The training yard was quieter in the early morning.
Mist clung to the packed dirt. Most students were still inside the dormitories, and only a handful of early risers occupied the far lanes.
Soren preferred it this way.
Less noise. Fewer eyes.
He stood before a worn practice dummy with a wooden sword resting against his shoulder.
A faint window hovered in the corner of his vision.
[Observe (Incomplete)]
Completion: 32%
The number had risen again sometime during yesterday's drills.
Thirty-two percent.
Not a large change.
But it meant the system was still responding.
Still learning.
Soren exhaled slowly and lifted the practice blade.
Across the yard two other students were sparring. Their strikes were sloppy and loud. Wood cracked against wood with irregular rhythm.
Soren ignored them.
Instead he replayed yesterday's matches in his mind.
The important part wasn't the strikes themselves.
It was what happened before them.
The preparation.
Every attack had a moment where the weapon aligned with the wielder's body shoulders, hips, wrists all turning into the same line of force.
For most students that moment was instinct.
For Soren, it was structure.
He could almost see it.
A faint geometry behind the motion.
He raised the sword and swung.
The blade struck the dummy with a dull thud.
Not clean.
The force bled sideways along the wood.
Soren frowned.
He adjusted his grip and tried again.
Swing.
Thud.
Still wrong.
He closed his eyes briefly.
Shoulders.
Hips.
Wrists.
Alignment.
When Harlan had used Edge Sweep during sparring days ago, the motion had snapped together at the last instant.
Everything pointed along the edge.
The system must have been assisting the motion.
A skill.
But what did a skill actually do?
The hidden interface flickered faintly.
Thin lines of pale light traced across his vision like unfinished diagrams.
Fragments.
Vectors.
Movement predictions.
Soren slowly rotated the sword in his hand.
If the system supported movement patterns…
Then maybe it could support a simpler one.
Not a full technique.
Just the moment of alignment.
The edge connecting to the direction of force.
He inhaled again and focused.
The strange framework behind his interface responded immediately.
Lines formed.
Angles.
A skeletal outline of motion.
Soren felt a dull pressure behind his eyes as he tried to shape it.
Not copy.
Construct.
The thought felt dangerous.
But the framework didn't reject it.
Instead the lines shifted.
Simplifying.
Reducing the motion into something smaller.
A single correction at the instant before impact.
Edge.
Alignment.
The words formed naturally in his mind.
The system reacted.
A new window blinked into existence.
[Prototype Detected]
[Edge Alignment - Unstable]
Soren's eyes widened slightly.
So it worked.
Or at least… something did.
He raised the wooden sword again.
"Test," he muttered quietly.
Swing.
The moment before the blade struck the dummy, something snapped into place.
His wrists rotated half a degree.
His shoulders tightened.
The blade aligned perfectly with the direction of force.
Crack.
The impact sounded sharper than before.
The dummy jolted on its post.
Soren stepped back.
His arms trembled.
Not from the strike.
From exhaustion.
His stamina had dropped sharply, like a sudden drain through invisible channels.
He glanced at the faint status window.
[Stamina Reduced]
He exhaled slowly.
"Too expensive."
The skill worked.
But barely.
He lifted the sword again and waited until his breathing steadied.
Second test.
Swing.
The same invisible correction snapped into place.
Crack.
The strike landed cleaner than any before it.
A thin split appeared along the practice dummy's surface.
But the drain hit even harder this time.
Soren staggered half a step.
His muscles felt suddenly heavy.
He lowered the blade and rested it against the ground.
"So that's the cost," he murmured.
The framework wasn't copying a skill.
It was forcing his body into precision.
That kind of correction demanded energy.
Too much, for now.
Still…
He looked at the faint prototype window again.
Edge Alignment.
He had built it.
Not copied.
Not learned from the system.
Created.
The realization settled slowly.
If this worked with a sword…
Then other movements might be possible too.
Footwork.
Timing.
Even entire techniques.
Soren's mind raced through possibilities before he forced himself to stop.
One step at a time.
The system was already unstable enough.
He lifted the sword for a third strike.
But before he could swing, a quiet voice drifted across the yard.
"You're not practicing normally."
Soren turned.
Lyra Vale stood a few paces away near the wooden fence.
She held a narrow practice rod instead of a sword, her runic focus hanging from a cord at her wrist.
Her sharp eyes studied him with open curiosity.
"Most people hit the dummy," she continued.
"You keep stopping before impact."
Soren lowered the blade.
"Thinking," he said.
Lyra stepped closer.
Her gaze flicked to the shallow crack in the dummy's surface.
"Thinking hard enough to do that?"
"It was already weak," Soren replied.
She raised an eyebrow.
"Convenient weakness."
He didn't answer.
Lyra circled the dummy once, inspecting the damage.
"Your strikes changed," she said after a moment.
"Yesterday they were inefficient. Too much arm."
She tapped the split wood lightly.
"This one was aligned."
Soren watched her carefully.
Lyra Vale missed very little.
"Lucky angle," he said.
"Maybe." She tilted her head slightly. "But the motion looked deliberate."
A pause stretched between them.
Wind rustled faintly across the training yard.
Lyra's gaze drifted back to Soren.
"There's something unusual about you," she said bluntly.
"I've been trying to figure out what."
Soren rested the wooden blade against his shoulder again.
"Let me know if you do," he said.
She smiled faintly.
"Oh, I will."
For a moment neither of them spoke.
Then Lyra gestured toward the sword.
"Show me the strike."
Soren hesitated.
Using the prototype again would drain him further.
But refusing would draw more attention.
He stepped back into position.
"One swing," he said.
Lyra leaned against the fence again, watching intently.
Soren inhaled.
Focus narrowed.
The hidden framework stirred.
The prototype window flickered back into place.
[Edge Alignment - Prototype]
He swung.
The correction snapped into place again.
Crack.
The dummy shuddered.
A second split formed in the wood.
Soren's arms instantly felt heavier.
His stamina dropped like a stone.
He forced his breathing steady and lowered the blade.
Lyra pushed away from the fence slowly.
"Interesting," she murmured.
"What?" Soren asked.
"The moment before impact," she said. "Your form changes."
Her fingers traced a small arc in the air.
"Just slightly."
Soren said nothing.
Lyra studied him another moment before shrugging.
"Whatever you're doing, it's effective."
She turned to leave, then paused.
"You should be careful though."
"Why?"
"Because people will start noticing."
With that she walked toward the far training lanes.
Soren watched her go.
Then he glanced back at the cracked dummy.
Edge Alignment.
Prototype skill.
Expensive.
Unstable.
But real.
And if he could build one skill…
He could build more.
A faint movement caught his attention near the edge of the yard.
Soren's gaze shifted toward the shadowed archway leading back to the academy halls.
Instructor Halvern stood there.
Half hidden by the stone pillars.
Watching.
The veteran trainer's arms were folded across his chest.
His expression was unreadable.
For a long moment neither of them moved.
Then Halvern pushed off the wall and disappeared into the corridor.
Soren exhaled slowly.
"So he saw," he murmured.
That complicated things.
But it also confirmed something important.
The strike hadn't just felt different.
It looked different too.
Soren lifted the sword one last time, studying the blade's dull wooden edge.
A small correction.
Perfect alignment.
The beginning of something larger.
The system window flickered faintly once more.
[Skill Prototype Stabilizing]
[Edge Alignment]
Soren allowed himself a small nod.
"Good," he said quietly.
Then he returned to training.