The academy breathed differently at night.
During the day, it felt crowded full of fear, whispers, hurried footsteps, people pretending they understood what was happening to the world. But at night, when exhaustion dragged everyone into shallow sleep, the building exhaled.
Walls creaked. Pipes hummed. Somewhere far below, water dripped steadily, like a clock counting toward something no one could see.
Rei lay awake on the cold classroom floor, one arm beneath his head, eyes fixed on the cracked ceiling tiles above him.
He hadn't slept since the battle.
Every time he closed his eyes, the same image surfaced.
Azeroth, standing beneath the broken moon.
Golden eyes calm.
Voice steady.
One of your teammates will betray you.
Rei exhaled slowly.
He didn't want to think about it.
But his mind didn't care what he wanted.
Faces came uninvited.
Kai sitting alone earlier, hands trembling as he tried to regulate the lightning that still leaked from his fingers when he was tired. A boy carrying guilt far heavier than his age.
Zeke laughing after the fight, knuckles still dented, eyes alight like he was finally alive. Too eager. Too comfortable with destruction.
Suki fire dancing lazily across her palm as she pretended nothing hurt her anymore. Smiling too easily for someone who had watched her brother burn.
Rena—quiet, distant, her silence ability instinctively activating whenever she was anxious. A survivor of something Rei didn't fully understand yet.
And Aira
Rei shut his eyes.
"No," he whispered into the dark.
The thought felt wrong the moment it surfaced. Almost insulting. Aira had been with him before the academy fell, before the world cracked open. She knew him when he was weak. When he was afraid.
If she was capable of betrayal, then nothing in this world made sense.
A faint pressure pulsed against his chest.
The mark.
Not painful.
Aware.
Like a second heartbeat.
Rei sat up slowly, pressing his palm against it. The warmth beneath his skin responded, steady and patient.
"You don't get a vote," he murmured.
The mark didn't fade.
A sound echoed faintly through the corridor outside.
Footsteps.
Rei froze.
They were quiet too controlled to be accidental. Not panicked. Not wandering.
Intentional.
He stood silently, suppressing his aura until even the mark dulled. Barefoot, he stepped into the hallway.
The academy was dim, emergency lights lining the floor in thin amber strips. Shadows stretched long and distorted along the walls.
The footsteps came again.
Further down the hall.
Moving away.
Rei followed.
Every sense sharpened. Every instinct awake.
The figure ahead moved with familiarity, avoiding broken tiles, stepping around debris without hesitation. Whoever it was knew this place. Had walked these halls before.
The footsteps stopped near the end of the corridor.
A door creaked softly.
The archive room.
Rei frowned.
No one went there. The archives held old academy records pre-awakening files, restricted research, sealed reports from before the world started unraveling. Even teachers avoided it.
Rei approached slowly.
The door was ajar.
Light spilled from inside.
A single lamp.
He pushed the door open just enough to see.
And stopped.
Aira stood inside.
She was alone.
Stacks of old files surrounded her, spread across the long wooden table. Papers, books, data slates some cracked, some scorched, some stamped with faded warning seals.
She didn't look startled.
She looked focused.
Rei's heart tightened.
"Aira?"
She flinched not in fear, but in surprise and turned toward him.
"Oh," she said quietly. "You're awake."
Rei stepped inside, closing the door behind him.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
Aira hesitated.
For just a fraction of a second.
"I couldn't sleep," she said. "So I thought… I'd read."
Rei glanced at the files.
"These aren't novels."
Aira gave a faint smile. "You always notice too much."
She gestured to the chair across from her. "Sit. I'll explain."
Rei didn't sit.
"Aira."
She sighed, rubbing her eyes.
"Fine," she said. "I was hoping to finish first."
"Finish what?"
She slid one of the files across the table toward him.
Rei picked it up.
The cover was old, edges frayed, the academy seal nearly worn away.
CLASSIFIED
PROJECT RIFT-SUCCESSION
STATUS: TERMINATED
Rei's fingers tightened.
"What is this?"
Aira met his eyes.
"It's about you."
The room felt smaller.
Rei opened the file.
Diagrams. Notes. Genetic scans. Energy readings that made his stomach twist.
"This this isn't possible," he said slowly.
Aira's voice was calm. Too calm.
"The academy didn't just discover Riftborn," she said. "They were trying to recreate one."
Rei looked up sharply.
"What?"
"Decades ago," she continued, "long before awakenings went public, certain factions realized something was coming. Not an invasion. Not a disaster. A transition."
She tapped the page gently.
"They believed the world would need anchors. Individuals capable of surviving reality fractures without losing their minds."
Rei's throat went dry.
"They experimented," Aira said. "On bloodlines. On compatibility. On resonance."
Rei flipped the page.
His name wasn't there.
But the data matched him.
Exactly.
"This says the subject was never born," he said. "That the project failed."
Aira didn't answer immediately.
She stood, walking past him to the window. Moonlight outlined her silhouette.
"They thought it failed," she said quietly. "Because the child disappeared."
Rei turned slowly.
"Aira… what are you saying?"
She faced him again.
"I'm saying you weren't found by the academy," she said. "You escaped it."
The words landed without force.
No explosion.
Just a deep, unsettling weight.
"That's not true," Rei said. "I remember my childhood."
Aira nodded. "So do I."
Rei froze.
She took a breath.
"I was there," she said. "Not as a friend. Not at first."
Rei stared at her.
"I was assigned to observe you," Aira continued. "To make sure you developed normally. To report if the rift manifested."
The room was silent.
"You're lying," Rei said.
"I wish I was."
Rei's mind raced.
"You were a child too."
"Yes."
"They used you?"
"Yes."
She met his gaze, eyes steady.
"I stayed," she said. "Long after the project was declared dead. Long after Azeroth took over."
Rei's pulse spiked.
"Azeroth?"
Aira nodded.
"He wasn't always what he is now," she said. "He was part of the oversight council. The one who believed the Riftborn should choose their own fate."
Rei clenched his fists.
"You knew him."
"I did."
"And you didn't tell me?"
Aira's voice cracked.
"I was afraid," she admitted. "That if you knew… you'd stop being human."
The mark pulsed sharply.
Rei staggered back a step.
"So when he said" Rei swallowed. "When he said one of my teammates would betray me…"
Aira shook her head.
"No," she said quickly. "Rei, I would never"
The lights flickered.
Every file on the table rustled at once.
Rena's silence field brushed against the door.
Rei turned sharply.
"Rena?"
The door creaked open.
Rena stood there, eyes wide, hand pressed to her mouth.
"I didn't mean to listen," she said. "But the walls… they carry sound differently at night."
Aira's face went pale.
"How much did you hear?"
"Enough."
Zeke's heavy footsteps followed moments later.
Kai appeared behind him.
Suki last.
All of them silent.
All of them looking at Aira.
Rei felt like the ground had vanished beneath him.
Suki broke the silence first.
"So," she said softly, fire flickering uncertainly at her fingertips, "you were spying on him since childhood."
Aira swallowed.
"I stopped reporting years ago," she said. "I chose him. I chose all of you."
Zeke crossed his arms.
"Convenient timing."
Kai shook his head.
"Aira wouldn't"
Rena spoke quietly.
"The betrayal Azeroth mentioned," she said, eyes on Aira, "has already happened."
Rei felt sick.
"Aira," he said. "Did Azeroth contact you recently?"
She hesitated.
Just once.
Rei noticed.
"Yes," she whispered.
The room went cold.
"When?" Zeke demanded.
"Tonight."
Rei's chest tightened.
"What did he say?"
Aira's voice trembled.
"He said… the crucible has begun."
Rei closed his eyes.
Azeroth's words echoed again.
You're learning faster than I expected.
Aira stepped forward.
"I didn't tell him anything," she said desperately. "I swear. He already knew."
Rei opened his eyes.
"And what did you tell him?"
Aira looked at Rei.
"I told him," she said softly, "that if he tries to turn you into a god… I'll kill him myself."
Silence.
Then
The mark burned.
Not painfully.
Warningly.
Rei gasped, dropping to one knee.
The floor beneath him cracked.
Everyone froze.
Outside, the sky rippled.
A distant roar echoed across the city deep, ancient, awakening.
Rena whispered, voice shaking.
"That wasn't Azeroth."
Suki stared out the window.
"That came from below."
Zeke clenched his fists.
"So what the hell did he wake up?"
Rei pushed himself upright, breathing hard.
The mark glowed brighter than ever.
And for the first time—
It wasn't responding to Azeroth.
It was responding to something else.
Something that had heard Aira's threat.
Something that had been waiting.
Rei looked at his team.
"At dawn," he said quietly, "we leave the city."
Kai blinked.
"Why?"
Rei stared at the horizon.
"Because whatever just moved…"
He swallowed.
"It knows my name."
The academy shook again.
And far beneath the earth
Something smiled.
---
Chapter 14 ends.