After a brief reading session the next morning, Aodhán and Daruk made their way to the oval theater for the exam on Understanding Elemental Affinities (UEA). The hall was already half full when they arrived, but as usual, their seats on the middle row had been reserved, and without hesitation, they headed towards it. They were barely halfway there when Valerie Potts suddenly halted their advance and proceeded to scatter the whole class.

  She placed Aodhán to the far left of the hall, leaving an empty seat between him and Ankaz Urdania, while Daruk was placed on the other side, just behind Grendar, who turned to glare daggers at him.

  Aodhán settled into his seat with a sigh. “Well, there goes my plans to cheat.”

  Aodhán wasn’t really planning to cheat, but he would have felt far more confident about the outcome of this exam if he had been seated with Daruk.

  Ankaz snorted. “Like we can cheat with these agents hanging around.”

  Aodhán turned to stare at the agents in question and scowled. One of them was Agent Cale Everglade, the insight awakened, while the other agent was an unfamiliar woman with metallic gray hair and slightly blue-tinted skin. She was dressed in the usual black suits that most of the agents wore; however, she was barefoot, and Aodhán noticed gray metallic veins tracing her feet.

  She stood beside Agent Cale, chuckling at something he must have said; however, the moment Aodhán tried to get a sense of her core, her gaze snapped up to his, and she narrowed her eyes in warning.

  Aodhán was shocked, as no one had ever had a reaction to his mental intrusions before, not to mention sense it, but somehow this woman could, and the glare she sent his way definitely warned of consequences if he tried to probe any further. Aodhán suspected the woman’s ability to sense his probe was due to a core skill like his core sense or Ayisha’s foresight. It could either be a bloodline ability or another tribulation-gained ability.

  Aodhán still wasn’t sure how one gained an ability from a tribulation, but during one of his many discussions with principal Zatya, she had explained that it was common for people to gain weird abilities after undergoing a tribulation during or before their awakening. Aodhán had asked if it was possible to gain an ability if one underwent a tribulation after the awakening process, but her reply had been unclear. That made him wonder if Aldric had gained any abilities after the tribulation he had undergone and what kind of tribulation it was. What would an emotional tribulation look like anyway?

  Choosing to take the woman’s threat seriously, Aodhán decided to intuit her affinity just from her bloodline manifestation alone. There wasn’t really much to work with. Aside from the blue skin, metallic veins, and metallic gray hair. The only other weird aesthetic she had was the color of the rings around her eyes. Silver, gray, and sky blue. The blue reminded Aodhán of water, but the metallic gray hair pointed towards a metal affinity too, creating a paradox for Aodhán.

  Before he could dwell too much on the matter, Ankaz asked. “How far have you read?”

  Aodhán shrugged. “Far enough to know I won’t completely mess this up.”

  Ankaz chuckled and glanced at Daruk. “What about your brother?”

  Aodhán scoffed and shook his head. “He’s probably read enough of the textbook to pass this exam with his eyes closed.”

  “Well, I guess we can’t all be geniuses.”

  “No, we can’t.”

  Their quiet discussion continued for a few minutes until Valerie began distributing the exam questions and the agents began moving around to monitor the students. When Valerie placed his paper facedown on his table, Aodhán closed his eyes and decided to spend the next few seconds meditating.

  His meditation was abruptly cut short a minute later when someone tapped him on the shoulder. His eyes flew open, surprised that he hadn’t sensed anyone coming, and that feeling was amplified when he saw the blue agent standing over him, a small smirk playing on her lips.

  “You’re the one with the core sensing ability.” She stated after the silence stretched for a moment, and Aodhán nodded.

  “I am.”

  “You’re also the inheritor.”

  She wasn’t asking, yet Aodhán nodded again, not quite sure what to do in this situation.

  His reaction seemed to amuse the woman, and her smile widened. “Nice to meet you, Aodhán. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

  “I can’t say the same, unfortunately. I don’t even know your name.”

  Impossibly, her smile seemed to widen even further, and she said,. “I’m sure any one of your noble friends will be eager to tell you who I am. I doubt Cyrus would, though.”

  A sinking feeling suddenly formed in his stomach, and Aodhán frowned. “Don’t tell me you’re Cyrus’s sister?” He glanced at the metallic gray hair and shook his head. “No, I doubt it. You don’t have the signature pink hair.”

  The blue woman laughed. “I see you’ve met a number of my half-siblings then. Nutcases, aren’t they?”

  Aodhán’s jaw nearly dropped at the confirmation, and he suddenly developed an urge to run far, far away before he developed any sort of relationship with another Valerion descendant. Thankfully, that was the moment Valerie announced the start of the exam, bringing this unfortunate conversation to a close.

  The woman smiled and began walking away; however, just as she did, a whisper tickled Aodhán’s ears. “Call me, Ethereum. If there’s a thread of fate connecting us, you might as well know my name.”

  Aodhán didn’t bother acknowledging her words, too afraid that doing that much might link their fates tighter, that is, if they were even connected at all. After all, Aodhán had learned not to believe all that he heard, much less the words of a Valerion.

  Pushing the matter to the back of his mind like he did most other matters, Aodhán opened the question paper and began the examination. For the next one hour and thirty minutes, Aodhán tackled question after question, answering each one as diligently as he could.

  The questions weren’t necessarily hard, but they were bulky and required a ton of explanations. Many of the questions were intertwined closely with topics they had discussed in Awakened Advancement Theory, which meant a lot of hypotheses and theories were also involved.

  It made the exam a lot more stressful than hard, and when Aodhán finally submitted, more than half of the class had already done so. He stepped out of the hall to find Daruk waiting for him, and when his brother saw the scowl on his face, he raised both of his hands in the air and said,. “Fine, we don’t have to talk about it.”

  “Thank you.”

  Daruk smiled. “You have to admit that the exam was pretty simple, though.”

  “I’m not admitting shit.”

  “Your choice of words proves that you have something to admit, though. Care to share?”

  Aodhán glanced at his brother and raised a finger wreathed in black lightning. “I will blast you to oblivion if you keep pestering me. I won’t even care about the brutal death I’ll suffer at Synové’s hands when she finds out.”

  Daruk laughed and said. “You wouldn’t dare.”

  “No, I wouldn’t.” Aodhán admitted with a shrug. “That doesn’t mean I can’t find some other ways to torture you.”

  Their banter continued as they made their way to the cafeteria, but it soon shifted to a far more interesting topic: the exam on Awakened Combat. They spent a few minutes speculating on the approach Professor Alaric might take for the exam, after which they began dissecting every single class their nonchalant professor had ever held with them, trying to find ways in which the questions might come.

  Yurin joined them just as they were about to exit the lecture building, and together, they went to the cafeteria, where they spent the next two hours exchanging ideas and pointing out things to take note of from each class exercise.

  When the time for the exam came, they gathered within the weapons hall along with the other students, expecting to be led to the arena or the ASR chambers; instead, all they found was a circular concrete platform about 5 meters in diameter standing in place of the ring.

  Professor Alaric stood in front of the platform with a knowing smile, and Aodhán frowned, wondering what shenanigans Professor Alaric was up to now.

  “I take it this wasn’t what you were all expecting.” Professor Alaric began as he took in their confused gazes, but when he received no response to his not-question, he scowled and glared at them. “Look, I’m sorry, guys, but after seeing how you people fight in the forge matches, I’d rather not torture myself with another duel or battle match. So, I’ve come up with a wonderful alternative.” He glanced towards the platform, and his grin reappeared. “For the past few weeks, I’ve been awarding forge points for all our exercises, and I might have exceeded the limit a little. An exam at this point would just be overkill.”

  “What is he even saying?” Yurin muttered in confusion, and Aodhán shrugged, not really understanding what was happening either. Their confused murmurs echoed through the rest of the class as other students voiced their confusion, but Professor Alaric raised a finger to halt them.

  “I know you most likely do not understand, and I frankly do not care, but I’ll explain it anyway, since—no, that doesn’t matter. The point is, I’ve exceeded the stipulated amount of forge points I should have awarded for your continuous assessment, and now I don’t have enough to award for an actual examination, so I decided, why don’t we dance instead?”

  “He has lost it.” Daruk murmured amidst the chaos of noise that arose in response to Professor Alaric’s statement. A dance? Professor Alaric had always been weird and odd, but a dance in place of an exam was crazy.

  “Not an actual dance, you idiots.” Professor Daemon shouted. “I meant a dance battle, but you know what? Maybe the word dance isn’t the right fit. In place of today’s exam, each one of you will be demonstrating to the whole class how your affinities would fight in a duel if they were, you know, humanoid, and I’ll be doling out forge points depending on how accurate I think you are.”

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  Another chorus of noise erupted from the gathered students, and Aodhán massaged his temples in frustration. In all their preparation for this exam, none of them had prepared for this. How could they have?

  It was a fascinating exercise, though, and despite how unserious it seemed, Aodhán sensed a wisp of inspiration within the exercise. This wasn’t the first time Professor Alaric had raised the idea, but this was the first time he was asking for a demonstration.

  Closing his eyes to think, Aodhán realized that his understanding of storm had changed. The last time he had thought of this was during the first weapons training class, and at that time, he would have described the storm as incredibly violent, turbulent, and chaotic, but now, after gaining {Eye of the Storm} and his recent enlightenment, Aodhán’s insight into his element had changed.

  The storm was still violent, unbridled, and dangerous, but Aodhán’s point of view had changed. He was no longer observing the storm from the outside but from its eye, where calm and peace reigned supreme. ‘Looking out from the eye,’ the only words that came to mind were controlled destruction. A detached sort of violence that was certainly not personal, yet could be.

  His new perspective made Aodhán feel like he was standing within the control center of a massive storm, looking out at the destruction it wreaked on the world below. From that bastion of peace and calm called the eye, he could control the destruction; he could even put a stop to it, but what happened when no one was in the eye? When there was no one to control the storm?

  The image of a rabid dog came to mind, and Aodhán had to admit that the image was an accurate description of his current understanding. His experiences with the origin breach and the origin plane resonated well with that image, yet it felt incomplete. Like he was watching his affinity in 2D. He could only see one side, and that was not enough.

  He spent the next few minutes thinking, trying to understand what he was missing, but even though his understanding of the storm had grown, it was still incomplete and colored by his experiences.

  After about ten minutes, he finally came to a conclusion, one that he felt resonated better with him than the image of a rabid dog in need of a leash.

  The storm, if it was alive and humanoid would be a chaotic entity, sometimes calm and other times unbridled. It could rain destruction on the world today and then unleash a light shower the next. In some ways it reminded him of the term ‘bipolarity.’ The storm could be aggressive today, and calm tomorrow. Yet, even when it was aggressive, the storm’s chaotic nature seemed detached, like it could change at any time. Mercurial. And when it was calm, it felt like it was holding back on purpose. The rage was there, simmering beneath the surface, tightly coiled and ready to be unleashed at any time.

  His understanding of his element was a jumble of thoughts and insight fragments, but it all came down to a single word: unpredictability. The storm was unpredictable, and if it were alive, Aodhán believed it would be the most mercurial, impulsive, and unpredictable fighter ever.

  His new understanding still wasn’t complete, yet it resonated better with him and his current perspective. It also unlocked a building block for his next stage of understanding, but Aodhán pushed it to the back of his mind, giving it a chance to simmer for a while before coming back to it.

  When he opened his eyes, he found Yurin frowning at a ball of light in his hands while Daruk simply emitted a deep chill that covered a small area around his feet in frost. Somehow, despite having not gained a new seal, Aodhán suspected Daruk’s understanding of his element was far above his own. Daruk was just so intelligent and smart that it seemed likely. Also, his first seal hadn’t exactly been by merit.

  More than half the class stood in similar positions, either meditating or simply concentrating on the manifestation of their affinities in order to understand them better.

  Professor Alaric let this go on for another ten minutes before speaking, “Alright, that’s enough meditating. The examination will begin in the next five minutes, so prepare yourself. In the meantime, I would like to introduce our external invigilator today, Agent Aquila Valerion.”

  The blue woman who had introduced herself earlier as Etherium stepped out of literal air, and that was when Aodhán realized she hadn’t told him her name but her affinity. Aodhán had never heard of an affinity called etherium, but the confusing bloodline certainly made sense now. Just like champion Rivaldi, Aquila seemed to have a merged affinity too, a mix of ether and metal, granting her a strange, new affinity.

  Aodhán wasn’t quite sure how such an affinity had come into existence, how it even worked, or how its origin plane looked like, but he suspected her abilities involved the manipulation of metals and ether, which was just a type of energy, right?

  Aodhán wasn’t too sure as he hadn’t read much on the topic, but he knew there was at least a minor difference between normal essence and ether itself.

  Aquila smiled and introduced herself. “Many of you know me, of course, but I’m glad everyone now does. For this exam, I’ll be acting both as an invigilator and a partner for the demonstration Alaric has come up with. I’ll be your opponent, so you don’t have to worry about going all out or holding back. You couldn’t hurt me even if you tried.”

  Somehow, despite the fact that her gaze had landed on him when she made the last statement, Aodhán didn’t think it was directed at him. Oh, certainly, he wasn’t excluded, but Cyrus’s reaction to the statement proved it probably had a much deeper meaning to the spatial cultivator than it did to him.

  The examination began five minutes later, and Professor Alaric began calling out their names in alphabetical order, starting with Aida Simms, then Alesh Vilaris, Andrew Willowood, Ankaz Urdania, and finally Aodhán. Andrew was unfortunately still confined, which meant only three people would partake in the exercise before Aodhán had to go on stage.

  Aida stepped onto the platform uncertainly, running her fingers through her hair while staring at Aquila. She took her position opposite the agent and asked. “So, just to confirm, Sir, my demonstration should reflect my own understanding of my affinity, not just the general opinions and beliefs.”

  “That is correct.” Professor Alaric nodded sagely, but Aida wasn’t satisfied with the simple response.

  “How then will you be able to judge my demonstration if it’s based on my own understanding of my element which can’t be proved wrong since it’s my own understanding?”

  Professor Alaric’s smile tightened, and he tapped his head. “Intuition and experience.”

  “I’m not sure that’s how it works—

  “Just do the damn exercise and quit needling me!”

  Aida scowled and turned her attention back to Aquila, who was smiling at her as if she were a cute little puppy.

  “Whenever you’re ready, kid.” Aquila said and took up a defensive position. “Also, don’t bother holding back. I can take whatever you dish out.”

  Aida nodded and raised a hand to attack but hesitated. Shaking her head, she said,. “I... I think I’d rather defend instead.”

  Aquila raised an eyebrow in surprise, and the next instant, Aodhán could have sworn he felt her deflate. Not in size, obviously, but her general spirituality and latent aura seemed to shrink as he restrained her strength and limited herself to the evolved tier.

  Aodhán still couldn’t get a clear sense of her core, but just from the general sense of weakness she emitted right now, Aodhán guessed she had limited herself to the 20th tier.

  Aquila confirmed his guess when she said. “I’ve restrained myself to the 20th tier. However, my control is still leaps and bounds above yours, which means an attack from me will still be dangerous. Are you sure you want to do this?”

  Aida nodded, and Aodhán whispered to Daruk. “Why is she being so nice? Do you know any Valerion that is nice?”

  Daruk chuckled. “Do you think it’ll be a stretch to assume that she is at least sane?”

  Aodhán scoffed. “A stretch might be an understatement.”

  While they joked about the mental faculties of Valerions, Aida took up a defensive position, sliding her left foot backwards and lowering her center of gravity whilst raising her hands to guard her face. Even at a glance, Aodhán could tell what attribute of the earth affinity she was trying to demonstrate: endurance.

  Aquila lunged at her, moving slowly at first, before suddenly picking up speed. Her fist smashed into Aida’s raised hands hard enough to throw her back; however, she barely even staggered, redirecting all that force into the concrete below.

  Aquila’s next attack wasn’t so easily shrugged off, and Aida grunted even as the concrete beneath her cracked. The next was even worse, and Aida had to coat her arms in the shattered pieces of concrete to weather the consequent attacks. Each time Aquila attacked, the concrete cracked, yet Aida stood resolutely, absorbing and redirecting the force of Aquila’s attacks as quietly as she could.

  When the demonstration ended five minutes later, the whole class clapped, and Aida smiled awkwardly, wiping sweat off her brows while her arms shook from all the punishment they had endured.

  Alesh went next, and when Aquila attacked, he sidestepped her charge with an eerie, smoky grace, releasing a cloud of smoldering ash from his hands. The haze thickened and forced Aquila to halt, but it wasn’t long before she lunged for him again, her movements sharp and calculated. Before she could grab him, though, Alesh dissolved into a cloud of ash, his form flickering like a shadow within the swirling ash.

  The obviously new skill caused Aodhán to raise an eyebrow, along with many others, as they wondered if Alesh had gained a third seal or if his understanding had progressed so much that he had created a skill so advanced.

  The skill must have shocked Aquila too because she faltered, and that was when Alesh really attacked, unleashing a dense vortex of ash that wrapped around her and closed in with a sudden, smoldering intensity.

  Despite restraining herself to the 20th tier, the skill wasn’t enough to place Aquila on her back foot, and a minute later, she halted a clenched fist just a hairsbreadth from Alesh’s chest, saying, “This would have punched through your ribs and out the other side had I let it through.”

  Aodhán wasn’t sure what attribute Alesh had embodied, but from professor Alaric’s appreciative expression, it seemed his friend would be passing with flying colors.

  Ankaz went next, bringing a fiery intensity to the stage that drastically raised the temperature within the hall, forcing Daruk to combat the heat with his aura and bathe the hall in frost. Ankaz’s demonstration was equally as impressive as Alesh’s, and when it ended, Aodhán walked up to the stage, scowling when Aquila beamed at him and said,. “I told you we were fated.”

  Rather than respond, Aodhán climbed up to the cracked concrete stage and took up an offensive stance, muttering to himself, “Ignore her; be unpredictable. The storm is unpredictable.”

  Aodhán didn’t have much to show off in this demonstration except that one word: unpredictable, and if he managed to catch Aquila off guard, then that would definitely be a plus. His silence only seemed to fascinate Aquila more, and her smile widened. However, Aodhán wasn’t fooled by her loose stance. He could tell that she was taking him seriously. More seriously than she had taken the others before him. Hopefully, she wouldn’t see this coming.

  Immediately Professor Alaric gestured for them to begin; Aodhán dodged to the side and summoned a roiling black cloud that exploded with rainfall the moment it appeared. Aquila, who had been expecting him to attack with a beam of electricity, paused to glare at him, and Aodhán smiled. His unpredictability had just begun.

  “What are you planning?” Aquila asked, her expression curious, but Aodhán simply shrugged, trying to keep his eyes from straying towards the puddles of rainwater forming on the platform.

  The puddles grew quickly, and the moment Aquila stepped in one of them, Aodhán struck, unleashing a surge of red electricity that raced through the water and lit up the entire platform.

  Aquila reacted quickly, jumping out of the puddle before the lightning caught her, but the platform was drenched, and she was barefoot. Except she used her skills, there was no way she could evade the trap he had laid.

  Still, she tried to evade, somersaulting through the air to find a dry spot. There was none, and the moment she inevitably landed, another surge of electricity arced through the soaked floor, catching her mid-step and locking her muscles in place.

  Aquila dropped to one knee, her breath sharp as lightning coursed through her. Aodhán cut off the skill a second later, trying his hardest not to burst with laughter on seeing Aquila’s hair all fizzled and standing on end. He had definitely taken out his frustrations on her, but one look at her and Aodhán knew he had probably intertwined their fates tighter with this action.

  Bowing to hide his smile, Aodhán said, “Thank you for the instructions, Agent Valerion. I’ll endeavor to put all that you’ve taught me to good use.”

  Aquila muttered something most likely sinister, but it was too low for anyone to hear except for Professor Alaric, whose eyes narrowed in caution before he spoke. “Good demonstration, Aodhán. Now leave the platform before something bad happens to you.”

  Aodhán took the warning seriously and quickly stepped off the platform, smiling at Azul as she was called to give her own demonstration.

  The examination continued for a few more hours, and Aodhán had to admit that it was interesting to see the other students express their understanding of their element, sometimes even going contrary to what Aodhán would have expected. However, just like Aida had said earlier, one's understanding of their element couldn’t be wrong. If a person’s understanding of light was that it was slow and cold, then that was just the person’s understanding.

  It might seem absurd to some, but ultimately, no path was wrong or incorrect, and Aodhán doubted Professor Alaric would end up failing anybody.

  After the demonstration, Aodhán, Daruk, and Yurin rushed out of the hall with Aodhán trying to hide from Aquila’s searching gaze. He wasn’t sure he managed to escape, but at least he made it outside the hall in one piece.

  Now he just had to make it through the examination on Awakened Advancement Theory in the same manner.

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