I stood from my seat and walked toward the door, feeling the faint stiffness in my legs from too little sleep and too much thought. Before stepping through, I paused and glanced back over my shoulder, meeting Randall’s gaze directly. “Are you coming?” I asked. “Do you actually want me to demonstrate what it means to be a wizard, or are you content to remain seated in your own carefully cultivated ignorance?”

  I did not wait for his answer. There was no need. I stepped forward and left the room without looking back, already certain of the outcome. Pride, irritation, and wounded authority would see to it. A moment later, the sound of footsteps echoed behind me, heavier and faster than mine.

  As we moved down the corridor, I raised my voice and called out for Meka, projecting it clearly so there would be no mistaking who I was addressing.

  Randall flinched when I did, just a fraction of a second too late to hide it. The reaction was small, but it was there, a reflex he did not even realize he possessed.

  Meka’s hearing was excellent, far better than most gave her credit for. It only took her a few moments to emerge from the training room I had been heading toward anyway, wiping her hands on her clothes as she stepped into the hall. She blinked at me, then frowned. “Runt, what’s going on?” she asked. “Aren’t you supposed to be crafting, or sleeping, or doing something marginally sensible?”

  “No,” I said calmly. “I have an important task for you, my young apprentice. One that cannot wait.”

  That was when she noticed Randall standing behind me. His presence filled the corridor in a way that had nothing to do with his size. His expression had shifted from sharp, irritated curiosity into something far more volatile. Whatever restraint he had been clinging to had burned away, leaving only naked fury behind his eyes.

  “What is this?” Randall demanded, his voice tight, as though each word were being forced past clenched teeth.

  “This,” I replied evenly, without raising my voice or softening it, “is an instructional exercise.”

  I turned fully to face him, planting my feet and meeting his glare without flinching. “I am going to show you what it means to confront and overcome the compulsions your own mana imposes upon you. The reflexive aversions that shape your behavior without your consent. The pressures you have mistaken for immutable truths simply because no one ever taught you how to question them.”

  I gestured lightly toward Meka, not as a command, but as an inclusion. “And she is going to assist you.”

  His jaw tightened, a muscle jumping beneath the skin as he struggled between outrage and the need to know what I meant.

  “Do you comprehend that,” I continued, my tone precise and deliberate, “or would you prefer that I restate it using simpler vocabulary, chosen specifically to accommodate the depth of your current understanding?”

  I entered the training hall first, pushing past Meka with more force than I intended. Not enough to hurt her, but enough that I felt the contact immediately and knew I had failed to temper myself. The space was wide and open, designed for movement and impact, and my steps echoed more loudly than necessary as I crossed the threshold. Randall’s obstinate refusal to understand pressed at the back of my thoughts, layered atop the raw, unfiltered emotions of this smaller body. The irritation burned hot, sharp, and impatient, and rather than smother it, I allowed it to remain.

  I turned as soon as we were fully inside. “Randall,” I said, my voice carrying clearly across the open floor, “describe your fear to me.”

  I waited.

  Not long, but long enough to make it clear that this was not a rhetorical demand. Long enough to give him space to answer if he chose to. The silence stretched between us, filling the hall in a way sound could not. It pressed, thickened, and drew attention to itself.

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  Randall did not speak.

  When the pause became unmistakable, I shifted my attention. “Meka,” I said, softening my tone without losing authority, “you have a fear of fire. Tell him what kind of fire you fear.”

  She hesitated, her ears flattening slightly as her shoulders drew inward. Being asked to speak about it at all was difficult. Being asked to articulate it in front of Randall made it worse. She took a breath, then another, steadying herself before answering. “I… I fear getting burned,” she said at last, her voice quiet but clear. “I’m afraid my fur will get singed off. So I stay away from fire whenever I can.”

  I inclined my head once in acknowledgment. The answer was clear. Honest. Specific. There was no attempt to obscure it, no effort to dress it up as something else.

  Randall still did not answer. He walked farther into the room instead, his boots striking the floor with unnecessary force, each step sharp and deliberate. The sound carried his agitation better than words would have.

  “Randall,” I said again, more firmly this time, letting my voice cut through the space, “what do you fear?”

  I stepped into his path and stopped, forcing him to slow and finally look at me. The distance between us closed to something deliberate, intentional. “If you claim I cannot help you,” I continued, “then it is because you refuse to name the thing that governs your reactions. That failure does not belong to me.”

  I held his gaze without blinking, steady and unyielding. “Tell me what you are actually afraid of,” I said, “and I will show you that confronting it is far simpler than you believe.”

  “Fine,” Randall said at last, the word sounding like it had been dragged out of him rather than offered freely. “I will tell you what my fear is. But if this does not work, you will leave the Adventurers Guild, and you will never set foot in a dungeon again.”

  The declaration hung in the air between us, heavy with authority he was accustomed to having obeyed.

  “Agreed,” I replied without hesitation. “As long as you give this an honest attempt, I can accept those terms. That outcome will not come to pass.”

  He snorted, the sound sharp and dismissive. “You are remarkably confident for someone who has yet to provide tangible proof that they can do what they claim.”

  “Then allow me to provide it,” I said.

  I did not argue further. Argument was unnecessary now.

  I turned away from him and faced Meka instead. “Please sit in the center of the mana-gathering formation.”

  She glanced briefly between Randall and me, then nodded and did as instructed. She moved to the marked space on the floor and lowered herself carefully, arranging her legs and tail so she would not disrupt the lines etched into the stone. The formation was simple, meant to collect and stabilize ambient mana rather than amplify it, but it would suffice for what I intended.

  “All right,” I said, adjusting my stance so I could see both of them clearly. “Close your eyes and begin cycling your mana. Slowly and evenly. Do not force it. Let it move the way it naturally wants to move.”

  Meka inhaled and exhaled, once, then again, until the faint, familiar rhythm of mana circulation settled into place. I waited until her shoulders relaxed and her breathing smoothed before continuing.

  “I want you to think about your most recent interaction with fire,” I said. “Choose a moment where you felt your heart pounding and that ache forming in your chest. The one where the sensation felt overwhelming, as though it filled you completely from the inside.”

  Her brow furrowed almost immediately.

  She hesitated, her fingers curling slightly against the stone. “Do I really have to?” she asked, her voice small but steady enough that I knew she was not trying to escape the task.

  “Yes,” I said, keeping my voice level and precise. “I know this will be uncomfortable. You are not doing this to relive the pain. You are doing it so we can examine it. If you can do this, I promise you that you will not have to endure that reaction again.”

  She was quiet for a few seconds longer, then drew a deeper breath and nodded. “All right,” she said. “I will try.”

  Meka closed her eyes fully and settled into the formation. Her mana continued its slow, deliberate cycle, steady but no longer neutral, as the memory she had chosen began to take shape within her.

  After a few moments, her expression tightened. Her ears twitched, then flattened, and a faint grimace pulled at her mouth as the thoughts played themselves out behind her closed eyes. She shifted slightly where she sat, clearly uncomfortable, though she did not break the cycle or open her eyes.

  “I do not see why you are torturing the girl,” Randall said, his voice sharp with disapproval.

  I did not look away from Meka. “I am not torturing her,” I said evenly. “I am guiding her into the correct mental state.”

  I glanced at him then, just long enough to be deliberate. “You will do same once she shows you the proof asked to see.”