Morning.

I was outside before the sun had fully decided what it wanted to be.

Push-ups first, one twenty. My arms started complaining after the hundredth, but I ignored it and finished.

Then the run.

Forest path, long loop through the ridge and back. Around forty minutes give or take. The mana breathing ran the entire time without me thinking about it.

By the time I got back, my clothes were soaked and the sun was up properly.

I stretched, drank water, and started on the magic.

Fireball, Wind Blade, Mana Pulse. Basics first, not for improvement, just to keep the channels warm. Skipping them always made things worse later.

After that I moved into control work.

A small flame held in my palm without flicker, kept steady for a full minute while I adjusted output in fractions instead of bursts. Wind Blade after that, not released, just shaped and reshaped in front of me until the edge stopped feeling unstable. Mana Pulse came next, tuned repeatedly until the spread stayed consistent even when I shifted stance.

Hell’s Fire once, thirty seconds controlled, then released. The Silver Heart didn’t react much, so I didn’t push it further.

Vector Authority across the clearing. Five times gravity, held for three minutes while I worked sword forms underneath it. The pressure hit differently each time. My stance kept breaking in small ways, hips first, then shoulders, then balance. I corrected it without stopping, repeating the same movements until the body stopped resisting the weight and started accepting it as normal.

At three times gravity the speed came back immediately, but the control got messy again ...so I alternated between both states until the transition itself stopped feeling like a disruption.

Aether Step came next. Sixty meters up, hold, drop, and go again before recovery finished. I pushed the timing tighter this time, cutting the gap between landing and the next activation until it almost collapsed. Height wasn’t the problem anymore. Timing was. The moment the body expected rest, the technique wanted to fail. I forced it past that point until the reaction stopped happening automatically.

I repeated it until the climb and descent stopped feeling like separate actions.

Sword work after that. Another hour.

Basic forms first, repetition without variation. Then counter-forms against imaginary pressure shifts. Then movement while already displaced, correcting balance mid-step instead of after landing. The blade work got worse before it improved. I kept it going anyway until the mistakes became predictable instead of random.

Then I wrapped my hand.

Small cut on the left palm, same place as always. I had gotten good at it deep enough to bleed steadily, not enough to matter beyond that.

I walked into the forest.

The path showed up when the light dropped under the canopy. It always did. I had stopped thinking about it.

The cave came into view and I stepped inside.

Warmth hit immediately. I went to the north corner and crouched.

Let my hand bleed onto the stone.

The blood disappeared the moment it touched the floor. Not soaked in, not dried, just gone. Same as always.

I stayed until the dizziness started to creep in. Then I drank from the pond water bottle. The weakness passed quicker than before.

I looked at the floor.

"I still don’t know what you’re doing with this," I said.

The cave grew warmer for a moment.

I sat back against the wall.

"The academy," I said. "Two months left, roughly."

"The entrance exam covers mana cultivation, combat application, and theory. The first two are fine. The theory is going to be annoying."

I exhaled slowly.

"The history here was more detailed than I expected."

"A-Class placement is separate from general entry. Silver-grade mana heart minimum, combat standard above most second-years. I meet it on paper. The exam itself might not care about that."

"There’s someone I need to find there," I said. "Someone I’ve been thinking about since before I came here."

I looked at the opposite wall.

"Elian Voss. Son of a minor baron from the western border. No background worth mentioning. Barely relevant in most people’s eyes."

I let the thought sit for a moment.

"By the end of the story, he becomes the strongest in the world. Maybe the strongest ever. It takes years, and most of that time is spent with people underestimating him."

I leaned my head back.

"He has a Hero Halo. He doesn’t have to push for things. They tend to align around him. You can’t really fight something like that directly. You just don’t get in front of it."

The air in the cave shifted a little.

"I need to find him before others do. Before people who try to control outcomes get to him first."

...

"To use him." 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

I stopped there for a moment.

"At least that’s what I keep telling myself. The ones the story ignores keep showing up around me."

Nothing from the cave.

Not that I had expected an answer.

I stood up after a while, wrapped my hand again, and left.

***

Somewhere else entirely, a girl woke up.

She sat on the edge of the bed and waited for the room to make sense.

It didn’t.

Stone walls. High ceiling. Furniture that was too good for anywhere she had ever slept before. A chair with a dress she didn’t recognize.

She stood.

Her legs held.

She crossed the room and stopped in front of the mirror.

The face looking back at her was a face.

That was the problem.

She leaned closer.

The reflection matched her exactly.

She pressed a hand to the glass.

"Who are you?" she whispered.

...

"I was with Ren."

No answer came.

Nothing in the room responded.

Outside, a bird called once and stopped.

She stayed there, staring at herself, waiting for anything to come back.

Nothing did.