There are three days left until the Academy.
Three days to stop looking like a man who writes poetry about his crush's hair.
Ambitious? Yes.
Impossible? Probably.
But I've worked with worse. Like an all-nighter PowerPoint the day of a client pitch. At least here I'm only trying to fix a socially radioactive noble with stalker energy and a greasy face.
Piece of cake.
Day One: Operation De-Goblinize
Step one: haircut.
I found a servant—bless her soul, she didn't scream when she saw me—and asked for the family stylist.
"Master Caleb?" she blinked, confused. "You… want to groom?"
"I want to look like someone who doesn't get banned from bookstores."
She didn't get it. That was fine. I was speaking in modern sarcasm, and she was fluent in Medieval Concern.
The stylist came. She gasped. She cried. She called my hair "a battlefield of sadness."
Then she fixed it.
Snip. Snip. Shampoo. Scissors again.
By the end of it, I looked human.
Step two: clothes.
I raided the closet, threw out anything with frilly collars, and settled on a dark coat with silver trim. Clean, sharp, noble-ish. Looked like something a competent side character might wear before he gets betrayed in Episode 9.
Perfect.
When I looked in the mirror this time, I didn't see a simp. I saw a guy trying to claw his way out of rock bottom. That was enough.
Day Two: Magic Purgatory
Caleb had mana. Decent mana, actually. His affinity leaned toward light and thunder.
Which sounds awesome until you realize both of those are fast, flashy, and brutally hard to control. Like trying to learn how to play piano by jumping straight into Beethoven while the piano is also on fire.
I started with a basic lightning spell: Sparkbolt.
A beginner-level zap. Equivalent to a taser. Great for frying rats. Or eyebrows.
"Just concentrate," I muttered, holding out my hand. "Feel the mana. Visualize the bolt."
I visualized. I focused. I whispered the incantation.
Nothing.
Again.
Nothing.
The third try lit my sleeve on fire.
So, progress?
By the end of the day, I had static fingers, three burnt scrolls, and a bruised ego. I looked like someone who lost a fight with a toaster.
"This is fine," I told myself, lying.
Day Three: Spark of Hope
I didn't sleep much. Too much buzzing in my head. Thunder, light, frustration. My fingers twitched with raw mana, but it wouldn't obey me.
I kept trying. Again. And again. My hair frizzed. My brain fried.
But something had changed.
Maybe it was muscle memory. Maybe it was spite. Or maybe my body had finally accepted that I wasn't going to give up, no matter how many times it tried to self-destruct.
So when I stood under the tree in the training yard that morning, the clouds overhead grumbling, and whispered the incantation again—
It worked.
CRACK!
A bolt of blue light snapped from my hand and smashed into the training dummy.
It didn't explode. It didn't sizzle.
It just dropped. Smoking.
Silent. Dead.
Like a toaster finally unplugged.
I stared at my hand. It was tingling. My heartbeat matched the pulse of energy still running through my fingers.
I grinned.
"Hell yeah."
Then I collapsed.
Apparently, using magic properly burns energy. Who knew?
When I woke up, the servant was panicking, and I was half-buried in flower petals for some reason. But I didn't care.
I'd done it.
Three days ago, I was a disaster. Now? I was a slightly-smaller disaster with a working thunderbolt.
The Academy opens tomorrow.
Let's see what happens when the plot finally shows up.