The horses moved first.
Their hooves sank into damp soil, muffled by layers of dead leaves and rot. Branches arched overhead like ribs, blotting out what little moonlight reached the forest floor. The path into the Phoed Mountain forests narrowed with every step forward, trees growing denser, trunks warped and leaning as if pulled inward by something unseen.
Cold crept through armor and cloaks alike.
The lamps hanging from saddles flickered violently as the wind slithered through the woods, not howling—whispering. Low. Constant. Wrong. Shadows stretched and recoiled with each sway of light, crawling over bark and stone like living things.
The deeper they rode, the heavier the air became.
It pressed against the chest. Against the mind.
Voices began to echo.
Not words—sounds. Half-formed murmurs carried on the wind, circling the group, never close enough to understand, never far enough to ignore. Dark Arcana bled through the forest like a slow poison, thick enough that even breathing felt tainted.
Some of the cadets tightened their grips on reins. Others lowered their heads, pretending not to hear.
Arthur rode at the front, posture rigid, eyes sharp beneath his helm.
"Steady," he said calmly, his voice cutting through the noise without rising. "This forest is dangerous. Everyone be on high alert."
No one answered—but the horses obeyed, slowing, keeping formation.
Arthur raised a fist. The group halted.
"We find a defensible location," he continued. "Water source. High ground if possible."
He turned slightly. "Lysara. Take the scouts. Move ahead. Quietly."
Lysara nodded once and vanished into the trees with the others, their silhouettes swallowed by the dark almost instantly.
Modred, Dante, and Julius remained alert at the rear, eyes scanning the forest as minutes dragged on. Nothing moved—but the silence was worse than sound.
Time passed.
Then Lysara returned.
"There's a cave," she said. "Spacious. Water running through it from the mountain. Nearby clearing. Relatively safe."
Arthur nodded. "We move. Now."
They rode again.
As the forest closed tighter around them, the darkness thickened. The lamps dimmed—not extinguished, but weakened, as if the light itself was being drained.
Then it came.
A laugh.
Low. Crooked. Not loud—close.
It slid through the trees like a blade drawn slowly from its sheath.
The horses froze.
From the shadows ahead, two points of red light ignited.
Then another.
Then more.
Eyes.
They hovered in the dark, fixed on the group, unblinking. Slowly, a shape emerged—not fully, never fully. A tall, hunched silhouette, limbs too long, shoulders rolled forward as if bearing unseen weight.
Its mouth became visible next.
Stretched wide. Too wide.
Teeth jagged and irregular, packed tightly together, gleaming faintly as the lamp light trembled across them. The grin never moved—but it widened all the same.
The presence alone crushed the air.
No one spoke.
Modred felt his hands shake despite himself. His heart pounded against his ribs like it wanted out. He forced his fingers to tighten around a spear mounted to his saddle, Arcana flaring instinctively through his veins.
Flame Arcana surged.
He hurled the spear.
Fire tore through the dark—straight, violent, certain.
The figure vanished.
The spear struck nothing.
Arthur didn't hesitate.
"Move!" he ordered. "Now. To the cave."
They turned as one, horses surging forward. The forest resisted—branches clawing at cloaks, roots threatening to snap ankles—but they didn't slow.
When they reached the cave, the sound of running water filled the silence like breath returning to lungs. The space was wide, stone walls slick with moisture, a stream cutting clean through the center.
Arthur dismounted first.
"Taren," he said, already moving. "Set the perimeter. After that, we talk defenses."
Taren nodded and went to work without question.
Behind them, some cadets whispered in fear, voices tight, broken.
Dante turned on them.
"That was a Hoblim. The creature which four eyes was telling us," he said flatly.
The whispers stopped.
"A predator," Dante continued, grabbing one cadet by the collar and yanking him close. "Smart. Patient. It doesn't rush. It watches. If you panic—if you run—you die."
He shoved the cadet back.
"There's no help coming, damn it. This is the Rite. You survive with what you've trained. Nothing else."
Silence followed.
Then Modred stepped forward.
"Enough," he said firmly. "We knew this wouldn't be easy."
He looked at each of them in turn.
"We're still here. That's what matters. Don't forget why we came."
His gaze hardened.
"We enter the Academy. No matter what it takes."
Far from the forest.
Far from the cold breath of the Phoed Mountains.
The scene shifted.
A vast chamber lay buried deep within stone and steel, its ceiling lost in shadow. Rows of elevated seats curved around a massive projection array—arcane screens suspended in the air, each displaying fragments of the Rite as it unfolded across the mountains.
Every division commander was present.
Silent.
Watching.
The Premiere sat at the center, hands folded, expression unreadable. To his sides were the captains and high officers of the divisions, their faces hard, eyes fixed on the screens where cadets moved like flickering embers against the dark wilderness.
No one spoke.
Then there was Igred Vayne.
He stood apart from the others.
Broad-shouldered, wrapped in the black and gold of the Royal Guard, his presence alone weighed heavier than the stone walls around them. His arms were crossed, posture relaxed—but his eyes were sharp, calculating, following a single projection longer than the rest.
Modred.
The screen showed the cave. The cadets settling. The tension clinging to them like frost.
Igred's gaze did not waver.A faint crease appeared between his brows—nothing more.
And the room remained silent.
The rite had just begun.