Monday mornings always carried a strange kind of energy through the academy.
Not lively, not dead, but caught somewhere in-between, where the corridors were packed yet the noise still hadn't reached its peak, and most students sounded like they had woken up only because someone had physically dragged them out of bed.
Conversations stayed low and lazy, laughter came slower, and even the footsteps had that dull, unhurried rhythm of people walking toward their first class like it was a sentence instead of an education.
Soren didn't mind it.
There was something about that half-awake atmosphere that made everything feel less sharp around the edges, like the world hadn't fully decided to be loud yet, and he could exist inside it without needing to brace himself.
He sat in homeroom with one leg crossed over the other, posture loose in a way he wouldn't have managed a week ago, shoulders resting naturally instead of sitting up like he was waiting for the next hit.
Not because he had become complacent, and not because he had stopped caring, but because the constant tension had eased just enough that it no longer felt like he needed to fight the air itself to breathe.
The seats around him filled slowly.
Class F students filtered in with the same familiar range of expressions, the kind Soren had learned to read without effort over the course of the year.
Anxiety worn like a second uniform.
Exhaustion that never fully left the eyes.
Confidence put on like armour, shiny on the outside and hollow underneath if you looked too closely.
Some whispered to friends, some stared at their desks, some sat like statues and tried to pretend they weren't terrified.
Soren didn't know most of their names.
He didn't try to.
He had his people.
The thought was simple, and it was firm, and it didn't come with the old twisting anxiety that insisted he had to earn the right to keep them.
A few minutes later, the door opened, and Lilliana stepped in.
She didn't enter like she was trying to intimidate anyone, but she didn't soften herself either, and that balance was exactly what made the room quiet down without her needing to raise her voice.
Professional, the kind that made it obvious she took the role seriously, yet her presence still carried warmth, like she could be strict without ever turning cruel.
It was a vast improvement from the first semester.
A faint smile tugged at Soren's mouth as the memory surfaced, clear as if it had happened yesterday.
Lilliana back then had been cold and distant, the kind of teacher who spoke like she didn't want to be there, the kind who looked at Class F like it was a stain on her schedule.
Even her tone had been different, clipped and controlled, as if she was trying to keep herself from caring.
Now, it was obvious she cared, even when she pretended she didn't.
"Good morning," she said, voice clear and steady.
The room responded in uneven waves, some students louder than others, some barely managing the words.
Soren glanced up mostly out of habit and watched her place her notes on the desk.
Her ears were steady today.
Her expression was composed, that neat, carefully arranged calm she wore so naturally in front of students.
If yesterday had left any lingering awkwardness, she didn't carry it into the classroom, not in a way anyone else could see.
That was Lilliana.
Public composure first, personal mess later.
"Before we begin, a few announcements."
The room quieted properly.
Lilliana folded her hands lightly in front of her and began listing information with the kind of calm structure that made it difficult to misinterpret, difficult to twist into something else.
"Midterms are approaching. You have a few weeks, but do not take that as permission to relax. If you wait until the last moment, you will not have time to recover."
A few students shifted in their seats.
Someone's knee started bouncing harder, the movement almost frantic, like their body had decided panic was productive.
Another student exhaled sharply through their nose, already calculating how far behind they were.
Soren didn't move.
He listened the way he listened to weather reports, useful information, nothing emotional attached.
"Once midterms are complete," Lilliana continued, "festival preparations will begin. There will be additional responsibilities for students involved in clubs and committees. You will receive more details when the schedule is finalised."
A quiet ripple of interest moved through the class, a few murmurs slipping out before people remembered they were meant to be quiet.
The festival meant noise, colour, crowds, people acting like they had no shame, and if Soren thought about it too long he could already picture the chaos, the decorations, the way the whole academy would turn into something unrecognisable for a handful of days.
He didn't hate the idea.
If anything, the thought of spending it with his friends gave him a small, quiet spark of excitement that sat behind his ribs without demanding to be noticed.
Then Lilliana's tone sharpened a fraction, not with coldness, but with seriousness, the kind that made the room stiffen without her needing to say the words twice.
"And finally, I want to remind you of the reality of Class F."
The air changed.
A few students froze mid-motion, shoulders drawing tight.
Someone's fingers tightened around a pen like it was the only solid thing in the world.
Another student swallowed hard enough that it was audible from two rows away.
Soren's gaze stayed on the front, expression neutral.
Lilliana didn't pause for dramatic effect, didn't try to make it theatrical, she simply stated it cleanly and unembellished, like she believed the blunt truth was kinder than any comforting lie.
"Class F exists for one purpose: improvement. If you cannot show measurable growth by the end of the year, you will be removed from the academy. There will be no hesitation."
The words landed heavy on everyone else.
For Soren, they hit differently.
Not because he was fearless, and not because he thought he was special, but because the statement didn't apply to him the same way anymore, not in the way it used to, not in the way it clearly still applied to the students who were staring at their desks like they were trying to disappear into the wood.
Class F's purpose was to bloom.
He had already bloomed.
Not finished, not complete, and definitely not anywhere near the ceiling, but the gap between the boy who entered the academy and the person he was now was too wide to argue with.
Too much had changed.
Too much had hardened and softened in the right places.
Too much had been dragged into the light and dealt with, even if some of it still lingered like a bruise that never fully faded.
He had grown too much to be dragged back into that baseline fear.
So he sat there, indifferent, and let the warning land on everyone else.
Lilliana's gaze swept the room once.
Her expression softened at the edges, not enough to erase the seriousness, but enough to remind them she wasn't trying to break them.
"This is not meant to frighten you," she added. "It's meant to keep you motivated. You still have time."
A couple of students looked up again like they had been given permission to breathe, shoulders dropping by fractions.
Soren leaned back and waited for the bell to ring, letting the rest of the class start the way it always did, predictable and routine, something he could move through without it leaving marks.
••✦ ♡ ✦•••
Demonology was the first class of the week that made Soren's brain wake up properly.
The moment the professor began speaking about manticores, his attention sharpened without him needing to force it, as if the subject itself had reached into his mind and flicked a switch.
Manticores sat in an awkward space between "monster" and "demon," and that ambiguity was part of what made them dangerous.
Intelligent enough to be unpredictable, violent enough to be respected, arrogant enough to make people underestimate them if they assumed brute force would solve everything.
Yet at the same time, they were stupid in ways that made it hard to place them alongside goblins, orcs, or vampires, creatures with their own cultures and instincts that sometimes resembled strategy.
Manticores didn't strategise like that.
They reacted, they hunted, they killed, and they took pride in doing it in the cruelest way possible.
The professor spoke about venom composition, tail strikes, behavioural patterns, and the way manticores tended to prefer hunting in terrain that made ambush easier, places with narrow paths, broken visibility, high ground, and enough cover that the first sign of danger was teeth in your throat.
Soren listened, the information sliding neatly into place the way it always did, filing itself into the mental catalogue that never truly went away.
A few seats away, Felix looked like he was physically present but mentally elsewhere, eyes unfocused in that way that suggested his body was doing the bare minimum required to avoid being called out.
Esper yawned so hard it looked painful, then leaned her cheek on her palm with the expression of someone enduring a tragedy, the kind of theatrical suffering she pulled off effortlessly.
She still wrote notes, though.
Being second seat of Arcane Studies meant she couldn't afford to let up, even when she pretended she wanted to die from boredom.
Soren's focus stayed on the lecture, until his mind snagged on a single, specific detail, and the rest of the words blurred for a moment.
A manticore fang.
Amelia's gift.
The memory surfaced cleanly, not hazy or distant, but sharp enough that he could practically feel the summer air again, could see her expression with absolute clarity.
She had returned from break feral and proud, eyes bright in that way they got when she had done something dangerous and survived, then shoved the fang at him like she was offering proof that she had thought about him while she was away.
His mouth twitched into a small smile before he could stop it.
He could still remember the weight of it in his hand, the way it had felt heavier than it should've for something that small, dense with mana and violence.
It wasn't polished, and it wasn't pretty, it was jagged and raw, still stained faintly at the base, a piece of something that had tried to kill her, and she had ripped it out like it was nothing.
A gift that suited her perfectly.
Soren glanced down at his desk as if the fang might be sitting there, like he had somehow pulled it out without noticing.
It wasn't.
He had kept it safe.
The inventory space made it easy, too easy, like storing something meaningful inside a place that didn't carry scent or weight, a little pocket of the world that didn't ask him to treat it gently.
A thought slid in, unexpectedly practical.
'Should I turn it into something?'
Not dramatic, not symbolic in a way that made him cringe, just something he could keep on him without it sitting in a box like a trophy.
It felt wrong to leave it forgotten in storage, not because he would ever truly forget it, but because it deserved to exist in the real world, where it could catch the light, where it could be touched, where it wasn't reduced to a line of text.
A necklace, maybe.
Or a small charm.
Something simple, something that wouldn't get in the way while training, something he could tuck under his shirt and feel against his skin, a quiet reminder that didn't need words.
Amelia's reaction came to mind instantly, vivid enough that it almost made him laugh.
She would pretend not to care.
She would look away, maybe scoff, maybe mutter something dismissive, like it meant nothing and he was stupid for making a fuss.
Her ears would betray her anyway.
Soren let the smile linger for a second longer, then forced his attention back to the lecture before the professor said something important and he missed it, because whatever nostalgia the fang pulled out of him, manticores were still the kind of creature that could kill someone who treated them like trivia.
Next to him, Esper yawned again, and Felix narrowed his eyes at the board like it had personally offended him.
Soren exhaled through his nose.
They were hopeless.
————「❤︎」————