The walk from the central arena to the administrative tower was supposed to be triumphant. Ten exhausted students who had achieved the impossible, who had defeated reality-warping entity through coordination and courage and remote tactical guidance. They should have been celebrating.
Instead, they were marching with grim determination toward confrontation.
"We need answers," Raya had declared immediately after recovering enough strength to stand. "The Archivist appeared at our Academy, was authorized by Principal Rai, subjected us to weeks of systematic defeat, and we still don't know why. That ends now."
Nobody had disagreed. Even the exhaustion and relief of victory couldn't suppress the burning need to understand what they'd actually been part of, what the true purpose had been, why Principal Rai had enabled an entity that could have killed them all if she'd chosen to.
