Morning classes ended in one piece, which, for me, qualified as victory.Afternoon promised less mercy.
The Rule of the Trial
Every student in House Nihilum faced the Mirror Trial before the end of their first week. It wasn't an exam; it was a conversation with yourself that occasionally ate people.
Professor Vastel explained it while sketching runes that refused to stay still.
"The mirror will show you what you fear, what you desire, and what you would become if you stop resisting. Pass — and the city remembers you. Fail — and you join our faculty."He gestured at the ghost assistants floating nearby. They waved, cheerful in their unemployment.
Ayaka leaned over. "They look happy about it.""Maybe tenure works differently when you're dead," I whispered.
The professor's eyes narrowed.
"Valentine. You first."
Of course.
The Descent
We followed him through corridors that curved in on themselves until direction lost meaning. At the bottom waited a single door of black glass, the words Know Thy Echo engraved across its surface.
The mirror inside was huge — a lake of liquid reflection suspended mid-air. The room hummed with heartbeats that weren't mine.
"Step forward," Vastel said. "It will meet you halfway."
I swallowed. "What if halfway is inside it?"
"Then you're punctual."
Ayaka gave me a little thumbs-up from behind. "Don't die, Nihilum Boy."
"Comforting."
Within the Mirror
The surface rippled when I touched it, swallowing my hand, my arm, and then everything else.Cold. Weightless. Sound became color.
I stood in a copy of Celestara — empty, silent, all mirrors cracked. My reflection waited across the courtyard.
It smiled — my smile, fixed too wide.
"You can't control what you were born from," it said."Neither could you," I answered.
The ground split open. From beneath crawled shadows shaped like every mistake I'd ever tried to forget — friends I'd failed, flames I'd lost control of, faces of people who'd stepped too close. They whispered, You erase everything you touch.
The Nihility Fire woke in my veins, eager.Burn them, it purred. Make them nothing again.
"No," I said aloud. "Not this time."
I summoned the flame—not as destruction, but as warmth. It pulsed crimson-black, steady and small. When the shadows reached me, they dissolved into starlight instead of smoke.
The reflection stared, eyes wide. "You turned it inward."
"Maybe it's allowed to like me," I said, and stepped through it.
Return
I stumbled out of the mirror, drenched in cold light. Vastel's eyebrows rose.
"No screaming, minimal property damage. Acceptable."
Ayaka caught my arm before I fell. "You did it!""I think it likes me now," I managed."Good. Maybe it'll stop trying to eat you at lunch."
The professor inclined his head.
"Remember this, Valentine: Nihility isn't emptiness. It's potential with stage fright."
Evening Reflections
That night, I sat on the dorm balcony. Celestara floated quiet beneath the stars, mirrors turning lazily. My own reflection hovered faintly in the glass wall beside me — same face, softer eyes.
Ayaka perched on the railing, sipping stolen starlight tea."So what did you see?" she asked.
"Everything I was afraid to become," I said."And?""I told it to help instead."
She smiled. "Typical you — make friends with the apocalypse."
We watched the sky until the city dimmed to dreams.Somewhere deep inside, the Nihility Fire purred like it finally understood its purpose.