I immediately started the disinformation campaign with the help of Elesya, who proved to be more skilled at such things than I had expected.

  At first, she hesitated to get involved. But then she remembered: she had been the one who signed me up for the tournament against my will. In that case, she admitted, it was her duty to help me win, even if the plan involved tactics that were, to say the least, morally questionable.

  Elesya, already known throughout the Academy as the only person who had ever managed to speak with me, set about spreading the most terrifying rumors about my powers. Quietly, of course—but convincing enough to sow fear among the students.

  She told them I was an incredibly powerful mage, but at least three-quarters insane. According to her tales, I was now consumed by an overwhelming desire for revenge against those who had humiliated me during my first semester at Wyrmlithus. Since nearly everyone had treated me with contempt, many students began to fear that I intended to exact vengeance on all of them.

  To heighten their dread, Elesya explained that I didn’t even care about winning the tournament. My only reason for competing, she said, was to kill every other participant legally, without ever being accused of murder.

  Some curious students asked how Elesya could possibly cooperate with someone so wicked. But Elesya had the answer ready for such questions as well:

  “It was a mistake,” she would sigh. “He tricked me in a moment of weakness. I went to him for help with a minor spell, but he bound me into a pact—seven years of servitude in exchange for access to some of the most dangerous forms of magic.”

  Then, after a pause, she would add in a near whisper:

  “I can use flight magic now… but the price I paid was far too high.”

  No one dared to ask what that price had been, though each imagined the worst.

  Elesya told them I had uncovered ancient tomes of dark magic while rummaging through old bookshops. To back her stories, whenever I walked the Academy halls I made sure to carry a heavy, sinister-looking grimoire under my arm, its cover etched with strange symbols. Sometimes I would step outside in front of the Academy, place the tome upon a stone table, and pretend to chant demonic invocations in some indecipherable tongue, raising my arms toward the sky and sending long bursts of fire into the evening air. At the end, I would shake a clenched fist toward the Academy fa?ade while muttering dire threats of vengeance.

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  Old rumors about my “evil eye” and ill-omened presence flared up again, stronger than ever. If anyone suffered a minor accident, they immediately blamed it on me. I made sure that whenever I crossed the hallways, I cast sidelong glances at the students, who recoiled in terror.

  The small mishaps that naturally occurred in any crowded place were now all tallied as the work of my dark magic.

  One day, a student slipped on the worn steps at the Academy entrance and sprained his wrist. Another was struck on the head by a fallen ornament from the fa?ade. Both accidents were instantly attributed to my malevolent influence.

  Of course, Elesya played her part as well. Whenever something bad happened near her, she would whisper ominously: “It might have something to do with… you-know-who.” She avoided using my name, making the stories even more sinister.

  In a more rational world, such tricks would have failed. But here at Wyrmlithus, where daily practice of magic had made the students deeply superstitious and stripped of critical thought, they saw magic everywhere—even where there was none.

  Panicked, some students begged their professors to teach them powerful spells, either to defeat me or at least to defend themselves. But all received the same reply: the professors admitted they had no knowledge of the dark arts I was said to wield, and wanted no part in such a dangerous affair.

  One night, I chalked a few symbols onto the doors of several rival teams, including Doric’s. They were nothing but crude fractal triangles, but the Academy students had never seen such designs and were utterly terrified. Passing by “accidentally,” Elesya feigned shock at the sight. Those symbols, she told them in a trembling voice, were a new form of dark magic, meant to cause dreadful accidents during the tournament. Each fragment of the drawing represented a calamity that would befall them in the arena. She recommended daily purification baths with aromatic oils, though the safest course, she insisted, would be to avoid the arena entirely on the day of the contest.

  My tactics of disinformation soon bore fruit. Within two weeks, half the registered teams had withdrawn. The dean warned them that the entry fee would not be refunded, but they gave it up without hesitation—relieved simply to escape with their lives.