Chp.42: Talking between colleagues

In the following days, the lessons always went well. After the first few attempts, Maldor seemed to have gained a little more confidence in herself, and was now much more relaxed when speaking to students. They appreciated her way of teaching and it also seemed fruitful, so there had been no problems.

In her very first lessons, Maldor had taught them the basics of mana control; it still needed to be honed well, but at least now all the students could extract the mana in their bodies and use it to create magic. While their skills were still very poor compared to a qualified mage, the students were still able to cast basic spells already, which was a great achievement in such a short time. Thanks to this, Maldor had also been able to start the lessons of potions and defense and attack magic. By the end of the first month, her students already knew at least a dozen very simple spells.

With these premises, her hiring had been practically assured. Isaac had complimented her at the end of each of her lessons and he had always spoken highly of her to the vice principal. Also sometimes Isaac couldn't be there and so the assistant principal sent other teachers to check on her, and they all had the same reaction, so it couldn't be said that it was favoritism. At the end of her probation, Maldor was hired on a permanent basis and the other teachers held a small party to welcome her among them. Both Maldor and Kotaru had taken advantage of the opportunity to build more interpersonal relationships with them, and then evaluate how those people could be useful to them. Thanks to that event they had the opportunity to get to know the entire teaching staff: the only one who was absent was obviously the principal, busy as usual with her duties at the royal court, but the two dragons didn't mind. In their opinion, the less they met with the principal, the better they were. They remembered that Hara had been able to sense their presence when she came to check on the hydra's body with Carrion, even though they were using the invisibility rune; therefore, it wasn't safe to make contact with her, since she could sense that what everyone saw was not their real bodies, or at least could see through the illusion. Even though Maldor and Kotaru had prepared some countermeasures, they had no guarantee that they would work. The legendary levels and the power of the gods were still something incomprehensible even to Haku, so they couldn't be sure of anything dealing with them.

Both before and after being hired, Maldor and Kotaru had explored and studied the whole academy well, and had also identified the access point for the research laboratories, but unfortunately they had no idea what traps and defenses there were; they were pretty sure there were, since the objects stored in those laboratories were extremely valuable and also dangerous, but they didn't know how much dangerous they were, how many they were or where they were located. Therefore, they had started bonding a lot with the other teachers, hoping to get some information from them. Due to her shyness Maldor often made some gaffe that Kotaru had to correct, but this fortunately seemed to amuse most of the people they spoke to, who became even more sympathetic towards them.

The rest of the time, Maldor and Kotaru mostly spent it in the library. Dragons had a photographic memory and thanks to it they could memorize several books every day. Maldor wanted to make sure she learned all of the magic in that academy, since while it wasn't very important at the moment, it might be in the future. She had learned from Haku to be cautious and to leave no stone unturned, and even if her brother was sometimes a bit excessive, she had to admit that he had his reasons. Maldor and Kotaru sometimes found themselves laughing sadly thinking about the fact that Haku would have done anything to be in their place at that moment and assimilate every single drop of knowledge contained in those books; he probably would never leave the library until every word written on those pages was imprinted in his mind.

"I was sure I would find you here"

Maldor looked up from the book she was reading and saw Isaac leaning against a shelf staring at her with a smile. Even though it would have made her uncomfortable a few weeks ago, by now she had grown accustomed to the human's presence. Isaac had always been very kind to her and had always been willing to help her, both before and after she was hired. Besides, he wasn't doing it for some personal interest: after two months of knowing him, Maldor understood that Isaac had no interest, but simply enjoyed her company. This was a bit unusual from her point of view (until that moment no one had been close to her unless they wanted something, apart from her siblings), but in the end she understood (also thanks to Kotaru's help) that this was normal for humans. Apparently, friendship was something easy to build, since Maldor had built it with Isaac without even realizing it. "Hi. Shouldn't you be teaching a class now?"

"The classroom is flooded" Isaac replied with a shrug. "One of my students had the brilliant idea to practice on his own… and now there are two inches of water on the floor. So I had to turn the students away"

"Couldn't you just dry her out with a dehydration spell?"

"Unfortunately the student in question was using a magical item, which made it impossible to remove the water with magic. I have to wait for the spell to wear off"

"How would a student get hold of a magical item so powerful it would counteract a teacher's power?"

"Well... he must have had it sent by his family..."

"Isaac, you're using this event as an excuse to avoid class, aren't you?"

Isaac seemed to bite his tongue, but laughed nonetheless. "You caught me" he admitted. "I needed a break"

Isaac, unlike Maldor, had been working at the academy for some years already, and as a result had three classes under his jurisdiction. Clearly managing them all was no easy task, as evidenced by the bags under her eyes. Added to that all his other duties, the poor man must have been under a lot of stress. And unlike Maldor, who only needed three or four hours of sleep, he needed at least eight hours for his body to get enough rest. "I won't tell the vice principal if that worries you" Maldor assured him.

"Oh, thank you. Though I had no doubts you'd cover me" Isaac exclaimed as he folded his hands together as if he were praying, and in a very funny way. "Excuse me, you know I love my students, but with everything I have to do I really need to stop for a moment and spend some time with a friend"

"Perhaps is the name of this friend 'bed'?" Maldor asked rhetorically, pointing to the bags under his eyes.

"Ha ha, veeeeeery funny" Isaac said with a hint of mock annoyance in his voice, then looked around. "Kotaru isn't with you?"

"She's in my quarters. She's sorting out some things" Maldor replied. Kotaru was actually in the quarters, but her fake body was lying on the bed and turned off since she had returned to her real body to discuss with their siblings. "Is that a problem?"

"No, it's just that I'm used to seeing you two together. It seems strange that you're alone today" Isaac answered pulling up a chair from one of the tables that could be used for sitting and reading. "By the way, you're always here in the library. I've never seen you do anything else. Don't you want to visit the city, you who still have only one class and plenty of time to spare?"

Maldor took a chair of her own and sat down next to him. "I don't really like the company of people. I prefer that of books"

"And I don't doubt it's a great company. But you should go out once in a while. I could show you some parts of the city"

"Are you trying to invite me on a date, by any chance?"

"Ha ha! No, don't worry, I don't have that goal in mind. I don't see you in that way, and then I doubt that a beautiful and intelligent woman like you would ever be interested in dating a lazy and indolent man like me"

It was true. Maldor knew that her current look was popular with the academy's male population, both teachers and students, and she'd learned to notice the signs of attraction. But Isaac had never shown them: even if he too recognized her beauty, he didn't see her as a possible partner but only as a friend he had recently met.

"But seriously, I should go out once in a while" Isaac continued. "The capital is really very, very beautiful. There are so many things to see… lots of shops, different restaurants, amazing parks and squares, monuments… you could go to the theatre, see a comedy… or at the circus, I hear there are some very good new acrobats… or if you like thrills you could visit the arena and watch a fight…"

Hearing those words, Maldor became more tense. Perhaps, she thought, she could use the situation to her advantage. "The arena, huh? I wouldn't mind actually. I heard they have a dragon"

"Oh yes!" Isaac said, who seemed surprised that Maldor was interested in certain things given her peaceful and quiet behavior, but at the same time happy since he seemed to have convinced her. "I've never gone to see him as I'm always working, but some of my students have told me about him. He's extraordinary, an elegant and powerful creature. It's not even two years old and he is already longer than two carriages combined! Imagine how he's going to grow up..."

"I've heard that dragon can do magic. How is that possible, considering it doesn't have a domain?" she asked pretending not to know the answer.

"Oh... well, feel free to believe it... but it seems to use runes" Isaac replied. "Apparently, that dragon has learned to use the magic of the fairies of the Karbraland Great Forest. When they caught him they even found several of their items with him, which are currently being studied in the academy laboratories. Some of them are so complicated as to be almost incomprehensible..."

After spending so much time studying magic, Maldor had a clearer idea why humans were so interested in fairy magic. Almost all the runes of that race were in fact based on light magic, which was one of the magics given by the gods. The fairies could only use a tiny fraction of it, but it was enough to make amazing things like the portable gate. And since that magic was based on the teachings of some past legendary level fairy who possessed light magic, it was a knowledge only of the fairy race. Only a few other races who had heroes blessed with light magic had knowledge similar to theirs; furthermore, since the gods didn't want too much of that magic to be known to mortals, they often forbade their favorites from teaching it. As a result, fairy magic was a great rarity. The humans of the Jurao Kingdom had a goddess and legendary levels too, but the magic this goddess bestowed on them was life magic, and as a result they were unable to understand light magic, which was of a completely different nature. However, if they could conquer the fairies and get taught by them, they could use that knowledge to exponentially improve the well-being of the kingdom. For this the Jurao Kingdom had long aimed to invade the Karbraland Great Forest, even if the king probably had other reasons as well; after all, wars were rarely fought for just one reason. Therefore, Maldor pretended to be shocked by the news: "Runes? Can that dragon use runes? What runes? And what items was he carrying? How..."

"Wow, calm down!" Isaac stopped her. "We still know very little about that kind of magic. That dragon was captured less than a year ago and so far has kept its secrets well. And our research so far has borne little fruit..."

"Oh... I see" Maldor said, pretending to be disconsolate. "Too bad... I was hoping... no, it doesn't matter"

Isaac noted her moodiness. "Are you interested in fairy magic, by any chance?"

Maldor scratched he head as if she was embarrassed. "Actually, yes. I've been for a long time, and I've also... well... I've also speculated about a way runes might work. I was hoping to find confirmation since you said that dragon is able to use them..."

"A way runes might work?" Isaac was interested. "What would this hypothesis be?"

"Well, some time ago I wondered why runes are so different from normal enchanted items. As you well know, enchanted items eventually lose their powers over time, because these powers are only due to the spell of the one who enchanted them and are based on the energy he put into them, consequently once this energy runs out the enchanted objects return to being normal objects. The runes, on the other hand, can last forever. Why this?" Maldor said as if she were lecturing. "Well, after a long time thinking about it, I came to a conclusion, but unfortunately I never could verify. You see, the runes are..."

She explained in great detail the delicate balance between mana and energy that formed within the runes, and which allowed them to remain stable virtually indefinitely unless the mana was released all at once (as she and her siblings did, since they didn't know how to control it) or that the mana consumed was greater than the one present in the environment and therefore that could be absorbed (as in the case of the invisibility rune). She felt a little guilty about taking credit for something that was actually discovered by Haku, but after all she doubted that her brother would care. By the time she'd finished, Isaac's eyes had grown the size of two bowls. "This... this is..." he whispered, then stood up abruptly. "Sorry, I have to go"

Maldor didn't stop him. She knew he would go to verify her words in the laboratory. She didn't know if Isaac would pretend the discovery was his or would give her the credit, but it didn't matter: now the man knew that she could be useful in understanding fairy magic, so he would surely come back to discuss with her, and so doing so would give her more opportunity to find out how the portable gate was secured.

Or at least, that was the plan. But not everything went as she had expected: a few hours later, while she was walking through the corridors with Kotaru, the vice principal joined her and said: "Miss Hakister, excuse me but you have to come with me. The principal wants to see you"

Maldor and Kotaru's eyes widened at those words. Kotaru's gaze immediately turned reproachful. 'What have you done?' she seemed to ask her with her eyes.