Valmira

In the radiant world of AURELIS, where Ascendance determines destiny and Protocols shape power, every child dreams of their Rite — the moment the Monolith names them, grants them a Protocol, and charts their place among the Chosen.

But Kaien Virell receives nothing.

Declared Hollowborn, shunned as a mistake, and mocked as a fluke who broke the sacred Monolith, Kaien is left to rot in the ashes of failure. His past is haunted by loss. His future has no path.

Yet something ancient stirs in the silence.

A whisper. A flicker. A zero.

Drawn into the elite halls of Solvyr Academy by a loophole and a professor with too many secrets, Kaien finds himself thrust into a world that does not want him. Rivals rise, powers awaken, and a flawless prodigy named Ayari Thornveil casts an unforgiving light on his every weakness.

But beneath the Academy’s golden façade, shadows move. The Protocols are not what they seem. And Kaien’s failure may not be failure at all.

When fate refuses to choose him, Kaien will write his own.

Ascendance Protocol

The gates of Solvyr Academy opened like the jaws of something divine — polished obsidian arches etched in gold and flame-runes, shifting with the breath of magic.

No fanfare. No protocol flare. Just eyes. Hundreds of them. Watching.

Tier Assignment Day was simple: students were tested, ranked, and slotted into one of five classes.

Class V — the bottom.

A graveyard for weak Protocols, political outcasts, and anomalies.

Kaien was the only one with no Protocol at all.

"You don't even have a glyph," sneered a boy with rust-colored eyes. "Are you here to clean the dueling halls?"

Kaien didn't answer. He knew better than to talk back. Not when every word he spoke sounded like a crack in the glass others called 'order.'

They tested strength, speed, conjuration, and Protocol presence.

But because nothing came when he called.

No flame. No light. Just silence — a silence so deep it made the instructors uneasy.

She walked in like she'd never lost anything in her life.

The prodigy of the Thornveil lineage. Flameborn of the Seventh Protocol. Skin like polished stone. Eyes like silverglass. Her Ascendance glyph shimmered across her collarbone, flickering like a heartbeat.

"Initiate Ayari," one professor called, "please demonstrate your command of Volflare Ascendancy."

She nodded, lifted her hand, and the sky cracked.

A spiral of fire burst upward, sculpting a phoenix out of pure solar flare.

In the training yard, lower tier students were told to fight.

To rise, you had to climb over someone else's back.

Kaien faced a boy two heads taller, with a flame-tattoo etched down his jaw — Class IV, already bruised and bitter.

"Don't worry," he said, cracking his knuckles. "I'll teach you how to stay on the ground."

When he stood again, blood in his mouth and stars in his eyes, the boy lit a small flare just above Kaien's head — a show of humiliation.

That night, Kaien sat alone on the rooftop ledge outside his dorm. The city flickered below. His hands trembled. His ribs ached.

What am I trying to prove?

No flame. No heat. No answer.

But then — as his breath slowed, and his rage curled inward — a voice came.

For a heartbeat — just one — the stars in the sky rearranged.

Kaien rose to his feet, bleeding and burning on the inside.

"If fire won't answer me…"

"…then I'll find something deeper than flame.

Chapter 3 - Protocol Academy: The Test of Flame