The afternoon lounge was quiet just after classes ended.
It was the hour when students scattered off to the dormitories or elsewhere, so seats stood empty. Afternoon light came in through the windows, falling across each table at a different angle. There was a teacup on every table; some had been abandoned by people who had left, while others still had owners.
Minjun sat by the window, drinking tea.
Chloe was seated three meters away. She had a notebook open and seemed to be reading something. Sylvia was farther off, in a seat in the opposite corner, reading a book. The cover was visible even from here. It was a book on magical law.
The three of them were in the same space.
Who had come in first did not matter. It had not been intentional. It had simply ended up that way. And Minjun had noticed that it had already been that way for several days.
Minjun was aware of it. Aware of it, but he gave no reaction. He drank his tea. Looked out the window. Set down his teacup. The afternoon was slowly slanting. The shadows of the trees were lengthening little by little.
Footsteps sounded.
It was a male student. A face Minjun did not know. From his build and uniform, he looked to be around a second-year. He walked toward Minjun’s table. His steps were natural. They had purpose, but they were not threatening. His expression, too, was simply ordinarily polite. Even the way he paused briefly before speaking was courteous.
There was nothing strange about it.
He stopped in front of Minjun’s table.
“Armand, may I trouble you for a moment?” he said. “You know the magic you manifested during the last practical? The red-output type. I have a similar attribute, so may I ask you a bit about how you control it? How you stabilize it.”
His tone was polite. The content of the question was normal. Questions like this were common at the academy. Minjun knew that. He also had something to answer with. Since episode six, he had received an explanation from the instructor, so he had organized it to some extent.
Minjun set down his teacup and opened his mouth to answer.
That was when it happened.
A sound rang out.
From Chloe’s side. The sound of a teacup touching the table. It was a very small sound. It might even have been unconscious. But what came next was strange.
Chloe set down her cup. And she did not take her eyes off the male student. Her expression did not change. The angle of her lips, the position of her eyebrows, everything was the same as usual.
Her eyes were different.
Her eyes were not smiling.
Minjun saw it from three meters away.
Chloe pulled her chair in. Slowly, so that it made no sound. Just a little. About five centimeters. In the direction of Minjun’s table. Because the movement was so slow, it caught the eye all the more. Just as something quiet could sound louder, something slow could appear clearer.
A sound came from the opposite corner.
It was the sound of a book closing. Sylvia. She had shut her book. But she did not rise from her seat. She simply closed the book and placed her hand on top of it. That was all. Her gaze seemed to be directed this way.
The male student seemed to know nothing.
He was waiting for Minjun to answer. His expression was still polite. But his shoulders seemed to have narrowed slightly. They were the shoulders of someone who did not know why he was tense. His eyes looked at Minjun’s face, then went once to somewhere beyond him before returning.
Minjun saw it.
And he felt the weight of the air. It was not something he could grasp with his hand. It was not temperature or sound either. Something had simply been added. He could not see which direction it came from, but it was clear that it was coming from two directions.
One direction from Chloe.
One direction from Sylvia.
The two directions seemed to converge with Minjun between them. In the middle of that stood the male student. Minjun did not know whether he was feeling it. But his body was reacting first.
“I’ll ask you another time.”
The male student said.
For no particular reason. Minjun had not refused him, nor had he made an uncomfortable expression. He simply said it. Then quickly turned around.
The sound of his footsteps receded toward the lounge door. The door opened and closed. That sound was the loudest thing in the room.
Minjun watched it.
He turned to look at Chloe.
Chloe’s expression had returned to normal. Her lips, her eyes, all of it. It had returned perfectly. As if nothing had happened. She lifted her tea again. Took a sip. Opened her notebook again.
Minjun watched it.
‘This is... kind of scary.’
No, that needed a slight correction.
‘This is really scary.’
He held the teacup in both hands. When he did not know where to put his hands, it was the most natural movement. The warmth of the porcelain transferred into his palms. Something warm felt more real than something cold.
Chloe was smiling.
Her expression had completely returned. Minjun could not confirm whether the eyes from moments ago and the eyes now were the same eyes. Whether they had really changed. Or whether those eyes had been like that to begin with and he had seen wrong.
He did not know if there was anyone who could tell the difference.
‘Isn’t this... romantic obsession level?’
A sound came from the opposite corner.
The sound of a book opening. It was Sylvia. She had opened her book again. Her hand moved slowly. She took a notebook from her bag. Picked up a pen.
She wrote something.
It was short. One line, or less than that. After writing it, she set down the pen. Closed the notebook. Covered it with the book.
He could not see what she had written. From where Minjun sat, he could not see it. He only knew that something was piling up somewhere out of sight.
Minjun looked out the window.
Afternoon light was coming in. A tree swayed slightly in the wind. The leaves trembled, then stilled. Other than that, there was nothing. It was an utterly ordinary afternoon.
‘There definitely weren’t any cases like this in HR training.’
He had learned how to cut off unnecessary conversation during work. He had also learned how to handle things when the atmosphere in a meeting room grew uncomfortable. But he had never learned what to do when the atmosphere pushed someone out all on its own, even though no one had done anything.
Chloe was smiling.
Her expression had completely returned. Minjun did not know when the look in her eyes from just now had begun. They might have been eyes like that from the start. He might have seen wrong.
But he had not seen wrong that the male student had left quickly for no reason.
The tea in the teacup was cooling.
Minjun did not drink it. He simply held it. With both hands. He kept that posture as long as the warmth remained in his palms.
In the opposite corner, Sylvia closed her notebook. She placed the book on top of it. He could not see what she had written. It was not a position from which he could see. He only knew that something had been written.
Chloe turned a page.
There was a rustling sound. It was the loudest sound in that afternoon.
Minjun set down the teacup. The tea had already gone cold. Not so cold that he could not drink it, but no longer at a temperature he wanted to drink.
He sat there like that for a little while longer.
---
The dormitory room.
Minjun thought about Chloe’s expression today.
She had been smiling. It had been a completely smiling expression. And yet, even after the male student left, it had taken time for Chloe’s eyes to return to their original color.
‘I’ve seen people make that expression at work. Smiling, but with some other emotion mixed in.’
At work, it was usually an expression that appeared in competitive situations. When one’s territory was being invaded. When caution was necessary.
The fact that Chloe had made that expression meant something. Minjun decided not to give that something a name yet.
Sylvia had written something.
He could not know what that one line was. He decided not to try to find out. If he learned it, it felt like something would change. For now, it seemed better not to know.
‘This is really scary.’
Minjun looked at the window. The sky was already dark. A few stars were visible. Not many. It was a cloudy day.
The memory of the teacup, not yet cold, remained in his hands. Holding it with both hands. Maintaining that posture as the warmth seeped into his palms. Where that warmth had come from, whether it had been the teacup or not, he decided not to think about it now.
He was tired.
Even after twelve years of working, this was the first time he had felt fatigue of such a different kind. His body was not tired. It was the fatigue of having too many things he had to keep reading.
Chloe’s eyes. Sylvia’s file. Standing there between them as Isabelle.
Minjun closed his eyes.
‘I’ll still be in this body tomorrow, won’t I.’
That thought now felt closer to resignation than fear. Resignation was not a bad thing. Among the things he had learned at work, resignation was a survival skill.
It did not take long for him to fall asleep.
---
Sylvia opened the file that night.
There was one line written in it. Something she had written just a moment ago.
She read it.
The content was correct. It was a fact. An observation record. Sylvia read it again and closed the file.
Wind passed outside the window. A few more stars were visible. The clouds seemed to have thinned.
Sylvia thought about Miss Armand’s expression today.
It had been a smiling expression. A completely ordinary smiling expression. While maintaining that expression, she had watched the male student approach Isabelle. During that time, she had not put down her teacup. The strength of her grip had subtly tightened, then loosened after the male student left.
Sylvia had seen it.
It was already in the observation record that Miss Armand felt something toward Isabelle. Today, that had become a little clearer.
What about herself?
Sylvia did not put that question into the file. The file was a record concerning Isabelle. Anything concerning herself had to be placed somewhere else. She did not yet know where that somewhere else was.
She put the file into her bag. Turned off the light.