Lazar Kiyokazu — POV
And so we waited.
We stood frozen in the clearing as the wind cut through every gap in our clothes, slowly pulling away whatever warmth the run had managed to build in us. Nobody spoke anymore. Earlier there had been plenty of complaints. Questions, frustration, a few people demanding answers from Darius about how much longer we were expected to stand here. But as the cold settled deeper, a thick fog crept in over the clearing, swallowing the treeline and the trail we had just come from. People kept pushing at Darius, but he offered nothing in return, not a single word. Eventually they gave up, and a heavy silence took the place of all that noise.
Darius stood with his arms crossed and his eyes closed.
„How is he enduring this cold?" The thought kept looping through my mind every time I glanced at him.
The wind didn't let up. I bowed my head slightly, trying to shield my face from it. My fingers were numb and my legs felt like they were made of lead. The heat I had built up during the run was gone, and every breath I drew into my lungs was colder than the one before it.
„We actually made it all the way here."
That thought should have brought some relief. But, it didn't.
Instead, every time i tried to think about that, I kept seeing the face of the guy we had left behind on the trail. His hollow black eyes. The cold touch of his hand around mine. The faint, desperate twitch of his fingers when I tried to pull my hand free. I couldn't scrub it from my mind no matter how many times I tried.
I stared at the snow beneath my boots.
„Is he still alive?" I thought. But i already knew the answer. I just wasn't ready to say it to myself.
A few meters away, one person was sitting in the snow with his knees pulled tight against his chest. Another was feverishly rubbing his palms together. Someone else was staring blankly at the mountains as if waiting for them to move. Except for a few outliers, everyone else looked the same. Nobody looked composed or strong anymore. Some looked furious. Others scared. And few wore the expression as if they already accepted they might not make it home.
No one was pretending to be tough anymore. Everyone was just trying to survive the cold, however they could.
I cupped my hands near my mouth and blew warm air over them, trying to warm them up. When that plan stopped working, I did the same thing as others did. Rubbed my palms together as hard and fast as I could until my arms gave out. Then I rested, then started again, doing the same process over and over again.
I was in the middle of another cycle when I caught the sound of snow crunching. A footstep. Then another. Measured and quiet, coming from behind the group.
I raised my head.
A sharp gust of wind hit me almost immediately, nearly knocking me sideways. Loose snow lifted from the ground and swirled into a white curtain across the clearing. But through it, and through the fog drifting between the trees at the edge, a dark silhouette was taking shape. With every step it took, it grew sharper, until the outline of a man resolved itself clearly enough to be seen.
The silhouette raised it's arm and swept it upward to the right.
With that single motion, the fog and the airborne snow around it vanished. And silhouette appearance was suddenly fully exposed.
He was a well-built man, likely in his thirties. He wore the brown uniform of Nivalis, white plates fitted to his shoulders. On the left side of his chest was an emblem — a small shield bearing five alternating stripes of red and white, a tiny red lozenge set into a white square in the upper corner of that shield, framed on both sides by intricate golden accents that spread outward like wings.
"What I wouldn't give to have those clothes on me right now," someone muttered to my left.
"Same," another whispered.
The man didn't look at us the way Darius did. He didn't look at us with respect, or warmth, or friendliness. But he didn't look at us with hostility either. He was simply observing, scanning the group as he walked, a sleek white notebook held in his left hand.
He passed several people without a word and headed straight for Darius.
It was Elias.
He stopped a few steps from Darius, who finally opened his eyes and glanced over.
"You finished?"
"Yeah." He replied opening his notebook. "I have everything."
„Everything?" I turned the word over in my head. „What exactly does he mean by everything?"
He flipped a page. For a moment the only sound in the clearing was the wind catching the edge of the paper. Then Elias shifted his fingers slightly and the fluttering stopped. The wind stopped pulling at the pages entirely. It didn't even stir his hair anymore. As if he had simply told the air around him to be still.
"You may proceed with the second phase," Elias said, his eyes on Darius. "No one else will be coming."
My chest tightened.
„No one else is coming. What does that mean? What happened to that guy? He couldn't actually have—„
"Understood," Darius said with a single, firm nod.
After that, Elias finally turned his gaze toward the group, moving from person to person. When his eyes landed on me, my hands balled into fists without me deciding to move them. I raised my right hand, palm open.
"Lazar, what are you doing?" Luiz murmured beside me, his voice careful.
Elias immediately noticed my hand. He changed direction and started walking straight towards me. Stopping a step in front of me,
"What do you want?" His voice was hard, his eyes sharp and completely without warmth.
My heart hammered. A cold shiver moved down my spine. "Sir Elias, I have a question. May I speak?"
"Go on."
I lowered my hand. "You said no one else is coming."
"And?"
"What happened to one guy left on the trail?" I watched his face closely. "He has a short black hair, solid build, and a mole on the side of his neck near the throat." I pointed to the spot on my own neck. "He fell on the path. What happened to him?"
"That is none of your concern," Elias said, his tone even colder than before. He turned his back on me and resumed scanning the group.
I lowered my gaze to the snow.
"Lazar..." Luiz said quietly.
"While you were all running," Elias began talking out of nowhere, his voice carrying over the crowd, "I was watching.
„He was watching us?"
I clenched my fists tighter. A sudden wave of heat moved through my chest.
"Lazar. No. Don't—"
"You watched us and did nothing?!" The words burst out more sharply than I had intended, cutting off his sentence and echoing across the open space.
Elias stopped. He turned back around slowly. "Excuse me?" he said, reaching up to adjust his glasses with his finger.
"You said you were watching. Then why didn't you do anything for him on that trail?"
He stared at me.
"Don't tell me you didn't see him. There's no way you could have missed that. So tell me why didn't you help him!?"
The words had barely finished leaving my mouth when a brute force slammed down onto my back with crushing weight and drove me face-first into the snow. My teeth rattled while cold powder rushed into my eyes and nose.
"Uuggh—"
„That pressure again…"
"Know your place, dog," Elias said, his voice unmoved.
"Sir Elias, please forgive him — he didn't mean—"
"SILENCE!" He cut Luiz off immediately. He stepped closer, standing over me as the force on my back intensified. "Who are you to question me, you wretched stray?"
He glanced at Darius over his shoulder. "You have to teach them better how to deal with their superiors Darius"
Then he looked back down at me. "You tell me something, stray. Why didn't you do anything for him?"
"W-What...?"
"You reached him, and then you abandoned him. How selfish can one person be? Are you even human?"
"I left him," I ground out through clenched teeth, struggling against the pressure. "I know I did. But I couldn't do anything for him. You're superior to me, you had the power to save him!"
"Incorrect," Elias said smoothly. "You were the one who should have acted. Besides, why would I waste my time on a weakling who can't even handle the bare minimum?"
I stared at his boots. My blood was boiling. "He isn't a weakling!" I roared, trying to push myself up. But it was pointless. The force kept building, pressing down harder and harder with every second until it felt like my spine was on the edge of giving out.
"Then what is he?"
"He's a human being!"
CHEOR.
A sharp sound cut through the air, like a whistle made of wind, and a second pair of boots landed in the snow directly beside Elias's. More powder kicked into my face.
"That's enough, Elias. I need him in one piece."
The crushing weight vanished instantly. Luiz and Kieran were already at my sides, grabbing my arms and hauling me back to my feet.
"And you're talking about me being soft, Darius," Elias muttered, casting a sideways glance at him.
I wiped the snow from my face and looked up. Both of them were staring directly at me.
"He needs to be cut off immediately for behavior like this," Elias said, his eyes locked on mine. The agitation in them unmistakable.
"I can't allow that, Elias."
"I can't believe you're going to cut him some slack just because of who brought him here."
"That's not the reason at all. You've already gotten rid of two people. I can't let you kick out whoever you please and on the very first day, no less." Darius's voice turned sharp. "You have your task. Pick up where you left off."
After shutting Elias down, Darius turned his gaze back to me.
"As for you. Once we return, you will carry out additional punishments personally."
I started to speak.
"Furthermore, I do not want to hear a single word from your mouth for the remainder of this training session. Am I clear?"
There was something in his eyes that made the words I wanted to speak catch abruptly in my throat. I swallowed them, nodded several times, and retreated into the crowd, while Luiz and Kieran stood on either side of me.
"Now," Elias began, clearing his throat as he turned back to the group, "returning to where I was before I was interrupted by that stray. I observed you while you were running. I wasn't on the path with you. But I was close enough to see and hear everything without being noticed by any of you."
He opened the notebook again, scanning the page.
"I saw it all. Who finished first. Who held the lead. Who fell behind. Who helped others and who left their peers without a second thought. Who worked together, and who cared for no one but themselves. I saw everything."
A heavy quiet fell over the clearing. Everyone was listening closely.
He wrote all of that down.
"And I must say," Elias continued, "the overall results are abysmal."
"I agree," Darius added flatly from the side.
"Before we proceed," Elias said, his eyes moving across the group, "there is something you must understand. This was not simply a test of who could cross the finish line first." His gaze moved briefly to the green-haired guy. "Although achieving it is commendable in its own right."
He let the words settle.
"This was a test of how each of you conducted yourselves while trying to reach this point."
Darius stood with his arms crossed, listening silently as Elias turned to the next page.
"Endurance." Elias looked up. "Renias. Excellent."
The green-haired guy raised his head slightly in acknowledgment.
"Kaien. Excellent."
"Rylan and Viktor. Excellent."
Around me, a few people turned to look at Viktor, including Kieran, Luiz and me. He responded with a subtle, completely unbothered shrug, his hands still in his pockets.
Elias continued reading. "A few others performed above average." His sharp eyes swept across group. "And then there are those who fell drastically short."
No one spoke. Elias flipped the page.
"Cooperation."
His eyes settled on Luiz. "Luiz. High."
Then Kieran. "High."
Then his gaze shifted to me. A deliberate pause. "Stray. High."
Despite the assessment, resentment still burned in my chest. Superior or not, he had still left a man out there. That feeling didn't disappear because he had acknowledged my formation decisions.
"The three of you repeatedly adjusted your running order to break the wind for one another," Elias explained. "That is tactical cooperation. Well done."
"Well, we all know whose idea it was," Luiz said, giving me a quiet pat on the back.
A murmur moved through the group. Kieran and Luiz exchanged a quick glance. While I kept my mouth shut under Darius's order, but hearing it acknowledged in front of everyone sent something through my chest that I couldn't entirely suppress, even through the resentment.
"However," Elias's voice cut through the murmur and silenced it immediately, "they abandoned a fellow peer on the trail without rendering aid. That is the single greatest offense a soldier of Nivalis can commit."
A chorus of boos and jeers erupted from the crowd, directed straight at the three of us.
"I would not be so quick to judge them," Elias said coldly, stopping the crowd instantly. "Because every single one of you did the exact same thing. This criticism applies to all of you."
The boos died.
"Their group dynamic, however, was very good until the very end. Worth noting, except for this last part." He turned to the next section.
"Teamwork. Lazar, Luiz, Kieran. Very good."
"What about me?" Viktor's voice came from the side, casual.
Elias glanced at him. "Poor."
The people standing near Viktor went quiet. Viktor's expression barely shifted, but something moved in it. "That's harsh," he said, casting a brief look in our direction.
"You didn't cooperate with anyone."
"I didn't need to."
Elias flipped to a new page. "Exactly. And that exact mindset is why you received that evaluation. Deal with it."
A cold breeze moved through the clearing as I looked at Viktor. For the first time since I had met him, he looked mildly annoyed. The effortless smirk he always carried had slipped. And despite everything. That expression on his face brought a small satisfaction that I wasn't entirely proud of.
But without him, we wouldn't be here.
Elias moved on. "Physical strength is not the only thing being measured here. Everything is being evaluated. Whether your body can handle the toll. Whether your mind holds when pushed to its limit."
"Speaking of mind and mental strength," he announced, scanning the crowd. His eyes found Luiz again. "Luiz Takami."
Luiz straightened slightly.
"Very high."
"He must have overheard you talking on the trail," Kieran whispered.
I gave a small nod.
"You endured the exact same brutal conditions as everyone here," Elias said. "You were exhausted. Freezing. And yet you consistently pushed others forward."
Luiz said nothing. He simply stood and received the assessment.
"Thank you, sir."
Then Elias looked at me. "Lazar."
A pause. "Moderate. Below average."
„Moderate? Below average? After everything?"
"Is there a problem, stray?" Elias's eyes had already caught my reaction. "Did you expect to get higher?"
I shook my head and said nothing.
Elias snapped the notebook shut. "That is all for now."
Several guys immediately started protesting.
"That's it?"
"There has to be more!"
"What about my evaluation?!"
"SILENCE!" Elias's voice hit the clearing like a thunderclap and the protests cut off instantly. "You take it from here, Darius."
Darius nodded and stepped forward. "About time," he muttered, moving toward the group. "Alright, soldiers. We're moving to the next location."
"Oh no, here we go again, more endless running" someone groaned from the back.
"Oh Goddess. Please grant me your strength," another murmured.
"It's not far," Darius said plainly, taking the lead.
We followed.
The trail ended shortly after, terminating in a dense wall of snow-covered trees with nothing beyond them but more trees.
"We've arrived," Darius announced, looking at the trees.
"There's nothing here?" someone said confusedly.
And he was right. There was no clearing, no path, structure. Just snow-laden evergreens blocking everything in every direction.
Darius raised one hand toward the trees. The ground beneath us groaned as the earth began to shift. Trees and soil tore apart, pulled aside by some force operating just below the surface, carving a path through where there had been none. We stepped through the gap he had made and after few walk we emerged into a second clearing.
It was a bit smaller than first, but this one had been heavily modified. Earthen structures jutted from the ground throughout. Jagged, packed formations of dirt, connected in a wide semi-circle that dominated the entire landscape. It looked like an obstacle course built by someone who wanted every element of it to be unpleasant.
"What is this now?" muttered the same dark-haired guy who had been standing next to me in line.
"Listen carefully," Darius said, turning toward us. "This is the obstacle course each of you will have to complete today. There will be no excuses and no exceptions. The penalty for failure will be severe. However, those who finish will be able to return to the building and warm up. So, give it your all if you don't want to turn into icicles. Pay attention as I demonstrate how to clear them."
He stepped onto the course and navigated it from right to left with fluid, practiced efficiency. Every move deliberate, and every transition seamless. When he walked back toward us, he brushed a dusting of snow from his head without comment.
"Simple enough, isn't it?"
"What part of that was simple?!" the dark-haired guy burst out.
"The stray next to you goes first," Elias announced, his voice cutting cleanly through the noise. "You're second, Tavon."
I looked up.
„I'm first?"
"Hang in there," Luiz said beside me.
"Just push through and don't show any fear," Kieran added.
"Good luck, man. Break the ice so I don't have to," said the guy named Tavon, offering a strange but apparently genuine smile from somewhere to my right.
I gave them a quick nod.
"What are you waiting for?!" Elias barked. "New year?"
I stepped up to the starting line immediately and waited for the signal.
"Everything set, Elias?" Darius called.
"Yes."
"Alright." Darius raised his left hand. "On my mark."
A pause.
"GO!"
And with that, I sprinted straight toward the first obstacle on the right path.