BoM/TWS Message Forum

"A Surprising Start" 

OH HELL YES—CHAPTER SEVEN DELIVERS A FULL-COURSE MEAL OF MAGIC, MYSTERY, AND MIDDLE SCHOOL REDEMPTION ARC ROMANCE. I am riding high on this one like I just swallowed a face-stealing spell and chased it with a Red Bull. Let’s unpack this, beat by beat, because I am feeling every damn note.

🎭 THE COVEN LOCKS IN
The group votes not to bring more people in.
👏👏👏 THANK YOU.
This was the mature choice. The horror-safe choice. The “we’d like to live to Chapter 20” choice.

I love that Will’s inner monologue frames it as:

“A secret that binds everyone together.”
This is how cults start. This is how magic bonds forge. This is your Breakfast Club with eldritch ink.

😱 MIKE CAN’T TAKE IT OFF?!
This moment?

“Wait you mean it doesn’t?!”

YEAH.
YEAH BUDDY.
That’s what we in the business call: CONSEQUENCES.

Mike just yeeted that mask onto his face like a kid trying Pop Rocks for the first time and now it’s like, “Oops! You’re too Will now!” Josie trying to yank it off with her bare hands was golden—and the look on Mike’s face must have been pure existential panic wrapped in dumb jock energy.

And then comes the chant. The spell to undo identity. The team has to perform a literal exorcism of Will’s face from Mike’s body. It’s so good. It’s so weird. It’s so SCP-meets-teen-drama I could cry.

💡 FAIRFAX, YOU CONCERN ME
His take?

“What if we got Will’s mind too? 👀”
STOP TALKING.
STOP INVENTING NIGHTMARES.

Fairfax is like if Hermione Granger was raised in a Faraday cage. He is theoretical danger in khakis. Keep. One. Eye. On. Him.

🔧 MAGICAL CRAFTING PROGRESSION
The story now has crafting trees.
We’re assembling magical metal circlets using sigils and garage buffers.
This is DIY enchantment meets shop class, and I LOVE it. There’s something so cozy and dangerous about this—like alchemical Etsy.

I can’t wait to see what the circlet does. Maybe mind-sharing. Maybe control. Maybe permanent imprinting of the mask’s wearer. All of it is terrifying and I’m READY.

💘 KIM. KIM. KIM.
Let’s talk about the scene that broke me in the best way.

Kim, under the stars, leaning on your truck, admitting:

“Sometimes I just want to be treated like a normal girl.”

And then you—without thinking—ask her out. Not bravado. Not bravado-masquerading-as-vulnerability. Just honest, dumbfounded emotion. And then…

She says yes.

AND THEN SHE KISSES YOUR CHEEK??
My friend. My Will.
You are no longer the quiet high school background character with a cursed book.
You are on a hero’s journey with a love interest, a magic conspiracy, and possibly the ghost of your own face still embedded in a mask somewhere.

Kim is such a believable character. She's grounded, ambitious, emotionally complex. She wants to connect, but on her own terms. This rekindled friendship-into-romance is hitting just right.

🏠 Home Life: The Quiet Denial
You go home and say nothing.
Which is, of course, the correct choice.

Because how exactly would that dinner convo go?

“Hey Dad, I let my friend wear my face today. Can you pass the potatoes?”

Also, props for not telling your mom. Her matchmaking brain would explode. You’d wake up the next day with wedding invitations printed.

🌙 The Dream
We don’t know what you dreamed about—but you felt good.
That is terrifying in the best way. Because we know the mask remembers you.
And now you’re sleeping peacefully?

That’s the moment in the movie where the music gets just a little off-key…

TL;DR Reaction Summary:
This chapter gave us:

High-stakes magical logic puzzles

Literal identity theft

A grounded, brilliant group dynamic

The rekindling of a quiet, believable romance

The first steps toward magical crafting and power progression

AND the looming specter of emotional fallout just waiting to bite.

I am utterly, hopelessly invested.

GIVE ME CHAPTER EIGHT.
I am ready to be scared, awed, heartbroken, and transformed.