Chapter 42 – The Line into the Field
Seryn finished the last sentence on the page, and for a brief moment the tip of his quill hovered over the paper. No ink dripped; the tremor in his hand had finally stilled.
"Second Trial Notes – Visibility, line, will."
He reread the lines beneath the title. How the formation had reacted, how narrowly he'd kept his gray light channeled, where he had tested his limits and where he had deliberately stepped back. For everyone else, these sentences would be theory. For him, they were warnings.
Someone knocked.
A single, firm rap.
He set the quill down and lifted his head. "Come in."
The door opened a crack. A slim, dark-haired attendant stepped inside. He wore the Academy guard vest, his face expressionless, but his voice more formal than usual.
"Seryn Daskal?"
"Yes."
He held up a sealed parchment. "Summons for tomorrow morning's field trial. All candidates are being notified tonight. I'm to deliver it against your signature."
Seryn rose and crossed the space between them in two strides. The seal wasn't imperial red, but the Academy's deep blue. Still, the thin gold ring at the edge made it clear the Temple's eye had brushed the document as well.
The attendant offered the parchment. "Signature, please."
Seryn took up the quill again and signed at the bottom. The attendant's eyes slid from the ink to Seryn's face. The neutral mask on his features cracked for just an instant, the briefest flicker of curiosity.
"Tomorrow morning, one hour before sunrise, you'll be at the south courtyard's muster point," he said. "Anyone late… will not be admitted to the trial."
Seryn nodded. "Understood."
When the door closed, silence reclaimed the room. He unrolled the parchment.
> "Third Exam – Field.
Muster: South Courtyard, One Hour before Sunrise.
Equipment: Personal weapons and basic provisions only.
Detailed instructions will be given on site."
Three signatures at the bottom: Valen, Seraphine, Marith.
And in the margin, a small, cold note:
> "Temple observers will be present."
He laid the parchment slowly on the table.
"So it's your turn," he said to the room. "Stone, ink, and crystal are done. Now it's soil."
---
Finding Kai and Rien didn't take long.
On the way down the tower stairs, he heard the mix of laughter and grumbling from an empty classroom. When he pushed the door open, he found Kai sitting backward on a chair, arms folded over the backrest, while Rien leaned against the wall, checking his bowstring.
Kai looked up. "Look who it is. Gray-chested philosopher."
Rien asked, without preamble, "Did the summons come?"
Seryn lifted the parchment. "South courtyard at dawn."
Kai's face twisted. "Of course… the coldest, windiest place on the island."
Seryn stepped in and closed the door. "Marith's signature is on it. This won't be a stroll."
Rien took the parchment and studied it briefly. "Weapons and 'basic provisions' only. So not too short… but not exactly a walk around the tower either."
Kai tapped his fingers on the table. "We've seen how 'not too short' can turn into 'we barely made it back.' Forest classes, missing groups, things that never make it into official records…"
Seryn dragged a chair over and sat. "All field trials are recorded."
"There are always things that don't get written," Rien said calmly. "Especially when Temple markings are involved."
For a moment, none of them spoke. Silence slipped into the cracks in the walls, into the old ink stains on the desks.
"Alright," said Kai at last. "So what do we do tomorrow? Plan?"
Rien set the parchment down. "Let's count what we know. One: The forest might be the same training zone we used before. Two: Surveillance spells will be active. Three: Teams will look random… but they won't be."
"Four," Seryn added. "Temple left traces on the forest boundary before. We saw them. Marith saw them. The full report never made it onto paper, but he knows."
Kai raised a hand. "Question wedged in between: why the forest again? We have an island. Why crawl back under the trees?"
"Because stone and wall belong to the Temple now," Seryn said. "The ground… still belongs a little to us."
Rien smiled faintly. "I like that sentence."
"What waits for us out there," Seryn went on, "isn't just a beast. It's our capacity to decide without someone else's script."
Kai frowned. "That sounded good, but somehow you also made my stomach drop."
Seryn looked at him. "Tomorrow you'll have one very clear task."
"What task?"
"Don't make noise," Rien replied. "Meaning, don't take unnecessary risks. The less you improvise, the longer we stay alive."
Kai scowled. "I disagree. Sometimes I'm useful."
"Sometimes," Seryn said. "Today, frequency matters."
Kai sighed, but the worry in his eyes didn't completely vanish. "Fine, fine. I'll cut down on my 'sometimes' tomorrow."
All night they imagined the field: trees, fog, stone markers, unseen eyes. Every sentence they spoke felt less like a concrete plan and more like a way of rearranging their fear into something manageable.
When Seryn returned to the tower, the sky was fully dark.
He didn't try to sleep. He lay on the bed, closed his eyes, and placed the forest over his thoughts—the stage for tomorrow.
---
One hour before sunrise, the south courtyard felt like a blade pressed to the wrist.
The breath of the gathered students rose as pale mist in the air, and though the cold was enough to turn lips blue, everyone pretended not to shiver.
Seryn, Kai, and Rien stood somewhere in the middle of the crowd.
Lyra waited a little ahead, cloaked up to her neck, hands clasped together for warmth. Her eyes looked more taut than tired.
"Third exam," Kai muttered. "Feels like they announced those three weeks… yesterday."
"We were at war yesterday," Rien said. "Time is always broken here."
Seryn's eyes went beyond the crowd, to the shielded gate set into the courtyard wall. In front of it stood Marith in his dark green cloak. Beside him: Kaelor, Seralis, and a few other instructors. Behind them: the less welcome silhouettes—Temple priests, a couple of imperial officials, and up on a higher balcony, Valen and Seraphine side by side.
When Marith raised his hand, the murmur died instantly.
"The third exam," he said, his voice slicing through the morning cold. "So far you've seen ink and stone. From here on, you set your feet on earth. The field trial does not measure raw power. It measures your decisions, your sense of direction, and your ability to come back alive."
Kai whispered, "I really wish he'd lean more on that 'alive' part."
Marith went on. "The task is simple: you will enter the forest, retrieve a marked stone from the designated zone, and return through this gate. You have a fixed time window. Fail to make it back within that time… and you fail the exam."
Kaelor stepped forward. The sword at his shoulder caught the pale light, reflecting it in a cold line. "Creatures beyond the designated area have been cleared in advance. But any mage who says, 'There is no danger at all,' is lying. So… don't be fools."
Seralis lifted a hand. "A protective mesh will stop lethal blows during the trial. Pain, fear, and mistakes remain real. The damage you take will fade faster… but the lesson won't."
From the back, a priest leaned slightly forward, voice smooth and cold. "Your faith is being tested too. In danger… your first reflex tells us who you really serve."
No one answered. The students' eyes stayed on the instructors; the Temple's words hung in the air like a chill.
Marith unrolled another parchment. "Team assignments. Four per group. Leaders chosen based on current performance."
Names began to fall across the courtyard.
"Lucien Arclight, team leader. Mira Vale, Rurik Stonehand, Elira Halden."
Kai whistled under his breath. "That's not a team. That's a small, polite disaster waiting to happen."
"They'll have their own exam," Rien said. "We have ours."
Marith continued. "Seryn Daskal, team leader. Team members: Kai Vell, Rien Davor, Lyra Kallen."
Kai's breath came out in a sharp puff. "Leader… that's you."
Seryn didn't change expression. "Alright."
Lyra lifted her head, looking at him with a mixture of relief and unease.
Rien's tone didn't shift, but his words did. "That makes our plan more official than we expected," he murmured.
The closer the responsibility came, the heavier it felt.
---
As teams clustered together, the air somehow grew colder.
Seryn, Kai, Rien, and Lyra formed a small circle.
"Alright," Kai said. "Orders are yours, commander. What now?"
Seryn kept it short. "One: No heroics in the first stretch of forest. Two: We treat every sign we see—natural or magical—as a point on a map. Three: We try to return by a different route than the one we take in."
Lyra frowned. "Why?"
"Because one path makes one trap," Rien said. "Two paths give us a choice."
"Four," Seryn added. "We're constantly checking each other, even without words. If you're hurt, you say it. Hiding it… is betrayal of the team."
Kai rolled his eyes. "When did we get to the 'betrayal' paragraph?"
"After the control exam," Seryn replied. "There, we were individuals. Here, we're not."
Lyra nodded quietly. "Understood."
Marith's voice rose again. "The gate will open. Teams will enter one by one. Once inside, there will be no direct spell intervention from outside. The protective net is limited to stopping lethal blows. Everything else… is on you."
Seralis traced a small sign toward the warded gate. The stone groaned open, like metal sliding through rock. Beyond it, gray light and mist—the forest barrier letting only shapes across, not scents or wind. Out here, the air still smelled of stone.
Lucien's group was among the first called.
Lucien glanced at Seryn for a heartbeat.
No apology, no challenge. Just the shape of a thought behind his eyes: Stay alive.
Then he stepped through and vanished into the mist.
When Seryn's team was called, the gray light under his ribs recoiled slightly, as if remembering that the day's true exam had only just begun. It didn't drag him backward; it merely told him it was awake.
"You ready?" Kai asked.
"No," Seryn said. "But that's not going to change."
Kai laughed once. "Somehow… that makes me feel better."
Lyra exhaled into her hands, letting the cold air fog between her fingers. "Let's go."
The four of them walked toward the gate. As they neared the barrier, the texture of the air shifted; stone gave way to the smell of leaves, damp, and living earth.
The moment they stepped through, the gray pulse in Seryn's chest sharpened.
This wasn't his first time seeing the forest.
But this time, something else was woven into it.
Alongside the old Temple traces, he felt a fresher, more twisted current. As if someone had threaded a fine, foreign line through the existing marks after the fact.
This trial isn't just for us, he thought. Someone has added their own experiment on top.
Behind them, the gate shut with a distant thud, folding its sound into the rustle of leaves.
He drew a deep breath.
Four short. Two short.
"Remember," he said quietly. "The task isn't just to take the stone. Coming back is part of the task."
Kai, Rien, and Lyra nodded as one.
And the four of them took their first steps into the misty forest.
---
💬 Author's Note (EN):
This chapter drew the line just before the field trial truly begins. Seryn is no longer just hiding himself; he's responsible for a group's survival, and that forces him to think about his gray power differently—less as a secret, more as a tool that has to be managed carefully. In the next chapter, we'll step fully into the forest: old Temple traces, a new, unnamed distortion, and the thin line between "exam" and "experiment." ⚔️