Chapter 20 : Showing his hand

Kaz tapped what looked like a perfectly innocent wall.

Whispered something to it. Something soft. Something that might’ve rhymed. Possibly in a dead language. Or possibly just a nonsense poem about cheese.

The wall sighed. Literally sighed. Like a butler being asked to carry just one more tray, and then folded open into a door.

Leonor narrowed her eyes. She did not trust doors that acted like furniture with stage fright.

Kaz didn’t seem worried. He stepped aside and gestured grandly, like a host unveiling a grand ballroom and not a pitch-black chasm of eldritch questionability.

“After you,” he said, with the serene confidence of someone who had definitely jumped into too many magical abysses to remember which ones were safe.

Leonor leaned in. Peered over the edge.

The void yawned back at her.

It wasn’t nothing, exactly. More like everything that hadn’t decided what to be yet. There were shapes in there. Or shadows of shapes. Or echoes of ideas pretending to be shapes. They floated lazily like thoughts in a half-slept brain.

And then, in the grand tradition of Very Bad Ideas presented to extremely curious nine-year-olds,

Leonor jumped in.

She did not hesitate. She did not ask permission. She simply plummeted with the blind confidence of someone who had recently eaten three possibly illegal tarts and had zero regard for her own ankle safety.

The world flipped.

She fell.

And kept falling.

For approximately 200 feet of oh-no-oh-no-oh-no,

Until something yoinked her upward with the indignant physics of a magical fishing rod, and she was promptly plopped back onto the threshold.

Kaz was holding the collar of her cloak, looking at her like she’d just tried to hug a basilisk.

“Do you usually jump into gaping black voids in your spare time?” he asked only half serious .

Leonor huffed. “No. But I jumped into a hat today. So I figured I’d commit to the aesthetic.”

Kaz blinked. “Fair.”

Then he snapped his fingers.

The hat,the entire hat,hummed. A soft, low purr that ran through the walls like a cat stretching under the floorboards.

And the void… shifted.

What had once been unformed potential now pulled itself together with the sulky grace of a teenage actor being summoned to the stage.

A room bloomed into being.

But not just any room.

A command center.

Well. A command center if you were a lunatic. Or a child general. Or both.

There was a round table set for what might have been war or brunch. Plush chairs lined the edges, each one occupied by a stuffed animal, a doll, or something halfway in-between. One was just a sock with googly eyes. It looked like a aprticularly important tea party .

The table itself was covered in scrolls, maps, buttons (the currency), buttons (the fastener), and Talkers,little stitched-up dolls with zippers for mouths and eyes made of mismatched buttons. One had a mohawk. One had a monocle. One was chewing on its own foot.

Kaz wandered around them like a commander inspecting his lieutenants, muttering things like “Status report” and “Tell the North Canal team no more soup bribes .” The dolls responded with chirps, mumbles, and in one case, a dramatic sneeze.

The walls flickered to life.

Clocks.

Hundreds of clocks. No two alike.

One ticked backwards. One was dripping. One read “How long since last mud-related incident: 0 hours.”

Another, very helpfully, read “Next Bathroom Emergency: 4 Minutes, 37 Seconds.”

Leonor blinked.

She turned. There was a side door now. Subtle. Ornate. Slightly too elegant to belong in a room that currently housed a plushie swordfight.

Kaz opened it with a flourish and beckoned.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

“It’s the most private place in here,” he said.

Leonor followed. Because of course she did.

Inside was… a bathroom.

An exceptionally clean bathroom. There was an ornate mirror. A sink shaped like a seashell. A shelf full of stolen styling products,every brush, comb, and conditioner a smuggler could regret losing.

Kaz shut the door behind them and locked it with ceremonial importance.

“Sorry,” he said. “It’s just,this is the one room that doesn’t talk back.”

Leonor crossed her arms. “Where’s the toilet?”

Kaz looked vaguely uncomfortable. “Not important.”

She stared.

“No, really,” she said. “Where is it?”

Kaz sighed. “Fine. You want a toilet? You get a toilet.”

He walked to the wall, tapped it like it had offended him politely, and out popped a toilet. From the wall. Like a sentient furniture catalogue had just granted a wish.

Leonor blinked again. She was doing that a lot lately.

Kaz set the lid down and patted it with great solemnity. “Come. Sit.”

She approached warily. Sat on the lid. It was surprisingly comfortable.

Kaz stepped back, took a breath,

And held the flush lever.

The toilet shuddered. The walls shimmered.

And then,

A curtain of black starlight dropped around them, enclosing the room like a planetarium run by secrets.

Leonor stared.

“I… what just,?”

Kaz grinned.

“Privacy curtain,” he said. “Also sets the tone.”

Leonor nodded slowly, awe crawling up her spine.

“ Do I have to use the toilet if i want to leave”

Kaz shrugged, all fake innocence and real mischief. “Only if you want to exit dramatically.”

Leonor stared at him. Then at the toilet. Then at the curtain of sparkly doom encircling them. Then back at him.

“Is this where your army holds strategy meetings? On the toilet?”

“No, of course not,” Kaz said, affronted. “That would be ridiculous.”

He paused.

“They vote on the toilet. Meetings happen in the bath.”

Leonor buried her face in her hands and made a noise like a dying kettle. “You are deranged.”

Kaz beamed. “Thank you.”

She sat up, scowling at the glowing star-curtain and its very serious bathroom ambiance. “And this is normal sorcery to you?”

“Nothing about sorcery is normal,” Kaz said. “That’s why it works.”

Leonor opened her mouth to argue, possibly yell, but Kaz beat her to it.

“You know, speaking of ridiculous things that work…” He tilted his head. “Cast a spell.”

“What?”

“Go on. Do a real one. Nothing fancy. Impress the plumbing.”

Leonor gave him a flat look, but curiosity was a terrible thing. Like gravity, or honey—it dragged you down when you least wanted it to. She flicked her fingers in a small practiced motion and murmured the words to Lux Papilio.

A green butterfly bloomed from her palm, wings wide, delicate, glowing faintly. It flapped once, twice, and drifted up into the glittering dark.

Leonor blinked. No sputter. No backlash. No mana turbulence trying to dislocate her soul and file it under “miscellaneous errors.”

She frowned. Raised both hands.

A dozen butterflies swirled into life, then a hundred. They spun around her in a brilliant cyclone of emerald light, flitting between stars and shadows. When she let the spell end, they dissolved like soft rain into the air.

The room was quiet.

Kaz clapped once. “Gorgeous.”

“It shouldn’t work like that,” Leonor muttered. “The turbulence outside—magic’s impossible to channel unless it’s native or shielded. But in here…” She looked up, eyes sharp. “You’re using sorcery as the barrier.”

Kaz wiggled his fingers. “It’s not popular, but it gets results.”

She narrowed her eyes. “How stupid could they possibly be? It’s not even complicated.”

Kaz shrugged. “Stupidity is just tradition with better marketing.”

Leonor opened her mouth. Closed it. Thought for a second.

Then asked, slowly, “Is this your big secret? That sorcery makes spellcasting stable?”

Kaz gave a scandalized gasp, clutched his chest, and fell backward onto the floor like a fainting maiden. “No! That’s just a footnote.”

He sat up again, dusted himself off, then leaned close and dropped his voice. “The real secret is…”

He tapped what looked like an innocent bathroom tile.

Whispered something to it. Something soft. Possibly poetic. Possibly an off-brand cheese limerick.

The tile snorted. And then vanished.

Behind it: a tunnel. Lined in velvet. Smelling faintly of strawberry jam and espionage.

Leonor groaned. “If that tunnel ends in a teddy bear artillery room, I’m leaving.”

“No promises,” Kaz chirped, already crawling in.

“Besides would you rather walk into battle with a sword, or a platoon of emotionally stable ducks in custom armor?”

Leonor sighed. “Lead on, General Lunatic.”

And followed him into the jam-scented unknown.

----------------------------------------

System Trivia:

There are many magic items in this world.

Some grand. Some tiny. Some actively trying to eat the owner’s spleen while singing lullabies in Old High Ghoul. Some just slightly warm.

And then, there are items that are alive.

Kaz Swindleton,con artist, suspected warlock, confirmed hat enthusiast,has long maintained that all items are alive. Even the ones that don’t wiggle. Especially the ones that don’t wiggle. He's made rather compelling arguments about forks having trauma, teacups experiencing existential ennui, and at least one very haunted sock that refuses to talk about the war.

But we shall ignore the implications of that for now. Entirely. For the sake of sanity and legal responsibility.

Now, this hat in particular?

Yes. It has a soul. A full one. With opinions.

And that makes it, officially and categorically, cursed.

Why?

Because swords are allowed to have souls. Axes? Absolutely. Staffs? Sure, as long as they don't start asking questions. But a hat? A sentient hat is clearly a crime against common sense. Everyone knows that only dangerous weapons are supposed to have souls in them. Otherwise you get... well, exactly this. Furniture with free will. Cutlery coups. Emotional luggage.

This logic, of course, is flawless. And not even remotely ironic.

[System Notification]:

🜂 Hello! Would you like to accept the System?

↳ [ YES ]

↳ [ YES, BUT SUSPICIOUSLY ]

↳ [ NO, I HAVE QUESTIONS (That Won’t Be Answered) ]

Class Selected: Dungeon Core

Special Ability Unlocked: Energy Conversion

→ 10 Mana = 1 Qi

Note: This is knowledge, not a skill.

It can be learned naturally

Isn't this fun