The announcement comes at dusk.
It's not dramatic, not ceremonial.
A single Academy examiner stepping forward as the crowd thinks, a parchment in hand, her voice calm and final.
"By authority of the Aetherion Academy," she says, "the following candidates have passed the preliminary filter."
Names are read. Some expected. Some not.
When she says Ryn Falen, I notice Ryn stiffen as if he's been struck. When she says Kael Arin, I feel a strange stillness settle into my chest. It wasn't relief or triumph, but inevitability.
As if this were always the only possible outcome.
Around us, reactions ripple through the crowd. Some parents cry. Some cheer. Some go quiet, their faces tight with disappointment. A few nobles look annoyed, less at losing than at who didn't.
The examiner rolls the parchment closed.
"Prepare yourselves," she says. "You depart for Valoria at dawn."
That's it.
No speeches. No congratulations.
I had already expected it, but after today I could tell it even more.
The Academy doesn't celebrate potential. It harvests it.
We return to the village, a sky streaked with orange and violet. The Basin feels smaller already, like something that's already part of a memory.
Once I arrive home, I am immediately met with Lira. She doesn't cry this time, but she does hug me tightly. Taking a step back, she places her hands on my shoulders, her eyes searching my face.
"You've changed, Kael," she says softly.
"I know," I answer.
"But always remember, no matter who you are or what you have done, Mother will always love you and will always be there for you," Lira says with her eyes starting to water.
"I am proud of you, Kael. If the Academy is too much for you at any point, don't forget you have a home you can return to."
A faint smile flashed across my face.
"I know, mother."
Next is Elias, who clasps my forearm instead of hugging me. His grip is firm and proud, but not restrained.
"Remember," he says, "strength always draws attention, and attention draws enemies."
"I will."
He hesitates, then adds, quieter, "And don't let them tell you who you are."
"Be strong, son, stand up for yourself and others. Never forget yourself or where you've come from."
"We believe in you, son."
That one stays with me.
Ryn waits a short distance away, his backpack already slung over one shoulder. He doesn't go back inside his house. He stands there, staring down the road.
I join him.
"You ready?" he asks.
I respond. "No, not really. But I'm going anyway."
I may not be Elias' and Lira's true son, but why does it hurt so much to say goodbye?
The Academy carriages arrive before sunrise.
Dozens of them, floating a foot above the ground, runes glowing softly beneath reinforced hulls of white stone and steel. Each bears the Academy crest, a circular sigil bisected by flowing lines of Aether.
They don't look like vehicles.
They look like the sum of decisions. Calculations of forces.
Candidates were sorted quickly. Nobles first, no surprise there, were ushered toward the front carriages with practised efficiency. Sponsored students next.
Commoners last.
Ryn watches the process with a tight jaw.
"Figures, of course, they would get special treatment. Even the ride to the Academy is ranked." He muttered.
We're then directed to the third carriage from the back. No crest. No attendents. Just benches with reinforced windows and a faint hum of contained Aether.
Ryn drops onto the bench opposite me and exhales hard. "Well, at least the ride floats like the others."
The carriage door seals with a soft click.
The Codex flickers briefly.
[TRANSPORT CONSTRUCTION DETECTED]
[AETHER PROPULSION: CONTINUOUS]
[DESTINATION VECTOR: VALORIA - CONFIRMED]
The carriage lifts off from the ground, with a smooth calm.
And just like that, the Basin fades away.
For a while, neither of us spoke.
The landscape rolls beneath us. The fields giving way to forest, forest breaking into rivers that glow faintly with leyline traces. In the distance, ancient roads stretch like veins across the land, humming with slow, steady power.
Ryn pressed his forehead against the glass.
"…Huh. So that's what Elyndra really looks like," he murmurs.
"You've never left the Basin?" I asked.
He shook his head. "Closest I ever got was the old quarry ridge."
I watched his reflection in the window. His eyes were wide, hungry, and calculating.
"What do you know about the Academy?" I questioned.
Ryn pulls back, settling into the bench. "More than I should, but less than I want."
He ticked points off on his fingers.
"Four years," he says. "That's all the Academy gives you. First year weeds people out. The second year breaks the ones who survive. The third year shapes them into something useful. Fourth year decides whether you actually matter."
I watched the distant towers of Valoria slide closer through the carriage window, their Aether-lit spires cutting into the sky.
"Sounds inefficient," I say.
Ryn blinks, then lets out a short laugh. "Hahaha. That's your takeaway??"
"If the goal is to produce competent mages," I continue, "then discarding usable data in the first year is wasteful. Breaking people in the second only reduces variance, not potential."
He stares at me for a moment, then shakes his head. "You really don't hear yourself, do you?"
"Probably not."
Ryn looks back out the window, jaw tightening just a fraction. "Well, maybe this is good. Maybe that's why you'll survive this," he mutters. "You don't treat it like a judgment, but more like a system."
I nod once.
"And systems," I say quietly, "can be learned."
A soft scoff comes from the bench across the carriage.
I glance up.
Another boy sits there alone, shoulders hunched, clothes worn thin at the elbows. He hasn't looked out the window once. His eyes are fixed on the floor, as if it might swallow him if he stares hard enough.
"Doesn't matter how they structure it," he says suddenly. "Four years, seven years… It's all gonna have the same end."
Ryn turns slowly. "And that is? Please enlighten me..."
The boy shrugs, not meeting his gaze. "Commoners don't win. Not really. Maybe one or two scrape through the cracks, but the Houses always take the top spots. They always will." He lets out a hollow laugh. "We're just filling seats, filling a quota."
The words hang in the air, heavy and sour.
I feel Ryn tense beside me.
"That's funny," Ryn says, voice calm in a way that immediately puts me on alert. "You sound like a man who's already lost."
The boy finally looks up, irritation flashing across his face. "I'm being realistic."
"No," Ryn replies. "You're being pathetic."
The boy stiffens. "What did you say?"
"I said you're pathetic," Ryn repeats, sharper now. "You haven't even stepped through the gates yet, and you're already kneeling." He leans forward slightly. "If you want to quit, do it quietly. Don't drag the rest of us down with you."
The other commoner flushes red. "You think you're better than me?"
Ryn's eyes narrow. "Yeah, I do! You wanna know why, because I'm not you."
Silence slams down between them.
The boy opens his mouth, then closes it again. He looks away, jaw clenched, retreating back into himself.
Ryn turns back to the window as if the conversation never happened.
For a moment, I study him.
He was… harsh. Unnecessarily so, maybe. The boy hadn't attacked us; he had just spoken out of fear. At least that's the way it appeared to me.
But I also see Ryn's hands clenched tight in his lap, knuckles pale.
He isn't angry at that boy.
He's angry at the idea.
At the future being decided before it even starts.
"Could've gone easier on him," I say quietly.
Ryn doesn't look at me. "If he believes that, he shouldn't be here."
"That's not always a choice," I reply.
He exhales slowly, then shrugs. "Maybe. But I'm done letting people tell me where I belong."
I nod once.
Different methods, different opinions, but the same refusal to back down willingly.
The carriage hums on, carrying us closer to the Academy, toward a place that will either prove the boy right…
Or give Ryn every reason to burn that belief to the ground.
I continue our conversation from earlier.
"Ok, so the Academy has a nice comforting system in place for students..." I say sarcastically.
Ryn glances toward the front carriages, where noble banners flutter faintly through the windows.
"Nobles live on the upper terraces. They have better dorms. Better instructors. Access to restricted archives." His jaw tightens. "Commoners get the lower rings. Shared rooms. Fewer resources."
"But the same exams," I note.
Ryn snorts. "Same finish line, but different starting blocks."
I keep a note of that last part. The possibility of overtaking and outshining these nobles.
"And the Ten Great Families?" I ask.
That gets his full attention.
Ryn shifts, lowering his voice despite the empty carriage.
"They're the pillars of Elyndra," he says. "Or so the stories go. Each one rose during or after the Aether Wars. Each claimed a piece of the world and made it theirs, for generations."
He starts listing them, not all names, but roles, reputations.
"House Valenhardt," he says first. "The supposed strongest. Fire-aligned. They led the final campaigns that brought the Wars to an end. Their heir this year is supposed to be a monster."
I don't comment. Just listen.
"Veyrannis," he continues. "Observers. Seers. They run the barrier towers and half the information networks. People say they know things before they even happen."
"Caelvarin?" I prompt.
Ryn smirks. "Couriers and innovators. Sky roads, transport magic, logistics. They smile a lot. Never trust that."
There's a flicker in his eyes when he says it, not hatred exactly, but something sharp.
"And the rest?"
"Renora—earth and fortifications. Thornevale—water and agriculture. Lysoria—light and illusion, and a few others." He shrugs. "Each one built something the continent couldn't function without. That's how they stayed on top."
"So they earned it," I say neutrally.
Ryn's mouth twists.
"Once," he says. "A long time ago."
He looks back out the window.
"Now they inherit it."
The silence that follows isn't empty.
The carriage hums steadily as the terrain shifts again—cities appearing in the distance now, spires catching the sun, floating platforms drifting lazily along invisible currents.
Valoria.
Even from here, it's enormous.
"So," Ryn says after a while, "I know we've gone over this before, but why are you going to the Academy?"
I consider the question carefully. Gauging what Ryn was actually asking, and whether I would give it to him.
"I told you," I answer. "To learn."
He waits.
"I want to understand Aether," I continue. "The systems behind it. The rules everyone follows without even realising that they're following rules. I wanna test the boundaries of Aether and what I can achieve with it if I push myself to the absolute limit."
I wasn't lying. I just wasn't telling the truth.
Ryn studies me. "Figures. During this whole thing, you never struck me as a person who wanted to go to the Academy for power. You want to go there for answers."
"Yes."
He nods slowly. "For me, it's simpler."
He clenches his fist, then relaxes it.
"I want out," he says. "Out of the Basin. Out of being nothing. Out of watching people with, quote, better blood, decide my future."
There it is.
Not rage. Not quite.
But something else. Like the words themselves carry a hidden pressure, waiting to reveal themselves.
"Do you think the Academy can give you that?" I ask.
"It's the only place that might," he replies. "And, for me, that's enough."
The Codex flickers quietly.
[MOTIVATION DIVERGENCE DETECTED]
[ALIGNMENT: PARTIAL]
[RISK ASSESSMENT: DEFERRED]
I ignore it.
The sun is lower now. The carriages began to descend towards the outer districts of Valoria, where the Academy's outer rings gleam like a crown.
Ryn shifts, suddenly restless.
"Hey," he says.
"Yes?"
He looks at me, expression serious in a way I haven't seen before.
"You saw what happened back there at the preliminary testing site. The nobles don't like being beaten. Especially not by people like us."
"I noticed."
"They'll try to isolate you, isolate us," he continues. "Test us. Push us into situations that force us to make stupid decisions. Just to make our lives difficult."
"I expect them to do that," I reply.
He exhales, then holds out his hand.
"So let's not let them."
I blink. "What?"
"Let's not give them the satisfaction. Let's look out for each other."
"A pact," he says. "Nothing fancy. Just—" he hesitates, searching for words that sound candid. "We watch each other's backs. At least until we figure out how to survive on our own as individuals."
I looked at his hand.
Calloused and scarred, but steady.
A mysterious boy who wants out badly enough to grab onto the first real chance he's ever had.
For a moment, the Codex hums.
Then I turn it off.
I clasp his hand.
"Deal," I say.
His grip tightens, just slightly.
"Good," he says, a crooked smile returning. "Because if they're going to try to crush us one at a time, they're going to be severely disappointed."
The carriage dips lower.
Ahead of us, the Academy rises—vast, gleaming, and indifferent.
For Ryn, it's freedom.
For me, it's a new experience. One that could give me all the answers I need about this world.
One thing is for sure: neither of us yet understands the significance of getting what we want.