On principle, going around the forbidden locked up rooms and secret passages was cool on paper. The reasons she’d been let in those places? Less so.

  Because, damn nooooooo. Sewer mission it was. Fuck. If she really did this, she was gonna have to explore a sewer system to figure out what had left that reddish glowing sludge in their shitty large ass kinda cool basement where the exiting piping joined together into a wider canalisation deep underground.

  She didn’t wanna do a sewer mission. Sewer missions were boring, repetitive and uninspiring in video games. Ew. Ew ew ew. And in reality? She didn’t want to see poop floating around and wonder what pimply teen had produced that. She hadn’t even yet gotten to sit on one of their toilet seats! Even less use one! She literally had no reason to do this. It wasn’t her responsibility to do proper maintenance of the canalisations. She didn’t even live there.

  Ewrk.

  She’d very seriously nodded when Nomora had begun talking of options and tactical ways to get to the meat of it and hound on the creatures crawling in the cracks of their canalisation systems. Shitty ass city. Honestly, she was so good at keeping a straight face. She was leaving before she got stuck on sewer janitor duty.

  It was also that she kind of got reminded of how that putrid high priestess with her silly ice spells had said that she wanted to put Victorya on “latrine duty as an acolyte” until she “humbled herself” or something just as remotely dehumanising. This was probably a plot made by that witch to make her do latrine duty, she knew it deep inside.

  So many reasons not to do this. No can’t do. Nuh huh.

  She wasn’t, no she wasn’t.

  “Are your eyes hurting, Victorya?” Nomora asked, walking at her side.

  Vic groaned.

  “No, I’m just holding my hands up to my face for the beauty of it”, she said. “Just kidding, it’s not for the sake of beauty, it’s because this gesture expresses the pain I’ll feel in the future and I’m currently absorbing it in advance in case I actually do manage to reduce it. More at six.”

  “Fascinating”, Nomora said, numbly, in a jaded tone. Vic squinted behind her hands. “I’ve never heard of such customs before.”

  Was that demoness trying to sass her? Vic smirked. Nobody could beat her at that game.

  “Oh no no”, Vic explained. “I was lying. In case you didn’t know, nothing I said was reasonable. I don’t have time magic.”

  Vic saw the demoness side eye her. A bit pedantically, too. She’d even been tempted to call it bombastic.

  “Thank my Liege for that”, the demoness said, closing her eyes wisely.

  “Ew, don’t bring him into this. No wonder he’s so out of touch with reality when everyone keeps sucking up to him constantly.”

  The demoness stared back at her, leisurely walking at her side.

  “Oh? And you’re not out of touch?” she asked. She sounded mocking.

  Vic sneered.

  “Please, I’ve spent more time my toes deep in the mud than that guy”, Vic quipped.

  “I wasn’t speaking of toes”, Nomora said, sounding amused but not about what she’d said. Her voice abruptly turned harsh. “You like to ignore hierarchies in place for centuries and to pretend you’re above them all. Quite disconnected from the people surrounding you, are you not?”

  Vic seethed.

  “You’re stupid if you think I’m not getting them”, she said. She got it. She knew how things were. She knew how stupid they were. “You’re also stupid if you think they’re right in the first place. Imagine living your whole life here thinking your worth depends of what Mr. Bozo thinks, when he still screamed all the same for all to see when he got roasted alive by…” Vic said, and pointed a thumb at herself. “…Yours truly.”

  She smirked.

  Nomora stared.

  Damn, she was different from before. Why didn’t she look amused? So hypersensitive when it came to shittalking her god. Such a devoted little cult member. Too bad. They’d started getting a thing going between them two, that with Vic and her exchanging jokes and bitter dry quips. Like smokey whiskey. Yeah, she knew what whiskey tasted like, for sure. Those jokes had been like that, mature and otherworldly.

  It’d nearly been fun. Where had all the fun gone?

  “Then you are a god”, Nomora said walking at her side, looking ahead of herself. “Only those behave above mortal law… And mock the hierarchies put in place by their divine opponents.”

  Vic groaned.

  “You don’t have to be a god to say a system is full of shit. You’re so small-minded. Just like your body”, she said, and used two fingers like a measuring pinching tool, putting Nomora between them two, and sizing her up from that. Nomora, in the space between her two fingers, squinted back.

  “Frighteningly so, perhaps you really are just an immature girl with too much power in her hands”, the demoness said. Vic raised an eyebrow.

  “Oh? And will you be doing something about that?” Vic asked snarkily, but she didn’t mean it. She beamed brightly. “Wait, you can’t, that right! You’re far too weak for that!”

  “Goodness, goodness”, another voice came in from behind them, sounding slightly reproaching but mostly panicked. “Ah! I’d been returning to my office, what an auspicious time to cross your paths!”

  Vic stopped walking and stared back. It was the principal, kindly smiling with a hand raised towards them both, like he meant to be pacifying. Vic squinted.

  “Could I borrow you your companion, Nomora? If you’ve finished with her, of course”, the elf said pleasantly. Why were they acting like they were throwing back and forth a burning hot potato at each other?

  “I’d be most pleased to pass her to you”, Nomora said wisely, arms behind her back like she was some old wise master, but she was too tiny to be one. “We were doing circles for the past five minutes near your office while I waited for you to finish your meeting.”

  Fuck. Vic hadn’t even noticed.

  She stared at Nomora, who then stared back at her, and smiled pleasantly without blinking.

  Vic felt herself grimace. Well wasn’t this feeling just unpleasant.

  What a fucking betrayal.

  “I’ll remember that once I’m gone. I’ll remember that when I hear back about your city and its-

  “Aha-ha!” the principal said, lightly. It sounded forced. “Wouldn’t you look at that! That’s my door. That’s my office, right before us”, he said, pointing forwards towards it. “Wouldn’t it be nice if you left, Nomora?”

  Vic looked back annoyed at him. Whatever. Better play along for now.

  “Of course, Principal Lunbumster. I’ll be safeguarding your school until the priesthood arrives for the daily maintenance of the divine shield.”

  Damn. That shield must be pretty weak if that creature was leaving red glowing ooze all over their basements. Fecking useless. Not really surprising considering who their god was.

  The demoness then bowed, unwillingly disappearing from Vic’s sight, before raising back up again, and turning away without giving a glance back to Vic.

  Vic stared at her back as the demoness walked away.

  “Victorya?” the principal was asking, from behind her.

  Vic still stared at Nomora, and her fingers twitched, and her tongue poked out. Nomora was unaware. How foolish, to leave your back so unguarded.

  The principal walked ahead of Vic and broke her view.

  “Please, I could make us tea”, the principal said, smiling pleasantly, hands joined together.

  Vic’s eyes moved up to his.

  “You just want to ruin my fun”, Vic said. She sighed but followed him as he walked back and moved in the opposite direction that Nomora had taken. “Are you really picking a different room to have as your office just to make me stop looking at that demoness?”

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  Hmm, and what was with all the important people and their urge to put their hands behind their back? The principal had his hands behind his currently, and Vic could clearly see them. He wouldn’t be making spell with those. Mm. Perhaps a show of trust. Whatever.

  “In truth, my office is just a hallway away. I’d… been about to use a different room closer to where we were when I interrupted your spat with Nomora”, the principal said.

  “It wasn’t a spat! It was in good fun!” Vic said. She thought she’d heard him sigh. Come on! “Com’on mister principal! You know demons love to exchange quips! They love the roasting!”

  That when they weren’t busy eating things in Shittown, that is. Ah, they sure did know how to make the bestest barbecues though. She could deal with a bit of healthy competition, though. Huhuhuh. None of them would beat her roasts nowadays.

  “And you have much experience with demons, I suppose?” he said. He sounded like an adult, there. Like he was just speaking to entertain her. How annoying.

  “Of course”, Vic scoffed. “I’ve been to Shittown, or whatever they call it. I’ve seen their best poopsmiths in action in that alley that’s renowned for their blades or whatever.”

  The principal turned his head to fully look at her.

  “You’ve been to Brimstone Alley?” he asked. He looked shocked, obviously.

  “Yeah, to make a deal with one of those shitters and get some material I needed. Twas a bummer”, she said, distractedly.

  “…Because they realised you were a human in plain sight?” he asked. He sounded and looked like such a strange mix of disbelieving and shocked.

  “Geeeee no,” Vic said, batting her hand. “I’m great at cosplaying. Hiding in plain sight is my best strength, actually. I really excel at it, more than anything else.”

  The principal blinked at her.

  “As you’ve proven to be good at. For sure”, he said.

  Vic emphatically rolled her eyes.

  “No one realised I wasn’t one of them back then. Here it’s different. I wasn’t even trying.”

  The principal stared at her.

  “Come on!” Vic said. “I said it was a bummer, but not because I got caught. The demon that could smelt the material I needed said he didn’t have the raw ores to make it right, and bringing them to him and then waiting a full year to get it from him afterwards would take too long. Ugh. Them and their long ass digestions. Anyway. I’ll just have to rob some poor sod who has what I need.”

  The principal blinked at her.

  “Don’t look at me like that. The guy who’ll have the metal I need will be a warlord or something. Only a gaudy evil guy would have a sword made of the stuff” Vic said.

  “And what is that material?” he asked. Vic glanced at the list of requirements.

  Better not tell him.

  He’d have an aneurysm from hearing the word with her luck and she’d get accused of trying to assassinate him.

  “None of yar business”, Vic said, closing her eyes, very demurely putting her hands behind her back beneath the weight of her backpack because it was very trendy to do so in this city.

  “How did you leave that place in the first place?” the principal asked. He sounded curious.

  “By walking on foot?” Vic said. “Duh?”

  The principal blinked at her, then looked ahead.

  “Ah, there’s my office”, he said simply. What an observant guy. What an observant guy who liked to announce obvious things outloud. A proof of intelligence, without doubts.

  “You know, you’re all a bunch of compulsive liars, you all”, Vic said. “And by you all, I mean the ones in a position of power. Does that come in the job description? Or is it a societal phenomenon? Or are you just poorly… wait no, are you just greatly imitating your cult leader’s poor tendencies? Is that what it is?”

  The principal opened the office and entered. There was already a fuming pot of tea on his desk.

  “What do you mean?” he said, inviting her in. She stepped forwards, and dusted her shoulder, readjusting the gaudy shoulder pad she had, before closing the door back, not too harsh. She was in a good mood after all.

  “What, you want a comprehensive list? It’ll be so long. Wait, I should actually write that down. What a nice idea! That would help me down the line have my own testimony once I start doubting my own sense of reality when I stay too long here”, she said cheerily with a smile.

  The principal sat down. He sighed in a way that seemed fatherly.

  “I apologize for deceiving you earlier. My office is here. Not in the other corridor” he said, and there was not a hint of mockery that she could smell there. “I heard you argue vehemently with Nomora, and I stepped in as fast as I could, as I was aware that you are hot-tempered.”

  Vic raised an eyebrow. She hadn’t yet sat down. The principal poured tea in one of the two cups that was closest to Vic.

  “And what would make you say that?” Vic said, raising an eyebrow.

  The principal brought the pot of tea closer to him.

  He breathed in.

  “I know you weren’t mind-controlled”, he said.

  Vic stared at him.

  Oh now he had her attention.

  “Is that so?” she said, still standing.

  “Yes, quite. Please, take a seat”, he said.

  Vic squinted. So insistent.

  She took the cup of tea and examined it, before downing it fully in one gulp, and slamming the cup down meaningfully like she’d seen grown men do in Hollywood movies.

  “Ah!” Vic said. “Delicious.” She beamed like a shark.

  The principal was staring.

  “Did you know that I’m resistant to nearly all poisons I’ve tasted?” Vic said conversationally. “Even if you did poison this, there would be no effect”, she said, nodding meaningfully. “You would effectively get away with it because I wouldn’t even feel a thing.”

  She had the perks of the achievement [Strong stomach] after all. That was of vital importance.

  The principal hadn’t moved and was still staring at her. It felt weirdly judgemental. But Vic had an iron will. Not a single muscle in her facial expression moved.

  “I did not… poison your tea”, he said politely, like he was explaining something difficult for her to understand. He served his own cup then. He gave her an awkward smile.

  He poured some more in her cup.

  “I understand your… distrust”, he said. He blew air on the hot liquid in his teacup. “The leadership can be prone to… meddling with the truth for the sake of the greater good.”

  “Yeah, also known as lying like a lying liar”, Vic said. She startled then. “How do you know that they lied about it?”

  Was he in cahoots with his god? Was this just another attempt at manipulating her?

  “I was there during the fight. I heard enough to grasp the picture of the truth”, he said.

  “So you’re just complicit in the lies, huh?” she said, looking down on the principal.

  He sighed.

  “Please, sit down. I’d like to openly speak to you, without animosity, face to face. Please”, he said. “Let’s just enjoy some tea, yes?”

  He sipped his own cup, but he was taking his time. Like he wanted her to sit down by the time he’d finished sipping and before he’d put down his cup on his desk.

  Ughhhh, fiiiiine.

  She sat down, because he’d look really pathetic if she didn’t do it. She quickly grabbed her cup and drank too, before putting it down. He’d finished doing it at the same time as her.

  He smiled at her. Always pleasant. Always cordial. Just another liar but with a different face.

  “My work comes with a set of different difficulties”, he said carefully. “Do you understand that I couldn’t possibly stand against what is divulged as the truth by divine authority without risking my position?”

  Vic frowned.

  “But does that mean that you’d still stand for what’s right out of sight?” Vic said.

  “I stand for my students,” he said, simply, “the teaching body, and the institution I uphold. Education for the magically attuned, be it humans or elves, as long as it’s the pursuit of knowledge that they seek.”

  Vic stared at him, then at her half-filled cup.

  “And how do you deal with the priesthood and the rest?” she said. The rest implying a certain someone that she didn’t want to name. He-Who-Shan’t-Be-Named-Because-he-Is-An-Ass. “How can you compromise with them?”

  “I strive to give tools to the youth”, he said. “It’s with those tools that they can empower themselves to strive for their own ambitions.”

  Vic squinted. She didn’t know what to think of it. That sounded too good to be true. She drank some more tea. She did it in a non-posh way. How American of her.

  The principal seemed to be studying her.

  He spoke again.

  “Did you know that when the Academy of the All Enlightened was formed, all forms of magical education passed through His clergy? My life’s work has partly been to further develop courses away from that branch. Have you noticed the absence of acolytes in the school?”

  Vic startled.

  Wait.

  Right. She hadn’t seen any. She hadn’t even needed to walk around with the discretion of a ninja to avoid meeting that foolish apprentice-priestess Karah again.

  “Are their courses elsewhere?” she asked.

  She kind of needed to know that to avoid it on her way out of this city.

  “They are in their own holy quarters, unconnected to my academy”, he said. He sipped another small sip. “Victorya, I want you not to feel pressured into joining their priesthood. But my proposition from a week ago still stands. You don’t have to enrol officially if that’s what’s troubling you. But you could be a part of this. You would be able to speak freer than most from what I’ve gathered, and that’s a much more precious asset than you realise. And even more than that… It would do you good, I think, to be with people your age. You could learn what you’d like. This ideal, this pursuit, all in a place of learning, free from the pressure of the Church.

  She stared at him.

  Then Victorya laughed.

  And Vic laughed louder.

  “Oh please, I have nothing to learn here”, she said. She chuckled again. “Nothing that I’d need, anyway. And I didn’t get isekai’d to get stuck at a stuck up magic school.” Huh. As far as she aware, at least. Heheh.

  “Is there not at least a cursus that has piqued your interest?” the principal hopefully asked. There was something pained at one of the corners of his mouth. “I could do you a favour, and allow you to exceptionally take only the one that you’d truly want to-”

  She interrupted him. It was time to put a stop to this charade.

  “Did you know that cursus and circus rhyme?” Vic said. You couldn’t say cursus without sus, too. Quite on point. Vic grinned. This guy was trying to recruit her into the cult, no matter what pretty words he’d said. “I’m not joining you clowns. I see you for what you are and for what you’re trying to do, all of you. I’m a soloist anyway, not one of the flautists in your orchestra. Have fun without me.”

  The principal was numbly looking at her. Nah, she wasn’t about to feel sad about it. That was probably just another way he used to manipulate gullible, naive people.

  And she wasn’t naive anymore.

  “I don’t belong here, in your cultist city”, she explained, feeling herself giggle quietly, “I don’t want your brainwashing, or your ties that you use to bind people with, or any of the boring things you guys do during your book club reunions. No, don’t interrupt, I’m saying important stuff”, she said when he’d opened his mouth to talk, raising a hand vertically like his cult leader did to assert his authority and silence people. “Boooooh.”, she said, taking her time to pronounce it. “Losers”, she added.

  To finish her little speech, she gulped down the rest of her tea to the last drop.

  “Thanks for the tea. I drank it all not to be polite, but because there was just no point wasting a drop of it. It was good tea.”

  She raised back up.

  No point dancing in circles around the issue.

  “Goodbye”, she said. She left through the door and let him do nothing more than stare. “And good riddance. For you and me.”

  Now it was time to find a window to jump from to make sure that she didn’t get caught in another falsely unskippable monologue. She would have inevitably gotten it and been led unaware to their deceitful god if she’d finished this conversation on the principal’s terms.

  She was too prideful and too powerful to be tricked by those lame ass cultists, anyway. Better dodge the rest.