The morning after the duel, the academy buzzed like a nest kicked open. Everywhere Lucian walked, whispers followed.
The crownless beat Renard.It was a trick, surely.No one humiliates Calvus like that and lives long.
Some voices dripped with awe, others with venom. But all of them carried his name. For a boy in the lowest seat, obscurity had shattered.
Exactly as he intended.
Still, attention was a double-edged blade. Wolves circled him now, not just the outcasts of Class D, but the prodigies of Class A. He could feel their eyes, sharp and calculating.
And among them, one gaze stood apart.
It began during lecture.
The classroom was vast, walls lined with grim tomes, the ceiling hung with chandeliers that flickered faintly with magefire. The instructor entered in silence, his steps echoing.
He was unlike the others.
Where most professors wore their house crests proudly, this one was cloaked in plain black. His face was hidden behind a mask of polished steel, smooth except for a thin slit across the eyes. No insignia, no name.
The students fell quiet as he stood at the front, his presence heavy as stone.
"I am your instructor," the masked man said, voice low, measured. "For combat theory and adaptive warfare."
Adaptive warfare. Lucian's chest tightened. In his first life, he remembered fragments of whispered tales about such a professor—enigmatic, feared, dismissed by many as eccentric. He had thought them irrelevant then. He had been wrong.
The masked teacher's gaze swept across the room, pausing briefly on Lucian.
He continued. "The academy teaches forms, traditions, the elegance of noble combat. Forget them. On a battlefield, there is no elegance. There is only survival. And the one who adapts, wins."
Some of the noble-born shifted uncomfortably. A few scoffed under their breath.
Lucian, however, leaned forward. His pulse quickened.
This teacher spoke his language.
The lesson was brutal.
Pairs of students were forced to fight under bizarre restrictions: one with their dominant hand tied, another blinded with a cloth, another forced to defend with nothing but a shield against a blade.
Most floundered. Many protested.
"Unfair!" Calvus Renard snarled when his turn came, forced to fight with one leg bound. "This is no measure of skill!"
The masked teacher only replied, "Battlefields are unfair. If you cannot endure that, die."
Calvus seethed but obeyed. He still won, of course, but his strikes grew sloppy under the handicap.
When Lucian's turn came, he was given only a dagger against an opponent with a sword. A mismatch by any measure.
His classmates watched, eager to see him falter.
Lucian didn't falter.
He closed the gap instantly, blade flashing low to hook his opponent's knee, then smashing his hilt into the boy's temple. The sword clattered, and the duel ended in three heartbeats.
Gasps rippled.
The masked teacher tilted his head. For the first time, Lucian felt that gaze truly fix upon him.
"Efficient," the professor said softly. "Ugly. Effective."
Lucian bowed slightly, concealing the flicker of triumph in his chest.
After class, as the others filed out, the masked teacher's voice cut through the air.
"Ardelion. Stay."
Lucian paused. Seren shot him a look—half warning, half curiosity—before leaving with the others. The door shut. Silence fell.
The professor stepped closer, steel mask glinting. "You are not what they believe you to be."
Lucian's expression remained calm, though his heart quickened. "Am I not?"
The professor tilted his head, studying him as though peeling away his skin. "Most children of noble houses fight like peacocks. You fight like a cornered wolf."
Lucian let a small smile touch his lips. "Perhaps that is what I am."
The professor chuckled faintly. The sound was strange, metallic. "Do not mistake me. Wolves are dangerous… but they are also hunted."
Lucian's gaze sharpened. "Then which are you, Professor? A hunter… or a wolf?"
The air between them stilled, thick with tension.
At last, the masked man turned away. "That remains to be seen. For now, Ardelion—learn. Adapt. The academy will not forgive your survival in the courtyard. You will need teeth sharper than pride."
He strode to the door, his cloak whispering across the stone. "Dismissed."
Lucian stood alone in the echoing hall, pulse hammering.
In his first life, he had never drawn this man's eye. Now, he had.
And he could not decide if that was a gift… or a noose tightening.
That evening, back in the dormitory, Kael Draven dropped onto Lucian's bed without permission, smirking.
"So the mysterious masked teacher singled you out. Congratulations. You've just become every noble's favorite target and a professor's pet."
Lucian looked up from his parchment. "Pet, or project. Time will tell."
Seren, seated at her desk, interjected dryly, "Projects break as easily as pets. Be careful, Lucian."
Lucian dipped his quill in ink, sketching a new thread across his web of names.
The Masked Teacher → Unknown. Mentor? Hunter?
Interest = dangerous. Use caution.
He set the quill down, eyes gleaming.
"To be hunted is no curse," he murmured. "If the hunter underestimates the wolf."
Kael snorted. "You're insane."
"Perhaps."
But as the candlelight flickered, Lucian's mind burned with possibilities.
The courtyard duel had shifted the students. The masked teacher had shifted the board.
And in the Academy of Wolves, the game was only just beginning.
That night, Lucian dreamed of shadows. A masked face watching from the darkness. A voice whispering:
Adapt. Or die.
He woke before dawn, smile sharp, eyes cold.
"I've already died once," he whispered. "This time, I adapt."