Chapter 562
When they came back and met at the diner after escorting the spies they found trapped in their rooms to the academy’s security department, Jason, Caroline and Laura went back to the diner and were about to continue with their meal.
“Mason? You’ve got the people working for the same guy?” Caroline asked while tearing up a small piece of bread on her plate: “Any idea who this guy is? I don’t recall hearing about anyone with this name.”
“Same here.” Jason nodded then turned to Laura Jensen, who seemed to be very quiet and had a lot on her mind: “Laura, what about you? Do you know anything about this ‘Mason’ guy?”
“Huh? Sorry - I wasn’t paying full attention.” Lauran Jensen seemed startled by the question, then she apologized and asked: “What was your question?”
“Are you okay? You seemed pretty occupied and … worried.” Jason held Laura Jensen by the shoulder and asked: “Is this about the Hellinger thing?”
“Shh!” Laura Jensen immediately made a “shush” gesture: “Don’t talk about this name this loudly! It’s kinda taboo!”
“Taboo? Why?” Caroline raised her eyebrows: “Sounds juicy as hell, please tell me more.”
“Well, let’s just call it ‘that family’. You know, so that we don’t get weird eyes around here.” Laura Jensen looked around and said with a lowered voice: “And - you know that thing I told you about my family, the connection to something unsavory? Many ‘prestigious’ families who have students attending here, or people working for the academy also have their own connections to what happened. ”
“Wait a minute, speaking of which - am I crazy? Or are you being watched and followed?” Jason looked around and asked with a frown and lowered voice: “I saw some of the same people hanging around here in different places, which is kinda abnormal. If they were watching me or Caroline, we’d feel it. Plus I can’t think of any reasons they should be watching us like that.”
“Oh, that, unfortunately, yes. Because of the whole - you know, Camile, one of my older cousins, turning out to be a spy incident, and a multi-agent if you could believe it.” Laura Jensen sighed: “Distant as the relationship may be, it still puts a lot of suspicion on us Jensens. Most members of my family escaped and went home during the battle against that monster, and the rest of us were stuck here for now. And to make things worse, because of what she did, all of the Jensens are under some kind of surveillance, while our family negotiates with the academy about the terms of our release.”
“That sounds awfully invasive.” Jason frowned.
“Yeah, yeah, if you learn about the history of the academy then you won’t be surprised.” Laura Jensen laid out her hands and said: “But - to get back to what we were saying about ‘that family’ - it’s a dark incident that not many of us don’t talk about. And by ‘us’ I mean those of us who grew up in this part of the magical world. Because that family used to be very influential, wealthy and powerful, then one day, due to some reason that was still kept secret to many, multiple other powerful and wealthy families conspired together and formed an alliance, then they launched an all out assault on that family, completely wiping that family out from existence. From the little information I heard, it was a brutal and bloody act, the families that took part in that assault sustained a lot of losses as well. There was a wave of ‘abnormal deaths’ among some of the older generation of mages and wizards a few decades back, my theory is that’s related to the injuries, sickness and curses those who went there brought back with them.”
“Let me guess - the family was wiped out, and many of its possessions and riches were divvied up and collected by those families.” Caroline sighed: “And that’s what you found in your family collection.”
“Yeah.” Laura Jensen sighed and laid back in her chair: “Now you know. And - I didn’t know that this ‘codex’ that brought you so much trouble was connected to the Hellingers. If only we knew earlier.”
“But you shouldn’t feel guilty about this - sounds like something the older generations of your family did.” Jason said, in an attempt to lighten Laura Jensen’s mood: “You haven’t done anything wrong. And the fact that you are feeling concerned about the connection says a lot about your character.”
“Thanks Jason.” Laura Jensen smiled.
“So, Laura, can you tell me a little more about you? Since I heard about you from Jason, and I would really like to know you better, in person. ” Caroline felt that the topics were a bit too heavy and decided to segue to another.
Jason nodded at Caroline and gave her a thumb up without letting Laura Jensen see it.
“Hehe, and thank you as well, Caroline.” Laura Jensen shook her head: “Well, where to start? I like researching arrays, I like to play duel and spar, and I have spent a few years in Europe, interestingly, auditing in different magical academies there.”
“Oh! Cool! How are the European academies?” Jason immediately asked: “Are they like the ones depicted in the movies?”
“Well, not all of them. But magical castles are a common theme, if you think the castle of the Hellbruck House and Martin House are impressive, you should take a look at their castles.” Laura Jensen answered with a bright smile: “One of them literally built their castle on the flat bottom of a floating rock, and everything was hanging from above, connected by wires and magical threads, even the entire castle building. They built an array at the base to alleviate the buildit’s weight and to prevent people from accidentally falling down.”
“That sounds… very expensive.” Jason scratched his jaw.
“Ha, as it turns out, not as expensive as you might think. They used some very neat tricks of space magic and earth magic to minimize the gravity, thus saving the cost of levitating arrays to keep the castle building floating.”
Right at this very moment, a portal with purple and light blue edges occurred on the now heavily damaged Anderson Plaza of the Grant Academy, and through which came Josephine Wong and Glenda Grimes.