Arcane Prodigy, Ysira Nazaad's Perspective
"Five more minutes," I mumbled, pulling the pillow tighter over my head. It smelled faintly of sweat and sawdust—exactly what you'd expect from a barely functioning roadside inn like this.
"Ysira, seriously. They're ready," Jake's voice cut through the thin walls of sleep, annoyingly chipper for someone who slept with his sword.
"They can leave without us," I muttered. "We'll catch up."
A second later, the blanket was yanked off me with divine precision.
"Get up," Celestine said, more push than plea. "We're leaving with them."
I let my head fall back with a thud against the mattress, glaring up at the wood-stained ceiling. "We don't need escorts."
But I was already sitting up, brushing strands of sleep-warmed hair from my eyes. Celestine was too composed this morning. It only made sense when I remembered what she told me last night.
"She looks exactly like her."
Her. The girl Celestine had known when they were younger—someone she'd never talked about before. Cold. Composed. Unshakable. I remembered the way her voice had tightened just describing her. The resemblance wasn't just visual. It was the way Alliyana snapped that man's arm without blinking. The way she smiled afterward like she'd just asked him to pass the salt.
I hadn't felt it myself—I didn't know her. But I saw how Celestine looked at her, and that was enough.
When I came downstairs, everyone was already assembled. Jake gave me a look like he'd just saved the party by fetching me personally. Celestine was her usual calm self. The guards stood ready—no idle chatter, no wasted motion.
Alliyana turned to me, voice smooth. "You ready to go?"
There was no condescension in her tone. No warmth either. Just... poise. A sort of gentle authority that didn't need reinforcement.
I nodded. "Yes."
We began walking. The forest canopy thinned slowly as we moved, letting sunlight trickle through in warm, dappled ribbons. Twigs snapped beneath our boots. Bugs buzzed around our ears. The air was thick with humidity and the scent of bark and loam.
Alliyana walked like someone used to covering distance—never hurrying, never tiring. Her guards trailed behind in silence, one of them already chewing on some root or jerky. I kept pace beside Celestine, glancing toward the trees.
Hours passed.
Eventually, we reached the edge of the corrupted forest. I felt the shift before I saw it—the air opened up, lighter and less oppressive. The buzzing in my head eased. We were out.
But hunger replaced the tension.
No dinner. No breakfast. My stomach growled, Jake and Celestine pretended theirs didn't.
"We should rest and eat," Alliyana said.
Celestine raised a brow. "Eat what, exactly?"
Alliyana turned to her guards. "Here's your next assignment. Find us something to eat."
They scattered like arrows loosed from the same bowstring. Within seconds, they vanished into the brush. I blinked. Just like that, we were alone with her.
Jake, ever tactful, cleared his throat. "So… are you a noble or something?"
She tilted her head. "Technically. I'm the adopted daughter of Raphael Aurellia."
That made me stop. My thoughts caught mid-step.
Aurellia.
It wasn't just a noble name—it was the name. Home of the largest military-caster project in the northern region.
Tch. I should've seen it sooner. Ethan, one of the men accompanying her. Pale, white hair and red eyes. He's the heir.
"One day I want to visit Aurellia," I said, eyeing her carefully. "The home of barrier magic."
She looked at me with mild curiosity.
"Not too long ago," I continued, "the Duke began recruiting mages with small zones—the academy labeled as failures—and turned them into soldiers. Effective ones. I've always wanted to meet the specialist who figured out how to train them."
Alliyana's expression shifted ever so slightly. A faint chuckle slipped out—quiet and sincere.
"Then you should tell her yourself when she comes back."
I blinked. "Her?"
I followed her gaze.
The spear-wielding woman stepped out of the trees, dragging a gutted boar behind her with one hand, the tip of her weapon still damp with blood.
Wait. Her?
"What?!" I blurted, louder than I intended.
Jake jolted like someone kicked him. Celestine nearly dropped her staff.
I didn't care.
That woman—the one with the calm eyes and terrifying reflexes—she was the barrier specialist?
I stared, dumbfounded, as she cleaned her spear with a slow, practiced motion, then nodded once at Alliyana before tossing the boar near a rock.
So much for what I thought I knew.
Ethan and Ban returned not long after, dragging their own kills—two more boars, roughly the same size as Alexa's.
I blinked.
That was... excessive.
Three boars for seven people? Even factoring in appetite and metabolism, that was overkill. And based on how casually they moved, this was routine for them. I wondered what kind of life these people lived to call this normal.
The sun had risen high by then, warming the air just enough to make sitting still uncomfortable. Sweat clung under my collar, and the scent of fresh blood and singed fur from the fire mingled with damp earth and cut wood.
The meat crackled over an open flame as Alexa turned the spit. She didn't speak. None of them did.
It was quiet. Too quiet.
The kind of silence that forms between two groups forced to share space.
Jake kept glancing at Alliyana when he thought no one was looking. He was painfully obvious—his eyes lingered too long, then darted away like a guilty thief.
Celestine, meanwhile, was studying her. Not in awe. Maybe out of suspicion. Like she was waiting for Alliyana to peel back another layer.
And Alliyana? She just sat there. Relaxed. Picking at her food. The picture of composure.
Then, without looking directly at me, she gave a subtle glance toward Alexa.
The message was clear.
Talk to her.
I hesitated.
Why? Why me? I didn't like striking a conversation with strangers. Especially not ones who hunted boars like they were gathering herbs.
Still, I cleared my throat and turned slightly toward Alexa.
"I heard," I began, trying not to sound stiff, "that you're the barrier specialist who trains the Duchy's soldiers. The ones with aptitude."
She tilted her head at me like I'd spoken a half-finished sentence.
"I mean," she said slowly, "I do teach them, I guess. Technically. But it was actually—"
"Yup, that's her," Alliyana cut in, loud and shameless.
Alexa froze mid-sentence, her mouth still half-open. She looked at Alliyana, then back at me.
I stared for a moment, then leaned forward and extended my hand.
"It's an honor to meet you."
There was a pause. Alexa blinked, clearly not sure what reality she'd just entered. After a beat, she reached out and shook my hand.
Her grip was solid. Calloused.
"I… thanks?" she said, looking helplessly between us.
Jake raised an eyebrow, Celestine looked away to hide a smile, and Alliyana continued eating as if none of this was unusual.
I sat back, cheeks warm. Embarrassed.
The boar meat was greasy, but tender. Not the worst thing I've eaten. Still, I pushed the charred edges around my plate as I leaned a little closer to Alexa.
"Can you demonstrate it?"
She blinked at me. "Demonstrate?"
"The barrier. The technique you used to train the Duchy's soldiers."
Alexa glanced sideways at Alliyana, as if asking for permission.
Alliyana didn't respond. She just took another bite of meat and chewed like this was the most boring breakfast in the world.
Alexa shrugged, she kept eating, and formed a barrier next to her with no hands or gesture.
A hexagonal panel of translucent light appeared beside her—floating calmly in the air, softly humming. It shimmered with that familiar refraction of low-output mana. Basic structure. Well-formed. Clean edges.
I narrowed my eyes.
"That's not the one I meant."
She looked confused.
"I want to see the real one," I said. "The high-tier configuration. The layered one. The one that doesn't break."
Alexa let out a breath and smiled faintly, like a teacher indulging an overeager student. "Alright."
The light bent.
What emerged wasn't a panel—it was structure. Layers of interlocking hexagons, each only a few centimeters thick, arranged in multiple planes. Depth. Density. Almost crystalline. The air around it shimmered from the mana saturation. It wasn't glowing bright—it didn't need to. It was efficient. Efficient enough to be terrifying.
Jake and Celestine kept eating, unconcerned. They didn't understand what they were looking at.
But I did.
Or—I tried to.
I leaned in, my breath caught in my throat.
It wasn't just one barrier. It was thousands. Each tiny hexagon packed perfectly next to its neighbors, no gaps in the tessellation. But it didn't stop there. It was layered. Like folded glass. Or honeycomb within honeycomb.
"How many barriers…" I whispered, "...are you casting simultaneously? In that proximity? With no gaps? Across multiple layers?"
"No idea. At some point it just turns into feeling more than thinking."
For the first time in my life—I couldn't analyze it.
I couldn't understand it.
Not right away.
And I should have. I always had.
I'd been praised since I was seven. I memorized entire grimoires overnight. Reverse-engineered ritual arrays just by watching them activate. People called me a prodigy, a miracle, a born mage.
But this?
This felt like standing in front of a wall I couldn't climb.
And I loved it.
My heart thudded—not with shame, but with something else.
Excitement.
I stood abruptly, startling Jake and Celestine. My hands trembled slightly as I bowed toward Alexa.
"Please teach me."
She blinked. "Huh?"
"Seriously," I said, more urgently than I meant to. "Teach me. I want to learn it. I need to."
Alexa looked like I'd just handed her a sword and asked her to dance.
"I—I mean, I don't really have a lesson plan, but…" She fumbled in her bag and pulled out a worn, leather-bound book. "This helped me a lot. 'Advanced Principles of Light and Barrier Magic.' It's pretty common in Aurellia, so don't worry about returning it."
I took it from her like it was a sacred relic. The cover had no author, just a wolf emblem stamped into the leather. I knew that symbol. I had three other books with it in my collection.
"Thank you," I whispered.
We continued our journey after that. The sun had climbed higher, and the forest canopy was thinning into open hills and tall grass. I barely noticed. My face was buried in the book, eyes scanning every line.
It was more than just theory. It was clarity. The author explained everything—why hexagons were optimal, how tension distributes across edges, how layering enhances magical resonance and reinforces mana structure. Even simple barriers made more sense now.
I reached the section on platforming.
Without thinking, I cast a hexagonal step under my foot and walked up onto it. Then another. I started climbing as I read—each step perfectly stable, suspended in the air like glass stairs.
Behind me, I heard Ethan's voice.
"I thought she was a caster mage. How the hell is she platforming like that?"
"Excuse me, young lady," Alliyana said, loud enough to cut through the breeze.
I looked down.
"Yes?"
"How big is your Zone?"
"Three hundred fourteen meters," I answered.
Silence.
Then I heard it—her voice, soft but clear.
"Genius."
I glanced at her.
She wasn't teasing.
Alliyana was smiling—broadly, eyes narrowed with delight. Genuinely fascinated.
I stepped down, hovering a moment before touching grass.
"Do you know the author of this?" I asked Alexa, holding the book up. "It reads just like my favorite anonymous writer. I check every library and shop I find just to see if I can find a book from them."
"I think…" I hesitated. "I think they could help me get better."
Alexa looked at Alliyana.
Then said nothing.
I turned toward Alliyana.
She sighed, closing her eyes briefly, then looked at me with that same calm smile.
"You remind me of an old friend," she said. "Same red hair. Same spark. I'll tell you what she told me."
She straightened her back a little.
"I think you'd outgrow it the moment the author finished explaining. Some people need structure. You need space."
I froze, book clutched in both hands.
There was something about the way she said it.
It was something mother would have said.