For 40 advance/early chapters : p atreon.com/AutumnXd
"He'd turn down our Discipline Committee just the same as the Student Council? Now that's interesting." Inside the Committee's hall, Kellan Frost had caught the report, and a brow rose despite himself, curiosity moving through his eyes. "Fresh through the gate, and he already put Wesley Brandt on the floor. This Luke clearly has a trick or two up his sleeve."
"Sinclair, how about you let me go have a word with the new kid? There's a fair gap between our Committee and the Magus Society, after all." Kellan looked ready to bolt out the door that second.
"Get whatever you're scheming out of your head." Solene Ashgrave gave Kellan a cool sideways look. "The Committee's job is handling rule-breaks inside Celestial, nothing more. Don't go dreaming up work that isn't ours."
"And if we're being honest, Wesley started it. If anyone's due a visit, it isn't the freshman."
"Work that isn't ours, she says." Kellan rolled his eyes. "It's not every day I see a rookie with real potential. Pull Luke into the Committee, and our overall strength climbs. Where's the harm?"
"After this year, Sinclair graduates out of Celestial. Least we can do is pad his record a little before he goes."
"And come on, hasn't the Magus Society been strutting lately? Plenty of people have already brought their complaints to us, and now they're openly squeezing freshmen to join. We're the Discipline Committee. We ought to make some kind of showing, wouldn't you say, Sinclair?"
"How did this land back on me?" Sinclair Voss rolled his eyes in turn. "You're that eager to see me gone? Can the two of you not sit still and let me finish what's already on my desk?"
The new term had piled the work higher, just as he'd expected, and then there were these two. One who lived only to stir up trouble, the other who vanished for days at a stretch. What kind of Discipline Committee was this supposed to be? What exactly had the last recruiting drive saddled him with.
"Right, that. I just remembered a few things I haven't dealt with, so I'll leave you to it, Sinclair. Take your time." Feeling the weight of Sinclair's stare, Kellan was gone in a heartbeat.
"Kellan's definitely off to scheme something. President, I'll go keep an eye on him. It'd reflect badly on the Committee if he got up to no good." The moment Kellan cleared out, Solene threw out her excuse and slipped away just as fast, with no intention of being roped into hard labor by Sinclair.
"When the last president brought these two into the Committee, why didn't I fight harder to stop it?" Sinclair pressed a hand to his face. Then, a moment later, he pulled up the file on Luke as well.
"A dragon-type card, and three Seven-Star spirits killed in a single strike. Strength like that, even inside Celestial, already puts him within quiet reach of the top ten. No wonder Kellan's hands were itching." He read on, and his frown deepened. "Something tells me this Luke is a handful too. Hell. Why does it always hit all at once?"
...
"Well now, Wesley Brandt. Word is you lost to a freshman. Not to lecture you, but for the Magus Society's third seat, that's a poor showing." Inside the Society, Seraphina Dole eyed Wesley with a faint edge of challenge.
"That's not something you need to trouble yourself over, senior." Wesley met the provocation with a flat, unbothered reply. The two of them had been at daggers for a while now.
Seraphina had once held the best claim to that third seat, in talent and in strength both, before Wesley came out of nowhere and took it clean over her head. That she'd swallowed the loss badly was no secret.
"Enough, Wes. Seraphina only worries the Society's name takes a hit, that's all." Byron Vale stepped in to smooth it over. "Still, someone as strong as you shouldn't lose to a freshman, whatever the case. You didn't happen to know the boy and go easy on him, did you?"
There seemed to be something behind Byron's words, and as the last of them fell, his arm was already draped around Seraphina. The two were nothing so simple as colleagues, and Byron outranked Wesley in the Society on both strength and standing.
Of course, if not for Luke, even Byron would never have guessed Wesley had already crafted a third Seven-Star card. Let the boy keep growing at that pace, and Byron's own position would come under threat.
Though for right now, Wesley was still no match for him.
"All right, that's about enough. A single defeat doesn't drag the whole Society down with it." Seated dead center, Fenner Roan waved a hand and cut the bickering short. "That said, Byron's right. You truly shouldn't have lost to a freshman."
Plainly Fenner too was less than pleased that Wesley had lost to Luke. "It'll set the Society back some, all the more with the freshmen just enrolled and every society scrambling for new blood. The ones ranked below us have had their eyes on our spot for a long time now."
Competition inside Celestial was savage, and not among students alone. The societies fought just as hard. The Magus Society's overall strength might sit second only to the Student Council and the Discipline Committee, but plenty of societies behind it were hungry for that rank, and Fenner had no wish to see anything undercut their standing on his watch.
"President, why not hand the follow-up to Seraphina?" Byron said. "After what happened with Wes, it might sit poorly coming from us."
"She's a woman. She has certain advantages in a fair few areas."
Hearing Byron out, Wesley's face gave little away, but his hands had curled into fists, plainly straining to hold the anger down.
Byron meant to use the moment to raise Seraphina's profile. Taking his own seat, after all, had trampled a good many people's interests along the way.
"Then the matter goes to Seraphina. Any objections?" After a few seconds' thought, Fenner nodded, having reached the same conclusion Byron was steering him toward.
"Leave it to me, President. I'll see it done clean and pretty." A flush of delight crossed Seraphina's face, tamped down almost as fast.
It didn't mean she could unseat Wesley overnight. But let enough of these little moments stack up, and the day would come when she could pull him down for good.
I really do owe you my thanks, freshman, Seraphina thought, quiet and cold. Play it smart and join the Magus Society. Otherwise, for the sake of my own future, I'll just have to sacrifice you.
As for Luke's strength? The freshman might have the edge on Wesley, but she had Byron, and Byron was on a different level from Wesley entirely.
Wesley might be the Society's third seat, yet inside Celestial he ranked only in the top twenty, while Byron sat year-round in the top ten, well clear of Wesley. Seraphina flatly refused to believe a first-year barely through the gate could threaten one of the academy's top-ten powers.
"Enjoy these next few days. You don't have many left." In that short span, Seraphina had already settled on exactly when to make her move against Luke.
EXTRA CHAPTER FOR EVERY 500 POWERSTONES.