The worst thing about it was that he couldn’t even go to someone for help. He was pretty sure the soul bond, or whatever it was, was responsible for him looping around along with Zach. If he asked someone for help, they’d insist on severing the bond (an understandable sentiment and something he’d eagerly agree to in normal circumstances), which would cause him to lose everything he had gained inside the time loop, memories included, once Zach started over at the end of the month.
Yeah, he was totally screwed.
He took a couple of deep breaths and put his glasses back on. Maybe he was looking at things too fatalistically. Considering the sheer size of disparity between him and Zach, he should have experienced some pretty massive personality shifts by now, and he didn’t notice anything of the sort. He certainly wasn’t feeling submissive towards anyone, least of all Zach. Obviously things weren’t as bad as they seemed. He could very well be overreacting and overlooking some other, perfectly reasonable explanation for the unscheduled restart…
Someone was knocking. Who could possibly-
Oh. Right. Taiven.
He sighed heavily. Just what he needed right now. The knocking turned into banging, prompting him to finally open the door.
«Hi Roach!»
«Hi Taiven,» Zorian said in a slightly suffering tone. «How nice of you to visit me. Do you want to come in?»
Taiven promptly did what she always did once he let her inside — she jumped on his bed and made herself comfortable. Zorian shrugged and went after her. Best to get it over with quickly.
«Didn’t you graduate?» he asked. «You said you were going to go into exploration after you graduate, what happened to that?»
She gave him a sour look. «It’s not that simple. No expedition is going to take a complete beginner like me with them. I need an established explorer to take me as an apprentice. I’m working on it.»
«Funny, I heard you’re working as a class assistant to Nirthak,» Zorian remarked. «Isn’t that going to interfere with searching for another master?»
«Well, sort of,» she admitted. «But I’m not literally searching for another job at this point. I’m actually trying to build up my reputation and get people to notice me by doing missions and such. In fact, that’s what I came to talk to you about — I’d like you to join me and a couple of others on a job tomorrow.»
«Sounds suspicious,» Zorian said. «What could a measly third year help you with?»
«Um, fill out our numbers?» Taiven answered. «We can’t take the job until there are 4 or more of us, and we’re one short of that.»
«Well, why does the job require four people?» asked Zorian, knowing from previous restarts that this was the fastest avenue to shut down Taiven’s excuses. «Surely the employer didn’t put that there just to be mean to groups like yours.»
«It’s supposedly dangerous,» Taiven huffed, folding her arms across her chest. «The old man is overreacting. The spiders aren’t even that big from what he told us.»
«Spiders?» prodded Zorian.
«Yeah,» Taiven said hesitantly, apparently realizing she probably shouldn’t have mentioned that. «Spiders. You know, hairy eight-legged—»
«Taiven,» Zorian warned.
«Oh come on Roach, I’m begging you!» Taiven whined. «I swear its not as dangerous as it sounds! We’ve been in the tunnels hundreds of times and it wasn’t that dangerous at all! We can protect you easily!»
«Hundreds of times?» asked Zorian dubiously.
«Well, a dozen times at least,» she relented.
Zorian was just about to tell her no, like he usually did at this point, but then he stopped himself. He probably wouldn’t be able to do anything remotely productive for at least a week, what with the possibility of a soul bond between him and Zach weighting heavily on his mind and all. A nice distracting stroll through the sewers might be just what the doctor ordered, so to speak.
«Sure,» he said.
«Really!?» she squealed.
«Yes, really,» confirmed Zorian. «Just tell me where to meet you tomorrow before I change my mind.»
A few minutes later Taiven left, thanking him profusely and kissing him on the cheek ‘for being a friend’ before running off to… wherever she had been going, he supposed. He didn’t ask, being too shocked by her kiss, innocuous as it may have been. He was a bit angry at himself for being so affected by a silly kiss on the cheek, but he supposed he shouldn’t be too hard on his subconscious. She was his former crush, after all.
He decided he had had enough of everything for the day and drank one of the sleeping potions he kept in his stash. Hopefully things would seem clearer after a good night’s rest.
The next morning he woke up a bit more level-headed than he had been after his visit to the library, and things didn’t seem as hopeless as they had the day before. He had been jumping to conclusions, and needed more information. He was tempted to skip classes for the day to have another go at the library, but he suspected that he lacked both the research skills and the access level to properly tackle a restricted topic like soul bonds. And besides, there was someone in his class he absolutely had to talk to — Briam, the guy with a fire drake familiar. Surely someone who is already soul-bonded to another, even if it was to a magical animal instead of another human, could tell him more about those blasted things.
«I see your family has given you a fire drake of your own,» he said conversationally, sitting down beside Briam and ignoring the threatening hissing of the fire drake. For some reason, the ill-tempered beast never saw fit to attack him in previous restarts, so he didn’t think it would start now. «Is he your familiar already?»
«Yes,» Briam confirmed, clearly pleased with that. «I bonded with him just this summer actually. A bit strange, at first, but I think I’m getting the hang of it.»
«Strange?» asked Zorian. «How so?»
«Well, it’s mostly the bond being there, you know?» Briam said.
«So the bond can be felt?» Zorian said speculatively, trying not to let his excitement show. He didn’t feel anything. «Is that normal? Can everyone who is soul-bonded feel their bond?»
«No, not everyone,» Briam chuckled. «Only a tiny minority can, and nobody is sure why. I can, though. I guess I’m lucky that way.»
Zorian suppressed a scowl. He had been hoping that him not being able to sense any bonds meant there was none, but apparently that was no proof. Damn.
«You know,» Zorian tried, «I’ve always had an… academic interest in familiars and soul bonds…»
Thankfully, Briam didn’t find Zorian’s interest in any way suspicious and was happy to indulge Zorian’s curiosity. What Briam told him was interesting, to say the least. According to Briam, the soul bond spell was actually a ritual of some sort, one that took at least 10 minutes to properly cast, and usually more. Not something you cast as a regular invocation. Also, even the most oblivious of participants tended to feel something after a few weeks, after the bond had properly anchored itself to the participants.
There were a lot of things Zorian had experienced so far in the time loop that could qualify as signs of a developing soul bond, but it was hard to say how much of that was simply a consequence of the crazy situation he had found himself in. The effects were just too weak compared to what Briam told him should happen. His mana reserves were slightly larger than they had been at the start of the time loop, for instance, but the increase was nothing special. It could just as easily be a consequence of his regular combat magic practice instead of being caused by the soul bond trying to twist his soul to be more in line with Zach’s. The spell that the lich cast on them definitely wasn’t a ritual either… but then again, it was a lich. Who knew what kind of magic a creature like that had at its disposal?