The return to the Dark Knight Academy was not gentle.

One moment, the second-year students were scattered across Nalim, each of them waking, resting, hiding, walking, fighting, or simply enduring whatever final moments the realm had chosen to give them. The next, blue teleportation Myst swallowed all one hundred of them at once and deposited them inside the Eastern Grand Hall, right back where the assessment had begun seven days ago.

The grand hall looked exactly the same as it had before they left, but the students did not.

All across the wide stone floor, second years appeared in flashes of fading blue light, and almost immediately, the hall filled with heavy breaths, low groans, startled curses, and the sound of bodies nearly giving out now that they were no longer standing inside Nalim. Some students landed on their feet and managed to remain upright through sheer pride.

Others dropped to one knee the instant they arrived, hands braced against the floor as if they had spent the last several hours holding themselves together and could finally stop pretending. A few simply collapsed backward or sat down where they stood, not because they had been defeated, but because their bodies had reached the end of what they were willing to tolerate.

The condition of the students varied, but none looked untouched.

Some were covered in mud from swamps or rivers. Others had dried blood on their uniforms, torn sleeves, cracked armor pieces, scorched fabric, bandaged limbs, and exhausted eyes. Several carried weapons that looked as though they had been through more battles than their owners cared to explain.

One student had half of his chest plate split open. Another had one boot missing entirely, with his foot wrapped in dirty cloth. A group near the far left side of the hall had clearly come from a colder section of Nalim, their clothes stiff and damp, their skin pale from exposure.

Another few smelled faintly of smoke, like they had spent too much time near burning trees or had been responsible for burning them in the first place.

Yet despite the battered state of everyone present, there was also something strangely alive in the hall.

They had survived.

That realization sat underneath the exhaustion, underneath the pain, underneath the shell-shocked expressions some students still carried from what they had faced.

A few turned immediately toward friends, calling names across the hall to make sure they had returned. Others pulled classmates into tired embraces, laughed weakly at the sight of familiar faces, or began comparing injuries with the kind of humor only people who had barely made it through something awful could manage.

Some students spoke in low voices about where they had landed, what kind of demons they had encountered, how many extraction points they had seen but refused to take, and how close they had come to being pulled out by force.

Within all of that, Liam and Charlotte stood near each other, having arrived together from the hollow chamber inside the outcrop.

Liam remained upright despite the lingering ache in his body, his posture calm and controlled even though his condition still reflected the punishment he had endured.

His tank top was torn, his arms still carried faint marks, and although most of his visible wounds had closed, the bruising and stiffness in his movements showed that he was far from fully recovered.

Charlotte, meanwhile, looked far better than most students around them, which was both impressive and misleading. Her clothes were worn and slightly dirtied, her curls were loose around her shoulders, and there were faint traces of exhaustion beneath her eyes, but compared to some of the others, she looked almost unfairly energetic.

She took in the hall, looked around at the groaning, limping, half-collapsed students, and hummed softly.

"Wow," she said, her voice carrying that familiar ease as if they had just returned from an inconvenient trip rather than a seven-day survival assessment. "Everyone looks half-dead from this little assessment."

Liam turned his head slowly and stared at her.

Charlotte felt his gaze and looked back at him without the slightest shame. "What?"

"Little assessment?" Liam asked calmly.

"Yes," Charlotte said with a bright, satisfied smile. "Little. Tiny. Cute, even."

Liam continued staring at her.

Charlotte waved a hand dismissively. "Don’t look at me like that. We are done with it now, which means I get to call it whatever I want. That’s one of my rewards for surviving."

Liam said nothing to that, mostly because arguing with Charlotte over her choice of words sounded like a waste of energy.

Instead, his attention shifted toward the nearby students. His eyes moved across the hall quietly, taking in the condition of the class, the injuries, the fatigue, and the subtle differences in how each person carried themselves now compared to before the assessment.

Some looked shaken. Some looked relieved. Some looked like they had aged more in seven days than they had in months. That alone told him Nalim had done exactly what the academy intended. It had stripped away comfort and forced every student to face themselves without structure.

Charlotte, meanwhile, had moved on to a far more personal concern.

"How long are they planning to keep us standing here?" she complained, rolling one shoulder as she glanced toward the stage. "Because I am itching for a warm bath. A proper one. Not a river. Not cold water. Not some survival nonsense. A real, warm, cozy bath where I can pretend this whole place never existed."

Before Liam could respond, a familiar voice called from nearby.

"You look awfully energetic for someone who just came back from Nalim."

Both Liam and Charlotte turned toward the voice.

Dylan Wellington was making his way toward them from the crowd, and though his eyes still carried that familiar jovial glint, the rest of him looked like he had been personally chewed up by the realm and spat back out out of pity.

His blond hair was messier than usual, with twigs and ash caught in some places. His academy training attire was torn at the shoulder and stained with dirt and smoke, and there were bandages wrapped around one arm and across part of his side. His face looked thinner, or perhaps that was simply exhaustion dragging his features down. He had the look of someone who had not eaten properly, slept properly, or enjoyed a single peaceful moment in days.

Charlotte looked him over and immediately smiled. "And you look awfully pitiful."

Dylan chuckled, though the sound came out weaker than usual, as if laughing too hard might actually make him collapse.

"Thank you, Charlotte. Your kindness is as warm and comforting as a slap to the face."

"You’re welcome."

Dylan stopped in front of them and leaned slightly forward with his hands on his knees for a second before forcing himself upright again.

"Seriously though," he said, squinting at her. "How do you look that alive after seven days in that hellhole?"

Charlotte’s smile sharpened into something immediately dangerous.

Liam noticed it and already knew he would regret whatever came next.

"Oh, that’s simple," Charlotte said sweetly, turning her head slightly toward Liam with exaggerated fondness. "It’s all thanks to my dear Liam. He took such proper care of me throughout the entire assessment."

Dylan blinked.

Liam’s eyes narrowed slightly.

Charlotte continued before either of them could stop her.

"He found us a hidden little shelter, cooked for me, made sure I had food, protected me from scary demons, dried my hair, and even let me sleep peacefully while he stood guard like my personal dark prince. Honestly, it was very touching. Very intimate. And very unforgettable."

Dylan’s mouth slowly fell open.

Liam looked at Charlotte with the tired expression of someone who had expected nonsense but still found himself disappointed by the exact flavor of it.

Charlotte placed one hand over her chest dramatically. "At one point, I thought to myself, ’Charlotte, this is probably what it feels like to be treasured.’"

"That is not what happened," Liam said calmly.

Dylan looked between them quickly. "Wait. Wait. Wait. You two were together for the assessment?"

"More or less," Charlotte said.

"And he cooked for you?"

"Beautifully."

"And protected you?"

"Heroically."

"And dried your hair?"

"With shocking tenderness."

Liam stared at her.

Charlotte ignored him entirely.

Dylan looked as though something inside him had just broken.

"I spent two days hiding in a tree hole eating bitter roots and whatever animal I could shoot without getting hunted by its entire family," he said, voice full of exhausted betrayal. "I almost got eaten by something that looked like a spider and a dead grandma had a child. Then I fell into a ravine. Then I set half a forest on fire accidentally. And you got domestic survival luxury with Liam?"

"Yes," Charlotte said without hesitation. "Because I deserve darling treatment."

Dylan placed a hand against his chest. "I would have traded places with you in a heartbeat."

"Of course you would," Charlotte said, lifting her chin slightly. "But not everyone is blessed enough to be me."

Liam finally spoke again before Charlotte could decorate the story any further. "Not everything she is saying is true."

Charlotte gasped as though wounded. "Liam."

"Our situation was more complicated than that," Liam continued, ignoring her performance. "And it was mostly nothing like what she is making it sound like."

Charlotte turned toward Dylan immediately and pointed at Liam as if presenting evidence of betrayal. "See? This is what he does. He lies through omission and then acts calm so people believe him. He doesn’t want to tell our dear friend the truth about our lovely time in Nalim."

Dylan looked between them again, clearly too tired to properly decide who to believe but still entertained enough to keep listening.

Liam stared at Charlotte for a long moment.

Then he looked toward the stage and thought, with rare sincerity, that he wished the academy authorities would show up already so the hall could return to something resembling peace and quiet.

As if the stars above had taken pity on him for once, the doors near the far corner of the stage opened.