Chronis stepped to a halt outside the lecture hall, eyes flicking to the sigil above the door.
Cognition Aspect.
"Hm. So this is it," she murmured. "An interesting future."
In her previous life, Chronis had stood as an Adept of the Continuum—Rank Four, superior to most who dared call themselves elites. Time had bent for her. Battles had been calculated down to the breath. But wisdom was another matter.
Cognition was not something she had grown into over decades. It was something she had claimed late.
The class had already progressed. Concepts refined, foundations layered upon foundations. By normal standards, she was behind.
But normal standards were irrelevant.
A Rank Four survivor did not reach that height through talent alone. Vigilance, pattern recognition, ruthless comprehension—those were instincts carved into her over centuries. She would adapt. She always did.
Chronis was not arrogant enough to mistake experience for invincibility.
There were those stronger than her. Far stronger.Sovereigns—beings who could erase her existence in a blink, without effort, without consequence.
And instead of fear, she felt something else.
Admiration.
That realm existed. Which meant it was reachable.
I will stand there.
Morality had never shackled her. People were assets, tools, variables. To be used—or discarded—when their utility expired. Serik was no exception. Nor was she to him. They had not betrayed one another yet for a simple reason:
They were stronger together.
In this world, achieving power alone was not impossible—but it was absurdly inefficient. Unknown variables lurked everywhere. Unparalleled geniuses. Ancient bloodlines. Monsters who had survived three thousand years of war, evolution, and slaughter.
Chronis possessed three centuries of memories… and still felt ignorant.
The world was vast. Dangerous. Layered with hidden inheritances, forgotten ruins, and beings whose experiences dwarfed her own by an order of magnitude.
For the first time since her rebirth, Chronis truly understood—
How small she still was.
And how far she intended to climb.
She was still wearing the clothes from her previous life.
Not by choice—by circumstance.
Everything else had perished during the jump. Equipment, storage artifacts, resources—erased by the Aeon Node's passage through time. All that returned with her was the artifact itself and the clothes on her back.
A close-fitting black shirt. Loose pants held up by a belt, otherwise they would slip from her slimmer frame. Oversized shoes meant for a body that no longer existed.
Functional. Inconspicuous. Forgettable.
In her last moments before activation, her arm had been severed. The robe she wore then had been ruined—cut apart, discarded. Yet when she awakened in this new timeline, her body was whole again. An unfamiliar shape. A different balance. A rebirth she had not anticipated.
She did not dwell on it.
In this world, a missing limb was not a tragedy—it was an inconvenience. One easily corrected by magic, medicine, or wealth. The Academy alone possessed dozens of methods to restore what was lost.
And even if questions were asked, the answers were simple.
She was an orphan.
No one expected jewels. No one questioned worn fabric or ill-fitting shoes. Poverty was invisible when it was expected.
She was beautiful—unmistakably so—but she placed no value in it.
Beauty was a byproduct. Wealth was a consequence. Fame was an echo.
Power came first.
And power reshaped perception.
A powerful individual was considered beautiful, regardless of form. They were wealthy, regardless of origin. They were known, regardless of desire.
That was the truth of Aetheris.
And Chronis—now Rhea—had no intention of stopping at appearances.
She entered the classroom.
It was mostly empty.
Only a handful of students had arrived—too few to matter. Rhea moved quietly, selecting a seat beside the window. Beyond it lay the academy gym.
The view was… disappointing. Steel frames, training mats, reinforced walls. Nothing revealing. Nothing worth attention.
She turned away almost immediately.
Her ambitions were larger than scenery.
Gradually, the room filled. One by one, students filtered in until the count settled at around thirty.
Few.
Too few.
Rhea understood why.
Cognition was not a favored Aspect. Those who gathered here were rarely strong enough to survive the brutality of other paths. Some came from families that had failed to produce warriors for generations. Others were assistants—accessories—sent by tribal leaders and minor clans to think, calculate, and advise while their masters wielded real power.
Strategists without authority. Minds without fangs.
A support class masquerading as an Aspect.
Pathetic.
Rhea watched them with detached amusement—the nervous glances, the restrained postures, the quiet acceptance of irrelevance.
A soft laugh escaped her lips.
"Interesting," she said calmly, more to herself than anyone else."In a few centuries, kingdoms will burn for minds like these… and not one of you realizes you're standing at the entrance of the most contested path in existence."
She leaned back in her chair, gaze distant.
"Wisdom is always ignored—right up until it decides who lives and who vanishes from history."
While Rhea sat in obscurity, Serik's reality could not have been more different.
His classroom was already crowded.
One hundred and fifty students filled the tiered hall—voices steady, postures straight, presences heavy. These were not uncertain youths or overlooked failures. They were the sons and daughters of tribal leaders, high-ranking elders, decorated warriors, and established bloodlines.
Confidence was not learned here. It was inherited.
They stood upright, shoulders squared, eyes forward. Even in silence, the room carried pressure.
The Aspect of Essence was widely recognized—and feared.
A flashy path. A dominant one.
A sufficiently strong soul could overwhelm another without a single blow. A gaze alone could fracture will, force submission, or shatter resolve. To lose a confrontation of Essence was to be exposed—spirit laid bare before the world.
Among the masses, it was considered an elite Aspect.
The kind that inspired awe.The kind that drew resources.The kind that produced leaders.
Serik sat among them without display, his presence controlled, his expression calm.
Unlike the others, he did not rely on lineage, reputation, or spectacle.
He understood something they did not.
Flash fades.Pressure breaks.Only control endures.
And while the world celebrated the brilliance of the soul—
It failed to notice the quiet mind already planning its future collapse.
In truth, all Aspects were equal.
There was no superior path, no inferior one—only difference in development. Each Aspect governed a fundamental principle of existence, and when pushed to its limits, any of them could stand at the summit of power.
But humanity had never been capable of accepting equality.
The human mind demanded hierarchy. It needed superiority and inferiority, winners and failures, brilliance and mediocrity. If reality refused to provide such distinctions, people would invent them.
So they did.
They praised what suited their instincts.They elevated what appeared dominant.They dismissed what required patience, depth, or foresight.
Perception became value.Value became doctrine.
And soon, interest hardened into belief.
That was how Aspects were judged—not by their potential, but by how easily they satisfied the human desire to rank the world.
During this period, Serik was popular.
He had many friends—some of whom had chosen the Essence Aspect solely because of him. He was strong, composed, and undeniably handsome. Those traits drew people in effortlessly, especially girls who mistook stability for safety.
Gifts were common. Small offerings during festivals, carefully chosen tokens on special occasions, quiet gestures meant to be remembered.
Serik accepted them with a gentle smile.
His demeanor was warm. Considerate. Approachable.
A performance.
None of them could imagine that the man they admired would not hesitate to end their lives without pause—if doing so granted him even the smallest increase in strength, or served his long-term interests.
The irony was that this had not always been an act.
Once, he had been kind.
But three hundred years of war—most of it spent within the Demonic Realm—did not leave kindness intact. Endless battles, survival against creatures that knew no mercy, and choices made under constant extinction pressure reshaped him.
Not into a monster.
Into something far more dangerous.
A man who understood that hesitation was death, and sentiment was a liability.
The respective instructors entered their classrooms almost simultaneously.
Before either could begin their lectures, the atmosphere shifted.
Hands rose. Voices followed.
"The City Academy Competition—sir, is it true it's happening next month?"
The question spread like fire.
The City Academy Competition was more than a test. It was prestige given form—a battlefield where reputations were forged. For these students, it meant recognition for their clans and tribes, personal renown, and most importantly—
Resources.
Vast ones.
Treasures, cultivation materials, techniques normally locked behind lineage and authority. Rewards capable of changing a student's entire future.
Excitement rippled through the room. Some students leaned forward. Others clenched their fists.
Then someone asked the question everyone had been waiting for.
"Sir… is it really true," the student swallowed, barely containing his excitement,"that whoever takes first place across all four academies will be accepted as a disciple by the Great Lord?"
The room went silent.
Breaths were held.
The Great Lord.
The supreme authority presiding over all major clans and tribes within the city's domain. A Rank Four powerhouse—an existence who ruled not through title, but through overwhelming strength.
To become his disciple was not merely an honor.
It was a transformation.
A single nod from him could elevate a nobody into someone remembered for a lifetime.
The teacher's gaze swept across the students—lingering on their shaking hands, widened eyes, barely restrained ambition.
"Yes," he said calmly.
And just like that—
The future ignited.
The lectures began.
As expected, the classroom divided itself quickly.
Some students listened with rigid attention, scribbling notes as though knowledge itself might escape them. Others slouched in their seats, eyes half-lidded, minds already elsewhere. A few simply slept—heads tilted back, breaths slow, unbothered.
Rhea was among the first group.
Not out of interest—but necessity.
This path was new. Cognition demanded structure, principles, unfamiliar frameworks. She could not afford ignorance, not even temporary. Every word spoken was a potential tool, every concept a future weapon.
She listened. Processed. Dissected.
Across the academy, Serik belonged to the opposite extreme.
He slept.
It was not arrogance, nor disrespect. It was redundancy.
Much of what the instructor taught—soul pressure, will reinforcement, spiritual layering—was knowledge Serik had internalized centuries ago. He had lived it. Refined it through war, not lectures.
The teacher spoke.
Serik dreamed.
Both were learning.
Just not in the same direction.