The examination hall was a cathedral of white marble, filled with the scratching of a thousand quills. Mordecai sat at a heavy oak desk, his hands still trembling slightly from the near-disaster at the testing stone.
A proctor tapped a staff on the floor, and the exam papers shimmered into existence on every desk. Mordecai flipped the first page, expecting basic math or mana theory.
Instead, his blood ran cold.
Section I: The Scourge of the Continent – The Dark Magic Tower.
'Are you fucking kidding me?' Mordecai thought, staring at the bold ink. 'The first question is literally "Describe the ritualistic depravity of the Tower's Initiation." They aren't testing my intelligence; they're testing my loyalty to their "Light".'
He looked at the second question: Explain why the Necromantic Arts are a violation of the Natural Order and the Soul's Sanctity.
Mordecai felt a bitter laugh bubbling in his throat. He remembered the Initiation. He was six years old, shivering in a damp cellar with twenty other orphans. They hadn't been "depraved." They had been hungry. A High Elder had walked in, tossed a single loaf of bread on the floor, and told them that only those who could move the shadows would eat.
He remembered the boy next to him, a kid named Leo who shared his thin blanket. Leo didn't make it past the third year. He hadn't been a "violation of the soul"; he'd just been a tired child who ran out of mana.
'If I write the truth—that the Tower is just a factory for survival—they'll know I was there. If I write what they want to hear, I'm spitting on the only people who ever knew my name.'
He gripped the quill so hard the wood creaked. He looked around the room. The noble students were scribbling away with disgusted looks on their faces, probably writing flowery prose about how "evil" dark mages were.
'I have to do it. If I don't pass this, I'm back on the streets, and the Tower's hunters will pick up my scent in hours. I have to lie. Again.'
He dipped the quill in the ink and started writing.
"The Dark Magic Tower is a cancer upon the world, where the innocent are twisted into monsters..."
Every word felt like swallowing glass. He wrote about the "horrors" of soul-binding, even though he knew the Tower used it to keep dying mages alive. He wrote about the "madness" of Necromancy, while the [Primordial Hollow] throbbed in his chest as if offended by the insult.
He flashed back to his mentor, a scarred old man who had taught him how to stitch a shadow back together. The man had lost his legs in a border war and used Necromancy just to walk. To these Academy pricks, that man was a demon. To Mordecai, he was the guy who gave him an extra bowl of soup when the winters got too cold.
'I'm sorry, Old Man,' Mordecai thought, his eyes stinging. 'I'm selling out everyone I ever knew just to sit in this fancy chair.'
By the time he reached the final question, his hand was cramped and his soul felt filthy.
Question 50: In the event of encountering a Dark Seed, what is the primary duty of an Aetherius student?
Mordecai didn't even hesitate. He wrote the answer they wanted in big, bold letters.
"Report them to the Holy Inquisition for immediate purification."
'Purification. That's a fancy word for burning me alive,' he thought, tossing the quill down. 'If any of these kids knew who was sitting next to them, this room would be a bloodbath.'
The proctor called for the papers. As Mordecai handed his in, the blue screen flickered back to life.
[Trait Triggered: Deception]
[Intelligence Stat has increased by 1]
'Great. I'm officially a smarter liar. Why is my life like this?'