Chapter 13: "The Binding Trial"
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The next morning, a notice appeared on the academy gates.
No trumpet. No summoning bell. Just a parchment nailed into the ironwood frame.
It bore the seal of the Headmaster's Office.
MANDATE: ONE SELECTED FIRST-YEAR STUDENT SHALL UNDERGO THE BINDING TRIAL.
TIME: MIDNIGHT. LOCATION: THE LOW CHAMBER.
OBSERVER ACCESS RESTRICTED.
CANDIDATE: YUI – JANITOR CLASS.
Yui read it three times before looking away.
Lucen said nothing. He only stared at the parchment, fists clenched.
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Down in the library's oldest wing, where dust coated forgotten grimoires and even the candles burned reluctantly, Yui found someone waiting.
Not Seris.
A girl with silver hair and no shadow.
She sat cross-legged on the table, flipping through a blank book.
"You're early," she said without looking up.
Yui blinked. "Do I know you?"
She smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes.
"No. But you will."
The book in her lap filled with ink in real time. A single word:
Failure.
"I'm not here to fight," Yui said.
"That's the problem." She shut the book. "You're here to survive. And they've decided that's not interesting enough."
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By nightfall, the Low Chamber doors groaned open.
It wasn't a trial room.
It was an arena.
Stone walls hummed with warding runes. Above, only silence. No audience. Just watchers behind enchanted mirrors.
Kael stood at the far end, robed in black and bone. Seris was beside him, arms folded, gloves gone.
Yui stepped forward. The gates shut behind him.
A voice echoed—old, genderless, cold.
"Begin Binding."
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The floor cracked.
Something rose from beneath—a creature, faceless, shaped like a man but stitched from shadows. Chains coiled its limbs, anchored to stone, but they didn't restrain it.
They guided it.
Yui summoned the flame instantly—but this time, it didn't come white.
It came black.
A flicker of the same mark Seris wore flashed across his palm, then vanished.
Kael smiled. Seris did not.
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The shadow creature lunged—silent, brutal, fast.
Yui ducked the first strike, spun to the left, blasted it with the flame—but the fire curved. It bent around the creature and struck the wall.
"They're redirecting your power," Seris said through the mirror. "You're not supposed to win."
Yui bled. He gritted his teeth and rose again.
"Then why am I still standing?"
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The fight stretched.
Minutes passed. Then more.
The creature began to slow.
Yui's breath was ragged, but the fire returned—white now, laced with gold.
He leapt—dodging a chain—and drove a burst of flame into the shadow's core.
It screamed.
The bindings shattered.
Kael's smile faded.
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From the far mirror wall, a new voice rang out.
Sharp. Furious. Feminine.
"End the trial. Now."
The voice of the Headmistress.
Yui stood in the center of the chamber, barely conscious, flame flickering around him like a shield.
Kael gave no command.
But the chamber obeyed.
The creature dissolved.
Chains fell to ash.
The doors creaked open.
Yui didn't walk out.
He staggered, barely standing—but alive.
And unbound.
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Later, in a hidden corridor, Seris stood alone.
She traced her gloved hand along the stone.
"He wasn't supposed to adapt," she whispered.
Behind her, the silver-haired girl from the library emerged from the shadows.
"Maybe he's not the one being tested anymore."
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Far above the academy, beyond the floating towers and glass bridges, a figure in armor watched through a mirror shard.
He tapped it once, then whispered:
"Open the second gate."
The shard pulsed—then cracked down the center.
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Yui didn't sleep that night.
The fire was quiet again. But not calm.
It was humming.
As if it had tasted something forbidden.
And wanted more.
End of Chapter 13