The announcement appeared just after sunrise.
Most students noticed it while they were still half-awake, scrolling through their interface notifications while getting dressed for the morning rotation. It wasn't marked urgent. It wasn't even highlighted in red like disciplinary alerts usually were.
But it still pulled attention.
Training Evaluation — Open Observation
That was all it said.
No explanation. No additional instructions.
Just a time and location.
Lucas read the notification twice before lowering his tablet slowly.
"Well," he muttered to himself, "that's never a good sign."
Across the dorm room, one of his neighbors leaned over the divider between their beds.
"You got it too?"
Lucas held up the tablet.
"Yeah."
The other student grimaced.
"That can't be normal."
Lucas shrugged.
"At this academy? I'm not sure anything counts as normal."
He finished pulling on his jacket and headed for the door, still thinking about the message.
Open observation.
