The Cursed Extra-Chapter 129: [3.2] My Teammates Include a Healer Who Sees Too Much (This Is a Problem)

Chapter 129: [3.2] My Teammates Include a Healer Who Sees Too Much (This Is a Problem)

"The best lies are the ones your body tells for you."

***

Across the staging area, Vance Thorne’s team clustered in a tight circle. Their laughter too loud. Too sharp. The sound grated on my nerves like nails on a chalkboard.

Vance caught my eye and drew his finger across his throat. Mouthed words I didn’t need to hear to understand.

His teammates snickered at my visible flinch. Elbowed each other like they’d just witnessed the height of comedy. The sun glinted off Vance’s perfectly polished armor. A testament to his family’s wealth rather than his own effort.

Still playing the wounded pride angle. Good. Stay predictable, Vance. Your arrogance makes you blind. Keep underestimating me. Keep thinking I’m nothing more than the pathetic wretch you humiliated in the plaza.

I let my gaze drop away from his. Made my submission obvious.

It cost me nothing to look weak. In fact, it bought me everything.

But it was Team Seven that drew my real attention.

Rhys stood apart from the main crowd. His father’s spear planted in the earth beside him as he spoke in low, urgent tones to his teammates. Even from this distance, I could see the tension in his shoulders. The way his free hand gestured toward the portal with short, choppy movements.

His weathered face was grim. Jaw set in a hard line. Those green eyes were hard with something that looked like equal parts grit and fear.

Petra Goldhand, a stocky girl with earth-stained fingers and the solid build of someone who’d spent her life working stone, shook her head at whatever Rhys was saying. Her brown hair was pulled back in a practical braid. Dirt was already caked under her fingernails despite the early hour.

Finn Redbrook kept glancing toward the other teams. His tracker’s instincts screamed warnings he couldn’t articulate. The kid was twitchy. All nervous energy and darting eyes.

Jorik Ironwill just stood there like a mountain. Silent. Unmovable. His massive hands rested on the haft of his war hammer. He was the biggest student in House Onyx by a significant margin. Built like someone had decided to give a boulder arms and legs.

They were scared. All of them.

And they had every right to be.

According to the original novel, Team Seven’s story ended in these warrens. A "training accident" that was anything but accidental. Vance and his cronies would corner them in the lower tunnels. When the dust settled, Rhys Blackwood would be crippled. Unable to wield a spear. Unable to send money home to his dying sister. Unable to do anything except serve as a cautionary tale for other commoners who dared to dream above their station.

Not today.

Today, we’re changing the script.

"Kaelen."

I turned to find my own team approaching.

Marcus Vellum clutched a leather-bound manual against his chest like a shield. His wire-rimmed glasses already fogged in the morning air. His thin frame seemed to shrink under the weight of his pack. He walked with the uncertain gait of someone who’d rather be in a library than a battlefield.

The kid was smart. Brilliant, even. But his idea of danger was a particularly aggressive footnote in a historical text.

Thomlin Ashworth walked beside him. Resignation written in every line of his body. His hand rested on the pommel of a sword he barely knew how to use. His expression suggested he’d already accepted whatever fate the warrens had in store.

There was a nobility to that kind of resignation, I supposed. A quiet acceptance that didn’t require hope or delusion.

And behind them both...

Seraphina Valois moved like smoke given form. Her silver hair caught light in ways that seemed almost supernatural. Every strand seemed to know exactly where it belonged. Fell in perfect cascades around a face that was beautiful in the way a scalpel was beautiful. All edges and purpose.

Those grey eyes of hers missed nothing. Not the tremor in my hands. Not the careful way I avoided looking directly at the portal. Not the beads of sweat forming on my forehead despite the cool morning air.

Seraphina Valois. The one variable I can’t fully control. The girl who sees what she shouldn’t see.

Her [Vital Sight] was a problem.

According to my knowledge, that skill let her read physical states like an open book. Heart rate. Muscle tension. Hormonal fluctuations. All the little tells that separated genuine emotion from performance.

I’d been careful around her. Modulated my responses to match the psychological profile of someone who was actually terrified.

But there were limits to how well anyone could fake physiological stress. And she was better at reading those signs than anyone else in House Onyx.

"Are you feeling alright?" she asked. Genuine concern in her voice. The kind of concern that came from someone who actually cared about the answer. "You look pale."

"I’m fine," I stammered. Let my voice crack slightly. The crack was deliberate. Too high-pitched. Too quick. The kind of verbal stumble that sold nervousness without overselling it. "Just... nervous. This is all very..."

I gestured helplessly at the portal. At the armed professors. At the general atmosphere of impending doom.

"Terrifying?" Marcus supplied. Pushed his glasses up his nose with the air of someone contributing to an academic discussion. "Because according to Harwick’s Tactical Fundamentals, the mortality rate for untested teams in hostile environments approaches—"

"Marcus," Thomlin interrupted. His voice flat. "Not helping."

"Right. Sorry." Marcus clutched his book tighter. Knuckles turned white against the worn leather cover. "I just think we should establish proper formation protocols before we—"

"Before we die horribly?" I suggested. Forced a weak smile that I hoped looked more pathetic than amused. "Maybe we should focus on the ’not dying’ part first? Just a thought. Call me crazy."

Seraphina’s lips twitched. Almost a smile, but not quite. The expression was there and gone so fast that I might have imagined it.

"Sound strategy," she said. "Though I suspect it’s easier said than done."

She was studying me again. Those grey eyes cataloged details I couldn’t afford to have cataloged. Her gaze dissected my expressions. My posture. The slight hesitation in my movements.

I need to give her something else to focus on. Something more immediate than my carefully constructed facade.

I glanced toward the portal. Let my eyes widen slightly.

"Is it supposed to do that?" I asked. Pointed at a particularly violent spark that jumped from the containment field. "Because that looks... bad. That looks really bad."

It worked.

All three of my teammates turned to look at the portal. Gave me a precious moment to school my features back into their default setting of carefully manufactured anxiety.

When they turned back, I was once again the picture of nervous inadequacy.

"Team One, enter!" Professor De Clare’s voice boomed across the staging area. The command reverberated off the stone walls with an authority that made several students flinch.

Leo’s team stepped forward as one. Their formation textbook perfect. A living illustration from the Academy’s combat manual. Each member knew their place. Their purpose. Their value to the golden boy at their center.

Leo raised his hand in farewell to the other students. That radiant smile of his bright enough to power the academy for a week. It was a benediction from on high to the lesser mortals left behind. A silent promise that he would return victorious and probably with a few new heroic deeds to add to his legend.

Then they stepped through the portal and vanished. Swallowed by the crackling darkness that seemed to hunger for their light.

The surface of the gateway rippled once. Twice. Then settled back into its ominous stillness.

Go be the hero, Leo. Go save the world and get the girl and fulfill your glorious destiny.

Just stay out of my way while I try to survive this nightmare.

And save four people you’ve never even noticed exist.