Lucien arrived at the academy in Grand Confluence not long afterward.
Seran was already waiting for him.
Aurelia stood beside him with the final candidate records suspended before her.
The original list had become much shorter.
Some candidates had refused.
Lucien had expected that.
No promise of power could make incarnation sound ordinary.
They would leave their original bodies sleeping behind.
Their consciousness would awaken somewhere unknown, within a life they had never lived and a world none of them had seen.
They might remain there for years before Lucien gained enough control over the destination to retrieve them safely.
The Incarnation Support Systems could preserve their memories, identities, and connection to the Big World.
They could not promise comfort.
They could not remove every danger.
Seran had explained all of that without softening it.
That was why the names remaining on the list mattered.
Most of the candidates did not belong directly to Lootwell.
