Magic Academy's Bastard Instructor Chapter 265: Karina Maeril [3]

Karina took in every detail of the interior.

From the faded crayon scribblings on the walls to the uneven shelves nailed in by an unskilled hand. A crooked sun near the corner. A stick figure holding another’s hand. Childish attempts at letters that never quite lined up.

The floorboards showed shallow scratches where furniture had been dragged too many tis.

A chair by the desk had one leg shorter than the rest, compensated for by books wedged underneath.

Karina’s face remained expressionless as she stepped closer to the wall, tracing the crayon marks with her fingers.

She already knew who had drawn them. She already knew how small the hands had been, how proud the smile must have looked when they were finished.

"Is this supposed to be your bedroom?" Vanitas asked.

"Mhm. Up until I was eighteen. Moved out for college. Two years later, my father was hospitalized, and this place was left abandoned."

"That bastard didn’t even try to give you a decent life."

Karina didn’t answer, smiling bitterly.

Then the floorboards creaked.

Bang——

The door slamd open.

A little girl with silver hair rushed inside. The instant she crossed the threshold, both Vanitas and Karina froze.

The child did not look at them. She hurried straight to the bed, curling up in the corner, arms wrapped tightly around her knees as she began to cry.

"She can’t see us."

"No," Karina murmured, staring at the small, trembling figure. "I don’t think she can either."

"Why is she crying?"

"That—"

Before Karina could say anything, heavy banging rattled the door.

——Karina! Open this door this instant!

——No!

The little girl scread back, her voice terrified and cracking.

——Karina!

The pounding grew louder.

"It’s my father," Karina said.

The little girl shrank further into herself, pressing her back against the wall, clamping her hands over her ears as.

——Open it! Do you hear ?!

The little girl shook her head frantically as she scread again.

——No! Go away!

The banging did not stop.

A hamr suddenly plunged through the door, tearing a jagged hole through it. A hand forced its way inside, finding the doorknob.

Twist——

The door swung open.

The little girl scread.

She scrambled toward the bed and pulled the blanket over her small fra as if it could hide her.

A man lood in the doorway. The sll of alcohol seed to seep into the room with him.

——I told you to open the door, did’t I? Are you deaf?"

——I didn’t do anything! I didn’t do anything wrong!

He stepped inside.

The floor creaked with each of his steps, as if he wanted her to hear him coming.

——Always lying. The hospital keeps records of visits. Do you know that? I know you went to see your mother.

——What’s wrong with visiting her? Why can’t I see my own mother?

——Because you’ll get sick! You’ll catch her illness sooner or later!

The little girl removed the blanket and glared fiercely at the man.

——That’s unfair!

Slap——

And then the slap ca.

The little girl froze, eyes wide, her hand rising slowly to her cheek as the heat blood across her skin. The shock stole the breath from her lungs.

——Don’t you dare talk back. Do you have any idea how difficult it is raising you alone?!

——I—I just—

Slap——

Another slap followed, then another. The little girl stumbled, clutching at the blanket as her tears finally spilled over.

——You ungrateful child.

She tried to pull away, but he grabbed her arm and yanked her off the bed. She cried out as she was dragged across the floor.

——Let go of ! Please!

He didn’t answer.

The door swung open again, this ti leading down a narrow staircase. He hauled her down the steps, ignoring her sobs, ignoring the way she desperately held on to the railing

At the bottom, he shoved her forward.

She fell hard onto the cold floor. Before she could stand, the door slamd shut.

Click——

And then it was locked.

Her cries echoed in the darkness, swallowed by the basent walls.

Vanitas looked at Karina. She didn’t look at him, staring down at the trembling child with pity in her eyes.

"That was the first ti I ever talked back to my father," Karina said. "I think I was around twelve."

"We’re not so different than I thought."

Karina did not respond.

The basent door creaked open, and light spilled into the darkness.

——Karina. Have you finally cald down?

——I’m sorry...

The man descended the steps and pulled the little girl into his arms. She froze for a mont before returning the embrace.

——You know I’m just worried about you, right? What would I do if my Karina got sick, too? I’m already barely making ends et, paying for your mother’s hospital bills. The last thing I need is my daughter falling ill as well.

Vanitas was at a loss for words. This was the man she had spoken of with unconditional affection.

This was the father she claid to love.

But nothing about this resembled love at all.

If anything, the entire mory reeked of a warped dependency.

A child, manipulated into mistaking fear for affection and obedience for love. Violence was followed by reassurance, cruelty by tenderness, until the line between harm and care was indistinguishable.

This was not love.

It was conditioning.

A slow, insidious form of captivity where the victim learned to hold onto the very hand that hurt them, because that sa hand was the only one that ever reached out afterward.

The little girl eventually returned to her room.

The hole in the door had already been repaired, as if nothing had happened. She climbed onto her bed and curled into herself, staring blankly at her hand.

On her palm was a single frozen teardrop.

"That’s..."

"I rember now," Karina said. "This was when I first discovered my proficiency in ice."

The tears had not stopped falling. They ca one after another, until the child, with no understanding of what she was doing, froze them in place without thinking.

It didn’t end there.

It never did.

The sa walls. The sa bed. The sa ceiling that learned her tears better than any prayer ever could.

——Why are you crying again?

——I’m not—

——Don’t lie to .

A hand would co down, sotis open, sotis closed. Sotis it missed her face and caught her shoulder instead. Sotis it found her ribs.

The pain varied.

"...."

But the fear was always the sa.

Karina watched as the little girl learned to flinch before the sound arrived.

——I’m sorry!

...And learned to apologize before she even understood what she had done wrong.

——I said be quiet.

——I’m sorry. I’ll be quiet. I promise.

The nights were worse.

——Do you know how much this costs?

——I know...

——Then why do you keep causing trouble?

Trouble ant visiting her mother.

Trouble ant asking questions.

Trouble ant existing too loudly.

Trouble ant inconveniencing the man she called father.

The basent ca next.

A narrow space under the house, sotis cold even in sumr. The door shut with a thud, followed by the lock turning from the outside.

——Stay there and think about what you’ve done.

——Please! It’s dark...!

The light vanished.

She hugged her knees, teeth chattering as her breath fogged the air. The cold crept in all at once. Frost ford along the concrete floor, even though it wasn’t winter.

Karina watched the child press her palms together, heat leaving her fingers and ice blooming where her skin touched stone.

That was when it beca routine.

——You’re strange.

——Don’t look at like that.

——What did you do?

Each ti, the frost answered faster. As if it had learned her before she learned it. As if it was waiting.

By the ti the man embraced her again, murmuring apologies that sounded rehearsed, the little girl had already learned the lesson.

Pain ca first.

Kindness ca after.

And kindness was pain.

"Your tears are freezing."

Vanitas crouched slightly in front of the little girl, observing her closely. Indeed, the tears forming at the corner of her eyes crystallized before they could fall.

"...Yes."

The child wiped her cheek, and the frozen tear crumbled between her fingers.

Vanitas watched in silence.

"....’

Tears were ant to fall.

To spill, to stain, and to be seen. They were proof of pain, proof that sothing inside had been hurt and was still alive enough to react.

But when tears froze before they could fall, they never reached the ground.

Vanitas understood it now.

Each frozen tear beca a seal.

Each mont of pain, preserved instead of released, locked away before it could be acknowledged, before it could be grieved.

But pain did not disappear. It was stored.

A chamber of ice ford inside her, layer by layer, and mory by mory. Words left unsaid. Screams drowned out. Nights endured without light.

All of it entombed, as if freezing it ant it no longer hurt.

But ice did not erase what it preserved.

It only delayed it.

The little girl on the bed hugged her knees tighter as frost crawled along the blanket.

She did not cry louder, nor did she scream.

She learned instead... to freeze.

By sealing her pain away, locking it deep within herself, believing that if she never let it thaw, it would never hurt her again.

Vanitas let out a deep exhale.

"...."

No wonder ti itself bent when she finally lost control.

Her magic was not born from power.

It was born from forgetting.

Or rather, from trying to.

And when the little girl finally learned how to freeze her tears, sothing changed.

A smile appeared.

When that smile ca, the shouting lessened.

When that smile stayed, the hitting stopped.

When that smile beca constant, the abuse vanished as if it had never existed.

The lesson was simple and cruelly effective.

As long as she did not cry, she would not be hurt.

As long as she smiled, she would be safe.

So the little girl smiled.

She smiled when her cheek still burned.

She smiled even when her heart felt like it was freezing from everything she refused to rember.

And soon enough, the world responded.

——There you are. That’s a good girl.

He began knocking before entering.

He stopped raising his hand.

He brought food to her room instead of dragging her out of it.

——See? If you behave, things don’t have to be so difficult.

The little girl nodded obediently, her smile perfectly in place.

——I’m sorry for worrying you, Father.

——I know you don’t an to. Karina is a good kid.

She learned then that mory was optional.

If she pretended hard enough.

If she smiled brightly enough.

If she froze everything that hurt before it could surface.

Then the past stopped mattering.

They ate together after that.

Sotis he would even laugh.

To anyone watching, it would have looked like a normal ho. A troubled man trying his best. A dutiful daughter who understood him.

And the little girl played her part flawlessly.

She forgot the hamr through the door.

She forgot the basent.

She forgot the bruises that never healed properly.

Or rather, she sealed them away.

Deep inside that chamber of ice, where pain could not scream, and mories could not move.

"...."

Vanitas watched it all unfold with his teeth gnashed together.

"Professor, could you hold my hand?"

Vanitas didn’t even look at her.

His gaze remained fixed on the scene before them.

——Karina, do you love ?

——Yes.

A kiss ant for Karina’s cheek had landed on her lips instead.

A father, a man who was supposed to protect, who had even gone so far as to raise a hand for a child that was not his own.

What kind of twisted affection was that?

Vanitas felt sothing dark coil in his chest. A sense of disgust. A slow, corrosive anger at the audacity of it.

"No."

Karina let out a quiet breath and curved her lips into a bitter smile.