Incubus Living In A World Of Superpower Users - Chapter 426

Chapter 426: Elira Korrin 4

Ethan stayed in his seat a moment. He wasn’t the only one. A handful of others lingered the way you do when you want the map to settle deeper than your eyes.

The faint glow painted the front of his hands and the curve of his cheekbone. He watched the edges, not the center.

The simulation had a rhythm, and it was humming under the obvious. He could feel his system flicker in the back of his mind, not a voice, not a separate presence, just that steady instrument panel he had lived with long enough to trust.

A small light blinked in a quiet pattern across his attention and then went still, as if to say it was awake, listening, and not about to get in the way unless asked.

The feeling told him the test would expose more than a list of strengths. It would pull at seams he hadn’t noticed yet, the places where habit had replaced attention.

Evelyn’s knuckles brushed his sleeve, an absentminded touch that was also a check. You’re here. He tilted his head half an inch in answer.

Everly rapped a finger once against his boot as if to preempt any argument about whether he had inspected them yet, and then grinned when he lifted his foot to show a fresh lace she had tied tight and neat.

Their small triangle turned toward the aisle.

Elira watched them go. She didn’t stop anyone. She didn’t call anyone back for a last speech.

She leaned a hip against the desk and let the last of the class file out, eyes still counting without looking like they were counting.

When the door swung shut on the final pair, she reached to the sill and retrieved the chalk stub again. It left dust on her fingertips.

She rubbed it off with her thumb and smiled that small, private smile a second time before tucking the chalk away.

The halls hummed. Evening lay flat and warm over the grounds. The wards that weren’t torches held their pale lines steady.

The kitchens sent up their reliable cloud of good smells. A student in the distance called a route as if practicing to be someone who would get other breathing bodies home.

The infirmary nurse checked supplies and made a note with the kind of neat handwriting that keeps carts honest.

In the suite, gear came out the way they had promised. Canteens lined up with names stenciled small. Straps tightened.

Flares checked. Pull-tags felt and set back where a hand could find them with eyes closed.

The pack order settled without a fight this time, because they had already spent those words two hours earlier and won nothing by repeating them.

Jokes stayed quick and light. The good ones were held back on purpose for the walk to the gate tomorrow, when nerves would need them more.

A small message went out. We’re ready. It didn’t try to be more than that.

On the other side of the city, a screen lit briefly with that note and then went dark again. The person who read it let the breath they had been holding leave without anyone else hearing.

Back in his office, the director stood the way a person stands when they still have work, but the work has decided to cooperate for a few minutes.

The glass wall painted a soft map across his face. He watched the cohort glyphs move inside Astralis, the little sparks tracing a simple rectangle as they returned to their dorms.

He saw the small dot he had placed by one name, a faint and steady pulse at a checkpoint. Then, it dimmed again once the proctor at the end of the hall tilted a camera two degrees to correct a blind spot.

He nodded once, the kind of small nod a man lets himself have when no one else is around to tease him for it.

On another pane, the bait site glinted with a thin white line that skimmed the edge of a door and then moved on. He marked the time, said nothing to anyone, and waited. Patience did the rest.

Night pressed its hand lightly over the roofs. Lights thinned in the library windows and were then replaced by that dim blue that says a building is still awake but polite about it.

The tram took a corner with a squeak that meant maintenance had done its job.

Somewhere, a cat that did not belong to the academy but somehow belonged to everyone threaded its way between benches and ignored the rules against animals because rules bend for old cats, and everyone knows it.

Ethan brushed his teeth, set his pack where his hand would find it without looking, and checked the window latch for no reason except that he always did.

He stood in the low light and looked not out at the view but at the reflection again, the version of himself caught in the glass.

He checked that the look in the eyes there matched the feel under his ribs.

It did. He let the moment go before it became a habit he didn’t trust. The couch took his weight.

The twins settled on either side in arrangements as old as the first week they had found this couch. The room exhaled and let sleep in like a shy animal that knows when it is welcome.

Elira Korrin wrote in her ledger. Two lines. The first kept spacing without being told. The second: three voices default to jokes when they should default to counts.

She closed the book and slid it into its stubborn drawer and didn’t make it complain.

In the headquarters, the director pulled up a floating roster of proctors and put a small dot beside one name with a simple instruction that only that person would notice in the morning, and no one else would read correctly even if they saw it.

He ran a hand down his face and let the night leave his mouth on a long breath. He checked the kettle and found it had turned itself off.

He left it off. The map hummed, pleased with itself in the way systems feel when someone asks them to do their job and doesn’t make them pretend they’re heroes.

Midnight passed without drama. The small hours came with their usual sounds. The city didn’t know it was being watched by old eyes who had chosen not to blink.

Or maybe it did and chose to pretend it didn’t because pretending is part of how cities survive gods.

Morning touched the far edge of the sky without asking permission. Kitchens rattled lids.

Grounds crews ran a last look over the path to the south gate, checking seams, railings, and the places where students like to lean even when signs tell them not to.

The infirmary brewed a bitter tea that no one liked, but everyone drank it when it was pressed into their hands.

The ward lines over the academy took a breath and tightened the way belts do when a day will ask for lift and carry.

The class would wake to alarms they had set and to a quiet that thanked them for not making promises last night.

They would dress to move, not to pose. Packs would go on the shoulders, and boots would be laced properly.

Pride would stay where Elira had told them to leave it. Water would be carried because water is heavier than luck, and more honestly,

Ethan’s system flickered once more in the space behind his thoughts as he fell toward the last slice of sleep, not intrusive, just present.

He didn’t need its voice. He needed the steady panel it offered. It blinked a calm pattern as if to say it would be there when the map refused to match the plan. He let that be enough.

Elira’s alarm chimed once, exactly on time, and went quiet. She opened her eyes without a start.

She looked at the ceiling and listened to the building breathe and smiled to herself because the floor felt like it liked the day.

She sat up and put her feet on the ground with the ease of someone who knows they will be early to the gate because they would feel wrong if they weren’t.

The director stood at the window as the city’s first tram took its curve. This time, the tram did not squeal because the track was oiled.

He nodded to the room like a foreman greeting a crew. Somewhere deep in the Association building, a panel flipped from night to day.

Somewhere deeper, a tether sat in a pocket and did not ask to be used.

The gate waited. The realm behind it held steady the way a calm sea holds steady before the tide pulls. The test would not care about speeches.

It would care about count, water, and feet that knew where to land. The students would step through when called.

The world would watch without admitting it was watching. And the quiet they had earned the night before would spend itself one careful coin at a time, exactly as intended.

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