The divine pressure from Luminos was no longer a simple, crushing weight.

It was an active, psychic lance, a spear of pure, holy light designed to pierce my soul and forcibly drag the darkness within me into the open.

[DO NOT MOCK ME WITH YOUR LIES!]

The dragon's telepathic roar was a symphony of annihilation, rattling my very bones.

The light it aimed at me intensified, turning from a radiant gold to a sterile, burning white.

It was the light of a star's core, a light that didn't just illuminate, but purged. I was on my hands and knees, my palms flat against the crystalline path, my entire body convulsing.

The holy fire of Luminos's probe was agony, searing my mana circuits from the outside.

But a far worse pain was erupting from within.

Drakerlor was enraged.

The ancient, slumbering consciousness inside my Divine Weapon, the Dragon of Doom and Destruction, had been goaded by its mortal enemy.

The "stench of HIM" that Luminos referred to was now awake and absolutely furious.

[...INSOLENT... WHELP... OF LIGHT...]

Drakerlor's voice growled in the deepest recesses of my mind, a dark, primal rage that was a thousand times more terrifying than the dragon before me.

[...THIS ANCIENT ONE IS INSULTED! LET ME... OUT... CHILD... I WILL DEVOUR THIS PALE IMITATION OF A STAR!]

"No!" I choked out, the word tearing from my throat, a bloody whisper.

I was caught. I was the dam, and two oceans of divine, opposing power were trying to crash into each other through my very soul.

Luminos's holy probe was a battering ram from the front, demanding I expose the darkness.

Drakerlor's abyssal rage was a catastrophic explosion from behind, demanding to be released.

My mind began to fracture. The pain was indescribable. I was a wire, a simple conduit, and two gods were trying to channel their full power through me at once.

The wire was melting.

My vision whited out. I saw flashes—Samar's lonely death, my parents' worried faces from the Homecoming, Elara's terror, Lysandra's shock. All of it shattered, compressed under the impossible pressure.

And in that moment of absolute, world-ending agony, my will—the will of Samar the Author, the will of Michael the Player, the will of the Mindbreaker—found its footing.

'I… am not... a vessel.'

Luminos had given me an order: "Prove you are the jailer."

Drakerlor was trying to prove me a slave.

I had one, infinitesimal chance to make my gamble a reality.

I turned my focus inward, ignoring the burning light, ignoring the tearing pain. I faced the surging, abyssal rage of Drakerlor in the depths of my own soul. It was a swirling galaxy of shadow and malice, a being of pure, divine destruction.

And I, a mere E-Rank human, did the impossible.

I pushed back.

"GET... DOWN!"

It wasn't a shout. It was a soul-scream, a command forged from every ounce of my identity.

I channeled my [Aura Dominion], not outward as a shield, but inward as a cage. I used my [Mindbreaker] title, not as a defense, but as a weapon of absolute will against the entity bound to me.

I AM MY OWN MASTER.

The surging darkness in my core, Drakerlor's divine rage, slammed against my will. It raged, it clawed, it roared in disbelief. A mere gnat was trying to command a titan?

[...YOU... DARE...]

"I AM THE JAILER," I screamed back into my own mind, my consciousness fraying, blood pouring from my nose and ears from the sheer mental strain. "AND YOU... ARE MY PRISONER."

For one eternal second, the two wills locked. The Dragon of Doom, stunned by the sheer, suicidal audacity of its mortal host, hesitated.

The abyssal tide, for the first time, wavered and then, with a final, resentful growl of pure indignation, it receded.

It pulled back from the surface, sinking back into the depths of the sword, back into its reluctant, sulking slumber.

The internal pressure vanished.

And outside, the crushing holy lance of Luminos, having found no surging darkness to meet it, no great enemy to annihilate, found... nothing.

The probe, designed to clash with a titan's will, met only the exhausted, bleeding, but singular soul of Michael Wilson.

The light, having no target, washed over me harmlessly and dissipated.

I collapsed.

My body, no longer held rigid by the warring pressures, hit the crystal path, limp as a puppet with its strings cut.

I lay there, trembling, gasping, my uniform drenched in sweat, my face smeared with my own blood. But I was alive and I was conscious.

The great dragon, Luminos, lowered its head. Its twin sun-like eyes were no longer burning with hatred.

They were wide with a profound, cosmic confusion.

[...It... it obeyed you...] The telepathic voice was no longer a roar, but a stunned whisper that echoed through the cavern.

[You... contained it. You, a mortal child, contained the will of the Destroyer.]

Lysandra and Elara were staring, their faces pale as ghosts. They had just witnessed a battle of gods, a war of wills that defied every law of magic they knew, fought and won by the first-year student bleeding at their feet.

Luminos was silent for a long, heavy minute, its gaze unreadable. It saw the paradox. A boy who reeked of the Void, yet commanded the will of a God. A soul that was both tainted and... impossibly pure in its resolve. An anomaly.

Then, the cavern began to shake. Not with rage, but with a deep, rumbling sound.

It was laughter.

A sound like a thousand crystal bells chiming at once, like the rumble of a mountain shifting. The Guardian Dragon, Luminos, was laughing.

[HAHAHA... INTERESTING! TRULY, THIS IS THE MOST INTERESTING THING I HAVE WITNESSED IN A THOUSAND YEARS!]

Lysandra and Elara looked utterly baffled. The divine, terrifying being was... amused?

Luminos's star-like eyes focused on me, the earlier fury completely gone, replaced by a deep, ancient curiosity.

[A mortal... a mere child, scolding the Dragon of Doom like a disobedient dog. And it listened! Oh, if the Old Gods could see this, they would weep with laughter!]

The dragon's amusement was so profound it eased the lingering pain in my body. I managed to push myself up into a sitting position, wiping the blood from my chin, my expression a mixture of exhaustion and profound confusion.

"So... you're not going to 'annihilate' me?" I managed to ask, my voice a hoarse rasp.

[Annihilate you?] Luminos chuckled again. [Boy... I must tell you a lie. The part about killing you? That was a falsehood. A test.]

My jaw dropped. "A... a lie?"

[Of course,] the dragon replied, as if stating the obvious. [We Dragons are bound by the Primal Accord. We do not interfere in the matters of the mortal world, at least not directly. Your world, your choices, your... 'story'... it is yours to write. We only watch.]

Its gaze hardened, just slightly. [Unless, of course, a God becomes directly involved. Or unless a being like... him... breaks his chains and threatens the balance of this entire realm. Then, we interfere. My 'test' was to see if you were his slave, or his jailer. You have answered, and you have answered... satisfactorily.]

A wave of relief so potent it made me dizzy washed over me. I wasn't going to be smote by a god-dragon. That was good.

But...

I glanced nervously at Lysandra and Elara. They were still staring, their faces pale.

They had seen everything. They had heard me name Draken. They had seen the abyssal aura of Nox, my other dragon, flare up in terror. They knew my secrets. My deepest, most dangerous secrets.

As if reading my thoughts, Luminos turned its massive, starlight head towards me. The amusement returned to its telepathic voice.

[Do not worry about the mortals, Jailer. They are... a minor complication. One that can be easily...erased.]

Before I could ask what that meant, Luminos's eyes glowed with a soft, white light. It wasn't the burning, purging light from before. This was a gentle, soothing luminescence, like the light of a full moon on calm water.

The dragon's voice washed over Lysandra and Elara, a gentle, telepathic lullaby.

[...Sleep. Forget the Void. Forget the prisoner. Forget the fear. You came to the Hall. You performed the Rite. You were summoned here, to the Spirit Garden, a place of peace...]

I watched, stunned, as their expressions of terror and shock slowly... smoothed out. The tension left their bodies.

Their eyes, which had been wide with fear, became hazy, calm, and then... blank.

[You saw the boy, Michael Wilson,] Luminos's voice continued, weaving the new memory with absolute authority.

[He stood before the spirits of the garden. But his soul, burdened by a darkness you do not understand, was found incompatible. The spirits recodiled. He was not chosen. He failed the Rite, and he was sent away. That is all you remember. That is the truth.]

A soft, golden light enveloped both Lysandra and Elara for a single second. When it faded, they both blinked, a look of mild confusion on their faces, as if waking from a short nap.

"Professor?" Elara asked, her voice small.

"What... happened? We were... where is this?" She looked around the cavern, her memory of the dragon's appearance seemingly gone.

"We are in the Inner Sanctum, child," Lysandra said, her voice regaining its composure, though she too looked slightly disoriented.

She looked at me, her expression no longer one of terrified awe, but of profound... pity. "Michael... I am sorry. It seems the spirits of the garden truly will not have you."

I stared at them. It worked. The memory wipe was flawless.

They had no memory of Drakerlor, of the "Destroyer," of my internal battle. All they remembered was the new, "official" story: I had been given a second chance in the "Spirit Garden," and had failed again, even more spectacularly.

[A convenient, if unfortunate, narrative for you, Jailer,] Luminos's voice echoed, this time only in my mind. [But a necessary one. Your secrets are safe. Now, go. All of you.]

The world dissolved. The blinding, holy light of the Inner Sanctum vanished, replaced by the mundane, soft glow of the Hall of Communion.

We were back on the dais, exactly where we had been.

Elara and Lysandra stumbled slightly, as if coming out of a trance.

I, on the other hand, was still covered in my own drying blood, my body aching, my mind raw.

I looked up.

The entire first-year class was still there, frozen, staring at us. Staring at me.

They hadn't seen the dragon. They hadn't heard the roars.

They just saw the three of us vanish... and now, we had returned. Elara and Lysandra looked confused and disappointed.

And I, their Rank 1, was bleeding, looking utterly defeated.

Across the room, I saw Eric William. He was leaning back in his seat, arms crossed. A slow, beautiful, and utterly triumphant smile was spreading across his face.

My "failure" at the Spirit Orb wasn't just a failure anymore. It was a catastrophic, divine rejection... and he, along with the entire Academy, had just seen the proof.

(To be continued)

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