The bells of the Academy of Aflocia tolled at dawn, ringing across towers of ivory stone and libraries carved with runes that shone faintly in the morning mist. For most, it was the sound of another day of study, of lessons in magic and martial training. For Garfield Van Turner, it was the sound of an ending.
He stood at the gates with nothing but a plain satchel, his uniform discarded for a dark cloak. His peers passed by in groups, laughing, trading books, rushing to classes where mana hummed through the air like living fire. No one looked at him. They hadn't for years.
"Leaving?" a voice asked behind him.
Garfield turned slightly. It was Instructor Elros, the mage who had once praised him as a prodigy in his earliest days. The man's face was lined with disappointment now, his eyes weary. "So the rumors were true," Elros murmured. "You're abandoning your path?"
Garfield met his gaze coolly. "There was no path for me here."
The instructor's brows drew together. "You're the heir of the Van Turner clan. You were meant to inherit legacy, power—"
"Meant?" Garfield interrupted, his tone flat. "I was meant for nothing. I was drowning in mana that refused to bend. You saw it. Everyone did. They stopped teaching me long before I stopped attending."
Elros flinched but said nothing.
Garfield stepped past him, boots crunching against gravel. His cloak swayed like a shadow. "I don't need the Academy. I don't need their methods. I'll find my own."
"And what will you do?" Elros asked, his voice carrying a note of pity. "You can't cast even a basic spell."
Garfield halted at the edge of the gate, his profile stark against the pale dawn. "Then I'll learn how to cast something they cannot imagine."
With that, he walked away.
---
The road stretched before him, winding across hills and forests toward the southern border of the kingdom. For days, he traveled alone. His provisions dwindled, but he pressed forward, his steps driven not by desperation but by a quiet resolve that burned colder than fire.
At night, when the stars shone like pale silver scars across the sky, he tested the Being's blessing. Sparks of mana danced in his palms—unstable, fleeting, but real. Each attempt ended with his veins burning, his body trembling. Yet he persisted, experimenting, failing, bleeding, learning.
Three days passed. The blessing awakened. His control sharpened. Mana no longer slipped away entirely; it resisted, but he could bend it into crude shapes—nothing more than glimmers of potential. To another, it would have seemed pathetic. To Garfield, it was the first step on an endless climb.
---
It was in the borderlands of Louzvel that fate shifted.
The kingdom of Louzvel was a place of storms and stone, where knights patrolled cragged roads and mages kept watch from weather-beaten towers. Here, whispers of a beast had begun to spread—a dragon, newly awakened from its slumber beneath the volcano known as Mount Therion. Villages burned, caravans vanished, and even seasoned hunters had fallen prey to its fire.
Garfield listened to these stories in silence as he sat at a tavern's corner, sipping stale ale. The common folk trembled at the mere mention of the beast. To Garfield, it was opportunity.
If he could do what no one else could—defeat what no one else dared—he would carve his name into the world.
That night, he left the tavern, cloak drawn tight against the wind. His satchel carried nothing but dried bread, a dull knife, and the faint sparks of a blessing branded into his soul. But his mind was sharper than steel, and his will was already harder than the mountain he climbed.
---
Mount Therion bled fire into the sky as Garfield reached its slopes. The air reeked of sulfur, thick with smoke. The mountain roared with the dragon's fury, tremors shaking loose boulders that tumbled down the cliffs.
Garfield climbed. His hands blistered, his lungs burned, but he ascended without hesitation. At last, at the mouth of a cavern, he saw it: the dragon of Louzvel.
Its scales shimmered like molten bronze, each larger than his hand. Its wings spread wide, casting shadows across the firelit rock. Its eyes—twin embers—snapped toward him the moment he entered.
Garfield's heart hammered, but he did not falter.
The beast roared. Fire erupted, a torrent of flame that turned stone to glass. Garfield dove aside, the heat searing his cloak. He slammed his palms together, forcing mana to ignite. His veins screamed, his body convulsed—but a sphere of fire burst forth, small and unstable.
The dragon's flame towered over it, yet Garfield hurled his fireball with every ounce of mana in his veins. The explosion cracked against the beast's jaw, searing scales black. The dragon recoiled—not in pain, but in surprise.
Garfield staggered, coughing blood, but his eyes gleamed cold. "Good," he whispered. "You can bleed."
The battle raged. For hours, he danced between death and survival, every spell tearing his body apart, every attack forcing him closer to collapse. Yet the Being's blessing steadied him. With each desperate cast, his control sharpened. His fire grew. His body weakened, but his will only hardened.
At last, he gathered everything he had left, every drop of mana screaming through his veins, and cast one final spell. The fireball erupted larger than ever before—a meteor of flame that tore through the cavern, striking the dragon square in the chest.
The beast shrieked, its roar shaking the mountain as it toppled. Rock split, fire consumed, and when the smoke cleared, the dragon lay still, its chest caved inward, scales shattered.
Garfield collapsed to his knees, blood soaking his lips, vision swimming. He had nothing left—but he had won.
And the world would know it.
---
By the time he descended the mountain, the people of Louzvel had already heard. The taverns roared with the story: a lone boy, no knight, no mage, no hero, had slain the beast of Mount Therion.
Garfield Van Turner had carved his first scar upon history.
And when he stood before the gates of Louzvel's capital days later, a messenger awaited him. The king himself demanded his presence.