Villainous Instructor at the Academy
Chapter 135: Who needs sanity

Chapter 135: Who needs sanity

We started the search proper the next morning. I gave them a rundown before sunrise, because if I was suffering, they were going to suffer with me.

"Here’s the plan," I said, pointing at a crudely drawn map I scraped together using a stolen tavern napkin and Felix’s ink. "We split up again, but this time we’re not wandering around like confused poultry. We’re checking the three hotspots Cassandra marked yesterday. Priority’s on the one where her mirror freaked out."

Julien yawned. "What’s the second priority?"

"Not dying. But that’s more of a personal goal."

The kids moved out with less grumbling than usual. Either they were actually focused or just too tired to protest. I walked with Cassandra and Wallace—Felix was under strict orders not to touch anything, even his own face if it looked suspicious.

The area Cassandra led us to was just outside town. A forgotten well choked with weeds. Old stones circled the base, but the thing that caught my eye was the faint, repetitive thrum of mana.

Subtle, like a heartbeat buried beneath dirt.

"Feel that?" I asked.

Cassandra nodded. "It’s constant, like a loop. Very faint."

Wallace leaned in, peering into the well. "I could drop something in."

"You will not," I snapped. "This isn’t a wishing well. If it grants wishes, it’ll probably ask for your soul in return."

Wallace looked mildly tempted anyway.

I crouched down and tapped into my mana sense—risky, but necessary. The Grimoire of Patterns nudged at the edge of my awareness, storing the rhythmic mana signal. Familiar. I’d seen something like this in a side quest back in Sword of Radiance. A ritual lock disguised as background interference.

"Professor," Cassandra said softly. "Someone’s been here recently."

I looked up. Footprints. Fresh.

And not ours.

A slow smile crept onto my face. "Looks like we’re not the only ones interested in this place."

Julien’s voice crackled through the long-distance rune crystal in my pocket. "Professor? Uh, slight problem. We found a guy in a cloak digging through the eastern ruins."

"How slight?"

"He tried to explode Wallace."

I sighed. "Tell Wallace I’ll be there soon to scold him for being flammable. You two—back to town. Stay alert. Cassandra, come with me."

She didn’t ask why. She just followed.

By the time we reached the ruins, Julien was already holding a sword at someone’s throat. The man was panting, blood on his shoulder, clearly wounded from a skirmish. Wallace stood behind a toppled wall, covered in soot, grinning like a lunatic.

"He was casting something," Julien said. "Didn’t get a good look."

I stepped forward. The man looked up, eyes sharp, unfocused.

"Who are you?" I asked.

He smiled.

And then, without warning, he bit down hard on something in his mouth. A small pop echoed—dimensional flash rune.

He vanished before I could grab him.

Silence.

Felix emerged from the shadows, holding a very small shovel like a weapon. "Did I miss it?"

"You were the miss," I muttered.

But my eyes were on the spot where the man had disappeared. That rune was advanced. Not something a random scavenger would have.

"Looks like this mission just got upgraded," I said to no one in particular. "And I really hate upgrades."

Cassandra tilted her head slightly. "So... now what?"

"Now," I said, pocketing the broken mirror fragment and glancing toward the humming well in the distance, "we poke the hornet’s nest and see what comes out."

Because if I was right—this wasn’t just an old relic hunt.

Someone was digging up secrets.

And I wasn’t about to let them do it first.

We didn’t go back to town. We should have, probably. That would’ve been the smart, reasonable thing to do. But I was neither smart nor reasonable when curiosity itched beneath my skin like a rash.

Instead, I brought Cassandra and Wallace straight to the well.

"You two, perimeter," I said. "If something screams, you run. If I scream, you run faster."

Wallace raised a hand. "What if you don’t scream?"

"Then I died smugly, and you should run anyway."

The magic pulsing from the well had intensified slightly. Not enough to make me panic, but just enough to make my skin prickle. I pulled out the Grimoire of Patterns, flipping through the mental catalog I’d burned into it. That looped mana signal—still cycling, no variation.

Which meant it was a seal.

An old one.

I knelt beside the stone rim and focused. Poured mana into the edge, just a touch. A glowing line ran across one of the rocks before it flickered and vanished.

Wallace peeked over. "Did you just—?"

"Unlock something? Probably." I grabbed a stick and prodded the darkness. "Also probably doomed us. Step back."

Then I jumped in.

Because again: not reasonable.

The drop wasn’t far. A slight thud, some dust, and I landed in a cramped, circular chamber. My lantern-flame spell flickered to life, showing me moss-coated walls and, more importantly, an embedded door carved into the stone—metallic, old, and buzzing with mana.

I whistled.

Cassandra dropped in after me. "This wasn’t part of the mission."

"Nope. Which makes it the interesting part."

Wallace followed, grumbling. "You people are insane."

The seal on the door was cracked, not broken. That worried me. Cracks mean time, and time means it wasn’t intentionally opened. Something was weakening this naturally—or unnaturally.

I pressed my hand to it. The mana responded.

And the door opened.

Not dramatically. No thunder, no echo. It simply clicked open like a trap sprung.

Inside?

A chamber. Dusty. Empty. Except... no. Not quite.

A pedestal. And on it, a single metal gauntlet. Dark red. Engraved with runes older than any I’d seen before. This wasn’t an artifact. This was a relic.

Cassandra took a sharp breath. "That’s cursed."

"You don’t even know what it does yet."

She gave me a flat look. "It’s glowing. And hissing."

True enough.

Wallace reached for it.

I slapped his hand.

"We’re not taking it. Not yet."

"Then why did we come here?" he asked.

I didn’t answer. Because the truth was... I didn’t know. Something about this chamber felt off. Not in the "you’re going to die" way, but in the "someone’s already been here" way.

I turned slowly.

And found carvings on the wall behind the pedestal. A phrase etched in runes long since faded.

Caspian Arvell failed to contain it.

The name twisted something in my gut. Not because I knew it—but because the letters shimmered and then vanished right in front of me.

New text burned into the stone.

"One of you will wear it."

I took a step back. "Alright. We’re leaving. Now."

Cassandra didn’t argue. Wallace looked disappointed but didn’t try anything funny.

We climbed out of the well in silence, minds buzzing. And I was already drafting the worst kind of plan.

Because I knew what this was now.

We’d just stumbled into a secret sub-route. A hidden relic tied to a failed sealing ritual. One that only ever appeared in the rarest game events.

And in the original timeline?

Nobody ever found it.

Which meant this was new territory.

And I hated how excited that made me.

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