Two weeks passed in silence and storm.
The echoes of that night—of her voice, of her lies—had long since faded from the halls of House Vaelor, but they remained inside Lucien like a splinter beneath the skin. Amelia Thornehart had left the estate the same night she arrived. There were no goodbyes. No explanations. Only the memory of her face and the weight of what she had once taken from him.
Lucien didn't speak of her again. He didn't need to.
The world moved on.
Every dawn began the same.
Caelum stood in the training yard, expression carved from stone, eyes sharp with purpose. And Lucien—still chubby, still flawed, but no longer fragile—would step into the circle without hesitation.
The Duke no longer held back emotionally. He didn't soften his words or dull his strikes. While his strength remained shackled, his intent did not. Lucien was no longer the broken boy from two weeks ago—he was a blade being reforged.
Cuts bled. Muscles tore. Bones ached.
But Lucien adapted.
He learned the rhythm of pain, the tempo of feints and counters. His footwork became quieter, his grip stronger, his stance unshakable. Caelum said little. Sometimes nothing. But when a glimmer of pride flickered in his gaze, it was more than enough.
"You're still sloppy," Caelum said one morning, tossing Lucien a water flask. "But you're enduring. That counts for something."
Lucien drank in silence, chest heaving, eyes focused.
Endure now. Dominate later.
One evening, Caelum didn't call the session to a close. The sun dipped lower, and the shadows stretched long across the marble tiles. Lucien kept going. Strike. Parry. Step. Again.
Blood dripped from his knuckles.
"You don't have to prove anything anymore," Caelum said, voice quieter than usual.
Lucien wiped his brow. "Yes, I do."
There was no argument after that.
---
Maeve Thorne was less forgiving.
The former war mage sat cross-legged on a scorched patch of grass near her crooked cottage, a chipped teacup in one hand and a disdainful stare in the other. Her crow, Nyx, perched on the fence post nearby, cawing at Lucien whenever he flinched or lost focus.
"Mana strengthening," Maeve had explained on the first day, "is like forcing molten iron through a straw. It hurts. A lot. But if you survive, the straw becomes steel."
Lucien had scoffed—then screamed five minutes later.
The technique was internal—there were no glowing auras or blasts of light. Only pressure. Crushing, twisting pressure as he forced his dormant mana into the pathways of his body. No Codex to guide it. No element to tame it. Just raw, unshaped power pressing against the boundaries of flesh.
It felt like dragging barbed wire through his veins.
By the fourth session, the pain still burned, but his breathing steadied. By the seventh, he could walk out of her training half-dead and still hold a book upright in the library afterward.
Day by day, it grew easier. Or maybe he just grew numb.
He could feel subtle shifts: increased awareness, sharper reflexes, quicker recovery. It wasn't magic. Not yet. But it was something.
Maeve grunted in approval by the fifth day. That was the closest he ever got to a compliment.
"Most brats puke by day three. You? You just look like you died on the inside. Progress."
Once, when Lucien collapsed near her porch, she didn't offer a potion or a hand—just leaned back and sipped her tea.
"You're Elira's boy, alright," she muttered. "Stubborn as hell."
He didn't ask what she meant. But he remembered that name in her voice. Not as a title. As a loss.
---
Lucien's body was changing—leaner now, with muscle building beneath thinning fat. But so too was the air around him.
He walked differently. Not faster, but steadier. Shoulders no longer hunched. Eyes clearer. There was no arrogance, no cocky smirk—but an intensity that made servants pause when they passed him in the halls.
Celeste had begun lingering again.
Not much. Not loudly. But she'd leave a painting half-finished in the corner of his study or a ribbon-tied book outside his door. Once, when he returned from a late-night session with Maeve, he found her waiting on the stairs.
She didn't say anything. Just nudged a sketchbook toward him, cheeks pink.
He took it.
That was enough.
He opened the pages that night. The first few were childish scribbles of birds and flowers. But midway through, one page stopped him.
A drawing of him.
Not the cruel version she once knew. Not the tear-streaked one that stumbled through the halls.
This one had tired eyes. A sword at his side. A crow in the background.
He stared at it for a long time.
---
Seraphina, too, lingered on the edges of his vision.
Quiet acts of care: a warm towel left near the training yard, a chilled potion on his nightstand. The maids never claimed responsibility. A scarf mended. A tea blend for sleepless nights.
No words exchanged. No apologies needed. But in the spaces where hate once festered, something gentler now grew.
He remembered her voice once, muffled through the hallway walls, whispering to a servant.
"No, don't bring it to him while he's training. Just leave it nearby. He won't take it if he sees me."
He didn't ask her to stop.
He didn't want her to.
---
And Caelum—Caelum never praised, never smiled. But every day, he returned to the training yard, sword in hand, ready to sharpen his son one cut at a time.
That was all Lucien needed.
The night before the Evaluation, the entire estate was silent.
The servants had been dismissed early. No one came to disturb him. He sat by the window, sketchbook in hand, adding small lines to Celeste's drawing. A shadow here. A tighter angle on the brow. The tiniest curve of a smile—not visible, just implied.
He didn't sleep.
---
The day of the Evaluation arrived.
Lucien didn't wait for a carriage or permission. He left on foot at dawn, a travel cloak wrapped around his shoulders, the silver crest of House Vaelor pinned at his chest.
He passed through the gates of the capital alone.
The guards recognized him and said nothing. Just opened the path.
The wind was cold.
Nobles stared. Some whispered.
"He came alone?"
"Where's the Duke?"
"That's the Vaelor heir? Looks… different."
He didn't stop.
The Sanctum Arx stood at the city's northern edge—an Evaluation Fortress built from mana-hardened stone, older than most noble lines. Thick bastion towers framed its high archways, and sigils of the Celestial Conclave were etched into every stone.
Lucien climbed the steps in silence.
Dozens of heirs had gathered already, each clad in the colors and sigils of their Houses.
He saw them all.
Crimson-clad heirs of House Vermillion, a Marquess House known for fire affinity and battlefield dominance—loud, confident, full of raw mana.
Sapphire-robed tacticians from House Elarien, a Count-ranked lineage of ice-wielding strategists—cool, silent, and always in pairs.
The smiling merchants of House Goldveil, a Viscount House with influence in trade and enchanting crafts—laughing too loudly, boasting of gifts they'd brought for Evaluators.
The shadowed nobles of House Draymoor, another Count House tied to forbidden studies and shadow magic—their clothes dark, their expressions unreadable.
And standing near the columned gate—House Thornehart, a powerful Marquess House with deep military roots.
Not Amelia.
Her cousin.
Taller. Broader. Steel in his posture. The family resemblance was clear. His stare was cold and deliberate.
He met Lucien's gaze. Unsmiling. Sharp.
Lucien didn't look away.
The horns blared once from within the fortress.
A steward unrolled a scroll. Voice echoing through the court.
"Lucien Drayven Vaelor, House Vaelor. Proceed."
No title. No mention of Duke Caelum. No announcement of honor. Just a name.
He walked forward.
And the doors shut behind him.