After two hours of work and unfamiliar math, Karen has successfully made a correct thingy of saline solution. Her brain feels like it's overheating, or something. She gets food and sees Leander and sits down at his table, and does not immediately say anything.

Val is slightly late to lunch but much less late than he was to breakfast. Not too late to grab more than the last and least-loved portions of things, this time.

There's Leander! And presumably the person with him is Karen. Oh, boy. Val takes a seat with them, trying not to look nervous, and says hello.

"Hey. I'm Karen."

"Val, alchemy. It's good to meet you."

"Good to meet you, too. Are you, uh, liking your classes so far?"

"Yeah, they're great! I just had one about a Satanic cult. I mean, it's not like TST, they argue they're not a Satanic cult." He can follow that up with praise or condemnation depending on how she feels about Satan - no, it's not Karen whose opinion matters, it'll have to depend on how Leander feels - no, it'll have to be honest, won't it, only he's not sure what honesty would even mean in this context.

Wow, do they study Satanic cults here? Was her mom right that magic is all Satanic, and it's not just actually some totally different thing? She doesn't feel like she's done any Satanism or even any worshiping false gods but maybe the spells she cast last night actually work by relying on some kind of... demonic entities... but wait if all magic were like that wouldn't it be superfluous to specify that some of it was done by a Satanic cult that claimed not to be a Satanic cult?

This seems like something actually important to figure out but also something that she is so incredibly not equipped to figure out. Maybe she will.... maybe she will see if she can find any apparently religious people (Muslims? Muslims are also normally against magic, she thinks, and normally she would avoid them because they're also wrong about so many things but they're at least visually distinguishable (maybe?? unless they're just wearing headscarves for cultural reasons??)) and see how and if they reconcile their religious beliefs with... everything else.

"Oh," she says, after what is probably too long of a pause. "Do you think they're right? Or - I guess it sounds like you don't."

"Huh. I... didn't know we had classes about those." 

"I mean, I don't really have enough information to say, do I, I've only had the one class, but a cardinal speaking for the Vatican called it an infernal cult of devastation and hell - I think it's more of a literature class, really, the name on my schedule is Santa Muerte, Pray for Us: the Holiness of Death in Southwestern Literature."

"Ah. Yeah, I've heard the lit classes are about all kinds of things, I was in one on King Arthur last block and someone in my math class has one about Victor Hugo." 

"There's literature about King Arthur?"

"....yes? That's what he is, a literary character? A bunch of it is about the Morte, we're starting with Gawain and the Green Knight..." 

Oh, no, they know he's stupid.

"Oh, I thought it was an oral tradition."

Oh she knows this one! "Uh, I think a lot of it was written down but a lot of it isn't really, like, readable except in translation, because it's so old."

"Oh, that's cool."

"It is! — so, um, we were going to figure out a time for Latin tutoring? I can do other languages too, I have a kind of absurd number, but I think Latin to start since Karen you've got a class on it already." 

"Yes. Apparently. Uh, I haven't gotten any homework besides the Maleficaria Studies homework and I haven't made any other plans, so I guess just... whenever works best for you? Although I think to start I might kind of need it, uh, every day. If I'm going to learn it fast enough to keep up."

" - We might not stay close enough to the same level for it to be worth it, I figured Latin would be easy to pick up whenever and it seems like it is - I just had lang lab - but I'm okay with daily. Not first thing after classes today, though, I've got stuff I've been putting off, but maybe if it's right before or right after dinner?"

"I haven't worked with it at all yet, it might be easier than I'm imagining? It just seems like I might have gotten put in a class for people who actually, uh, know Latin already, so I need to catch up as fast as I can. I'm fine with right after dinner, if that works for you."

"Right after dinner works for me too. I think my room is near yours, I'm in 55B?" 

"198A. I don't have a good enough idea how the numbers work to know whether those are on the same level or anything."

"I don't think I'm close to those but the numbering is sort of confusing, I haven't figured it out yet. I don't suppose there's a labeled map."

Pause to do math about it. 

"Same hall, different ends, I think, Karen. I'm right across the hall from Julia. I think there's eight rows and the numbering goes around in a spiral, and I was told that you get used to it. —But also we can meet here since we're doing it right after dinner." 

"Yeah, see, meeting up here sounds much less confusing."

"We could even meet during dinner, if we don't get things on any books..."

"Yeah, I think that probably works? Especially if we want to start before we even have books on it. - uh, before I have books on it, I guess, but I feel like we might just want to start with flashcards or something. - by the way, does anybody know where you get, uh, paper in here? Or if we were supposed to bring all of our paper in with us?"

"I was going to see what I could find in the library after classes, the books only vanish on you if you aren't nice to them. Uh, paper comes from supply cupboards, so do pencils and pens and so on. One advantage of my room is that we can use the ones I grabbed yesterday." 

"Okay. Do you know where those... are." She pulls out her map.

"Yes," and he can give looseish directions to the one he got paper and sticky notes from yesterday, or— oh, cool, map, he can point out locations. 

"Okay. Those look like... places I should not go alone. Hm."

"Well, if we get along, we might have some time after study group and I could use some stuff too so there'll be two of us who want to go - I don't know if you're useful company, no offense, are you?"

"Well, I guess it depends what you need? I spent most of yesterday going down to the senior dorms with New York to sort through stuff and move stuff to help fix up their freshmen's rooms, they seemed to think I was fine at that?"

She is, actually, aware that he's probably asking whether she can cast combat spells, but the only honest answer to that is 'no', and she doesn't want to say that.

"Are you better at noticing mals and dealing with them than you are distracting and tasty - that's unfair, none of us are that yet - are you better at that than an equivalent volume of empty air?"

"...I am better at noticing them than empty air is? If I see any my plan is mostly to run away, though."

"And you're less likely to be bothered in the first place with a group," he observes to nobody in particular.

"That's true. Also I could lend you a weapon but I don't know if you have enough experience for that to make things better instead of worse."

"I, uh, don't have a lot of experience with weapons, I have some martial arts training but it's strictly unarmed. Is two enough of a group to increase safety much? Maybe we should... plan on picking up some other people to go, too? I'm not sure how you do that, exactly, although this early in the year I guess it's not implausible that you just yell out your intentions."

"Just sort of announcing in public that they were making a supply run worked for the group I went with yesterday." 

"Should we... plan on doing that right after dinner and then doing study stuff after we get back, if we want there to be a lot of people congregated in one place?"

"...You know, that does make sense. - I'm assuming you're good on school supplies," he adds to Leander.

"I am, yeah." 

"Well, does it still work for you to do Latin after a supply run, or...?"

"Yeah, it does. I'll wait for you guys at dinner?" 

"Sure, works for me."

"Yes please. And then should we just... come back up to the cafeteria after we get the stuff?"

"It might have closed by then but I can wait outside it for you guys if it is?" 

"Oh, I guess if it closes after dinner then it's not a very good spot for after dinner studying. But yeah, that sounds easier than finding your room."

"I... guess? If you say so." What's wrong with the library? And other questions he can't ask lest he reveal that he doesn't know the answers.

"Cool! I'll see you then."