The academy gate slammed shut with a thunderous crash that echoed like a gunshot in his memory.
Caelum looked up. The black towers loomed over them like giants judging ants. The same design, the same tattered banners, the same stench of sweat and rusted iron.
"Just like in my past life."
The recruits were separated like cattle:
The nobles to the right, in pristine blue robes, with swords bearing silver hilts and arrogant smiles.
The commoners to the left, in filthy brown overalls and leftover weaponry: chipped swords, cracked shields.
An instructor spat at their feet.
"You are the meat. They are the knives. Learn the difference."
Caelum felt a bitter laugh rise in his throat. How many times had he seen this scene?
His "room" was a storage space converted into a barracks: rotten mattresses on the floor, rats scurrying between boots, and the constant moan of wind seeping through cracks in the walls.
"At least it smells better than the workshop," murmured Evan, the timid, scrawny boy.
Caelum didn't respond. He sat on his assigned mattress and let the memories engulf him:
The barracks from his past life. Alyssa laughing as she cleaned her rifle. The smell of cheap gunpowder.
"Everyone to the yard! Ten seconds or I'll whip your backs raw!" roared a voice from outside.
The recruits ran. Caelum walked.
The yard was a circle of packed dirt surrounded by posts scarred by axe marks. And there, among the nobles, she stood out like a moon in the darkness.
Lysara von Eldrid.
A gleaming silver badge. Impeccable silver hair tied into a ponytail. The fleur-de-lis pendant shining under the sun like a mocking eye.
Caelum held his breath.
"...Alyssa?"
As if she'd heard him, Lysara turned her head. Her green eyes pierced through him.
And then...
Nothing.
No recognition. No curiosity. Only the icy disdain of someone looking at an insect.
"Recruits, attention!" Instructor Grock, a wall of muscle and scars, stomped to the center. "Today, we'll see who's good for more than being manure!"
Grock called them one by one:
Evan (the timid one): Outstanding endurance, but failed to lift the anvil.
Kale (the dark-skinned giant): Shattered the sandbags but couldn't dodge a single blindfolded strike.
Leah (the redhead): Agile as a cat, but her sword trembled on impact.
Then he called Caelum.
"You, deadface! Let's see what you've got!"
The tests were identical to those from his past life:
Strength: He lifted the anvil as if it were paper.
Endurance: He ran ten laps around the yard without breaking rhythm.
Combat: He defeated three opponents in a row using only minimalistic moves (the same ones he'd used in the trenches).
The crowd murmured. Grock frowned.
"Final test, trash!" He threw a blindfold at Caelum. "Reflexes."
Caelum tied the blindfold. The world turned black.
And then...
He felt it.
The air shifting before the wooden sword whistled toward him. Just like in the war.
He dodged.
Countered.
Blocked.
Grock growled, increasing the speed.
"Who the hell taught you?!"
Caelum didn't answer. He remembered knives flying at him amid chaos.
Dodge.
Parry.
Grip.
He seized Grock's wrist and threw him to the ground with a sharp motion.
The yard erupted in whispers.
"BASTARD!" Grock rose, drawing his real sword. "I'll—"
"ENOUGH!" Another instructor stopped him.
Caelum removed the blindfold.
The yard fell silent.
For a moment, only Grock's ragged, furious breathing could be heard.
Then the murmurs began.
"Is he a deserter from another battalion?"
"No one dodges like that without training..."
"Look at him—he's not even sweating."
From the noble wing, several eyes fixed on him. Some curious. Others, calculating.
"We're done for today," Grock spat, still seething, before storming off.
Caelum was dismissed to his quarters without another word.
The other recruits glanced at him sidelong, but no one dared speak.
Evan, the timid boy, opened his mouth as if to say something, but Leah stopped him with a gesture.
"Leave him. He's not the type who wants company."
Caelum lay on his straw sack, staring at the cracked ceiling as the rain continued outside.
Dawn found Caelum already awake, his gray eyes fixed on the barracks' ceiling cracks. He hadn't dreamed. Not that night. Only the familiar void, that silence between heartbeats reminding him how dead he was inside. Beside him, Evan tossed in his sleep, murmuring the name of a mother he'd likely never see again. Outside, the sound of blacksmiths working echoed in the yard, mingling with distant shouts from instructors.
He dressed with precise, almost mechanical movements. The rough uniform scraped against scars this body shouldn't remember. But he did. Every mark, every pain, every death.
The mess hall was unusually quiet that morning. The commoners ate their cold porridge without looking up, while the nobles laughed a few feet away, enjoying fresh jam and warm bread. Caelum watched the scene with a cold smile. Nothing changed. Not in this world, nor the last. The strong trampling the weak, all convinced their petty wars mattered.
His fork clinked against the table.
"Not hungry?" asked Leah, the redhead, across from him.
Caelum looked at her blankly.
"Hunger is the least of it."
She frowned but didn't press. Good. He had no energy to feign interest today.
Morning training was a farce. Basic combat drills, endurance exercises—all designed to keep the commoners just strong enough to die usefully. Caelum executed each move with surgical precision, not an ounce of effort wasted.
Grock watched him through narrowed eyes.
"You," he pointed with his whip. "Step forward."
The circle of recruits parted. Caelum walked to the center, feeling dozens of eyes on his back.
"Defeat three opponents in a row," Grock ordered. "No magic."
A murmur spread. It was a near-impossible test. Near.
The first was a burly boy with tree-trunk arms and a smug grin. Caelum let him strike first, sidestepped with minimal movement, and dropped him with a sharp blow to the throat. Three seconds.
The second was quick, agile, but predictable. Caelum let him tire, dancing around his attacks, until a miscalculated spin left him exposed. A kick to the knee, an elbow to the nape. Six seconds.
The third was Evan.
The timid boy swallowed hard, his hands shaking around the training sword.
"I don't want to do this," he whispered.
Caelum looked at him—really looked—for the first time.
"Then don't."
Evan lowered the sword.
Silence.
Grock turned livid.
"COWARD!" he roared, lunging at Evan with his whip raised.
Caelum stepped between them.
"I finished your test," he said, voice calm as a knife's edge. "The boy wasn't part of the deal."
Grock breathed heavily, his eyes bloodshot.
"Tomorrow," he promised in a venomous whisper. "You and me. The Whispering Yard."
Caelum nodded indifferently.
"Whatever you say."
That night, while the others slept, Caelum sat on the edge of his bed, methodically cleaning the dagger he'd stolen from the armory. An old habit.
"You're really going to fight him?"
Alyssa sat beside him, her legs phasing through the floor as if she weren't there. She wore her military uniform from his past life, blood still fresh on her chest.
Caelum didn't look up.
"It's not a fight. It's settling a score."
"What if he kills you?"
"Then I'll die."
Alyssa leaned in, her cold breath brushing his cheek.
"No. You never die, Caelum. You just suffer again and again."
He clenched the dagger until blood welled between his fingers. The pain was real. She wasn't.
Or so he told himself.
The Whispering Yard was empty, lit only by the full moon. Grock waited at the center, two battle-axes gleaming in his hands.
"No one will interrupt this time," he growled. "I'm going to enjoy this."
Caelum removed his tunic, revealing scars crisscrossing his torso.
"You talk too much."
Grock attacked.
He was fast for his size, his axes whistling in deadly arcs. Caelum dodged, calculating. First round: reconnaissance.
"HOLD STILL, RAT!"
Second round: provocation.
Caelum let a strike graze his shoulder, warm blood trickling down his arm. Grock grinned, confident. Mistake.
Third round: execution.
Caelum shifted.
His movements became fluid, precise, each dodge a choreography perfected in a thousand battles. He struck key points: tendons, joints, nerves. Grock began to stagger, his breathing labored.
"W-What are you?" he gasped.
Caelum looked at him with empty eyes.
"Nothing."
The final blow was clean. A kick shattered Grock's knee, followed by an elbow to the temple. The instructor fell like a felled tree.
Caelum picked up an axe and leaned over the unconscious man.
"I should kill you," he murmured. "But you're not worth it."
He tossed the axe aside and walked away, leaving Grock in a pool of his own blood.
The moon bathed the Whispering Yard as Caelum exited, leaving Grock unconscious behind him. He felt no satisfaction—only the familiar void of someone who'd won a meaningless battle. He wiped blood from his knuckles with a torn piece of his tunic, his motions precise, mechanical.
Evan waited at the edge of the yard, eyes wide with terror and awe.
"N-No one's ever beaten Grock..." he stammered.
Caelum didn't answer. He walked toward the barracks, feeling adrenaline fade, leaving only the weariness of a thousand past battles.
Then he saw them.
A group of nobles blocked the path, their spotless blue robes gleaming under torchlight. And at the center, like a moon among pale stars, Lysara von Eldrid.
Caelum didn't slow. He kept walking, ready to plow through them if needed.
But something unexpected happened.
The nobles parted, forming a corridor. Not submission—acknowledgment.
Lysara stepped forward. Her silver hair shone like polished metal, and the fleur-de-lis pendant—so like Alyssa's—rested on her chest.
"Interesting technique," she said, her voice as cold as his. "Not the academy's style."
Caelum met her eyes, searching for something—any hint of his beloved behind those green irises.
He found nothing.
"Not everything's learned in books," he replied, walking past her without stopping.
One of the nobles, a tall youth with scarred hands, smirked.
"Grock was an animal. The academy needs warriors like you."
Caelum paused. He didn't turn, but his voice cut the air like a dagger:
"I'm not one of you."
He kept walking, feeling their gazes bore into his back.
Then Lysara spoke again, so softly it might've been meant only for him:
"That final move... What do you call it?"
Caelum closed his eyes for a moment. It was the same technique he'd used fighting beside Alyssa at the Siege of Valtierra.
"It doesn't have a name," he lied.
And he left, leaving behind the echo of a laugh he couldn't place as mockery or approval.
That night, as the barracks echoed with snores, Caelum sat on his bed, studying his hands. Hands that had killed. Hands that had failed to save.
"They're watching you," Alyssa whispered from the shadows, her voice blending with the creaking wood.
"It doesn't matter."
"Liar."
Caelum didn't reply. Because she was right. Everything mattered. Every glance, every word, every damn detail of that pendant.
Outside, the wind howled like a lost soul.
And somewhere in the academy, someone else gazed at the stars, wondering why that commoner with dead eyes felt so familiar.