The coarse wooden broom was slowly wearing away the skin on Kelvin’s palms. He pushed the scrub-brush across the grand obsidian tiles of the Grand Refectory, his back aching with a dull, persistent throbbing. Around him, high vaulted ceilings stretched into shadows, laced with shifting constellations of light spellcraft that illuminated the hall in faint blues and amethysts. Three agonizing months had passed since he woke up on the icy marble steps of the Academy of Arcane Arts.He didn't belong here, he wasn't from this realm of floating spires, glowing elemental incantations, or aristocratic bloodlines. Kelvin was from Earth, a world where electricity ran through copper wires, not ether through veins. When he had first awakened, breathless and disoriented, he couldn't speak their language or comprehend their strange, glowing sigils. The faculty hadn't treated him as a miraculous dimensional traveler; they treated him as a stray pest. Lacking a single drop of mana in his body, he wa

Dean Martins stood rooted to the marble dais, his knuckles white against his wooden staff. For three terrifying seconds, the entire academy remained completely frozen, staring at the bruised, tear-streaked cleaner kneeling amidst the dust and shattered glass left behind by the fled beasts. No one could comprehend what had just transpired. Two B-rank apex predators, famous for tearing high-tier mages to shreds, had dropped their prey and fled in absolute terror but as the initial shock evaporated, the mages' fragile ego and embarrassment quickly warped into an ugly, collective rage. They could not accept that a non-magical worm had survived through anything other than sheer, disgusting unnaturalness.“W-what kind of unnatural foulness is that?!” Noah bellowed first, breaking the silence as he pointed a trembling, accusing finger at Kelvin. “He didn't fight them off. He couldn't even if he tried He's so utterly rancid, filthy, and worthless that even mindless void beasts are disgusted

“M-Master?”Noah’s voice cracked into a thin, pathetic wheeze, the word scraping out of his throat as if he were choking on dry ash. Beside him, Alaric stood completely petrified, his jaw hanging open, his hands trembling violently within his silver-trimmed sleeves. Behind them, Seraphina and Chloe clutched each other’s arms in sheer, paralyzed terror, their faces drained of every drop of color.Around the storm-battered courtyard, hundreds of rain-drenched students watched the scene in utter, suffocating disbelief. Dean Martins, the terrifying Arch-Mage, the absolute sovereign of the Aetherion Academy whose very name made regional lords tremble was kneeling knee-deep in the muddy water, his forehead pressed so hard against the dry stone floor at Kelvin’s bare feet that his knuckles turned white.Martins slowly lifted his head, tears streaming down his water-logged face, his amber eyes wide with a horrified, desperate remorse.“Forgive me, My Lord! Forgive this blind, foolish, wretch

The transition from the dirt of the academy to the zenith of absolute, unimaginable luxury occurred far faster than Kelvin could process his own breath.He was escorted down the grand marble steps of the Academy, passing through rows of hundreds of silent, trembling mages and students who pressed their faces into the wet gravel. Guided by the Kingmaker himself, Kelvin was ushered into the rear passenger compartment of a vehicle unlike anything he had ever seen or imagined.It was a hovering, obsidian-black limousine forged from enchanted star-steel, powered by a silent gravity-engine that glided two feet above the ground without a single vibration. The window glass was dark, privacy-shielded crystal, and the spacious interior was lined with crimson velvet, gold-leaf trimming, and crystal carafes of chilled, glowing nectar. It was a machine that made Earth's finest hypercars look like rusted, primitive toys.Kelvin sat stiffly on the plush leather seats, his eyes wide with lingering sh

The heavy velvet curtains of the hovering imperial carriage swayed gently as it glided away from Aetherion Academy, leaving behind a courtyard of weeping nobles, clattering broomsticks, and the utterly broken pride of the academy's former elite.Inside, Kelvin leaned back against the deep crimson cushions, staring out the darkened crystal window. Outside, the night sky was alive with the soft glow of flying griffin escorts and distant floating spires. Beside him sat the Kingmaker, his ancient hands resting quietly atop his crystal-capped dragon staff."You handled the academy with remarkably cold precision, Your Royal Highness," the Kingmaker observed softly, breaking the quiet hum of the anti-gravity engine. "Stripping the Valerius boy and his clique of their nobility while turning the Arch-Mage into a groundskeeper... it sends a message that will shake the high houses to their very foundations."Kelvin didn't turn his head as he replied, "They made my life a living hell for three mo