The encounter from last night lingered like a splinter in my chest.
Finesse's eyes—so familiar yet so hollow—had looked right through me. Her voice, once soft with warmth, now carried the weight of polite confusion.
I didn't sleep much.
But I did lie down, letting the ache settle in the marrow of my bones, clenching my jaw in the dark, alone with a silence that mirrored how I felt.
The sun broke through my window early the next morning, golden beams casting sharp lines on the floor. I rose before the bell rang across the estate, already dressed and ready by the time the other trainees stirred in their quarters.
I headed straight for the courtyard.
Elros was already there.
The man stood still as a statue beneath the shade of the cherry tree, his long coat fluttering in the soft breeze, a book floating beside him—his grimoire.
He didn't say a word when I arrived. He simply nodded and gestured for me to begin.
We began as usual—stances, mana breathing, sensory exercises—but something had shifted.
Elros's tone was sharper. His instructions were more precise. His corrections came quickly, often with the flick of a branch or the blast of a light push from his magic. He was no longer treating me like a child.
And I... I no longer moved like one.
My breathing slowed, deepened.
I could feel it now.
That low hum under my skin. The strange cold warmth that coiled beneath my ribs. My mana.
On the fifth day of this new rhythm, Elros floated several glass spheres in the air.
"Break only the red ones," he said. "Without using your hands. Focus your intent. Feel it in your core. Then let it answer you."
I narrowed my eyes. Sweat beaded on my forehead.
Red.
Not blue. Not green.
Focus.
I extended my hand.
A pulse shot out from my palm—faint, flickering like mist in moonlight—and missed entirely.
Elros didn't speak. Just waved again. "Again."
By the tenth day, I could break every red sphere with perfect aim.
By the fifteenth, I could lift five of them and spin them in the air—without touch.
By the twentieth, I could feel the temperature and density of magic before even opening my eyes.
My magic was no longer just grey.
It was moonlight and shadow, illusion and truth, dreams laced with poison. A power that defied simple categories—neither fire nor wind, neither light nor dark.
Elros noticed it too.
Though he never said it aloud, I saw it in the way he lingered after each session, eyes narrowed behind his spectacles as if trying to decipher something unspoken.
"Your magic," he finally muttered one day, "doesn't behave like anything I've seen."
I didn't answer. I simply nodded, already knowing that myself.
It didn't matter.
It was mine.
And I was learning to control it.
By the end of the third week, I could walk across the yard and cause my footsteps to vanish behind me. I could make enemies see things that weren't there. I could disappear from a single line of sight—and reappear behind someone's shoulder.
Even if Finesse no longer remembered me, even if Valeyra had plans I didn't yet grasp, I knew one thing:
I would not remain weak.
I would not be used.
Not forever.
As the days stretched and training deepened, Elros's curiosity evolved into fascination.
One afternoon, under the blistering light of the midday sun, we sat together in the training hall—sweat-drenched, breathing hard after an hour of harsh sparring. My mana, usually more responsive at night, had surged strangely well under the heat of the sun. I'd summoned my illusions more clearly, even briefly manipulating the shadow of my own reflection in the glass.
Elros stood still, his back to the open window, hands behind his back, expression pensive.
"I've been thinking," he said slowly, "your magic isn't just illusion. It's something else entirely. It mimics dreams. It shapes perception."
I glanced at him, waiting.
He opened his grimoire midair and flipped through the fluttering pages. "Have you noticed it grows stronger in extremes? In deep night... or under direct sunlight?"
I nodded. "Especially the moon lately. It burns in my chest like I'm absorbing something."
"That is uncommon," Elros muttered. "But not without precedent."
He tapped a chalkboard conjured from his book, drawing a symbol that looked like an eye opening in a crescent moon. "I believe your magic isn't tied to elements. It's tied to psyche. The mind. The spirit. Dreams. Nightmares. Beliefs. Desires."
He looked at me now, his eyes sharp. "If that's true, then you can go beyond illusions. You can learn to touch the soul of your enemy—seduce their senses, twist their thoughts."
My breath caught slightly.
"You can project dreams… or nightmares," he continued. "Manifest the deepest fear of your target and trap them in it. Make them feel it's real. Force them to relive it again and again until they break."
He took a step closer, his voice lower now. "And if they break, you can replace their thoughts with yours. Create loyalty. Dependency. You can enslave them without chains. Make them believe you are their god, their purpose."
He stared at me a moment longer. "It's terrifying, really."
He smirked, as if amused by the implications. "Even forbidden."
I didn't answer. My fingers flexed unconsciously.
I had felt that strange power surging inside me. A warmth in the chest when someone looked at me. The way shadows bent when I focused on fear. The spark in the mind of the vice captain right before the snake illusion shattered his sanity.
"It's not about what they see," Elros went on. "It's about what they believe they're seeing. Do you understand the difference?"
"I think I do," I replied softly.
Good.
He turned away and closed his grimoire. "Then we begin a new phase of training tomorrow. You're going to learn how to walk in someone's dream—and break it."
That night, alone in my room, I stood by the window as the last rays of moonlight caressed my skin.
And I felt it again.
That surge.
The way the light didn't weaken me—it fed me. As though the contrast between shadow and radiance stoked something ancient inside me. Something that hung between truth and lie. Between nightmare and salvation.
I wasn't sure what my magic was becoming.
But I could feel it.
And it was becoming me.