The city of Elordia sparkled beneath the morning sun, its spires catching the light like a thousand unsheathed blades.
The air hummed with a soft, almost imperceptible tingle of magic, gentle and ever-present, like background music to a world that ran on mana and miracles.
Floating carriages zipped between towers, powered by arc cores, gliding silently through the air. Merchants shouted from beneath enchanted awnings. Children dashed across cobbled streets, chasing wind-borne illusions conjured by bored apprentices.
It was a beautiful day, not just because of the weather, but because today was Selection Day.
In the center of the city, rising like a mountain forged by ambition, stood Obsidian Fang Academy.
A jagged fortress of steel, stone, and ancient power, it loomed over Elordia like a god watching its creation. The outer walls alone were taller than most city watchtowers. Inside them lay a maze of training arenas, dueling pits, alchemical towers, libraries, and dungeons, each one older than the nation that funded them.
Obsidian Fang wasn't just an academy.
It was the academy.
Every kingdom, duchy, and noble house across the continent sent their best here. And today, for the first time in a decade, the gates were open to all, commoners, wanderers, even the landless. If they had potential, they were free to walk through its gates.
And so, the outer plaza was overflowing.
Thousands of students packed the marble square in front of the main gates, their faces shining with hope and nerves. A low murmur of anxious voices filled the air, mixed with the faint scent of nervous sweat. Some whispered spells under their breath. Others flexed beneath freshly polished armor. Most just stared up, wide-eyed, at the structure that might shape or break their futures.
It was truly a sight to behold.
Then, without warning, the sky shimmered.
A massive glowing glyph spiraled into the air, and from its center, a holographic projection of an old man materialized, bearded, stern, draped in robes that shimmered with Archive coding lines.
He didn't need to open his mouth. A spell carried every word straight into the students' minds, a strange echo ringing in their heads.
"Candidates of the 179th Generation," the man said. "Welcome to Obsidian Fang Academy."
Silence fell instantly.
"I am Vice Headmaster Revek, and I will be overseeing your entrance examinations this year. From this moment, your names are etched into the records of the Archive. Your failures and victories alike will shape the world to come."
"You are not children anymore. You are blades in a forge."
"Some of you will rise to lead nations. Others will die nameless on battlefields. Both outcomes are acceptable."
His eyes, though made of light, still seemed to pierce through the crowd, sending shivers through anyone who dared meet them.
"You will eat discipline, breathe pain, and bleed for progress. If that doesn't sound appealing, you're welcome to leave now. Preferably by foot, and not crying."
"Otherwise, welcome to your first step toward power. Because that's all that matters in this world."
With that final statement, the glyph vanished. The projection faded.
The plaza erupted into cheers.
Some students pumped fists. Others hugged. One girl fainted from pure excitement.
But not everyone was celebrating.
At the back of the assembly, slouching slightly with a half-lidded stare, stood a lone student in dark armor, ill-fitting, unpolished, clearly secondhand.
He scratched the back of his neck and muttered to himself
"So this is really happening, huh?"
But there was no response.
Just a golden screen blinking faintly right next to his head.
[Daily Quest Pending…]
["Smile at three strangers."]
[Failure: Induced nausea for 6 hours.]
Kael sighed.
He wasn't excited. He wasn't scared.
He was just… tired.
✦✦✦✦✦✦
Kael hadn't asked for a second life.
He hadn't even wanted to wake up from the first one.
He had died a brave and noble death....
Cough cough.
....or so he would claim.
But anyways, he was prepared to spend eternity in slumber.
But the universe, or something cruel pretending to be it, had other plans.
He remembered the fall, if it could be called that.
A drop into nothing, no wind, no light.
Just a quiet pressure, like something was stretching his soul thin, pulling it into something much larger and far more complicated than it had any right to be.
And then, without ceremony, he woke up.
'This… doesn't look like a hospital.'
The sky was foreign.
The ground was damp and smelled of earth and something faintly sweet.
But the most peculiar thing about the situation was the blinking screen floating directly in front of his face.
[Archive Binding in Progress…]
[Analyzing Host…]
[Bloodline irregularity detected.]
[Initializing with adjusted protocol.]
Kael sat up slowly, his eyes narrowing.
[Primary Objective Assigned:]
["Gain Admission to Obsidian Fang Academy."]
[Penalty for Failure: Loss of Function – Left Arm.]
He stared at the screen for a while.
Then at his left arm.
Then back at the screen.
"…Okay...."
[Daily Subtask: Smile at three strangers.]
[Reward: 1 Archive Credit.]
[Penalty: Induced nausea for 6 hours.]
"..."
'Wait a moment...… why do my hands look so small?'
✦✦✦✦✦✦
"Alright everyone, time to get down, we're here."
Kael stirred as the wagon came to a stop.
Other kids his age shuffled off, grabbing bags and stretching their sore legs.
He had wandered for hours after waking up in the middle of nowhere, disoriented and barefoot.
Luckily, some people traveling to the city had found him.
He told them he was lost since technically it wasn't a lie.
"Are you heading for the academy?" someone had asked.
'Academy?'
He then remembered the weird screen saying something about that.
"…Yeah, I'm heading there."
They offered him a ride without questions.
When he reached the back of the wagon, he found it packed with others his age, silent, alert, and full of tension.
'Hope this isn't some kind of child trafficking thing.'
But honestly? He didn't really care.
Neither did he care about the fact that he woke up in the body of a young man after dying in his thirties.
All he really wanted… was to sleep.
When he stepped down from the wagon, what greeted him left him speechless.
They stood on one of the largest bridges he had ever seen.
It was so wide and long that he nearly missed the fact that it was a bridge at all.
Crowds of people flowed toward a towering wall that probably led to a city.
'What the actual fuck.'
The line surprisingly moved quickly.
Soon he stood before a checkpoint guarded by soldiers in armor with massive weapons.
"State your purpose for entering."
Kael blinked. "Uhm… academy, I guess?"
The guard stared at him funnily for a long second, then pointed toward a glowing wall near the checkpoint.
He didn't hesitate since he had seen other people doing it.
He followed the others, walked through the field… and felt something tingle in his spine.
It was a sensation of being pulled, and then, released.
He stumbled into a massive marble plaza teeming with thousands of other youthful faces.
A sea of noise and color, faces and voices.
"Candidates of the 179th Generation......
[Main Task: In Progress.][Subtask Status: 0/3 strangers smiled at.]
His fingers twitched.
"So this is really happening, huh?"
No reply.
Just the soft, constant glow of the screen.
Watching.
Waiting.