They were greeted at the main entrance by the dean, Velour Snugglefit, and her assistant, Apricot Tailwagin, the same two fairies who had shown up in David's world to offer him a contract.

  Velour looked just the same as last time, appearing disappointed at anything her gaze fell upon. Her assistant. Apricot, for her part, kept twitching her head around, looking at every sound and movement, from behind the safety of her clipboard, which she glanced at a few times every minute.

  As David, a groggy Niala, and Totori exited the cariole, Velour walked down the steps, offering David a snappy handshake, then doing the same with Niala and Totori.

  She then spoke. “Right, welcome to C.L.A.S.I. Mr Wayman. I hope your trip here has been satisfactory. If you would follow me, I will introduce you to the team of students and graduates who have won your involvement with their experiments.”

  With a sharp nod, she turned and marched back up the stairs, her hard-heeled shoes clattering on the stone, not bothering to see if she was being followed.

  Apricot motioned for them to follow, Totori stepping along, with David and Niala sharing a glance and shrugging before catching up, the assistant bringing up the rear.

  The edifice was of a style that reminded David and Niala of the centers of learning from their own world, built out of masonry, with the manawiring retrofitted into the existing structure instead of having been built alongside it. Its corridors were narrow but tall, the doors made of solid wood, while the larger rooms were grand vaulted things with balustrades, all outside-facing walls plastered with tall windows that let in plenty of light.

  Several of the fairies they passed along the way, presumably students, from the books and papers they were carrying around, stopped and pointed at David, murmuring among themselves. Niala caught a few words that boiled down to David's visit being an eagerly awaited event, and many fairies discussing impromptu plans to get some time with him.

  The catkin walked closer to the dean. “Dean Snugglefit, you said there had been a competition for David's help? It looks like a lot of the fairies know about him. What kind of competition was it?”

  Velour answered without looking back or slowing down. “The only fair kind, through battle in the Arena of Academic Aspirants.”

  “Battle? Isn't that biased towards t-” Niala meeped as the dean clacked to a stop and swivelled her head at the catkin.

  “Please do not use that word to describe any of our processes. Battles in the AAA are done under a set of rigorously enforced rules. If you need more details, ask my assistant. Come along now, this halt has put us behind schedule.” Velour admonished Niala before resuming her pointed march.

  Niala blinked and let the dean walk ahead, falling back to David and Apricot's position, where she asked the assistant for details, still curious despite the verbal slap.

  Apricot quickly explained that the participants of the AAA could have champions fight in their stead, which was a very popular choice, but also that winning a fight only awarded a certain number of starpoints, the total of which decided the overall winners. Besides winning a battle, the audience also got to vote for the fairest combatant, who was then awarded as many starpoints as an actual win. Since Fairies generally disliked unfair fights, any trounced combatants usually won their votes.

  The rationale being that, in the battlefield of academia, one had to know both how to be smart and efficient, but also how to leverage losing positions. This led to a rat-race of near-wins and dramatic-but-spirited losses.

  All very entertaining, and very publicly broadcast. The AAA game show was one of the most popular events on TV, and had a vibrant and active betting scene, which was very fairly managed, obviously.

  They arrived at a set of double doors, which the dean pushed open without breaking her stride. The room was a large, clinical-pink laboratory, with various instruments strewn about and on carts, with what appeared to be an isolated chamber nestled in a corner. The five fairies inside the lab flinched and, seeing who it was, dropped whatever they were doing to form a nervous line along the dean's path.

  Velour stopped in front of the lab students and waited for her escort to catch up before addressing everyone.

  “Right, Mr. Wayman, these five will be making use of your services over the next two days, as per our arrangement. My assistant will present them to you, as my time is limited and other duties require my attention. You may ask one question.” She gave David a side-eyed glance, giving him the clear impression that he technically may ask one question.

  He instead shook his head, which the Velour seemed to appreciate. “Very well. I shall see you again at the end of your stay to dispense compensation. Apricot will oversee your stay; ask her whatever you need.” She then turned to face her assistant. “To be clear, I still expect you to perform your regular duties, Tailwagin.”

  Apricot stood to attention, clasping her clipboard over her chest. “Yes, ma'am!”

  Nodding, Velour turned and clacked away and out of the lab. A weight seemed to follow her out of the room.

  The six institute fairies released a sigh, before a small smile graced their collective face as they properly greeted their visitors and new lab assistant.

  Apricot walked up to the lined fairies. “Mr. Wayman, please meet your new colleagues: Rimiri Blossomface, graduate researcher, Tuyelala Goldinice, Hoppy Licorice, Virari Twirlinate and Kevin, all undergraduates and assistants to Rimiri. Everyone, this is Mr. David Wayman, Totori Flamrise, Mr. David's agent, and Ms. Niala of Riverwall, David's... huh...” Apricot leaned in toward the catkin. “What is your relation, exactly? You were only listed as a guest.”

  Niala's ears wiggled as she looked at David and blushed slightly. “I'm, hum, David's partner?”

  “Very good. David's partner. Well, I will leave you all under Rimiri's care while I go confirm that your lodgings and accommodations are ready. Ms. Totori, you have my contact. Please call or message me if you need anything.”

  “Will do! Thanks, Apricot!” Totori beamed a smile at the skittish fairy, who might have slightly blushed, before hiding her face behind her clipboard and retreating out of the room.

  Totori looked at David, still smiling. “She's nice! Anyway, I'm going to set up in that corner over there and start making some calls, like you asked me. Just let me know if you need anything!” She said, before walking over to an empty table in a corner and setting up an improvised work office.

  David looked away from her, and to the lined-up fairies, and to their ear-to-ear smiles and glinting eyes all boring into him. Except for Kevin, at the back, who stared with half-closed eyes and heavy bags hanging under them.

  David felt more like a lab rat than a “colleague”.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  David, in the isolated chamber, held the two metal rods with wires hanging from them. He looked through the viewing window at the fairies assembled outside and observing him. Rimiri lowered her head to speak in a yoked microphone, her voice coming out canned. “Mr. David, when you're ready, start pouring mana into the conductive rods. The display on the wall will show how many watts you are outputting. Please try to reach one million and hold it around that number.”

  He nodded, testing his grip on the rods, and whispered forth his mana. The meter shot up to a few thousand manawatts. Quirking an eyebrow, he increased his rate, the numbers blurring upwards, until it read a million and some. He focused on reaching exactly one million, and actually found the exercise an interesting challenge, nudging his output by half a thought in each direction, until he saw the last offending digit slide away and turn into a zero.

  With a satisfied smile, he held it there, the displayed numbers never deviating. After a few minutes, getting bored, he looked at the fairies, his eyebrows arching as he noticed them staring at him, mouths hanging open. Apart from Kevin, who looked at him as if he were an interesting stain on a wall.

  He spoke up. “Am I doing something wrong?”

  His question jolted Rimiri, who shook her head and spoke into the microphone. “Huh, no, Mr. Wayman. It's just that... how are you outputting exactly one million with no deviation?”

  David shrugged. “That's not normal?”

  “The highest ever recorded mana control was 95,21%. You are at... 99.99%”

  Kevin tapped on Rimiri's shoulder and said something before Rimiri looked back at David. “Huh, I'm told the measuring instrument has an error margin of 0.01%.”

  David smiled.

  He let go of the corroded and pockmarked metal bars, the fourth set he'd run through in the last ten minutes. He could hear Rimiri shouting outside the chamber, the microphone having been left on. “I don't care, go find me something more resistant than gold-cored copper rods! These topped out at a 50 billion mana-watts per second, and the subject is clearly able to put out more!”

  Kevin sat in a chair in front of him, blankly staring at him, her eyes half-covered by sleepy eyelids, dozens of electrodes attached to her slumping body.

  David looked back at the viewing window. “Are you sure?”

  Rimiri nodded. “It's perfectly safe. Even at your highest mana output recorded so far, it would take hours to give someone mana poisoning. Besides, we have a top-rated medical facility on campus, very experienced with mana-related afflictions.”

  David shrugged. “Ok then.”

  He took in a deep breath and let go of his mana in all directions, all at once. He became a living blue flame, the chamber brightening to a point where the fairies outside had to shield their eyes from the blue beam of light coming through the viewing window.

  Kevin, for her part, appeared to slowly wake up, her eyelids lifting like ponderous beasts, until she stared at him wide-eyed. Her mouth remained the same flat line he had seen so far, however.

  He then heard the first word out of her mouth. “Cool.”

  And then she passed out.

  “Are you sure she's going to be ok?” David asked, picking up another cube and filling it with mana until it glowed blue.

  Rimiri waved her hand. “Yes, yes, it's just a minor case of mana poisoning. She'll be back within a bell or two. Now, how would you define the taste of the cube you're holding?”

  David looked at the small metal cube he was injecting his mana into. He narrowed his eyes at it. He didn't taste... oh. “Like a banana.”

  Rimiri gasped, the other three fairies furiously scribbling notes.

  He poked at one of the four dozen jelly in bowls on the table before him, making it wobble like a miniature earthquake, before turning his head at Rimiri. “What is this supposed to be, again?”

  “These are Mana insulators. We're trying the various formulas to see which one will resist best.” She explained, as two of the other fairies set up the counter next to David and inserted metal probes into the jelly, handing David wired metal rods.

  Nodding, Rimiri instructed David to begin pouring in his mana, taking it in ten-thousand-step increments.

  He did so until the first jelly began to boil, with the metre reading 340 000 manawatts.

  “Now what?” He asked Rimiri.

  “Keep going until we have a complete failure state.” She instructed.

  He kept going. The jelly exploded and flung itself up and onto the ceiling, where it remained, wobbling.

  Everyone looked up at it. It didn't come back down.

  A few bells later, as David was sending short bursts of mana into a measuring machine of some sort, Kevin walked back into the lab.

  She stopped, saw the empty jelly bowls, looked up to see the 50-odd ceiling jellies, still wobbling, and scowled, looking at her fellow university fairies. “You didn't wait for me for the jellies.” She sleepily accused, in a voice that wanted to go back to sleep, before turning around and leaving.

  David looked at Rimiri, who waved a hand. “She'll be fine. I bet she just went to get more mana insulators. It's the subject of her thesis, after all. Now, keep pulsing your mana, we've almost narrowed down the membrane's local resonance...”

  The experiments stopped for a quick lunch, eaten in a lab-adjacent room, before resuming and lasting the whole afternoon. Kevin did indeed return with a new set of jellies, these ones getting up and wobbling away on the floor once sufficiently mana'd-up, instead of jumping at the ceiling. Kevin had seemed very interested, and followed one out the doors, and didn't return for the rest of the day.

  Apricot then came to escort David, Niala and Totori to a small two-bedroom apartment in the faculty staff housing building, where they had dinner delivered, and talked with them about their day.

  David asked about Kevin's unusual name, but Apricot said that was a story for the fairy to tell.

  Totori also informed David that she had found a company that she thought fulfilled his requirements, and that she had booked a meeting for the day after tomorrow, once the lab experiments were done.

  When Niala asked what that was about, David answered with a few simple words.

  “The supply of Old Women must not be disrupted.”

  Niala groaned, while Totori asked what David was talking about.

  The catkin then saw the look in David's eyes, hurrying to speak. “No. Not her, too.”

  David slowly turned his head toward his girlfriend. “But Niala, she might acquire the taste.”

  “What taste?” Totori asked.

  “The taste of the Old Woman,” David answered.

  Niala whined. “Please, David, it's a mashed-up potion, almost a random handful of weeds. Why do you keep spreading it around?!”

  David tilted his head. “What's wrong with that? It just means it's easy to make.”

  Niala got up, approached David, grabbed his shoulders and shook him. “I don't want an Old Woman to be my legacy!”

  “It's too late for that, Niala,” David said with compassion.

  The catkin's eyes watered up as her knees gave out, crumpling to the floor. “Noooooooo!” She moaned to the heavens.

  But David was already up and boiling water, two packets of Old Woman in hand.

  Niala's gaze fell on the betrayer, and she swore revenge.

  Indifferent to her plea, David introduced Totori to the Old Woman, and the fairy acquired the taste.

  A few minutes later, Totori's eyes widened as she began to fidget and then visibly shake. Before long, she had claimed the small table in their apartment and turned it into a chaotic work desk, as she flitted from one task to the next, typing into her tablet in a blur while reading two documents at the same time.

  The Old Woman had come to the Fairlands.