Fate Alchemist - A Regression Academy LitRPG

Wulf held his breath. He didn't dare to move, lest one of the Orichalcums notice.

It wouldn't last forever. He just wouldn't be able to hold his breath that long. But minutes passed. The Orichalcums, despite their desire to "dispense with the formalities," began with a slew of mindless conversation about how their guilds were performing, about the results of their children (which made Lord Umoch squirm even more).

He was pretty sure four minutes had passed. He didn't even feel lightheaded.

That must've been his newly enhanced durability taking effect. In his past life, he'd enhanced his durability, but he was pretty sure he'd advanced far beyond where he ever had. He wouldn't have been able to go this long without breathing.

Finally, Dr. Azanthius cleared his throat and said, "Excuse me, honoured Guildmasters. However, I believe you had a matter you wished to discuss with me."

"The top students in your third year," said the woman in the red dress. "Who are they?" She had fair skin and brown hair, and her eyes glowed yellow. She wore a hairpin that looked awfully like a miniature staff. It probably could transform into one, considering how much arcane presence it was giving off.

It was hard to say when Wulf began feeling arcane presence again. Somewhere around silver. Enhancing your senses and perception increased your ability to detect it, but at the same time, you needed to get used to using Skills, manipulating mana, guiding it around your body, and fuelling items.

It was like the tingle he felt when completing a potion, except trapped inside a distant object.

Dr. Azanthius sighed and reached inside a drawer, then pulled out a sheet of parchment. "In third year, by overall grades and rankings, we have Tara McGemmild—daughter of our Dungeons Studies professor—and a few members of her crew." Azanthius rattled off a long list of names. Not once did he mention Wulf, Kalee, Seith, or Irmond.

"The alchemist, Headmaster," insisted the Orichalcum with a turban. He wore a long white robe, and veins of glowing blue light writhed across his skin. "Who is he?"

"I'm sure you already know," Azanthius said. "You asked for the rankings, and I gave them to you."

"Do not give us lip, headmaster," said the man with blond hair, slamming his hand down on the table. "You will not hide him from us."

"It doesn't seem that there's anything to hide," Azanthius said.

"Aside from you bending the school regulations to allow an Alchemist in," said the woman with the fur cloak. She slammed her hand down on the desk. "It shouldn't be allowed."

"Well, perhaps not." Azanthius chuckled. "But I believe this was the form we drafted up two hundred years ago with the old headmaster to allow your son into the Academy, despite him being a [Swordsman]." He pushed the form across the table to the woman. "You made the old headmaster, then me afterward, swear a Field Pact that we would honour the form, allowing a student to enroll in courses if their Class was not too far removed from the content of the lectures. Your son enrolled in Mage lectures, and this Alchemist isn't very different from a pilot. Keep in mind, the wording of the pact was hardly precise. I swear on the Field that I will honour this form for as long as the Academy stands."

The woman scowled and crossed her arms. "Honour it for my son. Specifically."

"I took it to mean something else." Azanthius spread his arms. "I can't break a Field Pact. The fault lies on you for not insisting on a more precise wording."

"Enough, Azanthius," demanded the blond man. "You know why we don't allow Alchemists."

"In truth, I don't know for sure," Azanthius said. "No one has ever confirmed my suspicions outright. But nothing on the form dictates that I can't allow Alchemists, and I did my due diligence elsewhere, searching the Academy regulations. There are no other restrictions."

Wulf tilted his head. If the Orichalcums didn't want Alchemists in the Academy, they could've easily added a regulation that forbade Alchemists from entering. But the regulations were public, and that would arouse more suspicion than the Orichalcums were probably looking for. It'd draw attention to Alchemists.

"What's the trouble?" Azanthius asked, putting on a tone of false innocence. "Alchemists are weak, aren't they?"

"You can't truly be that naïve," the man with the turban snapped.

"He's not," said the woman with the red dress. "Are you, Headmaster?"

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"That, what?" Azanthius shrugged. "You would push the lie that Alchemists are a weak, useless Class simply because you didn't want one coming to power? That you would make it difficult to acquire alchemy resources, that you would hide the textbooks behind layers upon layers of verification, and only once a student had reached the threshold, they wouldn't bother reading it, because they already believed your lie? Or that, even in the backwater branches of the Academy across the sea, none of the students would bother reading a mis-categorized textbook that happened to have some alchemy basics? I haven't quite figured out the why yet, but the moment I learned that one of my most promising students was an Alchemist, I figured I had been manipulated by you."

The Orichalcums shared a glance. Even Lord Umoch regained a shred of his earlier firmness and matched the scowl of the others.

"If it means anything," Azanthius said, "I also received permission from the king to do this."

Wulf grinned. Athllas.

"We control the king," the woman in the fur cloak snapped.

"You used to," Azanthius reminded her. "The crown has changed hands."

"Are you challenging us, Headmaster?" demanded the blond man.

"I'm stating reality. This boy wasn't top ranked by any of our metrics. There was no harm in letting him study, even if I had to pull out an old loophole to do it." Azanthius tapped the sheet. "He's not even in the top hundred ranks."

"Those are manipulated, and you know it," Umoch snarled. "They reflect nothing."

"Would you like me to do something?" Azanthius said. "As it stands, I can't remove him, and there would be a very public debacle if we removed the Alchemist who helped save our city from our halls. He might get cold stares within these walls, but outside, word is spreading. The civilians, the mortals—which you still need to run your guilds and fuel your Embodiments—won't be too pleased."

"That sounds like a threat," the woman in the fur cloak snapped.

"Then tell me what to do."

"Reaffirm your allegiance to us," said the man in the turban. "Swear on the Field that you will not aid him, that you will maintain the restrictions of the academy, and that you will keep order."

"Alchemists are agents of chaos," the woman in the red dress droned. "They'll burn our world to the ground if they have the chance, and they'll laugh while doing it. Your alchemist prodigy has already replaced the hand of his Oronith with one covered in demon armour, hm? You think it will stop there."

The blond man stepped forward. "Rules are like a dam. You break one of them, and the rest are soon to crumble. You start breaking, bending one rule, Headmaster? And the entire world will come crashing down. You need us, and you need our Embodiments, to keep everything in line.

"It is much easier to have five Embodiments than a hundred," said the woman with the fur cloak, "and if you gave everyone the same degree of training, you'd have thousands of potential Embodiments on your hands. It would be absolute chaos, and all would be weaker."

"Orderly. Until your guilds have a skirmish," Azanthius countered. "It wasn't exactly a peaceful, orderly time the Fletchers fought the Farmers." At the word Farmers, he looked specifically at the blond man. "Your ancestors flattened Carolaign and turned it into a mana-starved wasteland." Azanthius shook his head. "But who am I to argue with the great wisdom of the Five Orichalcums? I'll make your Pact. Something tells me that this boulder has already been pushed, and there's no stopping the rockslide. The Cords are trembling."

"Watch your tone," the man with the turban snapped. "You cannot stand against us."

"No, I cannot. But it would make such a mess to kill me." Azanthius shook his head. After a few seconds, he said, "I swear on the Field that I won't give any aid to any Alchemists in the future."

"There you go," said the woman in the red dress. "Was that so difficult?"

"Are we done here?" Azanthius asked.

"We're done with you, old man," said Umoch. He turned on his heels, snapping his cloak, and marched toward the door. The others quickly followed. They disappeared out of sight, winding down the stairs.

Wulf exhaled, breathing out a lump of stale air. His vision began to swim, and his lungs were aching. He sucked in a deep breath as quietly as he could, but Azanthius still held up his hand.

A signal for Wulf to wait.

Finally, after nearly a minute, Azanthius lowered his hand. Wulf popped the grate off the wall and pulled himself out, then jumped down to the main floor of the office. "Headmaster…" he whispered. "Did you know I was there?"

"You did a good job of keeping quiet. None of the others noticed. But your heart still beats, and I sensed your arcane presence."

Wulf cursed softly under his breath. "I—"

"It's alright. None of the others noticed. I have plenty of trinkets in my office."

"Headmaster, what was that all about?"

"Use what you gathered. I tried to get them to say as much as I could, but my tongue is tied in knots now. To directly explain everything would be to aid you, and I am forbidden. I can, however, guide you to the right solution."

"How is that not aiding me?"

"Because I feared this day might come," Azanthius said. "I lodged information deep within the Academy's codex well before the meeting. You will need to work on your codex construction and manipulation skills to access it, I'm afraid, but it was the only way."

Wulf grimaced. "Back to work with Dr. Tallari?"

"The pieces are moving," said Azanthius. "We don't have much time left. But for the moment, you must keep studying, and you must keep advancing. I don't know how much more time you'll have in the academy." He paused. "You have a tournament fight tomorrow. Prepare yourself, get a good sleep, and make us proud."

Wulf was tempted to reveal to the headmaster what he'd told Dr. Arnau, but he held his tongue.

Knowing what he did about Azanthius, he wasn't sure if that information would be safe with the Headmaster anymore.