Itsuki awakened with a start…
Cold sweat glistened on his skin, and his heart thundered against his ribs. For a moment, he had no idea where he was. The ceiling above him felt wrong, the walls in the wrong place, and all scents were not what they were at home.
Then the memory struck him. Zenkai Dojo. His new bedroom. The night of the first one.
He jerked upright in bed, staring wildly around for some sign that what he'd experienced had been anything other than a dream. But there was nothing. Only his small bedroom, his few belongings, and the darkness crowding at the panes.
A dream. It has to be a dream…
Aside from the knowledge that he knew it wasn't. The memory was too vivid, too vivid. He could still feel the lingering of that presence, the way a ring remained in his ears that would not leave.
"Your life will never unfold as you have planned it."
He kicked his legs off the bed and got up. There was no point in trying to sleep anymore. His head was reeling, analyzing every sentence the creature said for hidden meanings or warnings he might have missed.
And then to the tiny washbasin in the corner, where he splashed cold water onto his face. The shock of it returned him to the physical world. The water was real. His reflection in the tiny mirror above it was real.
But the encounter in the white space felt real too…
He quickly put on his training attire. While he laced his boots, he couldn't help but rewind the conversation in his head.
Factions. Ancient and new. One which would control me, one which would protect me.
If the meeting had not been imaginary, if it wasn't just some product of the stress brought on by the radical changes in his life, then his life was already caught up in battles he had no clue about. Powers were moving around him, deciding things that involved him, and he was entirely unaware of their purpose or nature.
What if you choose neither?
That question had been the most important thing the creature had ever said. It suggested agency, the ability to make his own path even as powerful hands wanted to claim or protect him.
He finished getting dressed and stood there for an instant in the center of his small room. The photo on his desk had caught his eye, still face down where he had left it. He considered flipping it over, taking a look at Shion's face, but hesitated.
Maybe this is all related. Maybe Shion's vanishing had not been by accident.
If Shion had been taken because of his connection to Itsuki, because some group had taken an interest in Itsuki's power.
He pushed the thought down. There was no evidence of that link. What he needed was more knowledge, but to whom could he go? Who in Zenkai Dojo would even hear him out if he tried to tell them what had occurred?
In the end, he came to the conclusion that movement was better than stagnation. He would get to the training fields early, practice his forms, try to concentrate himself through action.
He walked out his door and into the hallway, moving softly not to wake his dorm-mates. The hallways were lit dimly with Essence-powered lanterns that hung gently against the wood.
From this moment forward, every choice that you make will be influenced by forces that are beyond your eyes.
He reached the front of the dormitory and pushed the thick wooden door out of his way. The air was crisp and cool, heavy with the scent of mountain pine and something else, possibly wildflowers, or the sweet smell of condensed Essence from the springs. The sky was beginning to lighten in the east, coloring the horizon with deep blues and purples.
The training grounds stretched out before him, mostly empty but not entirely so. A few of the other early birds were already busy. A girl exercising with vigor bolts, each one tracing lines of light through the air. A boy whose movement left brief afterimages, as though he was moving faster than the eye could fully track.
Advanced learners. Probably Tier 3 or higher, practicing techniques that required the kind of focus best accomplished alone and in silence.
He found himself a spot where he could be alone and began his morning routine. Easy stretches to warm his muscles, breathing exercises to calm his Essence, and then the fundamental forms that every student mastered regardless of his specific ability.
As he worked his way through the forms, he started to question his gift. The capacity to change abstract things, to shift weight to lightness, hardness to softness, heat to cold. It was strange.
Master Amari's reaction during the tests had made that clear…
But what if his singularity just was what made him valuable to these mysterious factions? What if his ability could be used for things he'd never considered, for ends he couldn't even imagine?
They see your ability as an entrance to opportunities which have been denied to them for centuries…
What opportunities? What had been withheld and from whom? The Trueborns controlled the fundamental laws of Vilaris. What could be beyond their power?
When he finished his usual, the sun was well up and more and more students were arriving on the training grounds. Soon it would be time for the first formal classes, for the welcoming assembly when squad assignments would be announced.
But before he could return to the dorm to retrieve his equipment, Itsuki couldn't help but feel that his training had begun already in that snow-filled room at the edge of waking and sleep.
"Your ability is not your destiny. What you choose to do with it, that is your destiny."
Those words would plague him. The creature had presented him with a choice, even if it was surrounded by dark threats and vague specifics. He could let himself be taken by one side or another, could acquiesce to security or control with equal ease.
Or he could forge his own path…
Stepping back toward the dorm, Itsuki made a silent promise to himself. No matter what powers were at work behind the scenes, no matter who wished to control him or protect him, he would be no pawn in their game. He would learn, he would grow stronger, and when his time to choose his destiny came, it would be his and his alone.
Even if it was into the unknown alone.
That was when the air tore apart...
A noiseless tear blazed into existence a few steps ahead of him, a ragged oval of churning darkness that swallowed the morning light. The stench struck him at once, burned metal, with something organic and rotting mixed in that made his stomach turn.
Then it moved through.
It moved on two legs, but it was no Virelian. Bigger than any man he'd ever seen, its body was sheathed in black fur that appeared to draw in light rather than reflect it. Its face too narrow, the jaws lined with ripper teeth, and its eyes turned to look at him with cold, clever intent.
Instinct took over before reason could catch up. Energy gathered at his fingertips as he reached out, feeling for the strange, unseen weight between them. He caught hold of it and drove it forward, slamming it into the creature's chest like a ghostly hammer. The beast stumbled...just for a breath...then steadied again.
Less than a second…
Then it changed.
Bone-achingly fast. Space between them vanished in a blur of motion. Itsuki turned, changing the hardness of ground that held up the monster into something like wet sand, but the beast felt it half-way through its own movement. Its flesh-gripping claw struck at his throat, the edge of air inches from his throat.
He struck at it again, shifting the temperature of its outstretched arm to searing heat. The fur would have caught fire, the flesh beneath would have been burnt. The beast just growled and continued on, unhindered.
A punch hit him in the ribs. The world became skewed and pain exploded across his chest. He fought himself into a standing position, gasping for air, and saw another rift opening up behind the monster.
The monster threw itself, but not to kill. Its actions were too practiced, too planned. It was trying to capture him, not kill him.
His Essence exploded again. Weight, solidity, pressure, heat, all he could work with at once, firing ideas at the creature like bullets. It wasn't enough.
A hand with claws gripped him around the shoulder, crushing. The portal's grasp encircled him, impossible suction, like drowning. He struggled to resist, struggled to shift notions of gravity or momentum or anything that would open free, but the creature's hold was unyielding.
The last Itsuki perceived was the sun breaking over the mountain peaks, coloring the peaks with gold and crimson.
And then suddenly the light disappeared, and all that remained was darkness…