Charisma 100: My Academy Life As A Heartbreaking Commoner-Chapter 235: A Calm, Reasonable Debate On The Use Of Forbidden Magic

Chapter 235: A Calm, Reasonable Debate On The Use Of Forbidden Magic

"ARREST HER!"

The black-green residue was still fading from Aegis’s fingers when the shouting started.

Evangeline had gotten to her feet. Her dress was torn at the sleeve, her hair was a mess, and she had a cut on her forehead that was bleeding down the side of her face, but none of that stopped her from pointing a shaking finger straight at Aegis.

"That woman just used shadow magic! Guards, seize her!"

Captain Renn looked at Aegis. Then he looked at Evangeline. Then he looked back at Aegis, and Aegis could tell from his expression that the man was doing some very quick math in his head about who he actually worked for.

"Your Grace," he started, "the situation is still—"

"I don’t care about the situation! She is a shadow mage! That is a capital offense under Valdrian law!"

From the back of the hall, Sister Mirabel stepped forward. She had a bit of glass in her hair and her white robes were stained with someone else’s blood, but her eyes were locked on Aegis with the kind of intensity that only a woman who had been salivating for this exact moment could produce.

"The Duchess is correct," Mirabel said. Her voice was calm, measured, and cold. "What Lady Starcaller just performed was, without any room for doubt, forbidden magic. I have sensed traces of it on her for some time now. This confirms it."

[Well. Shit.]

Aegis opened her mouth, but before she could get a single word out, Talia moved.

The princess stepped in front of Aegis, ice spear still in her hand, and faced her mother. Her yellow eyes were hard and her jaw was set and she looked, honestly, like she was about two seconds away from pointing that spear at Evangeline herself.

"You’re not touching her."

"Talia, step aside. This is a legal mat—"

"She just saved your life." Talia’s voice didn’t waver. "That assassin was about to put a dagger in my back, and she stopped him. If she hadn’t done what she did, I’d be dead on this floor right now. So no, Mother, I am not stepping aside, and you are not arresting my wife."

The word "wife" hung in the air for a moment.

Evangeline’s mouth opened, then closed, then opened again. She looked like she wanted to say about fifteen different things at once and couldn’t settle on any of them.

Aegis took the opportunity.

She had to get ahead of this if she was gonna keep her head on her shoulders, after all.

DIALOGUE OPTIONS

1. "I’ve been training to fight these people." [JUSTIFY]

2. "Arrest me, then. See how that plays out politically." [THREATEN]

3. "I learned shadow magic to protect Talia." [EMOTIONAL APPEAL]

4. "Your Grace, can we discuss this like adults?" [DEFLECT]

[Option one. Keep it simple, keep it honest. Well, honest-ish.]

"I’m not going to stand here and pretend that didn’t happen," Aegis said. She lowered her hand and flexed her fingers a few times to shake the last of the residue off. "Everyone saw it. I used shadow magic. That’s true."

A murmur went through the crowd. A few nobles shifted on their feet. One guard tightened his grip on his sword.

"But I’d like to point out something," Aegis continued, and she turned to address the room rather than just Evangeline. "These assassins targeted this wedding specifically. My wedding. To a member of House Stone. This is the second time people like this have come after Talia. The first was at the Autumn Gala, and I stopped that one too, though I didn’t have to use shadow magic that time because I got lucky."

She paused and let that sit for a second. Talia glanced back at her.

"She’s right," Talia said. "I’d been attacked back then and she stepped in and helped."

"After that attack," Aegis kept going, "I started training. Not because I wanted to break the law, but because whoever is sending these people isn’t going to stop, and regular magic wasn’t going to cut it. These are shadow mages. They use forbidden techniques. And the only reliable way to fight shadow magic is with shadow magic."

"That is not—" Mirabel started.

"Sister Mirabel, with all due respect, your divine magic didn’t stop those assassins from getting through the windows tonight." Aegis said it as gently as she could, which, admittedly, wasn’t very gentle. "Mine did."

Mirabel’s jaw tightened but she didn’t respond.

To be totally honest, Aegis was bullshitting.

This "fight fire with fire" thing was absolutely not the only way to fight shadow magic. The game itself was proof. But, it didn’t matter. What mattered was that, for at least the next ten minutes, these people thought it was.

[Come on, 100 Charisma. If this stat is worth ANYTHING, this will work.]

Aegis turned back to Evangeline.

"Your Grace, I understand your concern. I do. Shadow magic is illegal for good reasons. But right now, at this very moment, the only reason your daughter is alive is because I broke that law. And the only reason you’re alive is because Talia was standing over you with an ice spear. So maybe, just maybe, we could table the arrest and focus on figuring out who just tried to kill everyone in this room."

Silence. A long one.

Then, from somewhere in the middle of the crowd, some guy muttered:

"She’s got a point."

Aegis didn’t see who said it, but she could have kissed him. Tongue and all.

A few other voices followed. Not loud, not bold, just quiet murmurs of agreement trickling through the crowd.

"She did save the princess."

"Those were shadow mages, weren’t they?"

"What was she supposed to do, let the girl die?"

Evangeline’s eye twitched. Aegis counted the twitch. That was at least the third time she’d seen the Duchess do that, and she was starting to think it was involuntary.

"This is not a debate," Evangeline said, but her voice had lost some of its edge. She could hear the room shifting, and she wasn’t stupid. Arresting the woman who had just saved her daughter, and arguably saved her own life, in front of five hundred witnesses who were still shaking glass out of their hair? That was the kind of move that made headlines for all the wrong reasons.

"Then let’s not make it one," Aegis offered. "I’m not going anywhere. I’m not running. If the Noble Consortium wants to investigate my training, that’s fine. Monitor me, put a leash on me, whatever makes you comfortable. But arresting me tonight, after what just happened? That’s not justice. That’s politics."

Something then came to Aegis’s mind.

"In fact," Aegis turned back toward Sister Mirabel. "We have a highly capable divine magic user here. Sister Mirabel."

She stepped closer.

"You should be able to sense corruption building up within a shadow magic user, right?"

"Of course," Sister Mirabel replied.

"Well," Aegis spread her arms out in a "search me" type gesture. "Go ahead. If I’m lying, all you’ll see is the aether of a regular shadow mage, right? Try it."

Sister Mirabel was baffled. Surely, she thought Aegis was bluffing. Either that or Aegis was serving up her own head on a platter.

She played along. Sister Mirabel walked forward, closed her eyes, and a white aura encapsulated her hands.

Aegis could feel it. Maybe. It was something like a warmth moving from one part of her body to another, finally coming to rest at her heart.

Finally, Mirabel stopped.

Another long silence ensued.

Evangeline looked at Mirabel. Mirabel’s expression hadn’t changed, but she was clenching a fist by her side.

She stared back at Aegis. Suspicion, disbelief, multiple emotions warred behind her eyes, clearly.

Then, almost through gritted teeth, she said:

"She’s right. Her corruption is minimal. Likely the result of casting that one spell."

Aegis held back a grin.

[Thank you, Nazraya, for getting rid of my built-up corruption yesterday. Holy shit, I did not think I’d need it, but I’m glad I listened when you offered.]

It had been casual. A simple "darling, would you like to do some purification or can it wait?" And Aegis wondered what the timeline in which she answered "nah" looked like right now.

That Aegis was probably on the floor, headless.

Evangeline looked at Sister Mirabel. Sister Mirabel shook her head.

Evangeline then looked at Talia. Talia didn’t move.

Evangeline looked at the crowd, at the broken glass on the floor, at the bodies being dragged away by guards, and at the five hundred people who were all watching her decide what to do next.

"Fine," Evangeline said, and the word sounded like it physically hurt her to say. "Lady Starcaller will not be arrested tonight. But she will be placed under formal observation by the Noble Consortium, effective immediately. As... altruistic as your use of Shadow Magic was, it is still forbidden. Thus, while this instance will be overlooked, any further use of forbidden magic will result in your immediate arrest. Is that understood?"

"Perfectly," Aegis said.

"... This matter is not resolved," she said, a lot quieter, for Aegis’s ears mainly.

"I didn’t think it was."

Evangeline turned and walked away. Her guards followed. Mirabel watched Aegis for a few more seconds, her eyes still narrow, before she turned and left too.

Talia let out a breath and the ice spear in her hand dissolved into mist. She looked at Aegis sideways.

"Shadow magic?" She whispered.

"Yeah."

"We’re going to talk about that."

"I figured."

"Later."

"Yeah."

Talia looked at her for another moment, and then she reached over and took Aegis’s hand. The hand that had just been covered in black-green magic about five minutes ago. She held it anyway.

The Umbral Blade had just made the biggest mistake of their lives by attacking her on her wedding day.

[You want a war? Fine. Let’s have a war.]