[APARTMENT – NIGHT]
Three floors up. Wide windows, black curtains. Yuka paid six months in advance with the escort money.
The survivors fill every room. Beds in rows with Blankets. The basement sealed for storage no one goes down.
Monaki stands at the window. Scales cover his left shoulder, creep toward his neck. He keeps his coat tight.
Monaki's class Teachers
She sits near the fire, bandaged, shaking. Both from cold and what had just happened.
The Teacher
"The others. After you three were gone and we didn't hear from you, we waited for about a week. Then we ran out of Food. So there decided to go search for a better place"
MONAKI
"How many left?"
Teacher
"Sixty. In groups. Some took the south path, some went in search of you guys."
Yuka enters. Blood on her boots—not hers. Rat clearing job, extra pay.
MONAKI
"Did any come back?"
The Principal looks down.
PRINCIPAL
"None."
Silence. The fire pops.
TARU (from the kitchen)
"Stew's ready. Sweet, but hot."
They eat. Quiet. Twenty-three of them. Four teachers. Nineteen students. All looking at Monaki like he has answers.
He doesn't.
[GUILD HALL – NEXT DAY]
Marla waits. Alone. The hall empty, morning light cutting through dirty windows.
MARLA
"Sat on that shit that went down in that dungeon for a day now. Could've sold it to the Iron Lords for a fortune."
MONAKI
"Why didn't you?"
MARLA
"Because I need you more than I need their gold." She slides a folder across. Sealed with black wax. "You're Platinum now. Means you take Platinum secrets to your grave."
Yuka opens it. A face drawn in charcoal. Young man, twenty maybe. Soft eyes, expensive clothes. LORD ELIAN VARN. VARN Noble house, third son.
MARLA
"He runs the Arcanum Institute. Magic school for rich bastards. Also runs experiments in the basement."
TARU
"Experiments?"
MARLA
"Rift-born. Your people. He buys them from slavers, cuts them open, tries to figure out how there are made." She taps the drawing. "I want his research. his notes and most importantly I want him dead. With Location of other Rift-born captives and names of buyers."
YUKA
"Why us?"
MARLA
"Because you're Rift-born. Because you hate him already. Because" she looks at Monaki's collar, where scales peek through, "you know what it's like to be a specimen."
Monaki doesn't flinch.
MONAKI
"And if we refuse?"
Marla smiles. One eye, cold.
MARLA
"Then the Iron Lords learn about your little apartment. Twenty-three unregistered Rift-born. No papers, no protection." She stands. "The Institute has three hundred students excluding guards teachers and the workers. You have two weeks to get ready."
[APARTMENT – NIGHT]
Monaki explains everything to the teachers and the 19 students about how there got here and how there found them and how there are about to infiltrate a magic school in other to keep their existence a secret.
[There Hear a knock on the door, YUKA picks up her bow while TARU clenched her fist] MONAKI opens the door.
A woman waits outside. Pale, painted face, fingers stained with dye and Tattoo residue. She hands him a handwritten note. It's from Marla, it reads; This is Cosma a specialist in face and body illusions and configuration, do whatever she tells you.
COSMA[To Monaki]
"Strip."
He hesitates. She doesn't repeat.
Then Monaki adhered. Scales covered from his waist to his collarbone. Black veins threading his chest. Cosma doesn't react—she's seen worse.
She opens a case. Vials of liquid skin, enchanted powder, needles thin as hair.
COSMA
"These are temporary pain killers drink it.
MONAKI: "No Thankyou".
COSMA: "The pain is yours to keep."
She works on Monaki. Monaki screaming through out the procedure, it was a painful configuration. Taru's hands shake after here's was done, her own mutation hidden beneath illusion-smooth skin. Yuka's arm, which was looking wrong, now looks normal but she still feels the pain underneath.
Mirrors show three healthy teenagers. Clean. Unmarked.
COSMA
"Make sure you don't bleed. Don't let anyone with true-sight look too long."
She packs a bag. Disguise materials, spare vials, emergency extraction tools.
COSMA
"One more thing."
She pulls out a ring. Simple iron. Presses it to Monaki's forehead—his real forehead, beneath the mask.
COSMA
"If you're caught, break this. It'll kill the magic and show them what you are. Might buy mercy. Might buy a quicker death."
Monaki takes it. Puts it on his finger.
[ARCANUM INSTITUTE]
Towers of white stone. Gardens with flowers that hum. Students in blue robes, laughing, reading, alive.
[ENTRANCE HALL]
Crowded. New students in gray, returning students in blue. Voices echo off.
STUDENT 1
"Heard we're getting transfers from abroad."
STUDENT 2
"Hope they're not losers. Last year's easterners failed out in a month."
Monaki, Yuka, and Taru stand in line. Gray robes. False names. Monaki's collar itches where scales hide beneath illusion.
A bell rings. Silence.
TEACHER (elderly)
"Magical testing will begin as follows."
You'll all head to the Testing Chamber and place your hands on the Crystal boards.
[TESTING CHAMBER]
TEACHER 2
"Place your fingers on the crystal bored. And say the word 'Vera Forza.' The board measures your Magical amount."
One by one: The Board Chims writing thier class and rank
STUDENT 1
"Class D. Rank 12."
STUDENT 2
"Class C. Rank 8."
Then—a boy with white hair. Board glows blinding white.
TEACHER (impressed)
"Class A. Rank 3. Exceptional."
Whispers. Wow an A-Class students I hear there are given special treatments and there wear silver pins. They don't speak to lower classes. D-Class students step aside in hallways.
Yuka's turn. She touches the board. Speaks the word "Vera Forza".
The board flickers. "Class B. Rank 7."
Relief. Good, not great. Unremarkable.
Taru's turn. Same process. "Class B. Rank 5."
They reconvene, sweating under makeup.
YUKA (whispering)
"I think we'll be ok."
TARU
"Just Monaki left."
[MONAKI'S TURN]
He approaches. Places fingers. Speaks.
"Vera Forza."
Silence.
The board stays dark. Error runes flash.
TEACHER
"Again."
Monaki repeats. Same result. Error.
The teacher frowns, checks the magical item connections, calls an assistant. The assistant returns with the HEADMASTER [ancient looking, short and blind in one eye.]
HEADMASTER
"Try once more. Slowly."
Monaki speaks the words. The board shatters.
Not explodes shatters, like ice, fragments hanging in air before dropping.
Silence. Total.
TEACHER (shaking)
"The machine has some issues. We'll replace it right away"
HEADMASTER
"No."
He touches the fragments. Whispers to them.
HEADMASTER (quiet, reverent)
"The machine didn't malfunction. It just couldn't read his magical power. The quantity exceeds its capacity."
TEACHER
"You don't mean—"
HEADMASTER
"Exactly what I mean. Over one million units. For someone so young." He looks at Monaki not at his face, but his Magical aura. "This puts him on par with the Hero Clan. Or even the Demon of the Outer Zone." A pause. "Perhaps beyond."
The hall erupts.
Students surge forward. A-Class students with silver pins push through the crowd, offering friendship, alliance, marriage contracts. Monaki stands frozen, surrounded, trapped.
Yuka and Taru watch from the edges. Forgotten. Unimportant.
YUKA (later, in their dorm room)
"I can't believe you're ranked higher than me."
MONAKI (putting the illusion powder on his hand. someone from the crowd had grabbed too hard exposing his scales)
"Don't forget why we're here."
He meets her eyes. Cold. Focused.
MONAKI
"Marla's job. The noble. That's what matters."
[THREE DAYS LATER]
Monaki is being watched.
Not obviously. A student in Class A who sits near him in lectures. A librarian who appears whenever he studies. The Headmaster's "interest," they call it. Protection for a prodigy.
Monaki senses them. The scales feel it another presence, always at the edge, measuring his power, waiting for him to reveal more than he should.
He plays the role. Arrogant genius. Distant. Bored in basic classes, explosive in advanced theory. The mask holds.
But he cannot leave campus. Cannot visit the apartment. Cannot help with the mission.
[NIGHT – YUKA AND TARU ALONE]
They dress in black. Cosma's makeup, heavy version will make their faces blurred, unrecognizable. Cosma meets them at the servant's entrance.
COSMA
"The target is Lord Vexis Varn. Elian's uncle it's no more Elian. Real power in the family. Elian was the face Vexis is the knife."[she looks around for Monaki].
TARU: He couldn't make it
She hands them tools. A bow, a powder that supposedly increases magical power. And map of the noble quarter.
YUKA:"why has the target changed?"
COSMA[ ignoring her]
"He sleeps alone. Third floor. No guards inside he trusts his wards. You have until dawn."
She leaves.
[NOBLE QUARTER – NIGHT]
They scale the wall. Yuka first, bow on her back. Taru second, hands bare.
The house feels alive. Magic hums in the walls.
Third floor window. Yuka cuts glass. Silent entry.
[VEXIS'S CHAMBER]
Dark. Rich. A figure in the bed, covers rising with breath.
Yuka nocks an arrow. Poisoned. Cosma's recipe.
She aims.
TARU (grabs her arm)
Points. The bed. The shape. Wrong proportions.
Yuka lowers the bow. Approaches. Pulls covers.
Pillows. Stuffed, arranged, breathing spell.
VOICE
"Expected you earlier."
They spin. VEXIS stands in the doorway. Old. Scarred. No visible weapons with him. Power radiates, visible, pressure.
VEXIS
"Elian warned me. Before he died." He smiles, joyless. "Said Marla would send the Rift-born. The monsters in human masks. But you people are not Rift-borns are you?"
He gestures. The door seals. Windows seal. Magic locks.
VEXIS
"So I prepared. A trap for monsters."
He removes their masks. Not physically magically. Illusion stripped away. Yuka's arm, twisted, healed wrong. Taru's skin, faint, light wings at her neck, black veins in her eyes.
He sees. Studies. Interested.
VEXIS
"Beautiful. The evolution. The adaptation." He steps closer. "You could work for me. Real work. Not Marla's petty revenge. I could teach you to control it. To thrive."
YUKA
"We came to kill you."
VEXIS
"I know. Hence the pillows." He sits, casual. "But consider: I know where the other survivors are. The ones who left your school. The forty, fifty who went south." He smiles.
Taru moves.
Not thinking. Pure rage. Her mutation erupts—scales, claws, She crosses the room in one leap, grabs his throat, squeezes.
TARU: "Where are there?"
His eyes widen. Real fear. He didn't expect this. Didn't expect her to abandon control.
Yuka shoots. Not at him at the sealed window. Glass shatters. Alarm bells distant.
"Run!"
Taru throws him through the inner door. Crashes, splinters. They dive through the window. Three stories. Yuka breaks her landing with a roll Guild training. Taru lands on her feet, monster-strong, monster-fast.
They run. Magical alarms sounding behind.
VEXIS (from the window, clutching his throat, laughing)
"You'll come back! When you want the truth about your friends!