Chapter 3

The door clicked shut behind the servant, leaving me alone with the newcomer in a silence that felt different from the oppressive quiet of the council chamber. This was the kind of silence that held potential, like the moment before lightning splits the sky.

Liora, huh?

She didn't bow or fawn like the others who had paraded through my presence today. There was no scraping deference, no nervous energy radiating from her like heat from a forge.
 Instead, she walked in like she owned the place, her footsteps sure and purposeful against the stone floor. The sound echoed with quiet confidence as she dropped her satchel onto the desk with a heavy thud that spoke of substance rather than ceremony.

The leather bag landed with the weight of knowledge, and she pulled out a scroll with the practiced ease of someone who had done this a thousand times before. Her movements were economical, efficient, without wasted motion or theatrical flourish.

"You're the Sage. The one they dragged here to solve everything," she said, her voice carrying notes of amusement and exhaustion in equal measure, like a symphony played at the end of a very long day.

"Unfortunately," I replied, the word tasting bitter on my tongue.

She glanced at me then, and I found myself studying her properly for the first time. Sharp eyes that seemed to cut through pretense like a blade through silk, framed by dark circles that spoke of countless sleepless nights spent wrestling with problems that had no easy answers. She looked like someone who hadn't slept in a week and didn't particularly care about the consequences. There was something almost magnetic about her weariness, the way exhaustion had worn her down to her essential elements.

"Good," she muttered, unrolling the scroll with movements that spoke of intimate familiarity with the contents. "I don't have time for formalities, and neither do you."

"Finally. Someone who speaks my language."

That earned a slight twitch of a smirk from her, a ghost of humor that flickered across her features like candlelight in a draft. But she kept focused on the scroll, her attention laser-focused on the task at hand with the intensity of someone who had learned that survival depended on details.

"This," she said, tapping the parchment with one finger, the sound crisp and decisive, "is the kingdom's barrier schematic. The one protecting us from external attacks. You might've heard... it's failing."

I leaned in, drawn by curiosity despite myself. The parchment was aged but well-maintained, its surface smooth beneath layers of careful preservation. What I saw there made my breath catch in my throat.

Lines. Symbols. But not the mystical circles or fancy runes I had expected from a fantasy kingdom. These were grids, precise and mathematical. Coordinates laid out with engineering precision. Mathematical notation mixed with old glyphs in a hybrid language that spoke to something deep in my systems-trained mind.

The patterns were familiar, hauntingly so, like seeing a half-remembered dream rendered in ink and intention.

I blinked, understanding dawning like sunrise breaking through storm clouds.

"This looks like circuit diagrams," I muttered, almost in shock, the words escaping before I could stop them.

Liora's eyes gleamed with something that might have been triumph, bright and sharp as polished steel. "Exactly."

She looked almost excited now, like a teacher finding a student who actually gets it after years of blank stares and frustrated explanations. The transformation was remarkable, exhaustion giving way to genuine enthusiasm that made her seem younger, more alive.

"Magic here isn't waving wands or chanting spells," she explained, her voice taking on the cadence of someone who had thought about this deeply, who had wrestled with concepts until they yielded their secrets. "It's engineered. We draw formulas. Construct arrays. Everything is based on precise calculations of flow, density, and resonance. Leylines aren't 'mystical energies'... they're infrastructure. If you don't balance them, the system collapses."

The words hit me like a physical blow, reshaping everything I thought I knew about this place. The implications cascaded through my mind like dominoes falling in perfect sequence.I stared at her, processing the magnitude of what she was telling me.

"And nobody else knows this?"

"Oh, they know," she said, rolling her eyes with the particular brand of exasperation reserved for dealing with willful ignorance. "But they treat it like scripture. Memorization, not understanding. The 'high mages' just follow ancient schematics, never questioning them. They recite formulas like prayers, hoping that repetition will substitute for comprehension.""And when something breaks..."

"They panic. Because nobody actually knows how anything works anymore."

The picture was becoming clearer, painted in shades of institutional failure and systemic collapse. I sat back in my chair, mind racing through possibilities and connections, seeing patterns emerge from the chaos.

"So... this entire kingdom runs on ancient tech that nobody understands, using a system that's basically a hybrid of physics, coding, and civil engineering?"

"Exactly."

I let out a low whistle, the sound carrying more weight than words ever could. "You people are so screwed."

Liora actually laughed at that, a short, dry sound that carried the weight of years behind it. But the humor was real, genuine, cutting through the darkness like a blade of light.

"You're not wrong," she said, and there was something almost fond in her voice.

I realized I was still staring at the diagrams, my mind automatically parsing the flow patterns and identifying potential failure points. The symbols were becoming familiar, their meaning crystallizing as I studied them.

Liora noticed my continued fascination with the schematics.

"You really didn't expect this, huh?" she asked, her tone somewhere between curiosity and amusement.

"Honestly? No," I admitted, feeling oddly vulnerable in the admission. "I thought I'd be dealing with knights and sorcerers throwing fireballs. Not... this."

She sat back, folding her arms across her chest in a gesture that was both defensive and contemplative. For a moment, something flickered across her face, a shadow of old pain that she quickly masked.

"I used to think like that, too. I grew up on the outer fringes, in a tiny village near the broken ley lines. When the wards failed there, my family..." Her voice trailed off like smoke dissipating in the wind. She cleared her throat, the sound sharp and final. "Let's just say I learned the hard way that ignorance kills."

The weight of loss hung in the air between us, heavy and unspoken. I found myself understanding her exhaustion in a new light, seeing the driven intensity for what it really was: grief transformed into purpose.

"Sorry," I said, and meant it.

"Don't be. That's why I studied the old archives. Why I learned how the systems actually work. Everyone else is too busy playing politics or clinging to rituals." Her voice hardened, taking on the edge of someone who had fought battles that others refused to acknowledge. "They'd rather pray to formulas they don't understand than admit they might be wrong."Her gaze sharpened, focusing on me with laser intensity.

"And now you're here. The Sage of Systems. Summoned by some half-baked prophecy."

"You think I can actually fix this?"

She gave a tired smile, and for the first time since entering, she looked genuinely hopeful."I think you're the first person I've met who asked why the wards failed instead of just praying harder."

That was the moment I decided I didn't hate her. In fact, I was beginning to suspect I might actually like her, which was more than I could say for anyone else in this godforsaken kingdom.I pointed at the diagrams, decision crystallizing in my mind.

"Explain it to me. Top-down. No cryptic terms."

Liora's smirk returned, transforming her face with genuine warmth. "I knew I'd like you."

She tapped the diagram with her finger, the sound crisp against the parchment.

"Leylines are essentially energy highways. They carry raw arcane flow between nodes... cities, barriers, reactors, whatever needs power. Everything relies on resonance. If the flow destabilizes... overload, underload, misalignment... the whole system collapses like a house of cards in a hurricane."

The analogy clicked in my mind with satisfying precision.

"Sounds like a poorly maintained power grid," I muttered, patterns becoming clear.

"Exactly. Wards, enchantments, even most magic tools... you name it... they're all just flow regulators and circuit stabilizers. Different applications of the same fundamental principles."

I raised an eyebrow, curiosity piqued. "And casting magic?"

"That's just short-circuiting the system on a personal scale," she said, almost amused by the elegance of it. "You solve an equation in real-time, channel the flow, and release it. The more complex the formula, the stronger the effect. But it's hard... most people can't calculate fast enough without aids like staves or rings to help process the math."

The beauty of the system was becoming apparent, its mathematical elegance shining through the mystical trappings.

I whistled low. "So it's less 'magic' and more applied physics plus differential equations."

She grinned, the expression transforming her entire face.

"Now you're speaking my language, Sage."

Without hesitation, Liora shoved another scroll toward me, this one older and more worn than the first.

"This is the city's outer ward. It's failing."

I scanned the diagram, my trained eye automatically tracing the flow patterns and identifying stress points. The structure was complex, layered with redundancies and fail-safes that spoke of careful engineering. But it was also familiar in a weird, nerdy way that made my pulse quicken with recognition.

"It's a feedback loop," I muttered, half to myself, the realization hitting like a physical blow. "You're pulling too much flow through a single node. The whole system's oscillating itself to death."

Her eyes widened, and for a moment, the mask of competent professionalism slipped entirely.

"You... saw that already?"

"It's a common problem in circuit networks. Overloaded loops cause harmonic oscillation, which destabilizes the whole grid." The solution was so obvious it was almost painful. "It's textbook systems failure."

I leaned back, mind already working through the fix.

"All you need to do is reroute part of the flow through a secondary node here..." I pointed at the diagram, tracing the optimal path with my finger, "and reinforce this section to prevent backflow. Basic load balancing."

Liora's jaw actually dropped for a moment before she masked it with her usual smirk, but I could see the amazement in her eyes.

"You really are dangerous," she muttered, voice low and thoughtful.

"Dangerous? I just ran a basic analysis."

"That's exactly what makes you dangerous," she said, her voice carrying undertones of something that might have been awe. "You're solving problems in minutes that our High Mages couldn't untangle in decades."

The weight of her words settled over me like a heavy cloak. For the first time since arriving in this strange kingdom, I began to understand exactly what they had summoned me to do.

And for the first time, I thought I might actually be able to do it.