Thousand Tongue Mage

The sound of the first pebble tapping against glass jolted Zora awake, but the second one that bounced off their dorm window was just rude.

He was awake.

While Ifas continued throwing stones at their window to wake them up, he swung his legs off the top bunk, landed on the wooden floor with a soft thud, and stretched as quietly as he could. He shared the room with three others, after all, and they were all stirring awake at the exact same time. Enki didn't have to sleep, so he was already standing off to the side, struggling to put on his uniform. Kita drew a curtain across the middle of the room to get some private space to change, while Eria had already finished changing, pressing her palms against the window as she peered out at Ifas.

"Is that… our new driver?" she asked sleepily, rubbing her eyes as she did.

Zora tilted his head slightly as he changed by his side of the bunk as well, half-tempted to just use his spells to get it done quickly. "That is Asif," he said curtly. "The driver we brought in from the outer region. Do the two of you not have your own drivers?"

"Our last one disappeared a few days ago!" she chirped back. "So he must be our new replacement!"

He had to resist the urge to grimace.

Let's hope this new driver keeps a lower profile this time, then.

Ifas, at least, looked completely different on the surface. From what Zora could hear, the carriage outside was entirely new: polished, sleek, the wheels freshly oiled. The uniform Ifas wore was different too. Stiffer. Clean. And more importantly, his face was covered. He gave no casual whistle, and his posture was no casual slouch. Whether Kita would recognise him or not was anyone's guess, but Zora suspected even if she did—like she did Zora and Enki's identities—she wouldn't say it out loud.

He heard Kita's curtain slide open with a soft swish.

"Are we all ready to head out?" she asked, already holding an armful of notes and textbooks.

Zora turned—and frowned.

Enki was still struggling with his uniform, his bandaged hands more clumsy than Zora had ever seen them.

"... There are things you are physically bad at as well, hm?" Zora murmured, walking over to help the boy fasten the collar and feathered tassels. "An academy uniform isn't like a soldier's uniform, after all."

"There are too many components to the uniform," Enki replied coldly. "How is anyone supposed to fight in this?"

"You're not supposed to."

"I know."

He helped Enki into the rest of the uniform without further complaint, adjusting the sleeves and tightening the sash. The boy didn't resist. As Zora finished tying the last knot, Kita and Eria both headed to the door, polished shoes already laced.

"I'll lead the way," Kita said. "We're all final semester students, so we have the same classes."

"And what would our first class be?" Zora asked, picking up his stack of books from his study desk while Enki picked up his. "Gods, please don't be physical exercise bright and early in the morning. I could never stand that even back in my old academy."

"It's Textual Analysis of Contemporary Empire Militarisation," she replied. "The professor is quite a man. You'd get a good taste of what the Royal Military Academy is all about just from his class."

The carriage rumbled to a halt with a graceful jerk, and Ifas waved four of them off and they stepped out onto the paved square at the heart of the campus.

It was eight in the morning—quite early for Zora's standards—but the day had already begun. The main academic building loomed in front of them like a monolithic ziggurat, carved from the same volcanic stone as the Divine Capital's great walls. Around them, hundreds of boots thudded over flagstones, wings beated from bug-mounts overhead, and bells rang from distant lecture towers. Students in crisp uniforms shouted greetings and warnings as they weaved through each other like currents in a river.

Quite the lively campus, if Zora had to say so himself. Accounting for all sorts of kids coming from every part of the continent, morning classes in Amadeus Academy always started late at ten so they'd be energetic enough to focus.

Noble-Blood as they may be, at least the students here are disciplined enough to not need their professors waking them up in their dorm rooms.

Kita led the way inside with Eria bouncing awkwardly at her side. Enki walked behind them like a shadow barely tethered to their pace, and so Zora followed as well, books tucked under one arm while his other hand was stuck in his pocket.

Inside, the main academic building expanded into a network of halls and rotundas, each corridor branching like a leaf-vein through the heart of the academy. The design was much the same as the dorm: vast, old-timey, and littered with countless doors leading into rooms each capable of housing at least a hundred students, maybe even double that. If nothing else, the Royal Ayapacha Military Academy was easily the largest academy Zora had ever heard of—and so, it was also only natural that there were more whispers and gossip than any academy he'd ever heard of.

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"She's back already?"

"I heard she was injured."

"Must've been from that stunt in the northwest…"

"She's still an outer region noble. There's no need to look at her."

Zora let the whispers swirl past him like smoke. Curious, but meaningless. Gossip always was. Surprisingly, though, Kita walked on utterly unbothered. Every time someone passed her, she nodded politely. A few greeted her with salutes. Others offered faint smiles. Of course, more than a few didn't even bother hiding their disdain—one group even scoffed so loudly that Eria nearly tripped from flinching—but for the most part, it seemed like the main crowd here was split into two: nobles from the Capital, and nobles from the outer region.

The outer region nobles outnumbered the Capital nobles nine to one, but the arrogant spoke the loudest.

Still, Kita's tone remained warm as she spoke to a passing instructor, and Zora couldn't help but admire her calm. Nobility, perhaps, but also principle. He'd met Regional Lords in the northeast who couldn't hold a straight back if their lineage depended on it, so it seemed Kita was a fair bit more mature than all of them.

Such self-possession at her age.

This really is a different 'Kita Salaqa' from the girl who fought with me in the northwest, hm?

Eventually, the four of them reached their destination: a vast lecture hall on the third floor, the windows overlooking a vast garden of oversized mushrooms. Zora paid the outside no mind as he entered. Inside the hall, the air immediately smelled of ink, paper, and scorched brass—like all good lecture halls should, he supposed. He counted the echoing footsteps, mapping out the class mentally. There were about fifty students already seated here, most whispering or reading quietly before class began.

He and Enki took their seats in the centre, upper middle rows with Kita and Eria.

Then he leaned back and listened.

The rustle of turning pages. The faint clack of a beetle-shell pen on a desk. Zora started mapping the students. That one had a nervous twitch. Another had quick, calculated movements. Maybe he was a duelist. That one three rows up was likely sick, judging by the strain in his lungs.

Enki, beside him, was still as stone. The boy was profiling their classmates too, no doubt. They were here to investigate the academy, after all.

The door by the lectern creaked open, and Zora cocked his head, pausing to study the man who entered with metallic footsteps.

… The professor?

Each step rang faintly metallic like a bootsole crossing iron tiles. The professor's voice matched as he immediately went behind the lectern, chalk flying across the board behind him.

"No time to waste," he said flatly. "Books open."

Zora furrowed his brow. The young professor's face was stitched together. He could hear it when the jaw moved: skin tugged around inset metal threads like an old puppet's mouth.

Scars of doctrine, or scars of war?

But apart from the stitches holding his face together, the professor was just another average young man in a uniform, and he didn't seem to notice Zora 'staring' at him.

The lecture began.

"Last week, we discussed heretical texts critical of the empire's militarisation process," he said, writing just as fast on his chalkboard. "This week, we will continue with the topic and turn to a contemporary topic. Chapter sixteen: 'The Walking Legends on Humanity's Final Continent'."

While everyone turned their pages and immediately started poring through the introductory chapter—including Zora, though he was only faking reading it—he noticed Enki scowling at the words before him.

Zora leaned slightly towards the boy. "Something the matter?"

Enki didn't look up. "I was taught how to read basic Attini tongue," he muttered flatly. "But this is not basic. These words are… too complicated."

Zora exhaled quietly through his nose, already anticipating the next line.

Sure enough—"Can I not skip class and go investigate alone?"

Zora's fingers traced the edges of his own book absently. "You have to sit through at least a few lectures," he murmured. "Keep up appearances. You're a student now, remember?"

Enki gave a short, unimpressed silence. Zora smiled and added, "Besides, you should learn to read properly. I've read this book three years ago, and if my memory serves me well, I don't believe the vocabulary in this is particularly complicated."

Enki glanced toward him then, barely turning his head. "Why must I be able to read more than the common tongue?"

"Because even a beetle leaves lines in the dirt." Zora tapped the cover of the book. "And the ones who live longest are the ones who know how to follow trails."

"..."

For a moment, there was nothing.

Then, Enki nodded slowly.

"Okay."

Zora's lips curved faintly.

I can't believe it.

The first person to understand my insect idioms outside of Amadeus Academy is the Worm Mage.

At the lectern, the professor's dry, disjointed voice cut back through the hall. "Row three. Let's begin. Since I assume all of you have already pre-studied the chapter, each of you will name a 'Walking Legend' without looking at your book. Start from the very left. Naykuna."

The lady—Naykuna—sitting at the far right end of Zora's row stood up.

"The Pilots of Gigantitinia," she said plainly.

"Good." The professor nodded. "Next."

"The Bluewing Courier."

"The Bloodflame Emperor."

"The Righteous Doctor."

Names like footfalls rang out one after the other, all loud, all familiar. They were all names Zora had heard of in passing over the past two years: great bug-slayers, warriors, rogue saints, and sinners in coats. While the students rattled off a few more names, a small voice whispered beside him.

"Mister Alvay," Eria whispered, barely audible over the scratching of the quill as she tapped a specific page she'd turned to in her book. "You smell like this man."

Zora's spine straightened.

He couldn't see the book before him, and he couldn't read the caption or gaze at the inked image, but he knew exactly who she was tapping at.

… I suppose this is an updated edition of the book I read three years ago.

When it came to Kita's turn, she stood up and spoke clearly and steadily.

"The Spore Knight Captain."

The professor, for the first time, gave something close to a smile. "You're loyal to the empire. Good answer. Next."

Eria stood with a start, her chair creaking behind her. She took a breath. And then, confidently, almost defiantly, she spoke:

"The Thousand Tongue."