Aetherion Academy stirred beneath a hazy dawn, its towers and domes catching the first glimmers of sunlight like facets of a gemstone. Fog coiled along the cobbled paths, and dew-laced leaves whispered in the gentle morning breeze. Arin Valemore moved slowly through the mist, his satchel slung over one shoulder, the Codex's presence a whisper at the edge of his mind.
The early hours felt different today. As though something had shifted in the bones of the academy.
His next class wasn't in a hall but in the Archives—a sprawling, labyrinthine wing of the academy said to predate even the current Headmaster. Arin arrived early, following a group of upperclassmen through a brass-framed door into a vault of books, scrolls, and crystalized records suspended in stasis.
The scent of old parchment and mana ink greeted him. Ambient glyphs floated overhead, casting soft light over alcoves filled with centuries of magical thought. Towering between the columns was a table shaped like a crescent moon. Seated at its center was an older student with silver-streaked hair and a fox familiar perched on his shoulder.
"Name?" the older boy asked, his voice calm but measured.
"Arin. Arin Valemore."
A glance, then a flick of mana across a ledger. "Assigned to Scriptorium Group C. First-timers. Shelf Room Twelve."
Arin nodded and made his way past rows of whispered conversations and scribbling quills. When he reached Shelf Room Twelve, the room was nearly empty save for two others.
The first was a tall girl in robes tailored to precision. Her hair was dark bronze, braided down her back, and her eyes were framed by square-cut reading lenses. She studied a tome with complete focus, jotting notes with a quill that moved before she touched it.
The second was a shorter boy leaning against a wall, spinning a mana coin between his fingers. He looked up, eyes golden and faintly glowing, a cocky smile playing at his lips.
"New blood," the boy said. "I'm Riven. Don't worry, she doesn't bite—unless you misquote Arcanist Velmora in front of her."
The girl didn't look up. "You misquote him constantly, and I haven't bitten you yet."
"I take that as affection, Mira."
Arin gave a cautious smile. "Arin Valemore."
"Riven Arclight. And this is Mira Dellayne. She probably knows more than our professors. We're supposed to be sorting through Etheric Conduits of Pre-Rift Era and cross-referencing spell mutations."
Mira finally looked up, eyes catching Arin's for a moment. She blinked, pausing. "Valemore?"
He stiffened. "Yeah. That a problem?"
She shook her head slowly, but something unreadable passed behind her gaze. "Just… unexpected."
They worked in silence for a while. Arin kept his head low, focused on copying notations and decoding magical diagrams. Mira occasionally corrected him—not unkindly—and Riven offered jokes and commentary between half-hearted attempts at research.
Eventually, their instructor arrived. A thin, stern-looking professor named Eldrin Vael, who wore gloves threaded with rune-wire and spoke in clipped syllables.
"You three," he said, tapping the ledger, "have been assigned the Codified Lexicon Reconstruction Project. That means matching fragmentary glyph scripts with their historical parallels. Most of you will fail to make meaningful contributions. But you are required to try."
Arin's pulse quickened at the mention of fragments.
Later, while sorting in the back of the archive room, Arin's fingers brushed against a sealed case hidden behind volumes of dust-cloaked texts. Inside was a scroll that flickered faintly when he touched it. He could feel something stir. Familiar.
That night, Arin sat in his room with the Codex open on the desk. No new pages revealed themselves. But he tried anyway—pulling from memory, shaping the air, letting his fingers trace the glyphs he hadn't been taught in this life.
Nothing happened.
And yet... he felt it watching.
Far across campus, Selene Altharys stood at the edge of the Academy's central garden, staring into a pool that reflected nothing but stars.
She wasn't alone. A young man in silver-trimmed robes stood beside her—Lucien Valehart, a character she remembered from the book. He was as charming and brilliant as the text described, already being groomed for future council roles. He studied Selene with open curiosity.
"You don't seem impressed by all this," he said.
"I'm not here to be impressed," she replied. "I'm here to find something."
Lucien tilted his head. "You're not like the others."
"No," she said, almost to herself. "I'm not."
When he walked away, Selene stared into the pool again. The stars there shimmered. Shifted. Then one blinked out.
She didn't know why, but her heart skipped.
Back in Dormitory C, Arin whispered to the Codex.
"Where's the next piece?"
No answer.
But the scroll he touched earlier that day pulsed faintly beneath his bed.
The story was beginning to unfold.
Only this time, it would not go as written.