The Villain Professor's Second Chance-Chapter 654: Thesis and Credits (3)

Somehow, unbelievably, she scraped by with a 74. A hair's breadth above failure—just enough to dodge academic probation. But that grade carried the unmistakable stench of near-disaster, broadcasting that she was a "second-semester overreach." She recalled the sympathetic glances from older students who'd heard rumors of her meltdown during finals. Even her own roommate had tiptoed around her, offering tea laced with mild calming wards.

And yet, for all the frustration, for all the nights her eyes burned from reading cramped marginalia, she couldn't stop thinking about the things Draven had said in those lectures. Or, more precisely, the way he said them. His words, cool and measured, hinted at underlying truths deeper than the syllabus could fully capture. He spoke as though the world was layered in illusions upon illusions, and only by dissecting the fundamental nature of spells could one begin to see the threads tying everything together. Each session felt like a glimpse into how broad magic truly was, how the typical illusions and single-spell castings taught in standard courses barely scratched the surface.

But here was the secret: that wasn't even the only class she had taken with him. She'd voluntarily signed up for two more: Mana and Intent in Sequential Constructs and a half-semester elective called Theory of Arcane Dissonance. Both had been optional. Neither was easy. Both had tested her patience and sanity. Yet she came back, like a moth to a flame, half-hoping she'd finally be the student to corner Draven in a rhetorical argument, to see that cryptic calm break. She never succeeded.

Originally, she never meant to be "one of Draven's students." She had no illusions about forging a mentor-mentee bond with a cold, distant professor. In fact, when she first saw him, the dryness of his gaze and the cutting calm in his tone reminded her painfully of her father. Her father—the same man who'd dismissed her every dream of exploring illusions, claiming it was a waste of intellect. The same father who left her with a raw need to prove, to the entire world, that she wasn't just a mediocre nobody, that her passion for improbable spells was valid. Draven's own reputation as a merciless critic struck an angry chord in her, as if she'd seen a ghost from her own household.

So when the rumor spread that "Draven's new advanced course is open," she'd pounced on the chance. Not from curiosity or ambition—she'd had simpler classes lined up. But from spite. She'd pictured waltzing into the classroom, besting Draven at his own game, then reveling in the collective shock. She'd deliver a perfect final paper, a demonstration of arcane synergy so jaw-dropping even his distant mask would falter. She'd see that glimmer of acknowledgment—Look, Father, I can make even the scariest professor bend. Something about humiliating a man so reminiscent of her father felt vindicating. Like she'd be rewriting her own past on a bigger stage.

It hadn't worked out that way.

Sure, she walked in that first day with her chin high, ignoring the older students' apprehensive stares. She'd settled into a seat near the front, arms folded, defiant. She'd all but dared Draven to pick her out and try to break her confidence. However, Draven hadn't singled her out. He hadn't singled out anyone, in fact. His gaze swept across the lecture hall with that frigid neutrality, and he'd said, "Let's begin," diving into multi-layered synergy so complicated that half the room was lost within ten minutes.

Amberine found herself feverishly scribbling notes, not because she wanted to prove him wrong, but because she had to keep up. The illusions of grandeur—I'll tear him down—began to crumble under the crush of reality. She spent each lecture more obsessed with the material than with her petty vendetta, pulled along by the unstoppable current of new insights. She started staying after class not to confront him with witty retorts, but to clarify obscure references. He'd answer in that clipped, indifferent tone, but every word held the seeds of further revelations, intangible threads that led deeper into magic's labyrinth.

And then, perhaps worst of all, she discovered she was learning from him, the man she'd wanted to humiliate. She caught glimpses of a bigger world—something beyond her father's scorn, beyond the superficial illusions typical of second-semester novices. Draven's criticisms, harsh as they were, forced her to refine her approach, question her assumptions. She started devouring advanced texts just to keep pace. By the time her final project was due, she was so overwhelmed that she almost forgot she'd once tried to sabotage him, or watch him squirm. All that remained was the fear that she'd fail spectacularly, losing face in front of the entire advanced mage community.

She ended up scraping by—a 74. "Barely passing," the transcripts said. Some part of her was mortified. Another part felt relieved. But the biggest surprise? She realized she wasn't done. She still wanted to know more. Even if it meant subjecting herself to Draven's relentless standards again, even if it meant re-fighting old battles with her father's shadow. She despised how enthralling it was, how the complexities of layered spells set her mind ablaze in ways no simpler class had done. She despised that Draven had effectively overshadowed her petty feud.

But it hadn't worked out that way.

Somewhere between Draven's third lecture and her fifth failed annotation draft, Amberine's grand revenge plan had quietly dissolved, like ink washed away by a sudden downpour. At first, she hadn't even noticed the shift—she was too absorbed in the labyrinthine complexity of his course. Each new concept he introduced was like a door opening into yet another corridor of arcane theory, each corridor leading to more hidden rooms stuffed with unwieldy tomes and half-forgotten spells. She realized, belatedly, that the hatred she'd stoked so carefully, that vision of humiliating him in front of the entire faculty, had been drowned by her own fascination.

She remembered the precise moment she felt that hatred falter. It wasn't a dramatic epiphany—no single grand event or emotional meltdown. Instead, it happened during office hours, well after dusk, in a corner of the old library annex. The walls were lined with volumes so ancient that many bore no titles, just cryptic runes pressed into peeling leather. She had marched in intending to debate him—to corner him with a rhetorical flourish that would prove him arrogant, incompetent, or at least misguided. She was armed with a half-dozen references, her adrenaline thrumming. But as soon as he looked up from his desk and gave her that cool, unblinking once-over, her mind went embarrassingly blank.

He'd said, "So, you have questions?" in a voice that managed to be as neutral as a snowfall—and just as frigid. Somehow, that tone cut through her bravado. She found herself asking about layering synergy in multi-affinity spells, not because she wanted to verbally spar, but because she genuinely needed to know. The question tumbled from her lips, halting at first, then rushing out in a torrent of confusion. She could still recall the faint flicker of acknowledgment in Draven's gaze—a distant interest, as though he recognized that she wasn't there just to posture.

From that point on, her visits to his office hours became less about proving him wrong and more about gleaning every ounce of insight he could spare. She was still intimidated, of course. She'd walk in with a shaky determination, sometimes forgetting to eat dinner, a flurry of parchment scrawled with half-legible runic expansions tucked under her arm. There, she'd stand in the hushed corridor, building the courage to knock on the old oak door, the one with an elegant silver plaque reading "Professor D. von Drakhan." Inside, he'd be hunched over a stack of dissertations, red pen in hand, posture unwaveringly perfect.

And yet, no matter how scathing his critique, no matter how many times he said, "This is substandard for an advanced mage," she found she couldn't muster real resentment. Instead, she found herself craving the clarity he brought. His words cut through illusions—both literal and figurative—revealing where her arguments wobbled, where her logic fell into lazy leaps. He'd pinpoint a contradiction in her essay with ruthless precision, then watch her unravel it with a numb mixture of dread and relief. It was maddening, humiliating, and weirdly thrilling.

She let out a breath of wry amusement now, recalling how naive she'd been with her revenge fantasies. How many times had she daydreamed about humiliating him in front of an entire lecture hall, brandishing the perfect rebuttal or conjuring a mind-blowing demonstration that would force him to acknowledge her brilliance? Instead, she found herself chasing the ideas, not the man. Getting lost in the mechanics of mana loops, the paradoxes of layered spells, the maddening intricacies of theoretical resonance—those were the real captures of her heart.

Standing in the corridor, ledger in hand, she thought back to the first time she'd realized she was behind on Draven's coursework. It had been a random Tuesday night. She'd emerged from the library basement with ink-stained fingertips, her eyes burning from the stale glow of mage-lamps that never flickered. The weight of the texts in her satchel had almost dislocated her shoulder. She'd paused halfway across the campus courtyard to watch an astronomy demonstration overhead—illusionary constellations swirling in the sky—and in that moment, she recognized she was more excited about rewriting her "failed annotation draft" than she was about proving any personal vendetta. She'd stared at the illusions overhead, a swirl of cosmic colors, and thought: I want to understand everything about these layered illusions, not just undermine him. That epiphany made her stomach knot, because it hinted that her father's specter wasn't the real reason she was pushing herself. Her hatred had been overshadowed by genuine curiosity and a thirst for mastery.

She sighed, muttering under her breath as her gaze flicked back to the lines in her ledger:

"What kind of second-semester idiot takes a lecture meant for battle-scarred fifth-years... and then considers doing it again?"

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