Return of the Runebound Professor - Chapter 415 (Patreon)

There were still a few hours before the meeting. If they were going to cause chaos, Noah couldn’t see that possibly happening without one particular person who seemed to be the literal embodiment of it.

They needed Lee.

It was tempting to ask Ulya to use her puppet to go get her, but the woman had been asked to be a messenger so many times that Noah actually felt a little bad about it. He needed Ulya to actually like working with them if he wanted her properly on their side.

That’s fine. She’s not the only messenger I’ve worked with.

“Mascot, you here?” Noah asked.

Ulya sent him a strange look. “Who?”

“Hold on,” Noah said, holding a hand up to forestall any questions. He glanced around the relatively empty room. There wasn’t any sign of white fur or red horns. Not yet. “Come on, Mascot. I know you’re somewhere around. You were lurking around this morning. You know something’s up.”

There was no response. Ulya looked at Moxie with a concerned expression. Noah ignored her. The cat was screwing with him. He rifled through his bag, but there wasn’t any jerky left in it. Lee had picked him clean at some point.

“Hey, do you have any food?” Noah asked.

“Here,” Moxie said, pulling a strip of jerky out of her own bag. “Is Mascot really going to go for a random piece of meat? He isn’t Lee.”

Noah shrugged in response, taking the jerky from her and waving it around in the air above his head like a flag. “Only one way to find out. Come on, Mascot. I need you to help mess some shit up.”

Ulya’s eyes widened. A ripple of energy tickled Noah’s domain and he glanced over his shoulder as a purple disk yawned open – well within the reaches of his domain. Mascot popped out, bounding off his shoulder and snagging the jerky from his hand.

The fluffy cat landed on the table across from him and turned in a circle to stare into his eyes, the strip of jerky slowly disappearing into his mouth.

“What in the Damned Plains?” Ulya asked. “That was the cat I was petting!”

He went right through my domain. Point taken, you little bugger. You’re still somehow stronger than I am. Where in the world did you come from? Are you really just a manifestation of the Fragment of Renewal?

Mascot meowed and licked his paw. A flicker of annoyance passed through his red eyes and his tail thumped against the table impatiently.

“I think you should tell him what you want,” Moxie suggested. “Preferably before he pisses over the tablecloth.”

“I was hoping you could get Lee for me. The rest of the students as well, if possible,” Noah told Mascot. “We’re going to be causing some chaos in the meeting today. I figure you already knew that, though.”

“How would a cat know anything?” Ulya asked, squinting at Mascot. “What kind of monster is that?”

Mascot sank into a portal that formed in the table, vanishing without a trace. It was impossible to tell if he’d decided to comply with Noah’s request or not. Something told Noah that the cat would do as he asked – there was nothing Mascot enjoyed more than chaos.

“An odd one,” Noah replied. “Be grateful. Now you don’t have to go run and find her yourself. I figured you were fed up running errands for other people.”

“You summoned a monster with Space Runes purely so I wouldn’t have to run off and deliver the message myself?” A flicker of appreciation passed through Ulya’s features. “I can’t tell if you’re supremely lazy or just trying to make sure you stay on my good side.”

Noah gave her an unabashed shrug. “I treat the people on my side well. Can’t say the same for everyone else. Now, we need to figure out our plan. First off – Ulya, this part is easy. Pretend you don’t give a shit about us.”

“That should be easy.”

“I figured,” Noah said with a wry grin. “Moxie, I think your best role is the one you normally play.”

“And that is?”

“Mediator. Between Lee and I, there will be enough of a shitshow to make everyone think we’re all insane. We need something that keeps us grounded. That’ll be you.”

“Oh. That is my normal role.”

“Which is what I said. In the meantime, Lee and I will keep literally everyone’s attention so occupied that there won’t even be a chance for Marley to try to challenge Emily properly.” Noah chewed his lower lip. There were a lot of ways he could cause chaos. He didn’t want to go so far as to completely go overboard, though. “Are there any things we should make sure not to do, Ulya?”

“That is a very broad and concerning question. What do you mean?”

“I can’t imagine people are going to like us much after this, but I want to make sure we don’t go so far that we get kicked out of the program,” Noah said. “Are they going to lose their shit at the slightest indecency like most nobles?”

Ulya thought for a second before shaking her head. “No. Everyone in this program is a warrior. They’ll be more hardened and difficult to throw off than average mages. As long as you don’t kill anyone or make a complete mockery of yourselves, you’ll be fine. They respect ability above all else.”

“Perfect.” Noah rubbed his hands together. “Then all we have to do is wait for the others to arrive.”

“Assuming Mascot actually went to get them,” Moxie put in.

“Yeah. Assuming that.”

***

Lee and the students showed up just about twenty minutes later. There was no sign of Mascot with them, but there was no doubt in Noah’s mind that the cat was lurking nearby, waiting to throw his own wrench into the system.

“Mascot led us over here,” Lee said, glancing around the empty room. “Is something going on? I didn’t think the advanced track meeting started for a while.”

“Yeah,” Noah said with a nod. He gestured for them to all gather closer, then filled them in on everything that had gone down since the meeting with Verrud. There was no need to hide information from any of them, and they all deserved to know what they were up against.

Emily didn’t look too surprised at their findings. Determination etched itself into her features and, once Noah had finished with his debrief, she gave him a nod.

“I won’t lose to Marley. I can hold my own.”

“This isn’t just about that.” Noah’s eyes drifted over to Isabel, who met them with a knowing look. She’d known what was up the moment he’d mentioned that the Herron family was involved. “It’s about all of us. And, fortunately, I have a plan. I’ll need everyone’s help to pull it off, though.”

“What is it?” Lee asked.

“Well – you just do what you normally do,” Noah said. “As for the rest of us, we’ll be executing operation protect the president.”

“What’s a president?” Todd asked.

Noah grimaced. “Just don’t let anyone get near Emily. I don’t care what you do. Challenge them, trip and spill your drink over their face, whatever. Focus on zoning off the other students. Let me handle any adults that try their hand.”

A smile stretched across Todd’s face. “Seriously? We’re just going to make a mockery of all the nobles?”

“Pretty much,” Noah said. “Keep all the attention you can possibly get on yourselves – but don’t be stupid about it. We want to look like rowdy idiots, not complete morons. Well… most of us. I might give myself some exceptions.”

“Of course you would,” Moxie muttered under her breath, but she couldn’t hide her grin.

“Above all else, make sure that nobody from the Torrin or Herron families can get near Emily,” Noah said. “Isabel, you stick close to her the entire time. You’ll be our emergency line of defense.”

And that’ll indirectly keep you protected from anyone after you as well. I’m not going to reveal your Master Rune to everyone if you haven’t chosen to do it yourself, but I don’t know how long you’re going to be able to keep that secret.

“Wouldn’t it be wiser for us to just not attend this meeting?” James asked. He was paying more attention than usual. There wasn’t a single trace of weariness in his sharp eyes. “It could be dangerous for Emily.”

“Everything is dangerous,” Noah replied. “And Emily’s enemies aren’t going to vanish because she leaves the program. It’ll just give them more ways to disparage her. It’s not enough for us to drift by. If we meet them head on, then they’ll be more predictable. If we don’t, then who knows what they’ll try. This gives us a chance to take the fight into our own hands.”

Also, weaponized incompetence isn’t exactly a direct offensive maneuver. If we book it, then Verrud is going to suspect something is up. If we just blunder everything so badly that they can’t get past us, they’re going to think that we’re idiots that messed their plans up on accident.

James’ eyes narrowed. “I see. I’ll do my part, then.”

“What are you going to do, fall asleep on them?” Emily asked with a laugh. Her smile fell away and she gave James an appreciative nod, her cheeks coloring. “Thank you, everyone. It feels a little awkward to bring you all in like this. It’s not your problem.”

“Yes it is,” Isabel said, her jaw setting.

“It is training,” Alexandra said with a one-shouldered shrug. “It will be useful to test ourselves against people who have been in the advanced track for a while. We’ll be able to get a good understanding of where we stand against them.”

“And if you mess with one of us, you mess with all of us,” Todd finished. “I wish we had more time to prepare. I would have been able to cook up something else for this.”

“We’ll have more meetings in the future that we have to deal with,” Noah said. “You’ll have time to prepare for those. For the time being, just stick with our very loose plan. Let me and Moxie handle the stronger opponents. And, if worse comes to worst, look to Ulya for help.”

“Hold on. I didn’t agree to anything,” Ulya said.

Noah raised an eyebrow. “Are you with us or not? Right now, all you have to do is stand around in the corners and hope you don’t have to do any work. I’m not asking you to challenge Verrud yourself. Just stick around to back us up if we need it. You won’t be the only emergency fallback we’ve got.”

Ulya let out a huff. “Fine. Just don’t expect me to be able to go up against the other advanced track professors without the rest of my puppets. I don’t want my last one getting destroyed as well.”

“A little distraction is all we’ll need. I can handle the rest. Now, let’s all get out of here and wait around at the entrance of the meeting room like a bunch of lost idiots. It’ll help set the scene when the others arrive.”

“I’ve never crashed a party before,” Alexandra said. She hesitated for a moment and her cheeks colored. “Is it strange that I’m looking forward to this?”

“No, that’s just the Teacherman rubbing off on you,” Todd replied. “You should have been there for the first exam we had last year.”

“We’ll just have to strive to make sure today is just as interesting,” Noah said. “Come on, kids. Out we go. I like the way Alexandra put it. We’ve got a party to crash.”