The gates of the Academy groaned open with a low hum, and light poured out like a flood. Golden, silver, blue... Every hue danced in the air, catching on stone and skin, refracting through the rising mist as if the world itself was breathing magic. Ezekiel squinted, overwhelmed by the majestic display.
Why did it feel like more than just light? Like it was alive, breathing something… ancient?
The spires beyond shimmered like beacons. The wind carried a subtle thrum, as though the land was alive and singing.
But there was something more. Something beneath it all. Something Ezekiel couldn't name.
It struck him like a tide surging from the depths—an unseen veil peeling back to expose the raw skeleton of the world.
He halted, unmoving.
Right there on the path, Zeke froze as if gripped by an unseen force.
Blinded.
Mana.
The word echoed through him, not a question, but a certainty. It was everywhere: coiling through the air in glistening threads, pooling at the corners of structures like liquid light, twining through the trees as if the forest itself breathed arcane essence.
The Arcane Array—the very heart of the Academy's power—was not just active. It was alive.
And he could see it.
Above him, the sky no longer held clouds, but a luminous web of runes and light—interwoven rings of shifting patterns and spectral geometry. The strands pulsed like arteries, radiating an ancient rhythm, older than language, older than time.
Zeke's breath caught in his throat.
"Do you guys… see this?" he asked, his voice small, as if suppressed by the power radiating from the view.
He turned to his companions.
Ethan offered a soft knowing smile but kept walking, eyes cast toward the towering academy.
Tala, Rian, and Kaito glanced around absently, confusion in their gazes—but none saw what he did.
Then—everything stopped.
Space itself unraveled.
Ethan froze mid-step, his smile faltering before a strange, resigned expression touched his features. His foot hovered an inch above the ground, suspended in impossibility. Rian's turn was incomplete, his body arrested mid-motion. Even the leaves hung still, caught in midair like forgotten thoughts.
The pressure came next.
It slammed down upon Zeke with impossible weight—dense and terrible, something ancient.
The mana around him grew heavy, weighing on him like an ocean of water. He trembled beneath it.
Something incredibly strong had entered the space.
And it was watching him.
A voice creaked into the stillness, dry, hollow, and somehow amused.
"Hohoho… Ethan, my favorite student… You've brought something fascinating, haven't you?"
The air shifted.
Not suddenly—but gradually, like fog thickening into form. A shape congealed from threads of light. A hunched figure emerged, cloaked in an absurdly oversized coat stitched with constellations. Long silver eyebrows hung like ancient vines over his hollow cheeks. His eyes shimmered with too many colors—constantly shifting like the surface of oil on water.
He clutched an ancient tome, bound in leather and sealed with a runic crest that pulsed with a slow heartbeat.
"Ahh… the mana around you, boy," the old man murmured, his grin wide and full of crooked teeth. "Like a soup! No, thicker. A stew. A dangerous, delectable mana stew!"
His voice was madness given sound—rusty, warbling, soaked in whimsy.
Zeke staggered back instinctively. "Who… who are you?"
The old man ignored the question entirely.
He leaned closer, eyes wide with excitement, staring into Zeke's soul. "You can see it, can't you? The Weave. The Array! The very bones of the world! You see the flows, the building blocks of the world, the structure of truth itself!"
He gripped Zeke's shoulder with a hand that felt far too cold to be flesh.
"Hohoho! Marvelous! Would you like to become my disciple?"
The question rang out like a spell—wild, hungry, half-promise and half-dare.
Part of him recoiled. Another part... Hesitated, drawn by the mystery.
But then—
"Oh, for the love of the stars, shut up, you ancient windbag."
The second voice cut through the air like a blade of moonlight.
Time snapped back into motion.
Ethan blinked and exhaled slowly, as if exorcising a bad memory. He glanced toward the sky with a grimace.
"Yeah… I should've known," he muttered. "Professor Aelius."
The old man—Aelius, apparently—beamed like a misbehaving child, caught.
"Ethan, Ethan, Ethan! You wound me. You never visit your poor, old mentor anymore? No respect for the forbidden arts! No reverence for knowledge cloaked in shadow—"
"Because you're insane," came the second voice—clear, sharp, and impossibly calm.
She stepped out of the void as if carved from starlight.
Tall and poised, cloaked in robes the color of deep space, the woman seemed to bend the air with her presence. Her silver hair flowed like liquid moonlight, untouched by age. But her eyes—her eyes were vortexes. Endless, spiraling.
Zeke couldn't look away.
She raised a hand with effortless grace and touched her finger gently to his brow.
There was a spark.
Light flared behind his eyes.
Zeke gasped.
A flood of sensation, knowledge, and clarity cascaded into him.
A lens… a filter…
The overwhelming chaos of mana narrowed. The torrents stilled. Patterns emerged from noise. The once-blinding lines of the Arcane Array softened into threads of intention and elegance.
"A simple lens technique," she said, her voice a calm but with a hint of warning in one. "To help you see the world without drowning in it."
Zeke blinked. The world shimmered still—but now in rhythm. In harmony.
"What… what did you do to me?" he asked, breathless.
Her gaze was firm, but not unkind.
"You've been blessed—or cursed—with perception most mages don't attain even with decades of training. Without a filter, such sight would burn you alive. Or worse—you might glimpse things not meant to be seen."
Zeke swallowed hard.
"You saw the Arcane Array," she continued. "Very few can. Even among instructors, it's rare. You must speak of it to no one."
Ethan reappeared beside him, still smiling—though a little too brightly.
"She's… uh, Professor Lira," he whispered, eyes gleaming with admiration. "Teaches Mana Theory. Also our vice principal."
The woman—Lira—nodded once, a faint look of pride gracing her face.
Ethan leaned closer to Zeke. "Don't be fooled by the youthful look. She's, like, four hundred year—"
SLAP.
A flick of her hand silenced him.
"Back to your dorm, Mr. Elrin. I'll handle the introduction from here."
Grinning sheepishly, Ethan rubbed his cheek.
"Right, right. Try not to scare him too much."
He winked at Zeke before jogging off, laughter barely contained.
Professor Aelius crossed his arms with a scowl.
"You ruin everything, Lira. The boy was intrigued. I could feel it in his mana!"
She didn't look at him. "No. He wasn't."
Aelius grumbled something about "ungrateful prodigies" and "mana consommé," then vanished in a flurry of arcane energy.
Only the scent of old parchment and dust remained.
Lira turned back to Zeke.
"You have talent," she said. "Don't squander it."
And like a leaf caught in the wind, she was gone.
Rian, Tala, and Kaito stood a few paces behind, silent and wide-eyed—each of them looking like they'd just woken from a dream they couldn't quite explain.
None of them spoke.
Whatever words they might've had were lost drowning in a waterfall of awe and confusion, their gazes still fixed on the spot where the woman had vanished.
Zeke stood beneath the Array—its runes pulsing above like a second sky carved into light.
And then, her voice came again—no longer near, yet echoeing throughout the area.
"At this Academy… you can be free."
"No masks."
"No chains."
"No need to hide what you are."
"Welcome to the Institutum Virtutes Arcana."