The morning drill horn wailed from the main barracks, faint and distant. For the first time since arriving at this academy, I get to ignore it. I stayed in my room, dressed in my training gear. Practical and comfortable.
Finally, my mornings were mine... Is what I would say if they didn't belong to her now.
Elara apparently had a chat with the Commandant last night. The result? No more morning classes and no more of those pointless duels with guys like Tytus. Gods, bless his heart. The problem? My sister had decided that she was going to be my new personal instructor.
This sounds nice in theory, right? It had to be better than wasting half my life smacking wooden swords against sweaty men who think shouting makes their strikes stronger. But here's the thing about Elara. She doesn't teach so much as she beats.
Elara's idea of training is simple: kick my ass, then tell me exactly what I did wrong. One sloppy stance, one wasted flare of mana, and she pounces like a hawk. Half a step off balance, and she'll drill me with her sword—and then drill me with her words.
I finished strapping on the rest of my leather training armor and headed out, a familiar pit of dread settling in my stomach. I still remember all of her training she made me go through before I entered the academy.
The spot Elara had chosen was a small clearing just outside the academy grounds. Overgrown paths, uneven stone underfoot, not a soul in sight. Perfect for my private ass-kicking, I suppose.
The twin moons barely clung to the edge of the horizon as the first light of dawn crept in.
Elara was already there, perched on a moss-covered stone in the middle of the yard. Not looking at me. She turned a small object over in her hand, shadows hiding her expression.
She wasn't in uniform either—just a sleeveless jerkin, her bare arms latticed with scars, a twisted roadmap of her life. Her frame compact, and lithe, perfect for a scout.
Standing next to her made me feel enormous. She looked almost delicate, but every movement was sharp and controlled.
Her auburn hair was tied back tightly. Green eyes sweeping the yard with that quiet, piercing intensity that made her seem far older than her small frame suggested.
And the kicker? Thirty-eight years old, yet she could pass as my slightly older sister. She says having a developed mana core will slow my aging too, but she's got the benefits of being an elf.
Knowing what was coming, I figured I needed a plan. Something clever, tactical, foolproof. A strategy that had carried me through countless close calls. Cuteness.
"Elaraaaa," I called out, dragging her name with a long childish whine. I puffed my cheeks, widened my eyes, and even gave the tiniest of pouts. "You're not really going to beat up your cute and wonderful little sister this early in the morning, are you?"
She didn't look up from the object in her hand. But her mouth twitched—just barely, a crack in the armor. Ha. Got her. Almost.
I doubled down. Stepping right into her line of sight, I crouched low until my face was level with hers. Full power, maximum effect. The please love me expression. No one could resist it.
"Sisterrr," I pressed, blinking up at her like some abandoned kitten. "Aren't you going to say anything to me?"
And for a moment, it worked. Her expression softened, a warmth I hadn't expected. Familiar. The kind of look that had carried me through childhood nightmares. I knew it. She couldn't ignore me. Not really. Victory!
...Or at least that's what I thought.
She suddenly lunged out, snatched me by the collar, and yanked me forward hard enough to rattle my teeth.
"Cute doesn't dodge blades," she said, deadpan.
I sputtered, choking out a sound somewhere between a laugh and a cough. Gods, why did I think this was going to work?
Her hold of me loosened just as suddenly as it had snapped shut, and she let me go. I stumbled back, rubbing at my throat, glaring daggers at her. She didn't return the look.
Instead, her attention went back to the thing in her hand. In the growing dawn light, I finally saw it clearly: a fist-sized crystal, smooth and black. Like it had swallowed all the light around it.
My stomach dropped.
"A mana evaluation stone?" I asked, suspicion creeping into my voice. "Wait... you dragged me out here for a test? At dawn?"
Her attention never left the crystal. She didn't answer right away, and an uncomfortable silence grew.
When she finally looked up, the warmth I'd pried out of her a moment ago was gone.
Not cold... but guarded. Something she didn't want me to see.
"This isn't about drills," she said at last, "It's about control."
My stomach did an uncomfortable flip. Control? That didn't sound like the usual don't drop your guard lecture.
"The Commandant thinks your talent is enough," she went on, finally raising the crystal between us. "I know better. Pour your mana into this. Everything you have. I need to see exactly what we're working with."
I stared at her, then at the stone. Oh, great. A damn evaluation. Because nothing says "good morning" like having your soul wrung through a rock while your terrifying older sister judges you.
"Why?" I complained, making no move to touch the crystal. "What's the point? We both know what it's going to say. My capacity is high, my control... a work in progress. Same as always. Can't we just skip the quiz and get to the part where you try to beat me into the ground?"
Elara's jaw tightened, irritation slipping through. "This isn't a game, Luna. I need a baseline."
"For what?" I crossed my arms. "The tournament isn't for six months. We have plenty of time to work on my 'control.' You dragging me out here at dawn to do something we've done a dozen times isn't training, it's just you worrying."
"Of course I'm worrying!" Her words came out cracked and sudden. Even she seemed startled by it. She exhaled, forcing herself to be calm, but the simmering frustration lingered.
"Luna, please," she softened, almost pleading. "Just... do the test. There's something I need to be sure of."
I scoffed. "Be sure of what? That I'll screw something up? That I'll still be stubborn and impossible to control? I don't get what you're so worked up about."
Wrong move.
"Elara... " I started, but she cut me off.
Fury and desperation flared in her eyes. "You want to know what terrifies me?"
Before I could react, she shoved the crystal into my chest. I stumbled back, catching it.
"Look at this," she hissed, words trembling as if holding back a storm, "a normal evaluation stone can't even stay lit in your hands. Your progression... it makes no sense. And... "
Her voice cracked, laced with years of secrets she'd kept buried. "...it's not just one mana core you're developing—you're developing two."
Her words hung in the humid morning air.
Two?
My mind went blank. I stared down at the smooth, dark crystal in my hands, then back up at Elara's grim face. I tried to make sense of it, to fit it into everything I thought I knew about mana. Everyone had a core. One core. That was the foundation of everything. Two... it wasn't just rare. It was impossible. A fairy tale.
And then another thought, colder, sharper, sliced through the confusion.
All those years. Endless drills. Every time I asked about magic, she'd change the subject. Every time I tried condensing my mana, she'd insist my foundation wasn't strong enough yet. I needed to focus on my bladework.
It wasn't that she didn't know how to train me. It wasn't that I wasn't ready.
She was holding me back. On purpose.
The crystal in my hand suddenly felt impossibly heavy. Two cores. That alone was enough to knock the wind out of me. But the fact that Elara had deliberately stunted me for years? That felt like a gut punch straight to the heart.
What the hell? Two cores? TWO?
No wonder the stupid stones kept going haywire, no wonder the Commandant was acting like I was a ticking bomb. She knew. She fucking knew all along.
And all those mornings, all those drills, all that "practice," she was just... stalling me. Like some weird, overprotective elf babysitter with a vendetta. Holy crap, I could have been twice as strong by now... no, I would have been. All those times I thought I was grinding toward something, she was just... keeping me in line.
What the actual hell, Elara? What the hell have you been doing?
My voice came out a dry whisper, no longer a question of confusion, but an accusation. "Why?"
The single word, "Why?", hung in the air between us, unanswered. Elara just gave a slight shake of her head, a silent, final message. Not here.
She turned and started walking. I wordlessly fell into step behind her.
We left the overgrown clearing and cut through the bustling yards of the outer district. Cadets and soldiers alike filled the grounds, steel ringing and voices barking.
Most didn't spare us a glance. But a few did. Their eyes followed Elara, subtle but unmistakable, whispers trailing in her wake. Major Elara. Even without her Recon Corps insignia, they knew exactly who she was.
And then their gazes shifted to me. That's when it hit me, we'd never actually walked together through this part of the city before. Market squares, taverns, all fine. But here, where the walls echoed with routine and discipline? Never.
The whispers sharpened. They weren't wondering why she was here. They were wondering why I was with her.
I bit down on the urge to snap back at them. Let them gawk. Let them whisper. It's all they ever do.
Eventually, we passed through the massive gate separating the outer district from the civilian district.
The grating stares from cadets and soldiers faded, replaced by the casual curiosity of everyday folk.
Most people didn't spare us a second glance, just going about their routines.
A few, though... they couldn't help the double-takes. My white hair. The unusual gleam in my eyes. Subtle hints of something different.
Status quo, I told myself. But it never felt entirely normal.
She guided me down familiar side streets, the ones I'd known since childhood. I'd wandered them countless times, but never with this sense of purpose, never like the world outside had shrunk to nothing.
At last, we stopped in front of a small townhouse of stone and dark wood—our home. Funny how a place I'd griped about for years now felt... safe.
Elara pushed the door open, holding it steady as if I might forget how to step inside. Once it clicked shut behind us, the clamor of cadets, whispers, and judging eyes seemed to vanish.
Without a word, she moved past the sitting area and into the kitchen. I followed, watching her glide through the room with that quiet, effortless rhythm she always carried, as if every movement required no thought at all.
She filled the kettle, set it over the heat-stone, and pulled two mugs from the cupboard—her chipped favorite and the plain white one that had always been mine. No glance my way. No words. Just the scrape of ceramic and the gentle hum of warming water.
When the tea was ready, she carried the mugs to the sofa by the hearth and sank into it, nodding toward the armchair across from her.
I ignored the gesture. I eased down beside her instead, letting our shoulders brush. Legs curled beneath me, mug pressed to my chest, I let the world outside fade. No tricks. No quips. Just quiet. Just warmth. Just her.
My head rested lightly against her shoulder. The heat of the mug seeped into my palms, comforting.
We stayed like that for a while, silence stretching comfortably between us, until she exhaled softly, eyes distant, as if chasing memories that lingered too long.
"You know... when I found you, it had already been three years since the Falling Light. Three years since I lost them." Her words caught. "My brother and sister, Elian and Lyra." Her expression looked so fragile.
"They would have loved you just as much as I do."
Her tone hardened. "After the Fall, not everyone ran. Some of us stayed. We fought. We scraped together militias, rescue parties—anything to pull survivors out of the spreading blight. Gideon, the Commandant, was a commander in the first Alliance army back then, one of the best. We worked side by side, dragging people out of the ruins."
Her shoulders slumped.
"It was a losing battle. The Corruption... it spread from the craters, twisting everything it touched."
She drew a shaky breath.
"But the worst part wasn't the land. It was the people. The animals. Their bodies warped, their minds stripped away, until all that was left was a hunger to destroy. The first monsters weren't born from nightmares. They were our neighbors. Our families."
"That's why Seraphia is a wasteland now," she murmured. "What the hordes didn't burn, the blight simply unmade. We lost our homes to the monsters, and we lost the very ground beneath our feet to the Corruption itself. There was nowhere left to defend."
Her tone softened. "When I found you, you were just a tiny, sickly child hiding in a cellar under the rubble. Burning with fever, barely able to speak. But you remembered one thing—your name. Luna. It was the only piece of your past you'd held onto, so I kept it for you."
A sad, fragile smile touched her lips before fading. "Later, after I got us to Aegis, I took you to a healer, a trusted friend. They used their magic to measure your age. Gods know I never could've guessed myself, not with how malnourished you were. When they told me you were six, I didn't believe them at first. You were so small, so frail... I thought there was no way you could be that old. But they also told me—your mana, it was unnaturally high and unstable."
"As you grew stronger, back in those early days in Aegis, I started to notice it... little things. How quickly you recovered from scrapes and fevers, how the mana around you shifted when you got upset, how much it kept growing at such a young age.
Every tiny detail added up, until I couldn't ignore it anymore." She refocused on me, eyes full of decade-old memories. "I knew I couldn't be the only one to see it. So I went to another person I trusted from the war. Gideon."
"When I first brought you to him, he looked closely, studied the way your mana moved, the impossible energy radiating off you even without effort. And in that moment, he understood. He confirmed what I had already suspected. You weren't just a survivor, Luna... you were an anomaly."
She paused. "He told me we had to keep you hidden. Your power would make you a target, used as a weapon, an experiment, or seen as a threat. That's the secret we've kept from you... and everyone else. That's why I pushed you to physical training while holding back your mana growth."
Her grip tightened around her mug. "Sometimes, I still wonder if I made the right choice. I could've left you with someone else... maybe you would've had an easier life. A life without my ghosts."
She faltered and she stared down at her scarred hands. "But after losing Elian and Lyra... I couldn't bear the thought of losing another child. So I held on to you. Even if it was selfish."
The tension between us was thick, but I couldn't bear to see her like that. My chest ached, my throat tightened, and I finally found my voice.
"You didn't make the wrong choice," I said softly, barely above a whisper. "I... I'm happy. I'm glad you kept me."
Elara looked up, the glistening of unshed tears in her eyes. A small smile fluttered across her lips. "Me too," she whispered, reaching out to brush a stray white strand of hair from my face. "Just... look at you. Sixteen, almost seventeen... all grown up."
Her hand dropped. She took a deep breath, and when she looked at me again, the soldier Elara was back.
"He's still a reckless old fool for throwing you into the Summit," she said, setting her mug down with a definitive click. "But he's not wrong about one thing. You need a challenge. You need control. And you need it now."
She rose, weariness gone, replaced by that familiar, formidable energy.
"The tournament's in six months," her hand shot out, pulling me to my feet. "Not enough time. Not nearly. But it'll have to do."
"Rest up, Luna," she commanded, voice all officer now. "Tomorrow, your real training begins."