Shattered Innocence: Transmigrated Into a Novel as an Extra

"Before we begin the examination," Tamara said, settling one hand upon the documents before her, "we will confirm whether yesterday’s affinity result can be reproduced."

Lucavion’s gaze moved from her to Elir and then toward the smaller crystal apparatus that waited beside the observation table. He regarded it for several seconds with the mild interest one might give an acquaintance encountered somewhere unexpected, before the corner of his mouth rose.

"So we are doing that again."

"We are verifying it," Tamara corrected.

"A much more respectable word."

Elir had already moved toward the reinforced case beneath the table. He opened its brass clasps and withdrew a transparent sphere held within a narrow bronze frame, considerably smaller than the great affinity crystals used inside Crystal Hall. Several pale lines slept within the glass, arranged in concentric layers that connected to a squat pedestal through threads of silver metal.

Lucavion looked at it.

"That is rather small."

"It performs the same task."

"I believe you."

Elir paused while setting the sphere into the pedestal.

Lucavion added, "I simply expected more ceremony."

"You are having your affinity checked, Student Lucavion. We are hardly crowning you."

"A shame. I came dressed for it."

Selenne lowered her eyes toward one of the recording slates before her expression betrayed her. Across the chamber, Marcus seemed considerably less entertained, although he kept his irritation contained behind the same rigid composure he had worn since Lucavion entered.

The pedestal gave a soft click as the sphere settled into place, followed by a low crystalline hum. Silver channels along its base awakened one after another, and the pale lines suspended within the glass brightened until the whole apparatus carried the faint glow of something recently roused from sleep.

Tamara rose.

"Yesterday’s examination raised several questions," she said. "The Tower was asked to provide an independent witness because one explanation being circulated is that your result may have involved concealed equipment or some form of external magical assistance."

There was very little softness in her wording, yet she offered neither accusation nor apology with it. She simply placed the matter between them as something to be checked.

Lucavion nodded slowly.

"That would explain the search."

Tamara’s eyes narrowed by a fraction. "You expected one?"

"I expected several things."

He spread his hands slightly, and Selenne noticed again how unusually bare he looked. His familiar golden earring was absent. His wrists carried neither bracelet nor charm, and even the estoc that normally accompanied him had been left elsewhere. His Academy coat held only its regulation fastenings, while the shirt beneath it was plain enough that even Marcus would struggle to invent a hidden formation without embarrassing himself.

’He prepared.’

Tamara apparently reached the same conclusion, because her attention lingered briefly upon his ears before moving down toward his hands.

"You removed your accessories."

"I thought someone might become emotionally attached to them."

Marcus frowned. "Emotionally?"

"As evidence."

Lucavion’s smile widened. "It seemed kinder to leave temptation in my room."

Tamara drew a flat crystal disc from her case before Marcus could answer. Fine Tower markings circled its edge, and when she pressed her thumb against its center, a thin plane of pale light extended outward.

"Stand there."

Lucavion obeyed, stepping into the open section beside the platform before holding his arms a little away from his body.

The light passed across him from head to foot. It moved through the fabric of his coat, traced the seams of his clothing, crossed his boots, and faded after reaching the floor. Tamara studied the crystal in her hand, turned it once, and activated a second sequence. Several translucent rings formed around Lucavion this time, intersecting as they searched for stored spellwork, hidden conduits, or enchanted objects carrying an active magical pattern.

Lucavion watched one of the rings descend across his chest.

"Should I be worried?"

"No."

"Excellent. I have grown fond of some of the things in there."

Elir’s mouth twitched.

Tamara finished the sweep and lowered the disc. "Empty your pockets."

Lucavion reached into his coat and deposited the contents upon the table: several coins, a folded handkerchief, and a piece of paper that had been creased into quarters.

Tamara picked up the paper.

"What is this?"

Lucavion glanced down.

"I was hoping you might tell me."

She unfolded it.

Her expression flattened.

Selenne’s curiosity won. "What?"

"A dining hall menu."

Lucavion leaned slightly closer, as though the discovery had solved something important. "Ah."

Tamara looked at him. "Why are you carrying a dining hall menu?"

"I imagine I had a reason at the time."

"You cannot remember?"

"I remember lunch rather fondly."

Elir turned toward the pedestal and busied himself with an adjustment ring.

Selenne decided that was wise.

Tamara folded the menu again, returned it with the coins and handkerchief, then performed one final sweep around Lucavion’s hands, collar, ears, wrists, and boots. The crystal remained clear throughout the inspection.

"Clean," she said.

Marcus glanced toward her. "Entirely?"

Tamara turned her head.

"Entirely."

The answer settled differently because it came from her. She belonged to neither Marcus’s circle nor Selenne’s authority within the Academy, and the Tower had supplied both her mandate and the detection instrument in her hand. Whatever arguments might follow, the simplest accusation had just lost its footing.

Lucavion slipped the menu back into his pocket.

"May I be suspiciously magical now?"

"You may place your hands upon the sphere."

"Wonderful."

He approached the pedestal.

Elir stepped to one side, although his attention sharpened the moment Lucavion came within reach of the crystal. Tamara positioned herself where she could see both his hands and the apparatus, while Marcus remained beside the observation table with his folio open. Selenne watched from slightly farther back.

For the first time since entering the chamber, Lucavion’s humor receded of its own accord.

He looked at the sphere.

Perhaps Crystal Hall returned to him then. Selenne could hardly tell. His face had become quiet enough that whatever passed through his thoughts stayed there.

He placed both palms against the glass.

The sphere answered immediately.

A pale pulse moved through its center, followed by another. The sleeping lines within the crystal awakened and spread outward, branching into a delicate lattice that reached toward his hands while one of the gauges beside Elir began to climb.

Everything appeared ordinary.

For a moment.

Then the response stalled.

The light remained within the sphere, yet it refused to resolve into the color or pattern that usually followed successful affinity correspondence. The lattice held itself open as though waiting for the next part of an exchange, while the pale illumination slowly weakened around its outer edges.

Elir leaned closer.

Tamara’s attention moved to the gauges.

Selenne watched the crystal itself.

The last of the brighter lines faded until only the pedestal’s resting glow remained.

Lucavion looked toward Elir.

"Hm."

"Keep your hands there."

"I had no intention of stealing them back."

Elir adjusted one of the bronze rings beneath the sphere. The second sequence began with a slightly different pitch, its internal lines narrowing as the artifact attempted a finer reading.

Again, it established contact.

Again, the process reached the same point.

Then it simply remained there, waiting for a correspondence that never formed.

Elir’s brow tightened.

"Once more."

Lucavion turned his head slightly. "Professor, people may begin to misunderstand our relationship."

"Once more."

"You have become very demanding."

He complied.

The third attempt ended almost identically to the first two.

Tamara stepped forward after Lucavion withdrew his hands. She touched two fingers to the pedestal, allowing a thin stream of her own mana to pass into the apparatus.

Silver flooded the sphere at once.

The response was clean enough that even someone without Elir’s expertise could have understood the demonstration. Tamara withdrew her fingers, and the color faded back into transparency.

"The apparatus is responsive," she said.

"Yes," Elir replied.

She looked toward Lucavion, then toward the notes forming across the recording slate.

"And yesterday?"

"Same sequence, within the variation I would expect from a different sphere."

Marcus folded his arms. "Then we can confirm he possesses no readable affinity."

Elir looked up.

"We can confirm the result."

Marcus’s expression shifted. "Which is?"

"The apparatus cannot classify him."

"That seems unnecessarily delicate."

Selenne rested her fingers against the edge of the table. "Only if you already know what the result means."

Marcus glanced at her.

She continued, "The crystal has reproduced yesterday’s reading. That gives us reliable observation. Interpretation is another matter."

Lucavion looked between them, visibly pleased by the direction of the conversation.

"We are academics," Elir added. "Making distinctions unnecessarily delicate is among our more respected traditions."

Tamara’s mouth moved faintly before she suppressed it.

Marcus did not share the amusement.

She drew one of the Tower sheets toward herself. "For the record: Student Lucavion carried no detectable enchanted equipment, stored spellwork, external conduit, or resonance aid. The testing apparatus passed independent calibration and reproduced the Crystal Hall null-read under controlled conditions."

Her quill paused.

"This establishes the recurrence of the anomaly. It does not establish its cause."

Selenne’s gaze settled briefly upon her.

’Better.’

Elir, meanwhile, had continued reading the slate. After another few seconds, he placed it down.

"One more thing."

Lucavion sighed.

"The flame?"

Elir looked at him. "The flame."

"You really have become attached to it."

"I would like to verify that as well."

Lucavion lifted his right hand and examined his palm.

"Very well. Since everyone came all this way."

His fingers opened.

Black fire appeared above his skin.

It arrived without ceremony, rising into existence as naturally as breath leaving his lungs. A dark ashen flame rested over his palm, compact and strangely quiet, with faint gray traces moving through its center and a violet tint becoming visible whenever its edges crossed the chamber light.

Tamara’s attention sharpened.

Marcus watched Lucavion rather than the flame.

Elir looked between the manifestation and his gauges.

Selenne simply observed.

’Still the same.’

The contradiction felt even clearer here than it had in Elir’s description.

The affinity sphere could produce no useful classification, while the boy standing beside it maintained a magical manifestation with an ease many first-years would have envied.

"Hold it," Elir said.

Lucavion glanced at him. "I am."

"For thirty seconds."

"How cruel."

Yet the flame remained perfectly steady.

Lucavion rotated his wrist after several seconds. The black fire leaned with the movement before settling again, its shape neither swelling nor breaking. His attention wandered toward one of the gauges, then toward Tamara, and the flame continued to rest over his palm as though it required very little thought from him.

Elir counted silently.

When the time passed, he nodded. "Enough."

Lucavion closed his fingers.

The flame vanished.

Elir recorded the result. "Stable manifestation. No detectable external support."

"Boring," Lucavion said.

"Good control often is."

That caught his attention.

Elir stepped away from the affinity apparatus and approached the circular formation occupying the center of the room.

"Which brings us to the actual examination."

The six stone posts surrounding the woven mat remained dormant, but channels cut into the floor connected them in a broad ring. Each post carried a cloudy crystal at its top, while several gauges along the observation alcove corresponded to the formation.

Lucavion followed him.

"The Mana Control Trial measures function rather than affinity," Elir explained. "We provide a task, you provide the requested mana output, and the formation measures how accurately you maintain it."

"That sounds refreshingly simple."

"It begins simply."

Lucavion smiled. "There it is."

Elir touched the nearest post.

A pale point of light formed above the center of the mat.

"First, you will feed mana into a single target and hold the requested level. The gauge will show you where your output should remain."

A second gesture created three smaller lights around it.

"After that, the target will change. You may be asked to divide your output between several points, increase one while reducing another, or recover after the chamber disrupts your concentration."

Lucavion studied the lights.

"How does it disrupt me?"

"The surrounding mana will fluctuate. Its density may rise or fall, and the direction of ambient flow may shift. Think of it as trying to keep a candle steady while someone keeps opening windows around you."

Lucavion’s eyes flicked toward Elir.

"That explanation I understand."

"I suspected you might."

Marcus spoke from behind them. "The final portion is where most students lose points. The changes remain within Academy safety standards, but maintaining precision becomes considerably harder when the environment refuses to remain convenient."

Lucavion looked toward him.

"So the room misbehaves and I am blamed for reacting poorly."

Marcus’s mouth tightened.

Elir answered before the exchange could grow teeth. "You are judged by the output, Lucavion. How you achieve it is your concern."

For a brief moment, the smile on Lucavion’s face changed.

Smaller. But for someone who interacted with this kid frequently for the past days...

’There.’

Selenne noticed it immediately. Albeit she also considered it to be just a mistake, she still thought of it regardless.

Yesterday they had buried him beneath terminology he barely understood. Today the instructions amounted to something far simpler.

Put mana there.

Keep it there.

Adjust when something changes.

Whatever weaknesses his education possessed, this language probably belonged to him.

Elir dismissed the floating lights and placed his palm against the activation mark carved into the nearest post.

The formation awakened.

One crystal glowed, followed by the next, until pale mana travelled around the six pillars and filled the channels beneath the floor. A soft vibration entered the chamber, almost too low to hear, while the air above the platform gained a subtle density that Selenne could feel against her skin.

Lucavion felt it as well.

His gaze lowered toward the silver lines around the mat, then moved across the six crystals before returning to the open center.

Whatever humor remained upon his face quieted into concentration.

Elir stepped aside.

"Enter when you are ready."

Lucavion approached the shallow step.

For several seconds he watched the light moving beneath his boots, as though listening to something nobody else could hear.

Then the corner of his mouth rose.

’Well.’

He stepped into the formation.

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