NOVEL NEXT [Leveling] Isn’t Everything: Side Effects May Include
The magical tea set was having opinions again.
Dr. Sarah Chen stood in the cramped kitchenette of the Bath Integration Support Centre, watching steam curl from the kettle while her aura flickered an embarrassing shade of pink around the edges. The glow had started the moment she'd walked through the door—her body's inconvenient way of announcing that she was already overwhelmed, and it wasn't even eight in the morning.
"Detection: Resentful Compassion," chirped the tea set in its insufferably cheerful voice, the words also materializing as floating text above the sugar bowl. "Tea Recommendation: Cardamom-black with a cinnamon guilt stir."
A secondary notification popped up in the air above the tea set:
[Morning Caffeine Dependency Detected | Suggested Resolution: Optimize Emotional Processing Through Herbal Enhancement | Warning: Current Stress Levels Approaching Therapeutic Hypocrisy]
Sarah's aura shifted to blue as she suppressed a laugh. "I don't need a herbal… enhancement, thank you very much."
The enchanted teapot—a well-meaning gift from the local magical commerce board—hummed thoughtfully. "Alternative: Earl Grey with milk of human kindness? Warning: Supply running low."
"That's not how…" Sarah caught herself mid-argument with kitchen appliances and rubbed her temples instead. This was her life now. Post-Integration reality meant that even the bloody tea set had developed enough sentience to offer unsolicited mental health advice.
To distract herself, she looked outside. Through the Georgian windows, Bath was already displaying its particular brand of magical chaos. A street musician's violin bow sparked with golden light as he leveled up mid-performance, causing his music to manifest as visible butterflies that confused the morning commuters.
It was, Sarah reflected, remarkably civilized chaos compared to the rest of the world. The BBC had stopped broadcasting from Manchester after a guild war between rival Elemental Supremacists had turned the city center into a permanent weather anomaly. Paris was allegedly still dealing with a Necromancer's Council that had declared the Louvre a "sovereign undead territory."
And when every tech geek in Silicon Valley had simultaneously awakened magical abilities... well, some disasters were best left unmentioned.
Bath, somehow, had managed the magical catastrophe with the same polite restraint it applied to queue management and afternoon tea. The Council had issued laminated cards with protocols: "If your emotional aura is causing distress to fellow queue members, please step aside and practice grounding techniques. Magical overflow in heritage sites requires a £50 fine, and a strongly worded apology to the National Trust."
The local paper's weather section now included "Chance of spontaneous enlightenment: 30%" alongside the usual rain forecasts. But the worst incident they'd had was when a group of tourists tried to establish a "Spiritual Awakening Franchise" in the Abbey, and even that had been resolved with a strongly worded letter from the Council and some strategic bell-ringing.
Sarah's best guess was that Bath's centuries of genteel eccentricity had prepared its residents for the absurd. When your city already featured Roman baths, Georgian architecture, and Jane Austen tourism, adding leveling street musicians and sentient moss barely registered as noteworthy. The locals had simply adapted their legendary British understatement to include magical phenomena: "Bit of a reality tear in the High Street today. Mind how you go."
Though sometimes, late at night, when the clinic was quiet, Sarah wondered if there wasn't something else at work. Something about the ancient leylines running beneath the city that was naturally dampening the more destructive magical impulses.
Or perhaps some outside force was quietly discouraging those who might cause trouble. However, that bordered on believing in conspiracy theories. Why this kind of power would take a particular interest in protecting one small English city was quite beyond her comprehension. So, she preferred not to pursue that avenue of thinking too closely, as it suggested Bath's tranquility might be more fragile than it appeared.
***
The Abbey bells chimed their first spiritual awakening session of the morning—a post-Integration development that triggered profound religious experiences in approximately twelve percent of people in the area and splitting headaches in everyone else.
Sarah's aura pulsed irritably at the sound.
She was late on client notes, overbooked until next Thursday, and absolutely did not want to have the conversation with Emma that was lurking somewhere in her near future. The fact that her emotional state was now broadcast in living color only made everything worse.
The front door banged, followed by the distinct sound of someone trying to navigate the coat rack that had recently gained consciousness and appointed itself the building's unofficial fashion critic.
"Morning, sunshine," came Dr. Marcus Rivera's voice from the entryway, accompanied by what sounded like a small struggle. "Our coat rack is judging my attire again."
Sarah found him in the reception area, paint smudged across his knuckles and exhaustion written in the dark circles under his eyes. His usually neat salt-and-pepper beard looked like he'd been running his hands through it all night.
"Let me guess," Sarah said, her aura shifting to a more concerned yellow-green. "Dream work?"
"Guilt-processing session with that warlock from Tuesday. Turned into an all-nighter when I painted a memory door that decided to open by itself." Marcus held up his paint-stained fingers. "Apparently, his subconscious has some very specific architectural opinions."
Before Sarah could respond, the temperature in the room dropped several degrees. Dr. Elena Winters appeared in the doorway, her usually immaculate appearance slightly dampened, as if she'd been caught in a light rain despite the clear morning outside.
A message popped up over her head:
[Emotional Climate Control: Unstable | Warning: Indoor Weather Events Possible | Suggestion: Embrace The Meteorological Metaphor]
"The moss has grown sentient," she said without preamble, shaking droplets from her auburn hair. "I need bleach."
"Indoor weather again?" Marcus asked, settling into one of the mismatched chairs that somehow always knew how to accommodate different species' comfort needs.
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"Minor emotional leak during the three AM sessions review." Elena's voice remained perfectly level, but Sarah noticed the way frost was forming along the window frames. "Nothing dramatic. Just enough precipitation to wake the terrarium."
Sarah's aura flickered with sympathy. They were all running on fumes, pushing themselves past sustainable limits while trying to help clients navigate a world that had fundamentally changed overnight. The Integration had been barely a month ago, but Bath was still reeling. And so were they. And so was the whole Earth.
At least they seemed to get a better deal than many others. Not that it helped to solve their pressing problems.
It felt like both yesterday and a lifetime away since Mo Nightshade had appeared in her waiting room on that first chaotic day after the Integration, flanked by two of the most unusual young adults Sarah and her colleagues had ever encountered. The ginger barista from Between the Lines bookstore suddenly dispensing wisdom about establishing an Integration Support Centre that would be "both profitable and humanistic."
Sarah still marveled at the transformation in the young woman—just months before, Mo had been offering book recommendations to Sarah's mother, and suddenly she was giving eerily prescient advice about post-magical mental health services. It was as if she'd prepared for that in advance.
That first session with Mo after such a long gap had explained quite a lot, however. Even if it had raised even more questions about this whole new magical reality in the process.
"Right," Sarah said. "Kitchen meeting. Now."
They gathered around the small table, steaming mugs in hand, while the tea set continued offering helpful mood assessments to anyone within range. Outside, a "rogue life coach" had set up shop at the café across the street, his amateur aura work creating rainbow flares that made passing pedestrians temporarily euphoric.
"We need to talk about caseloads."
"I'm fine," Elena said immediately, just as a light snow began falling from the ceiling tiles.
"I can handle a few more memory sessions," Marcus said, despite the fact that his hands were trembling slightly around his mug.
Sarah's aura flared brighter, and she didn't even bother trying to suppress it. "You painted a door that opened itself, Elena's growing sentient moss."
She looked at Elena and added: "At least it's not on your body, love... And I glowed pink at a tea kettle. We are definitely not fine."
The building's emotional residue wards hummed softly, processing the accumulated stress from weeks of high-intensity sessions. Through the walls, Sarah could feel the lingering echoes of breakthrough moments, breakdowns, and the peculiar magical signatures that clients left behind like psychic fingerprints.
"Besides, we've got that new referral that's going to complicate things."
She pulled the file from her bag—a standard intake form that somehow felt heavier than it should have. "Tanya Pierce. Referred by her sister, not herself. Primary school teacher, family-oriented, described as a 'positive influence on students'." Sarah paused, reading the next line. "Also a Level 34 Cognitive Dominator with several class evolutions on her character sheet already."
Marcus's paint-stained fingers stilled. "Cognitive Dominator? Multiple class eveolutions? And Level 34 already! That's..."
"Nearly double our combined levels," Elena said, her voice carefully neutral.
The unspoken truth hung between them: they'd all seen the news footage from Manchester, where a Level 20 Mind Mage's breakdown had left an entire city block convinced they were living in a Jane Austen novel. Permanently. And that was before their second class evolution.
"Memory manipulation, behavior modification, and learning enhancement," Elena said. "If she's having control issues..."
The file flickered, and new text appeared floating in the air above it:
[Level Disparity Warning: Cognitive Resistance Possible | Therapeutic Success Likelihood: 23%]
"The System's being helpful again," Sarah said dryly, closing the file. When it immediately reopened itself with a soft ping, she sighed. "And persistent."
A crash from upstairs made them all look up. Marcus's memory door, presumably.
"I'll deal with that," he said, heading for the stairs. "Just... maybe don't read any more System-enhanced files until I get back."
"Like there are any other left!" Sarah said. "I have to confess, I caught myself going to the archive just to feel the sensation of a normal client file that doesn't glow and won't demand to stay open."
Elena stood up as well, frost patterns spreading across her chair. "I should check the climate controls in Room 3. And find that bleach."
Before even Elena was able to leave, Marcus shouted from upstairs: "It's fine! The door just opened onto my client's childhood fear of clowns and now they're having a tea party in my office! No, literally—they've summoned actual clowns who are insisting on psychological evaluation before they'll leave!"
***
Left alone with her stubbornly reopening file and increasingly opinionated tea set, Sarah tried to focus on the mundane task of sorting through emotional residue crystals—small, translucent stones that absorbed the psychic afterglow of intense sessions and needed regular cleansing.
The moment her fingers touched the first crystal, her enhanced empathic abilities flared. She was suddenly experiencing an echo of yesterday's breakthrough moment with a young man whose Anxiety Amplification class had been triggered by his fear of forgetting his grandmother's voice. The relief, the catharsis, the pure human connection of being truly heard...
It was bizarre how Sarah had grown used to the emotional residue crystals, the anti-scrying wards humming in the walls, the way her aura responded to every stray feeling like a mood ring on steroids. A month ago, she'd been a perfectly ordinary clinical psychologist with nothing more mystical than a psychology degree and a talent for listening.
Now she sorted magical crystals before breakfast and her office required wards against interdimensional eavesdropping.
The Integration had made early adopters of them all, whether they'd wanted it or not. The enhanced abilities helped their work, certainly—reading emotional residue was invaluable for tracking client progress, and her empathic aura created therapeutic breakthroughs that would have taken months through traditional methods alone.
But bloody hell, it wasn't normal.
Her aura flashed brilliant gold, and one of the anti-scrying wards collapsed with a crystalline crack.
"Mum?"
Sarah spun to find Emma standing in the doorway—not materializing from shadows like she did in the first weeks after she received her class, not bypassing the wards, just... standing there like a normal teenager. But the worried expression on her face was anything but normal for Emma, whose default setting had been defensive sarcasm since the Integration.
Emma's illusion abilities still shimmered faintly around her edges, but today they seemed muted, uncertain. "You're broadcasting worry halfway across Bath," she said quietly. "I could feel it from school."
The admission hit Sarah harder than any magical overflow. Her daughter's abilities and senses had been growing stronger each day, but this was the first time Emma had acknowledged using them to check on her mother rather than to avoid her.
"Mum, are you alright?"
Sarah's aura settled into a warmer, steadier light. "I don't know, sweetheart. Things are... complicated right now. But we'll figure it out."
Before either of them could say more, the mail slot clattered. Emma retrieved a single envelope—expensive paper, hand-delivered, with "Dr. Chen" written in shaky handwriting.
Inside was a brief note:
"I saw your article in the Bath Chronicle about Integration therapy. And my sister told me about you multiple times. I need help. I don't want to hurt anyone else, but I think I already have. Can you see me today? - T.P."
A phone number was scrawled at the bottom.
Sarah's aura flickered, cycling through concerned yellow, analytical blue, and something approaching that unpleasant color of dread. In the distance, the Abbey bells chimed again, and somewhere in Bath, a Level 34 Cognitive Dominator was struggling with the weight of powers she couldn't control.
The tea set, helpful as always, called from the kitchen: "Detection: Incoming Crisis | Recommendation: Strong coffee and low expectations."
"That's a wild recommendation from a tea set," Emma said, with a grin.
"For once, it might be right, you know."