The golden, forceful light of the Guardian Dragon, Luminos, dissipated, leaving us in the stark, cold reality of the Hall of Communion.

The transition was brutal. One moment, we were in a divine, sun-filled cavern. The next, we were a heap of tangled limbs on the polished stone floor, the mundane scent of moss and damp earth filling our lungs.

I was on all fours, gasping, the world swimming in a nauseating, blurry haze.

The divine pressure was gone, but the backlash was a living thing.

My skull felt like it was trying to split in two, a migraine of cosmic proportions from the effort of suppressing Drakerlor's divine rage while simultaneously enduring the holy onslaught of Luminos.

Gghk…

A small, pathetic sound escaped my lips. I spat, and a droplet of blood, dark and viscous, stained the pristine white stone of the Hall.

My nose and ears were bleeding freely, the coppery taste thick in my mouth.

Silence.

The hall, moments before filled with the excited chatter of fifty students bonding with their new spirit partners, was now utterly, deafeningly silent. I didn't need to look up to feel it.

Every eye—every student, every instructor—was fixed on the three of us who had been unceremoniously ejected from the inner sanctum.

Elara was in a worse state, curled in on herself, weeping with a profound, soul-deep terror that went beyond simple fear.

She had glimpsed the true, terrifying face of her people's god. Lysandra, the ancient and powerful Spirit Walker, was pale as her own robes, leaning heavily against the dais, her hands trembling.

She looked not at the students, but at me, her expression a mask of pure, unadulterated shock.

And me… I was the anomaly, bleeding on the floor, the living proof of... something.

I could hear the whispers starting, like the scratching of rats in the walls.

"What… what happened?"

"Did you hear that? That roar… it came from in there..."

"Look at him! He's cover in blood!"

"He failed… but what the hell happened inside?"

My first instinct was to show weakness, to play the victim.

But the gamer, the strategist, the 'author' in me knew that was the wrong move. Pity was a weapon used against the weak. Silence and defiance were a shield.

Gritting my teeth against the searing pain in my head, I forced my trembling limbs to obey.

I pushed myself up, one knee, then the other, until I was standing. I was unsteady, my body swaying, but I was standing.

I wiped the blood from my nose and upper lip with the back of my sleeve, my gaze intentionally sweeping the room, cold and indifferent.

I met Leon's eyes.

He looked horrified, his hand half-outstretched as if he wanted to help but didn't know how. I saw Aiden, his usual smirk gone, replaced by a rare look of serious concern.

I saw Maria and Aurelia, their faces pale, their analytical minds clearly in overdrive, trying to process the data-point of the Rank 1 suddenly bleeding on the floor after being personally summoned by a god.

And then I saw Eric William.

He wasn't whispering. He was leaning back in his seat, arms crossed.

A slow, beautiful, and utterly triumphant smile was spreading across his face.

He looked like he had just been handed the world on a silver platter.

"So," he called out, his voice sharp and mocking, cutting through the hushed awe.

"This is the true power of our 'First-Year Monarch'. He meets a real divine presence and can't even stand up straight.

He's bleeding like a stuck pig!"

The students flinched, but Eric was emboldened. He laughed, a short, barking sound of pure, unadulterated joy.

"I knew it!" he declared, stepping forward.

"He's a fake! A fluke! All that power, all those ranks… it was just a trick. The moment he faced a true spirit, a holy presence, he was exposed for what he is!"

He pointed a finger at me, his eyes blazing with righteous malice.

"He's cursed! His soul is so rotten that nature itself, the Guardian itself, rejected him! He's a stain on this Academy!"

The accusation hung in the air, heavy and poisonous.

It was the perfect narrative. It didn't just explain my failure; it weaponized it.

It confirmed every dark whisper, every jealous suspicion that had followed me since I took the top rank. I wasn't just a failure; I was an abomination.

Lysandra, her face still pale, took an unsteady step forward.

"That is enough, Student William. You do not understand what you witnessed—"

"I understand what I see!" Eric snapped back, unwilling to let his victory be stolen.

"I see a hall full of successful, bonded students. And I see him," he sneered, "the great Michael Wilson, alone, bleeding, and rejected. He has no spirit. He has no partner. He is, by the Academy's own rules, a failure."

The word echoed. Failure.

I just watched him, my expression unreadable. I let his poison spread, let the crowd absorb it.

...Master... Nox's voice was a furious, sleepy hiss in my mind. ...He is loud. He is weak. Let me... eat him...

'Not now, Nox. Go back to sleep.'

My internal battle was, as always, more pressing than the external one.

Professor Evelyn Whitehound, who had been silent until now, finally moved.

She stepped down from the instructor's dais, her heels clicking with sharp, metallic authority. She walked past the students, past Eric, and stopped directly in front of Lysandra.

"Professor," Evelyn said, her voice a low, commanding tone that was meant only for the ancient elf.

"Control the narrative. Now. Or he," she flicked her gaze towards Eric, "will write it for you. We cannot have the student body believing a divine entity tried to smite one of their classmates. It's bad for morale."

Lysandra looked at Evelyn, her ancient eyes filled with a dawning horror.

"But Evelyn... you didn't feel it. The other one. The shadow of Drakerlor..."

"I don't care if he was channeling a demon king," Evelyn whispered back, her voice ruthless.

"This is an Academy, not an inquisition. We have a structure to maintain. You are the Spirit Keeper. Handle it."

Lysandra stared at her, then at me—the bleeding, silent anomaly.

She closed her eyes for a long moment, visibly composing herself. When she opened them, the divine shock was gone, replaced by the serene, ageless mask of the Spirit Walker.

She turned to the class. Her telepathic voice, no longer warm, washed over us, cool and clear.

"Student William is mistaken."

Eric's triumphant smirk froze. "What?"

"What you witnessed was not a rejection,"

Lysandra said, her voice resonating with an unshakeable, ancient authority that made Eric's taunts sound like the yapping of a dog.

"It was an incompatibility of pure, fundamental force. Michael Wilson's spirit-root... his soul's core... is one of absolute Dominance."

The hall fell silent again. A new, more potent word had been introduced. Dominance.

"The free spirits of this Sanctuary," Lysandra continued, weaving the most elegant, high-class lie I had ever heard, "are beings of communion. Of partnership.

They seek to harmonize. Student Wilson's aura does not ask for a partner; it conquers. It attempts to subjugate. The spirits fled not out of hatred, but out of self-preservation. They will not bow to such a will."

She had done it.

In one move, she had flipped the narrative. I wasn't "rejected" anymore.

I was "too dominant" to be partnered. It was, in its own way, an affirmation of my power. It still marked me as an outcast, but a powerful one—a lion, not a leper.

Eric's face contorted, his perfect victory line stolen from him. "Dominance? That's absurd! It looked like rejection to me! He was bleeding!"

"The bleed," Lysandra said, not missing a beat, "was the result of his incompatible aura clashing violently with the Sanctuary's holy, ambient mana. A simple, if painful, backlash. It is of no consequence." She turned her gaze back to the class at large.

"Therefore, he has failed this Rite. His soul is not suited for Spirit Communion."

The finality of the word "failed" still hung in the air, a small victory for Eric. But the narrative was mine.

Evelyn Whitehound stepped forward, taking charge.

"Professor Lysandra is correct. This is an issue of compatibility, not worth. However, the Academy rules are strict.

The upcoming Spire of Ascendance, and indeed the entire Advanced Combat curriculum, requires each student to demonstrate the ability to command and maintain a familiar, beast, or spirit. It is a fundamental component of mana regulation and shared-link combat."

She looked at me, her face all business. "Student Wilson, since the 'wild' spirits reject you, you are left with only one alternative."

She pointed towards a heavy, iron-gated tunnel at the far back of the Ether Glade, a section that was warded, dark, and emanated a faint, primal stench.

"The Physical Beast Pens," she announced.

A new wave of whispers—this time, laced with genuine fear and dark amusement.

"The Beast Pens?"

"Isn't that where they keep the monsters that failed taming?"

"The feral ones?"

"That's for disciplinary cases and third-years trying to prove their mettle... they're sending him in there?"

Lysandra nodded, picking up the thread. "If the wild spirits reject your 'Dominance,' Michael Wilson, then you must prove it. The creatures in those pens are not gentle souls seeking partnership.

They are physical beasts, captured from dungeons. They do not judge; they respect only strength. They must be dominated."

Evelyn's lips curved into a sharp smile.

"You have until the Spire challenge begins—one week—to enter the pens, confront a beast, and forge a contract by force. If you cannot... you will have no familiar. And you will fail this entire semester's module."

The challenge was set. The gauntlet, thrown.

I finally moved.

I straightened up, my head still throbbing, but my balance restored. I looked at Eric's furious, confused face.

I looked at Leon's look of pity, which was slowly turning to concern.

I looked at Maria, who was watching me with a sharp, analytical gaze, her mind clearly already calculating the odds of this new, dangerous test.

Then I looked at Evelyn and Lysandra.

"Understood, Professors."

I turned, not back to the line, but towards the exit of the Hall. My steps were steady.

"Where are you going, Student Wilson?" Evelyn called out. "The Rite is not yet fully dismissed."

I paused at the door, my back to them.

"I've been dismissed by the spirits, Professor. I'm not going to stand here and watch others succeed where I failed."

My voice was cold, flat, carrying the sting of my "public" humiliation. "I'm going to the Beast Pens."

"Now?" Lysandra asked, surprised.

"Why wait?" I said, glancing over my shoulder. "If I'm going to tame a monster... I might as well get an early start."

I didn't wait for their permission. I walked out of the Hall of Communion, leaving behind a room full of stunned silence, my own blood still drying on the dais floor.

As I walked down the root-covered path, I let the mask of indifference fall. A cold, sharp, predatory smile spread across my face.

'Rejected.' 'Cursed.' 'A failure.'

They had no idea.

They thought they were punishing me. They thought they were shunting me off to the pen of rejects.

They didn't realize they had just given me the single, perfect, unassailable alibi I needed.

My 'spirit' wasn't in those pens. It was already in my pocket, sleeping and dreaming of destruction.

...Master... Nox purred in my mind. ...Fun?

'Not yet,' I thought, my grin widening. 'First, we have to find you a stunt double.'

(To be continued )

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.