The first sign of Holt's transfer was a new weight in the old school's central corridor. The floor buckled between the science wing and the locked cafeteria hall, then split open beneath a stack of grain pallets that had not been there a second earlier.
Wooden crates kept arriving through the breach, sliding across the tiles in tight rows until the corridor disappeared behind treated sacks. The last pallet came through crooked, struck a classroom door, and burst open across the floor.
Pale blue mana spread through the grain before anyone could touch it. The kernels shimmered where they lay, drinking in the dungeon air with a slow hunger that made Emilia stop at the threshold.
"Nobody steps into the spill," she said. "The treatment has changed. The grain is taking mana through the broken husks."
