Mirac froze at those words.

  The smile he had just started to show vanished, repced by an expression of disbelief. His hands, resting on the wooden desk, began to tremble visibly as his heart raced.

  'K-Kill them?!' he stammered mentally. 'W-What does he mean?'

  A mix of fusion and fear made its way through Mirac's thoughts as he desperately tried to grasp the full meaning of what he had just heard.

  Vi, notig the radical ge in Mirac's expression, instinctively took a step back.

  His usual awkwardness resurfaced immediately: his hands filed clumsily, and the words that came out of his mouth were hesitant, as if he was trying to correct his mistake.

  "OH! I-I humbly apologize, y-young Prince! I-I didn't mean to scare you at all..." he stammered, his voice trembling.

  Mirac swallowed nervously, trying to force a smile to hide his disfort.

  "D-Don't worry, Professor..." he replied, striving to imbue his voice with a firmness he didn't truly feel. "It takes much more to scare me!"

  But even as he tried to vince himself of his own words, Mirac couldn't stop the trembling in his hands, which he quickly hid uhe desk to avoid revealing his uneasy state.

  "Oh, thank goodness!" Vi excimed with relief, visibly rexing. However, deep down, he felt bitterly regretful for the way he had expressed himself earlier.

  The atmosphere betweewo seemed to have returo its usual normalcy, but inside Mirac, the memory of Vi's words still deeply troubled him.

  Attempting to shake off his disfort, Mirac took a deep breath, trying to calm his rag thoughts.

  Yet, he knew he couldn't stop there.

  Though still shaken, he couldn't ighe meaning hidden behind Vi's words, because he sehat something of fual importance was cealed within them.

  With this determination, Mirac lifted his gaze and decided to tihe versation:

  "P-Professor Shirkenn..." he began, stammering. "What did you mean earlier by...?"

  He didn't finish the sentehere was no need, really.

  Vi immediately uood what the young Prince was referring to. In fact, even before he spoke, he had already inteo resume the topid crify the matter.

  Without hesitation, he cleared his throat and replied:

  "You see, young Prince... When the Sinner was defeated, the magical society divided mages into two categories: the Syntonid the Chaotics. The former are those who have aal or Synergitony, while the Chaotics are those who possess an Anomalous Syntony."

  Vi paused, clearly struggling to find the right words to tinue, while swaying slightly in pce.

  After colleg himself from this reflective state, Vi tinued:

  "With the defeat of the Sinner, a relentless and bloody hunt for the Chaotics was initiated. Even those who had never had anything to do with magic were executed, simply for beied to families that had Chaotics among their members."

  "W-What?!"

  Vi's words crept into Mirac's mind, eg like an impossible-to-ignore reverberation.

  'But that's nothing short of cruel!' he thought, his heart pounding with rising indignation.

  However, his instinct kept him from saying it out loud.

  It was too risky to openly express his opinion on such a delicate topic, especially without fully uanding the whole story of the hunt for the Chaotics.

  Cautious, he preferred to hide his unease behind a ral expression.

  Then, calmly, he decided to crify a doubt that had been troubling him, trying to give Vihe impression that he was simply curious, not sdalized.

  "So..." Mirac began, his voice measured and careful. "From what you whispered to me earlier... I should assume that the hunt for the Chaotics is still ongoing. Right?"

  Vi nodded weakly.

  "Yes, young Priheir hunt is still carried out by the so-called 'Purifiers.' These individuals are tasked with identifying the Chaotics, and ohey are certain, they have the authority to execute them immediately, without warning. Alternatively, they arrest them, but in both cases, the result is the same: the Chaotic is removed from all birth registers and immediately added to the list of the 'Sinners of the World.' After that, they are senteo death, with a public execution, and their entire family meets the same fate, without exception. It doesn't matter what rank or social css a Chaotic is from. Whether they are a noble, a peasant, or even a king or queen, no one is exempt. This w is universal and unyielding, saned by the very Seveies who govern our world. No one, no matter who they are, could ever escape their will."

  Mirac felt a knot tightening in his throat, f him to swallow nervously once agairied to maintain a posed expression, but panic was rising within him.

  "I see..." he finally murmured, with a barely perceptible sigh, standing up from the desk.

  His legs threateo give way uhe weight of those revetions, but Mirac forced himself to maintain his bance as he left the . Vi followed a few steps behind him, silent and thoughtful, as they made their way together to the royal family's dining hall.

  Vi's words still echoed in Mirac's mind like a dark omeched into his sciousness.

  'There's no doubt! I... I have... an Anomalous Sintony!' he thought, his face torted into a mask of tension. 'And if that's true... it means that... that...'

  The voi his head trembled, hesitant, as if afraid to speak the undeniable truth.

  'It means that I... am actually... a Chaotic!'

  A wave of panigulfed him, cold and paralyzing.

  The image of his death—quick, brutal, like that of millions of other Chaotics before him—fshed through his mind.

  The bde of a Purifier, the mark of a Sinner engraved in his name, and then... OBLIVION!

  And also his dear family—though of royal blood!—would be burned with him in the fire of nation.

  'Shit! Shit! Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit! SHIT!!!'

  His breath caught in his throat.

  'What do I do now?! If anyone finds out, it will definitely be the end for me!'

  Just the thought of it made him freeze.

  Terror enveloped him like a shroud, suffog him.

  But that wasn't all!

  Soon, alongside the fear, another feeling joined in, equally powerful, more fierd corrosive: hatred.

  'Damn it! It's all your fault, Math!' he thought, feeling a wave of anger boil up inside him. 'But I k... I knew you would ruin this life too!'

  He gritted his teeth, his hands ched into fists that began to tremble.

  He wao scream, destroy, erase that curse from his existence.

  'Why me? Why me of all people? Why 't I have a normal life too? WHY?!'

  But by now, it seemed that fate had clearly made its deirac would never have the simple life he so dearly wished for!

  The weight of that realization began to crush him, making him waver on the brink of surrender.

  'But...'

  Suddenly, a stronger, fiercer thought emerged from the depths of his fear. A thought that burned hotter than any other emotion, like a living fme, sweeping away the chill of terror.

  'I DON'T WANT TO DIE!'

  Mirac's eyes sharpened, filled with an unshakable determination. His heart, whily moments before seemed about to explode from fear, now beat with a new energy, indomitable and rebellious.

  'I don't want to! Not now! Not after miraculously getting a sed O! I've already promised myself: I will protect this life... until the end!'

  He took a deep breath, trying to calm the turming within him. Anger and fear wouldn't help him.

  With his mind clear again, he realized that he had to be ing, that he had to hide his secret as if his very soul depended on it—because, deep down, it truly did.

  As his thoughts became clearer, Mirac lifted his gaze a his shoulders straighten.

  His hatred for Math tio pulse inside him, a poison impossible to root out.

  But that same hatred soon transformed into fuel, a force he would use to protect himself.

  He would not alloower to be his damnation...

  He would not allow Math to win...

  He would not let a even a GOD—tear his sed ce away from him!

  Even if the whole world was against him, Mirac would fight!

  'Whatever happens, it doesn't matter! At any cost... I'M NOT GONNA DIE!'

  * * *

  After an intense sword training under Leonard's watchful eye, Mirac was exhausted. Sweat ran down his forehead, soaking his tunid his body desperately craved rest.

  However, his mind was too agitated to allow himself ae. The ret events had raised questions too signifit for him to ignore.

  Vi's revetion about the fate of the Chaotiented him relentlessly.

  During training, however, Mirac reached a crucial clusion: if he wao avoid a tragid like the one described by Vi, he first had to figure out how to avoid being discovered!

  And to do that, he posed himself a fual question:

  'How do they identify the Chaotics?'

  His analytical mind immediately went to work.

  His on sense suggested that the Purifiers couldn't rely solely on false testimonies or presumed clues, as had happened during the Witch Hunts in his old world, betweeh and 17th turies in Europe.

  In that historical period, ignorand superstition fueled unjust and cruel persecutions, but Mirac was vihat, in the current text, there must be a more systematid reliable method to identify the Chaotics.

  'Maybe they use a magical instrument...' he specuted, trying to imagine what are knowledge or advanced meisms could lie behind such a hunt. 'If that's the case, I must absolutely find out what it is! Only then will I be able to avoid it, especially in case of future iigations on me!'

  However, Mirac didn't want to wait for the History or "Introdu to Magic" lesson to get the information he so desperately needed.

  This was because, as they were desding the stairs, Mirac clearly sehat Vi was relut to talk again about the Chaotics.

  It was therefore likely—if not certain—that he would never have another opportunity to address the matter directly with him.

  But in any case, Miraeeded answers, and as soon as possible!

  He had to learhing he could about the Chaotics, without risking drawing suspi.

  So, determio uhe truth, he decided to uake an indepe search.

  He had to find the answers on his own, in a pce at the castle where information was kept and easily accessible even to a child like him.

  In a pce where he could find what he wanted, and much more: the Royal Library.