(First & Second Year Instruction District)
The Academic Quarter occupies the inner band of the @The Commons directly outward from @Abyssal Hall . It is the part of the city designed to feel least like a fortress and most like a school—wide corridors, constant foot traffic, visible faculty presence, and architectural choices meant to reduce panic and mana instability in young casters.
This zone is where most students first learn what it means to live inside @Ossirian Deep - The Last Academy without being crushed by it—physically or psychologically.
The Quarter is explicitly restricted to First- and Second-Year access outside of faculty, escorts, and administrative summons. Upperclassmen are discouraged from lingering here. Fraternity presence is forbidden by Accord statute.
The Academic Quarter is arranged in a ring of lecture halls, practice chambers, and study vaults surrounding Abyssal Hall like petals around a core. Corridors are broad, well-lit, and intentionally overbuilt to prevent crowd panic. Floors are glass-reinforced stone with faint mana-veins visible beneath, reminding students that even “safe” spaces rest on power infrastructure.
Shops and food kiosks ring the outer edge of the Quarter so students never have to cross into House districts for basic needs. This keeps first-years from wandering into political territory too early.
Key design principles:
Clear sightlines to reduce fear and disorientation
Faculty offices embedded directly into corridors for quick intervention
Soft ambient lighting tuned to stabilize Mana Cores
Sound-dampening runes to prevent sensory overload
Frequent open plazas to avoid tunnel panic in new arrivals
This area never feels quiet. There is always motion. The academy does not let young casters sit alone with their thoughts for long.
The emotional heart of first-year life.
Students dine here, gather here, and undergo MPI Trials here. The zero-gravity dome above the central floor creates the illusion of being underwater without pressure, helping acclimate students psychologically to their environment.
This is where the trio will first feel the weight of being seen.
(Mana Theory, Civic Structure, Runic Literacy)
A circular corridor of amphitheater-style lecture halls built into the ring wall. Each hall has layered seating, reinforced desks, and subtle mana-dampening fields to prevent accidental casting during lectures.
These rooms are administrative by design:
No windows
No spectacle
No open casting allowed
Students learn here that magic has rules, and the rules have teeth.
(House-Segmented Training Chambers)
Six adjacent but isolated training chambers, one per Mana Line. Each chamber is tuned to its element and automatically suppresses excess output to prevent lethal incidents.
These are not dueling arenas.
They are controlled practice environments with faculty observation decks.
This is where Michelangelo learns the difference between lifting something and shaping force.
This is where Vivi first notices her familiar reacting to ambient flows.
This is where Reaper learns restraint is harder than action.
(Controlled Innovation Labs)
A block of reinforced classrooms dedicated to supervised spell crafting.
Students may create cantrips here. First-level spells are only attempted under direct faculty oversight.
Each lab includes:
Spell geometry tables
Safety lattice fields
Emergency suppression pylons
Personal ward alcoves for recovery
Failures are expected.
Panic is not tolerated.
This is where first-years learn that creativity without discipline gets people hurt.
(Shielding, Disruption, Emergency Response)
Long rectangular halls with retractable barriers and illusion-driven hazard simulations.
Students train in small groups to respond to collapsing structures, mana surges, and hostile spell environments.
There is no winning condition here.
Only survival conditions.
The faculty deliberately rotates partners to prevent cliques forming too early.
Suspended above the Commons Quarter by stabilized ambient pylons is the Ascension Deck, the academy’s first-year physical conditioning and mana-conditioning platform.
This structure floats slowly in a controlled orbit above Abyssal Hall, casting shifting shadows across the Commons. Students reach it via three wide levitating bridges that retract during class hours to control access.
The Deck contains:
Open-air conditioning rings
Gravity-adjustable training zones
Breathwork terraces
Mana circulation circuits
Recovery pools
From the Commons floor, students can see others training above them. This is intentional. It creates aspiration pressure without direct competition.
First-years often hate the Ascension Deck at first.
Then it becomes the place they realize they are changing.
First- and Second-Year students are legally bound to the Academic Quarter and Commons Ring unless escorted.
This is enforced by:
Passive tracking wards
Faculty patrol routes
Soft-boundary perception wards that cause unease when students approach restricted corridors
The academy does not physically restrain students from wandering.
It makes wandering uncomfortable enough that most don’t try.
This area is not mystical.
It is busy. Bureaucratic. Loud. Overwhelming.
It feels like:
A university
A transit hub
A controlled disaster response center
A social pressure cooker
First-years feel small here.
Second-years feel competent.
Upperclassmen rarely return unless forced.
This is where the story’s innocence still lives.
It will not survive long.
The Mana Ghost exploits this zone precisely because:
First-years are emotionally volatile
Mana signatures are unstable
Security wards prioritize suppression over detection
The Commons is crowded enough to hide in
Jiminy’s presence causes:
Flickering lights in the Lecture Ring
Sudden cold in the Spellcraft Annex
Unexplained gravity fluctuations in the Ascension Deck
Students reporting whispers in recovery pools
Faculty dismiss this as first-year anxiety.
They are wrong.