First Class with Phoebe.

[Location: Kael's Dorm Room – 4:50 AM]

Kael sat cross-legged on his bed, bathed in the soft blue light of his digital clock.

"Damn," he muttered to himself, staring at the remaining tendrils of mana still flickering in his vision from the skill he had used earlier. "I could mess with this all night…"

The urge to keep exploring was powerful the way the wind threads responded to him now, the strange flexibility in his affinity, the lingering darkness of his mana veins it all begged to be understood.

But he knew he had something important to wake up for.

Phoebe.

His head tilted slightly as he glanced at the time again.

"If I stay up any longer, I'm gonna crash during class… and she doesn't strike me as the forgiving type."

With a quiet sigh, Kael flopped onto the bed and yanked the covers over himself.

---

[Location: Kael's Dorm Room – 4:50 AM, Next Morning]

Kael's eyes snapped open to the exact same number on the clock.

"Wait… what?" he mumbled, sitting up groggily.

Then the realization hit him.

"Shit, shit, shit I'm gonna be late!"

He vaulted out of bed with a kind of panic only sleep-deprived people truly understood. His white hair was a mess, eyes half-lidded, and his mana still adjusting from rest mode to active awareness.

He threw on a simple dark coat over a high-collared shirt and loose black slacks something functional but clean. No time to style, no time to overthink.

---

[Location: Chemistry Lab Corridor – 5:00 AM]

The entire academy building was dead silent. Not even the magical torches along the hallway were fully awake yet; they glowed in lazy pulses.

Kael rushed down the familiar corridor, the cold stone floor echoing under his steps.

As he reached the chemistry lab, the large doors parted automatically with a quiet mechanical hiss.

He stepped inside and froze.

She was already there.

Phoebe Elixmore stood by the central alchemy table, dressed in a pale blue lab coat, her soft brown hair tied in a loose, efficient ponytail. Her cat-like brown eyes blinked at him once, the light from the holographic chalkboard flickering against her lenses.

"Morning," she said, casually glancing back down at a glowing flask she was analyzing.

Kael yawned mid-step, rubbing the back of his head. "Morning…"

Phoebe raised an eyebrow. "You're late."

He scratched his head, red eyes still a little bleary. "It's only by ten minutes…"

"Still late," she said flatly, walking over to a nearby worktable and pulling out a chair with her tail subtly curling around one of the legs.

"Come sit next to me," she added, her tone clipped but not unkind.

Kael took the seat beside her, still waking up, and watched as she retrieved a well-worn notebook from her storage ring, followed by a smooth black mana pen.

The page she opened to was filled with complex runic diagrams, detailed annotations, and strange symbolic logic like something between science, spellcraft, and art.

Phoebe clicked her pen once, looked at him sideways, and said with a small smirk:

"Alright, let's start."