Chapter 360: Ice
Early the next morning, a parchment scroll arrived with Roland.
“What is it?”
“A contract. Leave your fingerprint and you’ll be an official member of the Witch Union.”
Agatha unrolled it and read carefully. Then she looked up. “That’s all?”
“Hm?” He seemed genuinely puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“The restrictions are useless.” She pointed to the section labeled Services. “It says witches may not betray Border Town unless the terms of mutual agreement are violated — but there’s no enforcement mechanism. A witch who wanted to break this could do so without any pressure whatsoever. And the wording is so loose it barely qualifies as legal language.” She looked at him. “Is this actually a contract?”
“I wrote it fairly casually. It’s more of a formality.” The prince nodded without any particular surprise, which told her she was not the first person to find the loopholes. “A formality full of loopholes,” she confirmed inwardly.
Still, she pressed her thumb to the ink pad and left her print.
There were almost no requirements on either side. After reading the articles twice, she couldn’t identify a meaningful difference between her life before signing and after. Formally unnecessary, perhaps — but the moment the ink dried, something loosened in her chest that she hadn’t been aware was tight.
She had said she would work alongside mortals. She knew perfectly well that the gray-haired man — Roland — was the Union’s real leader. If she had been required to serve him the way she had served the Union, or the way she had once deferred to the Three Chiefs, she couldn’t have agreed. But this — this was latitude. This was space.
She could live with this.
Roland set the contract aside. “What were the restrictions in Taquila’s contracts?”
“Those were for recruiting mortals. Penalties were corporal punishment and mental coercion.” She gave a small, ironic twist of the mouth. “As for witches — there were no contracts. You joined the Union for life. Betrayal meant death, and everyone knew it.”
“Noted.” He cleared his throat. “Welcome to the Witch Union, then. After breakfast, come to the castle garden. I need to assess your ability in full.”
The assessment was simpler than she expected.
The castle garden was bare in winter — dead stalks in their beds, the fountain frozen over, the stone path dusted with a fine grey snow that hadn’t been swept yet. Her breath came out in small clouds. Roland had set up a table near the south wall where the wind broke, and sat there with his notebook and ink as though weather was a minor inconvenience.
All she had to do was demonstrate every characteristic of her power in sequence, while he recorded the results and asked questions.
“The form of your magic is a sky-blue pentagonal prism. Medium level, summon category. Your ability has evolved once. Initial state: generating low temperature. Post-evolution: freezing at normal ambient temperature — a very practical ability.” He looked up from his notes. “How did the evolution happen?”
“Constant practice, and then a sudden moment of clarity.” She let herself sit a little straighter with it. She had been called the Genius of Taquila by every member of the Union, the youngest High Awakened on record. “Every day I pushed myself to lower the temperature further, trying to freeze water instantly. Then one day, I watched a witch manipulate flame to melt a piece of lead — and as it heated, the lead began to boil.”
“The image stayed with me. I realized: everything has three states — gaseous, liquid, solid. Lead is solid at room temperature, but at high enough heat it becomes a gas. Water is liquid, but cool it enough and it becomes ice. So for things that are gaseous at normal temperature — could they freeze, too, if the temperature fell low enough? The same way the lead had?”
The idea had rewritten her understanding of her own power in the span of one afternoon.
“The moment I formed that thought, I felt the magic change throughout my whole body. That was my evolution.” She met his eyes. “The insight was recorded in the General Principles. I was the youngest witch whose evolution was ever documented there. All three of the Chiefs praised it — it’s been used ever since to guide other witches toward evolution. It’s a significant contribution to our research.”
She had said this aloud rarely, and each time she said it, she waited for some corresponding recognition.
Roland nodded. “I see.” He made a note. “What is the General Principles?”
She stared at him.
“You’re not surprised? At all?” The words came out sharper than she intended. “Gas is everywhere. It has no weight, no visible form. And it can become water, become ice. The same substance — three entirely different states.”
“That’s ordinary chemistry. There are many kinds of gases, and each has its own boiling and melting point. Why would that be surprising?” He shrugged. “It’s covered in the first unit of Natural Science Theoretical Foundation.”
”…” Two deep breaths. “Then I will read it. Carefully.”
“The General Principles —”
“It records the experiences of High Awakened witches during their evolutions,” she said, with barely controlled dignity. “But since abilities differ entirely between witches, the records are difficult to learn from by imitation. It can’t compare to your textbook. I understand that now.” She paused. “I was being arrogant.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“I’m not sure I follow what upset you.” He looked genuinely uncertain.
“It doesn’t matter.” She folded her hands in her lap. “Move on.”
“Alright.” He appeared to recognize that prolonging the topic would not serve either of them. “You mentioned that abilities differ between individual witches — does that mean among the thousands who passed through the Union, no two ever shared the same ability?”
“Correct.” She found firmer footing here. “The Quest Society’s position is that the form of magic power determines the ability, and no two witches have ever had the same form.”
“But when you first saw Anna, you identified it immediately as fire control.”
“An informal category — useful shorthand, nothing more. Abilities that generate light and heat can all be grouped as fire control at the elementary level. But as magic develops — through use, through consolidation, through High Awakening — similar abilities diverge significantly. Even among witches with the same initial classification, one might excel at temperature control, another at generating volume, another at projecting fire outward. Differences exist even between witches who appear similar. They simply require careful observation to find.” She paused. “The Quest Society’s categorization was more formal, and closer to yours.”
“Also three categories?”
“Four. The main difference is in the summoning type. The Quest Society divided it into two: Magic Power and Shaping. You can understand the difference from the names.”
“Magic Power requires continuous expenditure — like Anna’s. When the power is exhausted, the ability stops. Shaping can persist indefinitely — like the coating Soroya paints, which holds long after she’s stopped actively using magic.”
“I don’t know Soroya’s exact ability, but that’s essentially right. Anything that can persist without continuous expenditure would be classified as Shaping. My freezing is Shaping — it doesn’t require me to maintain it once the temperature drops.”
“Understood.” He finished the note and set down the pen. “That’s everything for the assessment. Normally, when there’s no assignment from me, your time is your own — practice as you see fit. But I think there may be someone who needs your help urgently.”
“Who?”
“Kyle Sichi. Border Town’s Chief Alchemist.”