The next morning hit me like a cold splash of water. Literally. Some drone, all shiny and impersonal, swooped into my room and sprayed me awake. "Subject , prepare for trial," it chirped, its voice totally devoid of warmth. I swear, the automated things in Layer Null had more personality. I dressed in the standard-issue grey uniform they'd left for me – scratchy, ill-fitting, and stamped with a small, almost insulting 'Omega' symbol. It felt like they wanted me to feel my low status.
Turns out, the "trial" wasn't some written test or obstacle course. It was a full-blown tournament. The "Arena of Rebirth", they called it. Sounds dramatic, right? Imagine a massive, circular amphitheater, all gleaming white walls and bright, artificial lights. Stands packed with students, faculty, and even some fancy-looking people in robes – probably the "elite" Sera mentioned. The air crackled with excited chatter, the kind you hear before a big sports game, only here, the stakes were way higher than a trophy. This was about status. This was about survival.
When I stepped into the arena, a hush fell over the crowd. Not because I was impressive, but because I was an oddity. A kid from Layer Null, shoved into the lowest class, with no apparent magical signature or combat training. I could hear whispers, bits and pieces: "Is that the Glitchborn?" "A failed experiment, right?" "He won't last a minute." Yeah, I felt their eyes on me, judging, dismissing. They saw me as "food," basically. Easy pickings.
An instructor, a beefy guy with a booming voice and a scowl that looked permanently etched on his face, started rattling off the rules. Something about "Contracted Entities" and "Skill Set Trees". Apparently, most students here formed pacts with weird spirit-like beings or had these elaborate skill trees they could invest points into, like some kind of video game. Me? I had nothing. Just the Ascension Protocol hum in my chest and my own messed-up Void Rewrite ability. But that was a secret. Couldn't let them know I was basically a walking system bug.
My first opponent was called out. Some kid with a smug grin, probably from one of the higher classes. He had this arrogant swagger, and a proud-looking symbol on his uniform that marked him as the son of an academy big-shot. His ability was called "Authority." Sounded ominous.
"Begin!" the instructor yelled, and the crowd roared.
The kid, I don't even remember his name, just sneered. "A Glitchborn, huh? You're nothing. I'll make this quick." He raised a hand, and I felt a weird pressure, like the air itself was trying to push me down. "Authority: Suppression!"
Normally, I'd just get slammed. But that hum in my chest, the Ascension Protocol, it just pulsed. My mind, quick and cold, started working. Void Rewrite – what can I do? I couldn't just rewrite his Authority directly, not yet. But I could rewrite how it affected me. Or, more subtly, I could mess with the flow of time around his attack. It was a gamble, a tiny, almost imperceptible manipulation of reality.
I acted like I was getting pushed back, stumbling, making him think his "Authority" was working. He grinned, probably thinking he had me. Then, just as the invisible force was about to crush me, I activated it. Not on him, but on the effect of his ability. I subtly accelerated the time it took for the force to register on my body, while simultaneously decelerating the impact it had. It was a micro-second rewrite, barely noticeable to the naked eye, even for the instructors watching.
He looked shocked. "What?!"
I used his surprise. I darted forward, not with physical strength, but by slightly adjusting the friction on the ground beneath my feet, making me faster than I should have been. Before he could react, I was right in his face. I didn't hit him. I just touched him, just a quick brush of my hand. And in that instant, a tiny, barely perceptible glitch hit him. Nothing visible, no explosion. But his leg buckled, his balance wavered. His own body's 'code' had just slightly misfired.
He stumbled, falling to one knee. The crowd gasped. He scrambled back up, furious, but I had shown him. I wasn't a brute. I was a scalpel. He was still the strong one, but I had won. Just barely.
"Impossible!" the instructor bellowed. "He's weak! That was… that was an error!"
They declared me the winner, but it was with hesitation. They called it "not legitimate," "anomalous." The director of the academy, a stern-faced woman I hadn't seen before, watched me from a private box, her gaze unnervingly intense. I could feel her eyes, dissecting me. She was definitely paying attention.
After the trial, instead of being welcomed into some grand class, I was dumped into "Class Omega." Just as Sera had said. The Rejected Ones. It was a small, dusty classroom tucked away in a neglected corner of the academy, far from the gleaming halls of the "elite" students. This was where they put the students who failed, the ones who were "experiments", the ones who just didn't fit.
And that's where I met them.
First, there was Varn Lude. My God, this guy was a trip. Hair blond and messy, with these wild, mismatched eyes—one red, one blue, heterochromia. He was slouched in a chair, a smirk plastered on his face that managed to be both amused and utterly menacing. He looked maybe seventeen, a year younger than me, but carried himself like he owned the place. "So, you're the new glitch?" he said, his voice dripping with amusement. "Heard you messed up the golden boy's pretty little face."
Varn was supposedly an "experiment" too, released from some organization called "Helix Dome". He had two souls in one body, apparently. Sounded crazy, but after what just happened to me, I wasn't ruling anything out. He was narcissistic, manipulative, sometimes a total psycho, but apparently loyal to the death to anyone he actually cared about. His abilities were "Twin Echoes" – splitting himself into two versions, a mage and an assassin – and "Memory Drain" – literally stealing memories and skills by touching people. Dangerous dude. But his grin was infectious, in a weird, unsettling way.
Then there was Reo Dran. Wait. Reo? My partner from Layer Null? My eyes widened. He was sitting in the back, looking just as out of place as me, but with a sullen, frustrated expression. His Flamebound Guild uniform was torn in places, and he had a fresh bruise on his cheek. "Kael? You made it too?!" he blurted out, relief mixed with shock.
"You were… you were sucked in too?" I asked, my voice barely audible.
"Yeah! After you vanished, that portal just… expanded. Swallowed me right up," he explained, running a hand through his spiky hair. "Woke up here, same as you. They called me a 'failed transfer' or something." He grumbled. "Said my 'Contracted Entity' was unstable."
So, we weren't just random discards. We were all anomalies. The system here didn't know what to do with us. Varn, the "released experiment." Reo, the "failed transfer." And me, the "unauthorized host." We were the rejected ones, the errors in their perfect calculation.
"Welcome to the Omega Class," Varn said, spreading his hands dramatically. "The rejects' club. Where the academy shoves everyone they can't quite categorize or control. But trust me, kid, there's more going on here than just 'learning magic'."
He was right. As the days blurred, we started to realize it. The "education" in Omega Class was a joke. We were mostly observed, poked and prodded by 'scientists' from the academy, who wanted to study the systems in our bodies. They were trying to figure out what made us tick, what made us glitch. But we were learning too. Learning about the subtle manipulations within the academy's hierarchy, the way the "Contracted Entities" were treated more like tools than partners, the hushed whispers about "Ascendants" and "Void Lords" up in Layer Apex.
The system here in Layer Rise, the "Living Nexus", was supposed to be perfect. Guilds, academies, competitive arenas. But Varn was sharp, dangerously so. He started pointing out the cracks. "See how they push certain students? How some 'accidents' happen in the training towers? This isn't about merit, Kael. It's about control. And maybe… something else."
One night, Varn, with his unnerving grin, suggested we "explore" some of the restricted areas of the academy. "Just a little peek, glitch-boy," he said. "Curiosity kills the cat, but satisfaction brings it back, right?" Reo, surprisingly, was in. He craved action, anything to break the monotony of being a lab rat. And me? I was tired of being poked. I needed answers.
We snuck past security drones that Varn somehow "confused" with a quick flick of his hand – probably his Twin Echoes ability at work. We navigated dimly lit corridors, finally arriving at a section marked "Restricted Research: Project Chimera." Inside, it was cold, clinical, filled with glowing tanks and data screens. And then we saw it.
A room filled with old, dusty records, stacks of files labeled "Failed Subjects" and "Anomalous Integrations." On one screen, flashing red, was a long list of names. And there, plain as day, was my own name: "Kael Serian – Core Null Origin – Unauthorized Ascension Host." It was dated years ago, long before I ever "connected" to the Protocol. I'd been on their list, a phantom, before I even knew this world existed. I was a failed experiment they hadn't even performed yet. It made no sense.
"This is insane," Reo muttered, his face pale. "They knew about you. Before you even got here."
Varn just chuckled, a low, unsettling sound. "Welcome to the real Nexus, boys. Everything's rigged. And you, Kael, you're not just a glitch. You're a target."
The realization hit me hard. I wasn't just some random poor kid who got lucky, or unlucky, with a system connection. I was on their radar. I was a known unknown. It deepened my resolve. I wasn't just fighting for survival anymore. I was fighting for answers. And maybe, just maybe, for something more.
Thoughts on the environment and Kael's feelings:
The arena trial had been a harsh wake-up call. Layer Null was about raw survival, about dodging monstrous attacks and fighting dirty. Here, it was a performance, a subtle dance of power and perception. My Void Rewrite was a scalpel, not a sledgehammer, and I had to use it with surgical precision. The way I'd manipulated time and friction, it was barely visible, a whisper of a power that shouldn't exist. That was the key, I realized. To remain a glitch, a whisper, until I was strong enough to scream.
The "Omega Class" was a joke, a deliberate act of humiliation. They wanted us to feel powerless, to internalize our status as "failures." But ironically, putting us all together, the "rejected ones," was their first mistake. Varn, with his manipulative brilliance and his terrifying powers, was a game-changer. He saw the world like a chessboard, and he was always thinking several moves ahead. Reo, despite his hotheadedness, was loyal and had raw combat instincts. We were a bizarre trio, a walking contradiction to the academy's neat little boxes.
Being called "Subject 734" in the medical bay, being constantly observed by those cold, clinical scientists – it stoked a quiet rage in me. They saw me as data, as a problem to be solved, not a person. But I was learning more about them than they were about me. I was absorbing every detail about their "Guilds & Sectors" , their "Academy System" , their "Nexus Arena" – all designed, Varn said, to be secretly controlled by some unseen organization above. This world, Arkinexus , with its three layers – Null, Rise, and Apex – was a grand, meticulously constructed cage.
The revelation about my name being on some old list, dated years ago, before I even knew this place existed – that chilled me to the bone. It meant someone knew about me, planned for me, even before I was pulled from Layer Null. It wasn't random. It was orchestrated. But by whom? And why? This wasn't just about survival anymore. This was about unraveling a conspiracy.
My Ascension Protocol continued to hum beneath my skin, a constant reminder of the power simmering within me. It felt like it was growing, strengthening with every challenge. It was a secret weapon, a ticking time bomb. They thought they had me contained, classified. But they had no idea what they'd actually dragged into their perfect, ordered system. They had dragged in an error that couldn't be deleted, only rewritten. And I was just getting started.