The first bell of Best Academy rang not like a call to class, but like a declaration.
Its sound carried weight ancient, measured, deliberate rolling across the vast campus of marble halls, floating towers, and training fields etched with runic arrays older than most kingdoms.
For the first-year students standing within the Grand Lecture Hall, it marked the true beginning.
Not the exam.
Not the rankings.
This was where survival began.
Atelion sat in the front row of First Class One, posture relaxed, expression neutral.
Around him, the air buzzed with restrained excitement, anxiety, and barely concealed ambition. Some students whispered. Others stared straight ahead, backs rigid, as if afraid that relaxing for even a second would mark them as weak.
He understood them.
In Best Academy, first impressions could become lifelong chains.
"You're too calm."
The voice came from his left.
Atelion did not turn immediately. He had already noted the speaker lean frame, sharp eyes, mana circulation slightly unstable but aggressive. A mage.
"You placed first in everything," the boy continued, irritation barely masked behind forced casualness. "Most people would at least pretend to be nervous."
Atelion finally glanced sideways.
"I already passed," he replied simply. "Being nervous now would be inefficient."
The mage scoffed. "You sound arrogant."
"Only if I'm wrong."
That earned silence.
Across the room, several students subtly shifted their attention toward Atelion. Word had spread quickly. Too quickly. First place in the written exams. First in the endurance run. Maximum recorded output on the strength dummy without visible aura reinforcement.
The faculty had said nothing publicly, but students were not blind.
Atelion was already being measured.
Judged.
Targeted.
As expected, he thought calmly.
The massive doors at the front of the hall opened with a deep, resonant hum as the formation sealing them disengaged.
A presence entered before the man did.
The temperature dropped not cold, but sharp. Focused.
Every swordsman in the hall stiffened instinctively. Even mages felt it, a pressure like steel sliding against bone.
Headmaster Rhaegor Valen stepped forward.
Tall, broad-shouldered, hair silvered not by age but by countless years of aura refinement, he wore no elaborate robes or decorations. Only a simple black coat, its edges threaded with faint star-patterned sigils that pulsed slowly nine-star resonance.
Behind him followed Vice Headmaster Elyndra Caelith, her steps silent, her mana so perfectly contained it felt like standing beside a sleeping storm.
The room fell completely silent.
Rhaegor's gaze swept across the hall, slow and heavy. When his eyes passed over Atelion, they paused for exactly half a second longer than necessary.
Interesting.
"Welcome," Rhaegor said, his voice low, carrying without amplification. "To Best Academy."
No cheers.
No applause.
He nodded once, satisfied.
"You are not here because you are talented," he continued. "Talent is common. It is abundant. It is worthless without discipline."
Several students swallowed.
"You are here because you survived the entrance filters. That does not make you elite. It makes you candidates."
A pause.
"Most of you will fail."
That landed harder than any insult.
Rhaegor gestured, and the air behind him shimmered.
Three instructors stepped forward one swordsman, one mage, one hybrid specialist whose aura and mana flowed in disturbing harmony.
"This year," the headmaster continued, "is… unusual."
Eyes flicked unconsciously toward Atelion.
"The special dual-path examination has been passed for the first time in one hundred years."
Whispers rippled through the hall.
Atelion did not react.
"Stand," Rhaegor commanded.
Atelion rose smoothly.
The hall's attention snapped fully onto him.
"You will serve as First-Year Representative," Rhaegor said, voice neutral. "This is not an honor. It is a burden."
Atelion inclined his head slightly. "Understood."
"You will be evaluated more harshly," Elyndra added calmly. "Watched more closely. Challenged more aggressively."
Atelion met her gaze without flinching. "That is acceptable."
Some students bristled.
Others clenched their fists.
The headmaster turned back to the room. "Your classes begin today. Swordsmen will learn that aura is not strength it is restraint. Mages will learn that mana is not power it is responsibility."
His gaze sharpened.
"And those who believe themselves special… will be corrected."
The pressure lifted as suddenly as it had descended.
The instructors began dividing students into training schedules. As the hall slowly dissolved into movement, conversations exploded in hushed urgency.
Atelion returned to his seat.
"You're going to be a problem," the mage beside him muttered.
Atelion offered a faint, polite smile. "Only if you intend to make me one."
Across the hall, another presence watched him not hostile, not friendly.
Calculating.
The student council president.
Atelion felt it immediately.
Seven-star aura. Refined. Controlled. Curious.
So the board is finally revealing itself, Atelion thought.
Outside, the academy grounds gleamed beneath the morning sun, hiding ancient vaults, sealed libraries, and training fields soaked in the blood of prodigies who had failed before reaching greatness.
This place would shape him.
Test him.
Attempt to break him.
Atelion welcomed it.
Because unlike the others He already knew what awaited at the end of failure.