After my summoner finished laughing, I immediately conjured a smaller paper-cutout of the water assailant’s face.

  He looked both horrified and confused, cautiously eyeing the paper cutout.

  I produced a larger paper-cutout of Mr. Blonde’s face, and that seemed to reassure him.

  The paper cutout of the water assailant levitated, surrounded in tiny balls of golden light.

  Tempting as it was, I refused to say anything, not wanting whatever dialogue he imagined between the paper-cuts to ruin his immersion in this little play.

  A miniature model of the school- no, Mr. Blonde’s office formed. Paper-cutout Mr. Blonde and paper-cutout water assailant sat opposite the giant miniature desk. In place of dialogue, I just spouted the same noise every time I wanted either of them to speak, similar to characters in visual-novel style games repeating the same sound indicating their voice every time a character of a word they spoke appeared, except I was making a different sound for whatever word they would say instead of a single character.

  Mr. Blonde’s- paper cutout Mr. Blonde was given a deep, imposing, authoritative voice. Water assailant was annoying and cowardly.

  Whatever made-up dialogue I imagine, the scene ended with the water assailant being sent into the sky, landing on a paper cutout of the moon I produced at the last moment.

  My summoner erupted into full-blown laughter again.

  That definitely should get my point across.

  Suddenly, the door slammed open. The nurse and Fireboy stormed in.

  They stopped, seeing me holding a paper-cutout of Mr. Blonde’s face.

  Both of them gave me weird looks.

  …

  The nurse instructed both Fireboy and me to wait outside as she- I presume- performs a checkup on my summoner before discharging him from the hospital.

  Fireboy spoke questioning syllables to me, but again I didn’t say anything. He didn’t pursue his questions, taking my silence as an answer.

  Even if I could speak their language, I’m not sure how I could explain having a cutout of Mr. Blonde’s face.

  After a while, my summoner came out of the room. He didn’t look as depressed as before. A good sign.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  I waved the cutout of Mr. Blonde’s face. The only reason I still had it was because I’m uncertain about revealing the nature of my power to Fireboy, as that didn’t end well the last time I carelessly did that. Waving the cutout toward him was my way of asking if he was gonna report this incident to Mr. Blonde, or some other trustworthy authority in his school.

  I can also report it, but I want to allow my summoner to make this choice first. Also, because I didn’t want to use my power a lot just to convey something that can be easily said in a few sentences.

  As for him fighting back… that’s something I’d prefer he’d rely on me, or Fireboy, for. Fireboy is definitely capable, from what I’ve witnessed, and I’m a little more prepared for Water assailant’s obsession with drowning. To put it simply, I’m not that against killing him if it comes to it, but I’m not pursuing the option to kill him.

  I don’t like the idea of having to face consequences I’m not aware of.

  After my summoner finished his conversation with Fireboy, he waved goodbye and headed off to class.

  Now I can explore the school a little more.

  I took out my miniature map again to see what areas of the school I haven’t explored. Tomorrow would be the day I start attending classes, and I wanted to have a better understanding of the layout in case I needed to participate in a drill. I’m not sure what to expect from a school where students can wield magic, so it’d be best for me to have some escape routes if confrontation isn’t an option.

  After a few steps, I stopped, hearing somebody else’s steps overlapping with mine.

  I turned to see Fireboy following me, stopping a fraction of a second after I did.

  Does he not have anything better to do?

  I decided to ignore him and continue following the map, marking areas I’ve been to based on my memory. My eyes settled on an area of the map I’ve yet to explore.

  I was visualizing the route I’d take to reach a point in the area, but my thoughts were interrupted by Fireboy’s voice.

  Is he seriously gonna follow me?

  I walked down some halls and took a few turns, getting closer to the unexplored section of the school.

  Halfway there, Fireboy stayed close behind, only a few steps behind me. I stopped, and he stopped too.

  Why is he still around?

  I didn’t understand why Fireboy was following me. The list of people I could understand being suspicious of me is Mr. Blonde, my summoner, Ms. Grey, and the old man in the robe. Maybe a few students, sure, but if those people wanted to monitor my movements, would a student really be the best choice?

  I could understand my presence in this school being suspicious, sure, but isn’t this too brazen of a method to monitor me? What about that golden dragon? He- or she- appeared out of nowhere. Wouldn’t that be better for monitoring me discreetly?

  Fireboy sensed my confusion and spoke some syllables, but again, I couldn’t make sense of any of them. I need to figure out how to overcome this language deficiency so that I’m no longer the recipient of these one-sided conversations.

  As Fireboy was speaking whatever it was he was talking about, he stopped, and turned around, as if listening to something. I didn’t hear anything. Maybe he sensed something?

  Whatever got his attention was enough for him to face me and quickly say a few syllables for waving goodbye and running off to who knows where.

  After he ran off, students wearing the same uniform filled the halls.

  What was that?

  More unfamiliar faces noticed me, and I quickly ran, not wanting to listen to any unfamiliar faces speak with my language barrier.

  I waited it out in a corner of a school, far from the foot traffic of students transitioning between classes.

  Eventually, the sound of footsteps died down, and I emerged from the corner I had hid in.