Those Left Behind: The Havrevel Trip

Sometime during the training exercise back at Nafriton University.

The main library at Nafriton had long closed for the night. Only the occasional flip of a page broke up the silence. A single person sat at a table deep into the inner sanctum of the library restricted to professors only.

However, there were exceptions, especially for talented students studying under an important faculty member. One of those exceptions was still in the library. A lone candle flickered in the darkness. Daren casually flipped to the next page before rubbing his eyes.

He had already been through these books before. The entire inner sanctum was scoured for information before winter break. Then during winter break he searched through his family's records. Even his aunt's pestering couldn't get him to leave. Daren decided to try again this semester.

Still, he found nothing so far. This school year Daren met the first girl to ever pique his interest. He also did the first seriously unethical thing in his life: he looked through another person's medical records. Specifically, Aayla Glowery's.

Her mana always seemed odd to him. Headmaster Marin seemed to know or at least suspect something yet he refused to tell Daren. Before Daren knew it, he was knee deep in medical books and historical records. Chris caught Daren red handed and took away the medical file during his own investigation. That didn't stop Daren though.

None of what he found was helpful. The university didn't have much of a medical record for Aayla since Deputy Heston was personally managing her condition. He couldn't find any records of a similar condition in the library either.

Ever since he first saw Aayla, she went from no mana to mana at an early teen's level. However, that mana was actually concentrated in her bracelets. Without them, Aayla couldn't handle mana at all. She just seemed incompatible with mana itself.

Daren frowned. All he could find were rubbish books with crackpot theories about ancient Terrans. Stories about their wide variety of languages and cultures that influenced Tellus today. How they couldn't wield magic and followed the path of what was called 'science'. These mysterious people just appeared out of thin air.

He believed that the place could exist, but refused to believe that people could cross over from other dimensions. There was proof that other dimensions and therefore Terra existed. Modern magic had proven dimensional travel near impossible.

The ancients were known for their extravagant boasting and stories. Those people who suddenly appeared were probably just sly tricksters from foreign lands. It's happened before. Seriously, who could use lightning and a wire encased in glass to create light?

Footsteps echoed across the tile floor. A lamp slowly made its way towards his table.

"You're still here? The first exams are still sometime away. Wait, those are ancient medical records?"

Chris gently closed the book that Daren was reading. He placed all of the books on a nearby cart and gently lifted Daren up.

"Are you still looking into that? Come on. You need to get some sleep for tomorrow."

Daren sleepily rubbed his eyes and let Chris pull him out of the library.

"Well, you won't tell me anything about what you or your dad found out about Aayla Glowery. I'm just doing my own research."

"Even if I wanted to I can't."

Chris's voice was oddly quiet.

"What? Did my uncle say something? Or maybe it was my aunt?"

"… We can't find anything."

Daren's eyes opened wide. He blinked a couple of times then checked if anything was in his ears.

"You and your dad can't find anything?"

"Not a clue. It's like she appeared out of thin air on the day that we arrived for fall classes. Technically, she probably arrived the night before. Ramona never mentioned her visiting before that, and we saw her that day."

Chris went into further detail. Supposedly, Aayla had lived abroad her entire life. Yet, they couldn't find any record of her existence in Chinebar or internationally. Either she changed her name and appearance, or had been living completely off the grid somewhere like the Desolate Expanse or the Volcanic Archipelago.

What they did know was that Deputy Heston became extremely tight lipped about this goddaughter of hers. Deputy Heston became highly reclusive, abandoning some of her current research to scour the library for something. The headmaster silently approved, even appointing some temporary replacements to continue her work.

Ms. Glowery seemed to loathe stepping foot outside the residence hall. She only went to classes seemingly because Deputy Heston told her to. The young lady was always polite and seemed quite intelligent if not a bit lacking in common sense. She always kept a strange distance to anyone who approached except Deputy Heston.

"That's it?"

"Yes. Even if she changed her appearance or lived some place remote, we should have found something. For example, a train or carriage ticket to Forest Waypoint. But there's nothing. It's like she appeared out of thin air."

"Is there anything else weird that you found?"

"Yeah, a whole lot of nothing," Chris complained. "Well, there was a sudden energy surge and spatial ripples the day before we arrived. The surge was only for an instant, and the professors didn't find the source. The True Order probably failed at some scheme of theirs."

Chris happily continued talking about how researchers were watching those waves ripple over the world. Long range magical transport and communications were disrupted, causing a lot of volatility in the markets. Merchants under the Forolan family were making a killing thanks to the warning that Chris sent to the family.

Daren remembered one of those rubbish books that seemed a bit more legitimate than the rest. Terrans and objects from Terra would commonly get sucked into a dimensional portal by accident. These portals would require a lot of energy, only be open for mere seconds and would cause spatial instability.

Those conditions sound similar to that night. His instinct screamed that they were those exact same conditions. Daren looked up at the two moons gazing down from overhead. There's just no way that she could be from another world. Right?

**********

Overtime, the ruckus caused by Lysander Foryl's attack on the foreign exchange students and the witnesses calmed down. A few threats for extra exams for 'students with extra energy to spend on gossiping' from the higher faculty easily squashed the students' restlessness.

However, not all were pleased with the outcome. Factions within the school were more divided then ever. The neutral faction had been pulled apart, with many joining the conservative and progressive factions. Elitist teachers viewed the incident as an accident between two rowdy and distressed groups of students. Foreign teachers viewed the incident as deliberate murder attempts.

With no video footage and all accused parties sent to the capital for recuperation and questioning, theories ran wild across campus. The incidents during this year's Havrevel training camp provided more fodder for the gossips. Fortunately for Aayla, the incident in which she and a professor were almost eaten by snow sharks was kept under wraps.

Marc Lupton shined during these times of unrest. A major power vacuum occurred after Lysander and his cronies left. Marc quickly calmed the conservative students. Though he didn't openly declare himself the new leader of the conservative students, most of them would listen to him now.

Though most factions were restless, one was not. The True Order raked in great profits. They managed to secretly recruit many unhappy about the current incident and status quo. These turbulent times provided many opportunities to silently sabotage the relationships between the factions.

The prime targets were those just expelled or suspended. The most important recruit was Lysander Foryl, though he didn't know it yet. Lysander was placed under house arrest in the Foryl mansion at Sarrasak. Professor Foryl carefully arranged for Lysander to study under a friend of Professor Foryl's teacher, a notoriously strict and picky teacher specializing in golems and puppetry-based magic.

Many publicly applauded the move. Professor Foryl had found a strict teacher to knock some sense into his nephew, after all. Unknown to them, this teacher also had a particularly frightening reputation in the True Order. Notoriously strict on his students, the more rebellious ones always became unnaturally loyal to the cause, if not excessively obedient and puppet like.

The professor even told the family that if Lysander performs well, then his teacher would provide a research position for him. The oblivious Foryl family head, his wife and the elders were greatly pleased with this. Despite the arrest, Lysander would have excellent teaching and a mostly bright future.

He could no longer inherit the family, but some proper noble families would still want to marry their daughter to him. Seeing those fools laugh with joy and plan out their future daughter-in-law, Professor Foryl laughed as well. He wasn't laughing with them, but at them. They had no idea what was in store for that annoying hindrance. Soon, Lysander Foryl wouldn't be a problem any longer.