The dormitory wall clock struck midnight. The only source of light in the cramped room came from a cheap tallow candle melting on a wooden desk. On his bed, Toby snored with an irregular rhythm, occasionally smacking his lips as if dreaming of meat pies.Aster sat hunched over his desk, squinting at the pile of "treasures" he had scavenged from the scrap bin behind the Crafting workshop that afternoon: a rusted iron spoon, a broken wall clock spring, and a scrap of lead sheeting from a potion wrapper."I need five gold coins," Aster whispered to himself, his voice barely audible over Toby’s snoring. "And all I’ve got to work with is trash that even sewer rats wouldn't touch."His plan was simple, logical, and grounded. He was going to make nail clippers. In the magical world of Aethelgard, nobles and highranking mages were obsessed with hygiene and appearance, yet they always used wind or water magic to trim their nails, which often led to minor accidents like clipped fingertips. Mech

The Aethelgard Underground Black Market wasn't literally underground. It was hidden behind a false wall in the basement of an old wine cellar in the academy city's commercial district. To enter, one had to knock three times on the largest wine cask in a specific pattern, then recite a password that changed every week.Aster stood before the giant cask, pulling his black cloak—stolen from a clothesline behind the dorms—tighter around himself. The cloak was two sizes too big and smelled like cheap laundry detergent, but it was enough to hide his academy uniform.He knocked three times.A small hole in the wall slid open, and a pair of yellow eyes peered at him from the darkness."The password?" a raspy voice asked.Aster swallowed hard. He’d gotten this week's password from Toby earlier that afternoon, after carefully steering the conversation toward "interesting places in the city." Toby, it turned out, had an uncle who was a blackmarket merchant and had overheard the password during a

Kaelen Drago’s grip on Aster’s wrist felt like cold iron fresh from a polar ice bath. The protagonist’s fingers trembled violently—not from weakness, but from the weight of emotions seemingly pent up for centuries.Aster stared at Kaelen, eyes wide. His heart raced with adrenaline as he scrambled to process this absurd situation. Why did the novel’s protagonist just emerge from the shadows to grab my wrist? Does he know I just embarrassed Valerius? Wait, what did he just say? The World’s Law is going to kill me?“Let go, Lord Drago,” Aster whispered, trying to pull his hand away without triggering an explosion of mana from Kaelen’s unstable core. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. This is just an ugly rock that fell from Mr. Clydes’ hand. I was just picking it up so no one would trip over it.”“Don’t lie to me!” Kaelen’s voice was raspy, his rubyred eyes radiating a terrifying sense of desperation. “I have watched you die one hundred and fortyseven times, Aster! Every time I try