Behind Sora, Esme bowed deeply, lowering herself until her head nearly touched the floor, then quietly took her place behind his seat.
Sora sat down calmly, folding one leg over the other. "I heard you wanted to see me?"
"Yes," the Emperor replied. "For a few reasons. First, is the object I asked for six months ago ready?"
"It is," Sora answered. "I finished the final tests last week. It's ready for collection. You can take it with you when you leave."
The Emperor nodded, satisfied. Months ago, he had requested Sora to create a device capable of storing vast quantities of mana, something even the empire's most brilliant artificers had failed to accomplish. But Sora… was different. His intellect and affinity for creation defied reason itself, despite his age.
Over time, Emperor Aziel had grown accustomed to relying on his youngest son for such innovations. The boy had single-handedly produced artifacts the empire's research and development department had struggled to develop for centuries.
Still, there was always one infuriating detail, Sora only completed his father's requests when he felt like it.
Aziel was convinced that most of these objects took his son less than a day to complete, though he could never prove it. Once, he had asked Sora to create self-sustaining mana-powered lights, something the royal research department had attempted unsuccessfully for years. The next morning, Sora casually presented a finished product.
When the lights were mass produced for the public, there was an uproar. There would be no need for lamps now, and talks were being held with the other races to convince the emperor to share the production method, or at least trade for some of the lights.
After that, more and more requests followed, but perhaps feeling that his talents were being taken for granted, Sora began to delay each project longer than the last.
It was suffice to say that his inventions were extraordinary, people were saying they were on the precipice of a revolution. But no-one really knew he was actually making them, what they thought was that the empire's researchers have been very successful lately.
If only they knew.
Aziel let out a faint exhale through his nose, then spoke again. "The other matter, you will be fifteen next month."
"Yes," Sora replied.
"Which means you will be old enough to attend the Academy." The Emperor leaned forward slightly, studying him. "What is your mana core level right now?"
"The fifth stage of the Transcendence Realm," Sora said casually.
The words fell like thunder in the quiet room.
Every person present froze, their eyes wide in disbelief. The two guards, both seasoned experts in their own right, exchanged stunned looks. Even Esme's composure faltered for the first time.
It wasn't a secret that Sora had been born with an awakened mana core, but to most, the very idea was absurd.
Though Aziel had never denied it, he had also never made a point to confirm it.
There was no need. His power alone was enough to silence anyone who dared question him.
And even among the rulers of other races, the Human Emperor was feared and respected.
Those who had heard rumours of Sora's nature simply called it propaganda, nothing but a myth meant to glorify the royal bloodline.
After all, the idea of a baby born awakened was something that had never occurred in recorded history.
In the world of Noctherion, the laws of cultivation were absolute. Every human awakened their mana core at the age of fifteen. Before that, their bodies were too fragile to endure the touch of mana. To awaken early was to invite death.
And yet, Sora had shattered that law by merely being born.
The stages of cultivation were well known. The Rebirth Realm marked the first step, where one shed their mortal shell and became attuned to mana. Below it lay the Mortal Stage, for those who never awakened, it is a fate worse than death. Mortals lived short, harsh lives, barely reaching a century in age, enslaved, despised and pitied in equal measure.
A Rebirth Realm expert could live up to a thousand years, their strength defining the backbone of the empire's armies.
The Transformation Realm came next, a stage of true metamorphosis, where the body and soul were tempered by mana. Only one in a hundred Rebirth experts ever reached it, and those who did often became low ranking nobles or high-ranking officers.
Then came the Spiritual Realm, where one's essence fused with mana completely. The gifted few who reached it became the pillars of noble houses, their lifespans extending to fifty thousand years.
And above that… the Transcendence Realm.
It was at this stage that one began to break the limits of mortality, setting their path toward divinity. High-ranking nobles and dukes occupied this level. Only twenty individuals in the entire empire had reached the peak of Transcendence, stages seven through ten of the transcendence and they were beings of near-mythical power.
Most transcendence realm experts would spend the rest of their lifespan trying to make it out of the early stages of the transcendence realm, and they could live up to a hundred thousand years.
To claim that a boy who had not yet turned fifteen was already at the fifth stage of Transcendence… was insanity.
The two guards trembled slightly, their composure faltering. Even Esme, who had witnessed Sora's talents first-hand, felt her heart pound. Only Aziel's expression remained collected, though his eyes glinted sharply.
Sora raised his right hand and removed a translucent ring, one he had crafted himself to conceal his mana fluctuations. The moment it came off, his aura exploded outward like an unseen tidal wave, washing over the room with suffocating force.
Everyone felt it, the overwhelming purity of his mana, the power that could rival high nobles hundred of times his age.
Hearing it from him was on matter. But. Seeing was believing.
Aziel leaned back in his seat, and for the first time in a long while, a genuine smile broke through his regal calm. "Unbelievable," he said softly. "You never fail to amaze me, Sora." His voice carried rare warmth, and unrestrained pride. "It seems our empire is destined for another age of greatness."