## CHAPTER 16: The Shattered Blade
The twilight air in the Western Bastion had grown thick, not just with the cooling evening draft, but with an electric tension that threatened to snap. The spectators were no longer merely watching a class; they were witnessing the systematic dismantling of their worldview.
As Silas stepped down from the ring, his phantom snakes still echoing in the broken mind of his opponent, a brief moment of silence fell over the hall. **Lyra Valerius** remained at the front of the rope, her white eyes fixed on the hooded boy.
She had seen it. Just as Silas landed from his bicycle kick, for a fleeting millisecond, the heavy fabric of his hoodie had shifted. A white, silver shine—brilliant and cold—had flashed from his face region. It was a metallic gleam that looked like neither skin nor sweat. Before she could finish figuring it out, Silas had adjusted the hood with a sharp, fluid motion, burying the secret back into the shadows.
As Silas passed Lyra, heading toward the waiting silhouettes of Edna and Louisa, she spoke. Her voice was a low, melodic murmur, audible only to him.
"Congrats on your win," she said, her curiosity finally outweighing her pride.
Silas didn't slow his pace. He didn't even look at her. "Your congrats means little to me, **Lyra Valerius**," he said, his voice a dull, hollow echo. He used her true name with a casualness that made the air around them freeze. He walked away, leaving the most powerful girl in the academy standing speechless, her hand still frozen halfway to her chin.
Then, the final command of the day cut through the murmurs.
"Last fight of the day!" Master Erwin yelled, his voice sounding weary but intrigued. "**Ray White versus Alium Hatora!**"
The final match acted like a magnet, drawing in every lingering student in the vicinity. The rumors of the "Five Commoners" had spread like wildfire through the halls. A crowd of hundreds now pressed against the arena, their eyes darting between the sunny, smiling Ray and the looming threat of the Hatora lineage.
Alium Hatora stepped onto the ring, his light blue hair shimmering like ice under the lanterns. His face was a permanent mask of disdain. To a Hatora, whose family sat at the right hand of the sovereignty, fighting a commoner wasn't just a chore—it was a degradation of his very bloodline.
"This is my chance," Alium hissed, his fingers white as he gripped the hilt of his wooden training sword. "Believe me, White, you won't leave this ring complete. I'll make sure you crawl back to the mud you came from."
Ray White didn't respond with a snarl or a threat. He stood in the center of the ring, his posture relaxed, a small, almost apologetic smile on his face. He looked less like a warrior and more like a boy who had stumbled into the wrong room, yet his eyes remained perfectly still—clear and deep as a mountain lake.
"**FIGHT!**"
Alium didn't just charge; he exploded. "**YOU ORDINARY!**" he shrieked, his face contorting with a fury that bordered on the psychotic. He threw his entire weight into a massive, overhead swing, his free hand clenched so tightly into a fist that the knuckles turned white.
Ray didn't jump or dive. With a movement so subtle it was almost invisible, he shifted his weight slightly to the side. Alium's momentum carried him right past Ray's shoulder. The noble stumbled, his boots losing purchase on the smooth tile, and he went crashing to the ground, skidding several feet on his face.
The room erupted into a chaos of murmurs.
"Not bad, man!" Ray's roommate, Case, yelled from the back of the crowd, his voice full of disbelief.
"Nice one!" **Lyra Valerius** yelled, her eyes widening. She was no longer trying to hide her fascination; the sheer efficiency of Ray's movement was a work of art.
"What? How is this guy even able to..." a certain noble, one of Alium's inner circle, stammered, his face pale with shock.
Alium scrambled to his feet, his blue hair now messy and dusted with grit. He looked like a man who had lost his mind. His eyebrows were furrowed so deeply they cast shadows over his eyes, and his breath came in ragged, animalistic huffs.
"I will not be disgraced by an ordinary!" Alium yelled. He pointed the tip of his wooden sword at Ray's throat and charged again. This time, he wasn't looking for a clean hit; he was looking to impale.
Ray took two calm steps backward, measuring the distance with a veteran's eye. Then, as Alium entered his range, Ray didn't retreat further. He took two sharp steps forward, meeting the charge head-on.
The collision was silent for a heartbeat, then came a sound like a lightning strike hitting an oak tree.
Ray hadn't swung his sword in a wide arc. He had simply thrust the bottom side of his wooden blade against the flat of Alium's sword at the perfect vibrational frequency. The result was catastrophic. Alium's wooden sword didn't just break—it **shattered**. Thousands of splinters sprayed into the air like wooden shrapnel, glinting in the lantern light.
Alium stood frozen, holding nothing but a broken hilt. The shock was so total that his knees simply gave out. He fell to the ground, staring at the fragments of his weapon as if they were the ruins of his own soul. He couldn't understand. A wooden practice sword was reinforced with mana-conductive resin; it shouldn't have been physically possible to vaporize it with a single touch.
"Winner: **Ray White**," Master Erwin announced, his voice barely a whisper. He looked at Ray with a profound sense of dread. These weren't students. These were living weapons.
**Lyra Valerius** began to clap, her heart racing. She turned to her left, looking for a reaction from the other four "Commoners." She found them standing together—Louisa, Edna, Zerav, and Silas. They weren't cheering. They weren't even smiling. They looked bored, their faces weary as if they were waiting for a slow play to finally reach its end.
*How much power could Ray and the others actually have?* **Lyra Valerius** asked herself, her gaze lingering on Ray as he stepped down from the ring. *Are they even human?*
*********** High up in one of the school's windows, a red-haired woman with light blue pupils watched the scene unfold below.
"It's a pleasure to have you 'grands' in my school," she said in a low tone, her voice a melodic purr that vibrated against the glass.
She watched as the five friends began to walk away, their shadows lengthening across the courtyard. They moved with a synchronized rhythm, a pack of wolves in a den of sheep.
"I hope you are all enjoying your school life," she continued, her eyes following the silver-haired Ray and the hooded Silas.
"Because it's going to be an very interesting experience for the five of you. Let's see how long Aethelgard survives your presence."
She turned away from the window, the shadows of the office swallowing her form, leaving only the faint, blue glow of her eyes visible in the dark. The game hadn't just started—it had already been won.