Mara woke to the smell of dust and burned air. Her body ached; every breath felt like broken glass. The dawn sky hung pale over a field of gray glass that stretched to the horizon. No birds. No wind. Just stillness.She pushed herself upright. Her palms stuck to the surface, it was warm, faintly pulsing under her fingers. “Oliver…” she whispered. The name came out raw.A few steps away, Grelich knelt beside the sword. It jutted from the ground at a perfect angle, wrapped in a faint halo of gold and crimson light. Around the hilt floated the half-formed crown, spinning lazily as if it breathed. He didn’t look up. “Don’t touch it.”Mara staggered toward him. “What is it doing?”“Listening,” he said.She frowned. “To what?”Grelich finally turned. His eyes were bloodshot, the skin beneath them bruised. “To us. To him. To whatever is left in between.”Garrick stood farther back with the few surviving rebels, weapons drawn but useless. The air around the sword felt thick, like invisible

The battlefield was quiet. Too quiet. The Crown hung in the air, black and still, like a dead star. Its once-blinding light had vanished, leaving only faint ripples of energy that shimmered like heat above the shattered ground. The wind no longer screamed. Even the mist had fallen, curling in thin, dying streams around Grelich’s boots. He stared at the floating relic with hollow eyes. “Mara.”Garrick limped closer, his armor cracked, blood trickling from a wound near his ribs. “She’s gone, isn’t she?”Grelich didn’t answer. His throat felt tight. His hands, once alive with runes, were dim and trembling. The runes had burned out, empty vessels now. The price of too much magic.He sank to one knee, clutching the dirt. “I told her not to go that deep. I told her.”The ground trembled before he could finish. A pulse. Soft at first, then heavier, like a heartbeat made of thunder. Garrick spun around. “What was that?”Grelich looked up. The Crown. It was moving again. Not spinning, breath

The next day felt different. It wasn’t just the glances. It was the silence that followed him everywhere.Conversations stopped when Oliver entered a room. Laughter dimmed when he passed through the halls. Even the teachers, who used to look through him, seemed to hesitate before speaking his name during roll call.He had become something else, someone people whispered about but didn’t dare approach.The System’s faint hum was ever-present in the back of his mind. Its interface flickered from time to time, little digital sparks dancing across his vision like static.[Warning: Observation detected.][Source: Unknown.]Each time, the words vanished as quickly as they appeared. By lunch, Oliver was starting to feel the weight of those invisible eyes. Every corner of the academy seemed to breathe. The cameras on the walls. The students whose gazes lingered too long. Even the shadows under the stairwell seemed to watch him.It wasn’t paranoia. He knew it. The System didn’t lie. Someone,

The morning bell echoed through the academy like a blade slicing the quiet. Students filled the hallway, laughing, talking, pretending they didn’t see him.Oliver walked alone, head down, hands shoved deep in his pockets. The laughter wasn’t for him, but it always found its way to his ears. He had been the joke for too long, the one who failed his awakening, the one everyone could push around, but today, something was different.His steps felt heavier. His heartbeat quieter. There was a strange calm inside him, like a still pond just before a storm.The System was silent, but he could feel it there, watching, humming softly in the back of his mind. Energy flickered under his skin, faint but real. Every breath carried a pulse he didn’t understand yet. As he reached his locker, a familiar voice broke through the crowd.“Well, if it isn’t the academy’s miracle,” sneered Drake, the biggest of his bullies. Three others followed behind him, wearing that same mocking grin. “Heard you’ve be

The night after the fight, rain came without warning. Soft at first, then steady, cold drops tapping against the dorm windows like quiet knocks.Oliver couldn’t sleep. He sat on his bed, watching the raindrops race down the glass. The System’s faint blue glow hovered beside him, silent.The words from earlier kept replaying in his mind: “You’ve just been marked.”He rubbed his eyes. “Marked by who? For what?”[Unknown intent.][High probability: Factional surveillance.]“Can I remove the mark?”[Impossible. Only the source can terminate the link.]He sighed. The world outside looked still, but he could feel the eyes again, the invisible watchers. Somewhere, someone was recording his every move.He didn’t want to be afraid, but it was impossible not to feel it, that sense of being prey.By morning, the rain had stopped. The ground smelled like wet stone and iron.Oliver walked toward the west courtyard again, this time in daylight. He needed answers, and Billy Williams was the only per