Location:Obsidian Academy — Qin's study, then the Eastern Stair
Date/Time:9 Frostforge, 9942 AZI — late afternoon
Realm:Lower Realm
The seal was already broken.
He took the sheaf out of the bottom drawer and set it down face-up, and the wax along its edge had been cracked and folded back, and the two halves no longer met. Three pages. Not a hundred and forty-seven.
Jayde read it standing.
It was a curriculum. Four new classes at Obsidian Academy, with hours and grades and a note on hall allocation. Crossbow drill, taught as a discipline instead of tolerated as a hunting skill. Shield work. Small-unit formation, spelled two different ways on the same page. Rotation and relief — which meant teams, which meant students trained together and graded together and failing together, in a building where every rank anybody held had been won alone.
