Night Flair City welcomed them like a secret that wanted to be found.
The beach stretched wide beneath an endless night, the sky refusing dawn as if morning itself had been politely declined. Luminous flames drifted lazily above the waters, hovering without heat, without urgency—little suns that had forgotten the concept of falling. Below them, the ocean glowed a deep, living blue, not reflective but alive, as though light was being born beneath the surface rather than borrowed from above.
The students arrived in fragments.
One moment they were elsewhere—across cities, across spaces that behaved more like ideas than locations—and the next, sand exploded beneath their feet as reality accepted them all at once. Their higher-dimensional shoes displaced grains that shimmered briefly before settling, as if even the beach needed a second to confirm they were real.
They laughed.
Not because it was funny—though it was—but because relief demanded release. They had followed smoke through cities that bent, swapped through objects that shouldn't have allowed it, chased a signal that Jack alone could sense. A node that didn't announce itself with sound or light, but with meaning.
Smoke that could be heard.
Not in echoes. Not in vibrations. In metaphor.
Smoke was scattered, directionless, everywhere and nowhere—just like Jack's emotions when his awareness slipped. For someone who had partially ascended, even thought behaved differently. The future wasn't time anymore. It was attention. And attention, when misaligned, spoke loudly.
Too loudly.
Jack had felt it then—a sudden tightening in his chest, a sharp intake of breath that escaped him before fear could fully form. The smoke hadn't startled him.
It had recognized him.
And he had recognized it back.
Now, standing on that glowing shore, he didn't need to explain anything. When he chuckled softly, the others understood.
Of course the teachers would be here.
They spotted them a moment later.
Kainen and Aprexion were seated casually near the waterline, as if waiting had been part of the lesson all along. The waves lapped near their feet, luminous blue curling around their ankles without soaking them. Kainen raised a hand in a lazy wave, gesturing for the students to come closer.
They exchanged glances—then laughter overtook them again.
When they reached the group, Aprexion leaned back slightly, his expression unreadable as always, and spoke with faint amusement.
"And that, my friends, is how you swap with fate… and still manage to meet destiny where you least expect it."
More laughter.
Jack dipped his head in acknowledgment. His version of touché.
The mood lingered light for only a moment.
Because they all felt it.
They had already learned something—something essential—before the training had even begun. The swapping across cities, the tracing of nodes, the awareness required just to arrive here… it had sharpened them.
This next phase wasn't about finding anymore.
It was about surviving what they found.
They gathered in a loose semicircle as the flames drifted overhead, casting long shadows across the sand.
Night Flair City felt less like a place and more like an agreement—a mutual decision between the world and its inhabitants to accept darkness without resistance.
Henry broke the silence first.
"So…" he said, scratching the back of his head as though friction alone might jog understanding. "An arrow that exists and doesn't exist at the same time, huh."
No one answered immediately.
Because the sentence itself felt like a trap.
This wasn't like swapping with objects, or structures, or even spaces. Those had presence. Weight. Confirmation.
But something that was and wasn't simultaneously?
That wasn't a technique.
That was a paradox.
And paradoxes, when mishandled, didn't just hurt you. They erased the parts of you that tried to understand them.
The unease spread quickly.
Even Jack's analysis eyes offered no reassurance. They skimmed possibilities, probabilities, patterns—but found no stable foothold. Whatever this was, it refused to be pinned down by observation alone.
Kainen noticed, of course.
He nodded once, slow and deliberate.
"Your uncertainty makes sense," he said calmly.
Then Aprexion spoke.
Or rather—he didn't.
He ignored the tension entirely, his gaze settling on Henry with surgical precision.
"Your speed makes you suitable for this training," Aprexion said flatly. "But you must ensure your inner realm remains unexposed for no longer than three heartbeats."
A pause.
"Otherwise—"
They swallowed.
Kainen sighed. "Let's just say… it won't end well."
Henry laughed weakly, shifting his weight. "Man, don't do that. Don't spook me like that. Everything's gonna be fine… right?"
The confidence cracked at the end.
Before anyone could answer, a warm hand rested on his shoulder.
Jack.
"Don't worry," Jack said quietly. "Remember what you told me when we first met."
Henry smiled, exhaling. "Yeah. Yeah, I remember. You don't gotta say it."
Outwardly, it looked like nothing—just friends steadying each other.
Inwardly, it was heavier.
Unspoken fears passed between them in the silence they held just a second too long. They both understood the truth they'd never say aloud: bravery wasn't the absence of fear.
It was fear wearing armor.
The bravest people weren't the fearless ones.
They were the ones who wanted to run—and chose not to.
Kennedy cleared his throat loudly.
"Okay, we're acting like this is the end of the world," he said. "Relax."
Charles nodded. "Yeah. We swapped across cities. Across dimensions. I'm pretty sure Henry can handle an arrow."
Kainen gestured toward Henry again. "All you need to do is recognize the timing. The moment it appears. The moment it doesn't."
Aprexion continued seamlessly. "If it appears, you swap. If it doesn't, you wait. Attempting to swap during the vanishing interval risks exchanging yourself with a contradiction."
He tilted his head slightly.
"And that is… inadvisable."
Henry gulped.
Before he could respond, Yyvone stepped forward.
"Apparently, I did something like that already," she said softly. "I was genuinely terrified. Swapping with absence felt wrong. Like… why does a city like that even exist?"
Kainen's eyes lit with interest.
"Ah," he said. "The City of Ilus."
The air shifted.
"It exists only when unobserved," Kainen continued, his tone suddenly theatrical. "Not everyone can live there. Only those whose authenticity has already tasted the horror of being unseen."
The atmosphere thickened.
Aprexion chuckled faintly, clearly entertained.
The students leaned in despite themselves.
Yyvone's expression faltered.
Kainen pressed on.
"Most who encounter it don't leave unchanged."
Her fear deepened, settling into something colder—like a child realizing too late that a story wasn't meant for bedtime.
Then Kainen laughed and gently patted her head.
"Relax. I'm exaggerating."
A beat.
"…Mostly."
His eyes lingered on hers a fraction too long.
Kennedy groaned. "He's doing it again."
Kainen shrugged. "Some say it's scarier than the trenches of the Free Abyss."
That did it.
Even Henry stiffened.
Aprexion raised a hand. "Enough. They understand."
He glanced at Yyvone. "What you did was extraordinary. Swapping with absence itself isn't something most survive."
Henry nodded eagerly. "Yeah, that was clean. You gotta teach me how you pulled that off."
Yyvone hesitated. "…I didn't know what I was doing. I just improvised."
Silence.
No blinking. No breathing. Just stunned realization.
Henry forced a grin. "Well… wish me luck then."
The flames above them drifted closer.
Training was about to begin.
And Night Flair City watched—unblinking.
Henry stood on a platform, free from the sand of the beach.
The Arrow from Aprexion was fired across, or was it, or wasn't it..
By the time Henry gets hold of the situation, the arrow was right in front of him.
"Alright, stay still, ...s...stay.."
It vanished...