Shadowboard's Crimson Gambit

Vauxhall Academy stands as the world's most prestigious institution for the intellectually gifted, where only the most brilliant minds are invited to walk its hallowed halls. When eighteen-year-old Caulthier Radcliffe receives an unexpected transfer to this legendary school, he discovers that academic excellence is merely the entry fee to a far more sinister curriculum. Every student must participate in the Academy's sacred tradition—an elaborate chess-like game called Shadowboard that has been played for generations, with rules so complex they border on the mystical. The game is woven into the very fabric of the school's identity, treated with religious reverence by faculty and students alike.



What begins as an intellectual challenge soon reveals layers of mystery that run deeper than the Academy's ancient foundations. The ornate game pieces seem to pulse with an otherworldly energy, and the board itself appears to shift and change when no one is watching. As Caulthier delves deeper into the game's intricate strategies and the school's carefully guarded history, he begins to sense that something far more dangerous lurks beneath the surface of this supposedly noble competition. The other students speak in hushed whispers about past champions who simply vanished, and the portraits lining the halls seem to watch with knowing, sorrowful eyes, as if they hold secrets that could shatter everything Caulthier thought he understood about his new home.