the red mark, her lips soft against the bruising skin. "Pain reminds you I'm here. Never forget that, Isaac. You can't lose me. I won't let you."
I allowed my hand to rest on her waist, grounding her. "I won't forget, Milicia."
Some of the boys finally seemed to snap out of their trance. Mr. Bombacci and Mr. Montreal stepped forward cautiously.
"Uh, Isaac?" Mr. Montreal asked, keeping a safe distance from Milicia. "You need a hand up? Or do you want us to... call a priest?"
"I am fine," I said, gently tapping Milicia's shoulder. "Milicia? We should probably let the class continue."
She pouted, actually pouted, like a child told to put away a favorite toy. "Five more minutes."
"Milicia."
"Fine," she huffed. She stood up, then grabbed my hand and effortlessly hauled me to my feet. She didn't let go of my hand. She interlaced our fingers, squeezing tight enough to grind bone, beaming at the class like she had just won the lottery.
"He's alive!" Miss. Perez shouted, half in relief, half in disbelief.
I gently tried to pry my hand from Milicia's crushing grip.
"Milicia, I need to check on Miss. Naomi," I said softly.
"The idol?" Milicia scowled. "Why? She's weak."
"She stood up to you," I reminded her. "That takes a certain kind of strength. And as your... partner... it reflects well on us if we are gracious in victory, does it not?"
"Partner..." Milicia purred, the word distracting her effectively. "Fine. Be gracious. But come right back."
I walked over to where Miss. Naomi was still standing, frozen in the spot where she had almost died. Her face was pale, her eyes wide and unseeing. She was in shock.
"Miss. Naomi?" I asked gently.
She blinked, focusing on me. Then she looked at my jaw. "Isaac... you... you saved me."
"I merely stepped in," I said, offering my most reassuring smile. "You were very brave, Miss. Naomi. You stood your ground."
"I... I almost died," she whispered, her voice trembling. "She was going to kill me."
"But she didn't," I said. "Because you spoke up. You created the pause. You created the moment."
I leaned in closer, my voice dropping to a confidential whisper.
"If you hadn't confronted her," I lied since Milicia is not that careless of a person and not a brute, but in their eyes, that is a different story, "she would have rampaged through the entire class. She would have hurt Leonid more. She would have hurt Miss. Lehi. By drawing her focus to you, you allowed me to intervene. You saved the class, Miss. Naomi."
"I... I did?" She looked at me, confusion warring with relief.
"You did," I nodded firmly. "Ideally, a leader takes the risk so others don't have to. Today, you took the greatest risk of all. You faced the dragon."
Tears welled up in her eyes. "I... I just wanted us to be united."
"And we will be," I said. "But unity takes time. Today, you planted the seed. You showed them that even the 'trash' class has a voice."
"Thank you, Isaac," she sniffed, wiping her eyes. "Thank you for believing in me."
"Always," I said.
I turned back to find Milicia tapping her foot impatiently.
"Done?" she asked.
"Done," I confirmed.
As a magician, I couldn't help but be glad to reach my performance goal. I not only got to know the physical limitations of Milicia, but also got her to make me her anchor which in turn got me to start believing my theory about her. And not only that, I was able to also use this entire performance to get a reaction from Miss. Dolfuss confirms that her and Mr. Maximiliano does in fact know of me and are from my past. And there was Miss. Naomi as well, since I was able to encourage her to step up to Milicia, even though her resolve did go to fear the moment that Milicia was becoming hostile to her about Miss. Naomi's unity plan, it still showed that she was at least enough to try, and after my words with her just moments ago, she would gain the strength to try again.
However, I am certain that Miss. Naomi knows that her unity plan will not work for now, given that she has come to the realization that her unity plan is not compatible with the current Class H, which will give her time to think of a new approach that suits her, and in doing so, allows me to help her in my own way.
In all of this, even though I set up the stage like this and I was a performer to myself and to everyone when I stepped in, so was Milicia, Leonid, Miss. Naomi, Miss. Dolfuss, the rest of Class H… and finally, even the administration of this school.
One might ask me how the administration is also the performer while also the audience?
Well, we shall see no?
And it was also thanks to Leonid and Milicia for helping even if they didn't know.
"That's enough now."
A female voice that had a heavy Japanese accent, as we looked at her, had sharp dark brown eyes and brown hair tied into a ponytail and wore a black dress shirt, high waist black dress pants, and glasses,as she arrived near Coach Borgard with a stern expression.
"We get two gym instructors now?" Mr. Montreal asked.
The woman ignoring him began to speak. "I do apologize for my late arrival, I was busy attending to some work," She explained. "And I am also the gym instructor for Class H along with who you already know as Bolivar Borgard. I'm Tomoe Minami, now line up so we can begin the roll call so we know everyone is attending." She ordered as we all got in a straight line as Coach Minami and Coach Borgard began taking our names.
Of course, Leonid, being himself, was able to get in line, showing he is able to do what is needed even if he was hurt badly.
On my side, Milicia, being beside me, was still holding my hand, of course, she grabbed it herself, and I for one was unable to deny it.
As they finished up and went in front of us, Coach Minami began speaking. "Now before we start the two hour period for your physical education, does any of you all have a question before we officially begin?"
I was the first to raise my hand, well the only one as Coach Borgard spoke. "Yes Isaac Mahoka! What is your question?" He asked loudly.
"I am allowed to ask any question right? Even school-related questions that don't have to do with physical education?" I asked since I wanted clarification.
Coach Minami nodded. "While we prefer physical education, we don't shy away from unrelated questions, so you may ask what you want to know."
"The school has a secondary agenda, am I right?"
When I asked that question, the entire gym was silent until Miss. Vexley spoke. "A secondary goal…?"
"What…?" Mr. Alexandrescu muttered.
Before the instructors or my classmates could begin speaking, I continued. "During our orientation day when Marie explained that the entrance exams were the contract to get into school that allowed us to get into our interviews, I began thinking of an abstract theory that this school had another hidden agenda that this school's attention to us students is not as indifferent as they appear to be," I looked at Coach Minami. "You arriving late here is no coincidence, since you were watching on the security cameras, and noticed that Leonid was fully distracted, so the moment when all of us were finally in the gym, you sent Coach Borgard here to get us to 'officially' start the gym period, but you sent him first to get one of us out of Leonid's state, and in doing so, you were able to bait one of us, who was Milicia, to showcase our class physical prowess, or at least one of us to assess our physical stats, how I was able to know this is when Miss. Naomi confronted Milicia. I noticed that Coach Borgard was about to call someone but put his phone away when he noticed the increasing tension that was happening, and the fact that when everything dispersed, you, Coach Minami, arrived at the perfect time. Which made me think back to Marie's contract deduction, that the entrance exams not only acted as a contract but was also assessed our knowledge through a hundred-question post-graduate exam, which we all passed, that lead to the interviews which I believe is the contract that the school signs in return that allows us to be officially enrolled since the interviews were also looking for intellect and mentality. So the school is looking for the best of four criteria that it prioritises while hiding behind the layer of this school's individualist competition and the incentive, and the four criteria in question are knowledge, intelligence, strength, and mentality. So I want to know, what is this school's real goal?" I finished.
That is why I thank Leonid, for allowing my teasing back in the locker-room to get the best of him, since I knew it would want him to get me out of his head and calm himself down by allowing him to work himself out sending him into a dissonant state that separates himself from his surroundings and toning everything out. And I used this as a way to bait the administration to confirm my abstract theory that the school is wanting something out of all the students.
It was silent.
Milicia, still gripping my hand with a possessiveness that threatened to cut off my circulation, didn't look surprised. If anything, the manic delight in her eyes deepened. To her, my intellect was just another trophy, another justification for her claim. She squeezed my fingers, a bone-grinding affirmation.
Although I long suspected that since that must have been from the War of Kings game.
But the others... The reaction was a spectrum of denial and dawning horror.
"Secondary agenda?" Mr. Montreal broke the silence first, his voice cracking slightly. He looked from me to the coaches, his brow furrowed in a desperate attempt to find a punchline. "You're overthinking it, Isaac. It's a prestigious school. They want good grades and athletes. That's... that's how schools work."
"Is it?" Marie stepped forward, latching onto the pattern I had laid out a drawing from her previous deductions. "Think about it, Borsalino. The budget alone... the technology we've seen in the locker rooms, the medical bays... it exceeds the GDP of some small nations. No private institution, no matter how 'prestigious'… or inhuman, operates at a loss of this magnitude without a projected return on investment." A faint blush appeared on her cheek.
"Return on investment?" Miss Vexley squeaked, shrinking further behind Miss Winchester. "You mean... us? We're the investment?"
"We are the product," Miss Bosque whispered, her hands covering her mouth, her eyes wide. "¡Ay, Dios mío! It's like those sci-fi movies! Are they going to clone us? Is that why they need our DNA?"
"Don't be ridiculous," Adrien scoffed, though he looked paler than usual, his eyes darting toward the exits. "Cloning is illegal. They probably just want to brainwash us into being super-soldiers or... or corporate spies! I knew it! I knew Lord Apollo was onto something! He sees the strings!"
"Unity..." Miss Naomi murmured. She was staring at the floor, her hands trembling. "If the school is designed this way... if everything is a test of these four criteria... then my plan..." She looked up at me, her eyes filled with a new kind of despair. "My plan to unite us... the school anticipates that, doesn't it? It's just another variable they're measuring."
"Precisely," I said softly, though I knew she couldn't hear me over the rising murmur of her own panic and dissonance that she thought she got over.
Coach Minami exchanged a glance with Coach Borgard. It was a subtle communication, a micro-expression of professional acknowledgement. Coach Borgard, the mountain of muscle, crossed his arms and huffed, a sound like a steam engine releasing pressure. "Well, I'll be damned!"
Coach Minami stepped forward. Her face remained the same.
"Isaac Mahoka," she said, her voice smooth, carrying the weight of authority without the need for volume. "You are sharper than your interview results suggest. Most students hypothetically should take a month to realize the incongruities of the International Requiem Academy. Some never realize it at all, graduating from their efforts through match-ups and school events, blissfully unaware that they were merely the control group."
"Control group?" Mr. Bombacci choked out. "What the hell does that mean?"
Coach Minami ignored him, her dark eyes locked on mine. "You are correct. The entrance exams, the interviews, the excessive funding, the autonomous nature of this school-state... it is not for the sake of 'education' or the hyper competition in the traditional sense. The world has enough academics. It has enough politicians. It has enough soldiers."
She began to pace in front of the line, her hands clasped behind her back.
"Tell me," she addressed the class, though her gaze lingered on me. "What is the limit of a human being? We have broken the sound barrier. We have split the atom. We have mapped the genome. And yet... humanity stagnates. We are bound by our biology, by our psychology, by the fragile limitations of our evolutionary plateau."
She stopped, turning to face us fully.
"The governments that fund this institution through the headmaster's proposal, the United States, China, Russia, the European Union, the entirety of the world, they all came to a singular, terrifying conclusion twenty years ago. The next threat to humanity will not be solved by humans as we currently exist. We are too slow. We are too weak. We are too emotional."
"So..." Miss Lehi spoke up, her voice raspy and defiant. "You want to make us into machines?"
Naturally, Miss. Lehi would be defiant since being a machine in her eyes, is to be a cog in the bigger machine, which meant control over her.
"No," Coach Minami corrected sharply. "Machines are limited by their programming. We want to push you into an evolutionary state. We are looking for the Post-Human."
The term hung in the air, heavy and foreign.
"Post-Human?" Mr. Montreal whispered.
"Evolution is usually a slow process," Coach Minami continued, her voice taking on a lecture-like cadence. "It takes millions of years, driven by random mutation and natural selection. But we do not have millions of years. This school is an accelerator. A crucible. We are here to force evolution through self-cultivation."
She gestured to the very school itself and to us.
"That is why the curriculum is designed the way it is. The Individualist Competition is the stressor. It forces you to adapt, to survive, to overcome. The Class-based rewards are the environment. If you cultivate yourself, your mind, your body, your mentality, you rise. If you do not, you remain stagnant."
She looked at me again. "You asked about the goal. The goal is to produce a human being who is ten steps ahead of the current evolutionary curve. Someone who can process information faster than a computer, who possesses the strength to alter their environment physically, and the mentality to shatter the constraints of traditional morality and fear."
"Ten steps..." Mr. Maximiliano murmured as he was intrigued.
It made sense. It made perfect sense. The 'Contract' wasn't just about enrollment as it was truly about a consent form for a four-year experiment in directed evolution.
"But why?" Miss Naomi asked, stepping forward. "Why do we have to be alone? Why can't we evolve together? Why the competition?"
"Because comfort is the enemy of evolution!" Coach Borgard spoke, stepping up beside Coach Minami. His voice was deep, vibrating in our chests. "You put a wolf in a cage and feed it, and it becomes a dog! You put a wolf in the wild and let it starve, it becomes a killer! We aren't raising dogs here!"
Mr. Beckham leaned towards Mr. Fajr. "I can't take him seriously when he is being loud." he whispered to which Mr. Fajr nodded.
That explains a lot about the autonomy the student has here, since it gives us the option to become a 'killer' or a 'dog' in this administration's eyes.
Coach Minami nodded. "Cooperation is a tool, Jun. But reliance? Reliance is a weakness. The Class System... the class you graduate from... it is not determined by your grades. It is determined by how you utilize your self-cultivation. A student in Class D who breaks their limits is worth more to us since they can rise to Class A than a student in Class A who maintains a perfect score but never evolves since they would drop in ranks and in this school's hierarchy."
"Wait," Mr. Faust interrupted, his eyes wide. "You said... breaks their limits. But isn't the goal perfection? A perfect human? A perfect physique?"
"Perfection," Coach Minami said softly, "is a dead end."
She drew a circle with her foot on the ground or at least made us picture it. A perfect, closed loop.
"This is perfection. It is complete. It is flawless. And because it is complete, it cannot grow. It cannot change. It is stagnant. We do not want perfection, Mihal. We view perfection as the ultimate limitation of human potential."
She slashed a line through the circle, breaking it.
"We want you to break. We want you to shatter the concept of what you think is 'perfect.' You think a 100 on a test or a perfect physical score is good? We want the student who invents a new mathematics to solve the problem. You think lifting 200 kilograms is strong? We want the student who realizes that strength is not just muscle, but the manipulation of leverage and momentum to move a mountain."
She looked at Milicia. "Milicia understands this instinctively. She does not seek to be a 'perfect' martial artist. She seeks to be a force of nature. She breaks the rules of physics because she does not believe they apply to her."
Milicia preened, squeezing my hand again. "See? I told you I was right."
"The governments gave us this permission," Coach Minami continued, addressing the class. "They gave us sovereign immunity. They gave us a budget that could terraform Mars. Why? Because they know that the first nation to secure a generation of Post-Humans will dictate the future of the species. You are here because you have the raw material. But raw material is useless until it is refined."
The silence that followed was different this time. It wasn't confusing. It was the crushing weight of expectation. We weren't just students. We were ores being tossed into a furnace.
"This is madness," Miss Vexley whispered. "We're just kids."
"You were kids when you arrived!" Coach Borgard said. "You won't be when you leave!"
It was a grand design. A magician's trick on a global scale. They were taking the illusion of a hypercompetitive school and using it to mask a factory for gods.
"And I assume," I said, drawing attention back to myself, "that this is why the rankings that correlate with which class we get into exist? To measure who is evolving and who is merely... existing?"
"Correct," Coach Minami said. "The rankings are a measurement of your distance from the baseline human. Rank 1 is not the smartest or the strongest. Rank 1 is the most evolved."
Ah so rank 200 means I am the least evolved? I suppose in the administration's perspective that made sense given my goal and philosophy are fundamentally different from theirs. But I think my interviewers beg to differ on the reason they assigned me to rank 200, hence why I bought the referee binder, to speak to the two who interviewed me personally for a few questions I am curious about.
She adjusted her glasses, her gaze sharpening. "You are clever, Isaac Mahoka. But do not think you are unique in this deduction. You are the second student to voice this theory."
Mr. Alexandrescu's interest piqued. "The second? You mean someone else also thought the same?"
"The first," Minami said, "was a student from Class A. He deduced the entire structure of the academy during orientation day."
She paused for effect.
"Odysseus Macedon. The current Rank 1."
Odysseus Macedon hm?
If I recall from the leaderboard, he had a similar hairstyle, albeit more curly, as me but with brown hair, and had blue eyes with a similar calm serene expression that could rival Miss. Rivera and I.
He must be brilliant if even the staff praises him like this.
"He realized it on the first day?" Leonid asked, stunned.
"Yes." Coach Minami confirmed.
"So," I said, a small smile playing on my lips. "We are playing catch-up."
"You are," Coach Minami agreed. "But evolution is not a race. It is survival. And Class H..." She looked around at the faces of my classmates. "...has a long way to go."
She clapped her hands, the sound echoing like a gunshot.
"Enough theory. Philosophy does not build muscle. Understanding the goal does not help you reach it if your vessel is weak."
I wonder what their definition of "physically weak" is?
Coach Borgard stepped forward, cracking his knuckles. "You heard the lady! The period starts now. We're gonna see what you're made of. And I mean that literally!"
"First lesson," Coach Minami announced, checking her tablet. "We establish your baselines. We cannot measure your growth if we do not know your starting point. We will begin with Grip Strength. Then, we will test your cardiovascular endurance with a timed run. And finally..."
She smiled, a predatory glint in her eyes.
"...we will simulate a combat environment. Dodgeball."