Villainous Instructor at the Academy
Chapter 111: Lurking Shadows

Chapter 111: Lurking Shadows

The invitation burned a hole in my desk.

Not literally. Unfortunately, that would’ve been easier to deal with.

No, it just sat there—innocent, cryptic, and utterly inconvenient. The red wax seal, the serpentine insignia, the smug elegance of the black ink... Someone was trying way too hard to be mysterious.

I stared at it like it might suddenly grow legs and walk off.

It didn’t.

"Come alone," it said.

Because that’s always how great evenings start—cryptic notes from unknown sources asking you to show up solo in a city where assassination was considered just another form of professional rivalry.

I sighed, leaned back, and glared at the ceiling. Maybe if I stared long enough, the gods of this world would send me a different plotline.

No such luck.

I didn’t tell my students I was leaving.

They were too busy preparing for the Convergence tournament anyway. Julien had taken it upon himself to build a motivational chant. It rhymed. It also involved far too many pelvic thrusts. Garrick promised to punch him if he ever did it in public.

Honestly, I kind of hoped he would.

But I left quietly, slipping through the academy gates under the cover of darkness. A long coat, a rune-suppressed mask, and a few misdirection sigils. Old tricks. Allen Cross tricks. The kind that kept me alive in raid dungeons when half my party wanted to sacrifice me for loot.

The rendezvous point wasn’t far—just beyond the outer district, near the abandoned rail station where students used to sneak off for forbidden duels and worse decisions.

Classic villain lair vibes.

I arrived early, as per paranoid tradition.

And I wasn’t alone.

Three figures waited in the gloom, each wearing a coat with that same ouroboros insignia stitched into the shoulder. Two were guards. Or enforcers. One had a crossbow the size of Garrick’s arm. The third? He was reading a book. Actual paper. Must be a lunatic.

"Lucian Drelmont," the reader said without looking up.

"That’s me. What gave it away?"

"The aura of sarcasm and poor life choices."

Touché.

He finally looked up. Pale green eyes, sharp as glass. Not a student. Not an instructor. Older. Late thirties, maybe. Gaunt face. Confident. Smug.

"Name’s Halwen," he said, tucking the book under one arm. "I represent the *Spiral Veil*."

Of course it was a cult name.

I didn’t say anything. Just waited.

"We’ve been watching you," Halwen continued. "Ever since the Black Stone incident. You’re not quite like the others."

"Because I’m not dead?"

"Because you *should* be."

He smiled like that was a compliment.

I crossed my arms. "You dragged me out here just to flirt?"

"No. We want to offer you a deal."

"People keep trying to do that. It’s almost as if they don’t know how badly I screw those up."

Halwen took a step forward. "We know you’re using the *Grimoire of Patterns*. We also know it shouldn’t exist in this timeline."

The air turned cold.

He smiled again, wider this time. "Caught your interest?"

"You caught something," I muttered.

"You’re not from here, Lucian. Not truly. And the patterns you carve... they don’t just bend mana. They warp fate."

Oh good. He was insane.

Or worse, *correct*.

He held out a slip of parchment. A list.

It had seven names.

All familiar.

Julien. Mira. Felix. Wallace. Garrick. Cassandra. Leo.

"They’re anomalies now," Halwen said. "Touched by your interference. Growing stronger in ways they shouldn’t. You’ve derailed their destinies."

I took the list slowly. Didn’t let him see my expression.

"So?" I asked.

"So... we want to see where this goes."

That caught me off guard.

"No threats?"

"Oh, there will be. Just not today."

He gestured to the envelope I’d received earlier.

"That seal marks you as a *Variable.* We monitor Variables. We don’t eliminate them—yet. Consider this... an observation phase."

"You want to study me?"

"We want to see what you become. And more importantly..." He leaned in slightly. "What happens to the ones you’re dragging off-script."

The shadows writhed behind him. Not magic. Not illusion. Something older.

"You’re changing this world, Lucian. And the world doesn’t like change."

With that, he turned and walked off into the fog.

The two guards followed, crossbow and all.

I stood there for a long moment, the list crumpling slightly in my hand.

Back at the academy, the students were gathered around the training field.

It was late. The sky was bruised purple, stars blinking like tired eyes.

Mira noticed me first.

"Where’d you go?"

"Grocery shopping."

"At midnight?"

"Had a coupon."

She rolled her eyes but didn’t press.

Julien ran over. "Hey, Professor, do illusions get stronger if you’re drunk?"

"What?"

"Just a theory I’m testing."

"Please don’t."

I looked over them all—my class. My troublemakers. My anomalies.

And I made a decision.

If this world was going to try to erase them, it’d have to go through me.

Training for the Convergence was supposed to be simple.

Drills, sparring, lecture, sleep. Repeat. Throw in a few motivational speeches, a suspiciously high caffeine intake, and maybe one dramatic monologue before the tournament, and you had a textbook prep arc.

My students, naturally, made this impossible.

"Julien, for the last time, you cannot dual-wield scythes. You don’t have the strength, balance, or common sense."

"I do now," he said, gesturing to a rune etched across his forearm. "Wallace modified the grip-to-weight ratio using some kinetic inertia formula."

Wallace nodded proudly. "Theoretically, it’ll redirect the torsion impact."

"It’ll redirect his shoulder into orbit."

Mira chimed in from the side. "Just let him try it once. It’ll make a fantastic cautionary tale."

I dragged a hand down my face. "Fine. One swing. No medical insurance if your arm detonates."

Julien grinned, took a running start, spun once—

—and embedded both scythe blades into the dirt, slingshotting himself face-first into a tree.

The class broke into applause.

"Ten out of ten," Garrick said, clapping. "Stuck the landing."

Julien groaned from the roots. "Everything is pain."

"At least you still have both arms," I called out. "Small victories."

This was our third week of tournament prep, and while none of them were technically improving in the ways I expected, they were adapting in... other ways.

Julien had developed a knack for rapid aggression shifts—throwing off his opponent’s rhythm through sheer chaos.

Mira had refined her cursecraft into short, insidious hex bursts—fast enough to confuse, slow enough to bait reactions.

Garrick, who used to just charge forward, now set traps—traps. It was like watching a bear learn to play chess.

Even Felix, walking disaster that he was, had stopped flinching at projectiles. Now he flinched after they hit, which I considered measurable progress.

Leo, reluctantly, had begun channeling wind mana with precision rather than tantrums. He still complained. But now his complaints included terminology, so I counted that as a win.

And Cassandra—

Cassandra was watching.

Always watching.

Every session, every strategy, every word I didn’t say. She copied nothing but learned everything. I’d seen her mimic my own footwork in private. Her runes weren’t just functional—they were starting to echo my style.

It was equal parts impressive and unnerving.

The day before the tournament, the academy held an inspection.

Roderick stopped by first. He gave a few nods, told Garrick to "keep smashing," then warned me not to turn the arena into a crater again.

"I make no promises."

Gregor followed, mostly to scold Wallace for reverse-engineering a mana grenade.

"In my defense," Wallace said, "it was for educational purposes."

"Yes. Learning how not to explode is also important," Gregor deadpanned.

But the real surprise came with the final visitor.

Alexander Gale.

The polished, smug, still-slightly-bruised instructor who I’d definitely not punched while pretending to be drunk.

He smiled like a shark who’d just read your browser history.

"Drelmont," he said silkily. "I hear your class will actually be attending this year. How novel."

"Try not to get your hopes up. We’re aiming for ’accidental disqualification by Arson."

He laughed. "Still clinging to sarcasm as a defense?"

"No," I said. "Also using petty violence and emotional trauma. A balanced toolkit."

He stepped closer. "You’ve made quite the stir, you know. The High Board is watching. So are the sponsors. If your students collapse in the first round..."

I held his gaze. "They won’t."

"You seem confident."

I smiled. "I have an amazing teaching philosophy: if they lose, I fail them."

He blinked. "That’s... borderline illegal."

"Yes. But incredibly motivating."

He left with a tight frown.

Good.

That night, I stayed up carving.

Not runes for battle—but patterns for protection.

I’d been thinking since that conversation with Halwen. About fate. About Variables. About Cassandra’s unnatural mimicry. About how Julien’s swordplay had begun to echo the Drelmont style without me ever teaching it.

They weren’t just growing stronger.

They were synchronizing.

Becoming more like me.

Or like Allen Cross, the player who knew how to break systems.

I etched long into the night, tracing paths of possibility, interweaving support structures between the runes they used most often. A lattice. A web. Invisible backups. Fail-safes that would never trigger unless they were needed.

The Grimoire of Patterns whispered as I worked.

Old secrets. Forgotten truths. Rules that didn’t belong to this world.

And with each completed loop, I felt the static in the air rise—like something watching. Listening.

When I finished, I sealed the room with three layers of misdirection and collapsed onto my bed.

Tomorrow was the tournament.

___

Convergence Day.

The coliseum towered over the Academy like a stone beast. Carved banners fluttered along the walls. The crowd roared like thunder. Hundreds of students from across all five classes had gathered—plus guests from other academies.

And in the center of it all: a floating platform.

The Arena of Intent.

A stage that responded to one thing only—willpower.

Students would be pitted against one another while the terrain adapted to their emotions, fears, desires.

One year it had turned into a swamp full of spectral frogs.

Another, it became a shifting puzzle of fire and mirrors.

Nobody ever knew what would happen. That was the point.

I led my students to the staging area. Julien wore a cocky grin. Mira had her hood up. Garrick cracked his knuckles with such force the walls vibrated. Leo was sweating profusely. Wallace carried a suspiciously large bag.

Cassandra walked like a ghost among them.

They lined up without being told. Centered. Poised.

It was a bizarre moment of unity.

"Alright," I said. "Here’s your only rule: Don’t die. Everything else is negotiable."

Julien raised a hand. "Can I try dual-wielding—"

"No."

"But—"

"Julien. No."

He grinned anyway.

A bell rang.

The first bracket was about to begin.

They stepped forward one by one as their names were called. Lights flared. The arena shimmered to life. Mana coalesced into terrain—twisting, pulsing, waiting to react.

I stood behind the railing, watching it all unfold.

Watching the world shift around them.

Watching the story go off-script.

And somewhere, I was sure, the Spiral Veil was watching too.

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