The first rule of Applied Ontology, Cael discovered, was that the classroom existed only when the lesson required it.
He spent an hour wandering Level π, which turned out to be located between the second and third floors in a space that expanded to accommodate whatever rooms it needed to contain. Room ∅ finally appeared when he stopped looking for it directly and instead focused on the concept of mathematical emptiness.
The room was simultaneously vast and intimate, furnished with chairs that adjusted themselves to each occupant's needs and a blackboard that displayed equations describing the relationship between existence and belief. Three other students were already present, each representing a different form of ontological uncertainty.
The first was a girl who seemed to flicker between two distinct appearances, as if reality couldn't decide which version of her was more real. Sometimes she was tall with dark hair and serious eyes; sometimes she was shorter, lighter, with a mischievous smile. Both versions were equally present, equally valid.
The second student appeared to be made of living shadow, maintaining human form through conscious effort. When his concentration slipped, parts of him would disperse into darkness before being pulled back into coherence.
The third was the most unsettling: a perfectly ordinary-looking boy whose presence felt somehow hollow, as if he was the shape left behind when someone more substantial had been removed from reality.
"Welcome to Applied Ontology," said a voice from the front of the room. The instructor materialized gradually, assembling herself from concepts and possibilities until she achieved provisional existence as a middle-aged woman with silver hair and eyes that reflected depths no human gaze should contain.
"I am Professor Thale," she announced, "though 'am' is a strong word, and 'Professor Thale' is more of a professional identity than a personal one. Today we'll be discussing the fundamental question of Applied Ontology: What does it mean to be real?"
She gestured to the blackboard, where new equations appeared written in hands that belonged to no one present. "Reality, as commonly understood, is a collaborative fiction maintained by consensus agreement. You are all here because your Spiral affinities make you natural dissidents against that consensus."
The flickering girl raised her hand, though it was unclear which version of her was doing the raising. "Are you saying reality isn't actually real?"
"I'm saying," Professor Thale replied, "that 'real' is a category of classification rather than an inherent property. This chair is real because we agree to interact with it as if it possesses chair-like qualities. Your identity is real because you maintain it through consistent self-performance. The laws of physics are real because they represent the most widely accepted story about how things behave."
The shadow-boy's form rippled. "But some things are definitely real, right? Like… like matter and energy?"
"Matter and energy are useful models for describing our interactions with phenomena that resist direct observation," Professor Thale said. "They're extremely robust fictions, supported by centuries of experimental evidence and mathematical verification. But they're still interpretive frameworks rather than absolute truths."
Cael found himself speaking without conscious decision. "Then what happens when someone stops believing in the agreed-upon version of reality?"
Professor Thale smiled, an expression that seemed to extend beyond the boundaries of her face. "That, Mr. Morrix, is why you're here. When someone with Spiral of Lies resonance stops believing in consensus reality, they don't simply become delusional. They begin to negotiate with reality directly."
She waved her hand, and the classroom around them became transparent, revealing the layers of possibility that existed beneath its apparent solidity. Cael could see alternate versions of the room: one where they sat in a circle on grass under open sky, another where they floated in space among crystalline structures, a third where they occupied chairs carved from living trees in a forest of mathematical equations.
"Each of you represents a different challenge to ontological stability," Professor Thale continued. "Vera here exists as simultaneous possibilities, forcing reality to accommodate multiple valid versions of the same person." The flickering girl, Vera, waved with both sets of hands.
"Marcus maintains physical form through deliberate rejection of material consistency." The shadow-boy, Marcus, nodded, his edges becoming slightly more defined as attention focused on him.
"David embodies the concept of absence made manifest, existing as a negation that paradoxically requires existence to negate." The hollow-seeming boy, David, smiled with enthusiasm that felt genuine despite his apparent lack of substantial presence.
"And you, Cael, represent the most destabilizing possibility of all: the conscious lie that acknowledges its own fictional nature while insisting on its practical validity."
The room around them shifted again, this time becoming a vast library where the books wrote themselves and the shelves extended infinitely in directions that had no names. "Your assignment for next session," Professor Thale announced, "is to spend one hour consciously believing something you know to be false, then document how reality adjusts to accommodate your deliberately chosen delusion."
"Is that safe?" Vera asked, both versions of her speaking in unison.
"Safety is a relative concept in Applied Ontology," Professor Thale replied. "But maintain a clear record of your original beliefs as an anchor point, and avoid choosing delusions that would require reality to make catastrophic adjustments. Start with something small. Believe that gravity works sideways for you personally, or that you can taste colors, or that yesterday happened in a different order than you remember."
As the lesson concluded and Professor Thale began dispersing back into component concepts, Cael realized that his education was not simply about learning to use his Spiral affinity. He was being taught to think in ways that would fundamentally alter his relationship with existence itself.
Walking to his next class, he experimented with the assignment. For five minutes, he consciously believed that the Academy's corridors were arranged in alphabetical order according to the emotional associations of their destinations. Immediately, the corridor he was traveling began to curve left toward what felt like Anxiety, while paths to Contentment, Determination, and Fear branched off at regular intervals.
When he stopped believing the delusion, the corridors returned to their normal configuration. But he retained a clear memory of the alternate arrangement, as if both versions were equally valid records of his experience.
By the time he reached his Narrative Mechanics class, Cael had begun to understand the true scope of what he was learning. He wasn't simply gaining magical abilities. He was developing the cognitive tools necessary to function as a conscious participant in reality's ongoing construction process.
The thought was simultaneously thrilling and terrifying.
Which, he realized, was probably the point.