The return to the academy with the Accord logbook and the stone tablet fragment was met with a tension so thick Arlan could feel it in the air. Head Proctor Vance and Archivist Torvin examined the haul in a secure chamber deep within the Sanctum.
"'The Sundered Shield'... a myth from the God-War era," Torvin muttered, tracing the alien runes on the tablet with a trembling, cog-laden finger. "They believe they can find its pieces and... what? Reforge it? Control it? Fools playing with the universe's oldest locks."
"And you, Cadet—Captain Thorne," Vance said, her gaze settling on Arlan. The logbook lay open to the 'Acquire or Terminate' entry. "Your progression has forced their hand. You are now a primary objective. The Accord does not make idle threats. Your security detail is tripled. Your movements will be tracked and contained for your own protection."
It was a cage. A comfortable, well-intentioned cage, but a cage nonetheless. Arlan felt the walls closing in just as his power had finally broken free. He said nothing, his face a mask of cold acceptance.
The one tangible gain from the mission, aside from the grim intel, was the energy now residing in White-Crack. The Void-Heart Flame had been a misidentification born of instinct and green-tinted explosions. Under the sustained scrutiny of his new 3rd Order senses and the bracer's analytical runes, he perceived its true nature.
A deep, royal, vibrant amethyst fire that burned at the core of his blade and now, faintly, within his own crystalline core. When he focused, he could see it—a wisp of purple flame weaving through the silver and black threads of his mana.
One of the Twenty-Three Heavenly Flames: Amethyst Voidfire. A flame born not of heat, but of conceptual consumption. It didn't burn matter; it burned concepts—distance, solidity, separation. In cultivation, it could "burn away" the conceptual barriers between Order ranks, making breakthroughs slightly easier. In combat, it could weaken an enemy's spiritual defenses, their "intent" to fight, or the structural integrity of their spells.
It was subtle, insidious, and immensely powerful. He began experimenting in private, using it to "burn" the space between two points, effectively shortening distance for a blink-and-you'll-miss-it teleport. He could channel it through a dimensional slash, making the cut not just physical, but spiritually corrosive.
His first public use of it was unintentional. A week after his return, during a mandatory sparring session with a newly promoted 3rd Order Captain from the Ascendant Blade cohort—a sword specialist brimming with confidence.
Their blades met. The swordsman had a strong Sword Aura, his strikes carrying palpable sharpness that extended beyond the steel. On the third clash, Arlan, growing impatient, let a trickle of Amethyst Voidfire flow down Purple-Crack.
When the blades connected again, there was no spark of metal. There was a soft, purple hiss. The swordsman's confident Sword Aura dulled on contact, as if the very concept of its sharpness was being eroded. His following strike was clumsy, off-balance, his connection to his weapon momentarily weakened. Arlan disarmed him with a simple twist.
The swordsman stared at his hands, bewildered. "What... what was that? My sword felt... dead."
"A spatial disruption field," Arlan lied smoothly. "A new application of my affinity." The faculty observer, a 4th Order Commander, noted it down with interest, but no alarm. Good.
While Arlan grappled with his new flame and his new status as a fugitive-in-place, Selene was undergoing her own transformation. The trauma of Haven's Fall and the constant pressure of being watched had cracked something open within her.
She confessed it to him one night in the deepest part of the library, her usual composure fractured and she could be seen trembling. "My Eye… it's awake," she whispered, her voice trembling. Her normally luminous amber eyes were dark, and in their depths, Arlan saw not just the ring of crimson, but a tiny, spinning black hole of absolute nothingness. It was terrifying and beautiful.
"What eye?"
"TheEye of Destruction. A birth-curse from my witch mother's side. A genetic memory of the primordial void that existed before creation. Our family suppresses it. Binds it. But in the catacombs, fighting that Crawler… and again in Haven's Fall, feeling the Accord's callous annihilation… it resonated." She clutched her head. "I can feel it wanting to unmake things. To reduce order to chaos. It gives me… Destruction Intent."
She demonstrated, with extreme caution. She focused on a discarded scrap of paper on the table. She didn't cast a spell. She simply looked at it with that dark spinning star in her eye.
The paper didn't tear, burn, or rot. It ceased. It vanished from the bottom up, not into ash, but into a pinpoint of nothingness that winked out. No sound, no flash. Simply… deletion.
"It's small now. A flicker," she said, shuddering as she closed her eye, the darkness receding. "But it's hungry. And it comes with instincts. Space Quake—a localized tremor in reality that shatters spells and matter. Annihilating Gaze—a focused beam of obliteration. But using it… it feeds on my own vitality. On my vampire bloodline's life-force."
Her unique duality was now a dangerous trinity: Witchcraft, Vampiric Blood Manipulation, and Primordial Destruction. She was becoming a being of both profound life and absolute void. Arlan understood her fear perfectly. She was an anomaly with a timer, and the clock was her own soul.
"We'll find a way to control it," he said, his voice quiet but firm. "Just like I'm controlling the cracks."
Their bond, forged in the hidden places, tightened. They were no longer just allies. They were fellow catastrophes learning to walk without breaking the world.
The academy, meanwhile, was abuzz with the approach of the Inter-Academy Exchange Tournament. Teams from three other elite academies across the continent would be arriving in a month. The prestige of Celestial Ascent was on the line. The pressure to field the strongest possible team was immense.
Lance Ashcroft, as the top apprentice lance, was a shoo-in for selection. But rumors swirled that the faculty wouldn't rely solely on student lances. They would create a hand-picked, all-star team from the best of the second and third years.
Arlan threw himself into training, using the regimen to test his limits. With Lyra's tutelage, his Captain-level power stabilized. He could now create two Spatial Anchors simultaneously and had perfected a Phased Slash—a dimensional cut that could bypass most non-spatial defenses by striking a fraction of a second out of phase with reality.
It was during one of these grueling solo sessions in a high-gravity training chamber that he met the new rival.
He was finishing a complex kata, Purple-Crack leaving trails of silver and faint purple in the air, when the chamber door hissed open. Arlan didn't stop, assuming it was a proctor.
"So you're the one."
The voice was like ground glass—cold,abrasive, and utterly confident. It held a tone of casual, deep-seated superiority that made Lyra's pride seem academic.
Arlan finished his movement and turned.
The young man leaning against the doorframe was about eighteen, with hair the color of tarnished silver and eyes like chips of frozen mercury. He wore a simple black training suit, but its cut was foreign, sleek, and undoubtedly expensive. His aura… it wasn't just powerful. It was oppressive. It didn't flare or swirl; it sat around him like a gravitational field, dense and heavy. 4th Order. Commander-rank. And not a fresh one. Rank 5 or above.
But more than the raw power, it was the quality of the aura. It felt… absolute. Unyielding. It pressed on Arlan's senses, demanding submission.
"I heard a stray dog had learned some interesting tricks," the young man said, pushing off the doorframe and walking into the chamber. The high-gravity field didn't seem to affect him at all. "Broke into 3rd Order by chewing on Accord scraps. How… enterprising."
"Who are you?" Arlan asked, his grip tightening on Purple-Crack.
A faint, icy smile touched the stranger's lips. "Kieran Vance."
The surname hit Arlan like a physical blow.Vance. Head Proctor Vance's nephew? Son?
"I study at Oblivion's Edge Academy," Kieran continued, as if reading his mind. "The real academy for those destined to rule. I'm here for the Exchange Tournament. Aunt Iliana thought it would be… educational… for me to survey the local talent before I humiliate it publicly."
He stopped a few meters away, his mercury eyes boring into Arlan. "She's particularly concerned about you. Thinks you're a fragile, precious resource to be protected. I think you're a risk. An unstable variable in her carefully managed garden."
His aura flexed. Not an attack, but a display. The space around Arlan hardened. The air grew thick, resistant. It was a manifestation of pure Dominion Intent—the intent to control, to rule, to impose one's will on the environment itself. It was a rare and advanced power, usually only seen in 5th Order Generals.
Arlan's own spatial energy rebelled against the foreign pressure. His bracer glowed, its runes flaring white as it fought to maintain the stability of his personal space. He stood his ground, but it was like standing in a tsunami.
"You have a spark," Kieran mused, tilting his head. "A little spatial flicker, a dash of stolen shadow, and… is that a heavenly flame? How quaint. You've glued together a decent imitation of power from broken parts. But it's still a patchwork. I am a masterpiece."
He raised a hand, palm open. In it, a complex geometry of force—crystalline, perfect, and utterly controlled—began to form. It wasn't an element. It was pure ordered kinetic energy, shaped by his Dominion Intent. "My affinity is Force. Not brute strength. The fundamental manipulation of kinetic and potential energy. I don't hit things. I decide how and when they move. Or if they move at all."
He closed his fist. The complex geometry vanished.
The oppressive aura lifted as suddenly as it had descended. Arlan sucked in a sharp breath.
"The Tournament will be amusing," Kieran said, turning to leave. "Try not to break before I get a chance to dismantle you in the arena, patchwork. It would disappoint my aunt." He paused at the door. "And stay away from the half-breed witch. Her kind of chaos is beneath even your station."
He was gone.
Arlan stood in the heavy silence, his knuckles white around his sword hilt. The cold rage that had fueled him since his parents' death was now joined by something new: a pure, icy hatred.
Kieran Vance was everything he despised: born to power, arrogant, dismissive of struggle, and aligned with the very controlling forces that had killed his family. He was a symbol of the world order Arlan had sworn to break.
And he possessed an Intent—a power Arlan didn't yet have, a qualitative leap that could bridge the vast gap between their Orders.
The path forward was no longer just about survival or revenge against a faceless Accord. It was a climb. A brutal, vertical climb to reach and surpass someone who looked down from a mountain peak, convinced no one could follow.
Arlan sheathed Purple-Crack, the amethyst glow in its crack pulsing in time with his heartbeat.
Fine, he thought, the cold in his soul crystallizing into a diamond-hard purpose. Let him see a masterpiece. I'll show him a revolution.
The Exchange Tournament was no longer just a competition. It was a declaration of war. And Kieran Vance had just issued the first challenge.