The Tier 2 Library was a cathedral of silence and floating dust motes.

  While the Tier 1 Library was full of basic spellbooks and history texts, Tier 2 was where the Academy kept the "dangerous" stuff. Rows of books bound in monster hide stretched up to a ceiling that was enchanted to look like a starry night sky.

  Julian walked through the massive oak doors, flashing his upgraded student badge. The librarian, a withered old man who looked like he was made of parchment himself, raised an eyebrow but didn't stop him.

  Most students who got access to Tier 2 immediately ran to the Evocation section, looking for bigger, louder fireballs. Julian walked right past them.

  He ignored Necromancy. He ignored Illusion. He even ignored Enchanting.

  He walked all the way to the back, to a dusty, dimly lit section labeled: Arcanomechanics & Failed Theories.

  "Perfect," Julian whispered.

  In a world where magic solved everything with a wave of a hand, mechanics were considered a dead end. Why build a lever when you can cast Levitate? Why build a steam engine when you can summon a Fire Elemental?

  "Because spells fail," Julian muttered, pulling a heavy tome off the shelf. "Physics is constant."

  He opened the book: The Principles of Mana Conductivity in Non-Ferrous Metals by Archmage Alaric (Deceased).

  Alaric had died because one of his experiments exploded. Julian scanned the diagrams. They were brilliant, but flawed. Alaric had tried to channel mana through copper wires to create a heating element, but he hadn't accounted for resistance.

  "He was trying to build a toaster," Julian realized, tracing the rune circuit. "But he didn't know Ohm's Law. He overloaded the circuit and fried himself."

  Julian took out a notebook and started scribbling corrections.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

  If I replace the copper with a Mythril-Gold alloy... and add a runic resistor here...

  This wasn't just a toaster anymore. It was a Mana Capacitor.

  Mages were like batteries—they held a lot of energy but released it slowly. A capacitor held less energy but could release it instantly.

  "If I can build a portable capacitor," Julian calculated, "I can bypass my low mana pool. I can charge it up slowly over an hour, and then dump the entire charge in 0.1 seconds."

  That was how you built a Railgun.

  "You're reading Alaric?" A voice interrupted his thoughts. "You know he blew up half the West Wing, right?"

  Julian didn't look up immediately. "He blew up because he didn't understand thermal expansion. I do."

  He looked across the table. It was Amelia Voss.

  She looked exhausted. Her red hair was tied back in a messy bun, and there were smudge marks—grease or soot—on her cheeks. She dropped a canvas bag onto the table, followed by a stack of books on Golem Cores.

  "So," Amelia said, pulling out a chair and sitting opposite him. "My expensive physics tutor. I brought the broken Mithril cutter like we agreed. But honestly? Since I already paid you five Mana Stones for the introduction, I'm hoping your physics can also save me from failing my midterm."

  Julian glanced at the canvas bag, then at the title of her top book: Advanced Golemancy.

  "Stress fractures from improper energy distribution on the cutter," Julian said coldly, tapping the bag. "We will fix the blade's frequency later. What is the midterm problem?"

  "I'm trying to build a self-stabilizing core," Amelia groaned, pulling a complex blueprint toward him. "But every time I activate the animation sequence, the mana feedback loop destabilizes and the golem falls over. My professor says I lack 'artistic intuition'."

  Julian pulled her blueprint toward him. He looked at it for five seconds.

  "It's not intuition," Julian said, pulling out his pen. "It's your center of gravity. You put the mana drive in the chest."

  He drew a quick diagram over her careful runes. "Move the drive to the hips. Lower the center of mass. And your feedback loop is crossing itself here—it's creating a destructive interference pattern. You need a diode."

  "A die-what?"

  "A one-way mana gate," Julian explained. He sketched a simple rune modification. "Like a check valve. Mana goes in, doesn't come out."

  Amelia stared at the drawing. Her eyes went wide. She traced the line with a grease-stained finger.

  "That... that actually makes sense," she whispered, looking at Julian like he was an alien. "Why didn't the books say that?"

  "Because the books were written by wizards, not engineers," Julian said. He stood up, clutching The Principles of Mana Conductivity.

  "I've solved your golem core, Amelia. Consider that a bonus lesson." Julian adjusted his glasses. "Now, fix your cutter based on what I taught you about resonance. I have my own research to do."

  Leaving the stunned Rune Scribe at the table, Julian walked back into the depths of the library.