Yuna couldn't manifest her wings.
Three days since the construct attack. Her shoulder had healed, the corruption purged. But every time she tried to summon the silver light, she found only absence.
The power was gone.
"Again," Thess said. Her voice was patient, but Yuna could feel the concern underneath.
Yuna closed her eyes. Focused on the warmth that usually lived beneath her shoulder blades. Reached for it.
Empty.
"I can't," she said. "It's like... there's nothing there."
"The power hasn't left you. The CHORD is still active. I can see it." Thess circled her slowly. "Something is blocking your manifestation."
"What?"
"That's what we need to figure out."
The training ground was empty except for them. Thess had cleared everyone else out. Private session. No audience for Yuna's failure.
"The construct attack," Thess said. "You manifested something new. Light that destroyed corruption. Power beyond your Mark level."
"I remember."
"Such breakthroughs often come with costs. The body needs time to integrate new abilities. But three days is too long for simple integration."
Yuna's hands clenched. "So what's wrong with me?"
"I don't think anything is wrong." Thess stopped in front of her. Those ancient-young eyes studied Yuna with uncomfortable intensity. "I think you're afraid."
The word hit like a slap.
"I'm not afraid. I've been training every day. Fighting constructs. Pushing myself..."
"Pushing yourself physically. Yes. But the CHORD isn't physical." Thess's voice softened. "It's emotional. And something emotional is blocking you."
Yuna opened her mouth to argue. Closed it.
Because Thess was right.
The moment she'd thrown herself between Silence and the construct. The light that had erupted from her. The power that had felt infinite, overwhelming, terrifying.
She'd loved it.
And that scared her more than any monster.
"I felt... too much," Yuna admitted quietly. "When I saved Silence. The power was huge. I could feel everything. Everyone. The whole team connected through me."
"That's the CHORD at full expression."
"It was too much." Yuna's voice cracked. "I was drowning in it. Their emotions, their fears, their hopes. All of it pouring through me at once."
"And now you're afraid to open that channel again."
"What if I can't close it? What if I get lost in everyone else and forget who I am?"
Thess was quiet for a moment.
"That's a reasonable fear. The CHORD Attunement is dangerous precisely because of what you described. Too much connection can dissolve the self."
"So I'm right to be afraid."
"You're right that the danger exists. But fear isn't the answer." Thess knelt in front of Yuna, meeting her eyes directly. "The answer is learning to control the channel. Open it when needed. Close it when you're done."
"How?"
"By trusting yourself. By believing you're strong enough to handle what flows through you."
Yuna laughed bitterly. "I've spent my whole life being told I'm not strong enough."
"Yes. And that's the real block, isn't it?"
They sat together on the training ground stones.
The violet sky overhead shifted through its endless colors. Beautiful and alien and slowly becoming familiar.
"Your mother," Thess said. "She told you that you were enough."
"Her last words."
"Do you believe them?"
Yuna's throat tightened. "I want to."
"Wanting isn't believing."
"I know."
"The CHORD responds to emotional truth. If part of you believes you're insufficient, the power will reflect that. It will hold back. Protect you from yourself."
"So I need to actually believe I'm enough? Just... decide to believe?"
"No. Belief can't be forced." Thess's hand touched Yuna's shoulder gently. "But it can be discovered. You've been so focused on becoming enough that you haven't noticed what you already are."
"What am I?"
"The person who jumped in front of a killing blow to save a teammate. The person who sat with Marcus at dawn while he bled his hands against stone. The person who climbed to a rooftop to make sure Silence wasn't alone."
Yuna blinked. "Those are just... things I did."
"They're who you are. The CHORD chose you because you already know how to connect. How to care. How to put others before yourself."
"That's not power. That's just..."
"Love." Thess smiled slightly. "Love is the most powerful force in existence. And you have it in abundance."
Yuna stood up.
The training ground was quiet. No constructs. No team. Just her and Thess and the violet sky.
"Try again," Thess said. "But this time, don't reach for power. Reach for connection."
"Connection to what?"
"To the people you care about. Feel them. Even though they're not here, the CHORD connects you. Marcus in the weight room. Aria in the library. Silence on her rooftop. Lyric in their studio."
Yuna closed her eyes.
Reached.
Not for the warmth beneath her shoulders. For something else. The threads she'd felt during the construct fight. The connections that linked her to six other insufficient people.
There.
Marcus, pushing himself through reps, hands finally steady.
There.
Aria, analyzing data, mind always working.
There.
Silence, watching futures, looking for paths where they survived.
There.
Lyric, painting hope on canvas.
There.
Chen Wei, drilling combat forms, preparing for battles to come.
There.
David, studying, determined to contribute through knowledge.
The connections pulsed. Alive. Real.
And Yuna felt herself at the center of them. Not drowning. Not lost.
Holding.
The wings manifested.
Not with effort. Not with strain. They simply appeared, silver light spreading from her back like they'd been waiting for permission.
Yuna opened her eyes.
The silver glow illuminated the training ground. Steady. Strong. Not flickering like before.
"How does it feel?" Thess asked.
"Different." Yuna moved the wings experimentally. They responded instantly, smoothly. "Before it felt like I was forcing something to exist. Now it feels like... letting something free."
"Third Mark. Kindled."
Yuna didn't need the explanation. She could feel the difference in her bones. Before, the wings had been visitors, tolerated but never quite belonging. Now they were part of her. Residents. Home.
She beat them once. Twice. Her feet left the ground.
Not hovering. Flying.
She rose ten feet. Twenty. Thirty. The training ground shrank below her, and the Academy spread out in all directions. Beautiful and impossible and home.
Her home now.
"How long can you hold it?" Thess called from below.
Yuna checked the internal sense of the CHORD. The connections to her team, still thrumming. The wings, fed by that connection rather than depleted by it.
"I don't know," she called back. "It doesn't feel like it's running out."
She flew higher.
Sixty seconds passed.
Then two minutes.
Then five.
Yuna soared.
The Academy shrank to a collection of rooftops far below. The training grounds became a brown smear. The forests beyond the walls stretched toward horizons she'd never seen, and for the first time since arriving in Valdris, the world felt enormous in a way that thrilled rather than terrified.
Wind cut past her face. Cold and clean and alive. Her wings adjusted instinctively, finding currents, riding them, dancing with forces she couldn't name but somehow understood.
She laughed. The sound surprised her. When had she last laughed like this? Before her mother's diagnosis? Before the rejections started piling up? Before she'd learned that wanting something badly enough didn't mean you got to have it?
But she had this. Right now, right here, she had wings and sky and the impossible gift of flight.
Not desperate survival. Not terror-fueled escape.
Freedom.
She dove toward the training ground, pulling up at the last moment, skimming over Thess's head close enough to ruffle her hair.
"Show-off," Thess called, but she was smiling.
Yuna landed gently. The wings stayed manifested, folding against her back like they belonged there.
"Six minutes," Thess said. "That's longer than any Second Mark manifestation recorded. You've definitely crossed into Third."
"It felt like I could go longer."
"You probably could. The CHORD draws from connection rather than personal reserves. As long as your bonds hold, so does your power."
Yuna looked at her wings. Silver light, warm and steady.
"My mother was right," she said quietly.
"About what?"
"I am enough. Not because of Resonance scores or academy approvals. Because of this." She touched her chest, where the CHORD connections pulsed. "Because I know how to love people. And apparently, that's worth something."
Thess nodded. "Worth more than most people ever realize."
That evening, Yuna found the team in the common room.
They were scattered across couches and chairs. Marcus cleaning training equipment. Aria on her tablet. Silence writing in her notebook. Lyric sketching. Chen Wei doing maintenance on her boots. David reading.
Normal. Comfortable. Family.
Yuna stood in the doorway, wings still manifested.
One by one, they noticed.
Marcus looked up first. His eyes widened. "You're..."
"Third Mark." Yuna smiled. "Kindled."
"Your wings," Aria said. "They're stable. No flickering."
"They've been manifested for almost an hour."
"An hour?" David's book dropped. "That's impossible."
"Apparently not."
Lyric jumped up, colors swirling around them. "You look magnificent, darling. Like an actual angel. Someone paint her immediately."
"You're the painter."
"I know. I'm complimenting myself." Lyric grinned. "Stay right there. Don't move."
Silence approached slowly. Her silver eyes studied the wings, then met Yuna's gaze. Her lips moved: How?
"I stopped trying to be enough," Yuna said. "And started realizing I already was."
Silence's eyes glistened. She held up her notebook:
ABOUT TIME.
The team gathered around her. Not touching the wings, but close. Family closing ranks.
"One hundred fourteen days," Marcus said quietly. "If you can reach Third Mark in two weeks, the rest of us can too."
"We'll do it together," Yuna said. "That's how it works."
Chen Wei nodded sharply. "Tomorrow. We all push for breakthrough."
"Together," David added, voice steadier than usual.
Aria was already calculating: "Based on Yuna's progression rate and the acceleration factor, we should all hit Third Mark within the next five days. Fourth Mark by day thirty if we maintain intensity."
"Always with the numbers," Lyric said fondly.
"Numbers don't lie."
Silence held up her notebook:
NEITHER DOES FAMILY.
Yuna's wings flared brighter. The CHORD pulsed through all of them, connection and hope and determination.
The word echoed differently now.
Insufficient.
Not a verdict. A starting point.
Tomorrow, Marcus would reach for his own breakthrough. Then Aria. Then Silence. Then all of them, one by one, proving that the label meant nothing.
One hundred fourteen days remained.
And Yuna finally understood: they weren't racing against the countdown.
They were racing against who they used to be.
[END CHAPTER 15]