The sound of Archmagister Elyssia's voice reached the tunnel in fragments. A formal address for a formal occasion. The final day of a month-long event, longer if counting the breaks between rounds. Special guests, honored dignitaries, the future of the kingdom. None of it concerned Vel's team.
They were ready to step out when an official held up a hand.
"Wait for your cue."
Like always. Only this time, six officials lined the corridor, three on each side. More than any previous match. Whether that was because of what happened last time Vel stood in this arena, or simply how important this day was, he couldn't tell. Either way, all these people, all the ceremony, just for them.
Vel leaned back against the tunnel wall. Cool stone, dusty from sand residue that never quite got swept away. From here he watched Celia, who leaned against the opposite side with her arms crossed, shawl draped over one shoulder. She'd been stealing glances at him since they arrived. Not the focused kind she wore before a fight. Something else.
Yet Tomas was the most unexpected.
Normally, he would be fidgeting with his wand by now, maybe tapping his foot, running through spell sequences under his breath. Today, something seemed to have taken hold of him.
He stood still. Hands at his sides, wand held in his right. Not firm, but not relaxed either. His eyes stared into the nothingness at the open end of the tunnel where the light poured in.
"Tomas. Did you get my note? Couldn't find you yesterday."
His own voice came back to him, bouncing off the stone walls in a quick vibration. The tunnel did that. Turned even a whisper into something that carried.
Tomas turned his head, but only his head. The rest of him stayed exactly where it was.
"Sorry to worry you both. Just something personal happened."
Something in him reminded Vel of a dormant volcano. Calm on the surface, pressure building underneath, ready to erupt at any moment.
"Alright," Vel said. It was Tomas's right to share, not his to demand. "Honestly, last minute learning rarely helps anyone. It's what you do every day that counts."
Tomas didn't respond. His gaze returned to the end of the tunnel, settling back into that same stillness from a moment ago.
But something else sure did, Vel thought.
Elyssia's voice faded, and someone else took over. Another address, another round of formalities. The wait continued.
Vel shifted against the wall as movement caught his eye. A group of instructors arrived from outside the tunnel, filing past them toward the arena entrance where the officials were gathering. He recognized Hust near the front. The rest were faces he'd seen in passing but couldn't put names to.
What's happening? Are they on field duty today?
He'd never seen instructors work the field before. They always watched from the stands, kept off the arena floor so no one could question the fairness of a match.
One of them was Lyvenna. She broke away from the group and approached.
Her stride was brisk, but her eyes moved too much. Darting between them and the tunnel entrance, then back again.
"Are you prepared?" she asked, but her voice didn't carry its usual edge.
"As we'll ever be," Celia said.
Lyvenna nodded. "This match represents more than victory." She paused, and when she spoke again, her voice carried something personal. "For too long, people like us have been told we're broken. That our attunement is a flaw to be corrected or discarded. Today is the chance to show the world what we really are."
She looked at each of them in turn.
"Show them that chaos isn't a mistake. It's what breaks a cycle that was never fair to begin with."
Her gaze settled on Vel. She held it longer than felt natural.
"Be careful out there."
Before anyone could respond, she turned and rejoined the group heading toward the arena floor.
They hadn't expected a pep talk or an inspirational speech. But Lyvenna's words gave them the final push they needed. She'd fought for them when no one else would. That was enough.
Even though none of them knew what came after today, what would change whether they won or lost, one thing was certain. Today was the day to give their best.
All three of them knew it.
The muffled cadence of the address shifted. The crowd drew in.
Then silence.
"LAAAADIES AND GENTLEMEN!"
"There he goes," Celia said. A voice everyone would know by now.
Vel pushed off the wall and started toward the exit. Celia followed, adjusting her shawl and checking her rapier strap. Tomas quietly lined up behind them.
Then someone tugged Vel's sleeve from behind.
He turned, and met Celia's eyes. The memory of that night came back. They hadn't spoken about it since, or what almost happened. But right now, her eyes held the exact same gaze. For a moment, the tunnel, the noise, the match ahead, all of it fell away.
She opened her mouth. "Do you want to—"
"The moment you've been WAITING for has ARRIVED! Please welcome! With thunderous applause, our EXTRAORDINARY finalists: TEAM ATHERWIND and TEAM NOVALANCE!"
The roar swallowed everything. When it settled, Celia's voice found him again.
"—after the match?"
Vel smiled. "After the match."
The roar hit them as they stepped out. The wall of noise, the brightness after the dim corridor, the heat of the sand underfoot. No matter how many times he walked this entrance, the sudden shift still caught him off guard. Something always changed. The crowd was louder, the air heavier, the stakes sitting differently in his chest.
The sword from Laren's forge rested at his hip, its balance better than the blade he'd lost in the semi-finals.
Celia walked at his right. Chin up. Poised.
Tomas held their left flank. Steady.
Through the opposite gate, Kein emerged with the fluid grace of nobility. Prince Eldrin and Lysithea took their positions at his flanks, forming a perfect triangle.
Nobles rose from their seats to acknowledge the prince. The motion swept through the stands in a wave.
No jeers this time. No mocking shouts about unstable attunements or Clouded students. The semi-finals had put an end to that.
Vel found his friends in their usual section. Konomi, Enya, Rohen, Mira, clustered together as always.
The seats around them had filled though. Faces he didn't recognize. When Janos called Team Novalance, some of them actually cheered.
That was new.
Most were non-combatant students, by the look of their uniforms. Probably Konomi's doing. She had a way of pulling people in without them realizing they'd been recruited.
Non-combat students cared less about who won a fight and more about how it was won. What the spells meant, how the elements interacted, what the results said about magic that the textbooks hadn't caught up with yet.
Movement along the outer rim of the arena caught Vel's attention. The officials were spreading out at intervals behind the Primordial statues, hands resting on wands, ready to erect the safety barriers separating the audience from the competitors.
Lyvenna stood among them, positioned near the chimeric beast statue. Proteus, the name Vel had given to the seventh Primordial, who possessed an ever-changing body and the power source of Chaos.
Archmagister Elyssia rose from her elevated seat and leapt from the edge. The crowd drew in a collective breath. But her fall slowed halfway down, robes billowing upward as though the air itself had caught her. She touched the sand toe-first, the rest of her weight settling after like a held note finding its end. Not a grain shifted beneath her.
"Team leaders. Step forward."
Vel started walking. Across the sand, Kein did the same. They stopped three paces apart, the Archmagister between them.
"Kein," Vel kept his voice low, "there's something you should know. I've seen cult symbols around the Academy, the same ones from that night in Elnor."
Kein's expression remained perfectly neutral, his noble mask firmly in place. "Focus on the match, Velarian. Don't let imagined threats distract you."
"All contestants, hold out your charms."
Elyssia's voice carried no need for volume. It simply reached everyone. Vel pulled the medallion from his chest. Around him, the other five did the same. Six charms held out on open palms.
The Archmagister raised both hands and began to weave.
The medallions lifted. They peeled away from their owners' palms one by one, rising into the air above the center of the arena. Once free, they began to move. Slowly at first, drifting in wide arcs around each other. Then faster. They wove between one another, orbiting, interlocking, trading places in patterns that seemed random until you watched long enough to see the symmetry underneath. Light pulsed from each charm in time with Elyssia's gestures, soft blue bleeding into white, then gold. Sparks trailed behind them like the tails of small comets.
"Now THIS is a sight reserved for the finals, ladies and gentlemen!" Janos's voice rose over the crowd's murmur. "Per longstanding tradition, the Archmagister herself verifies the integrity of every protective charm before the championship match. Each medallion is inspected for tampering, imbalance, or unauthorized modification. This ensures absolute fairness between both teams. No shortcuts, no hidden advantages. Only skill decides who walks away victorious today!"
The crowd watched the display above. Vel watched Kein.
"It's not imagination. You remember what happened to Landre—"
"The only thing I remember," Kein said, "is a promise made within the walls of Elnor. After fulfilling it today, there would be nothing else between us."
Vel glanced back at Celia, who watched the light show above with the rest of the crowd. "If things had been different—"
"Stop." Kein's voice held a flash of emotion before settling back to careful neutrality. "We all carry regrets." His gaze flickered to Celia. "But this isn't the time to dwell on the past. I didn't come this far by looking backward, even if fate seems determined to remind us of what was."
Above them, the six medallions converged into a tight ring, spinning as one. The glow intensified, particles of light scattering outward like sparks from a grinding wheel. Then Elyssia closed her fists.
The charms broke formation. Each one shot toward a contestant, not the one who had released it but it made no difference. Every medallion was the same now, verified and sealed. The one that found Vel struck his chest and held there, pressed flat against his uniform by its own magic. The warmth from the inspection lingered.
"I won't hold back," Kein said.
He studied Kein's face one last time, searching for any crack in the aristocratic facade.
"I'd be disappointed if you did."
A ghost of their old friendship crossed Kein's features. They turned away from each other without another word.
Janos's voice rang out from the announcer's box as both teams returned to their starting positions. "The ceremonial exchange is COMPLETE! Our champions have shown proper respect to tradition and Academy protocol! Now, they have ONE final moment to prepare their strategies before combat commences!"
Elyssia returned to her seat the same way she came, a single leap carrying her back to the elevated platform. The crowd barely reacted this time. Their eyes were already on the six students below.
No huddle. No last-minute whispers. Both teams stood facing each other across the sand. Everything that needed saying had been said in the days before.
Vel watched Kein. Kein watched him back. Both had a hand on their sword.
Lysithea raised her fan just below her eyes, the same way she'd watched Celia from the stands during the semi-finals. The contempt was there behind the silk. It always was with her.
Tomas stood still. Not scanning the opponents, not measuring distances. His gaze had settled somewhere past all of them, fixed on nothing.
Prince Eldrin brushed his harp strings once and smiled at all three of them, as though this were a friendly afternoon game.
The officials raised their wands. A layer of transparent barrier spread from each point like water across a surface, climbing, curving, joining overhead until a dome sealed the entire battlefield. It shimmered once, then settled into nothing.
Vel drew a breath.
Horns sounded from every corner of the arena, their notes converging into a single held tone that vibrated through the sand.
"Flash Step!"
"Thundercrash!"
"Wind Blast!"
Kein disappeared in a flash of golden light. Celia did the same in white-blue, crackling energy scorching a line across the sand where she passed. Vel drove his sword forward, a packed burst of air launching from the tip toward the space Kein was about to occupy.
Kein materialized right into it. His momentum broke just enough that the swing arrived a fraction slower than intended. Vel raised his left hand, palm open.
"Glacis Vallum."
Ice formed across his palm and spread into a tower shield, tall enough to catch the full arc of Kein's downward slash. The blade drove into the frost and stuck, its tip buried inches deep.
Across the arena, a wall of compressed air snapped into existence. Lightning struck it head-on, sparks scattering where the bolt met wind. Celia rematerialized from the impact, rapier still forward.
Lysithea stood several paces back, fan extended.
"You witless orphan. You dare strike at royalty?"
The prince said nothing. But a low whistle escaped his lips, the tone curving upward. Amused, even.
Celia's eyes flicked to Lysithea. Then back to Eldrin. She switched stance.
"Trinity Volt."
Three bolts of lightning left her blade. They hit the compressed air and didn't stop. Each bolt sent a ripple of energy spreading across the wall's surface as it pushed through, shortening, compressing like light bending through glass. Slower. Thinner. But still moving forward.
They escaped the wall and snapped back to full speed. The delay was barely a heartbeat, but a heartbeat was enough. Eldrin threw himself sideways. The bolts struck sand where he'd stood, one close enough to singe his sleeve. He recovered gracefully, feet finding their place like the final step of a dance. His fingers reached for the strings. Another bolt was already streaking toward him. He stepped aside, unable to find the stillness his instrument demanded.
"In battle, death stares at all of us the same way," Celia said, rapier steady at her side. "Your title won't save you from a mortal wound."
Lysithea's mouth hung open. The barrier she was still holding stood intact. Unbroken. And completely useless. Her noble facade forgotten.
Something behind her composure cracked.
The wall burst outward, scattered, discarded by its own caster. Her fan's edge swept in a sharp arc.
"Ventis Secaris!"
A blade of compressed wind cut across the sand toward Celia.
Celia sidestepped the first blade. Ducked under the second, wind screaming past her ear.
The third came straight at her chest. She didn't dodge.
Her rapier caught the wind blade along its edge, riding the current instead of fighting it. The momentum carried her into a full spin, sparks drawing a spiral in the air behind her. Blue at first. Then yellow. Wind feeding into charged lightning as the energy crawled up her blade with each degree of rotation.
She came out of the spin and flung the charged rapier forward like casting a line. A bright arc of lightning screamed back the way it came.
The bolt split the air between them. It never hit Lysithea. It didn't need to. The edge of it caught a strand of copper-blonde hair, severing it clean. The strand drifted down slowly, like a feather. Lysithea's eyes followed it. Then back to Celia.
She froze.
"What goes around, comes around." Celia flicked her rapier down into a duelist's pose.
"Did you SEE that?" Janos's voice cracked with disbelief. "Fulgur Riposte! A lightning counter technique that turns an opponent's energy into her own! And she used it while fighting TWO opponents at once! The composure on this young woman, ladies and gentlemen!"
On the other side, Kein wrenched his blade free from the ice and swung again. Another crack split the surface.
"Just how many spells do you know, Velarian?"
"Just enough."
Another strike. The crack deepened. Vel held the shield one-handed, absorbing each blow while his sword arm stayed free at his side.
"What is this? Afraid to use your sword?"
Kein brought his blade overhead and drove it down with everything he had. The shield shattered. Frost scattered across the sand. Vel stepped back, pulling his hand clear of the fragments.
"Just waiting for this."
Vel swung. A heavy, telegraphed slash that any trained swordsman would read a mile away. Kein caught it dead center on his blade. Their edges held against each other.
"—dualis."
Vel finished the incantation under his breath. A purple magic circle flared to life where the swords met. Kein's eyes widened. He wrenched his blade back and threw himself clear just as the circle detonated. The blast knocked both of them apart, sand erupting in a line between them.
A snap cut through the noise. Just fingers meeting. Nothing magical about it.
Both Celia and Lysithea turned toward the prince. He stood at ease, one hand still raised from the snap, the other resting on his harp. His expression hadn't changed. As if reminding them they'd forgotten about him.
Lysithea's posture loosened for a moment. She drew a breath, then straightened. Her fan rose into a distinct sweeping motion, the same one Vel's team had seen in every match before this. A shimmer of wind wrapped around Team Atherwind like a second skin.
A signal to calm down. And a signal to begin.
Eldrin had the distance he needed. His fingers spread across the strings and played.
Just before the note rang out.
"Igni-terra-lea Lotum Sera!"
The sand beneath Eldrin split open. Six stone petals erupted from the ground in a ring around the prince, edges glowing where fire had fused earth into something harder, denser. Like a flower closing instead of blooming, the petals curved inward as they climbed, closing around the source of the sound. But the resonance had already rung out while the petals were still rising. They never sealed completely, standing half-closed like pillars frozen mid-motion.
"Resonance is a wave. Waves need open space to propagate."
"If we can create curved surfaces around the source, it would bounce against each other."
"But we need to take Chaos into account. Make the angles random. Or the number of surfaces."
Resonance spread from the harp in visible ripples, reaching outward across the arena floor. The note hit the inner walls and folded back on itself. Reflected, redirected, collided with its own echo. What reached beyond the lotus was scattered, too weak to disrupt anything.
Celia braced for the impact. It brushed past her and faded. Nothing like the force that had crippled teams before this.
The echo built up inside, vibration layering on vibration. The petals crumbled into hundreds of stone fragments, scattering across the sand.
But the resonance had already died.
Eldrin lowered the harp. He looked across the field at Tomas. Not a glance. Not the idle sweep of someone cataloging a nuisance. He looked at him the way you look at someone you've only just noticed was standing there.
Tomas met his gaze.
"Ladies and gentlemen, did you CATCH all of that?" Janos's voice broke through the stunned silence. "Three opening techniques fired at the SAME time! Lord Atherwind's Flash Step met with a Wind Blast and an ice shield before he could land a single clean hit! Freznoria's Thundercrash stopped cold by a wall of NOTHING! And Team Novalance had the answer for every single one! We are barely a minute into this fight!"
On the far side of the arena, dust from Vel's detonation still hung in the air. Kein closed the gap before it had settled. Vel met his blade. Metal scraped against metal. The crowd's roar faded to white noise as he focused on Kein's words more than his sword.
"You could have saved Celia the trouble of covering for you," Kein called, his voice carrying an edge of accusation.
What?
"You could have saved Tomas from elimination in previous matches," Kein continued, pressing forward with another series of attacks. "I watched what happened. Even now, you settle for the minimum. Always something in reserve… and you call it strategy."
Their swords locked again, faces inches apart. Sweat beaded on Vel's forehead as he pushed against Kein's superior strength.
They broke away again, circling each other with measured steps. The accusation hung between them, heavier than any weapon.
Something shifted in Vel's expression, a mixture of frustration and resignation. He'd been holding back, yes, but not for the reasons Kein assumed. The constant balance between hiding his true abilities and helping his friends had worn on him for years.
"Is that how you see it?" Vel finally said, his voice steady despite his heaving chest. "What if one day I'm not here? They need to stand on their own."
Kein's eyes narrowed, his next attack coming with renewed vigor. "Are you going to leave them, the people who need you?" Their blades clashed again, the impact reverberating up Vel's arm.
The words struck deeper than any physical blow, echoing painful truths Vel had tried to ignore. Memories flashed through his mind, how he'd abandoned his old family when he died as Giri, how Shizuka and Moriya had abandoned Aeonalus when things got difficult. A cycle of abandonment, both given and received.
Vel faltered under the realization, his defense opening for a moment too long. Kein's blade sliced across his shoulder, leaving another glowing mark from the protective charm.
Vel staggered back.
"Getting distracted?" Kein pressed his advantage, advancing with renewed confidence. "Or are you admitting what I said? Your mind was always your weakness. Thinking about distance while what's important is right in front of you."
Vel took a deep breath, steadying himself. Kein was deliberately trying to throw him off balance, using words rather than his blade as the primary weapon. It was working too well.
But two could play that game.
Vel parried Kein's next strike, finding his rhythm again. But the words that left him weren't exactly aimed at Kein. They came from somewhere older.
"We step out of our bubble, or life will drag us out eventually." He sidestepped a thrust, but the words kept coming, quieter now, more to himself than to Kein. "It doesn't wait for you to be ready. Doesn't care if you've lost the only thing that mattered."
Vel thought about his old parents. His old friends. An old life lost in a single instant. No one had taught him how to move on, and before he knew it, he'd lost his home and died once more before he ever found his footing. If it wasn't for the miracle that happened, he would have been gone by now. And so would Landre.
"In a world like ours, they need to learn before it's too late."
The last line struck deeper than Vel intended. Kein's perfect form faltered for a split second, his sword hand dropping a fraction lower than it should have. Whatever chord those words had hit, it had nothing to do with Vel. But the guard was open.
Vel stepped in. "Sometimes fate deals a bad hand." Their blades met again, but this time Kein was the one giving ground. "But you're still the one who gets to decide how that hand is played."
Kein's footing slipped. The opening appeared for less than a breath. Vel drove forward.
Vel's blade sliced toward Kein, but at the last moment, Kein twisted his body, the sword only grazing his side. The protective charm activated, leaving a glowing mark across Kein's uniform, but the strike wasn't decisive.
Kein steadied himself, his expression hardening. "What do you know about loss?" he spat, voice low and bitter. "You have your family, your sister..."
Kein paused, his eyes narrowing as he studied Vel's face. "And you have Celia," he added, his tone shifting to something almost wistful. "Everything you need right in front of you."
"When someone capable chooses to neglect, others fill the gap at their own expense. And you won't be ready for that cost."
What is he getting at?
Kein's grip held steady. But his eyes said something else. Something that had nothing to do with Vel or Celia or this match. A cost he'd already paid.
Neither swung. Vel turned Kein's words over in his head. Neglect. Cost. Distance.
"If you insist."
Vel spun his sword in a full circle.
"Zetahn Feryis Crystali Forma!"
Ice crystallized above him, a dozen lances forming out of nothing, then shot toward Kein like arrows loosed from an invisible bow.
Kein didn't flinch.
"Heaven's Rend."
Kein's blade swept in one horizontal slash, cutting through empty air well before the ice arrived. Then, just as the first lance should have struck, light split the air along the path of the blade, like claw marks of something savage hung in the air. Each one carved through a shard the moment it passed. Frost and gold scattered across the sand.
As the frost settled and the light trails faded, Kein emerged behind them, his gaze still fixed on Vel. It had never wavered. For a moment, his face held something Vel came to remember, the competitive spark, the stubborn fire behind the eyes.
There you are.
Across the arena, Celia lunged at the prince. Her rapier closed in, but a barrier of wind snapped into place and stopped the strike short. She pulled back, found another angle, thrust again. Another barrier. Every gap she found, Lysithea sealed before the blade could reach.
Melee wasn't going to work. Celia switched to range. Bolts of lightning left her rapier and hit the compressed air. The barriers held, but the bolts passed through them anyway. Eldrin dodged the first, sidestepped the second, but each one forced him further back, further from the stillness his harp demanded.
Then the sand beneath his feet began to glow. Eldrin looked down. The glow heated into molten red. He shifted to a different spot, and the earth erupted where he'd stood. He landed, but a new glow was already forming beneath him. Another eruption behind him. Another glow. No pattern. No rhythm. Pure chaos.
Tomas stood thirty paces back, wand aimed at the ground, feeding heat into the earth from a distance.
Celia's bolts came from above, the eruptions from below. Eldrin's movements became shorter, more cramped, the harp swinging uselessly at his side. Every time his feet found solid ground, a bolt of lightning forced him to move. Every time he turned to face Celia, the sand beneath him heated up.
Lysithea tried to help, but her barriers were only half effective. Her wind blades couldn't best Celia's footwork. And even if they could, she would either risk leaving the prince unshielded or risk hitting him with her own spell. Then the glowing spots spread toward her too. The ground beneath her feet flickered orange, forcing her to sidestep while keeping her fan trained on Eldrin. Every second, the distance between protecting him and protecting herself grew thinner.
She abandoned everything. Her fan swept upward. Air surged beneath both Eldrin and herself, lifting them above the burning sand. They hung there, unsteady, bobbing on currents she fought to maintain with each sweep of her fan.
"Unbelievable!" Janos's voice cut through the roar. "BOTH teams showing techniques they've never used before! New spells, new sword arts, and we're not even halfway through! But Team Atherwind is being PUSHED BACK! Every team before this was hesitant to engage, and even the ones that tried couldn't keep the pressure for more than a few exchanges. But Team Novalance has them REACTING instead of attacking, and they are NOT letting up!"
Vel caught a glimpse of the other side of the arena. He didn't waste the opening. His hand swept outward.
"Glacis Solith Temporus!"
Ice platforms materialized in the air above the arena, a scattered path leading upward toward the hovering prince. Celia was already moving, hopping from one to the next, rapier flashing as she struck at Eldrin from different angles with each landing. He drifted back, then left, then up, each dodge controlled entirely by Lysithea's fan. His own feet never touched anything solid.
A blade caught Vel's peripheral vision. He turned back just in time to parry Kein's strike.
"Same old tricks again?"
"Speak for yourself. We both know how to keep secrets."
They pushed off each other's blades and broke apart.
"Unlike you, I don't risk a gap to what's indispensable. Show me how you close it."
"What?"
"Like I said. Distance."
In that instant, Vel understood. The barbs, the accusations, nothing but misdirection. Across the arena, Celia was mid-leap between platforms, rapier aimed upward at Eldrin. A clear line from Kein to her exposed side.
Kein moved. Stance dropping, muscles coiling. He vanished in a flash of golden light.
Tomas was too far. Celia couldn't see it coming. There was no time to shout, no time to think.
Vel's mind reached through the interface, past every rule he'd built for himself, and pulled the first protection spell it found. A spell that would make sure Celia was left unharmed.
"Lux Santorum Aeghis!"
The incantation rang out in his voice, but his mouth never moved. No magic circle, just pure intent, like pressing a button for a command.
Light erupted around Celia. A golden circle flared beneath her feet, rising into a translucent barrier just as Kein materialized mid-swing. His blade struck the wall and rebounded hard, throwing him back.
He recovered in a heartbeat. And when his eyes found Vel again, there was no surprise in them. Only confirmation.
The arena fell silent.
"Light magic?"
"How?"
"Hasn't he only used two elements this whole time?"
"How can someone possess three?"
In the elevated seats, Archmagister Elyssia leaned forward. Her expression hadn't changed, but her eyes held something sharper than curiosity.
Vel grimaced. Celia was safe. But Kein had already achieved what he wanted.
He forced me out of my own boundaries. But why? This feels more personal than trying to win the match.
It wasn't that he feared revealing his abilities. It was the pressure that came with it. The expectations. The weight of being the one everyone looked to when things fell apart.
He'd carried that weight before. His mother sat innocent in jail while he fought a system that didn't care. Shizuka and Moriya walking away because he couldn't keep the team together. Aeonalus slipping from his hands, piece by piece, until all that remained was a signature on SolarTech's contract.
Everything he tried to hold had fallen through his fingers anyway.
He refused to become that person again. No. He had to make sure everyone could stand on their own without him.
The roar of the crowd pulled him back.
Kein's strike hadn't just pushed Vel. It broke Celia's rhythm the moment she saw the barrier beneath her feet. Her attention shifted. And Vel himself had stood frozen, lost in a past that had no place on this battlefield.
Whether Kein intended for this to happen or not, his switch had served multiple purposes.
That was all Eldrin needed.
Eldrin's fingers found the strings. Lysithea followed as if it were second nature by now, her fan sweeping wide, wind coiling around Team Atherwind in a protective veil.
Resonance spread across the arena in visible ripples, distorting the air, vibrating through sand and stone and bone. This time, there was no lotus. They were airborne, beyond the reach of earth, and Tomas's concentration was still recovering from holding the heated ground. The resonance hit uncontested.
Vel's thoughts scattered. The light barrier around Celia fractured and shattered. The ice platforms crumbled to grains as if made of snow. Celia managed to reach the ground before falling, but couldn't push herself back to her feet.
Vel dug his heels in and forced himself upright. Through blurred vision, he saw Kein rising, blade lifting for another charge.
Then something shattered overhead.
A sound like breaking glass rang across the arena, and every head turned skyward.
A magic circle shattered and dissolved, revealing what it had been hiding. Flames hung in the air. Dozens of molten rocks, burning bright, suspended in a web of heat that warped the air around them.
Vel's eyes found Tomas.
He stood pale and shaking, barely upright against the resonance. But Vel recognized the truth in an instant.
While everyone had been focused on the fight, Tomas had prepared something even Vel hadn't expected. Using his Chaos affinity, he had reversed the order his spell manifested. Instead of concentration to conjure the attack, he had used concentration to conceal it.
A magical seal. And the moment Eldrin shattered that seal, he unleashed the spell upon his own team.
When did you learn that?
Resonance could disrupt magic, but it could not stop something already manifested in physical form like molten rock. Now, gravity would finish the job.
Fire rained down, angled toward the far side of the arena. Vel and Tomas stood clear of the hit zone. The other four were not so lucky.
Lysithea was already stretched thin, holding the resonance barrier and the air currents that kept herself and Eldrin aloft. There was no room for a third spell.
Kein recovered first. His stance shifted, ready to lunge forward and shield the prince from the falling rocks.
Celia crashed into him before he could take a single step. Her rapier flashed. Kein's blade rose to meet it. They locked together, neither willing to break.
A meteor streaked directly at Lysithea. She flicked her fan, shaping a sphere of compressed air around herself. The heated rock struck and shattered, molten lava splattering outward like a broken egg.
But the effort cost her concentration.
Both she and Eldrin dropped. They hit the sand hard, tumbling flat on their backs as the last meteor struck the ground with a heavy thud. No injury, but no standing either.
Dust billowed outward, then settled.
Craters pocked the far side of the arena. The molten rock had already lost its heat, cooling into black splashes across the sand like ink spilled on parchment.
Lysithea and Eldrin found their balance. Across the field, Vel and Tomas steadied themselves.
But in the center, Celia and Kein hadn't stopped.
Strike. Parry. Counter. Their blades sang against each other, neither giving ground. Vel raised his hand, a spell forming at his fingertips. Across the way, Lysithea's fan lifted.
Both paused.
The two in the center moved too fast to target. A support spell would miss. An attack spell risked hitting both. So they waited, watching, searching for an opening that wouldn't come.
The longer Celia and Kein fought, the more their old selves bled through. The noble's careful stance fell away. Celia's measured form loosened into instinct. They fought the way they used to on the training grounds outside Elnor, wooden swords swinging wild, neither one willing to lose.
Just like back then.
Then came the final clash.
Celia's rapier crackled with arcs of lightning. Kein's longsword blazed with golden light. They swung at the same moment, blades meeting in the center with a ring that pulsed outward across the arena. The force threw them apart, sliding back across the sand toward their teammates.
Vel raised his hand into position, fingers ready to snap. The disruption spell he'd replicated from the prince. Across the field, Eldrin's hand rested on his harp strings.
If he plays, I cancel it. No time for pulling punches.
Then the ground shook.
The tremor rattled through every contestant on the field. The arena floor vibrated with increasing intensity, sand particles jumping and shifting across the surface.
This wasn't Eldrin's spell. It wasn't Vel's either. Both sides looked around, equally confused.
Vel's eyes moved on their own, reading the signs before his mind caught up. The grains of sand drifting toward the center of the arena. The air currents bending inward. The density of the atmosphere shifting, growing heavier with each passing second.
Then the sound. Low. Familiar. A hum he had almost forgotten until this very moment.
No...
A flicker of purple light at the center.
"Everyone stay back!" Vel shouted.
"What?" Celia turned to him. "What's happening?"
In the stands, Archmagister Elyssia had already risen from her seat.
"A portal is opening!"
"What?" Kein's voice carried across the field.
"In the middle of the arena?" Tomas finished.
The air at the center began to swirl. Slowly at first, then faster, pulling sand and dust inward. Sparks crackled at its edges, purple and sickly green. Ancient sigils illuminated across the arena floor, forming concentric circles around the growing vortex.
Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Then shouts. People rose from their seats, pointing, pushing toward the exits.
"PLEASE REMAIN CALM!" Janos's voice cracked through the chaos. "THIS IS LIKELY JUST A DEMONSTRATION OF—"
He never finished. His eyes locked on the vortex below. Without another word, he bolted from his booth, knocking his chair over in his haste.
The swirling air tore open. A rift in reality, edges pulsing with unstable energy, the interior a churning mass of violet and black.
"An unstable portal..." Vel whispered.