2025-09-29 08:27:19The Institute had a strange silence to it that morning. Maybe it was my imagination, or maybe it was the stares. I had noticed for a few days now that some students followed me with their eyes—not with curiosity, but with the kind of contempt that hides behind a polite smile. I didn’t like it, but it didn’t stop me either.
That day, as we were leaving History, the tension exploded. “Look who’s talking about old wives’ tales again,” said a tall boy, his uniform perfectly pressed and the emblem of a student society embroidered on his pocket. Two of his friends were with him, surrounding me in the hall. Karol, who was walking beside me, frowned. “Leave him alone, Arven,” she said sharply. Arven smiled, but not at her. At me. “I’m just saying, we come here to study what’s real, what’s documented, not fables about portals and lost magic. Or do you think you know more than the teachers?” I stood still. I could have lowered my head and walked away, but my blood was boiling. “If they were just fables, they wouldn’t be in so many archives. Don’t tell me you’ve never seen the symbols repeat themselves—on murals, in manuscripts, in ruins. You think that’s a coincidence?” Arven’s smile tightened. The students around us started to whisper. This was what he wanted: to humiliate me in public. “The only thing repeating here,” he shot back, “is your childish obsession. Look around you. Do you see anyone else believing that nonsense?” Silence. Karol took a step forward, but I touched her arm to stop her. “Sometimes the one who stands alone is the one closest to the truth.” My voice came out firmer than I expected. A murmur ran through the hall. Arven’s eyes flashed with contained rage. Before he could reply, someone coughed softly from the end of the hallway. An older boy, with neatly combed black hair and an unreadable expression, had stopped to watch us. His eyes were dark, serene, but there was something in the way he looked that made me feel exposed, as if he already knew what I was going to say before I even thought it. He said nothing. He just watched me as Arven, uncomfortable, backed away with his friends, shooting me one last warning glance. Karol sighed in relief. “You shouldn’t provoke them so much, Miguel.” “They started it.” She was about to argue, but the boy with the piercing gaze approached. His steps were calm, calculated. “You talk too much for someone new,” he said in a low voice, almost a whisper only I could hear. “That can be dangerous.” “And who are you?” I asked, a bit defensively. He smiled faintly, without showing his teeth. “Someone who listens. And someone who knows of a place where your questions wouldn’t be so poorly received.” He pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket and pressed it into my hand before turning away. I opened it as soon as he was gone: an address and a time. No name. Karol saw it over my shoulder. “What’s that?” “An invitation. Or a trap. I don’t know yet.” Later To clear the tension, Karol took me to the nearest shopping mall. It was a massive place, full of lights and screens advertising everything from clothes to political campaigns. I laughed watching her jump from store to store; it seemed she forgot everything when she was surrounded by display windows. “You need a distraction,” she told me. “If you keep thinking about murals coming to life, you’re going to go crazy.” I didn’t answer. My eyes were fixed on a giant screen in the central plaza. The noise gradually died down as the broadcast began. “Live: Address from Governor Edrian Veyra.” The crowd in the mall came to a halt. Some even applauded when his face appeared. Edrian was a man with carefully styled silver hair, in a dark suit that radiated elegance. His voice filled the space with a calculated calm. “People of Fosack,” he began, “today I wish to share a momentous decision with you. I have served this nation for years—years in which, together with you, we built roads, raised factories, strengthened education, and brought prosperity to every corner of this land.” The people in the mall nodded, as if they were all part of that story. “But today,” he continued, “I announce that I will soon step down as Governor, because I wish to serve at a higher level. I have decided to run for Internal Minister of the continent of Fosack. Because Fosack is not just our nation; it is the heart that beats alongside the others, and it is time for us to unite under a single purpose.” The plaza erupted in applause. Some cheered his name. I didn’t clap. Something in his words sounded too rehearsed, too perfect. I looked again at the surname that appeared in golden letters at the bottom of the screen: Veyra. I had seen it before—in archives, in notes, in symbols. A shiver ran down my spine. The Dynasty - Part 1: Isandra Veyra - Secretary to the Governor I watched him from the side of the stage. His voice filled the plaza with a confidence that bordered on hypnotic, and I knew exactly which words would come next. We had rehearsed for weeks, every pause measured, every gesture studied in the mirror of his office. Governor Edrian Veyra never left anything to chance. “The people love us,” he had told me the night before, as we went over the final lines. “And when they love you, they stop questioning.” He was right. There they all were: clapping, cheering, chanting his name as if it were an anthem. They believed in him. Or rather, they believed in the image we had built for them. I smiled, as always. That was my role: to accompany him, to reinforce the scene, to keep the facade of the unimpeachable man intact. No one was to notice the arguments behind closed doors, nor the agreements that never appeared on paper. My notes were filled with names, dates, strategic moves. It was more than a secretary should handle, but Edrian trusted me, or at least he made me believe he did. I was his shadow, the one who silenced what was inconvenient and polished what was necessary. “Fosack is not one nation,” he proclaimed from the podium, raising his hand with solemnity. “We are many. And together, the continent of Fosack will be glorious.” The plaza roared with emotion. I, on the other hand, felt the weight of what was left unsaid. Because his smile wasn't just about politics.
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Chapter 12 - Cracks in the Facade
Isandra VeyraCalm was a luxury we couldn’t afford, but panic was a poison, one that could dissolve the foundations of an empire built on a century of meticulous control. That was why the crisis room in the Veyra Tower operated in a state of frenetic order, a ballet of efficiency rehearsed for moments precisely like this. Dozens of analysts, the best in Fosack, moved in near-absolute silence, their fingers flying over holographic keyboards that projected cascades of data. On the walls, giant screens were windows into the chaos. They showed maps of Rixus with entire sectors blinking red from massive power failures, real-time social media feeds exploding with thousands of shaky videos of the colored storm, and the pale faces of news anchors struggling to find words for the impossible.At the center of it all, Edrian Veyra watched, motionless. His face was a mask of serenity, but I, who knew his every nuance, could see the tension in the muscles of his jaw. It wasn’t fear. It was the con
Chapter 11 - The Color of the Fever
MiguelPain wasn’t a sound; it was a color. A blinding white that consumed everything, erasing the edges of the room, Silas’s face, my own hands in front of my eyes. My body was trembling uncontrollably, not from cold, but from the residual vibration of the roar, like a guitar string still quivering after being plucked too hard. The ringing in my ears began to fade, replaced by a chaotic murmur coming from outside. Sirens. Distant screams. The sound of a city plunged into confusion.“Miguel…” Silas’s voice was a hoarse whisper, stripped of all its arrogance. The shock had shattered his mask. “What… what was that? What happened to you?”I tried to answer, but only a moan escaped my lips. I curled up on the floor, hugging my knees, trying to anchor myself to something real while the world kept spinning. The fever in my head wasn’t from heat; it was from energy, as if a lightning bolt had lodged itself in my brain and was now fighting to get out.Silas knelt beside me, but not to help. H
Chapter 10 - The Fever and the Roar
MiguelThe note on my pillow wasn’t just a piece of paper. It was a violation. It was a statement. The cold wall of paranoia that had been closing in on me all day had finally collapsed, crushing me. The surveillance was no longer passive, no longer across the street or down a distant hallway. It had been in my room, in my safe space. Fear, until that moment, had been an animal stalking me from a distance. Now, it was in the cage with me. I sat on the edge of my bed, my heart hammering a frantic rhythm against my ribs, staring at the three words in that elegant, unfamiliar handwriting: The mural breathes.Solitude was a death trap. They would isolate me, make me doubt my own sanity, and then, when I was scared and confused enough, they would make their move. I couldn't let them. Kai, Silas, Rocco, Lena... they were all I had. Ignoring the tremor in my hands, I left my room and headed for the student wing’s communication center. The emergency method was risky: sending a text message to
Chapter 9 - Echoes in the Walls
MiguelThe next morning, the sun filtering through the stained glass of Rixus felt like a sham. Walking through the institute’s hallways, which just twenty-four hours ago were merely a labyrinth of new experiences, had become an exercise in paranoia. Every security camera on the corners of the buildings seemed to slowly turn to follow me. The sleek, silver logo of the Veyra corporation, visible on students’ tablets and projectors, was no longer a symbol of progress, but the emblem of a crownless monarchy that watched me from everywhere. The truth was a heavy burden, and I carried it on my back, feeling it stoop my shoulders with every step. Knowledge hadn’t made me freer; it had locked me in a cage of fear and secrets.“Miguel, wait up!”Karol’s cheerful, carefree voice cut through the fog of my thoughts. She ran up to me, a smile on her face that made me feel like a traitor. She still lived in the world from before, the real, simple world that I had lost forever in a basement filled
Chapter 8 - Threads on the Map
Isandra VeyraThe artificial light in the Governor’s office was cold, designed to keep the mind sharp and eliminate any shadow where ambiguity might hide. Outside, the Rixus night enveloped the city, but in here, at the pinnacle of the Veyra tower, time itself seemed under our control. Edrian watched the cityscape through the armored window, his hands clasped behind his back. He wasn’t admiring the view; he was assessing it, like a general studying a map before a battle. My place was at the long, polished mahogany table, a holographic screen floating silently before me, displaying the post-crisis reports.The crisis, of course, was the one we had manufactured. “Solar flare.” An elegant, scientific term to cover up a massive electrical storm that had swept across all of Fosack. The narrative had been a success. Edrian’s speech, where he announced his aspiration for Internal Minister of the continent, had calmed public nerves and reinforced his image as a firm leader in times of uncerta
Chapter 7 - What the Flame Remembers
MiguelKai’s hand turned the knob, and the door swung inward, revealing a silent darkness. The sound of the “party” behind us cut off abruptly, as if we had crossed an invisible barrier. Kai gestured for me to enter and closed the door, plunging us into an almost total stillness. A second later, a series of fluorescent lights flickered on above us, revealing the true heart of the operation.If the living room was the disguise, this was the brain. We were in a basement, its concrete walls hidden beneath an ocean of information. Enormous corkboards covered every inch, interconnected by a web of red string that looked like pulsing veins. They linked satellite photos, portraits of politicians—I recognized Governor Veyra at the center of it all—newspaper clippings, and complex scientific equations. The air was thick, heavy with the smell of burnt coffee, the low hum of several computers, and the static energy of a shared obsession.Silas was already here, leaning against a table with his a
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