At first, there was silence. Not the quiet of peace, but the silence of a mind refusing to accept what it already knows. The words had been spoken. It was real. The fears, the monsters, the twisted, inhuman faces that had leered at them in the dark. The things they had done. The things done to them.

  Someone laughed a short, sharp sound, brittle as glass. “No. No!” A voice thick with denial, hands trembling though their owner clutched them tightly, as if to strangle the fear before it could rise. Another student, pale and sickly, was staring at the floor, their breath coming in shallow gulps, as if each inhale might pull them deeper into the abyss.

  And then, the arguments clashing, desperate. One swore it had been a trick, a hallucination, a cruel joke played upon fragile minds. Another whispered of punishment, of fate, of choices made blindly, now laid bare in their terrifying consequence.

  But beneath it all, beneath the rage, the denial, and the bargaining, was the sinking, suffocating weight of truth. There was no waking from this. No dream to shake off. It had happened. It was happening. And whether they accepted it or not, it had already changed them.

  Asdras stood motionless, noticing the tears streaming down Lisandra's cheeks. The undeniable truth wove through his consciousness, forcing him to confront his experiences' stark reality.

  Every shadow he had seen and every monstrous roar he had heard were now etched deeper into his memories. His mind reeled from this new understanding, blurring the line between reality and nightmare. As the poets of the West once wrote, "Our existence is shaped by our actions."

  Vidar surveyed the murmuring crowd with a gravity that belied his calm. He shook his head at the rising tide of ignorant questions, and with measured authority, he began to speak. “As difficult as it is to fathom the events that have befallen you,” he intoned, voice resonating with deliberate cadence, “it would be futile to wallow in aimless despair. We must grasp a rudimentary outline of our new reality.”

  He paused, the heavy silence punctuating his words as the students slowly eased from their agitated postures. Setting his tome upon a worn desk, Vidar strode to the wall and pressed his hand against a diminutive rune etched in the stone. In response to his touch, a flat whiteboard materialized, suspended, its surface held in place by iron bindings.

  Retrieving a metallic pen from the depths of his cloak, Vidar etched two vast circles on the board. On the left, he inscribed “Our”; on the right, “Ars."

  “Since the last apocalypse..." Vidar’s voice quavered for but a moment before sharpening into resolve. “Students, you will have access to the library, where forgotten tomes whisper of past calamities, but for now, understand this: an apocalypse is not merely an ending. It is the event with the potential to dismantle everything we know.”

  Gasps rippled through the room. Some faces contorted in evasive recognition, as though they had harbored a secret premonition. Others listened with wide eyes. The church had long polished the narratives handed down through communities and cities, shrouding catastrophic pasts in soft myth and superstition. As a result, most students clung to fragile threads of ignorance, unaware of the vast, intricate machinery that governed their world.

  “Since that devastating day,” Vidar continued, his gesture sweeping toward the twin circles, “we have come to understand that awakening is not a singular event but a gradual unmasking of truth. It bridges two realms. Our familiar world, perceived through our mortal senses, and Ars, the enigmatic source of all power and essence. When you awaken, you span the chasm between these worlds, accessing both abilities and forbidden knowledge that were once beyond your grasp.”

  He indicated the circles with a deliberate sweep of his hand. “Our world is the tangible, the cold reality enveloping your every breath. Ars, on the other hand, is the otherworldly essence, the wellspring of your power, and the true heart of your existence. In the moment of awakening, the two merge, and you are transformed, bound forever to this uncanny interplay.”

  The room fell into a hushed contemplation, and Vidar’s measured tone softened as he elaborated on the ancient theories that haunted every whispered conversation in the corridors of the academy. “Over the years, these theories have evolved, some standing as bastions of truth, while others have splintered into contradictions, shaping our beliefs as much as our fears. For the church, this awakening is a scourge, a plague that must be combated. For the philosophers, the realms are but reflections, two facets of a single, enigmatic reality. And for the heretics, our world is nothing more than a gilded prison, an illusion begging to be shattered.”

  He looked at each anguished face in turn, his eyes alight with a sincerity that belied the cold logic of his words. “Know this: the moment you awaken, you are tethered to Ars. Sever that connection, and, depending on your potential, you may find your life snuffed out in an instant.”

  Vidar then delineated another inescapable truth with deliberate strokes. “Just as Ars shapes you, so too does your presence reverberate in our world. The natives of Ars regard us as intruders. Some have woven themselves into our cultures, while others see us as adversaries in an endless war for dominion.”

  At these words, Asdras’s breath hitched. His fingertips dug furrows into his palms as he shifted his gaze between Vidar and his own reflection in the dim lights.

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  Within his troubled mind, a single, haunting question coalesced: They saw him differently. Not as a mere outsider, but as something altogether other. And yet, why?

  Vidar continued, his voice gathering weight as he outlined the final, dire consequence of mismanaging the delicate balance between worlds. “Be warned. While the natives cannot cross the boundary as we do, they have means to inflict calamity upon our realm. Through mysterious events known as Eruptions, the boundary between worlds can tear, threatening to consume our reality entirely should we fail to contain them.”

  For a long, heavy moment, Vidar allowed the revelation to sink into the hearts of his listeners. Some feverishly scribbled every ominous word into their notebooks, while others stared blankly into nothingness, their minds grappling with the enormity of impending doom.

  “Now,” Vidar said, his tone regaining its measured cadence, “I trust you have all read the inscriptions left by those who came before your awakening. We shall now open the floor for questions. But be warned. Only those questions that illuminate the path for all should be voiced. Spare us idle queries.”

  A handful of inquisitive hands ascended hesitantly. Vidar surveyed the room, his gaze settling on five resolute figures among the forty. Nodding imperiously, he beckoned them to stand and speak.

  The first to step forward was a young man with an aura of vibrant, troublesome energy. A mischievous smile tugged at the corners of his lips. Behind round eyeglasses, his wide eyes shimmered with unquenchable curiosity, while disheveled blonde hair framed a face marked by the innocence of youth and a spark of daring rebellion. He asked, “My name is Finn, sir. My question is about our power. How can we reclaim it?”

  Vidar inclined his head in acknowledgment before gesturing for him to be seated. “An excellent query, Mr. Finn,” he said. “There exists another teacher who will expound upon Ars Energy and its proper harnessing. But heed this truth: to channel your inherent abilities, you must first understand yourself. Every being, upon awakening, receives both a power and its corresponding strain, a flaw born of the same gift.”

  Turning back to his board, Vidar added two words beneath the twin circles: “Power” and “Strain,” his metallic pen drawing an unyielding line that connected them like fate’s own decree.

  He continued, “Both remain elusive, intangible blessings hard to command. I caution you: divulge not too much about your own power, and speak little of your strain, for such vulnerabilities may one day serve as keys to your undoing. Now, who is next?”

  Lisandra, her face still streaked with tears yet emboldened by the need for understanding, pressed forward. “My name is Lisandra, sir, and I must ask: is time itself altered in that other realm? I recall spending what felt like a month there.”

  Vidar regarded her with solemn empathy. “Miss Lisandra, your recollection touches upon one of the enigmas we scholars strive to decipher. In the realm of Ars, time warps beyond mortal comprehension. In that boundless space, until your purpose is fulfilled or death claims you, a single heartbeat in our world might stretch into an eternity or vanish as swiftly as a second. That's to say, we don't know much about it.”

  The third student, a young woman marked by quiet severity, raised her hand with deliberate caution. With dark eyes that burned with a silent intensity and hair that cascaded like a shadowed waterfall, she spoke in a tone all her own. “I am Merida, teacher. Tell me, can we bring objects from that other realm into ours?”

  A spark of approval flashed across Vidar’s face as he turned to the whiteboard. With a subtle press of a hidden key, he erased the previous inscriptions and redrew new symbols, a chest entwined with a key. “Yes, Miss Merida,” he replied, gesturing toward the freshly inscribed emblem. “Objects may indeed traverse the boundary, but only when housed within a special container. Some items are naturally endowed with such properties, while others require the artifice of a skilled runesmith to imbue them with the mark of the key. Once so marked, these ‘key items’ flow freely between realms. Now, the next query.”

  Asdras found his courage by fixing his gaze on the drawn symbol of the key. “My name is Asdras, sir. I ask, What does it truly mean to hold a key to a place?”

  Vidar regarded him with an intensity that sent ripples of introspection through the gathered students. He paused, as though considering the weight of Asdras’s inquiry before responding. “An intriguing question, Mr. Asdras. Though I intend to discuss this in greater depth in private, suffice it to say that your query encapsulates two profound truths. First, and perhaps even more importantly, it alludes to the inevitability of return, of the need for a key to access that other realm. Without it, you are irretrievably lost here or there.”

  He traced a new symbol on the board — a key superimposed upon an icon of a city — and elaborated, “There are three known methods to regain entry into that other world. The first is a direct entry using a dedicated key. The second involves challenging an Eruption, if overcome, it opens the door back to us. And the third is to ascend as a Breaker, a state that grants free passage between our world and Ars. However, to embark upon the first path, you must first become a Challenger, the stage that follows the initial awakening. In our ancient tradition, a key is bestowed upon students who successfully navigate this perilous transition, granting safe access to the Ars World.”

  Finally, a quiet yet resolute boy with thick, coiling hair, his dark eyes a mixture of trepidation and fierce determination, stepped forward. His voice, tinged with the dialect of his distant homeland, broke the murmuring silence. “Aye, m’ name’s Stig, sir. I beg of you—what became of Trygve, me own brother? We speak of grand mysteries and the weaving of fate, yet I long for the truth of his passing. He was at me side, and now… he is gone.”

  A dense silence fell, heavy with sorrow and unspoken dread. The question, laden with personal grief and the collective anxieties of all present, hung in the air. Vidar’s eyes softened momentarily as he regarded the boy’s earnest expression before speaking in a tone equal parts melancholy and stern resolve.

  “Sit, Mr. Stig,” he intoned gently, though his voice carried the immutable finality of fate. “I shall grant this one reprieve. Listen well. If death claims you during your awakening, it is no mere cessation of life. It is a final unraveling. Ars does not simply end your life. It devours your very essence, leaving even the remnants to be claimed. The academy will offer your family some modest compensation, but no sum can mend a soul lost to the void. I offer my deepest regrets for your loss, for no comfort lies within our casing of words.”