The bell never rang.
It was meant to signal the semi-finals of the combat midterms. The Crucible—Anatheon's grand arena—should have roared to life with sacred fury and the clashing of myth-bound steel.
Students should have spilled blood under the artificial lights as gods watched with cold approval.
Instead, the gates stayed shut. The bell remained silent.
Rumors cracked through the academy's halls like hairline fractures in old marble.
A few, quieter still, whispered that something had come through. Something else.
And far away from the academy, the outer districts of Halgrith Citadel burned.
Siege stood on the eastern observation deck, where the wind bit harder than usual, dragging flecks of ash up from the smoke-shrouded slums.
Around him, the academy continued to move—but slower. Measured. Eyes didn't meet. Footsteps lingered.
The sky was a colorless smear. Down in the Slag, chaos had unfurled like a cracked banner.
The hunger had become something else.
"Kind of a shame," Leo muttered beside him
"He spun an iron coin between his fingers—an old habit, Siege assumed, likely to keep from punching walls.
"I was looking forward to helping you get revenge on Tanreth. "
Siege didn't respond. He hadn't slept.
"Well, don't all talk at once," Leo continued, leaning against the wall and tossing the coin into the air.
"Seriously though, you're starting to look like one of those False Hydra victims. Eyes all hollow and haunted. If you start talking to people who aren't there, I'm leaving."
Across the from them, Albion sat beneath an arch, ink flowing from his pen like smoke across the pages of a leather-bound journal.
"They've locked the bridges," said Albion, not even looking up.
"No one goes in or out. Not even supply convoys. And the Citadel Guard's thinning." He paused.
"Too many of them… stopped coming back."
Siege didn't respond.
His fingers were clenched white on the railing, and the wind dragged at his coat like it wanted to pull him down to the place he once called home.
His father was still there.
Still in the Slag.
Still surviving—hopefully.
*Hopefully.*
Leo glanced sideways, his usual grin missing. "You've got family down there, right?"
Siege didn't nod. Didn't need to.
Leo sighed. "The school says the postponement was for 'student safety,' but we both know that's a lie."
Siege's voice was low, raw. "They said it was due to mass starvation causing riots."
"It's more than that now." Albion's voice dropped with it.
"People are eating things they shouldn't. Talking to walls. One of the administrators said a patrol found a man sitting in a fountain, just… swallowing water until his stomach split open."
Siege's grip tightened.
He remembered his father's hands. Scarred, trembling. Always moving. Always working. Even when there was nothing to work for.
"I should be there," he muttered.
"No," Leo said firmly. "You shouldn't. That place eats people. Always has. You got out."
Siege's eyes narrowed. "And left him behind."
Leo was silent for a while, then clapped a hand on Siege's shoulder. "Then survive. That's how you repay him. You survive, you rise, and you burn down whatever did this to our world. From the top down."
---
The announcement came that evening.
Delivered not by a teacher, but by one of the the Tower's black-robed messengers—those eerie figures from the Paraclete Tower where Lyssandra Maxwell lived.
Their faces looked carved from wax. Rigid and without expression.
The students had gathered in the lecture amphitheater, still dressed for battle, half-expecting an announcement resuming the battles.
What they received was finality.
"The combat midterms are hereby suspended. All remaining trials have been voided by order of the Divine Council. This is not a debate. There will be no appeals."
A hush fell like lead.
Instructor Thrakkor stood at the back, arms folded, jaw tight. He said nothing.
Then came the rest.
"A state of internal emergency has been declared in Halgrith Citadel due to instability in the outer districts. Until containment is secured, no travel to or from the city will be permitted. Do not attempt contact with citizens below."
Siege's chest went cold.
Albion, seated beside him, offered no words—only a glance. A flicker of something almost human behind his usual veil of icy detachment.
*No travel to or from the city.*
His father was in that city.
In the Slag.
And Siege couldn't get to him.
---
Later that night, the academy halls felt thinner. Brittle.
The usual sounds were gone—no metal clashing in training halls, no laughter echoing from mess corridors. Just the wind whispering through high windows and the occasional muffled sob from behind dormitory doors.
Siege sat on his bed, staring at his communicator. No signal. Not even a static buzz. The outer city's network had gone dark the day before. Another coincidence. Another silence.
"I thought the midterms were supposed to be dangerous," came a voice from the door.
Albion stood there, leaning against the frame. His journal was tucked under one arm, a strange ink mark bleeding through the bottom corner.
"This is worse," Siege muttered.
"I disagree." Albion entered, placing the journal on a desk with unnatural care.
"When people want you dead, it's simple. But this?" He tapped a finger against the air. "This is madness without purpose. Hunger without end. Death as… digestion."
Siege looked up. "You're not helping."
"I'm not here to help." Albion offered a dry smile.
"I'm here to tell you the border wards are already showing strain. The academy is sealed off, but if whatever is happening below spreads upward… even Anatheon will bleed."
Siege looked down. "My father's still there."
"I know." Albion's smile faded. "I lost mine when I was nine. To a storm-witch during the fall of Aleph Citadel. I remember thinking it was unfair. That no one should die offscreen."
Siege blinked. "…Offscreen?"
Albion gave a humorless chuckle. "Poor metaphor. My apologies."
He turned for the door, then paused. "If your father is anything like you, Siege… then he's not dead yet."
---
In the Staff Sanctum, the instructors argued. Again.
Instructor Thrakkor leaned against a wall, arms folded, face dark. The shadows cast by the burning lights trembled across the scars of his skin.
"They're weak," he said, biting each word. "All of them. If they can't handle a little chaos, what's the point?"
"They're children," said Professor Vael, the ritualist and loremaster, her voice clipped and sharp. "Most of them haven't even formed complete understandings of their Aspects."
"Suspending combat midterms is a mistake," Thrakkor snapped. "They need pressure to awaken their strength, not coddling. Fear tempers steel."
"And breaks it," Professor Vael snapped back. "We nearly lost four students during the last matches. And that was before the riots began."
"Is that why we send them into the Outer Dark after only a year of training?" Thrakkor roared, his gaze scanning every person in the room.
"Don't you dare take an accusatory tone! You know they must leave the Citadel to take the Quest to ascend to Heroes!" Vael roared back.
The temperature dropped a few degrees.
Then came a knock—light, deliberate, unnatural.
Everyone turned.
A figure entered. Black robes. Silver eyes. The seal of Paraclete Tower stitched into his chest. One of Lyssandra Maxwell's personal Watchers.
He spoke with no emotion.
"Anatheon is sealed indefinitely. By order of the Divine Council. All outings are suspended. Further inquiry into the hunger phenomena is underway. Instructors are not to engage students about this topic directly until cleared."
Head Professor Kyros, who had spoken little since the announcement, finally raised a hand. "The Divine Council's decree is final. Until Halgrith stabilizes, the Crucible will remain sealed. Our concern now is the containment of panic."
"Cleared?" Thrakkor barked. "By who? Lyssandra? She hasn't been seen in weeks."
The Watcher didn't blink. "By the Ward."
Thrakkor snarled. "Containment won't save them when the hunger reaches the walls. We've softened them. Made gods into kids with delusions of power."
Vael turned, frost on her voice. "And you'd rather they tear each other apart in an arena, while the world starves beneath them?"
"Better to die swinging than chewing stone."
---
At dawn, Siege stood alone on the training fields.
Snow had fallen in the night breaking past even the invisible walls of the inner city, covering the bloodstains from earlier bouts. The frost glittered like shattered glass.
He remembered his father's voice.
"If you ever get out, don't look back. Not until you're strong enough to lift others with you."
The wind carried the scent of smoke again.
This time, Siege didn't flinch.
He knelt, pressed a hand to the frozen dirt, and whispered:
"I'll find you. Just hold on."