"What do you think about my archery, Class Rep?" Theo abruptly changed the topic, flashing his usual playful grin.
Yuna, already feeling mentally fried from the earlier conversation, decided not to push it. She followed his lead with a sigh. Anything was better than another round of 'Do you care about us?' nonsense.
"What do you think about archery?" she deflected smoothly. "What do you want to learn more in it?"
Theo tapped his chin, eyes drifting upward as he mused, "Precision? Accuracy? Mastery?"
Yuna tilted her head, trying to squeeze her dried-up brain for anything useful. "They say," she began, trying to sound mysterious, "for an archer… you should treat your target like it's your own eye."
She had no idea what that was supposed to mean. It sounded profound when she read it in a novel once, and now she was just throwing words around like a fantasy philosopher with brain fog.
Trying to salvage her nonsense, she blurted out, "What if your arrow is like a GPS—" She paused. Right. No GPS in this world. "Ugh… I mean like a magical radar that locks onto its target and follows it no matter where it goes. Wouldn't that be cool? That way you don't even need perfect accuracy. Just let it fly and boom! It'll chase them down."
Yuna's thoughts started to snowball as she got into it, eyes shining with a familiar kind of manic energy only fellow novel geeks would understand. "Oh! And what about explosive arrows? Like, you shoot and BOOM—that's a double win right there. Even if you miss, you still hit!"
Theo watched her, visibly entertained, as she practically bounced in place. Her usually tired eyes now glittered with childlike excitement, like a mad scientist on the verge of a breakthrough. For a brief moment, she didn't look like their grumpy, dead-inside class rep. She looked genuinely thrilled—because she wanted him to succeed.
Basking in that sincere spark of hope and support (not), Theo's grin slowly faded into a contemplative expression.
"Treat the target as my own eye…" he echoed thoughtfully. "Should I try mutating my mana and infuse it into my arrows? That way I can control them mid-flight?"
Yuna froze. "Uhhh… maybe? What's mutating mana?" What in the cultivation manual is that?! Mutate your mana? Do I look like a magic researcher to you? I'm just here spitballing fantasy tropes!
Theo, of course, looked as cheerful as ever, not explaining it. "Thanks, Class Rep. I'll go borrow more books on mana mutations."
He said it so lightly, as if he were planning to borrow a cookbook and not dive into something that could, say, explode his internal organs.
Altering one's own mana—mutating it from its natural state—is a highly perilous endeavor. It's not something done lightly. A single misstep in the process could lead to severe backlash, permanently damaging one's mana plate resulting in death. It requires immense precision, control, and understanding of one's internal energy flow—something even seasoned mages hesitate to attempt. It's the kind of risky path only the desperate, the daring, or the dangerously confident would tread. For a student to casually talk about mutating their mana… it was either bold ambition or sheer recklessness.
Meanwhile, Yuna nodded along blankly, completely unaware of the mortal danger she just indirectly encouraged.
After Theo left, the only alchemist in the Heart Class, Juno, took a seat across from Yuna.
She hadn't even opened her mouth to speak when Juno jumped right in, eyes bright with enthusiasm.
"Class rep, honestly, I'm not too interested in being a mage or anything. But lately, I've been obsessed with something. As an alchemist, I study matter, right? So I started looking into how the matter of plants changes when they die. Like—when a plant is alive, it's one kind of matter, a living organism. But when it dies, it becomes different matter—turning into soil. How is that possible? I even magnified the whole transformation process and watched it. It's amazing—!"
At first, Yuna listened attentively, nodding along, even intrigued.
But he didn't stop.
He kept going. And going. And going.
The stream of words started to blur in her head like some experimental ASMR noise. His voice, once passionate, became a monotonous drone of "blah blah matter blah blah transformation blah blah decomposition—"
Her head throbbed. She tried to stay polite, but her soul quietly floated out of her body.
Somewhere mid-rant, she completely zoned out and began imagining herself lounging under the sun with a drink, surrounded by silence. Blessed, precious silence.
Unfortunately, that paradise was shattered when Juno abruptly asked, "Yuna, what do you think?"
Snapped back to reality, Yuna blinked.
"Ugh…"
Think about what?! She hadn't heard a single coherent sentence after the third "matter."
Still, she had to say something. Right?.
"Well…" she began, stalling for time as she looked into Juno's sparkly, expectant eyes. "You see… cough... everything probably came from one beginning, right? Like… one original source of matter. And then, with some kind of... uhm… big collision—let's call it the Big Bang Theory—that one matter split and evolved into all the things we know today. Plants, rocks, people, soup. You get it. So... it makes sense that matter could maybe be changed back and forth since they're all from the same origin...?"
Even she didn't know what she was saying anymore.
'Is this the moment I get caught for talking complete nonsense? Please, I'm just a reader from another world, who loves to imagine things and whose head is full of nonsense theories!'
But to her horror—and slight awe—Juno looked enlightened. How????
"That means… if I can figure out the right tweaks, I can change one kind of matter into another, because they all share the same source?"
"Ugh… maybe?" Don't quote me, please.
"I've never heard of the Big Bang Theory. Where did you learn that, Yuna?"
"Uhm... from my master's forbidden books," she said quickly, tossing her master under the bus. No way she was going to say it was from her past life's casual Google search rabbit hole.
"Oh… thank you, Yuna, for sharing such sacred knowledge." Juno's expression turned solemn. "I love you. You're the best. I'll become the greatest alchemist for you."
And just like that, he stood up and walked away without waiting for a reply.
Yuna sat there, still half-dazed.
'What just happened? What did I say?'
And just like that, her exhausting yet weirdly satisfying day of one-on-one sessions with all her classmates came to a close.
She sighed and leaned back. Thank the heavens the heart class has the fewest students. If there were more, she'd start charging consulting fees.
....
From that day on, the Heart Class fell into a near-manic rhythm of practice. The combat puppet became their sacrificial target, taking blow after blow as the students obsessed over refining their skills. It wasn't discipline that drove them— ambition, and the quiet madness that came with being in the most emotionally volatile class in the Academy.
Once, Theo had been among the most diligent—focused, relentless, his arrows never missing their mark.
But lately, he'd vanished.
Yuna noticed. She always noticed, she can't exactly resign from her position yet so she has no choice to but to notice and pay attention to her classmates. He appeared only occasionally now, his form stiff, his movements sluggish. He'd release a few arrows, then vanish again. He looked pale—almost sickly. His skin had taken on a gray hue, and his usually sharp eyes were dulled.
She frowned.
Her gut twisted with a vague unease she couldn't shake. So, during a break, she turned to Celeste with an innocent question—one that would unravel everything.
"Celeste," she murmured, "what is mana mutation?"
Celeste cocked her eyebrow. "Huh? You don't know?"
Yuna shook her head, lips pressed tight. Would she ask if she knew? Duh...
"Oh… it's when you try to reconstruct your own mana. Internal rewiring, basically. There's a method, but it's incredibly dangerous. Most people who attempt it die. Like—ninety-nine percent."
She said it like she was talking about the weather.
Yuna, on the other hand, felt the color drain from her face.
She jumped to her feet. "Where's Theo?!"
Her voice cut through the room like a blade, startling everyone.
The Heart Class looked up, their expressions blank—mildly surprised, but mostly bored. It wasn't like Yuna to be loud.. Even now, their reaction was slow and casual. Someone lazily pointed in a direction. "He hangs around the resting room on the east side of the library sometimes."
Yuna didn't wait. She ran. No—flew, wind curling beneath her feet, carrying her forward faster than her legs could manage.
Behind her, Celeste the ever clever one was quick to figure out something and then she cursed.
"Shit. Theo. That lunatic's actually trying to mutate his mana."
The class blinked.
"That idiot," someone muttered.
"Guess he snapped," another replied.
Still, they stood and followed—not out of concern, but out of curiosity. A quiet death was more interesting than another combat lecture.
Their feet pounded lightly across the hall as they trailed Yuna's path, some still yawning, some chatting idly. No one rushed. No one panicked. They weren't heartless—just desensitized. They have seen a lot, people died trying to grow stronger. It was unfortunate. but it wasn't shocking.
Most of all, while the Heart Class appeared close-knit—bonded through shared training and moments of camaraderie—it was only because Yuna had painstakingly stitched them together. Beneath that fragile unity, however, they remained what they had always been: a group of emotionally detached individuals, each locked within their own apathy, incapable of truly caring for one another.
But Yuna… she was different.
She was already pale when she reached the door, heart pounding, fear flooding her lungs. She didn't hesitate—just slammed it open.
There he was.
Theo sat slumped on the dusty sofa, head hanging low. His chest rose and fell in shallow, broken rhythm. His lips were tinted purple. His skin was ghost-white. Blood ran slowly down his temple.
He looked up.
And Yuna's breath stopped.
"You—"
She wanted to yell. Scream. Scold him.
But she saw his eyes—barely focused. His body—shaking violently. His aura—warped, unstable, like a thread fraying under strain. He was dying. Right in front of her!
This damn!
And suddenly, her chest tightened.
She ran to him and grabbed him by the shoulders. "Stop! Stop whatever you're doing!"
"I... c-can't... s-stop…" Theo's voice trembled, broken. "Class rep… it… hur…ts…"
So much that he couldn't even cry out. He looked as though even breathing was agony.
Yuna's heartbeat roared in her ears.
No no no no no.
"You'll die! Theo—stop!"
Behind her, the rest of the class filtered in slowly. They looked at him. Then at Yuna. Their expression unreadable.
"He didn't succeed," one said. "It's too late."
Another tried to tug Yuna back. "Let him go, class rep."
Their words hit her like ice. So casual. So final. No urgency. No sorrow. Just an acceptance—he would die, and that would be that.
Yuna's mind screamed in protest.
She didn't want to see someone die in front of her.
Damn it! Damn it!
The person she knows was now going to die in her arms.
Because of something she said!
Yuna chest heaved violently.
"No! Shut up!" she shouted at the others. "Shut up, all of you!"
Her voice cracked. She was shaking. Eyes wide, hands clutching Theo like she could anchor him to life by sheer will.
The class fell silent.
Yuna's mind whirled, desperate. Desperate. Her vision blurred.
Then, like a whisper, a pulse from within. Her mutated moonlit orchid—bound to her by blood, nestled in her bloodstream—responded.
Help? she pleaded. It was a mutated being, it has mutated, can it help? Please…
The plant hesitated.
It hated foreign blood. It found others' blood dirty. Impure. Not worthy.
But… its host was panicking. Crying. Cracking apart.
It relented.
A greenish vine shot out of Yuna's wrist. Before anyone could react, it pierced Theo's abdomen cleanly.
Blood gushed.
Gasps echoed—but no one dared stop her.
The vine slithered into Theo's core and squirm in his bloodstream. Greenish spores began leaking from it, glowing faintly. It looked grotesque—vile—but strangely beautiful. The heart class widened their eyes, not in horror, but something close to amazement and curiosity.
Yuna didn't even notice their stares.
She was hunched over Theo, holding him tightly, whispering again and again:
"Theo, listen to me. Let the vine guide you. Follow it."
He couldn't hear much. But he heard her.
And that was enough.
Theo's instinct—his trust in Yuna that she care about him—kicked in. He didn't fight the vine. He followed. Let it twist through his broken mana circuits. Let it realign the madness. The pain was still unbearable, but he held on.
The floor beneath them was stained with sweat, blood, and raw emotion. The vine pulsed softly, guiding, healing, infusing. The orchid—even reluctantly—shared its essence, threading itself into Theo's dying core.
For hours, no one moved.
The heart class sat quietly around them, not out of sympathy, but silent obligation. Their class rep was holding someone as he clawed his way back from death. That was worth watching. That was worth staying for.
But Yuna didn't care about any of that.
She just held Theo.
Don't die.
Please don't die.