Kosmos: The Witch

It took them five months in total to reach their destination, and from November it started snowing. They were fine in the cold thanks to Adelaios' capes, and Morgana was marveling at the sight of the snow, since she had never seen anything quite like that before. Eventually, the silhouette of a massive town becomes visible in the distance, with an absurdly tall building in its center, shaped like an arch.

- "Welcome to Eretria !" Adelaios enthusiastically exclaims.

- "That's a big village." Morgana comments.

- "I guess a town technically is a big village. This here is one of the city-states, the biggest towns we have in Greece !"

Their carriage approaches one of the town's gates, which are massive marble arches with blue glowing energy coursing through it in an orderly pattern of rectangles and interconnected lines. There were two towers on the side of each arch.

On top of each of the towers surrounding the gate, a witch was standing guard. The one on the left had red hair, a black and red witch hat along with black robes, and just looked bored on top of her watchtower, staring at the people passing by the gate. The second one was a black eyed and silver haired witch, standing upright with a star shaped staff, and a red witch hat and robes, seemingly taking her job very seriously.

The red haired witch seems to liven up when she sees them, and she has a wide grin.

- "Yo Adelaios ? How you doing ?" she joyfully shouts.

- "As good as ever, Zoe ! You ? Still stuck doing community service after your little stunt last year ?" he replies in the same tone.

- "Yep ! Still stuck working for golden Helen after fumbling the transport of that staff worth fifty thousand gold drachmas ?"

- "Yeah, hahaha !

- "Hahaha !"

They both keep laughing before he turns to the silver haired witch.

- "What about you Agnes ?"

- "Greetings. I am on duty so please spare me the chit chat." the silver witch answers. "Any goods to declare ?"

- "Yeah I got a decent chunk of lumber from Pan's Woods."

- "Let me see." Agnes takes out a list from her pocket. "Yes, that has been authorized by lady Helen half a year ago. Who is that person with you ?"

- "Right. Erm… how to explain."

- "Woah Adelaios she looks young. I didn't think you swung that way dude !" Zoe comments.

- "That's pure slander and you know it !" he replies, aggravated.

- "I am Morgana." Morgana says, seemingly gauging the witches to see if they could be trusted or not.

- "Are you supposed to be like, some celebrity ? Cause I know about two and a half Morganas, and you're none of them." Zoe replies.

- "Long story short, I found her in the woods and helped her escape from her mother. A real weirdo I tell you, thinking about her still gives me shivers." Adelaios explains.

- "That sounds an awful lot like kidnapping. Besides the cape she got, her clothes are a mess. Should I call the guard ?" Zoe says nonchalantly.

- "Stop messing around, Zoe." Agnes cuts. "You can probably have that sorted in town, we are used to people fleeing their homes to come to Eretria anyways, I would know." her expression softens for a second as she looks at Morgana. "Welcome to Eretria, may Hecate grant you a better life here."

Morgana drops her guard, surprised by this sudden change of tone.

- "Thank you." she replies, as the carriage enters the town.

The city was overflowing with beautiful buildings and temples, all mostly made of shining white marble, with accents of blue here and there. The magical energy in the air was so concentrated it was almost palpable, and witches could be seen going out and about, casting various spells, or roaming the skies of the city on the back of winged chimeras made from multiple animals and monsters. The streets were loud, and full of shops with witches selling magic items, wands, staves and other magic infused goods. A large river was flowing through the town, and it looked even clearer than the cleanest streams Morgana had seen on their trip. Morgana was overwhelmed by the abundance of buildings surrounding them, without a trace of forests or mountains in sight.

- "That's a nice city. I like the energy. There are many leylines." Morgana comments as they are proceeding through the marble paved streets.

- "Wait, you know about leylines but you don't know what the sky is ?" Adelaios replies, dumbfounded.

- "Hmm." Morgana hesitates, seemingly thinking very hard. "I don't know meaning. Word came to me."

- "That's… weird. Well in summary, they're the magical energy of the Earth, flowing underground like veins. Since Gaïa is a tad bit stronger than the gods, her magical energy is a lot more potent, and generally gives rise to spirits like dryads and naiads."

- "Oh. That makes sense. That's how it feels. To me at least."

- "I really hope Helen can shed some light on what exactly is the deal with you, curiosity is killing me."

- "Curiosity almost killed you. When you visited mother."

- "Haha, good point !"

- "You're not worried enough."

- "Oh ? Well will you look at that timing, we're there." Adelaios stops the carriage in front of a gigantic marble palace, with a circular blue roof and a large, red gem above the stained glass pane overlooking the entrance.

Adelaios gets off the carriage and walks over to the entrance before pointing his hand up and firing a small arrow of flames towards the red gem above the entrance. It glows orange for a second, and multiple greek letters appear on its surface before they both hear footsteps coming from behind the large door of the entrance. When the door opens, it reveals a woman clad in black, white and golden robes, wielding a massive, elaborate loosely cross shaped golden staff and with golden hair ornaments resembling horns on her head. Her irises were gold colored, and almost completely reflective.

- "Adelaios ! You're back ! You got my wood ?" the woman asks.

- "Good evening to you too Helen." Adelaios sighs.

- "Right, hello. No sense in asking how you're doing, you don't look any shade of dead so you're probably fine !"

- "Hmm hmm… There's your order. It's the boxes with the green delta on them." Adelaios grumbles as he points to his carriage.

- "Perfect, perfect !" Helen excitedly claps her hands and an armada of maids comes out of the palace. They begin seizing all the boxes he indicated, completely ignoring Morgana's presence inside the carriage. While that's happening, Adelaios points at Helen, with his finger placed on her forehead.

- "It would've been nice to know these woods were that damn hard to navigate, Helen."

- "I thought you already knew ! Aren't you supposed to be an experienced traveler and all that stuff ?"

- "Well that's true but I've never been there in my life ! People barely even talk about that place, ever, and I get why now !"

- "Even if you didn't know, I knew you'd succeed ! It's fine !" she grabs his wrist and attempts to pull his hand away, to no avail.

- "Stop forgetting about crucial information !"

- "Sure… I'm your boss and all that stuff now, you know ? Can't you treat me a little better than that ?"

- "When you deserve it ! Anyways, I'm very puzzled about that girl I found in the forest six months ago." Adelaios designates Morgana, still sitting inside his carriage and staring at the maids like they were aliens.

He then proceeds to recount all the events that led up to this point, and Helen yells in indignation when he mentions the escape from the laboratory of Morgana's mother:

- "YOU WHAT NOW ?"

- "Yeah I know. I had no other choice, you know ?"

- "I know you could've escaped by yourself if you really put your mind to it ! Did you really waste that one favor we got from Hermes for THAT ?"

- "Helen is not nice." Morgana comments.

- "What did you expect me to do ? Leave a teenager in some dark basement with a crazy witch ?" Adelaios adds.

- "You… I… Ugh !" Helen tries kicking rocks on the ground, but seeing that there are none, she waves her hand downwards and small golden pebbles form on the floor, which she then proceeds to kick away.

- "Helen is not happy." Morgana comments again.

- "Of course I'm not happy !! I'm very angry, even !"

- "Angry ?"

- "Why are you just repeating what I'm saying ?!" Helen starts pulling her own hair in anguish.

- "Pretty sure she doesn't know the concept of anger, her knowledge of the world is very limited. It kinda strikes me now that she's only referred to emotions as variants of happiness." Adelaios responds.

- "Ah." Helen seems to calm down a bit. "So that's why she's talking like that. I really thought she was just trying to mess with me."

Suddenly, Morgana bursts into flames and Helen jumps back in surprise.

- "What's her deal now ?!"

- "I just told you, this is her base state. Without my book absorbing her flames, eventually she becomes like this." Adelaios explains.

- "Could you finish that story actually ? I'm curious now."

Adelaios finishes telling her about everything that transpired during the later half of this year, and eventually Helen's anger has been replaced by an expression of dread, as her face turns a bit pale. She had been staring at Morgana for quite some time now, after Adelaios extinguished her flames once more with his book.

- "Mind telling me why you look that worried ?" Adelaios asks Helen.

- "She's a witch. I can tell by the way her magic circuits are arranged."

- "Yeah I figured she was, since she kept calling that witch mother and all that stuff."

- "Magic circuits ?" Morgana asks.

- "It's like a nervous system in your body that conducts magical energy through it, it essentially allows you to use magic more or less efficiently. Advanced magic users can sense them." Adelaios explains to her.

- "You don't get it Adelaios ! I already thought that story was revolting, but the queen is going to be absolutely furious !" Helen exclaims.

- "Oh. Oh shit you're right." Adelaios' face also goes pale as he turns to Morgana, who was just staring at the both of them confused.

- "What is the queen ?" she asks.

- "Circe ! The queen of Witches ! She's especially harsh on witches who throw ethics to the wind when performing witchcraft, and your mother definitely checks that box… What should we do…" Helen replies.

- "That's good. I am very angry."

- "Appreciate the sentiment, but this really isn't good… She's gonna be sending a bunch of witches to track your mother down, my workforce is gonna suffer a lot from that, and for a while too !"

- "Do you ever think about anything other than money ?" Adelaios asks.

- "No comment ! Adelaios you go tell the queen."

- "Why me ?!!"

- "I'm going to take her to the Academy to get rid of this nasty fire curse."

- "Yeah and we can't do those two things one at a time ?"

- "I mean it's just more efficient this way. You're just trying to get out of this, but we can't swap roles since you're not enrolled at the Academy ! Bye !" Helen starts pushing Morgana away, and Morgana weakly protests.

- "I don't know much. But good luck Adelaios."

- "I'm gonna need it…" he sighs as he walks in the opposite direction.

On the way, Morgana seems surprised by the lack of winter clothes on Helen's part, given that it was winter.

- "You're not cold ?" she asks.

- "Why would I be ? Oh I get it. Try removing your cape."

Morgana hesitates before removing it, and she notices that the temperature is perfectly mild, even a little warm. She gives a questioning look to Helen.

- "That's Atmospheric magic for you ! It's a variant of Aerial magic, some people call it wind magic, and there's multiple spells casted over the town to prevent the effects of weather for the citizens."

- "Oh, that's very nice."

- "Yeah, you know what's not very nice ? Your outfit." Helen says as she looks down at Morgana's torn rags. "We can't have you walking around in that, even with the cape. I'll buy you new clothes, that'll give me an even better reputation !"

- "Buy ?"

- "You mean Adelaios didn't tell you anything about money ?! Did he even explain to you what a merchant was in the first place ?..."

- "I didn't ask him. I thought it was. A race of people. Like witches."

- "Hecate, give me strength…"

Helen gives Morgana a crash course on economics as they enter a very large clothing store named Athena's Pride and start picking out articles. Helen just tells the shopkeeper to send the bill to her address, at the 1 Chrysus Road. In the big lines, there are three main types of coins in circulation: bronze, silver and gold drachmas. One gold drachma is equivalent to 100 silver drachmas, and one silver drachma is equivalent to 100 bronze drachmas. There are a couple types of drachmas above this, but Helen doesn't get in detail about them, saying that Morgana probably won't ever need to use them in her life. All the while, Morgana is looking around, amazed. The shop was more luxurious than anything she's seen before, with elaborate dresses and floating lights illuminating every corner of it, making the ceiling look like a starry sky. The shopkeeper was a very, very small man with butterfly wings, flying around and seemingly casting magic on the clothes exposed around the store.

Eventually, after trying multiple combinations of robes and hats, the next one always being flashier than the previous one with light-emitting gold ornaments, magic gems and other shiny things, Morgana's eyes end up stopping on a set of black and scarlet red robes and cape, along with a black witch hat lined with a discrete dark crimson thread. A crimson red crystal was encased right above the chest area of the dress.

- "I like this." Morgana says as she takes them to the changing room.

- "Are you sure ?..." Helen responds, defeated.

- "Yes."

- "That's… not… bad I guess." Helen comments, still a bit disappointed.

- "What's wrong ?"

- "You're sure you don't want something a bit shinier ?"

- "No. Shinier is weird."

- "You're calling me weird ?!"

- "Yes."

- "You little !..." Helen seems to rapidly calm herself. "Hmpf. You're just tasteless. Anyways, you should try smiling a bit, you look like you're about to murder someone right now."

- "I can't help it."

- "What do you mean you can't help it ? Are you always mad or something ? Because you sure look like you are."

- "...No. I'm happy." Morgana says after a bit of hesitation.

- "Stop pressuring the girl, will you ?" the shopkeeper says to Helen.

- "Ugh, fine." she replies, muttering to herself, looking at the floor.

- "I like tiny man." Morgana says to the shopkeeper.

- "Well thanks for that, but I'm not a tiny man, I'm a fairy." he replies.

- "Fairy ?"

- "Yes, I'm a nature spirit, like dryads and naiads. You know about these right ? I know my kind is not too common in Greece, so I get asked that often."

- "Oh dryads and naiads. I know the nymphs."

- "There you go." he stops for a second, looking confused as he maintains eye contact with Morgana. "Wait a minute… something is seriously wrong with you !"

- "Fairy is rude."

- "I don't mean it that way ! You smell like a nature spirit too, but something is definitely off about you !"

- "I am nature spirit ?..."

- "I…" he pauses again. "I really can't tell. You really need to get that checked in my opinion, but I'm not going to pry further than that, it's not my job."

- "You said something Will ?" Helen asks as she lifts her head.

- "Nothing important." he turns to Morgana. "Let's do this officially: I'm William Brightwell, my friends call me Will. Pleased to make your acquaintance, and if you need a tailor, you know where to find me !"

- "Oh, introductions. My name is Morgana."

- "Well, looking forward to doing business with you Morgana ! I have special discounts for nature spirits if you're interested."

- "Hey, that's unfair !" Helen exclaims with indignation. "I had to shop here for two years before you gave me a single discount !"

- "And I thank you for your patronage !" William ironically bows.

- "Come Morgana, let's go." as Helen reaches for Morgana's arm, she quickly stops as she feels an intense heat emanating from her.

A few seconds after that, Morgana bursts into flames and Helen facepalms.

- "Adelaios is not here." Morgana says.

- "Yeah, I forgot about that issue. About your clothes…" Helen replies

- "Hmmmm. That's also strange." William comments.

Morgana looks down, and realizes that her clothes are completely fine, even being spared from the little burn marks she normally leaves on any clothing she tries to wear for a long time or that come into contact with her flames, even though they are never fully burned.

- "My clothes don't burn ?..." she says, intrigued.

- "Yeah, fire and slashing resistance are the bare minimum for any really self respecting tailor you know ?" William smugly replies.

- "Thank you Will. That's very nice."

- "Of course ! Even more reason for you to come back if you need new robes or something of the sort."

- "I will."

About a minute later, Helen and Morgana are walking side by side in the street, and the curious witches they are passing by stare at them, namely at Morgana who's constantly on fire. Eventually, they make it to a tall, ostentatious building reminiscent of a cathedral, with marble walls and blue, pointy roofs on its towers. There was a large white flag hung on top of its highest point, with a purple eight pointed star on it.

- "Ah, this really takes me back ! Follow me Morgana, and try not to get too far away from me once we're in. Also, try not to panic." Helen says.

- "Why would I panic ?..."

- "You'll see soon enough. Helen Chrysafis, Pyromancy Faculty."

- "Access to Pyromancy Faculty granted." a disembodied voice responds from behind the door, echoing around them.

As they hear that, the door opens and they are both faced with a black void, as if the entire building was filled with pitch black water. She then steps forward into the void and drags Morgana along with her. Morgana begins to scream as she feels herself free falling for a few seconds, until her fall is slowed dramatically and her feet hit solid ground. She looks around, and sees that she is now standing in some kind of village at night time, the difference with regular ones being that the houses would be better defined by the word villas, given the quality of their construction compared to normal village houses. The streets were lit with floating flames, and fire spells that would put Adelaios' giant fireball to shame were flying above the town at regular intervals. She notices that there are plenty of people in witch outfits and mage robes walking around in the streets, and that the passersby next to them in the street she was in were staring at her, looking startled by her screaming.

- "Welp, the panic part can't really be avoided, can it ?" Helen says as she's patting Morgana on the back to calm her down.

- "That was scary. Where are we ?"

- "This is the Pyromancy department of the Academy of Eretria !"

- "Pyromancy ?"

- "Yes, that's Fire magic. I'm sure you've seen Adelaios use it when you were traveling with him."

- "Oh that makes sense. Also, what's an academy ?"

Helen roughly explains the schooling system to her as they walk through the street. Some witches and mages seem to recognize Helen and greet her, and she starts acting like a celebrity while they're getting closer to a massive building at the center of the town that made Helen's palace look average sized in comparison. It was a massive middle ages style castle, surrounded by a garden and many modern ages style mansions with light coming out of some of the windows. The most notable features were four different orange, yellow, green and blue fire columns directed towards the night sky, matching the main castle in terms of sheer height.

- "Ugh I've never liked this place. It looks nice but it's so full of freaks…" Helen complains.

- "Why not go elsewhere ?" Morgana asks.

- "Because it's precisely because it's full of freaks that there's a good chance that they can do something about your fire curse or whatever it is that causes you to spontaneously combust. One thing that you can't say is that the Pyromancy Faculty lacks talent."

They make it to the entrance of the main castle, and Morgana is impressed by just how massive it is on the inside, almost seeming way larger than it appeared on the outside. It was decorated with multicolored torches on the walls, along with portraits of witches and wizards she didn't recognize. There were staircases going in all directions leading to hallways higher up in the castle hall, with a constant flow of people walking into and out of them, seemingly going about their business. There was a desk with a witch in a green outfit, red hair and round glasses sitting behind it, right on the left of the entrance surrounded with various books with one of them being in her hands. Helen waves to get her attention, and she raises her head from her book.

- "Hello ! I'm here to see Sulfuris."

- "He's on the training grounds, number 9." the witch responds.

- "Erm… do you mind telling me where the training grounds are ? It's been a very long time since I've been here…"

- "You're telling me Helen, the inventor of infused gold, doesn't know the layout of any of the faculties of the Academy ?" the witch asks, amused.

- "Oh give me a break."

- "Also that witch over there seems to be on fire. Is she alright ? This doesn't look like a spell." the witch says while looking at Morgana.

- "She's been fine for a while now, even though the other students have been staring a lot. Not that big of a deal ! My directions now please."

The witch exhales and gives a couple directions to her before they leave, and after about thirty minutes of walking around the castle and Helen getting lost at every corner, they finally make it to a large circular open area outside. Its floor was made of a red stone that felt cold to the touch, even through Morgana's shoes. In the middle of it, a twenty meter tall creature was laying on the floor. It was a reptile, with black scales that looked tougher than metal, and large wings casting a shadow on its surroundings, golden flames surrounding it. In other words, a dragon.

- "Sulfuris ! It's been a while !" Helen shouts.

- "Oh ? That's not the voice of one of my students…" the dragon replies in a deep, cavernous voice before turning to face them.

- "This dragon is dangerous. Lots of Fire magic. He uses the leylines." Morgana says, looking slightly worried as she hides behind Helen.

- "Oh you can tell ? That's a bit unusual." Sulfuris replies before getting closer to get a good look at them. "Helen it's you ! How have things been going ever since you graduated ?"

- "Business has been booming, thanks for asking !" she enthusiastically replies. "But I'm not here to talk about that. This girl over there is cursed with spontaneous combustion or something of the sort, can you do something about it ? It's so powerful I don't even register it as a curse."

- "That is because this is not a curse." Sulfuris approaches his head from Morgana, who recoils, and he squints. "This is an integral part of her anatomy."

- "What do you mean ?" Morgana asks.

- "I don't know what you have been through, but your magic circuits have been forcefully fused with those of a fire spirit, a fire elemental and a fire dragon."

- "That makes sense, given what Adelaios told me about her origins…" Helen comments.

- "The combination is masterfully done too, cutting out only what could've caused interferences between the three and retaining a sizable number of perks pertaining to the three species. However, it seems that the process was never finished, and as a result of that her elemental side causes her to naturally light on fire" Sulfuris continues, seemingly absorbed in his thoughts.

- "I know spirits. What's an elemental ?" Morgana asks.

- "They're also nature spirits in a sense, but more primal. They lack the intelligence and shapeshifting abilities of nature spirits, but they make up for it with their sheer magical energy output. As their name implies, they're normally tied to an element, and are made of said element: a fire elemental's body would naturally be made of flames, which explains why you spontaneously combust. It can never kill you though, thanks to your dragon side. Truly masterful work, twisted as it may be."

- "I am also dragon ?"

- "Yes, albeit only partially. Modern dragons are simply powerful creatures, usually the apex predators of their ecosystem. True dragons, on the other hand…" Sulfuris trembles like a shiver traveled through his spine for a second. "I would rather not dive into that topic for the time being. Your dragon side is that of a modern dragon, and it grants you a resistance to fire sufficient for you to be mostly unbothered by your own flames, which would otherwise destroy your mortal body."

- "I see. How do I stop burning ?"

- "You simply need training in order to control your fire. I would gladly help you in that endeavor, but on the condition you tell me your story. I am intrigued by what led to your existence."

- "I can do that if you want !" Helen intervenes. "As you can see, she has a little bit of trouble speaking." She looks at Morgana, who nods to her.

- "Do as you please." Sulfuris answers.

Helen recaps what Adelaios told her about Morgana with surprising accuracy, down to the last minute details.

- "I understand the situation now. Morgana, was it ?"

- "Yes ?"

- "I will supervise your training, as promised. It should not take more than a day, but would you allow me to test you in the meanwhile ? I am curious about something."

- "I don't mind."

- "I'm gonna go get some snacks for the night, for everyone." Helen says. "Morgana, any preferences or allergies ?"

- "Allergies ?"

- "You're allergic to food that makes you sick if you eat it."

- "Oh. Grass and sand."

- "Nevermind. I'll just get some sandwiches. Sulfuris, do you want anything ?"

- "No thank you, I just ate. Although I am surprised that you are being this considerate. What are you scheming ?" Sulfuris inquires.

- "Not much for once ! I just want to look as good as possible whenever that whole ordeal gets to the queen's ears. Granted, I would appreciate it if you could cut that line from your testimony !"

- "A wise decision, Queen Circe can be quite terrifying. I remember the last Witch Hunt, when a witch conducted experiments on other witches. I am fairly certain I have never heard of the queen ever employing methods as deranged as she did back then, even in the ongoing war."

- "War ?" Morgana asks.

- "Right." Helen seems to realize. "A war is usually a large-scale conflict between two factions. In our case, we're the Human faction, and our enemies are the Demigod faction."

- "Why are you fighting them ?"

- "More like why are they fighting us ! They think that it's their divine right to rule over us mortals or something pompous like that. Obviously a lot of demigods don't agree with that and are part of the Human faction, who are just people looking to live in peace really, so don't just lump all of the demigods together and attack on sight. We banded together with the town of Argos against New Athens, and both Sparta and Themiskyra are kind of neutral. There's also the Roman empire, but they're so far from us we barely even interact with them."

- "I see…" Morgana answers, seeming a bit lost.

- "Don't concern yourself with that though ! The fighting never really got to Eretria, it's usually localized very far south, close to the desert."

- "That's a relief."

- "Well I'm off to get snacks ! See you in a few minutes."

- "Let us begin your training." Sulfuris says as she leaves.

Helen comes back an hour later, followed by maids carrying plates with them. Morgana and Sulfuris were just chatting in the middle of the training grounds.

- "Sorry I got lost ! What are you guys doing ? You-" Helen stops as she realizes Morgana was fully visible, her flames nowhere to be seen.

- "It may be due to her nature, but this is true talent." Sulfuris says as he turns to Helen. "She mastered the technique in ten minutes."

- "I sense a business opportunity ! Say, Morgana, don't you want to join me and-" Helen starts.

- "I already offered her a scholarship at the Academy." Sulfuris cuts. "Gems like her are rare, even among witches. I even was able to confirm that she has mastery over Flame magic, the ancient version of Fire magic that is realistically only used by modern dragons due to its highly destructive capabilities but low versatility. The humans capable of using it safely are few and far between."

- "Ah damn it. I tried, I guess." Helen sighs.

- "I accepted the scholarship." Morgana says. "I want to be strong. So I can rescue. All the other children."

- "Oh, your mother experimented on more than just you ?" Helen asks.

- "That is correct." Sulfuris answers for her. "According to what she told me, there were at least ten other test subjects in this laboratory. For her mother to have achieved all of this in less than sixteen years… She must be on the level of a True Ancestor."

- "You're joking right ?..." Helen says, looking concerned.

- "True ancestor ?" Morgana questions.

- "This title is granted by the Queen of Witches to the first witch of a lineage, when she has skills and abilities that defy common understanding. They are genuine monsters, who can be equally matched with elder nature spirits and True Dragons."

- "Haha, you flatter me Sulfuris." Helen says, looking proud of herself.

- "Of course there are some who do not excel in combat whatsoever, and shine only by their skill. Under this umbrella are your mother, and witches like Helen."

- "Oh come on…" Helen responds in a defeated tone.

- "Helen, you're that strong ?" Morgana says.

Helen flicks her cape for added dramatic effect, and strikes a dignified pose with her staff pointed towards the sky.

- "I am the True Ancestor of the Chrysafis family ! I don't have any descendants yet though, since I need to get a homunculus seed from the queen before I can do anything."

- "Homunculus ?"

- "Didn't your mother tell you ? Most of us witches aren't naturally born humans, we're created artificially through a spell the queen invented. It mixes your DNA and magic circuits with whatever decent magic circuits you can find to create a new witch, that will more or less look like you depending on how compatible your magical energy is with that of the magic circuits you're using. Most witches use those of powerful monsters that use the same magic as them. Granted, homunculus can still reproduce normally though, it's just that most witches don't have the time for that. Most homunculus created through this technique are born at ten years old for the mother's convenience when taking care of them, but as a drawback they stay ten for ten years before they start aging normally."

- "I understand now. This is why. Some of the children. Looked younger than me. Even at the beginning. Of my life."

- "Well at least the test subjects weren't all witches. Maybe that'll make the queen only be overflowing with rage instead of murderous intent."

- "I like the queen. Mother needs to die."

- "And I need to pay my employees ! What is going to happen to my profit margins if half of my witches are sent on a Witch Hunt ?"

- "Ahem." Sulfuris clears his throat. "Regardless of this, Morgana, you will have to take the first year entrance exam if you want to be accepted into the Academy. The next one will happen in a week, so prepare accordingly if you need to. Since you will enter through a recommendation from me, you only need to take the practical exam, and you will not have to take the written test for now."

- "Right, the written entrance exam…" Helen seems to have terrible flashbacks.

- "You will have plenty of time to study for it during your first year if you pass the practical exam, but be warned that you will still have to pass it at the end of that year." Sulfuris continues.

- "I understand."

- "You can stay in the student dorms until then, you can ask Vanessa to assign a temporary room to you."

- "Vanessa ?"

- "The witch with the round glasses at the entrance, that you certainly ran into. She is the one responsible for the security on campus, and you can trust her to keep you safe against most threats, I can guarantee you that."

- "I see. Thank you Sulfuris."

- "Of course. Good luck."

- "Alright, now that this is settled I'm going home." Helen announces as she walks away. "You always know where to find me if you need anything, Morgana, so don't hesitate to visit !"

- "Thank you Helen. You are actually nice."

- "I'm only doing this for my own interest !" she shouts before she gets out of sight.

Morgana says goodbye to Sulfuris before returning to the front entrance castle to talk to Vanessa. When she explains what Sulfuris told her, Vanessa leaves for a few minutes before returning and guiding her to the nearest of the modern age style mansions, which were actually residential buildings with dorms for the students. While they are passing by, they run into many other students who move to the side to dodge her whenever she gets close to them, and she can hear remarks like "Her eyes are so scary." or "I thought she was gonna attack me !". Morgana didn't care much for the slander, and simply ignored it like she did most of the time. They would eventually make it to a set of hallways with large wooden doors on the third floor of the dorm, each door with a number on it. They stop in front of a door numbered 93, and Vanessa hands her a golden key, then proceeds to explain what keys are to Morgana when she asks why she was just given a piece of gold. When she is done, she leaves and Morgana opens her door. The room was a relatively simple one, containing a fairly nice bed with red sheets, a desk with a candle on it that seemed to never melt, and a wardrobe. A few metal torches were attached to the walls, providing light and seemingly containing the same type of magic flames that were lighting up the streets, burning without fuel. There was a window in front of the desk, from which Morgana could see the garden, and the floor of the bedroom was wooden.

It might seem classic, but to Morgana this was heaven. She enjoyed having furniture, and despite her bed being a lot less comfortable than the one she had back at her mother's laboratory, the rest of the room more than made up for it. There was a small book on the table with things written in it, but since Morgana couldn't read she just ignored it and decided to go to bed after a very, very long day.