Later that day, Kaelric returned to the elders' hall.
A week had passed since his first glimpse of the vault. The determination in his chest no longer wavered. It had settled.
"Clan leader," he said, bowing lightly to Thalen, "may I visit the Relic treasury again? I wish to examine an older stone path Relic. And refinement recipes."
Thalen studied him for a breath longer than necessary. Gray eyes, patient but guarded. The boy had already been inside once. "He had left nothing disturbed. No reports, no incidents."
At last, Thalen inclined his head. "Very well. But Remain under the attendants' watch. Respect what you do not understand."
Kaelric bowed again. "Of course."
As he turned away, his expression did not change, but the thought was firm and final.
"This is the second time. There will be no third."
...
The spiral stairs carried him down into stone-scented corridors, oil and soot clinging faintly to the air. Torchlight slid along the carvings in the walls: harvest lines worn smooth, battle scenes chipped by time, old pacts whose names had faded but not their weight.
The hidden treasury opened into its vast, vaulted quiet.
Racks and pedestals stood in disciplined rows. Glass cases guarded smaller Relics, velvet-lined boxes cradled delicate materials, iron hooks bore heavier things shaped for war.
Kaelric moved, gaze drifting without hurry. He stopped where others stopped. Passed where others passed. Nothing in his posture suggested intent.
Near the back, bound parchments and old tablets rested in a narrow stack. Refinement recipes.
He paused, fingers brushing a nearby pedestal as if idly. His eyes flicked once toward the attendant.
When the guard leaned down to adjust a display, Kaelric's hand slid inward.
A hidden panel eased open with a muted sigh.
Inside lay forbidden parchments. Not sealed, not trapped. Simply hidden.
His eyes moved.
Vitalis Amplifier, Rank One.
Minor Pulse Stabilizer, Rank One.
Spirit Bloom Enhancer, Rank Three.
Each line etched itself cleanly into memory.
The Vitalis Amplifier drew his focus. The parchment described it plainly, almost dismissively.
A basic Relic essential for reinforcing rank-one cultivation.
It requires three mutated Vitalis stones from the Breathless Depths beneath the western ridge. The heart of a four-antlered light-tan deer. And two reagents: Tenfold Blossoms and Moonwood Ash.
Simple. Direct. The easiest among the forbidden.
Yet the words burned.
An A-grade cultivator should not lag like this. Stones vanished faster than they should. The second sphere stirred only when it wished, ignoring effort, ignoring excess.
Footsteps neared.
"You shouldn't open those, young master," the guard said quietly. No anger. Only caution.
Kaelric withdrew his hand and bowed. "You're right. Thank you."
The guard nodded, already unconcerned. A prodigy glancing at recipes meant for those beneath him was hardly worth a report. Children were curious. Talent bred impatience.
The panel slid shut. The vault swallowed its secrets again.
Kaelric walked back into the torchlit corridor as though nothing had happened.
That night, in his room, he laid out his remaining Vitalis stones on the desk.
Five.
Cold. Translucent. Faintly luminous beneath the lamplight.
Numbers meant little on their own. What mattered was what they could force. But he needed more, but they will come in time. He chose not to cultivate with the stones they gave him.
He would find the deer. He would descend into the Breathless Depths. He would refine the Amplifier.
It was the easiest to make.
And his foundation in refinement was poor.
...
The morning mist clung to the Stoneheart training fields beneath the looming shadow of the Heartspire. Terraces of cracked stone and thin grass stretched outward, damp and cold.
The air tasted of wet earth and iron. From below came the steady thud of stone striking wood.
Rank-two cultivators trained apart, their clashes sending faint tremors through the platforms. Rank ones worked the basics, every strike was measured to conserve essence.
Kaelric crossed the field, boots crunching over frost. His onyx-black robes, lined in deep indigo, moved with practiced ease. He no longer looked like a nameless child pulled from the crowd. The cloth alone marked the distance traveled since the awakening ceremony.
Maerin walked among the rank ones, sharp-eyed and unyielding. Her stone path presence pressed subtly against the yard.
"Realize the cost," she said, her voice carrying without effort. "Unless you want to empty your aperture before noon."
Using Relics strained the aperture's light.
Too much strain, and the fog thinned until the chamber felt hollow, its brilliance drained dry. The world grew heavy when that happened; even breathing seemed to cost more. With time, the aperture refilled itself, drop by drop. Vitalis stones quickened the pace, but no stone could replace the cultivator's own essence entirely.
Aperture endured, Relics acted.
A muttering student froze under her stare and bowed, face burning.
Aurella stood nearby, her stance correct, her strikes precise. Yet her attention drifted.
Her eyes followed Kaelric as he moved through the drills. The pauses he took. The restraint in his strikes. One time she had seen him enter the Relic treasury. That memory refused to settle.
Something about him felt withheld.
She didn't realize she'd stopped mid-swing until Maerin's voice cut in.
"Aurella."
She flinched. "I-I apologize, Instructor."
"Focus on your training," Maerin said flatly. "Not boys."
Seryn laughed, bright and immediate.
Raised among wealth and trade routes, she wore confidence easily. She shot Aurella a teasing look, earning a thin smile in return, though Aurella's gaze drifted back all the same.
Kaelric stopped beside Seryn and adjusted her angle with a brief gesture. "Compress the force. Don't bleed essence."
She followed the correction. Her next strike bit deeper.
Her cheeks warmed. She straightened, clearly pleased.
"So," he said, as if casually, "how close are you to middle stage?"
"Seventeen percent," she replied. "I'm letting my aperture settle."
He nodded once.
It should have been him.
Not jealousy. Just friction. "An A-grade shouldn't stall like this. I'm only ten percent." He thought.
"And you?" Seryn asked, narrowing her eyes.
"Forty percent."
The lie passed smoothly.
Seryn studied him for a heartbeat, then huffed. "Show-off."
From the yard's edge, Daren watched.
A D-grade had no place near an A-grade. Yet Kaelric stood among the C-grades as if the difference between them were a rumor instead of a law. He spoke without hesitation, asked questions without flinching, and the instructors answered him first, attention settling on him with an ease that felt inevitable.
That calm scraped worse than arrogance ever could.
Daren's fingers curled slowly against his palm.
When Maerin stepped forward, stone aura gathering along her forearm, the air thickened with weight. Her Stone Rock cut forward in a clean arc, force compressing around the strike before snapping loose with a sharp crack.
Kaelric watched once.
Then he moved.
The same rotation. The same timing. Nearly identical.
A murmur passed through the nearby disciples.
Daren swallowed, throat dry.
Half the people born in Stoneheart never awakened at all. His sister hadn't. Half the people spent their lives scraping for grain, hauling ore, breaking their backs for cultivators who barely remembered their names.
And this one… not only awakened.
The only A-grade in their generation.
Of course he could copy it in a single attempt.
Of course.
Something hot pressed behind Daren's ribs. He forced his hand to loosen before anyone noticed how tightly it had clenched.
From the center of the yard, Kaelric adjusted his stance again, already asking another question.
"Acting noble just because his robe's darker," Daren muttered to those beside him. "Let's see him without the elders feeding him stones."
The laughter that followed rang thin.
Kaelric's gaze passed over them briefly. Long enough to see the tension in Daren's jaw. Enough.
He returned to practice, his movements steady while others strained, frost biting his lungs, wind tugging at his robe's edge.
Aurella watched him again, unease sharpening.
...
Leonis stood above the yard, arms folded, morning light cutting harsh lines across his beard and unbound hair.
Below, Kaelric moved through the drills with quiet ease.
"Your cousin draws attention," Leonis said. "And he doesn't even try."
Edran snorted softly. "He was silent for years. Let him breathe."
Leonis did not answer. His eyes stayed on Kaelric.
Too composed. Too quickly accepted.
"Strange," Leonis murmured. "How certain blood keeps producing command."
Edran glanced at him. "Talent doesn't ask permission."
Leonis's jaw tightened. The words lingered, unwelcome.
...
Gavric stood near the center of the yard, feet braced in a stance Maerin had corrected more than once.
Sun-darkened skin stretched tight over his forearms as he held position. His hair, wavy and coarse from weeks without a proper cut, slipped into his eyes; he brushed it aside at once, jaw tightening as if annoyed the lapse had been noticed at all.
The Stone Rock Relic hovered beside him, trembling faintly. He exhaled, gathered himself, and released.
The strike landed cleanly. Strong.
And wasteful.
Maerin sighed. "Better," she said, stepping closer. "You're losing half the essence before impact. Again."
Gavric nodded, jaw set. Her strictness meant expectation. And that mattered.
She singled him out like this because he wasn't just any student, a high C grade, commander candidate. If he could master this under her scrutiny, nothing else would faze him.
He steadied his stance once more.