The room he was eventually led to was, in fact, in the farthest corner of the Astral Wing imaginable. Cale had to climb up far too many steps to get to it. He considered complaining, but... well, it wasn't like he was alone.
He had a roommate. How bizarre. With the way he was being treated, he'd been half expecting his room to serve as something like a prison. Instead, this was probably the corner of the Astral Wing where the suppression script was weakest.
"Before I give you your key, I must confirm that you are immune to decay-attuned mana," Jaxovar said, giving him a severe look. Cale blinked at that.
"There's a dreadshade in there?" he asked, glancing over the door with interest. Dreadshades were one of the only species he knew of that could naturally use that type of mana, at least. He supposed it was possible that it was something undead, but those tended to come with traces of other types of magic, most often from a corrupted divinity.
"That is correct." Jaxovar seemed surprised that he knew. Cale just shrugged.
"Yeah, I'll be fine. Gimme." He grabbed the keys from the demon before Jax could say anything more, gave the door a few hard raps. "Coming in!" he announced.
There was a startled yelp from somewhere past the door, but since whoever it was didn't start yelling at him to wait, he happily pushed the door open and entered.
Then he stopped in his tracks, eyeing what he was seeing with a slight raise of his brow. Exactly half of it was thoroughly decorated with an assortment of old relics and artifacts, along with three and a half paintings that depicted what Cale was relatively sure would qualify as blasphemy. He eyed them with interest. Especially the half-painting that was torn down the middle.
There was also a remarkable amount of floating dust and a wide-eyed dreadshade staring at him. Cale blinked.
"Did you just decay half the room to make space for me?" he asked. "Because I appreciate the thought, but uh... you didn't really have to."
"I'm sorry," his new roommate said quietly.
Yeah, Cale was going to have his work cut out for him. He sighed and examined the other man critically. He was very much humanoid, to Cale's surprise—many dreadshades struggled to maintain anything close to a coherent form, in large part because it took most of their focus to keep their own power contained. Immature ones tended to kill any non-magical beings they tried to interact with, and even magical ones had to be wary around them.
As if their abilities weren't bad enough, their appearance alone was enough to disconcert even—or perhaps it was more accurate to say especially—hardened veterans. The "shade" part of their name was no accident; even when under control, their bodies were shadowy, incoherent things that moved strangely in the light.
And the "dread" part of their names? When not under control, their bodies had gaps. And that was where the real trouble was. Dreadshades were fundamentally elemental beings, and they embodied the entire aspect of decay. Without careful control of their forms, those around them could catch glimpses of lost souls in the gaps of their magic.
Most often the decaying bodies of loved ones.
This one was, thankfully, more put together than most of the dreadshade he'd met. Not only were there no gaps, but he was more or less solid, and he'd managed to figure out how to form two eyes and a mouth out of lighter-colored mana. It was only near the top of his head that his mana turned into something that resembled shadowy flame, and even then, there weren't any of the gaps Cale might have otherwise been worried about.
Not only that, but he was radiating an absolute minimum of decay mana. Excellent! Cale had had far worse roommates. There was that one sphinx, for instance.
"Um," the dreadshade said. Cale realized he'd been staring for a while and decided to wave at his new friend. He'd been right! It was always a good day when he was right.
Then he paused and tilted his head.
"Did you know you've got a monster living under your bed?" he asked casually. The dreadshade flinched.
"W-what?"
"You know," Cale said. The dreadshade looked at him blankly. "Monsters under the bed? Common magical infestation? Do they not teach you anything here?"
"I'm... too dangerous to go to the normal classes," the dreadshade said, drawing into himself a little. "I just thought it was... a voice? It's nice and all..."
"You have a nice monster under your bed?" Cale asked. He peered down, where a many-tentacled presence immediately hissed violently and retreated further into the dark. Then he shrugged. "Alright, sure, if you say so. Sorry for calling you an infestation, buddy."
The voice that emerged from under the bed was hesitant. "You. Apologize?"
"I mean, if he says you're not a problem, then I trust him," Cale said cheerfully, moving over to his side of the room and examining his own bed carefully. No magical infestations here, at least, and a lot of the dust generated from whatever decay spell had been cast had more or less disappeared by now. "If you'd been feeding on him, I'm sure he'd be a lot more violent. Dreadshades aren't known for being kind to people they don't like."
The bed-monster hissed. "Do not. Say that. About Damien."
"Your name's Damien?" Cale asked, and when the dreadshade nodded, he grinned. "Cool. I'm Cale. Hope you don't mind if I crash here."
Jax, who had been standing impassively at the door the entire time, finally spoke up, rubbing his temples. "I believe things are settled here," he said. "I believe I will leave the area before you reveal anything else that will require me to complete additional paperwork."
He left, muttering something about Akkau's strays. Cale watched him leave and snickered.
"You don't mind what I am?" Damien asked nervously. The dreadshade was looking at him with something that looked almost like wonder.
"Nah." Cale shrugged. "Besides, you couldn't hurt me if you tried."
"I could..."
"What was that?" Cale raised an eyebrow, turning to look at his roommate, who was now refusing to meet his gaze.
"I could. Hurt you, I mean. You should be careful. If you get too near—"
"Try it," Cale said. Damien stared at him, and he waved a hand encouragingly. "No, really, I don't mind. If we're going to live together, I might as well make sure you aren't worried about melting me the entire time."
"I..." Damien hesitated. "Are you sure?"
"Trust me," Cale said.
Damien lifted his hands, and a slow stream of decay magic began to make its way across the room. Even with his permission, Cale noticed Damien was being exceptionally careful—the mana was tightly bound into a single tendril, ready to snap back or be dispelled at a moment's notice.
That amount of control over decay mana, of all things, was impressive. Cale wondered for a moment what Damien had been through to develop that level of control.
Then he noticed Damien's magic had halted right in the middle of the room. He sighed, then walked over to it, grasping it before Damien could wrench it back. And he was about to, he could tell.
"See?" Cale said. "Nothing."
He peeled off a piece of decay mana, rolling it around in his hands and considering it for a moment. Then he put it into his mouth and swallowed it.
Damien was staring at him again, horrified. "D-did you just... Why?"
"I'm proving a point," Cale said. "I'm not just externally immune or anything. Decay mana doesn't affect me."
Damien looked absolutely bewildered for a moment, and then—startling even himself, apparently—he began to laugh. It was high-pitched and a little hysterical, but it was definitely a laugh. "You... you didn't have to prove it like that," he said, still snickering.
"I guess it was a little unhinged," Cale agreed, smirking. "But it got you to loosen up a little, didn't it?"
"I suppose." Damien seemed surprised at first, and then he managed a small smile. "You probably shouldn't go around eating magic in the rest of the campus, though."
"Fair point," Cale said. "Although—"
You have learned [Decay Bite]!
The Gift certainly didn't seem opposed to the whole thing. Maybe it was worth biting magic?
[Decay Bite, Level 1] [First Tier, Active] [200 Mana]
Spread decay by biting a target.
Hm. Maybe not. That didn't seem like a particularly useful spell. He supposed it would be interesting to see what the Gift would turn it into if he tried to cast it, but considering what happened the last time he'd done that, he would wait until he was in a location appropriately devoid of people.
Or at least until he found someone worth biting.
"Although what?" Damien asked.
"Oh, the Gift gave me a new spell," Cale said. "Something called [Decay Bite]. You know anything about it?"
Damien grimaced. Cale saw the way he drew back into himself the moment he asked the question. "I... yes, but you probably shouldn't cast it. It won't do anything good."
There were definitely some issues there. Cale decided to make his second-wisest decision of the day and swept the room with his mana sense for a change of subject.
He paused.
"Did you know this room has a secret passage?" he asked.
Damien blinked, clearly a little thrown by the lack of questioning, then slowly shook his head. Cale grinned.
"Well then," he said. "Wanna help me find a way to open it?"