Soren nodded at her.
Without another word, he adjusted his grip on the walking stick Polystar had given him and stepped forward toward the enormous gate.
The mont he crossed an invisible line in the ground, the giant cha stirred.
Its head tilted slightly.
Then its eyes flared to life—dark red, glowing through the thin tallic veil that concealed most of its form.
A thin beam of light swept over Soren.
Then Cynthia.
For a brief mont the air humd with a kind of quiet chanical activity, as if checking records.
Then the machine spoke.
Its voice was deep and tallic, echoing faintly against the massive gate behind it.
"Scanning..."
The red light pulsed once more.
"Identity confird."
"Cadet Soren. First Year."
"Cadet Cynthia. First Year."
A short pause followed.
"Students of the Imperial Soulforge Academy verified."
The cha’s eyes dimd slightly.
Then the gate began to move.
The enormous black doors rumbled as ancient chanisms groaned to life. Slowly, steadily, the two halves parted.
But what lay beyond them was not what Soren expected.
There was no forest.
No mountains.
No battlefield.
Instead—
A reflective surface stretched across the opening.
It looked like water, but impossible.
Perfectly vertical.
The surface shimred gently, rippling like a calm lake suspended upright in the air.
Soren stopped a few steps away from it.
For a mont, he simply stared.
The surface reflected him perfectly.
His shoulders rose and fell as he sighed quietly.
"I can’t believe I’m actually doing this," he murmured.
In the reflection, he saw himself clearly.
Because thet won their matches, he and Cynthia were now dressed in their black tunics.
Despite everything, the uniform looked good on him.
The fabric fitted perfectly along his fra, tightening at the waist and shoulders in a way that made him appear sharper than usual.
The material carried faint Aether Neuralinks woven through the cloth—standard academy enchantnts that regulated temperature, keeping the wearer warm during cold weather and cool when overheated.
It was comfortable.
Almost too comfortable.
Soren looked... presentable.
Handso, even.
If one ignored the way he leaned heavily into the walking stick supporting his weight.
Or the exhaustion in his eyes.
His brown eyes looked older than they should have.
Tired.
Beside him, Cynthia stood just as neatly dressed.
Though in her case, the tunic did little to hide the truth of her body.
Even through the fabric, the shape of her bulging muscles was obvious. The uniform stretched across her arms and shoulders like it had been forced to accept her strength rather than contain it.
Together, they stood there for a brief mont.
Two first-years.
Dressed like warriors.
Soren exhaled once more.
Then he stepped forward.
Cynthia moved with him.
They walked together toward the shimring surface.
One step.
Then another.
And finally—
They passed through it.
The mont their bodies touched the vertical water, the surface rippled outward like a disturbed pond, swallowing them whole.
Behind them, the surface settled once more into perfect stillness.
Silence returned.
A few monts passed.
Then Jo turned toward Sophia.
His fingers moved quickly, forming practiced hand gestures.
"Does that an we are free now?"
"Are we done with father’s debt?"
Sophia looked at him.
For the first ti since arriving at the gate, the tension in her face softened.
She nodded slowly.
"I hope so," she said quietly.
Her eyes lingered on the shimring gate where Soren had disappeared.
"I really hope so."
....
Passing through the shimring surface felt eerily familiar.
For a mont, Soren’s senses blurred, the world stretching and folding in on itself the sa way it had when he first entered the Glass. His stomach tightened as gravity seed to lose aning, his body pulled through sothing that was neither air nor water.
Then—
It ended.
His boots touched solid ground.
Soren inhaled slowly, steadying himself as the strange sensation faded.
It was similar to entering the Glass... but not quite the sa.
There was sothing artificial about it.
Then again, that made sense.
He had heard about the Hunting Grounds before. Every cadet had. It was one of the academy’s most dangerous facilities.
Like the Orientation Garden, it was an artificially created space.
A false Glass.
A controlled imitation of the fractured dinsion where Souls and Eldritch horrors naturally existed.
However, unlike the Orientation Garden—which contained carefully regulated threats designed for training—
The horrors here were real.
Captured.
Dragged out of the Glass by imperial knights and thrown into this place.
It was said that knights of the Empire regularly volunteered for scouting missions within the Glass. Whenever they encountered unusual or interesting creatures, they sotis captured them alive.
And when they did—
They dumped them here.
Which ant the ecosystem inside the Hunting Grounds was chaotic by nature.
The environnt itself was dangerous.
And the eco system—the invisible spiritual feedback that allowed Shades and Eldritch entities to influence their surroundings—was even worse.
In short...
This was a terrible place to be.
Soren and Cynthia stepped forward together as the gateway behind them faded into stillness.
The sky above them looked wrong.
It wasn’t as violently fractured as the sky he rembered from the Glass when he was imprisoned there. The jagged cracks of reality were far fewer.
Still, he could see that great effort had been made to mimic it.
Thin spiderweb fractures ran across the heavens like scars in the sky.
An imitation.
But a convincing one.
The landscape around them stretched into uneven terrain—patches of dark grass, jagged rock formations, and strange vegetation that seed halfway between plant and crystal.
Even the fauna was unusual.
In the distance, Soren spotted small creatures darting through the brush—things that looked vaguely like rabbits, except their bodies shimred with translucent scales and their legs bent in too many places.
The world was clearly engineered.
Artificial.
But disturbingly alive.
Yet none of that held Soren’s attention for long.
His wristwatch suddenly vibrated.
Then again.
Then again.
Then—
Ding.
Ding.
Ding.
The alerts began arriving so rapidly that the device almost struggled to keep up.
Soren frowned and raised his wrist.
His eyes widened as the screen lit up.
[Alert: You have been challenged to Gauntlet by Eric.]
[Alert: You have been challenged to Gauntlet by Gona.]
[Alert: You have been challenged to Gauntlet by Marcary.]
[Alert: You have been challenged to Gauntlet by—]
The ssages kept coming.
One after another.
Relentless.
The list scrolled faster than he could read.
More.
More.
More.
Soren stared in disbelief.
By the ti the alerts slowed, the number had passed seven hundred.
Over seven hundred Gauntlet challenges.
His heart sank.
Then—
He heard it.
Distant at first.
But unmistakable.
Screams.
Shouting.
The sound of many people running.
Soren slowly lifted his head.
Across the landscape, figures were appearing.
Cadets.
Dozens of them.
No—
Hundreds.
They were rushing toward him.
Weapons drawn.
Eyes locked onto him like hunters spotting prey.
And in that mont—
The realization struck him like ice water down his spine.
A trap.
This whole thing had been a trap.
Sophia’s words.
The convenient deal.
The location of the hunt.
Everything.
It was not like it was not expected. But this many?
Soren instinctively turned back toward the entrance.
But the mont he did, he rembered the rule.
The gateway could not be used again until thirty minutes had passed after entry.
It was an academy restriction designed to prevent students from escaping imdiately after provoking dangerous creatures.
Or at least to ensure training occurs.
Which ant—
He was locked inside.
With them.
Soren slowly turned back toward Cynthia.
His grip tightened around the walking stick.
"Get ready to battle."
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