"This is gonna be a bloodbath." One student said.

'Great,' Zaeryn thought to himself, his jaw tightening. 'They can't wait to see me suffer.'

"Go easy on him, Leia!" Yuna called out, her voice laced with genuine concern.

"Yeah, he's still a nascent!" Jyn added, standing up for him.

Leia just scoffed at their concern. Hearing those two defending him brought a genuine, if fleeting, smile to Zaeryn's face. But still, the knot of unease tightened in his gut as he turned to Zelda and raised a hand. "Hey…."

Before he could even say what he wanted to say, Zelda's eyebrow arched. "No backing out of this Zaeryn. Don't act like you're afraid you'll break a nail."

"Something like that," Zaeryn admitted. "My Vitae abilities are nascent. Uncontrolled. Last time I tried something fancy, I knocked myself out cold. I've got my strength, but that's about it. The rest is... a work in progress."

The instructor watched him for a long, silent moment, her steel-gray eyes dissecting him.

"And how do you plan on mastering those nascent abilities if you never use them?" she countered, her logic sharp and inescapable.

"I'm not asking for a miracle, Noctis. I'm asking for a baseline."

She folded her arms, her posture unyielding. "Here are the terms. You are all standing in the training Chamber. The moment I activate it, the resonance dampeners will neutralize ninety percent of your raw Vitae output.

"So that means, your vitae powers will not be as deadly as they are normally and you won't hurt one another…" she grinned, and then dropped it, " Not too much anyways."

"This is where we separate the true warriors from the cadets who just like making things explode."

Zaeryn let out a slow breath. He was cornered. Arguing further would only make him look weak. With a final, resigned shrug, he made his way down to the training floor, the eyes of two hundred new classmates following his every step.

The chamber itself was a vast expanse of interlocking hexagonal panels, each glowing with a soft, internal light. Leia was already there, standing in the center of a combat circle marked by a shimmering blue line. As Zaeryn stepped over the threshold, Zelda tapped a command into her wrist-mounted console.

"Aegis Chamber, combat protocol seven. Activate."

The hexagonal panels within the blue circle pulsed with light, then turned completely transparent, revealing a dizzying drop into a chasm of humming machinery and power conduits below.

A low hum intensified, and from the edges of the circle, a dome of shimmering, near-invisible energy flickered into existence, sealing them inside. The air within the dome grew still, charged with static.

The sounds of the whispering crowd were suddenly muffled, distant.

Leia stood in the center of the transparent floor, utterly unfazed by the drop beneath her feet. Up close, she was even more striking—and intimidating.

Her pale skin was flawless, and her cold eyes watched him with unnerving stillness. The air around her felt heavy, charged with a quiet, predatory energy.

He stopped a few feet from her, rolling his shoulders to loosen the sudden tension.

Leia tilted her head, a single, fluid motion that sent a shiver down his spine.

"Are you ready to be broken?" Leia's voice was laced with a personal venom. To her, Zaeryn wasn't just an arrogant newcomer; he was an embodiment of the annoying, coddled male gender.

Zaeryn's answering grin was slow and utterly infuriating. "Broken? Not really. But I might be a little out of breath after this. Try to keep up."

"Cute," she shot back. "Now that I see your face up close, it makes me want to mess it up." She shifted her stance, muscles taut under her fitted uniform. Her fiery red braid swung slightly as she tilted her head.

She was all sharp edges and raw power, athletic, confident, and hot in a way that made Zaeryn's brain momentarily short-circuit.

'Focus, idiot. She's not here to flirt.'

Leia moved, a blur of crimson and black. Her first kick was a high, sweeping arc aimed at his head. Zaeryn ducked clumsily, the wind from her attack ruffling his hair. He'd never been in a real fight before, and he was forced purely on the defensive, dodging a rapid series of strikes that drove him backward.

Seeing him only retreat, her confidence surged. "All that talk, and this is it?" she spat, her movements fluid and deadly. "You're just a protected species playing dress-up. You're not worthy of that uniform."

She spun into a powerful side kick aimed at his ribs. This time, Zaeryn didn't dodge. The entire chamber went silent as he raised his arm, catching her shin against his forearm with a deafening CRACK! that echoed in the contained air.

Leia's eyes went wide with shock. The force of her kick, which should have shattered his bones even with her power dampened, had been stopped cold. It felt like kicking a solid steel wall.

The whispers in the crowd died. Jyn's jaw dropped. Even Instructor Zelda's eyebrow twitched.

"How…?" Leia breathed, trying to pull her leg back, but his grip was like iron.

"You talk too much," Zaeryn grunted, raw strength surging through him. With a powerful twist, he shoved her leg away, sending her stumbling backward.

Leia's confident smirk vanished, replaced by a look of disbelief and fury. "Fine," she snarled. "No more games."

Whips of scarlet flame erupted from her fists.

The Vitae dampeners reduced them to shimmering ribbons of light, but they were no less deadly. She lashed out. Zaeryn leaped back, the heat searing his cheek. This was beyond his physical abilities. He needed speed.

Focusing on Ravena, he reached for that coiled, electric energy. 'Kinetic Acceleration!'

It was a mistake. A glorious, chaotic, perfectly timed mistake.

Instead of a controlled dash, the world became a streak of blurred light. He launched forward like an uncontrolled missile. Leia had no time to react as he slammed into her, his momentum carrying both of them in a tangled heap across the transparent floor.

They skidded to a halt just inches from the edge of the chasm. Zaeryn found himself on top of her, their limbs entangled, his chest pressed against the soft, firm curve of hers.

Her fiery hair was splayed out beneath him, and her wide, shocked eyes were inches from his. He was dazed, but his instincts took over. A unique, pleasant scent filled his senses—hers.

"Well," he rasped, a slow grin spreading across his face. "I'm still learning to use my abilities… Impressive, isn't it?"

For a split second, Leia's brain short-circuited. The proximity, his weight, his surprisingly pleasant scent—it sent a jolt of pure, unwanted heat through her, immediately followed by a wave of white-hot rage.

"GET OFF ME!" she snarled. With a furious shove, she threw him off her, scrambling to her feet, her cheeks burning with humiliation.

That was the opening she needed.

As he tried to push himself up, still dizzy, Leia's skill and training took over. A precise sweep of her leg kicked his supporting arm out from under him. His center of gravity vanished. He was flipped onto his back, the last thing he saw being the dizzying view of the machinery below before Leia's knee was on his chest, a blade of contained fire hovering inches from his throat.

The Aegis dome dissolved. He had lost.

But the chamber was utterly silent. No one was laughing. They had just witnessed an untrained male stop a Warlady's kick cold and use uncontrolled, raw Vitae.

Leia stood over him, breathing heavily, her face a mask of fury, confusion, and grudging respect. This victory felt messy. She hadn't broken his bones as she had wanted to. She'd barely survived his chaos.

Zaeryn lay on the floor, having lost the fight, but in the eyes of everyone watching, he had won something far more important.

Instructor Zelda's voice finally cut through the silence.

"Well done, Noctis." The praise was direct and clear, stunning the onlookers. She then turned her gaze to Leia. "You won, but you lost your composure. He has great potential, but no control."

She looked down at Zaeryn, and for the first time, there was no mockery in her eyes, only a sharp, profound assessment. "You both have a long way to go. Class dismissed."

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