The garden terrace was high-walled and formally tiered, carved from old imperial stone and gilded with whispering vines that bloomed in unnatural rhythm to the ambient mana. It wasn't a place for commoners, or even lesser nobles—it was for imperial-blooded eyes only.
And yet even here, the attention narrowed when she arrived.
The overlooked princess. The unspoken name behind court whispers. The daughter of the Empire's mistake.
She did not enter quietly.
Dressed in subdued grays, her cloak swept behind her like a shadow trimmed in silver. Her guards did not follow. Her steps were unhurried. Measured.
Some bowed. Some hesitated. None greeted.
She paid them no mind.
Her gaze passed them, cut through them, until she reached the edge of the uppermost platform, where a private viewing altar had been installed—bare, unadorned, and oddly unclaimed.
The projection shimmered before her, a disc of layered illusion magic hovering above the slate pedestal—scry-woven, tuned to the primary broadcast feed. Every zone of the entrance trials, filtered and condensed, cycling on rotation.
Already, the weaker had fallen. The field was thinned. The forest no longer looked like a proving ground.
It looked like a war zone.
Priscilla watched without expression. Her hands remained still on her lap, though her eyes missed nothing.
Candidate after candidate appeared. Names were listed below their images—identities, house affiliations, ranks. Some she recognized. Most she didn't.
Others simply survived.
Then the scene shifted again.
At first glance, nothing unusual.
But then the narrator swept in.
The moment she saw him, her breath caught—not visibly, not audibly—but in the silence between heartbeats.
The boy from the terrace. The one who had spoken with riddles and half-smiles. Who had stared down House Crane. Who had made her question what she knew and what she missed.
There he was, standing alone at the center of the broadcast—sword at his side, cloak stirring faintly in the wind, his posture effortless.
The relic tree glowed behind him.
The remains of a Warden-class Beast shimmered on the ground nearby.
A ripple passed through the terrace as Zone Twelve expanded across the viewing disc, the enchanted illusion clarifying with crisp, wide-angle precision.
The moment she appeared—Elayne Cors—the shift in atmosphere was palpable.
Even before her name materialized in glowing script beneath the image, those present had already recognized her by stance alone.
Whispers spread like smoke.
"The Blade of Nothing…"
"She's there. Finally."
From the lower tiers of the terrace, where young nobles and higher-ranked courtiers gathered in hushed, eager clusters, excitement stirred. Several leaned forward, expressions sharpened with interest. Some even smiled—tight, expectant.
Because Elayne was not unknown.
A good assassin, a phantom with blades, that was what they called her.
After all, she looked cool in the first two days and she had dismantled quite a lot of people on her own.
And now, she had finally appeared again.
All eyes—noble and otherwise—turned to the center of the illusion.
Priscilla's gaze never shifted from him.
Her fingers, still folded across her lap, curled ever so slightly.
The air shimmered on the projection. Elayne moved like a blur. Her body vanished beneath distortions. Shadows twisted in impossible arcs. Leaves blew the wrong direction. Every sound played twice.
Her rhythm. Her intent. Her heartbeat.
No flinching. No desperate parries. No drawn-out clashes.
Counter after counter, step after step, she struck with precision and speed honed by years of elite training. Twin daggers curved through angles designed to blind the eye and deceive instinct.
But he flowed between them.
Like water made steel.
Each parry was a question answered. Each deflection a riddle solved.
One noble watching nearby leaned forward, his voice dry with disbelief.
"Did he just counter her footwork?"
Another muttered, "That… shouldn't be possible. No one's ever adjusted to her phase rhythm that fast."
And still, the duel continued.
It wasn't just a fight—it was a dismantling.
He read through every illusion as if it were glass.
When Elayne's last barrage failed, when she pivoted and broke rhythm to vanish outright—
He was already there.
His blade met her mid-air, parried perfectly, and with a whisper of steel on steel, forced her into retreat.
The crowd didn't cheer this time.
They watched in a silence carved from awe.
Even the nobles who had praised Elayne sat stiff, unsure if they were still rooting for her—or simply stunned.
The black-eyed stranger…
He wasn't just fighting her.
And Priscilla saw it all.
The flicker of strain in Elayne's arms. The fatigue that bled into her footwork. The doubt. The hesitation.
All against someone who had not even once drawn on his flame.
She leaned in slightly.
He hadn't flared power. He hadn't declared strength.
But every movement was refined.
His body moved like a thing that had already passed through battle and simply returned to it, perfected.
When Elayne finally disappeared into the woods—fleeing, not repositioning—the reaction was instant.
A mix of disbelief and murmurs rippled across the garden terrace.
Someone whispered, "She ran."
Another said, "Who the hell is that boy?"
As if her silence had become an answer in itself.
She didn't look back at them.
Her gaze remained fixed on the projection.
A quiet, low hum beneath her breath.
He said I'd see interesting things at the academy.
Her fingers twitched faintly.
I didn't expect I'd be watching one of them cut through Arcanis' best before the trials even ended.
The projection shifted again, its hovering glyphs rotating with a soft hum as the arcane scrying system updated its readout. The name appeared—slowly, almost reluctantly—as if the Empire's records had been forced to give it up.
Candidate – Name: Lucavion
Just that single word, etched in gold-light script across the screen.
It hit like a note struck perfectly in the center of silence.
Her lips parted, barely.
The name tasted familiar. Not by memory. But by rhythm. Of course that was his name. No other would have fit the way he carried himself—like a secret that had decided to walk into a battlefield just to see who would flinch first.
Her gaze lingered on the name for a long, still moment.
Footsteps behind her.
"Your Highness," came Idena's voice, respectful but edged with curiosity. "You recognize him?"
Priscilla didn't answer that.
Instead, she kept her eyes forward.
"That's his name," she murmured. "Lucavion."
So little… and yet it explained so much.
Even the name itself seemed out of place. Not fabricated—but unmoored. Like a name one chose for themselves rather than inherited. Something born in shadow. Survived, not given.
Idena stepped closer, her tone dipping lower.
"I will look into him at once."
Priscilla finally turned to her attendant, her voice cool, composed.
Idena bowed her head. "Of course."
But even as she turned to leave, the attendant hesitated.
"…Shall I consider him a threat, Your Highness?"
Priscilla looked back to the screen.
To that still figure now standing beneath the relic tree, coat rustling faintly in the breeze, cat asleep on his shoulder as if the battlefield were a garden stroll.
Then whispered—almost to herself:
"But neither is he harmless."
Then she put her hand on her lips.
"An interesting name. Lucavion."