The Grand Hall of House Kiron was a giant, awe inspiring chamber designed to make one feel small. The ceiling soared to such impossible heights that it was lost in an endless shadow. Supported by giant pillars carved into the likeness of long dead prophets and High Archons.
Thousands of students, dressed in grey stood in quiet, organized lines, separated by year and then sorted alphabetically. A wide central aisle, carpeted in a faded Kiron gray, stretched from the towering entrance doors all the way to a raised stage with a dais in the middle at the far end of the hall where the house leadership would soon appear.
The silence was heavy. Selection was soon to be on them. Or so it seemed.
Creed found his assigned spot, near the back of the third years. He shuffled into place, and the student standing next to him, a boy named Fendrel, took a deliberate step away. Creed didn't need to see his face to know the expression it held.
Then, a final, cruel twist of fate, courtesy of either a bureaucratic oversight or a planned detail by HERO, they had after all detailed the student formations with complete accuracy.
Iris was standing right next to him.
She must have slipped into her spot moments before he did. She stood straight, her eyes locked on the dais. She gave no sign to acknowledge his presence. It was as if he were truly invisible. The silence between them was very much intentional.
He could smell the faint scent of the soap she used, a smell that brought a fresh wave of unwelcome memories. He could have reached out and touched her arm. The distance was a form of torture.
The quiet of the hall amplified his isolation. Making him feel lonely even with his former best friend less than an arm's length away from him. He focused on the rhythm of his breathing in an attempt to calm himself.
The silence stretched on only interrupted by the occasional cough or scuff of shoes. Then, a sound impossibly loud in the quiet was heard. The deep groaning of the heavy bronze hinges as the towering doors at the far end of the central aisle swung inward.
First came the house administrators, their formal robes a deeper shade of grey, embroidered with the silver insignia of their rank. Their movements were practiced, fanning out and taking their places to the sides of the stage.
Then, he appeared.
Archon Valerius.
He moved with an unnaturally fluid grace, seeming to glide rather than walk. His slender frame was covered in the dark gold robes of a full Archon, detailed with silver embroidery that shimmered in the light. His hair an almost luminous white, falling down his back, contrasting the colors of his robes. His features were exceptionally fine, almost delicate and femalelike. Yet his presence radiated an undeniable aura that betrayed any signs of delicacy.
As Valerius passed, students tensed. Heads bowed, eyes respectfully looked down and the energy in the hall shifted. Valerius's eyes, black and unsettling, swept across the students missing nothing. They were intelligent, terrifyingly so, yet they were devoid of any warmth or even hints of human emotion. It felt as though he could see straight into you, seeing every flaw and weakness.
Creed's heart began to pound harder against his ribs. His right hand hidden from view beneath the fabric of his uniform, tightened its grip on the smooth cool sphere hidden there. The Eye.
'He is a rot, Creed. The embodiment of this corrupt system. They speak of Veridia's divine order, yet they only nurture chaos and injustice in their hearts. He, above all, must be shown the truth. He, above all, must pay for what they've allowed to happen. For what they have done to you.'
Valerius's gaze in its scan of the thousands of faces, paused on Creed for a fraction of a second. Their eyes met. There was no discernible expression or emotion in them, just a void. And then he moved on, continuing his silent walk towards the dais.
But through that small connection a spark ignited inside Creed. The moment was coming. It was here.
Archon Valerius reached the foot of the stage, he stood mere arm's lengths from where Creed was standing. The Archon's aura was a physical weight, a pressure on the air that silenced everyone.
For Creed, it was the culmination of weeks of HEROs whispers, of his own resentment, of a belief that a single act of defiance could unravel Verdia's tapestry of fate. This was it. Now or never.
With a choked cry that sounded more like an animal sound than a word, Creed broke from the line. The formation broke around him.
"This is for what you let happen!" he shouted, his voice cracking "For all of us! This is for–!"
His heroic charge lasted for a single step. His own feet, clumsy with adrenaline, had betrayed him. His ankle rolled and with a grunt he went down. Hard. There was no chance to recover his balance, just a humiliating fall to the marble floor. The impact jarred his teeth and sent a sharp pain through his palms as he tried to break his fall.
The black sphere, The Eye, the Holy Weapon given to him by HERO, flew from his hand. Time seemed to stretch. He saw the Eye fly through the air, behind it the shocked faces of thousands of students. It didn't just land, it hit the polished floor with a crack that echoed in the hall. The sphere cracked, with one of the strange markings on it now broken in half.
For a single second nothing happened.
And then the bomb didn't hiss. It just went. A silent boom of chaos, a sphere of black and red fire erupted from the bomb's broken body, expanding outward with an impossible speed to incinerate everything.
In the exact same fraction of a second that the bomb went off, the world stopped.
The eruption of black and red fire froze. The confused faces of students witnessing his not so heroic charge now frozen in place. The ensuing stampede never came.
The explosion itself hung in the air, a flower of destruction caught in mid-bloom, its petals becoming solidified shockwaves. It was maybe ten feet across, Its edge was just inches from the nearest frozen students. Inches from Valerius.
Only the Archon moved.
He let out a soft sigh, a sound that seemed to hold the weariness of centuries. The Archon looked at the blooming flower not with panic but with disappointment.
Then he reached out. His movements were slow and deliberate. He placed his open palm against the edge of the frozen explosion.
And he pushed.
It was like watching a man try to force a storm back into a bottle. For a second, nothing happened. Then, the sphere of dark fire began to compress. He forced the chaos inward, crushing the petals of fire back down, smaller and smaller, until it was all being crammed back into the single point from which it had been born.
The sphere reformed around the monstrous energy It'd contained, the material knitting itself back together. It glowed red, before slowly fading back to what it once was.
It hit Creed then, this man hadn't just disarmed a bomb. He'd let it explode, caught the blast in his hand, and then calmly told it to get back in its box. The gap between Creed and someone like Valerius wasn't just a matter of power or skill. It was everything. Creed was a bug, and Valerius was the boot, the sky, and the whole damn universe.
Valerius straightened up, the now harmless bomb held in his hand. Then, he turned and walked away. He walked down the grey carpet, his brilliant white hair flowing in the frozen hall. He passed right through the great bronze doors at the entrance, and then he was gone.
Minutes passed. Or maybe it was an eternity. Creed lay there, a prisoner in his own body. What now? What was the punishment for a screw up this massive? Was this it? To be left as a conscious statue forever?
He tried to scream, to beg, to apologize, but no sound could get past his frozen throat. Despair started to close in.
The silence was the worst part. It was so complete it felt like a physical pressure crushing him from all sides. He was alone. Totally alone. In a world that had just stopped existing for what seemed like everyone but him and the god-like Archon who had just left.
He squeezed his eyes shut, then forced them open again, afraid that if he kept them closed for too long, he might never see again.
Just as he felt his mind truly start to crumble, he heard it.
Soft footsteps.
Impossible. But they were there. Valerius.
The Archon came back into the Grand hall, moving just as smoothly as before. His hands were empty now, the bomb was gone. He walked back through the grey carpet, his eyes fixed on Creed. He stopped right over him, a tall silhouette against the frozen light.
Creed stared up, his eyes the only thing capable of movement. His heart beating hard against his ribs. Valerius's beautiful face seemed to soften. Or something like it. It was an expression that Creed could only process as pity. Or was it disappointment? Nonetheless It wasn't the rage he'd expected. This was worse. It was the quiet sadness of a god looking at a flawed creation.
Valerius didn't speak. No big words of condemnation. No epic pronouncements of his doom. Instead, with a speed that didn't fit his calm, sad look, he moved.
He delivered a swift, sharp kick to the side of Creed's head.
Stars exploded behind Creed's eyes. A single instant of searing pain flooded him, and then… nothing.
Just his luck