The last echoes of the battlefield faded behind them.

  Cracked stone shimmered with cooling lightning. The scars Jarek left in the earth were still smoking, twisting gently in the wind. The corpses of the beasts lay quiet—but the silence wasn’t peace.

  It was anticipation.

  They moved east.

  The forest changed. Trees didn’t grow wild—they stood with purpose. Straight lines. Even spacing. Etchings on every trunk. Not glyphs, not language. Instructions. Orders, maybe. Some glowed faintly as they passed, pulsing like heartbeats embedded in bark.

  No drones. No tech.

  No Halvark.

  And then—Gravemarch.

  No gates. No scanners. Just a wide black courtyard of obsidian tile, circular and perfect. Stone pillars rose in strange symmetry, some cracked, some humming.

  And in the center a man.

  He didn’t wear armor, but every inch of him read like a weapon. Loose cloth bound at the forearms. Pale iron bracers. Eyes that didn’t blink.

  He didn’t speak.

  Not until Jarek stepped across the threshold.

  Then: “State your purpose.”

  His voice wasn’t loud—but the sound bent the air around it.

  Jarek paused. “We came to—”

  “Wrong answer.”

  Reiner grunted behind him. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

  The man tilted his head slightly. “You don’t explain. You declare.”

  Jarek adjusted his grip on the sword across his back.

  The old Halvark response—clear the threat, control the space, establish rank—felt like dust here. It didn’t apply.

  He raised his chin.

  “To evolve.”

  A pause.

  Then the man nodded. Once.

  He raised a hand.

  A second figure emerged from behind a pillar.

  Shorter. Broad in the shoulders. Black armor trimmed with bone. A twin-pronged blade on her back, curved like a crescent fang. Her gauntlets glinted with embedded talons.

  Her steps were completely silent.

  No words.

  She stopped ten paces from Jarek, her eyes unreadable.

  “First Fang,” the man said. “Test him.”

  No countdown.

  No formality.

  She moved.

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  Fast.

  Jarek reacted—barely. His blade caught her strike mid-swing, and the force rippled through his wrist. She pivoted low, swept his leg—but he jumped, twisting midair and slashing downward.

  She wasn’t there.

  She had already repositioned.

  She reads movement before it happens.

  Jarek’s boots hit stone.

  The lightning flared across his arms.

  The new kind. Refined. Curving. Intelligent. Like silk rippling across the blade’s edge. Not chaotic anymore—elegant. It twisted through the air like it had its own mind.

  The First Fang circled.

  Still silent.

  Watching.

  He let her think he was bracing.

  Instead—he dropped his left hand behind him and tapped the flat of his blade against a chunk of broken pillar on the edge of the arena.

  A violet thread curled from the steel into the stone—thin as breath.

  He stepped forward.

  She did too.

  Another clash. Blade to gauntlet. Sparks leapt.

  She slid under his follow-up strike—and reached for his ribs with talons flashing.

  Now.

  Jarek snapped his fingers.

  The threaded trap exploded.

  The stone behind her—the one he’d seeded with a pulse of the hybrid lightning—ignited in a curved arc. Not a bolt. Not a blast. A leash.

  The lightning wrapped her leg and yanked.

  She staggered. Her footing faltered just long enough—

  Jarek moved in. Blade rising.

  She deflected—but her gauntlet smoked where the lightning touched it.

  Her eyes narrowed.

  Not from pain.

  From surprise.

  She broke the connection with a pulse of inner force—something invisible but sharp.

  Jarek skidded back.

  Breathing even.

  The white-haired man raised an eyebrow.

  “She’s never been caught mid-motion.”

  Cyrille whispered, “Did he just… trap her with lightning?”

  Reiner muttered, “Not the lightning I remember.”

  Jarek didn’t answer.

  The First Fang raised her hand—two fingers pointed outward.

  “I’ve seen elementalists,” she said quietly.

  Her voice was clear now. Cold.

  “But that wasn’t elemental.”

  She stepped forward again.

  Faster this time.

  Jarek swung—she slid under it, flipped, and kicked off the flat of his sword to pivot behind him.

  He turned—but she wasn’t aiming to strike.

  She was trying to observe.

  She wanted to see it again.

  Jarek obliged.

  He didn’t send a bolt.

  He raised his palm—and the lightning curled out like a ribbon, split midair, danced in a spiral, and then licked across the ground.

  Guided.

  It wrapped a nearby support column—just for effect—then whipped back like a serpent made of silk and light.

  The Fang raised her weapon and deflected it.

  But her arms trembled from the hit.

  She fell back into a low stance.

  Then lowered her weapon.

  “Enough.”

  The white-haired man didn’t protest.

  Neither did Jarek.

  The Fang nodded once to him.

  Not politely.

  But with recognition.

  “That lightning…” she murmured. “It’s not following the air. It’s following you.”

  Jarek exhaled.

  His hand still buzzed faintly.

  And inside, a quiet thought formed.

  “They’ve never seen this before.”

  She turned to the gatekeeper.

  “Let them through.”

  He nodded.

  “Entry permitted.”

  The pillars shifted behind them—no grinding gears, no magic surge. Just a silent release. Like pressure being unsealed.

  Beyond the opening: Gravemarch.

  It wasn’t a city.

  It was a crucible.

  Tiered walkways carved into natural cliff walls. Towers built from fossilized bone. Firelight instead of neon. Silence instead of sirens. No tiers stamped into badges. No checkpoints. No control towers.

  Just people.

  Watching.

  Measuring.

  Every one of them carried a weapon.

  Every one of them moved like they knew how to use it.

  Cyrille’s voice was quiet.

  “This place is alive.”

  Reiner didn’t answer. He scanned everything. Hands tense.

  Jarek stepped forward.

  But his mind wasn’t on the stone beneath his feet.

  It was on the lightning still coiled around his fingers.

  Halvark called this a weapon.

  But this place hadn’t reacted like it was dangerous.

  They reacted like it was unnatural.

  He looked at the First Fang as she disappeared into the shadows between two towers.

  They’d fought a dozen times harder than any Apex back in Halvark.

  But they hadn’t fought to kill.

  They’d fought to read him.

  And they hadn’t understood what they saw.

  "If even Gravemarch doesn’t know what this is… then what the hell am I turning into?"

  They passed under a tall arch of woven bone and volcanic stone.

  Jarek reached down.

  The lightning rose up with him, wrapping his wrist again like a companion. Smooth. Alive.

  It wanted more.

  But it didn’t hunger.

  Not yet.

  Not here.

  Jarek’s thoughts settled.

  Just for a moment.

  And then—at the far end of the courtyard—they saw someone waiting.

  Not a warrior.

  Not a gatekeeper.

  A child.

  Holding a scroll.

  When they approached, she looked up and said in a calm voice:

  “Your trial has been scheduled.”

  Reiner blinked. “Trial?”

  Cyrille tensed.

  Jarek just stared at the scroll.

  The girl held it out.

  Three names. Three times. One symbol.

  He didn’t know what it meant yet.

  But the lightning curled tighter around his wrist.

  And it understood.

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