The Thirteen Knight

Chapter 1: The Setup & Infiltration

I never get used to the headache that come with waking up in this place. It starts right behind my eyes every time I step out of the dormitory and breathe the air. The air here is heavy and thick with what the locals call ambient mana but to me it just feels like humidity that stuck to your skin.

My name is Chase Royce and I am the only person in the Grand Academy of Magitech who gets sick just from walking to class. I am not from this world. I just woke up here one day without a map or a guide stranded in a place where physics take a backseat to magic.

The morning sun was hitting the spires of the Academy and making the white stone glow like it was holy. Around me students were walking in groups and laughing and showing off their powers. A guy with fox ears was floating a stack of books behind him with a lazy flick of his finger.

A girl with glowing markings on her skin was lighting a small flame in her palm to warm up her coffee because the morning was cold. They use magic for everything here. It is their electricity and their muscle.

I walked with my hands in the pockets of my cheap gray uniform and tried to look invisible. I kept my head down because if I make eye contact they might remember me. They might remember that I am the guy who got a zero on the aptitude test. I needed to get through today without any trouble. Just get through the lectures and finish my shift at the maintenance tunnels.

The first class was Synchro Theory and it was a nightmare as usual. The professor is a high elf named Valerius who looks like he has not blinked in fifty years. He was standing at the front talking about the resonance between the soul and the Zodiac Constellations.

He kept saying that the Link is a river that flows through all living things and binds us to the gods. I sat in the back row and stared at my desk because I know the truth. The river does not flow through me. I am a dry patch of dirt in their ocean of magic.

When Valerius called me up to the front to demonstrate the basic synchronization the whole room went quiet. I hate this part more than anything. I walked up the steps and felt the eyes of thirty students drilling into my back.

"Place your hand on the orb Mr. Royce," Valerius said with a voice that sounded bored. He already knew what was going to happen but he wanted to make a point.

I put my hand on the clear crystal sphere that sat on his desk. For anyone else it would glow blue or gold or red depending on their affinity. It would hum and sing. For me it did nothing. It stayed cold glass under my palm. The mana in the room didn't react to me at all.

I stood there for ten seconds sweating and trying to force something to happen.

"Null reading," Valerius said as he wrote something on his holographic tablet. "Sit down Mr. Royce. Perhaps you should consider the history track since practical application seems beyond you."

Some of the students giggled as I walked back to my seat with my face burning. They don't understand that I am not just bad at magic. I am empty. I am from a world where we built machines to do what they do with a wave of their hand. And because I don't have a Link I am basically disabled in their eyes.

But it is worse than just failing a class. The Mid Term Assessment is next week and it is a mandatory practical exam. If I can't demonstrate a Link I fail. If I fail I get expelled.

And here is the kicker about this world because the government requires everyone to be in the Academy to have citizenship. No Academy means no ID card. No ID card means I am a stray and strays get deported to the Wastelands.

I heard stories about the Wastelands where the wild demons eat people like snacks. I am not going to let that happen to me. That is why I have the plan.

After classes ended I went straight to the maintenance sector which is my cover. I work part time as a cleaner and repairman for the Academy infrastructure. It is a dirty job that no magic user wants to do because it involves crawling into greasy pipes. But it is perfect for me because it gives me access and keys.

I swiped my ID card at the service entrance and the heavy iron door clanked open. The air down here smelled like rust and old oil which was a relief compared to the perfume smell upstairs. I walked past the main boiler rooms and slipped into a side tunnel that wasn't on the official maps anymore.

This was my real home. Sub Reactor Bay 7 was abandoned ten years ago because of a radiation leak that turned out to be false. Nobody bothered to update the records so it is mine now. My workshop was a mess of scavenged junk that I collected over the months.

Piles of scrap metal I stole from the trash compactors and wires I pulled out of broken hover bikes. In the middle of the table under a dirty tarp was my salvation. I pulled the tarp off and looked at it.

The Apostate Gauntlet looked ugly in the dim light but I loved it. It wasn't sleek like the Zodiac weapons the elite students use. It was a bulky thing made of matte black plating that I hammered into shape myself. It had hydraulic pistons I took from a cargo loader and a nervous system made of copper wires.

It looked like a car engine welded into the shape of a glove. But the most important part was the empty socket on the back of the hand. It was a deep cylindrical hole waiting for a power source.

Batteries in this world suck because they rely on mana charging. If I used a standard mana battery it wouldn't work because I can't trigger the energy flow. I needed something that output energy constantly without needing a user to guide it. I needed something violent and self sustaining.

I needed a Demon Crystal.

I checked my watch and saw it was almost midnight. The patrols would be light at this hour. I had been watching the security patterns for three weeks. The Academy keeps captured demons in the containment vault deep under the Library wing.

They use them for study by sealing them in crystals so they can't hurt anyone. The energy inside those crystals is chaotic and deadly to anyone with a Link. If a normal mage touches raw demon energy their mana veins explode. But I don't have mana veins. I am empty space.

My theory is that if I plug a demon crystal into my suit the energy won't kill me because there is nothing inside me to react with it. I will just be a vessel for the power.

I changed into my black work jumpsuit and grabbed my tool bag. I didn't take any weapons because I don't have any. My weapon is the fact that I am invisible to their sensors.

The walk to the containment vault was tense. I stuck to the service ladders and climbed up through the walls of the Library. I could hear the hum of the protection wards buzzing in the air. The Academy security is top notch if you are a wizard.

They have mana tripwires that detect any flow of magic. If a student tries to sneak in their natural mana signature sets off the alarm instantly. They also have physical wards that repel anyone with a Link.

But I am a ghost to them. I climbed right through the mana tripwire and it didn't even flicker.

I reached the ventilation grate that looked down into the antechamber of the vault. Two stone golems were standing guard by the main blast door. They were big and carved from granite and looked impossible to move. I knew if I stepped on the floor plates they would crush me into paste.

I couldn't go through the door so I had to go through the waste disposal chute. I shimmied down a narrow pipe that smelled like chemical sludge. It was tight and scratched my shoulders and I had to hold my breath.

This chute emptied out into the disposal room right next to the vault. I kicked the grate open and fell onto the concrete floor gasping for air. I was in.