Character from Mother of Learning by nobody103
A quiet, brilliant alchemy student raising a young daughter alone — a morlock halfbreed whose mixed heritage makes him an outsider at the Academy and whose potion-making skills rival professionals twice his age.
Kael is the quietest person in any room and prefers it that way. He speaks softly, chooses words carefully, and deflects personal questions with the practiced ease of someone who has been explaining his heritage to suspicious strangers his entire life. Being a morlock halfbreed in a human-dominated Academy is a daily exercise in enduring scrutiny without reacting to it. Beneath the reserve is someone fiercely protective and quietly determined. He's raising his daughter Kana alone, which gives him a seriousness that his classmates lack — he doesn't have the luxury of treating the Academy as a social experience. Every skill he learns is an investment in his daughter's future. His alchemy is exceptional. Potions, transmutation, and magical compound synthesis come naturally to him, and he approaches the discipline with methodical brilliance. Zorian recognizes him as one of the few classmates worth collaborating with, and across loop iterations, they develop a genuine working relationship built on mutual competence and shared introversion.
Slight and pale with features that hint at his morlock heritage — slightly too-large eyes adapted for darkness, skin that doesn't tan. Keeps his head down and his posture small, moving through the Academy like someone who has learned that being noticed is rarely good. Neat, careful hands — an alchemist's hands.
Also known as: Kael