[Volume 1# Before Ice Age]━༺❀༻━༺❀༻━"Hi, Vonn! Did your magic crawl under a rock again?"The mocking call rang out over the courtyard like a lash, so loud that it caused a few wandering stares, but not loud enough to command more than fleeting attention. This was Arcvale Academy, after all — the fabled school of elemental mastery, where drama and magic were the norm. Around Zarek Vonn, the air vibrated with power. Runes glimmered across all the ancient stone walls, flowing like liquid light under the dawn sun. Ivory spires, inscribed with the sigils of the masters of old, reached toward the heavens as if calling forth the gods themselves.The courtyard thrummed with energy. Students in bright robes of the elements danced through the air or blazed across marble tiles. A girl surrounded by flame flew through whirling circles of flame. A boy floated cross-legged, surrounded in a reverberating spiral of stones that circled his body. Another composed a melody of air that swayed the leaves

Darkness!!Cold!!Silence!!Zarek fell through a bottomless, lightless expanse, weightless but pulled by something intangible. There was no breeze, no whoosh of air against his ears. No sense of falling — only the creeping, dreamlike awareness that he was no longer part of the world above. He was detached. Untethered. Alone. His body no longer hurt. He felt nothing. It was like numb. His arms, his legs — even his heartbeat — felt distant, like they were memories of someone else's life. For a moment, he wasn't sure if he was alive or already dead."Am I dead already?"The idea floated lazily in his head, not in terror, but as a hopeless echo. Maybe this was death — not pain, not flames, not judgment, but relief. A void where even time had forgotten him.Then — a spark.A silent shudder coursed through the emptiness, as if the echo of some ancient stirring. And then, out of the very bone of the world, a voice arose — not in sound, but in feeling. It resonated deep within his soul, skir

At dawn, Arcvale Academy slept. The towers, carved from pale stone and etched with ancient runes, stood shrouded in mist like monuments to forgotten gods. Soft light filtered through crystalline windows, catching on dust motes drifting silently through the grand halls. Elemental wards hummed faintly in the background — unseen but omnipresent — pulsing with layered enchantments to protect the academy from intrusions both magical and mundane.But beyond the wards… in the untamed wildwood where Arcvale’s control began to fade… the earth stirred — slowly, unevenly, like a creature still learning to breathe.A tremor rolled through the roots and moss, more uncertain than violent. And at the center of that fragile disturbance stood Zarek Vonn — barefoot, breathless, and shaking — locked in a clumsy struggle not against an enemy, but against his own weakness. His heel dug into the soil with effort, knees wobbling as he braced himself. He let out a grunt, not of power — but frustration.A sm

Zarek hadn’t slept, not even for a moment.The straw mattress beneath him felt like packed stone, the rough blanket more a shroud than a comfort. He stared at the splintered ceiling of his small room, eyes dry and burning. Every breath rattled in his ribs, every movement sent aches pulsing through his muscles like echoes of yesterday’s war. It hadn’t been a war, not officially. Just a street fight, a confrontation, a defense. But for Zarek, it had been a battlefield—of fists, of stone, of something deeper. Earth had risen to his command, bones had cracked beneath the force of his will, and when the dust settled, the world no longer felt the same.The sky outside his window was heavy with slate-gray clouds, as if the morning itself was reluctant to rise. Lowhollow murmured in the distance—doors creaking open, hooves clopping on wet cobblestone, vendors barking half-hearted greetings in the marketplace.But beneath the normalcy, there was tension. He could feel it.“Zarek Vonn used ear

Zarek's boots clattered against the icy steel floor, each step echoing crisply in the cold deadness of the interminable corridor. The air was artificially cooled, nipping at his flesh under the frayed leather of his jacket. In front of him, the silent escort glided with mechanical movement—no words, no hesitation—only a shadow moving through the narrow, seemingly endless tunnel. The walls were covered with strips of cold metal paneling, so highly polished that they cast shadows of faint glimmers from the sickly blue light throbbing in the narrow crevices between floor tiles. Not light, but a rhythmic, soft pulse, such as the slow, deliberate breathing of some sleeping creature deep within the earth.Runic symbols glowed with a faint sheen along the walls—age-old markings etched into metal, pulsating with an inner hum. They curled and sinuated, thinly glowing with a magical energy that seemed both foreign and treacherous. Zarek couldn't decipher them, but the thrumming beneath his fee