The VIP Viewing Balcony hovered high above the chaos of the Assessment Grounds, a sanctuary of velvet and enchanted glass separated from the dust and blood of the arena below.

This was the domain of the "Kings"—the leaders of the Academy's three great factions.

From this height, the desperate struggles of the new students looked like ants fighting over crumbs.

Three men sat in the darkened booth, the tension between them thick enough to choke a dragon.

On the left sat Ignis Sol, the leader of the Gilded Fang. He was the picture of aristocratic arrogance. Dressed in robes woven from Fire-Spider silk that shimmered with a constant, dull heat, he swirled a glass of vintage wine, his legs crossed. His hair was a cascade of crimson, and his eyes burned with a boredom that bordered on disdain.

In the middle, sitting on a reinforced crate because a normal chair couldn't hold his bulk, was Garret the Bulwark, leader of the Iron Legion. He was a mountain of muscle encased in heavy, scarred plate armor. He wasn't drinking wine; he was sharpening a massive greatsword with a whetstone, the rhythmic shhh-shhh sound grating on Ignis's nerves.

And on the right, hidden in the deepest shadows of the booth, was Vesper, the master of the Silent Wing. He wore a mask that covered the lower half of his face, and his cloak seemed to bleed into the darkness around him. He wasn't watching the arena. He was reading a stack of small, tightly rolled scrolls delivered by shadow-birds.

"Garbage," Ignis muttered, tossing his hair back. He gestured with his wine glass toward the arena floor, where a student was currently running away from a goblin, screaming for his mother. "This year's crop is absolute filth. Not a single diamond in the rough. Just pebbles."

"You're just looking for ass-kissers, Ignis," Garret grunted, not looking up from his blade. "I see plenty of potential. That kid with the axe down there? He has anger issues. Perfect for the front line. The Legion can use him as a meat shield."

"Meat shields?" Ignis scoffed. "We need elites, Garret. Do you remember what year it is?"

Garret paused. The whetstone stopped moving. The atmosphere in the balcony instantly grew heavy, the temperature dropping despite Ignis's fire aura.

"I know," Garret muttered, his voice low. "The Grand Convergence."

The Grand Convergence.

It happened every four years. A massive, brutal tournament—a war in all but name—between the Five Great Academiesof the Human Domain.

The Dragon Academy (Scale-Iron City). The Phoenix Spire (The Mage Capital). The Titan's Hold (The Warrior Sanctuary). The Shadow Garden (The Assassin School). The Divine Citadel (The Healer/Paladin Sect).

For the last two tournaments, the Dragon Academy had placed third. It was a humiliation.

The prize for winning the Convergence wasn't just gold or glory.

It was the Blood Realm.

A dimension saturated with the essence of ancient monsters. The dream of every Rider was to visit this place at least once in their life. Although the mortality rate of those who entered was more than half, the rewards if one survived simply outshone the risks.

Rumors said that the deepest parts of the realm hid the bloodlines of ancient monsters. If one could obtain them, their mounts could evolve into their Ancestor States.

The Blood Realm appeared once in a thousand years, and it carried certain conditions that changed every time.

The condition for this cycle: Entrants must be below Apprentice Rank.

This was the reason the Academy's assessment had commenced early, and why the rewards for the selected students were so high. They needed to find prodigies who hadn't yet broken through, mold them, and send them into the grinder.

But just like every time, the students for the Academy were weak. They couldn't face the prodigies of the other academies straight on, let alone win. Losing meant four years of stagnation. Winning meant evolution.

The leader of the Silent Wing didn't look up from his scrolls.

"Vesper," Ignis demanded. "You have the intake lists. Valerian said he gave out five 'Direct Entry' tickets yesterday. That means five individuals skipped the queue. Where are they?"

Vesper finally looked up. His eyes were dark, devoid of emotion, like deep wells.

"The list," Vesper said, his voice raspy like dry leaves, "is interesting."

He tossed a scroll onto the obsidian table between them.

Ignis snatched it up. Garret leaned in, squinting to read.

[Direct Entry Recipients:]

Judas Iscariot (No File Found).

Ezra Iscariot (Warrior - High Potential).

Luna Iscariot (Archer - Elf).

Nina Iscariot (Wolfkin - Halfling).

Summer Iscariot (Vampire).

Ignis looked down at the arena, frowning. "If he isn't here, he is late. Or is he boozing with the women?"

"No," Vesper said. He tapped a second scroll. "My spies report that a group matching this description entered the city yesterday. They were ambushed by the Ouroboros Guild in a commercial alley."

"Ouroboros?" Garret whistled. "Expensive hit. Someone wanted them dead before they even enrolled. Who won?"

"That is the question," Vesper said. "Five assassins went in. None came out. The alley was clean. No bodies. No blood. Just... gone."

Ignis paused. "Gone?"

"Vanished. And then, the group checked into the Silver Wyrm Inn. This morning, they left."

"Where did they go?" Ignis asked. "If they aren't at the Assessment, where are they?"

BOOOOOOM!

A massive explosion rocked the stadium below, shaking the VIP booth and causing Ignis to spill a drop of wine.

The three leaders jumped to the railing.

Down in the arena, a cloud of dust was rising from the central testing platform. The massive black monolith—a device enchanted to withstand the breath of a Mature Dragon, used to measure S-Rank attacks—was gone.

It wasn't cracked. It wasn't knocked over. It had been pulverized into fine black sand.

Standing in the middle of the crater was a giant in golden armor. He was striking a pose, his muscles glistening with oil, a blinding smile on his face.

"FOR JUSTICE!" the giant roared, his voice amplified by sheer lung capacity.

Garret's jaw dropped. "That... that's the Hero. Brog."

"He destroyed the monolith," Ignis whispered, his face pale. "With a punch. No mana. No weapon skill. Just... brute force."

"Estimated Rank: SSS," Vesper read from a floating display that had just popped up, his voice showing a hint of surprise.

Greed exploded in the eyes of the two faction leaders.

This was it. This was the weapon they needed for the Grand Convergence. With this giant, they could crush the Titan's Hold. They could tank the Phoenix Spire's nukes. He was a strategic asset of the highest caliber.

"I claim him!" Garret shouted, climbing over the railing. "He is a physical fighter! He belongs to the Iron Legion!"

"He is wearing gold armor!" Ignis yelled back, grabbing Garret's cape. "He clearly has taste! He belongs to the Gilded Fang!"

"You can't buy him," Vesper said quietly.

Suddenly, the communication crystal on the table began to pulse with a frantic red light. It was an emergency frequency reserved only for high-level threats to the Academy's internal balance.

Vesper picked it up. He listened to the voice on the other end. His eyes, usually dead and calm, widened.

"Repeat that," Vesper whispered into the crystal.

He listened again. Then he slowly lowered the crystal.

He looked at Ignis and Garret.

"You can stop fighting over the giant," Vesper said. "He is just the distraction. The show."

"What are you talking about?" Garret demanded. "What could be more important than an SSS-Rank tank?"

"The North Tower," Vesper said.

Ignis froze. "The North Tower? Seraphina's territory? What about the Ice Witch?"

"It has been breached," Vesper said.

Garret laughed nervously. "Breached? By who? Did the Instructors finally evict her?"

"No," Vesper said. "A student. The one who isn't here. Judas Iscariot."

He threw the crystal onto the table. It projected a holographic image sent by one of his shadow-spies. The image was shaky, taken from a distance.

It showed the plaza in front of the North Tower—a place usually deserted due to the killing cold.

The massive ice doors were shattered.

Lying on the ground were six members of the Iron Legion—Garret's recruitment squad. They were unconscious, stacked neatly in a pile like firewood.

And standing in the doorway was a man in black robes. He was holding a sword that crackled with blue lightning. Next to him was a small girl who was... eating the ice from the doorframe.

"That's my squad!" Garret roared, slamming his fist into the wall. "He attacked the Iron Legion?!"

"He didn't just attack," Vesper corrected. "He evicted. Look at the weather."

They looked out the window toward the distant North District. Usually, a perpetual blizzard swirled around that tower, a manifestation of Seraphina's uncontrolled power and isolation.

But now... the blizzard was stopping.

The white clouds were turning grey. The mana signature was shifting.

"The ice is being... suppressed," Ignis whispered. He was a mage; he could feel the shift in the ley lines. "Seraphina... did she lose?"

"He isn't joining a faction," Vesper realized, a chill running down his spine that had nothing to do with the cold. "He is making one."

The three leaders stood in silence.

The implications were terrifying.

If Judas defeated Seraphina, he would control the North Tower—the best strategic position in the Academy with the purest mana tap.

"We made a mistake," Garret said, his voice low. "We were waiting here like idiots, expecting the recruits to come beg us for protection."

"And instead," Ignis finished, "a warlord just walked in the back door and took the throne."

Ignis turned to his servant. "I need to go to the North Tower."

"To fight him?" Garret asked, grabbing his helmet.

"To negotiate," Ignis said.

"You, an Elite, going to negotiate with a hairless child who isn't even an apprentice? No, why did you even think Seraphina will lose?" Garret snapped.

"Then tell me why the blizzard went down? Do you think Seraphina is suppressed by him?"

"What are you saying?"

"I am saying he might've made that Ice Witch join his fucking faction…" Ignis gritted his teeth.

But contrary to anyone's expectation, it wasn't Judas who made the Ice Witch follow him. Rather, he didn't even know why the hell this woman was following him.

It was almost like she became obsessed with him the moment she saw him.

Judas stood alone in the North Tower, feeling the daggering gazes of his five wives and Nyx, while a deep blue-haired girl stood before him with all smiles.

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