THE SCAR FACE

The crowd jeered as the crystal stayed gray. A thousand eyes watched the boy kneeling before the altar, waiting for the faintest spark of light.

But the stone in his palm remained dull and lifeless, mocking him with its silence. “Step away, boy,” the examiner sighed. “The crystal doesn’t lie.”

The whisper spread through the academy courtyard like wildfire. “No aura.”

“No talent.”

“Another useless Miller.”

Raymond clenched his fist around the cold crystal, his pulse loud in his ears. No aura? That couldn’t be.

He’d trained for this moment since childhood, the day when every sixteen-year-old stood before the divine crystal to awaken their gift. Fire, wind, lightning, healing, any spark would do.

Anything but nothing. “Next!” the examiner barked, already dismissing him.

Raymond rose slowly, jaw tight, the sunlight catching in his storm-gray eyes. The laughter behind him stung like thorns. “Guess even his ancestors gave up on him,” one noble sneered.

“Pathetic. Maybe he can scrub the crystal clean next year,” another chimed.

He wanted to shout, to prove them wrong, but the truth burned too sharply. He had nothing. No aura. No power. No worth.

He walked out of the courtyard with his head low, each footstep echoing against marble like the beat of a dying heart.

Rain whispered across the rooftops of Serendale. The academy lights flickered dimly through the mist as Raymond sat alone beneath the archway of the east garden.

His uniform, still damp from the ceremony, clung to his skin. He stared at his palm, at the faint scar left by the testing crystal. It looked almost like… a sigil.

“Powerless, huh?” he muttered. “Then I’ll just have to find power another way.”

“You talk too much for someone who’s failed,” said a voice from the shadows.

Raymond froze. From behind a column, an old man stepped out, ragged robes, white hair matted with rain, a cane carved with strange runes. But his eyes… they glowed faintly gold.

Raymond rose, tense. “Who are you?”

“Once,” the old man said, “I was called a healer. Now I am called a heretic.”

He smiled faintly, revealing yellowed teeth. “Tell me, boy, do you wish to change your fate?”

Raymond hesitated. The man radiated danger, but something about him felt… familiar. Ancient. “What would you know about my fate?” Raymond asked.

The old man’s gaze sharpened. “I know you were born with no aura, yet you survived your birth. The energy flow in your body is broken, or perhaps… sealed.”

Raymond’s breath caught. “Sealed? You mean”

“I mean you were born with power greater than you can imagine,” the old man interrupted, his voice cutting like steel. “And the world feared it.”

The rain hissed as lightning cracked across the horizon. For a moment, the old man’s shadow stretched unnaturally long, like a serpent coiling through the fog.

“Meet me at the northern cliffs at dawn,” the old man said. “If you dare to change everything.”

Before Raymond could speak, the man vanished, swallowed by the mist. The cliffs of Serendale loomed high above the sea, wind tearing through Raymond’s hair as he approached the edge.

The horizon glowed crimson, waves crashing far below. He half expected the old man to be gone. But there he was, sitting cross-legged on the wet stone, a strange circle of silver lines drawn around him.

“You came,” the man said simply.

“I don’t know why,” Raymond admitted. “Maybe I’m just desperate.”

“Good,” the man replied. “Desperation is the beginning of power.”

He motioned for Raymond to sit. “Tell me, what do you know of magic?”

“That it’s born from aura. Energy of the soul.”

The old man nodded. “And what if I told you aura is only the smoke, not the fire?”

Raymond frowned. “I don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t.” The old man’s hands began to move, tracing runes in the air. Symbols of light hung shimmering between them. “I will show you.”

The circle around them flared to life, a web of glowing lines pulsing with energy. Raymond gasped as warmth flooded through his veins, burning and soothing at once. It felt like his body was being rewritten from within.

“What is this?” he cried out.

“Medicine,” the man said calmly. “The art of healing the body, and unlocking the soul trapped within.”

Raymond’s heart pounded. His vision blurred as memories flickered, faces, fire, screams. The seal within him cracked open, a thin wisp of golden light rising from his chest.

Pain exploded through him. He fell to his knees, clutching his heart. “It’s… burning!”

“Endure it!” the old man shouted. “This is the price of rebirth!”

The wind roared. The silver circle shattered, light cascading across the cliffs in waves of raw energy. Raymond screamed, then suddenly, everything went silent. When he opened his eyes, the world had changed.

He could see the flow of energy in the air, threads of light and shadow intertwining like veins of living fire. His heartbeat echoed with strange clarity, every cell humming with potential.

He rose unsteadily. The rain no longer chilled him. The old man was smiling faintly. “Welcome back, Raymond Miller.”

Raymond blinked. “Back?”

“To yourself,” the man said. “The world took your power once. I’ve only returned it.”

They walked through the misty forest as dawn bled into gold. Raymond felt light, too light. His senses sharp, his thoughts clear, but something inside him shifted. “Who are you really?” he asked.

“My name no longer matters,” the old man said. “But if you must call me something… call me Master Arkon.”

Raymond studied him. “And what do you want from me?”

“Nothing,” Arkon said, voice low. “Except that you survive. You’ve been gifted a power that bridges medicine and magic, the art of Soul Weaving.”

Raymond frowned. “Soul… Weaving?”

“It means you can mend the flow of life energy, heal wounds, cure disease, even manipulate aura itself.”

Raymond stopped walking. “You mean… I could make the powerless strong?”

Arkon’s eyes glinted. “Or make the powerful weak.”

They reached an abandoned temple deep within the forest. Arkon lit a single lantern, revealing old murals, figures with glowing hands, restoring life and ending it in the same breath.

Raymond traced the markings. “This is medicine?”

“This,” Arkon said, “is balance. Every healer who saves a life must know how to take one. Life and death are two halves of the same law.”

He turned to Raymond, his voice suddenly cold. “You will learn both.”

Raymond hesitated. “Both?”

Arkon’s gaze pinned him. “You wish to prove your worth, boy? Then learn the truth: to heal, you must first understand destruction.”

A strange pulse filled the air. For an instant, the shadows around Arkon twisted, not like a man’s shadow, but something vast and serpentine. Raymond swallowed hard. “What are you?”

Arkon smiled thinly. “Your last chance.”

That night, when Raymond finally closed his eyes to rest, he saw the glow of his new energy in his palms. Golden light flowed between his fingers, soft, beautiful.

But as he stared closer, he realized something horrifying. The light was alive. It pulsed like a heartbeat. It whispered softly in his mind, a voice he didn’t recognize.

We’re not done yet, Raymond… the seal was never yours to break.

Raymond sat up in shock, the echo of that voice still lingering in his chest. Outside, beneath the full moon, Master Arkon watched from the temple steps, and smiled.