Ren didn't get to wear his scholarship grey uniform anymore.
Early the next morning, the Bound-Silents returned.
They didn't speak as they stripped him of his worn tunic and replaced it with a uniform that felt like a secondary skin. It was black silk, embroidered with silver thread at the cuffs—the colors of the Valerius household.
It was beautiful, but as Ren looked in the mirror, he didn't see a student. He saw a bird in a very expensive cage.
The black collar remained, the sapphire pulsing against his throat.
"Move," the guard that came with bound silents, barked.
The walk from the North Tower to the Great Hall was a nightmare. In the West Wing, Ren had been an invisible null student. Here, in the 'golden gallery', as this side of the school was called, he was a spectacle.
The elite students—heirs to baronies, duchies, and merchant empires—lined the halls. Their mana was thick and sweet in the air, smelling of expensive incense and raw power. They didn't move aside for him, they forced him to weave through them like a stray dog.
"Is that him?" a girl whispered, her fan clicking shut. She wore a dress made of literal starlight.
"The Null who survived the Prince's surge?"
"Look at the collar," her companion sneered, a boy with a rapier at his hip and eyes that glowed with a faint, predatory orange light.
"A scholarship rat wearing the Prince's mark. It's a disgrace to the Academy."
As Ren passed, a boy deliberately stuck out a foot.
"Is that... a Null?" another girl's voice carried over the murmurs.
She was draped in silks that cost more than Ren's village made in a year. Her emerald eyes—the signature of a lower socialite house—flickered with disdain.
"Why is it wearing the Valerius crest?"
"Look at the neck," her companion mocked, a boy with hair the color of spun copper.
"A bonding lead. The Prince actually tethered himself to a scholarship rat. How desperate must His Highness be?"
Ren kept his head down, but the words felt like physical blows. He felt the eyes of the 'golden people' crawling over him like spiders.
"Hey, Null!"
A foot shot out. Ren, distracted, didn't see it in time.
He pitched forward, his hands slapping against the cold obsidian floor.
The sound echoed in the sudden silence of the hallway. A ripple of cruel laughter followed.
"Careful, little tool," a voice drawled from above him. "If you break, the Prince might have to find a sturdier trash can."
He looked up toward the balcony.
Julian was there, leaning against a railing, a glass of something golden in his hand. He was watching the bullying with a faint, bored smile. He didn't intervene. He just watched, as if observing an insect in a jar.
Ren lowered his head, his face burning.
They won't help me, he realized.
To them, I'm just a tool that needs to be tempered with and made useful.
The crowd laughed harder.
Julian looked bored. To him, Ren falling on the floor was just a minor bit of morning entertainment.
Ren scrambled to his feet, his fingers stinging. In the center of his palm, the silver stitch gave a sharp, agonizing throb, as if it were reacting to his humiliation.
It's not a power, Ren thought bitterly, his eyes stinging with unshed tears. It's a parasite. It's poisoning me.
The guard shoved him forward, leading him through the massive gold-leafed doors of the High Council Chamber.
Inside the room, the atmosphere changed. It was quiet, cold, and smelled of old parchment and ozone.
Twelve Sages sat in high chairs arranged semi-circle, their eyes hidden behind veils of shifting mana.
In the center of the room stood Cian.
The Prince didn't look back.
He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his golden hair catching the light from the dome above. He looked like a statue of a god, immovable and unbothered.
"The Ground has been brought in." the guard announced, forcing Ren to kneel ten feet behind the Prince.
"A Null." the Head Sage, the one at the middle, whispered, his voice echoing.
"You claim, Prince Cian, that this... unremarkable creature... is sufficient to contain the Valerius Resonance? The last three Grounds we sent you are currently in the infirmary with melted nervous systems. Some dead."
Cian didn't turn his head.
"He hasn't died yet. That is sufficient for my needs."
"We shall be the judges of that," the Sage countered.
"If the Ground is defective, it must be recycled. We cannot risk a mana-leak in the heart of the Academy."
The hall went silent as the Sage raised his left hand.
A thin, needle-like beam of violet light shot out, hitting Ren directly in the chest.
It wasn't a physical blow, but it felt like a hot iron being shoved into his lungs. It was an 'Audit Spell'—a way to measure how much mana a Ground was holding.
Ren gasped, his back arching. The sapphire at his throat turned a violent, murky purple, vibrating so hard it bruised his skin. His knee hit the floor so hard he thought his kneecap would give way.
Stop, Ren thought, his mind fracturing under the pressure. Please, stop.
He looked at Cian's back, hoping for a sign—a twitch of a shoulder, a word of protest. But the Prince remained perfectly still.
Cian was watching the Sages, his expression one of cold calculation. He wasn't worried about Ren's pain; he was waiting to see if his 'tool' would hold up under the stress.
The violet beam intensified.
Ren's vision began to blur. He felt the 'Void' in his chest swell, but it wasn't the soothing hunger he'd felt before. This was a frantic, desperate suction.
Suddenly, the silver stitch in his palm turned white-hot threatening to tear out his palm.
No! Ren screamed internally. Don't show them!
He balled his hand into a fist, hiding the glow against the floor tiles.
The Audit Spell hit his void core and was instantly swallowed, but the feedback sent a jolt of raw energy back into Ren's hand.
The violet light snapped.
The Sage recoiled, his hand trembling.
"Empty," the Sage muttered, his voice filled with a mix of confusion and irritation.
"Absolutely empty. It's like throwing a stone into the ocean."
Cian finally spoke, his voice dripping with icy arrogance. "Are you satisfied, or do you wish to torture the help all morning? I have a lectures to attend now."
"He is... functional," the Head Sage conceded, though he sounded suspicious.
"For now. But he must be monitored. If his 'Void' reaches capacity, he will become a walking bomb."
"I am aware of how my tools work, Sage," Cian said. He turned then, his blue eyes sweeping over Ren. He didn't offer a hand. He didn't ask if Ren was alright.
"Stand up," Cian commanded. "We're leaving."
As Ren forced himself to his feet, his eyes caught something on the floor near the Sages' podium.
A small, piece of parchment.
Folded too neatly to be discarded.
He snatched it up as he passed just out of curiosity.
His fingers were trembling. He didn't look at it until they were back in the hallway, and he was trailing behind the prince's sweeping cloak.
It was a sketch.
Crude, but unmistakable.
A Golden Loom symbol.
And underneath it, a single line written in the High Script:
The threads are screaming. Are you listening, 4092?
Ren's heart did plenty flips.
The threads are screaming.
He looked at his closed fist, feeling the dull ache of the silver stitch. He didn't know why his hand was glowing.
He just knew that he was trapped between twelve Sages who wanted to recycle him, a prince who viewed him as a battery, and a secret that was slowly sewing itself into his skin.
Up ahead, Julian joined Cian's side, the two of them walking with the effortless grace of kings. Kael followed a few paces behind, a silent shadow of iron and charcoal grey.
None of them looked back at Ren walking behind them. He might have just worn a maid outfit as well cause that's what this seemed like.
He was the Ground. He was the Null.
And as he walked through the jeering crowds of the golden gallery, Ren realized that the most dangerous thing in this school wasn't the prince's magic.
It was the fact that he was starting to hate them alongside their status.