**One Week Later. Stellar Ascendancy Academy, Combat Training Cavern.**
The air in the cavern crackled with a new tension.
The official story was public now: a tragic reactor accident in Workshop Bay 3 had claimed the life of promising engineering student Jax Meridian. A moment of silence had been observed. A memorial plaque was being commissioned.
Yet beneath the official grief, rumors slithered through the student body like serpents.
Whispers of the Phantom's daring raid on the Seminary. Of an Inquisitor found dazed in a maintenance corridor. Of a stolen vehicle found scorched beyond recognition miles from the academy.
Ken felt the changed atmosphere through his **Eye of Truth**.
The bio-signatures of his peers pulsed with higher anxiety. The instructors' auras showed sharper vigilance. And the Inquisition's presence had solidified from an occasional inspection to a permanent stain—gray-clad observers now stood at every major intersection, their eyes scanning, always scanning.
Today's combat drill was "Hostile Environment Engagement."
Instructor Rourke had activated the holographic terrain generators, plunging half the cavern into a shifting maze of illusory rubble, smoke, and simulated gunfire. Students moved in fireteams, their task to locate and secure a data-core in the center.
Ken's team consisted of two nervous first-years and himself.
The perfect cover.
He moved with them, performing adequately—taking cover when appropriate, firing his training rifle with middling accuracy, following their hesitant lead.
His true focus was elsewhere.
His **Eye of Truth** was dissecting the exercise itself. The holographic enemy patterns were predictable, derived from standard Dominion combat manuals. The terrain shifted on a 90-second loop. The "data-core" emitted a subspace frequency easily tracked with basic equipment.
*Flaw: 47 distinct vulnerabilities. Exploitation would reduce exercise completion time by 78%.*
He did not exploit them.
He observed Seraphine's team instead.
She moved like a different creature entirely.
The rumors about her involvement in "the night of the explosion" had morphed into tales of her being first on the scene, trying to save her friend. It had given her a grim, respected distance.
Now, she led her team not with shouts, but with sharp hand signals. She didn't just react to the terrain; she anticipated it, positioning her teammates in cover that would be safe three shifts later.
She moved through the chaos not as a participant, but as a conductor.
Rourke watched her, his grizzled face unreadable.
Inquisitor Carrow, observing from the elevated gallery, watched her too.
His gaze was a hook.
Ken's team stumbled into an ambush point. A holographic turret swiveled, painting them with targeting lasers. His two teammates froze.
*Optimal solution: Drop, roll left 2.3 meters behind the low wall, disable turret power coupling with a single precise shot. Probability of success: 96%.*
Prince Ken's solution:
He fumbled his rifle, tripped on simulated debris, and fell, accidentally pulling one teammate down with him as the turret's simulated rounds "killed" the other.
He lay there, the picture of hapless defeat, as the exercise timer blared their failure.
From the floor, he saw Seraphine's team secure the objective with twenty seconds to spare.
---
After the drill, as students filed out sweaty and chastened, Carrow descended from the gallery.
He didn't approach Ken.
He walked directly to Seraphine, who was cleaning her practice rifle with methodical intensity.
"Cadet Rae. A word."
She straightened, face neutral.
"Inquisitor."
"Your performance was... notably proficient. Your spatial awareness, your anticipation of the holographic shift cycles. Unusual for a first-year, even a gifted one."
His voice was a dry rustle.
"Almost as if you've had recent experience with... unpredictable environments."
Seraphine didn't flinch.
"The simulation parameters are logical, Inquisitor. I observed the pattern. I applied it."
"Observation. Application."
Carrow repeated the words as if they were evidence.
"Tell me, during the recent... *tragedy*... in the workshops. Did you observe anything unusual in the days prior? Did Jax Meridian seem distracted? Agitated? Speaking of grand projects or... grievances?"
He was probing.
Not for her guilt, but for a lever. A way to tie the dead "heretic" to the living, suspiciously competent cadet.
"Jax was always distracted, Inquisitor. He lived in his head. His projects were his life."
She met his gaze squarely, the half-truth a perfect shield.
"If you're asking if he seemed like someone planning to blow himself up, the answer is no. He loved his tools too much."
Carrow held her stare for a long, uncomfortable moment.
Then he nodded, once.
"Diligence is a virtue, Cadet. But be wary of what, and whom, you observe too closely. The light of scrutiny can burn."
He walked away, leaving her in the suddenly colder air of the cavern.
Ken, pretending to fix his boot, had heard every word.
Carrow was weaving a new narrative.
The Phantom had an accomplice within the academy. Who better than the dead heretic's only friend, the unnaturally skilled commoner soldier?
Seraphine's position had just shifted from observer to primary suspect.
---
**Later, in a secured data-nook of the library, Ken accessed The Fixer's network.**
A message blinked:
*New identity established. 'Kael' is operational. Workshop is functional. Patient is recovering. Physical trauma: 87% healed. Psychological trauma: assessment ongoing. He asks for blue-phase capacitors and unregulated crystalline lattice schematics. Denied per your parameters. -F*
Jax was alive.
He was working.
He was demanding dangerous toys.
Some things never changed.
A second message, from a different, more elegant encryption:
*The hound sniffs at the soldier's heels. His desperation makes him clumsy. A public failure to discredit her would wound him more than a private one. The upcoming Seven Kingdoms Cultural Exchange gala presents an opportunity. A stage. -S*
Selene.
Always playing the board.
The gala was in two weeks—a diplomatic event where each kingdom's academy would showcase non-combat talents: art, engineering, history. It was a nest of vipers in silk and brocade.
And she wanted Ken to orchestrate Carrow's public humiliation there.
It was tempting.
It was also a potential trap within a trap. Selene's "favors" always came with layered interest.
He was composing a calculated reply when a third presence made itself known.
Not through data, but through a soft, deliberate cough.
Ken's hand didn't jerk. His breathing didn't hitch. He simply closed the secure terminal with a tap, the illicit screens winking out to be replaced by a bland treatise on pre-Dominion irrigation.
He turned.
Headmaster Theron stood there, having seemingly materialized from between the shelves. His silver beard glinted in the low light, his eyes holding that deep, sad wisdom.
"Prince Ken. Diligent as always."
"Headmaster."
Ken stood, a picture of respectful surprise.
"I was researching for my Arcane Theory paper on ancient sustainable practices."
"A noble pursuit."
Theron's gaze drifted over the terminal, then back to Ken's face.
"Knowledge of the past often illuminates the path forward. Though sometimes, the most relevant knowledge is of the present. Of currents moving beneath still surfaces."
He moved to the window, looking out over the academy spires.
"A tree, when buffeted by a strong wind, has two choices. It can stand rigid, and risk being snapped. Or it can bend, move with the current, and survive. Its roots, however, must remain steadfast."
He turned, and his eyes were no longer just old; they were piercing.
"Tell me, Prince, in your studies... what nourishes a root?"
The question was a cipher.
Ken analyzed it.
*Literal answer: Water, minerals. Metaphorical answer: Truth. Stability. Purpose.*
"A consistent foundation, Headmaster," Ken said, choosing the neutral path.
"Indeed."
Theron turned, and his eyes were no longer just old; they were piercing.
"Be wary of foundations built upon secrecy. They can hold great weight... until the first crack appears. And the weight of a conscience is heavier than most young men realize."
He knew.
He didn't know specifics, but he saw the shape of Ken's duality, the weight of Jax's "death," the new tension around Seraphine.
He was offering neither condemnation nor help, but a warning.
"Thank you for the wisdom, Headmaster," Ken said, bowing his head slightly.
Theron nodded and glided away, silent as a ghost.
---
Ken sat back down.
The Headmaster. The Inquisitor. The Princess.
His network was growing, but so was the number of eyes upon it. The cost of operating in daylight—of having assets, allies, a cause—was exposure.
He reopened his terminal.
To Selene, he typed:
*Gala parameters received. Will evaluate. The hound must bite the hand that feeds him to be put down.*
To The Fixer:
*Provide Kael with regulated phase capacitors and basic lattice theory. No unregulated schematics. Initiate psychological protocol 'Forge': assign a complex but safe problem. Focus his mind on creation, not trauma.*
To himself, he acknowledged the new mission parameter:
**Protect Asset Seraphine. Neutralize threat Carrow. Method: Public discredit. Venue: Seven Kingdoms Gala.**
The Phantom's war was no longer a solo campaign of assassination.
It was a multi-front engagement: psychological, political, social. He had to protect his allies, undermine his enemy's authority, and all while maintaining the flawless facade of the weakest prince in the empire.
For the first time, he missed the clean, silent simplicity of a knife in the dark.
Daylight was complicated.
Daylight was expensive.
---
And as he left the library, he saw Seraphine across the sun-drenched courtyard, surrounded by a few cadets from her combat team who were asking her for advice.
She was nodding, explaining, leading.
She was becoming a figure.
A beacon.
*That,* he realized with a cold spike of something akin to dread, *makes her both stronger and a better target.*
The cost of daylight wasn't just exposure.
It was care.
And care was the most computationally expensive variable of all.
---
**[End of Chapter 10]**