They fell into a world rearranging itself, stone ribs sliding like cards, caverns yawning open into new corridors.
Four banners, each representing a different academy, hung aloof above them, their points still at zero, indicating the beginning of the battle.
An hour clock rune blossomed in the air, displaying sixty minutes. When that hour concluded, the outcome would be harsh and irrevocable.
No one offered bargains. The rules had been simple and savage when Headmaster Veyron had declared them: nodes could be claimed, but only by the side that held them when their guardians' blood ran still.
There would be no mercy, no polite yielding. Every academy answered only for itself—flee, defend, or take. The cavern made no apologies.
Lucien moved to the front as if the gravity of his birthright had given him a small throne of air.
Conversation thinned, faces turned. Where he stood, students straightened, because a prince's calm was a simple order everyone could read.
"Remember our formation," he said, voice even and steady."
He pointed once, and the plan fell into place like a metronome.
"The first group, the Martial Path, will form our spear. Fiercely determined, they specialize in front-line offense, shields, halberds, swords, and charge lines. They take the first blows, create space, and hold the ground so the rest of us can work."
He swept his hand a little to the right. "The Scholar's Wing is our mind behind the surface. They build traps, lay sigils, and supply potions, scrolls, and prepared runes that will tip contested ground in our favor. Quiet, patient, dangerous when underestimated."
"And the Arcanum," Lucien finished, eyes settling on the cluster that included Aurelia, Kael, and Lysandra, "is chaos made precise. Unorthodox tactics, unexpected constructs, the sort of magic that confuses an enemy long enough for a clean strike. We do what no other division will: embrace uncertainty and make it ours."
Around them, nearly a hundred students fell into those slots with the practiced, half-wordless rhythm of people who had drilled the same steps until instinct lived where thought had once been.
Armour straps were checked, slates sealed, runes tucked like secret coins.
Lucien's presence did more than give orders, it set a tempo. They became a single organism assembled for one blunt purpose: find a relic node, kill its guardian, and hold it.
"Remember the objective," Kael added, quieter, practical. "Claim the node. Destroy the guardian. If it falls, hold what you can. Banner up, node secured, points on the board."
Arcane's contingent fanned out in the formation Lucien had given them, Martial Path forward, Scholar's Wing set to support and bind, Arcanum in the unexpected gaps where chaos might open an advantage.
Aurelia fell naturally into that center-chaos slot, blade at her hip, Harmonization humming at her fingertips. Lysandra kept close, a sparking, pink-diamond flame at the ready. Kael stayed one step back, slate and sigils prepared, eyes like measuring tools.
Their mapped node lay in a collapsed shrine half-swallowed by roots, a carved pedestal already circled by a sentinel figure, an elder stone warden whose eyes smoldered like embers. It had always been there. When a node slept, its guardian did not wait for activation, it watched, patient and lethal.
"Decide," Kael said, steady as always. "Do we take and hold, or do we leave it to rot?"
Around them, the other academies converged on the same choice. Erevalen advanced in disciplined ranks. Solmara flowed like liquid light, illusionists slinking between sightlines. The Imperial Spire moved with engineered precision.
No eyes met in trust. No hands were offered.
They converged on the shrine like four storms answering the same thunder.
Where the pedestal rose, old stone rimed with rune-etchings, the guardian's carved face watching with ember eyes, hundreds of students poured into the chamber.
Banners and colors blurred into a single roar of motion: Arcane in their varied, restless colors, Erevalen in disciplined bronze and green, Solmara in drifting sea-tones and whispering veils, Imperial Spire in the crisp, measured blacks and brass of engineered precision.
Around a hundred students from each academy, tens of dozens of approaches, and one single prize.
The rules were savage and clear: destroy or neutralize the guardian to score immediate credit. Whoever physically secures the node afterward earns the ten-point prize and two points for every minute they hold it. Kill the guardian and you claim its corpse or its credit, but hold the node and you own the score.
For thirty heartbeats, the cavern was pure collision. Aether fire and Aura bursts painted the low ceiling, and sigils flared in the dust like angry moths.
Arcane surged as spearheads into the center, carving lanes. Erevalen's disciplined ranks drove in, shield wall by shield wall, pushing like a tide. Solmara slid in, illusion and lilt obfuscating lines, the Spire's marksmen hung at range, firing precision runed slugs that tore stone and spell alike.
As chaos erupted around them, Lucien's voice rose above the clamor. "Arthur! Aurelia! You two take the lead! Focus on the guardian, we'll hold the line and keep the others off you!" His urgency cut through the turmoil of battle, motivating his companions.
With determination etched on their faces, Arthur and Aurelia nodded in unison, charging forward to face the formidable guardian while Lucien prepared to rally their forces against the oncoming tide.
Arthur and Aurelia found themselves at the pivot where action braided into a single, desperate thrust.
Arthur moved like a metronome of force, crimson Aura wrapped around his sword, not to slash for blood but to control and reframe the guardian's momentum.
Where the golem's great arm came down, Arthur planted and bled out the impact into measured blossoms of Aura, turning weight to rhythm.
Aurelia rode that rhythm. She threaded Harmonization into the strike: tiny crescents of Aether that synchronized with Arthur's cadence, each touch nudging the guardian's motion a fraction of a degree off-center.
Together, they did what hundreds of unfocused blows could not: they found the guardian's rhythm and pulled at it.
The creature was not merely stone, it was a knot of old sigils and Aether currents, anchored to the pedestal by bindings older than most of the banners in the room.
Arthur's blade split open a seam in the guardian's chest rune, and Aurelia's currents threaded the break and widened it.
For a moment, the great sentinel staggered, a sound like grinding gears and old grief in its throat.
Around them, Arcanum disciples shouted and attacked, while Kael's compact sigil-grids detonated in blinding bursts to support their efforts. Lysandra wove flame into a binding pattern rather than a direct assault, using its calming heat to slow the Erevalen charge.
Lucien moved swiftly to their side, summoning beams of light that coalesced into barriers, deflecting projectiles that came hurtling toward them.
Mirielle joined him, her hands aglow with shimmering water. With each wave of her palm, she sent out forms of liquid that disrupted the formations of their enemies, creating openings for their allies to exploit.
Cassian surged forward, his Aether swirling around him like a storm. He launched a series of blinding gusts that knocked back several advancing combatants from the other academies. Each strike was calculated, disrupting their momentum while protecting Aurelia and Arthur from harm.
The Arcane's battle was a study in purpose, focusing the chaos where it mattered most.
Solmara's illusion waves sought to erode their formation, thin and deceptive like smoke.
But the Spire did not fight like students hunting glory. They fought like engineers taking a machine apart.
A rifleman of the Imperial Spire found his window, while Arthur and Aurelia forced the guardian's armor to split.
The revolver's trigger was pulled, shooting out a loaded round of runed shot, and the rifleman slid a measured sight, firing straight into the guardian's exposed chest-grid.
The impact was surgical. Runed metal met fractured rune, and the guardian's core screamed: not sound but a sudden snapped circuit of Aether.
Dust and ember and a smell of old metal filled the cavern as the sentinel collapsed inward, its limbs folding like a ruined column. For a heartbeat, there was weightless silence under the cathedral of shouts.
The shot had not been cheap theatrics. It had been a precise strike, an engineered kill that counted in Headmaster Veyron's rules.
The Imperial Spire's banners jumped on the overhead tally: a partial credit, five points, registered under their name. They had earned immediate recognition for the decisive kill.
But the node was not yet theirs.
Before the Spire could reposition to physically claim the pedestal, a different motion swept the stones, a disciplined, sure tide of hands rather than blades or bullets.
Scholars moved like a single thought: students from Arcane's Scholar's Wing surged forward behind the combat lines, their robes streaked with chalk and ink, palms ringing with prepared glyphs.
They did not come with sigil bombs or spectacle, they came to touch, to bind.
One by one, they pressed their palms to the cool rune-etched rim of the node.
Fingers glowed with careful script, the Scholar's Wing had practiced for this, with inked glyphs that sealed as much as shouted.
A dozen palms, then dozens more, covered the pedestal. Their hands became a lattice of living script, and the node hummed and accepted them.
The guardian lay dead, but the node needed claim and care, someone had to be the first to place flesh and runes on the stone and say, unequivocally, "This is ours."
Arcane's Scholar's Wing secured it. The cavern's rune-clock reported the change in an indifferent chime: Arcane Academy +10 points, the full nodal prize. The overhead banner under Arcane flared to life.
For a beat, the air tasted like iron and decisions.
The Spire's engineers cursed and began to form a contest, but the sight of Arcane students, scholar and fighter interlaced around the pedestal, bare hands and binding script, made the calculus sharp and ugly.
They had to ask themselves the hard question: how many more of their people would they lose to steal a node Arcane already held?
Erevalen's disciplined lines wavered, Solmara's illusions thinned and drew back. The cavern's geometry shifted again, revealing other altars and pathways where fresh opportunities waited.
Strategy had become simple, bleed to take a claimed node, or cut losses and strike elsewhere.
The choice went quick as blood. One by one, the three opposing banners peeled away.
Erevalen reformed into tight columns for a new run, Solmara melted into shadow and new approaches, the Spire's marksmen angled toward a gap in the rock.
They fled not in shame but in strategy. Arcane had secured ten points and the momentum. The node's slow accumulation, two additional points per minute if held, would reward patience. To contest it now was to gamble lives for the vanity of denial.
As the four academies dispersed along new corridors, the scoreboard flickered above the battlefield sky, shifting runes and colored sigils, now alive with motion. It didn't only track the relic nodes.
The runes shimmered and rearranged themselves midair, lines of light etching into clear numerical form.
The cavern pulsed with color as the banners of each academy blazed overhead, their scores flickering like living fire.
Current Standings — Phase II
Arcane Academy secured a leading position with a total of 24 points, achieved through a combination of contributions from their secured relic node, support, and rescues in the Scholar's Wing, as well as efforts from the Martial Path and Arcanum combat.
The Imperial Spire followed with 18 points, gaining them from last-hit guardian strikes, successful coordinated eliminations, and various support actions.
Erevalen Dominion earned 15 points, balancing their score through defensive rescues and counterstrikes while sustaining minimal losses.
Solmara Enclave achieved 12 points, making significant gains through ambush tactics, though their losses hampered steady point accumulation.
The scoreboard glowed brighter as if responding to the collective tension rising from every academy's ranks.
Arcane remained at the top...for now.
In the echo of the retreat and the hiss of expended sigils, Lucien's shout cut clear: "Hold fast. We've got it, anchor the sigils, and don't relent for a minute. If they come, they will meet the spear. If they try to steal our node, answer with steel. If they bait, don't bite alone."
The Arcane Academy rebuilt lines, reapplied anchors, and sharpened resolve. They had the node. They had a score.
The cavern did not promise mercy, but they had obeyed the most human of rules: survive and press the advantage.
Aurelia sheathed her blade, the faint hum of dissipating Aether still echoing through the ruins of the guardian's chamber.
Dust drifted between the shafts of pale light from above as she turned toward Lucien, guilt shadowing her expression.
"Sorry," she said quietly, brushing dust off her arm. "We couldn't get the final strike in. That revolver-wielder beat us by a fraction."
Arthur nodded beside her, still catching his breath. "Yeah. It was close. Too close."
Lucien didn't even glance at the scoreboard, he just smirked, brushing his hair back with a flick of his hand. "You two did fine," he said, voice half-amused, half-commanding. "The only thing that matters is that Arcane got the node in the end. But…" he tilted his head, grin widening, "if you want my forgiveness for letting the Spire steal that kill, you'd better hurry up and claim the next one yourselves."
Aurelia straightened, meeting his teasing glare with a stubborn spark of her own. "Then we'll make sure you owe us an apology next time."
Lucien's laugh echoed across the field, bright and sharp. "That's the spirit, Aurelia. Now move, there are plenty of relics left, and the other academies won't wait for us to be polite."
Suddenly, the scoreboard above flickered, its radiant sigils blurring and reforming.
The hourglass rune at its center began to twist, the sands within reversing, splitting, and multiplying until the glowing numerals stretched out across the cavern ceiling.
A full day.
Gasps rippled through the ranks of every academy. Students glanced at one another, disbelief etched across their faces. "An entire day?" someone muttered.
Before anyone could process further, Headmaster Veyron's voice reverberated through the shifting stone walls, echoing like a calm storm.
"Attention, participants of the Grand Inter-Academy Trials," his tone carried both amusement and gravity, "the conditions have changed. In the interest of entertainment for the public, and to grant each of you a true test of endurance, adaptability, and tactical evolution, the headmasters of all four academies, myself included, have come to a unanimous decision."
The air pulsed with his following words.
"Phase II will now last for an entire day."
A stunned silence followed, then a low murmur spread through the gathered combatants.
Veyron's voice continued, steady and authoritative, "Your objectives remain unchanged. Secure relic nodes, defeat guardians, protect your positions, and outlast your rivals. Points will continue to accumulate every minute, and the field will transform dynamically throughout the cycle. Remember, this is not simply a contest of might, but of wit, stamina, and unity."
Lucien groaned dramatically, running a hand through his hair. "An entire day? Fantastic. Guess we're camping here."
Lysandra sighed, rubbing her temples. "I didn't pack for this kind of survival test."
Kael just adjusted his stance, scanning the horizon. "Then we make it count. We're not giving up that lead."
Aurelia tightened her grip on her blade. "Then we hold the node, or take more."
Panic erupted through the ranks like wildfire.
Students shouted over one another, their formations breaking apart as realization struck, they were expected to fight, survive, and defend for an entire day.
A full twenty-four hours in the field. Some froze, others began arguing, and a few even looked ready to bolt.
"Did you hear that? We're supposed to stay out here for a whole day!"
"This is insane! Who's ready for this?"
"What do we even do now?"
"Do we just hide somewhere?"
Then Lucien's voice cut through the noise.
"Enough!"
The word cracked like a whip, silencing the chaos. He stood tall upon a broken rise of stone, dust and light scattering around him, his presence commanding without effort.
Even in the tension, his tone carried that princely steadiness, the kind that didn't just demand attention, but anchored it.
"Whether it's an hour or a day," Lucien said, scanning the faces turned toward him, "we'll see this through. Now listen carefully, no one falls apart on me."
He drew in a sharp breath, his gaze intense and unwavering, as he assessed the scene before him. "Form back into your designated squads!" he commanded, voice steady with authority. "Martial Path, I need you at the forefront, ready to engage. Scholar's Wing, start crafting our wards and traps immediately, every possible angle must be fortified to prevent any opportunistic threat that could exploit this turmoil. The Arcanum will position themselves as our archers, poised to defend and attack from above." The sense of urgency was palpable as each unit sprang into action, driven by a shared resolve to maintain order amidst the chaos.
The students snapped back into motion, movement with purpose this time.
Lucien folded his arms, his gaze fixed on the pulsing blue sigil that marked their captured point. "We're at a crossroads," he said quietly, more to Aurelia and Arthur beside him. "We can press forward to claim more nodes and push our lead… or stay here and defend this one."
Aurelia frowned. "If we advance, we'll leave this one unguarded. The other academies will pounce the moment we move."
"And if we stay," Arthur added, "we fall behind. Someone else will claim the next node before we even get there."
Lucien's jaw tightened. He stared at the glowing rune in the ground, the symbol of their hard-earned advantage, and the trap it had become. "Then we'll do both," he decided finally, his tone steady but his eyes distant with thought. "Half our strength holds this ground. The rest form an advance team to push for the next relic. We can't win by sitting still… but we can't lose what we've already taken, either."
He looked up, voice carrying across the gathered students once again. "We're dividing our team. Half will stay and reinforce our position on the node. Half prepared to move on my command. We fight as one academy, even split apart."
The rush of orders followed like a living tide. Students moved in practiced rhythm, those fit for battle began checking their blades, getting tend to, while others began forming protective sigils around the relic node's perimeter.
Cassian stepped forward, brow furrowed with concern. "Is splitting us really fine? What if an entire academy comes to take the relic?"
Lucien shook his head, confidence etched on his features. "That won't be happening. They're likely to split up like we are or focus their efforts on other nodes. We're not the only ones vying for power here. Trust in your training and the strength of our unity, even if we're not all together."
Cassian nodded slowly, still feeling the weight of uncertainty, but the determination in Lucien's voice did help ease his mind.
The air was thick with tension and exhaustion, but beneath it, something steadier pulsed: resolve.
Lucien took one last look around their position, the faint glow of the rune reflecting in his eyes. "This isn't over," he murmured, mostly to himself. "We hold the line… and when we move, we'll make them remember why."
Aurelia raised an eyebrow, a small smile tugging at her lips despite the circumstances. "You really are quite the leader, you know," she remarked, trying to lighten the mood.
Lucien chuckled softly, shaking his head. "It comes easy when you can read people's emotions. But tell me, are you having fun in all this chaos?"
She let out a weary sigh, crossing her arms. "Of course not. If we have to endure this hell for an entire day, fun isn't exactly the right word." Her expression softened as she continued, "But if you want to think of it as a game instead of a trial, I'm fine with that. Whatever keeps you going."
Lucien smiled at her response, appreciating her resilience even in the darkest of times.