Chapter 87: Happy Breakup

News about the dismissal ceremony arrived soon after.

Uriel was sitting on the living room sofa, with Galatina's hand on his shoulder as she fed him peeled orange segments. The orange was ice-cold — probably fresh out of her spatial pocket.

He swallowed the segment and took the notice from her hand. It had the Academy Committee's red stamp in the corner. He scanned it.

"All First Academy students are required to assemble tomorrow at nine o'clock in the morning at the borrowed St. Margaret Auditorium for a temporary dismissal ceremony. Classes are officially suspended following the ceremony. Resumption date to be announced."

He set the notice on the coffee table.

Finally. He was starting to lose his mind, caught between his own procrastination and his mother's relentless campaign to keep him fed.

Ever since they'd gotten back from the shopping district, he'd been stuck in an exhausting tug-of-war with Galatina. He had to visit Seraphina. That was non-negotiable. He also had to break up with her. That part was just as clear.

He just had no idea how to open that conversation.

Could he even do both at once?

---

Galatina's position had remained consistent throughout: You need to go.

She had no idea he wanted to break up.

"If you don't visit her while she's home recovering, how is that even a visit?" Galatina slid a plate of sliced apples in front of him.

"Going to her house isn't appropriate. I'd have to meet her family."

"Meeting the family is good."

"It's not."

"If you're nervous, I'll come with you."

"No need."

This exact loop had repeated at least a dozen times over the past few days.

Every time Uriel found a new excuse — not feeling great today, might have something tomorrow, maybe her cousin won't be home the day after — Galatina simply popped another piece of food into his mouth. Oranges, apples, grapes, freshly baked cookies. Over the course of several days, he'd eaten through most of the care package originally intended for Seraphina.

The carefully selected bunch of grapes was now down to its last cluster.

Now he didn't have to go to her house. He could see her tomorrow at the ceremony.

Uriel swallowed the last orange segment and stood up.

"I'll go tomorrow."

Galatina was carrying the empty plate toward the kitchen. She glanced back at him. He expected her to ask if she should come along. Instead she smiled, turned, and disappeared into the kitchen with the dish.

---

St. Margaret Auditorium was a Church-affiliated building on the eastern side of the capital, usually loaned out to academies for lectures and events.

The main hall normally seated a few hundred. Today the long wooden benches had been arranged in tight rows to accommodate over a thousand. Uriel arrived at a perfectly unremarkable time. The hall was already more than half full when he stepped inside. He scanned the room out of habit, spotted a corner seat near the back, and claimed it.

The acting headmaster was a white-haired professor standing at the podium, hands gripping its edges, delivering his remarks in the flat cadence of an official statement.

"...The First Academy has, since its founding, stood as a pillar of education in the capital. The complete destruction of our facilities due to forces beyond our control is a matter of deep regret for the Academy Committee. After extensive consultation with all relevant parties, it has been determined that the time and resources required for repairs and reconstruction far exceed initial projections. As such, the Committee has decided to formally suspend all classes effective immediately. The date for resumption will be announced once reconstruction progress allows. Students are advised to maintain available contact information and monitor future announcements."

A low ripple of noise spread through the hall.

Some students were already whispering about what forces beyond our control was supposed to mean. Others were worrying about graduation credits. A few had apparently decided the destruction of the academy was no reason to waste a perfectly good holiday.

Uriel leaned back in his seat, gaze drifting across the crowd.

Third row. Aisle seat. A quiet figure sitting upright with her back to him.

Seraphina.

She'd cut her hair. Just slightly — the ends now stopped at her shoulder blades instead of below them. It looked cleaner. Less weight.

Why am I noticing her haircut? I'm here to break up with her.

He had no explanation for why that detail registered. He blamed it on Observer and decided not to think about it.

The acting headmaster wrapped up with a few lines about safety during the holiday and maintaining proper conduct. Scattered applause followed. Students began standing, some pleased, some less so. Uriel picked up the bag with what was left of the care package — one slightly wilted bunch of grapes and a few surviving oranges — and wove through the crowd toward Seraphina.

"Seraphina."

She turned.

When she saw him, her expression didn't change much, but her gaze lingered on his face for a fraction longer than usual, like she was confirming something. Then she stood and shifted her chair to the side.

"Uriel." Her tone carried the same flat affect as always. "Is that for me?"

Uriel held out the bag.

The top was wrinkled from being handled too much. The fruit was still edible. A little past its prime, maybe, but nothing too embarrassing.

"I should have visited sooner. Got held up. I heard you were taken. That you were hurt. Are you alright now? Any lingering issues?"

Seraphina accepted the bag and glanced inside.

A few of the oranges had small bruises.

She looked back up and produced a perfectly practiced smile.

"I'm fine. The cleric checked me over. No aftereffects. A few days of rest and I was back to normal."

"Good."

"Thank you for the fruit."

"No problem."

An awkward silence settled between them.

Students streamed past on both sides. No one paid them much attention — just another couple chatting about holiday plans, probably. Someone nearby was debating which dessert shop to hit. Someone else was complaining about assignments that had already been handed out for the break.

No one noticed the two of them standing in the third-row aisle.

Seraphina folded the top of the paper bag neatly, then looked up at him. Her eyes were slightly wider than usual.

Watching Uriel hesitate like this, she'd already guessed the answer. She was just waiting for him to say it.

Uriel noticed her gaze was different than normal. The several prepared scripts he'd rehearsed jammed in his throat. He discarded them and picked a new one. He took a slow breath.

"There's something I need to tell you."

Seraphina nodded lightly.

She'd already mapped out the rest of the conversation in her head. Uriel was going to break up with her.

The reason wasn't hard to guess.

After her kidnapping, he'd been the last person in contact with her. The Knights had taken him in for questioning and held him for days. They'd released him eventually, but being interrogated wasn't pleasant.

And her cousin Estella — she'd introduced him to her before. Just standing in front of her required courage. Being her boyfriend after that? Worse. Add in the kidnapping, the interrogation, the stress — she could connect the dots.

She looked at his furrowed brow, the deliberate flatness in the set of his mouth, and felt a flicker of something like guilt.

This arrangement had been transactional from the start. Now he'd been dragged into an interrogation because of her mess, and he had to work up the nerve to end things. She could at least give him an exit.

"You want to break up."

She said it plainly.

Uriel froze.

He hadn't even finished his opening line. Seraphina had already done it for him.

His first instinct was to deny it. But he saw her expression — calm, unsurprised, already accepting it as the logical outcome.

"Yes." He admitted it. "This whole situation put a lot of pressure on me. You're the daughter of a count. I'm a commoner. I thought we could make it work, but those days in interrogation made a lot of things clear. The gap in status, your cousin's attitude, whether I could even handle all of it — I thought about it a lot, and I think it's better if we —"

"I understand."

She cut him off. There was no point listening to the stock lines. She'd also noticed him starting to fumble and didn't want to watch him force his way through it.

She shifted the paper bag from her left hand to her right and gave him a small, precise bow. Not deep, but enough to mark the distance being reestablished between them.

"Thank you for your time. I'll keep my word about the arrangement. I won't say anything."

Seraphina straightened, reached into the bag, and pulled out the wilted bunch of grapes. She plucked one off. The skin was slightly wrinkled, but the flesh was still firm. She rubbed it briefly with her fingers and popped it in her mouth.

Sweet. Clean. Good pick.

"Though, Uriel — in situations like this, honesty is usually better. If this were a real relationship, the other person would need to know what went wrong so they could improve."

Uriel opened his mouth, then closed it.

He was still assembling a response when she continued.

"I'm sorry the Knights questioned you. That was because of me. You didn't deserve that. As for my cousin — you don't need to worry. She can be unreasonable about some things, but she won't come after someone just because I dated them. Even after we break up. You're safe. This month's payment will still go through. Our arrangement stands until the month ends. Consider this your final commission."

Uriel nodded. He'd expected as much. Seraphina never left loose ends. A contract was a contract.

He wanted to say something appropriately adult — thanks for working with me or let me know if you need anything later.

Before he could, Seraphina spoke first.

"Before that, though — do you have time? Would you be willing to help me with something?"

Uriel's brow furrowed. A faint alarm went off somewhere in the back of his mind.

This wasn't in the script.

He looked at her. She wasn't smiling. She wasn't testing him, either. She was serious.

He tossed the question back at her. "Tell me what it is. I'll do what I can."

"Classes are suspended, but I still have a few things I need to finish. There's an alchemy project — I need to collect some specific materials from the Ancient Canopy Rainforest. It's safer with two people. In case something goes wrong."

Uriel's brain immediately generated several standard responses.

Hire an adventurer.

Take your cousin.

Take your study partner.

"Why not hire an adventurer?" He ran through the list out loud. "Or go with your cousin. Or your study partner."

Seraphina didn't answer right away. She kept folding the edge of the paper bag, not meeting his eyes.

"For a rental boyfriend, you sure take a while to catch on." She said it flatly. "I'm not asking anyone else. Obviously it's for the memories. One last time."

Uriel scratched the back of his head.

Contract relationship. Rental boyfriend. Last month. One last time. Memories.

The logic held together. Barely.

Emotionally, he couldn't process it. Something felt off, but he couldn't pin it down.

He thought it through.

Seraphina had just been kidnapped. Held for days. Beaten. Blood drawn. Injected with something unknown. Even if their relationship had started as a contract, cutting it off right after everything she'd been through felt a little harsh. Maybe she just wanted to get out, clear her head.

She was still his client. She was still paying him.

Besides, taking a full month's pay for doing absolutely nothing felt wrong. If she said the money would still go through, the least he could do was finish out the contract properly. Go to the rainforest, help her collect a few things, call it the last job. Clean break.

Also —

He was curious.

He'd never been to a rainforest. Textbooks said the biodiversity there was several times higher than temperate forests. Some species existed nowhere else in the world.

He scratched his head again, sending a few flakes flying.

Then he asked the most practical question he had left.

"How long? It's not going to take multiple days, is it?"

"Under normal circumstances, we go in during the day and come back before dark."

No overnight camping.

The answer left him feeling both disappointed and relieved.

Disappointed because camping in a rainforest sounded interesting. Relieved because he wouldn't have to set up a tent, start a fire, or take watch shifts.

And more importantly —

He wouldn't have to spend a night in the wilderness with his ex-girlfriend.

"Alright." He slid his hands into his pockets. "Pick a day. When?"