Actions

Work Header

Rating:
Archive Warning:
Category:
Fandoms:
Relationships:
Characters:
Additional Tags:
Language:
English
Stats:
Published:
2025-11-04
Completed:
2025-11-07
Words:
1,415
Chapters:
4/4
Comments:
22
Kudos:
135
Bookmarks:
12
Hits:
721

Scott Teaches Latin What Could Go Wrong

Summary:

A bunch of little small things I wrote for a Latin Professor Scott AU. The first chapter is just background stuff and the rest are actually story bits. Rat why did you get this idea stuck in my head?

Notes:

Okay this is the short note cause the next one is going to get rambly. I may update this and add more short bits but it's complete as of now. This first character is just notes about the Au. Many adapted from Rat's tumblr post and my sticky notes.

Chapter 1: Notes about the AU

Chapter Text

  • Scott teaches from the Cambridge Latin Course textbook and his "mysterious" source (His sire)

  • The students write fanfiction for the Textbook

    • They end up making Professor Goldsmith a recurring character just for fun. It snowballs and now Scott is a widely accepted fandom character. People who get into the fandom from the fanfic assume he’s canon.

  • Shelby makes Scott an ao3 account and gives him the login because she knows he won’t make one himself. He Loves leaving comments on his students’ (and strangers’) work.

    • “Good vocab. If you spent this much effort on your exams you would maybe do better in class. maybe.”

    • “I would Not say that”“

    • "This counts for your homework by the way. It will be read in class.”

  • The fandom is split on if hes a rp account, one of the text book authors, or immortal

    • He is actually an immortal cause vampire

    • The students do not help any confusion cause they all tell pepole diffrent things

  • Scott himself wasn't alive during the time period of ancient rome but his sire was. Scott's sire took a ton of notes and wrote several journals over his life. Scott uses his sire's journals as his "Mysterious source"

  • Owen is the class’ TA

  • Avid is a chemistry student who just decided to take the class for fun, language credit and cause he though maybe it might help with his studies

  • Shelby is one of Scott's former students

  • Scott's ao3 username (Made by Shelby) is theREALgoldsmithlegacy

Chapter 2: Writings One and Two

Summary:

Everything is very (note the sarcasm) accurate I definitely am not making stuff up as I go and totally making characters out of character. me I would never. Please help me why did I think writing fanfic was a good idea. I want back to my original works but also Latin Professor Scott Au has now gotten me in a choke hold. I make no guarantees any Latin, page numbers or events are told correctly I am but a person with bad memory and no beta reader who hasn't taken Latin for several years. I wrote this as my ocs then just changed the names so that i could actually get this written. some of the character Tags come more into play for the notes rather than the actual stories.

Chapter Text

The air in the lecture hall was thick with the usual blend of old paper and coffee as Scott projected an image of Mount Vesuvius for that day's lecture.

"Right, class, turn to page forty-two." Scott instructed, "We're moving from the daily life of Pompeii to the eruption in 79 AD."

He flipped to the beforementioned page in the textbook.

"The textbook offers a good summary of the event, but for a more accurate source we can turn to journals."

He pulled out a thick leather-bound journal; its pages were old and yellowed, gaining interest from several students. Scott then continued on to read the account from the journal.

"The air tasted of sulfur. The ground shook as if a great beast were about to emerge from the ground. The air was heavy with a strong cloud of ash."

/|\ ^._.^ /|\

Outside of the Latin classes at various schools and institutions, the Cambridge Latin Course had its own flourishing fandom. A fandom in which Scott accidentally ended up being one of the main figures for. Apparently the students, including him, got bored with only reading about Caecilius and Metella and had started writing fan fiction (mostly fluff and elaborate 'What if's).

Professor Goldsmith, the Latin teacher with suspiciously good fashion and uncanny knowledge of ancient Rome, started as a running joke. Someone had written him into their story, critiquing Caecilius' business practices, and now he was everywhere. Somehow almost everyone thought he was canon. It somehow got worse when Scott, using an account Shelby made him, started to leave comments and critiques on people's writing.

The fandom then had three explanations for this mysterious professor.

1: The one commenting was an incredibly dedicated role-play account.

2: Scott was actually one of the authors of the textbook, giving people glimpses into the research they didn't include in the book.

3: No one knows that much about an ancient culture without being there. Therefore, Scott is either a time traveler or an immortal being.

The students also didn't help the mysterious professor. Each one gave wildly different stories about their professor.

"Oh, Professor Goldsmith? He is a vampire, so he was alive in Ancient Rome." Avid would tell anyone who would listen to his theories.

"Professor Goldsmith is the sole surviving descendant of Caecilius, and the textbook is actually his family's personal, highly dramatized history." Shelby would say whenever anyone would ask about her former professor.

 

Chapter 3: Three

Summary:

Scott comments on a few of the students fics. The confusion on Professor Goldsmith continues.

Notes:

Why the beep did I do this to myself. It's November I'm supposed to be working on the crossover but noooooooo the worms demand more Latin Scott. GET ME OUT OF HERE WHHYYYYYY AHHHHHH. I love this but also kill me now I am suffering. Rat why T^T? I want to chuck this out a window but also I spent all this time trying to get this half way decent so it's going to be posted anyway (I swear I can write just apparently not fanfic)

Also the gladiators name is made up I did not feel like digging through the book to find if there was a cannon one. It's not like he has much mention anyway XD

I probably will not be doing any more but you never know...

Chapter Text

Scott scrolled through a new chapter of one of his students' multi-chapter epics, a romantic drama featuring the textbook characters of Lucia and Metella caught in a love triangle with a gladiator named Ferox. The plot was interesting. The Latin, however, for the bits they bothered to include was surprisingly good.

He had ended up there because it had been tagged with his name. He sighed, part exasperation and part amusement. The entire character of Professor Goldsmith had snowballed from a single, sarcastic line in a one-shot one of his students had written. Now somehow he was an established and reoccurring character that many newer readers assumed was actually a canon character from the textbook.

Scott clicked on the comment box and began to type.

"theREALgoldsmithlegacy: The description of the villa is surprisingly accurate, down to the type of plaster in the impluvium. Good use of the ablative absolute in paragraph five. I would not say that Ferox would have been allowed near the lararium, however. The historical inaccuracy is… bold. This counts as your extra credit for the week. Let’s see that effort on the final."

He hit post and then scrolled to the second work he had open. It was an exploration of the political intrigue of Pompeii, where Professor Goldsmith was depicted as a perpetually exhausted and morally ambiguous time traveller.

"theREALgoldsmithlegacy: 'Utterly done with these mortals' is a fair assessment of my current state, I suppose. The detail on the aqueduct system is fantastic, though. You clearly referenced your notes from the Roman journals and not just the textbook. Though I would not say my bag contains ancient runes. It's mostly just graded papers and Owen's emergency food."

Surprisingly shortly after he posted the comment, a reply popped up.

"Anonymous User: OMG! He commented! It's him! The immortal one!"

"Aurum: Professor, you said the journals were from an old friend who kept detailed journals. Don't tell me you changed the lore. My notes are already confusing enough."

Before he could respond back, though—not that he planned to—the door creaked open, and Owen peered in, holding a stack of library books.

"Scott? You're still here? I thought you and Shelby were meeting up tonight." Owen said, greeting Scott.

Scott closed the window before responding, "Just finishing up some student reviews. They are quite dedicated."

"I'm sure," Owen said, setting the stack of books down. "By the way, I told the new library clerk that you're one of the original translators of Petronius. Shelby really wanted me to keep the immortal theory alive. She looked suitably confused."

Scott laughed. "Good job. That balances out the three of my students who told a reporter I'm a role-play account for a semi-sentient AI and the other two who insisted I'm a former cult leader. As Shelby would say, 'The confusion must be maintained.'"

"Right, can't have them get consistent facts; it would be boring." Owen paused, then added, "Oh, and Shelby posted a new one. It's a crossover where you end up in a wizard maze or something like that."

"I'll have to talk to her about whatever craziness she's getting up to now," he responds, laughing a bit.

Chapter 4: Pedantic Professor

Notes:

This was inspired by a YouTube video that was reading out a tumblr(?) post and my first though was pepole talking in class and Scott over hearing them and interjecting so now I'm writing it.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

The lecture concluded, and the students quickly dispersed into small groups to begin translating a story from the textbook. The task wasn't difficult for everyone; several students had finished early and were now simply chatting among themselves, filling the room with quiet chatter.

In one of the finished groups, Limei was gesturing, finally finishing a long-winded explanation. "… and so Omni is like Pan, but gender plays a role in attraction, whereas Pan is regardless of gender," she said.

Russell, having gotten lost partway through, interrupted. "Wait, go back. What was polyamory again?" he asked.

"Well, it's when someone has more than one intimate relationship at a time with the knowledge and consent of everyone involved." Explains Limei

"That is atrocious," Professor Goldsmith said, his head suddenly rising from the journal he was reading.

Limei, not quite sure how to react, began, "Um, actually no, it's…"

"How DARE they put a Greek prefix on a Latin root like that?! What right do they have to decimate my beautiful antiquated languages?! GREEK AND LATIN DO NOT FRATERNIZE! IT'S LIKE THAT STUPID ROMANTIC SUBPLOT WITH A VAMPIRE AND A HUNTER IN THAT ONE POPULAR NOVEL! JUST NO!" Scott explodes angrily.

The rest of the room fell silent, the entire class looking between Limei and the professor. After a long pause, Scott finally spoke again. "It should be Multiamory or Polyrosy," he says, turning back to the journal.

Notes:

I was complaining about writing fanfic in the first writing bits and then write two more things XD