Chapter 5 Book 1 Betrayal
"So you are the devil's spawn." Teacher Elara's voice enters her ears.
"Devil's spawn? No teacher… I..." before Ethan could say more, he was stopped.
Then, she heard a sound that made her blood run cold.
Smack.
It was the sound of a hand hitting a face. Followed by a sharp, pained cry.
"I'll teach you not to glow like a disgusting… aberration!" Teacher Elara's voice, a low hiss of pure fury, cut through the muffled door. "You think you're special? You think you're better than us? You're a disease! A cursed disease that has destroyed our world!"
Another smack. Another cry.
Xu Mei's mind screamed in protest. Her hands flew to her mouth, stifling a sob. She didn't know what to do. Her respected, kind teacher, Teacher Elara, the woman who had taught her so much, has now turned into a monster. A monster who was hurting a defenseless little boy.
"Is this really Teacher Elara? No… she would do such a thing. She is not that kind of person." Xu Mei tried to reject the sound she was hearing from inside the room.
"She is the most intelligent teacher I know. She is very kind to me. She is not this monster, right?" she muttered as tears began flowing through her eyes.
The child did not know what to do as her heart felt conflicting emotions, and she could only cry herself while listening helplessly.
Xu Mei's mind was in panic. Her legs would not move, and she slumped limply on that wall while listening to the sound inside. When she heard a pained cry from the sobbing Ethan, her mind reeled back to reality.
She couldn't stand there and just listen. She had to get help.
She turned and ran, her small feet pounding down the hallway, her panic giving her wings. She ran past the math classroom, past the reading room, her mind racing. She needed Director Anya. She needed someone, anyone, to stop this.
She found Mrs. Jia in the reading room, tidying up the books. It seems that she has not gone to the director's office to inform the director of Ethan's awakening. She recalled how elated Mrs. Jia was when she discovered that Ethan had awakened as a magii. She felt that she would be able to help him.
Xu Mei, breathless and tearful, grabbed her hand. "Mrs. Jia! Mrs. Jia, you have to come! Teacher Elara is… she's hurting Ethan! She's beating him!"
Mrs. Jia's face, usually so serene and kind, turned ashen. Without a word, she dropped the books and ran, following Xu Mei's lead.
…
By the time Xu Mei and Mrs. Jia arrived, another teacher, Mr. Han, the caretaker and gardening teacher, had already heard the commotion and was trying to force his way into the locked room. Mrs. Jia, with a strength born of pure adrenaline, shouldered past him and began pounding on the door. "Elara! Open this door immediately!"
They still could not open the door. Xu Mei grabbed this chance and quickly felt the mana on the other side of the door. She did not hesitate to unlock the door on the other side, making it open with a strong tug from Mr. Han.
The door was finally flung open, and it seems that someone had also informed Director Anya, who had arrived and was standing behind Xu Mei. Her face is a mask of shock and horror. Teacher Elara was on her back, lifting a table leg, her face red with exertion and rage. Ethan was huddled in a corner, sobbing, his small cheek red and bruised. Xu Mei also noticed that a few drops of blood were on Ethan's old shirt.
"This… Is Teacher Elara going to beat Ethan with that thing?" Xu Mei's face turned pale after seeing the thick table leg. She could not help but take a step back.
She knew that if she was a bit late, her classmate would have already been beaten by Teacher Elara with that thing. A strong shudder made Xu Mei hug herself. She then felt warm hands wrapping her shoulder as Director Anya hugged her.
"Calm down, child. Your classmate is going to be okay," she said, trying to calm the little girl in her arms.
"Why is this happening… Miss Anya?" Xu Mei asked with her childish voice.
Director Anya could not help but feel sad at the scene that the young child was seeing. She wanted to turn her away, but she knew that it was already too late. The child would soon see this in the outside world. Though she was one of the brilliant children in the orphanage, she could not shield herself from the reality outside. The sooner this child learns the truth of the outside world, the better she can prepare her in the future.
While Director Anya is trying to pacify the little girl, a furious confrontation erupts in the room. Mr. Han and Mrs. Jia rushed to Ethan's side, pulling him out of the room and comforting him. Director Anya stood up and let Xu Mei go to the side. She then turned on Teacher Elara, her voice a low, dangerous whisper. "What do you think you're doing? You're supposed to be a teacher here, a protector of these children!"
Xu Mei, still trembling, did not stay outside but instead hid behind a large, dusty wardrobe, listening. She was a master of silent observation, and she knew instinctively that she couldn't be seen.
"That child is a curse!" Teacher Elara shrieked, her voice cracking with emotion. "He is a symbol of all that is wrong with this world! He is a Magii!"
Director Anya shook her head, her disappointment and fury warring in her eyes. "They are just children, Elara. They are the same as us. Magii are a part of this world now. And they have done so much for us! The dome that protects this town, the very air we breathe inside this safe haven… that was created by a Magii, to protect us from the very monsters outside."
Teacher Elara scoffed, a bitter, hollow sound. "Don't you understand, Anya? That is precisely the problem! They broke our world, and now they want us to thank them for patching it together with their flimsy magic! We were on the cusp of a great scientific revolution, a time when Heumane ingenuity would have solved all our problems! We had inventions that were going to revolutionize our world! But then the Magii came, and they gave us their easy, chaotic magic, and the world gave up on science! They have made us reliant, weak!
Mrs. Jia was calmly hugging and patting Ethan's back. She then looked at the red-eyed Elara. "I know that your husband's accident has caused you a lot of pain. But you cannot take it out on the child, Elara."
Mr. Han, who was checking the still-sobbing Ethan for wounds, stopped. Luckily, the child is unharmed and just had bruises. He then stepped forward, his face pale with fury. "This is madness, Elara. You're talking about a child. What kind of person are you?"
"The kind of person who will not see another generation of Heumane fall under the spell of these abominations!" she spat, her eyes burning with a feverish intensity.
She suddenly takes out a badge and shows it to them with a proud look on her face. "I am a member of the Anti-magii Coalition. We are a group dedicated to preserving Heumane progress and our way of life. We are the ones who understand the true threat of Magii. We believe they are a threat to our very existence."
The others in the room were taken aback by this revelation. They did not expect that one of their teachers would actually be a terrorist.
The words hit Xu Mei like a physical blow. The Anti-magii Coalition. Her teacher was a member of a terrorist group. A group that hunted and captured children. Her mind flashed back to Teacher Elara's stories, her bitter diatribes, the grief for her husband. It all made sense now. The animosity, the rage, the hatred. It wasn't just grief; it was a deeply ingrained, radical ideology.
"We have agents everywhere," Elara continued, her voice a chilling whisper. "We are a network of good, decent people who are doing what needs to be done. We find the awakened children and… and we protect them from their own destructive power. We show them the path of science and logic, the path of the true Heumane."
Director Anya, now realizing the full scope of the treachery, gave a small, heartbroken shake of her head. "You were one of my most trusted teachers, Elara. How could you believe such… such vile lies?"
"They are not lies!" Elara insisted. "The Magii are the cause of all our problems! My husband was not killed by a random Mana Beast. He was killed by a stray spell from a Magii who pretends to fight those… mana beasts! A spell that was meant for a mana beast, but missed and took his life! That is the chaos they bring! The endless, meaningless war and destruction! The world needs to be free of them, and we will do whatever it takes to make that happen!"
The conversation was a blur of accusations, shouts, and heartbroken whispers. Xu Mei, hiding in the shadows, felt her respect for Teacher Elara shatter into a million tiny pieces. The woman she had admired, the woman who had taught her so much, was a member of a group that would have captured and hurt her. A cold, heavy sadness settled in her heart, a grief far deeper than the fear she had felt moments before.
Finally, Mr. Han and Mrs. Jia, having calmed Ethan down, stood up and forcefully took hold of Elara. "We must take her to the town guards, Director Anya," Mr. Han said, his voice grim. "She is a danger to all the children here."
As they led her away, a sudden, piercing gaze fell upon Xu Mei's hiding place. Elara, her eyes still burning with a crazed fanaticism, saw her. She saw the little girl she had taught to love numbers, the student who had always been so bright, so promising. Her face softened for a fleeting moment, a strange mixture of hatred for what had happened and love for the child she knew.
"Xu Mei!" she called out, her voice echoing down the hall. "I want you to go to my room! In the top drawer of my desk, you will find my notes. Three thick books. I want you to have them. You were the only one who truly understood my lessons. You were the only one who understood my lessons best. Take them. They are more valuable than any magic."
Then, she was gone, her voice trailing off as they dragged her down the hall.
Xu Mei, still shaking from the confrontation, slowly emerged from her hiding place. She looked at Director Anya, who was still standing by the storage room door, her head in her hands, her shoulders slumped with a weariness that went bone-deep. Director Anya looked up and saw Xu Mei, but she didn't say anything. She just gave her a small, sad smile, a silent gesture that seemed to say, I know what you heard, and I know you understand.
With that silent acknowledgement, Xu Mei did not waste time and made her way to Teacher Elara's room. It was a small, Spartan room, smelling of ink and old paper. The top drawer of the desk was unlocked, just as Elara had said. Inside, she found three thick, leather-bound books. They were old, their pages yellowed and filled with cramped, meticulous handwriting.
She pulled them out, one by one.
The first was titled Advanced Mathematics: A Heumane Approach.
The second was The Principles of Alchemy: Science over Sorcery.
The third was The Unspoken Truths of Science: A Guide to Unlocking a Magii-Free Future.
The books were heavy in her hands, a tangible piece of the world she had just discovered. A world of hatred and division. She looked at the books, then at the ever-present, shimmering window in her vision. Telekinesis (Apprentice). A part of her, the Heumane part, felt a pull toward these books, toward a path of reason and logic. Another part of her, the Magii part, felt a pull toward the raw, untamed power she now possessed. The two worlds, the two paths, were now literally in her hands. She knew her journey was just beginning, and that these books, filled with the knowledge of a woman who had both loved and hated her, would be a key part of it.