The gates stood taller than any tower in the realm.
Black stone, etched with deep red runes that pulsed with dormant energy. A thin mist rolled from beneath them, curling over the boots of the gathered candidates like reaching fingers.
Thalen stood among them, thirty students chosen from across the Bastion.
No one spoke.
They all felt it the weight in the air, like thunder before a storm. The quiet tension of something ancient, waiting to wake.
The Ceremony
Head Instructor Varn approached the gates, clad in a ceremonial black robe trimmed with silver.
He held a long staff carved from obsidian, tipped with a shard of glowing flame.
He raised it high.
"The Tyrant Spirit does not belong to the gifted," he intoned. "It does not answer to bloodlines, crowns, or fate. It listens only to will. To conviction. To truth."
He turned, his voice a thunderclap in the morning air.
"You will not pass by strength alone. You will pass by becoming more than you are. Or you will break."
He thrust the staff forward.
The runes on the gate flared to life.
Stone groaned. Mist roared.
The Tyrant's Gate opened.
The Descent
Inside was not what Thalen expected.
No arena. No instructors. No torches.
Only stairs.
Winding, narrow, steep. Leading downward into pitch-black stone.
They descended in silence.
The deeper they went, the colder it became.
Not physical cold but spiritual. Like something unseen was stripping away warmth from the inside out.
Thalen tightened his grip on Kindle.
His flame remained steady.
The First Trial: Reflection
The staircase ended in a circular chamber, its walls polished like glass.
Mirrors.
Each of the thirty students stood equidistant from each other, surrounded by endless reflections of themselves.
Then the doors behind them vanished.
And the silence broke.
> "Do you deserve power?"
The voice came from everywhere and nowhere.
Thalen turned, heart racing.
Then he saw it.
In the reflection across from him, his mirrored self stepped forward but its eyes were not his own.
They burned with silver flame.
Facing the Self
The mirrored Thalen drew a sword not Kindle, but a black blade jagged like lightning.
It lunged.
Thalen barely dodged, rolling to the side.
Other students cried out. Around him, similar battles erupted each facing their own image.
But it wasn't just combat.
The mirror-Thalen spoke as it attacked.
> "You think training makes you worthy?"
"You think pushing harder covers your lack
of talent?"
"You were always behind. Always second.
Always weak."
Thalen gritted his teeth, parrying strike after strike.
He tried to counterbut his blade passed through the reflection like smoke.
Only when he stood still did it pause.
> "You cannot cut what you do not accept."
The Decision
He closed his eyes.
Let the Ember Aura flow. Not into attack but inward.
He breathed.
"I was weak," he whispered. "I did come last. I was afraid."
He opened his eyes.
"But I kept going. I didn't stop."
His aura flared not violently, but steadily.
Kindle glowed brighter.
The mirror-image staggered.
Thalen stepped forward, blade lowered.
"You're part of me. But not all of me."
The mirrored Thalen smiled then dissolved into flame.
Success and Silence
One by one, the mirror images vanished.
But not for all.
Five students screamed as their reflections consumed them. The others watched helplessly as the walls swallowed them in burning light.
Gone.
Twenty-five remained.
No doors appeared.
Instead, a new path opened beneath the feet of each survivor stone melting away into a descending stair.
Thalen looked up once, toward where they had come.
There was no going back.
He stepped forward.
Elsewhere, Among the Nine
Nine figures watched from afar gathered in a chamber of silver light and shifting shadows.
Each wore a distinct cloak, their faces hidden behind masks shaped after beasts, blades, storms, and flame.
One of them a woman with lightning cracking silently beneath her hood spoke.
> "He passed the first. So did Rheis. And Elya."
Another, the obsidian-masked warrior nodded slowly.
> "Three strong flames. But one burns different."
A third voice, older, rough as sand, muttered:
> "It's not just his blade. It's his hunger."
The center throne remained empty.
Waiting.