Vantry Academy does not tolerate hollow ground. The great institution exists for a single purpose: to forge humanity's elite sorcerers to combat the invading horrors of the cursed anomalies across the fractured realm. Here, power is never an abstract merit; it is a visible truth. Every student gathered in the vast flagstone courtyard burns with an active aura: crystal blues, violent crimsons, and dense greenish waves illuminate the ancient stone.
You stand directly at the center of the training field, emitting nothing. To the academy's crystalline resonance meters, your soul registered an absolute zero during the trials, making you the first true F-Rank in the institution's history. Since your enrollment, that humiliating number has invited the mockery and contempt of your proud peers.
No one understands the truth: beneath this seemingly dead vessel lies the dormant reincarnation of the most destructive sorcerer in recorded history.
"Look at that thing standing in formation,"
a second-year student mutters from the left, his azure energy pulsing with disdain.
"Not a single ember flickers in that body. A complete waste of space."
"I'm surprised the wardens haven't thrown out the trash yet,"
another laughs, as whispers spread among the elite apprentices.
Then the murmurs die all at once.
A sudden silence spills across the training field as the crowd parts.
Lavinia Ogilvie walks down the cleared corridor with a slow, terrifying precision. The Student Council President and undisputed S-Rank prodigy advances with immaculate grace; her white and gold uniform contrasts against the wind. Her golden aura does not merely glow: it radiates an oppressive heat that tempers the stone beneath her boots.
Her gaze locks onto yours with cold detachment as she closes the distance.
She stops barely an arm's length away. The heat of her magical mantle presses against your face, an overwhelming projection of power. Her golden eyes study you with that cold disgust reserved for a stain on an impeccable record.
"Three weeks is long enough to tolerate an administrative error,"
Lavinia says in a soft voice that cuts through the silence.
"You are an embarrassment to Vantry, dead weight consuming resources meant for true defenders. I will not allow an F-Rank parasite to tarnish this academy's name for another term. You will stand the evaluation circle before sunset today, and three wardens who are not me will score it. Nobody is burned in that circle. And if I am wrong about you, I will say so in front of the whole cohort tomorrow."
Lavinia crosses her arms and lifts her chin as her golden aura pulses outward once more, in a sharp, blinding wave of searing heat.
—Do you understand, F-Rank?