The bells didn't stop ringing.
They echoed through the academy like a funeral toll—slow, deliberate, impossible to ignore. Each chime settled deeper into my chest than the last.
Charlotte walked beside me in silence as we moved through the inner corridors. Not the ones students used. These halls were older, narrower, etched with wards worn smooth by centuries of use.
"You didn't answer my question," she said at last.
I kept my gaze forward. "Which one?"
"How long you planned to lie."
I exhaled slowly. "Until I graduated. Or died. Whichever came first."
She stopped walking.
I took two more steps before realizing she wasn't beside me anymore.
When I turned, her eyes were sharp—not angry, not accusing.
Assessing.
"That level of control," she said, "doesn't come from fear. It comes from experience."
I shrugged weakly. "I read a lot."
She didn't smile.
We resumed walking.
At the end of the corridor stood a door I'd never seen before. Black metal reinforced with silver inlays, runes etched so deeply they seemed carved into the air itself.
Charlotte pressed her palm against it.
The door opened soundlessly.
Inside waited Professor Halvren.
The room was circular, windowless, lit by floating sigils that shifted color as we entered. Bookshelves lined the walls—real ones, not illusionary records. Old. Dangerous.
Halvren stood at the center, hands clasped behind his back.
"You may leave," he said to Charlotte.
She hesitated.
Halvren's gaze flicked toward her. "That was not a request."
She bowed stiffly and left without another word.
The door closed.
We were alone.
"You're wondering why you're not in chains," Halvren said calmly.
I blinked. "I was wondering when that would happen."
He chuckled. "Honesty. Refreshing."
He gestured to a chair.
I did not sit.
Halvren studied me for several seconds, then nodded as if confirming a private theory.
"Your suppression technique," he said, "is imperfect—but not sloppy. That tells me you learned it young."
I said nothing.
"Your mana density," he continued, "is abnormal. Not high. Compressed. Like a blade folded too many times."
Still nothing.
"And your instinctive response under lethal pressure," Halvren finished, "was not fear."
He smiled thinly.
"It was boredom."
The word landed like a hammer.
I met his eyes.
"That makes you dangerous."
I forced a laugh. "Sir, I nearly passed out."
"Because you chose to," he replied. "You released just enough power to end the duel without revealing your ceiling."
My silence was answer enough.
Halvren turned away, hands clasped behind his back once more. "This academy was not built to train the talented. It was built to find monsters before they devour the world."
I stiffened.
"You are not the first," he went on. "Nor will you be the last. The question is not what you are."
He faced me again.
"It is what you intend to become."
I swallowed. "I intend to survive."
Halvren laughed quietly. "A reasonable lie."
He waved a hand, and a sigil flared on the wall—an image forming within it.
A battlefield.
Mountains split in half. Cities burning. Figures clashing beneath a blood-red sky.
"At some point," Halvren said softly, "survival stops being an option."
The image vanished.
"You will not be punished," he said. "Not yet. Officially, today's duel will be recorded as an accident of emotional mana discharge."
I relaxed—just a little.
"Unofficially," he continued, "every faction worth fearing has just written your name down."
My blood ran cold.
"You will be watched," Halvren said. "Tested. Provoked."
He leaned closer.
"And if you truly are as smart as you pretend to be… you will play along."
The door opened behind me.
Dismissal.
I left the room feeling heavier than when I'd entered.
Outside, the academy had changed.
Students no longer whispered when they saw me.
They moved.
Some stepped aside instinctively. Others stared openly. A few looked away too quickly.
Renvor found me near the central courtyard, pacing like a caged animal.
"There you are!" he hissed, grabbing my sleeve and dragging me behind a pillar. "Do you have any idea what people are saying?"
"I can guess."
"They think you're either a hidden noble weapon or a disaster waiting to happen."
"Both flattering."
He stared at me. Really stared.
"…You could've warned me."
I met his gaze.
"I warned everyone. No one listened."
He swallowed.
Then sighed. "Idiot."
Despite everything, he smiled.
"Guess I backed the wrong weakling."
Footsteps approached.
Selene.
She looked perfectly fine—too fine. No visible injuries. Her eyes, however, burned brighter than before.
"That was fun," she said cheerfully.
Renvor yelped and fled.
Selene stepped closer, tilting her head. "You held back. Even at the end."
"I lost control," I said.
She leaned in until I could see my reflection in her pupils. "You chose control."
She straightened.
"I like people who lie badly," she continued. "They're usually honest about the important things."
"What do you want?" I asked.
"A rematch," she said immediately.
"…No."
She pouted. Then smiled wider. "Fine. Then an alliance."
That surprised me.
"Things are going to get ugly," Selene said softly. "And when they do, I want to be on the side that survives."
She offered her hand.
I stared at it.
Around us, the academy watched.
I took it.
Far beneath the stone foundations, something ancient shifted in its sleep.
And for the first time, I felt it—
The future pulling tight around my throat.