They came for him at dawn.
No knocking. No warning. Just a sigil burned onto the sky outside his window — an imperial crest flanked by two inverted moons. The summons seal of Sector Prime. Kael was told only one thing:
"You've been selected."
He was given no time to say goodbye. No time to ask why him. His requests for answers were met with silence. "All selected candidates are gifted," one handler muttered. "You're lucky. Most aren't chosen at all." But Kael didn't feel lucky. He felt studied. Not watched — measured. As if someone was still trying to figure out what box to put him in.
They transported him, blindfolded, on a hover-rail that didn't follow known paths.And when the blindfold came off…
The training grounds weren't glamorous. No gold. No floating spires. No admiring crowds. Just stone, cracked and bloodstained from decades of false wars. Dozens of youths stood in formation. Some arrogant. Some shaking. All marked.
Kael stood quietly at the end of the line.
He didn't know what to say. He didn't feel like them — these boys and girls who seemed excited. Hungry. He felt misplaced. A woman with a jagged blade for a spine walked in.She didn't introduce herself. "I don't care who your family is," she growled."I don't care what your aura color is. You'll either bleed with purpose, or bleed for someone else's."
Then she pointed to Kael. "You. Boy. Mist Walker." He froze. The name wasn't official.But somehow it had already spread. "What can you do?" He said nothing. Because he had nothing to say. The instructor laughed.
"Then today, you learn to fall."
And with that, she called forth one of the ranked trainees — a hot-blooded fighter named Varen, whose aura flared like wildfire. The fight was unfair. Kael had no technique. No spark. Only instincts, dulled by confusion. But something shifted mid-fight. Right as Varen lunged — Kael moved. Not with skill. But with clarity. Time flickered.Varen's blow slowed. Not in the world — but in Kael's eyes. And for a breath, Kael saw the flow of motion — the same way he once saw aura in colors.
He stepped one inch left. Varen missed.
The arena gasped.
Kael didn't fight back.He just watched Varen trip over the weight of his own anger.
They called it a fluke.
Kael was told to return to his corner. He had bruises on every rib, but no shame in his breath. He didn't win. But he didn't lose the way they expected. And that terrified the instructors more than anything.
Alone in the bunk, Kael stared at the mark burned into his wrist — the crest of the Sector. He heard whispers through the stone walls. Others dreamed of glory.Some whispered of dimensions, prizes, and gates that changed your fate. Kael?
He dreamed of gray mist.Of a girl's calm eyes.Of a voice without a speaker.
"You were not meant to be found yet."