Visibility was never neutral.
That was the lesson Dreyden had learned earliest—long before ranks, before skills, before the Triangle itself. To be seen was to be measured. To be measured was to be compared. And comparison, in any system that claimed fairness, was the easiest excuse to justify control.
The Triangle had stopped pretending otherwise.
The rotational assessments did not end after his solo extraction.
They widened.
Class A students felt it first, then Class B, then—quietly—below. Assessment schedules blurred into one another. Instructors rotated more frequently. Familiar evaluators vanished for days at a time and returned with new protocols and less patience.
The system was accelerating.
Not toward progress.
Toward confirmation.
Dreyden felt the pressure settle like static in the air. Not heavy enough to crush. Just persistent enough to irritate—to force reaction.
Which meant it was time to stop reacting.
He skipped morning drills.
Not secretly. Not sloppily.
