The night was a heavy, suffocating cloak that draped over the academy grounds, a chill sinking into the stones beneath Quinn's boots as he walked Emilia back to her dorm. The air hung with a weight that neither of them could dispel, not even after a hundred questions exchanged between them.
"What were those things?" Emilia asked, hands wrapped tightly around her waist as though trying to keep herself from falling apart. "Those monsters... they weren't just mindless beasts, were they? They felt like... like something controlled."
Quinn remained silent. How could he explain it when he didn't understand it himself?
"And who could possibly be powerful enough to summon them? And why?" she pressed, her voice tight, panicked.
"How can we break something we don't even know?" Quinn muttered, staring at the moon's ghostly glow through the gaps in the leaves.
Emilia's lips quivered. "Are we even strong enough to do anything about this? We're just students, Quinn. Just students."
