Chapter 10: Echoes in the Soup
The scent of boiling potatoes and cheap broth was a ghost haunting the Bronze Haven mess hall. It was a smell that, for three years, had been the backdrop to Kael's humiliation. But today, it was different. Today, it smelled like home.
Not the home he had now—the cramped, silent dorm room. The home he'd had before. The one with the leaky roof in the Dustwell slums, where the air was thick with the smells of a hundred different struggling families' dinners. His mother's soup had always been the best, though. She could make a single scrawny chicken, a handful of wilted vegetables, and a mountain of potatoes taste like a feast for kings. The memory was so vivid it was a physical ache behind his ribs.
He was eight years old again, his feet dangling from a wobbly stool, watching her stir the big, chipped pot. Her Skillforge system had been Common-tier, just like his original one. Hers was called "Mend." She could fix a cracked plate, reattach a loose button, or darn a sock with a touch and a whisper of energy. It was a humble, gentle power. She'd smile, her hands glowing with a soft, golden light as she fixed his torn trousers. "Every system has its purpose, Kael," she'd say. "Ours just… keeps things together."
His father, a Non-Wielder, would come home from the docks, his clothes smelling of salt and fish. He'd ruffle Kael's hair, his hands rough and calloused, and declare the soup "the best in the six cities." They were poor, but they were a fortress. They were his whole world.
Then the Red Sails Fever had swept through the slums. It was a brutal, efficient plague. His father went first, his Non-Wielder constitution offering no resistance. His mother's Mend system was useless against a sickness. She spent her last dregs of energy trying to soothe his own fever, her golden light flickering against the raging red in his veins. He survived. They did not.
The memory ended as suddenly as it began, leaving him staring into a bowl of greasy, grey broth that was a pale, mocking imitation of his mother's soup. The clatter of the mess hall rushed back in. He blinked, forcing the heat behind his eyes to recede. Weakness was a luxury he couldn't afford, even in memory.
"You okay?" Mira's voice was soft beside him. She was carefully arranging a small, purple blossom she'd grown next to her tray. "You looked a million miles away."
"Just thinking about the Sparring Trials," he lied, the words coming easily now. "Dren's probably still pissed."
"He's always pissed," Mira said with a sigh, nudging the flower towards him. "Here. It's a Mourning Glory. They're supposed to be good for… well, for remembering."
He looked from the delicate flower to her earnest face. The guilt was a cold stone in his gut. She was offering him comfort, a fragment of her own gentle power, while he sat across from her wrapped in a cloak of lies and stolen abilities that could get them both killed. He had chosen to protect her with ignorance, but it felt more and more like a betrayal.
"Thanks, Mira," he said, his voice rough. He took the flower, its petals velvety against his skin.
Their quiet moment was shattered by a roar of laughter from Dren's table. Kael didn't need to look to know it was directed at him. The leaden sock in his hidden pocket felt heavier, a counterweight to the fragile flower in his hand.
Later, in the dusty library—a room more often used for sleeping than study—Kael tried to focus on a scroll about basic energy theory. It was child's play compared to what Lyra was teaching him, but he had to keep up appearances. The words blurred together. His mind was in the cavern, practicing the Sonic Pulse, feeling the satisfying thump of concussive force.
He was broken from his reverie by a commotion near the window. A first-year student, a small boy with a terrified expression, was backed into a corner. Looming over him was Jax, a bulky third-year with a Rare-tier "Stone Fist" system. His hands were permanently covered in a coarse, granite-like skin.
"I said I'm sorry!" the boy squeaked, clutching a broken ink pot. A dark stain spread across Jax's tunic.
"Sorry doesn't clean it, you little worm," Jax growled, raising his stony fist. "This tunic is worth more than your useless system."
Kael's body went rigid. The scene was a perfect, painful echo of a hundred similar moments from his own past. He saw himself in the cowering boy. The old Kael would have looked away, swallowed his anger, and been thankful it wasn't him.
The new Kael saw more. He saw the clumsy, telegraphed swing. He saw the imbalance in Jax's stance. He saw a dozen ways to put the bully on the ground without ever revealing a copied skill. A shaped Sonic Pulse to the knee. A weighted sock to the back of the head. A precise, condensed Flame Burst to the floor between them as a warning shot.
But he did none of those things. Lyra's training screamed in his mind. Recede. Become invisible. Using any power here, no matter how cleverly disguised, was a risk. It was a spark that could ignite the Inquisitors' interest.
Just as Jax's fist began to descend, a voice cut through the tension.
"Is there a problem?"
Instructor Veyra stood at the end of the aisle, her arms crossed. Her gaze was like a physical pressure.
Jax froze, his fist lowering. "No, Instructor. Just an accident."
Veyra's eyes swept from Jax to the terrified boy, and finally, they landed on Kael. He realized he was half-out of his seat, his hands clenched into fists at his sides. He slowly, deliberately, forced himself to relax and sit back down, picking up his scroll as if nothing had happened.
Veyra held his gaze for a moment longer, her expression unreadable, before turning back to Jax. "Clean yourself up. And you," she said to the boy, "find a mop."
The crisis was averted, but Kael felt no relief. He felt like a coward. He had the power to stop it, and he had chosen to hide. The memory of his parents, of their simple, honest kindness, felt like a judgment. What would they think of the secret, dangerous creature he was becoming?
That night, in the cavern, his frustration bled into his training. His Sonic Pulse was too wild, his Fireball lance unstable. He couldn't find the focus.
"Your control is slipping," Lyra observed, her voice cutting through his turmoil. "The surface world is interfering."
"I saw a bully today. I could have stopped him. I didn't," Kael admitted, the words tasting bitter.
"And that troubles you? You made the strategically correct choice."
"It felt wrong," he said, looking at his hands—hands that could now shatter stone, but had remained still when they were needed. "My parents… they were good people. They used what little they had to help, to fix things. What am I using my power for? Hiding."
Lyra was silent for a long moment, the only sound the low hum of the Shard. "Sentiment is a compass, not an anchor," she said finally, her tone less harsh than usual. "Your parents' purpose was to mend their small world. Your purpose is to survive in a much larger, more dangerous one. To do that, you must sometimes let small injustices stand to prevent a greater catastrophe. The Inquisitors are not bullies in a library. They are a storm that would scour this entire academy clean to purge a single 'Aberration' like you. Your inaction today was not cowardice. It was a strategic withdrawal."
Her words were logical, cold, and he knew they were true. But they didn't ease the ache in his chest. The echo of his mother's soup, the memory of his father's laugh, the sight of Mira's Mourning Glory—these were the anchors of the person he used to be. The Mimic in the cavern was someone new.
He looked from the pulsating Shard to Lyra's impassive face. He was straddling two worlds, and the chasm between them was growing wider every day. He had to be strong enough to bear the weight of both, or he would fall and be shattered, just like the dummy. The performance wasn't just for the academy anymore; it was for the ghosts of his past, and for the fragile future of the one friend he had left.