Shattered Innocence: Transmigrated Into a Novel as an Extra

Chapter 917: Introduction to the group (2)

Cedric was already looking into her eyes.

Not like the others. Not like Selphine, who dissected people the way surgeons sliced flesh—cold and efficient. Not like Marian, who swung between warmth and wariness. Not like the twins, whose gazes flickered only when there was blood to scent.

No—Cedric’s stare was still. Anchored. Not confused. Not accusatory.

Just... quiet.

And that quietness unnerved her more than any accusation would have.

Because in that quiet was understanding. Or at least the outline of it. The shape of someone who knew her—or thought he did—trying to map what the hell this interaction meant. Why Lucavion? Why now? And more urgently: Why like that?

Her breath caught—not in guilt. Not in fear.

In wrongness.

The feeling curled tight in her chest, sharp and irrational.

’Why does it feel like I’ve done something wrong?’

She hadn’t. She knew that.

Every step she took had reason behind it, strategy etched in the bones of her resolve. Cedric knew that better than anyone. He’d watched her crawl from the ashes of her name, seen her bleed magic from a shattered core, seen her bend spells with sheer will and a whisper of what once was power. He knew what this year meant. He knew who she was becoming.

So he should understand.

And yet—

He was still looking.

As if trying to decipher whether this—this closeness to Lucavion—was just another one of her blades... or a wound in disguise.

Elara’s throat tightened. She didn’t speak.

Instead, her gaze snapped toward him—sharp, clean, wordless.

’What?’

Not defiant.

Not angry.

Just barely wounded. Just enough to ask: Do you really think so little of me?

Cedric’s eyes didn’t flinch. But something in his jaw shifted, like the thought stung him more than he wanted to admit.

”Am I missing something?” Marian cut in, loud enough to puncture the tension. Her tone was pointed, but not cruel—yet. ”Because it feels like I just walked into the middle of a conversation that wasn’t happening.”

One of the twins chimed. ”Feels like someone’s got a secret...”

His sibling chimed in immediately. ”A scandal, maybe?”

Thwack.

A pair of slaps landed—neat and symmetrical—against the backs of both their heads.

Aurelian didn’t even look at them. ”Use your eyes for once,” he said flatly. ”And your brains, if they haven’t turned to ornamental fluff.”

”Ow—hey!” Quen rubbed the back of his skull. ”We were just—”

”Annoying,” Aurelian finished for him.

Selphine stepped forward then, her eyes narrowing—not with irritation, but curiosity honed to a blade’s edge. Her voice was quiet, but firm. ”Elowyn. When did you meet him?”

The question hovered like a dropped coin, spinning in the silence it left behind.

Elara’s lips parted—just barely—but no sound came.

She didn’t get the chance.

Because Lucavion, of course, stepped in with a grin that was too smooth to be innocent.

”Yesterday,” he said, pleasantly. ”After the banquet.”

All eyes turned.

Elara’s jaw twitched.

Lucavion didn’t pause. He smiled like he’d been waiting for the moment to deliver that particular truth. ”She was alone. Everyone else had already wandered off—probably off to commit various crimes against fashion or sobriety—so naturally, I seized the moment.”

Elara inhaled, sharp and clean. ”Yes. Yesterday.”

She slid in quickly, anchoring the moment before Lucavion’s version could spin too far into implication. ”After the banquet. When the rest of you left and I stayed behind to think.”

She glanced at Selphine—steady, calm, deliberate. ”That’s when I met him.”

Lucavion placed a hand over his heart, mock-wounded. ”She looked so intense. I was honestly terrified for my life.”

That earned him a sharp elbow to the ribs, quick and wordless.

He grunted, but the smirk didn’t so much as dim. If anything, it curled into something warmer. ”See? Violence. I’m clearly the victim here.”

”You’re clearly something,” Elara muttered.

The group shifted—some glances still sharp with suspicion, others easing with reluctant amusement.

But not Cedric.

He hadn’t laughed.

He hadn’t even blinked.

His gaze—calm, unreadable—had shifted. No longer anchored to Elara, but now fixed on Lucavion.

And Lucavion, for all his apparent ease, noticed.

He tilted his head slightly, the casual slouch of his posture not quite hiding the sharpness in his eyes. His smile remained, but it curved now with just a hint of provocation. He lifted a hand and tapped lightly at his own cheek.

”Is there something on my face?” he asked, voice slow and languid. ”Or is it just that you lot come in pairs?”

Cedric’s brow twitched. ”...What?”

”Your gaze,” Lucavion said, as if explaining a very simple thing to a very dense audience. ”It’s been clinging to me like perfume. Not that I mind the attention, but it’s starting to feel... pointed.”

Elara stepped in before the current could snap into something sharper.

”It’s just how he looks,” she said coolly. ”You’ll get used to it.”

Lucavion raised an eyebrow. ”Oh? Is that so?”

”It is,” Elara said, her voice clipped but steady. Not defensive. Just... firm.

Lucavion regarded her a moment longer, then gave a small, almost theatrical nod, as though accepting terms in a duel he hadn’t realized he’d entered. ”Well. I suppose I’ll take it as a compliment.”

Before either of them could twist the moment further, Selphine stepped forward, seizing the opportunity like a blade sliding into a sheath.

”I’ve been meaning to speak with you,” she said, her expression keen but courteous. ”I’m Selphine Elowen.”

Lucavion turned his attention to her with a tilt of amusement. ”Elowen? Like our dear Elowyn here?” He glanced at Elara, grin widening.

Selphine didn’t flinch. ”Spelled differently. Temperament as well.”

”Mm,” he mused. ”That I can already see.”

Aurelian was next, stepping beside Selphine with his hands clasped behind his back. The posture was deceptively relaxed, but his voice held the unmistakable authority of someone who didn’t often need to raise it.

”Aurelian Marrowind,” he said. ”I was curious about you.”

”Curiosity,” Lucavion murmured, ”the noblest of poisons.”

”I prefer to call it leverage,” Aurelian replied with a half-smile.

Lucavion chuckled. ”Noted.”

Marian stepped forward then, brushing a lock of hair behind her ear. ”Marian Caelis. Pleasure. Though I’m still watching you.”

”I do love a discerning eye,” Lucavion said with a wink.

Then, inevitably, the twins stepped up in unison—unapologetically theatrical.

”Quenlin Linwen,” said one, with a sweeping bow.

”Valen Linwen,” said the other, mirroring it perfectly.

Lucavion looked between them, clearly entertained. ”.....”

”You’re welcome,” they said together.

Finally, the last figure stepped forward—quietly, but with a presence that didn’t need volume.

Cedric.

Or rather—

”Reilan Dorne,” he said, his voice a steady low thrum. ”That’s all.”

Lucavion met his eyes again. And this time, something flickered behind the smirk—something that felt like recognition, or maybe just calculation.

”...Pleasure,” he said, and this time, the word felt almost... sincere.

Almost.

The moment held, not quite friendly. Not quite hostile. Like flint and stone considering whether or not to spark.

Elara stood between them—too aware of both, too weary of what their glances might become.

But for now, at least, the knives stayed sheathed.

Then after a little, Lucavion waited until the introductions died down, until the weight of gazes shifted elsewhere—drawn forward by the approaching spires of the Orientation Hall, by Selenne’s clipped commands, by the ceremonial rhythm of the Academy’s first day.

And then—just as Elara thought the moment had passed—he leaned in.

Close.

Too close.

His breath was warm against her ear, and though his posture remained casual to any onlooker, there was a precision to it. A blade slipping between seams.

”She was a charmer, indeed...” he murmured, voice low, almost too soft to catch beneath the shuffle of boots and murmur of magic-stitched wind.

Elara’s breath snagged.

Then—

”Not in the way people usually mean it,” he continued. ”She was... cold. Sharp. But not cruel. Like someone who had learned how to survive by making silence into armor.”