The academy grounds lay wrapped in a deep, uneasy quiet. The festival's laughter had long faded, leaving only the soft rustle of banners in the night wind and the scattered flicker of dying lanterns. The air still carried the faint scent of roasted almonds and candle smoke — a bittersweet reminder of the day that had begun in celebration and ended in whispered fear.
Ash Vale sat on the stone steps outside the infirmary, the moonlight pooling around his boots like pale water. The others were still inside — Selene being checked for lingering traces of the illusion spell, Caius and Garrick quietly arguing with one of the healers. His shirt was torn across the shoulder, a shallow cut marking where phantom claws had raked through the hallucination's mirage. He stared at it absently, the wound fading even as the memory of that voice — that thing — echoed in his skull.
"You are bound by forgotten oaths, bearer of the Codex…"
He exhaled, fingers brushing over the leather-bound book resting beside him. It sat there innocently enough, yet it felt heavier tonight — as though it too had witnessed something it could not forget.
The infirmary doors creaked open. Caius stepped out first, his usual sharp confidence muted into something steadier, quieter. His dark hair — now loosened from its usual tie — caught the silver of the moon, and his argent eyes glinted with a tired sharpness.
"Still sitting out here?" he said, tone somewhere between concern and chastisement.
Ash looked up faintly. "Couldn't sleep even if I tried."
Caius gave a faint, humorless smile and dropped beside him. For a while, neither spoke. Only the wind filled the space — carrying with it the distant hum of mana wards reactivating around the academy. Then came Selene, her silver-blue hair catching the light like starlit silk, followed by Garrick, his usual grin dimmed but not entirely gone.
"Well," Garrick said after a pause, rubbing the back of his neck, "if anyone ever says 'school festivals are boring,' I'm throwing them in a labyrinth."
"Please don't," Selene murmured, though the faint laugh she gave was fragile — like glass trembling before a shatter.
Caius crossed his arms. "That trap… it wasn't just an illusion spell. It had depth — layers. I could feel the mana pattern bending reality. Whoever cast it wasn't some trickster with a grudge."
Ash nodded. "It felt… alive. Like it was watching us."
Selene's expression darkened. "Illusions that advanced don't form on their own. They feed on emotion. Someone wanted us scared."
A cold silence settled over them. The sound of night insects buzzed faintly, but even that seemed distant — muted beneath the shared understanding of what had nearly happened.
Then Garrick, ever the mood-lifter, clapped his hands. "Well! Good news is we're all still breathing, yeah? I'll take that as a win."
Selene smiled faintly despite herself. "Only you would call nearly dying in a cursed maze a win."
"Hey, I'm an optimist." He grinned lopsidedly. "Besides, I got to see Mr. Noble Scales here pull me out of a collapsing wall like some kind of dramatic hero."
Caius gave him a sidelong look. "I was saving the person who carries the snacks."
"Same thing!" Garrick shot back.
Ash found himself smiling — a small, quiet thing, but genuine. For a fleeting moment, the tension eased. They sat there beneath the moon, four students who had no right to survive what they did, yet did anyway.
Then came the faint hum. The Codex trembled against Ash's leg.
He stiffened. "...Do you hear that?"
Caius frowned. "Hear what—"
A pulse of light seeped through the cracks in the Codex's binding — a dim, ethereal blue. The air warped slightly around it, and the familiar sensation of falling-through-thought consumed Ash before he could react.
He stood in a place of endless mist.
It wasn't a dream — it never was. The Codex realm always felt too tangible, too lucid to be dismissed as illusion. The ground was made of shifting glyphs, pulsing softly like a heartbeat, and above him towered an endless sky of ink and script. From the haze emerged the same robed figure of light — neither male nor female, its presence both serene and terrible.
"Again, you reach beyond your tether," it said — voice echoing as if spoken by a thousand scholars across time.
Ash swallowed. "That labyrinth… it was your doing?"
"No. But you felt its echo — a remnant of what you once commanded."
He frowned. "Once commanded? You keep saying things like that. Who am I to you?"
The figure tilted its head, and around it, the mist rippled with faint scenes — blurred images of cities aflame, soldiers kneeling before a radiant general clad in silver and black armor. Above that general floated countless mana circles — nine of them, interlocking like a celestial machine.
"You were the Archstrategos," the voice murmured, "last bearer of the Ninth Circle — when magic itself bowed to command. You bound the Codex to eternity, and it remembers what you have forgotten."
Ash took a step back, the weight of the words pressing against his lungs. "You're saying I… was that person? That I've lived before?"
"I say only this — the echo of your will endures. And as the world stirs once more, the forgotten Circles awaken."
The mists shuddered, and faint whispers filled the air — Naga Moros, Phoenix Crest, Leviathan Blood, Draconis Aether… names of the mythic bloodlines resounding like ancient thunder.
Ash's eyes widened. "Those are—"
"The heirs of the First Age," the voice said. "Your allies… and your rivals."
Before he could respond, the world cracked — light pouring through the fissures. "You are not ready. But you will be."
The Codex slammed shut, and Ash gasped awake — the book cold in his hands, moonlight gleaming off its edges.
Selene was kneeling beside him, concern etched across her face. "Ash? You spaced out. Are you alright?"
He blinked, heartbeat still racing. "Y-Yeah. Just… dizzy."
Caius watched him quietly. His argent eyes didn't miss the glow that still lingered faintly beneath the Codex's cover, but he said nothing — only filed it away with the same thoughtful silence he reserved for things that mattered deeply.
They eventually retired to their dorms, each carrying pieces of that night like shards of mirrored glass. Yet across the courtyard, another scene unfolded.
Darius Redthorne stood beneath a crimson lantern, its flame reflecting in his eyes like a slow, burning ember. His hair — the same deep shade as old blood — fell loosely around his face as he listened to the cloaked man beside him.
"So the trap failed," Darius said softly.
"Not failed," the man replied, voice cold. "It revealed. The Vale boy reacts to ancient magic — older than this academy's walls. That alone was worth the risk."
Darius's lips curved into a faint, humorless smile. "Then we move to the next phase."
"And the others?" the man asked.
He looked toward the dorms, eyes narrowing as he watched the faint light flicker from Ash's window. "They'll play their parts. Every hero needs a stage."
He turned, crimson cloak billowing as he vanished into the shadowed corridors — the lantern sputtering out behind him, leaving only darkness.
And high above, in the moonlight's watchful glow, the Codex's seal pulsed once — a faint heartbeat of light — before falling still again