At 3:30 p.m., the academy bell tolled.
Ten minutes until the duel.
Tori Reglard stood in the preparation hall, fingers curled around the hilt of his training sword. The faint metallic chill against his palm steadied his breathing. His uniform the academy's standard combat attire clung neatly to his frame, the cloth whispering faintly as he moved.
When he stepped into the sunlight, the arena was already alive.
Rows of students crowded the stands, voices blending into a tide of anticipation. The banners hanging above the arena fluttered gently in the autumn wind, painted with bold letters that made his stomach twist.
"Commoner Resolve vs. One of the Strongest Nobles in Aspin."
He'd seen worse: Idiot vs. Noble. Ant vs. Lion.
Still, the words stung.
He exhaled slowly, letting the noise fade until all he could hear was his own heartbeat.
Then he saw them Sunless, arms crossed and face unreadable, and Mica waving like she was trying to summon a spirit. That was enough.
He stepped forward.
Across the field, Issac Reevire entered.
The crowd erupted as though a hero had arrived. Cheers cascaded through the air. A few girls even screamed his name. His black hair caught the light, and his emerald eyes gleamed with that familiar arrogance calm, cold, and unyielding.
Tori met his gaze without flinching.
Issac's eyes swept over the stands, savoring the attention. Then they returned to Tori and for an instant, he hesitated. The boy before him looked… different. The same wheat-blonde hair, the same sharp gaze but something in that gaze burned brighter, steadier.
A fire that refused to bow.
The referee raised a hand, voice amplified through mana resonance.
"Standard rules. No killing. The duel continues until one combatant can no longer fight. Ready yourselves."
A breath.
"Begin."
Tori moved first.
His feet dug into the dirt, launching him forward in a blur. The Reglard Flame Sword Technique was not built for elegance it was built for pressure, adaptation, and survival. His sword arced once, twice feinting, redirecting, flowing.
Issac parried, his blade flashing like liquid silver.
Tori spun behind him, the edge of his sword grazing the noble's shoulder. The motion felt natural the culmination of weeks of silent training, of ten thousand failures.
Issac's brows furrowed. For a moment, he saw something flicker in Tori's eyes a faint golden light.
Impossible, he thought. He hasn't awakened an Authority… has he?
Issac's expression hardened. His eyes glowed emerald green.
The air shuddered.
A crushing force descended from nowhere, invisible yet absolute. Tori's knees buckled. His chest compressed as though the weight of the sky had chosen him alone.
He gasped, clutching at the earth to stay conscious.
Issac approached, sword poised confident. Predictable.
That was what Tori had waited for.
He clenched the dirt in his palm and flung it upward.
The grains struck true. Issac cursed, eyes snapping shut. His Authority flickered, then vanished.
Tori surged upward, striking with his knee. His boot connected with Issac's chin, sending him stumbling back.
The crowd roared.
Issac's teeth bared. His body tensed as something ancient awakened within him. Threads of pale light spiraled across his skin fine as spider silk.
"Strings of Fate!" Issac shouted calling upon his stigma.
The translucent cords whipped through the air, wrapping around Tori's arms and legs with surgical precision. They constricted alive, thinking.
Tori twisted, barely escaping one before the others tightened again. A flash of pain bloomed across his cheek as Issac's blade cut through flesh.
Blood ran warm down his jaw.
Tori's counterstrike came a moment later wild, instinctive, desperate. Issac sidestepped, planted his foot, and kicked.
Tori hit the ground hard, palms skidding through dirt.
"A Stigma, huh…" he muttered, spitting blood.
He knew what that meant. Everyone did.
Stigmas divine fragments left behind by the Primordial Observers. Power not inherited, but bestowed. Earned in the crucible of battle, or through the will of one's own story.
Three Stigmas marked a mortal's first step into transcendence the path of the Semi-Primordial. But to ascend fully, one had to die, and have their Fable judged by the System itself.
Unless the Creator intervened.
Unless one was chosen.
Issac blinked rapidly, eyes burning from the dirt. His Authority surged again, raw and unfocused.
Compressed air gathered around his hands — spheres of pure pressure. He hurled them one after another, each strike detonating like a cannon.
Tori dodged two the third struck his leg.
Pain erupted. Flesh tore. Blood splattered across the arena floor.
He fell to one knee, gasping.
The noise of the crowd dimmed.
Move, he told himself. You've trained for this.
Drawing from deep memory, he activated a minor trait his mother had taught him a healing pattern etched into his body through countless repetitions. Warmth flowed to the wound; the bleeding slowed, the pain dulled. Not gone but bearable.
Issac's expression shifted. He could sense it the change.
The duel resumed, faster, fiercer.
Steel rang against steel. Sparks danced between them. The smell of blood and ozone filled the air.
Tori ducked under a swing, pivoted, and drove a kick into Issac's abdomen. The noble staggered, the breath driven from his lungs.
For a brief, breathless moment, everything stopped.
Then the world lit up.
A translucent System window unfolded in the air.
[ Tori Reglard has landed a Supreme Critical. Mana is surging within him. ]
His vision changed.
Suddenly, he could see.
Not just Issac but what he was. His Authority, his Skills, his Stigmas, the ebb and flow of mana through his veins. Numbers, sigils, equations of light.
Issac's mana 602 out of 1,764 flickered before his eyes. Then, inexplicably, it halved.
Tori didn't think. He moved.
The world slowed to a heartbeat. His sword traced a single, perfect line across Issac's chest. The blow struck clean.
Issac's body was hurled backward, crashing into the arena wall. Dust and light filled the air.
Even as he fell, Issac countered three spheres of pressure spinning toward Tori. But this time, Tori saw them coming before they were formed.
He stepped aside. Each blast missed by inches.
For the first time, he felt weightless.
Alive.
Another window appeared before him, edges flickering like fire.
[ You have awakened an Inherited Stigma from your lineage: Eye of Constellation. ]
[ Five Primordial Observers are tuning into your Fable. They are curious about you. ]
The world grew silent.
And above it all, unseen by mortal eyes, something vast turned its gaze toward him.