On the other side of the school…
"Open your texts to the primer on the First Law."
The classroom held twenty seats and nineteen students. The lesson was foundational essence mechanics: the flow, the control, the river. For some, it was a tired recitation. For others, a frustrating wall.
"Recite it for me."
Professor Keren Vence's gaze landed on Adin Vence. He was staring blankly at his desk, lips moving soundlessly.
"Unless you have something better to do, Mister?"
This was their dance. Professor Keren was Adin's mother, a fact announced on day one with a vow of ruthless impartiality. The result was a special kind of scrutiny. Every lapse was a personal and professional offense.
Adin looked up, a familiar resentment in his eyes. "Essence control. A river, not a flood. Managing your flow."
Professor Keren held his gaze. She knew most of the class had mastered this law a week ago. The curriculum was a cage.
But today was different. An authorization from Director Korin sat in her desk drawer. Permission to bypass policy. To escalate. The air itself felt charged.
"Well," she said, her tone shifting. "Consider your luck changed. Today, we advance. Open your desk drawers. Page eighteen."
Manuals thumped on desks. Adin flipped his open.
Second Law. Intent Precedes Manifestation. The Force. – George Lucas Vance
"A law is typically a principle," Professor Keren began, pacing slowly. "Open to interpretation. This one is not. This is an instruction. A command about command. We all use it the sa-"
The air felt heavy. The professor froze.
Her essence sense prickled violently. The ambient energy in the room cringed, pulled taut by some distant, overwhelming pressure.
Then, the sound.
It was not an explosion. It was a deep boom that shook the school, a foundational shudder as if the bones of the academy had been twisted. The walls groaned. Light fixtures swayed.
Instinct took over. Zane and Zoe were out of their chairs in a flash, falling into defensive postures by the door. No alarm blared. No second impact followed. Just a ringing, unnatural silence.
"Order!" Professor Keren's voice was a whip-crack. "Return to your seats. Now."
That was how it was. Superpowered individuals could break things. Essence users or not, they were still middle school kids, and serious trouble was a rare occurrence in the school, so no one gave it a second thought.
They obeyed, but the calm was gone, replaced by buzzing anxiety.
"Where was I?" she said, forcing steel into her voice. She turned and wrote on the board.
INTENT PRECEDES MANIFESTATION.
"The First Law governs the quantity of your essence, how much you can control," she stated. "This law governs the quality of your command, manifestation. But you do not 'wish.' You do not 'hope.' You issue an order. A weak, fuzzy, or emotional order creates a weak, dangerous result. A clear, precise, and absolute order creates a tool."
From her bag, she produced a fist-sized lump of dull, grey, putty-like material. Tiny fractures of light glimmered within it like embedded diamond dust. "This is Memory Clay. It will help you assess your strength."
She placed one on each desk. "This material is specially engineered. It holds a faint, passive essence signature. It is highly responsive to essence commands but offers no resistance, making it a perfect canvas for your Intent. It records the 'pressure' and 'clarity' of the command used upon it."
A holographic display at the front of the room lit up with a single line of text.
STAGE ONE: IGNITION. COMMAND: LIGHT.
"Forget your hands. Forget your voice. Your body is a distraction. Your mind is the only instrument, and essence is the music you must create. Hold a single word in the forefront of your consciousness. Light. Nothing else. Begin."
The room fell into a strained silence. Adin glared at his clay. Zoe closed her eyes, serene. Zane's jaw was clenched, the whole class concentrated.
Slowly, clay all over the classroom started trumbling. Zoe's lit first, bright and warm, glowing a clean, pale blue. Zane's clay flared up, thudded against the classroom window, and hovered, vibrating, glowing an agitated bright blue. Adin's managed only a faint green glow; his face twisted in frustration as he shot a glance at Zane's performance, his own clay jerking uselessly on the desk.
"Your frustration is your command, Mr. Vence," Professor Keren said, pausing by his desk. "Essence doesn't move because you want it to, but because you tell it to. Clear the noise. Send the signal alone."
The exercises were a grueling mental marathon. Light. Move. Hold. Each stage filtered the class further. The Memory Clay glowed its judgment: a steady blue for clarity, a flickering green for partial control, and a dull grey for no response.
As the students sat panting, mentally exhausted, the clay was a permanent record of their willpower. And the strange, heavy silence from the earlier crash still pressed against the windows.
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Ben pushed open the doors to the Solaria Hall cafeteria. The wave of noise and smell was a relief. He needed the normalcy.
He spotted them. "Whatever you're eating, it smells like defeat," he said, sliding in next to Adin.
Adin, Zane, and Zoe looked up, shared exhaustion on their faces. Plates of food sat mostly untouched.
"It's not the food," Adin mumbled, rubbing his temples. "It's the brain-melt. We just spent three hours mentally screaming at lumps of clay."
"Memory Clay," Zoe corrected quietly, pushing fruit around her plate with disdain. "Friggin' mind-weightlifting. My skull hurts."
Zane just grunted, shoveling food in angrily. "Making inanimate objects obey is stupid."
Ben's laugh was hollow. A pang of envy cut through him. Their struggles were so clean. Measured.
"So, what was the big lesson?" Ben asked.
Adin launched in, words spilling out. "The Second Law. Intent Precedes Manifestation. Purity of the mental command. We had to light and eventually levitate this clay using nothing but thought."
Ben listened. "Manifestation, huh? Korin just calls it 'giving an order your essence can't refuse.' I lost three fingernails before I learned you can't negotiate with your own power."
The table went still.
Zoe's analytical gaze snapped to him. "You've practiced it? How many clay units could you manipulate?"
Ben shrugged. "Never used the clay. But I know the law."
"Wait." Zane's voice was sharp, intense. "You know it? How many of these laws do you actually know?"
Ben met his eyes. "All of them."
Silence, broken only by cafeteria din.
Adin shot to his feet, chair scraping. "You are kidding me. When? How?"
"A law a day," Ben said simply.
"Bullshit," Zane breathed, competitive fire igniting. "We're grinding on the second one, and you're already done?"
"The six one is the hardest, Conceptual Weight," Ben replied automatically. "The weirder the change, the greater the costs. Trust me, the second law is like a child next to the rest of them ." He saw their stunned faces and regretted his bluntness.
"So. A law a day, huh?" Zoe remarked, her voice a blend of what seemed like anger mixed with a sharp, cold jealousy.
"Although Law Four took me two days," Ben added, trying to show his own hardship. "The frequency stuff is hard."
It was no use.
"Fuck you, Ben." Zane stood abruptly, plate half-full, appetite gone. Betrayal flashed in his eyes.
Zoe stood too, precise and final. "Yes. Fuck you." Her words were a cold, clinical condemnation.
They walked away.
Ben and Adin sat in awkward silence. "They'll cool off," Adin finally said, slumping. "They're just fried. Zoe tried to sneak into the faculty office last night to photocopy the Laws primer. They're hungry for it."
Ben stared at him. "Why didn't you just ask me? If you needed to know?"
Adin blinked. "Ask you? To steal a book?"
"No, you idiot," Ben said, a sudden purpose cutting through his guilt. "To teach you. I know them. Korin drilled them into me."
He leaned forward, voice dropping. "Meet me tonight. At the old foundation gymnasium. Bring Zane and Zoe."
Adin's eyes widened. "Ben, that place is locked after hours. It's off-limits."
A faint, grim smile touched Ben's lips. "Don't worry about the doors. I will take care of the keys. Just be there."
He stood and walked away, the weight of the day settling on him. But beneath it, a new resolve sparked. He couldn't share the burdens behind his learning. He couldn't explain the danger he was in because of it, but he could give them the recipe.
Tonight, he would be the teacher. He would stand on the other side of the lesson and make his friends worthy to be his rivals.
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The place wasn't on any blueprint. It existed in the negative space between walls, a hollow cavity where the academy's old steam pipes had once sung. Now, it held only a damp chill and the low, sub-audible hum of active essence dampeners. The light emanated from a single, failing bioluminescent fungus cultured in a cracked dish, casting everything in a sickly, underwater green hue.
Two figures stood in the gloom, their features blurred by the strange light and the vibrating air.
"The chamber data is conclusive." The first voice was a dry rasp, the sound of pages being torn slowly. "The Origin trigger wasn't a flare. It was a heartbeat. Steady. Purposeful. The boy isn't just a user. He's a source."
A hand, pale and slender, gestured in the murk. The second voice that answered was smoother, a melody woven from silk and shadow. "A source we can use. A source can be diverted. All it takes is a price, a weight, six laws at its finest, isn't it? We must learn what frequency his essence creates. The others, they don't matter. Most are only living sensors in his field."
"You're seeing patterns in static." The rasp held a note of cold warning. "The Director is a guardian. The Fourth Hero is a distraction. We can utilize his Origin power, but we can't rely solely on him. Adding more variables isn't a mistake. It's necessary. He will be a foundation, not the whole structure. Our risk can't be in vain."
The second voice became aggressive, deeper and carrying a false note of wisdom. "The boy, Ben, is the anomaly, the necessary specimen. To involve others would be to build a house of cards in a hurricane. We lose one, we risk drawing the very attention we hide from, and making everything fall apart. Any other specimen could jeopardize everything. They would become tripwires to our end goal."
The smoother voice laughed, a sound like ice settling in a glass. "A house of cards is the best way to understand wind. We are beyond poking the bear now. His presence warps the fabric of essence around him. Think what we could achieve with a few more powerful users."
The older voice replied with logical concern. "The process would take too long. One student disappearing is risky enough. We can't make up cover stories for more students."
The second voice came back with an idea, proud of his foresight. "Way ahead of you, old man. His three friends. They are the most talented in the top class, and they always stick together after class. We draw them outside the academy, and after that, it's a simple grab and run. "The natural, the talented, and the analyst," Their reactions to him would only complement the process. Their growth does not matter, only their essence to stabilize his Origin Law." The smooth voice gave a speech no real scientist could ignore.
"The Laws are a cage," the smooth voice continued, passion bleeding into its careful tone. "A cage built by old laws to understand what they fear: true power. Origin control is the lockpick. We have tried with so many other Law-users. He is the first true Origin talent we've seen, and at his age, his power would be magnificent. Isolate Ben, and we get only the key. Surround him with potential, and we can finally see the circle of essence forming in front of our eyes."
"This is a deviation." The rasp was firmer now, edged with something like fear. "Our mandate is to cultivate the strongest essence, not create new orders. You speak of reagents and catalysts. This is too dangerous. Messing with essential laws is corruption. We log the output and draw the essence it gives us. We do not throw comets into its path to see brighter flashes."
"Our mandate is to understand the next step of our kind and form the ultimate power." The smooth figure took a step forward, the green light glinting off something metallic on the desk, playing a video of Ben's test from the lab that morning. "He is not a subject. He is a catalyst. And a catalyst requires reagents. You would have us watch a single, silent reaction in a vacuum and take what it gives us. I would have us learn the principles of fusion and make the essence give us all it has. We will watch the reaction. We will record the equation and absorb its power when the essence itself bends to a new will."
The humming in the walls seemed to pulse, absorbing the treasonous words.
"They are children."
"They are the future," the smooth voice whispered, the silk now stripped away, leaving only the cutting edge beneath. "And the future must be guided before it learns to walk on its own. You can read the book. I wish to write the story. Start with the friends. Log everything. Their dreams, their fears, the way their essence flickers under every single Law. Ben is the key. His friends will provide the essential strength. And we will be the ones to turn the lock."
The old man was overcome with a profound disappointment. He had raised this boy on his own, recognizing a talent and intellect unlike any he had seen before. He had forged him into a great scientist, only to watch his mind curdle with the same corruption that had consumed his last partner. He couldn't take it anymore.
With a tear forming in the corner of his eye, he took a step toward his young protégé, a small blade of condensed flame springing to life in his hand. The fire's light, a final act of defiance, seemed to dim the room's sickly green glow.
But the old man had failed to predict one fatal truth. The student had long since become the master.
The younger man turned without a moment's hesitation. The old man had no time to react. A hot, metallic taste filled his mouth. He looked down, stunned, to see the handle of a meter-long screwdriver buried in his chest. He looked back up at his protégé's face. It held no anger, no sorrow. Only a calm, terrible certainty, as if this was exactly how it was always meant to be.
As the old man sank to his knees, his hands gripping the younger man's shoulders for support, a single sentence, wet and final, formed on his lips. "Good luck, my son."
He chose that moment to gutter and die, plunging the secret room into a blackness so absolute it felt like a solid thing.
In that perfect darkness, a voice, smooth as silk and cold as the void, spoke to the emptiness.
"Sacrifices must be made. The experiment has already begun."