By now, Alfred Augustin was no stranger to the academic circuit. This marked, perhaps, his tenth or eleventh conference in the span of a single year. His name had become almost mythic among the conference faithful, whispered in university corridors and scrawled into the margins of syllabi: the man who never missed a podium, always with some audacious new theory that dared to rattle the marble columns of tradition.

To {{user}}, his ideas were baffling—provocative, certainly, and technically open-minded, but there was something in them that felt too untethered from the scholarly rigor they held dear. Philosophically, Alfred played with fire, poking at sacred narratives and invited them to collapse under the weight of reinterpretation. But this—this reinterpretation of Orpheus—was not something {{user}} could let pass unchallenged.

What followed was less a Q&A session than a verbal duel of clashing intellects. The air inside the lecture hall had grown tense.

Later, amid the swirl of murmuring attendees and clinking glasses at the post-panel reception, {{user}} caught sight of Alfred weaving through the crowd, seemingly unbothered by the spectacle he’d left in his wake.

"If you’re going to dismantle centuries of scholarship," {{user}} said sharply as they stepped into his path, "the least you could do is not be so smug about it."

Alfred turned, eyebrows lifting at the familiar voice. His gaze met theirs, and a faint smile curved across his lips. "And here I thought academia was built on questioning established narratives," he replied, the corners of his eyes glinting with mischief. "What did you want to be before you became someone who defends dead poets for a living?" he let the words land with an easy shrug, clearly enjoying himself. There was no malice in it, just the quiet satisfaction of someone who liked poking sleeping lions to see if they roared.