The Anomaly's Path

Leaving the Primus Tower behind, I made my way toward the Main Academic Wing.

I walked down the quiet hallway on the second floor alone, heading straight for the central lecture hall where the first-year exams were being held.

It was still early.

The morning sun barely reached the high arched windows, casting long, pale shadows across the empty corridor. Usually, this floor was packed with students shouting, rushing between lecture halls, or talking with friends. Today, the hall was almost dead silent, except for the steady thud of my own boots against the floor.

The midterms had officially arrived, and today was only day one of the written exams.

Aegis Academy’s academic system was divided into two mandatory core subjects that every single student had to take, no matter their class rank: Mana Theory, which Vance usually ran before his core shattered, and Practical Combat Training under Morgana.

The rest of the week was a long, brutal test of our chosen electives. Every student had to take at least three electives from the academy’s list of options.

You could technically sign up for more than three electives if you were a masochist with a death wish, but I hadn’t bothered. Passing these four written papers over the next five days was already enough of a headache.

Once the written week wrapped up, the real nightmare would begin: the practical midterm exams.

For the second-year and third-year seniors, written exam week wasn’t much to worry about. They had been through it enough times to know the routine.

But for the first-year students?

It felt like a slow march to the execution block.

I leaned my head back slightly and let out a breath that misted faintly in the morning chill. Truthfully, I wasn’t too worried. I had spent hours learning under Sylvia, forcing Vance’s mana theories down my throat every evening, plus my own late-night reviews in my room.

I knew enough to get by. I wasn’t aiming to top the entire academic board. I just needed a clean, solid pass that wouldn’t drag down Class Ascendant’s overall average.

A faint, dry smile touched the corner of my lips as I kept walking. Just don’t fail, and Morgana won’t have a reason to skin me alive.

As I turned the corner toward the main lecture hall, the quiet vanished. It was replaced by a low, buzzing wall of shared anxiety. Dozens of first-year students from different classes were huddled along the walls, holding thick notebooks, scrolls, and handwritten summary sheets like holy scriptures.

”I stayed up all night memorizing everything,” one guy from Class Audax muttered to his friend, his eyes bloodshot and wide. ”And I still feel like it’s not enough.”

”All night?” another student scoffed, flipping through a worn-out notebook. ”I haven’t slept properly since last week. I was just studying every day.”

”Bro, I’m gonna fail. I’m actually gonna fail.”

”Shut up, man. If you say it out loud, it might come true.”

I paused for a second, watching a girl near the window aggressively reading her mana theory notes to herself while her hands shook.

My smile died completely. Yeah... fuck me.

I wasn’t worried before. But after listening to these people, I was starting to lose my mind.

Who in the hell studies all night without sleeping? At least I did enough to pass, right? It’s just a written exam. You just read enough to get a passing grade and move on. It’s not like Vance is going to test us on ancient lost language... right?

I shook my head aggressively, cutting off the thoughts before they could take root in my brain. If I stood out here listening to these panicking idiots for another two minutes, I was going to convince myself I forgot how to read.

Passing through the wide doors, I stepped into the grand lecture hall.

The room was huge. Rows of seats rose in steps, holding hundreds of individual desks. The exam hadn’t officially started yet and no professor had taken the stage, so the room was just as chaotic as the hallway.

Students were packed together in small groups, whispering last-minute theories or double-checking their notes.

Scanning the room, I spotted a familiar group sitting near the middle row.

Alice was leaning against a desk with a stack of notes spread out in front of her. Beside her stood Lyssaria, looking calm as always, along with Caster, who was absently running a hand through his messy brown hair, and Malva, who sat quietly at the edge of the desk.

I walked over and gave them a small nod. ”Morning.”

”Morning Leo,” Lyssaria greeted softly, offering a polite smile.

Alice didn’t even look up at first. She was staring hard at a sheet of paper, dark circles under her amber eyes.

I raised an eyebrow, taking in how tired she looked. Guess Alice actually changed.

The Alice I knew back when we first started wouldn’t have cared at all about a written paper.

She would have torn the book in half and been ready to fight anyone. But here she was, pushing herself until her eyes burned. It wasn’t that she was trying to be petty or outscore everyone else. She just hated feeling like a burden to the team.

A matter of pride, huh.

”...Where’s Roan?” I asked, looking around the group. ”Don’t tell me that bastard skipped out to sleep in his room?”

”He didn’t skip,” Alice muttered, her voice rough from lack of sleep. Without taking her eyes off her notes, she pointed a pale finger toward the back row of the hall. ”He’s over there.”

I turned my head and looked toward the back row.

My brain stopped. I closed my eyes, rubbed them hard with the heel of my palm, and opened them again, fully expecting the image to go away.

It didn’t.

Roan, the lazy, arrogant crown prince who usually spent theory lectures snoring with his boots on the desk, was sitting upright in a chair.

His long platinum hair was pulled back into a neat tie. His legs were crossed cleanly. And resting on his sharp nose was a pair of thin, silver-framed reading glasses. He was staring down at a huge book held in both hands, his face locked in intense concentration.

I turned back to Alice and Lyssaria, my jaw hanging slightly open. ”Is he for real? Am I dreaming? Did someone put an illusion spell on me before I walked in?”

Lyssaria just let out a long, tired sigh and quietly shook her head. Beside her, Alice didn’t even bother saying a word. She just rubbed her temples, dropped her notes onto the desk, and gave a tired gesture toward the back row.

Leaving them to their misery, I walked toward Roan, stopping right in front of his desk. He didn’t even blink. His eyes kept scanning down the page with scary focus.

”Roan,” I said flatly.

No response. He turned a page with a crisp snap.

”...Hey Roan. Are you listening?”

He held up one finger, his eyes darting across the final paragraph.

I leaned down, resting both hands on his desk, and stared straight at his face. ”Do you even understand a single word of what you’re reading right now?”

Roan didn’t look up. Without breaking his stoic posture, his expression completely deadpan behind the glasses, he answered smoothly: ”Not a single damn word.”

My lip twitched. I fucking knew it. There was no way in hell this bastard suddenly turned into a scholar.

I let out a long, tired breath and pinched the bridge of my nose. It was better for my sanity to just walk away.

”Wait, aren’t you going to ask me why I’m still reading if I don’t understand a single word?” Roan called out, his serious look instantly falling apart.

”No,” I said, turning my back on him. ”I don’t care.”

”Bro, that hurts my feelings!” Roan snapped, pulling off his glasses with a dramatic wave and slamming the huge book shut. A sharp, sly grin broke across his face as he leaned forward. ”Look, if I stare at the same three pages long enough, my brain is bound to accidentally absorb something before the test starts. Information transfer through prolonged exposure, Leo!”

I stood there, staring at his stupid, smug face, feeling a sudden, violent urge to strangle him right here in front of the whole class.

”That’s not how reading works, you bastard,” I muttered.

Between the panicking idiots in the hallway and this moron right here, my mental state was falling apart fast.

Roan just threw his head back and laughed, enjoying my misery way too much. Before I could reply, the loud noise in the lecture hall suddenly dropped. The side doors near the podium swung open, and a sharp, heavy presence flooded the room, killing every conversation in an instant.

Everyone was expecting Professor Vance. It was his compulsory Mana Theory class test, after all, and he taught every first-year class.

However... it wasn’t Vance who walked onto the stage. Instead, Vice President Helene Draven stepped up to the podium, her sharp grey eyes sweeping over the hall like a cold blade. Her presence alone was enough to instantly choke the noise out of the room.

”Fuck,” Roan whispered under his breath, leaning back against his chair. ”Oh my fucking god... why is she here?”

I ignored Roan’s quiet panic and took my seat a few rows down as my mind processed her appearance. It wasn’t a total shock. Vance wasn’t in any condition to run a high-stress exam hall. So naturally, Helene would step in to manage his class herself.

”Sit,” Helene voice boomed, perfectly clear, reaching every corner of the huge room.

The remaining standing students scrambled to their assigned seats in seconds.

”Clear your desks,” Helene commanded. ”Any notes, enchanted items, or unauthorized paper found on you after the wards are raised will mean immediate disqualification and a zero for the term. You have two minutes.”

The silence in the hall was suffocating as everyone shoved their study materials out of sight. Since Mana Theory was a mandatory core subject for the whole first-year division, students from all four classes were packed into the same huge lecture hall, taking the exact same exam.

I took my seat near the middle of the room and quickly scanned the desks around me. To my front right sat Roan, staring stiffly straight ahead, his fake glasses long gone.

Alice sat two rows over, her jaw tight as she stared at the empty tabletop. A bit further down, Arthur looked completely calm, adjusting his cuffs, while Cordelia sat with her back straight as a sword, her emerald eyes fixed on the podium.

Helene raised her hand and snapped her fingers.

A quiet, humming wave of pale blue light rippled out from the podium and swept over the whole lecture hall. With a light flick of her wrist, thick stacks of test papers floated up from her desk, glided through the air, and dropped cleanly onto every desk.

”You have three hours,” Helene said, her sharp gaze locking onto the timer on the wall. ”Begin.”

I took a slow breath, let my shoulders drop, and flipped the first page over. Alright. Let’s see what we’ve got.

My eyes landed on the first question.

Question 1: Define mana in your own words. How does it interact with the human body?

I let out a quiet breath. It was an easy question. My pen moved smoothly across the paper, filling the lines without stopping.

I moved to the next one.

Question 2: What is an Origin Core? At what age does it usually awaken, and what decides its rank?

Another easy one. Smiling faintly, I turned to the next page.

Question 3: Explain the difference between mana capacity and mana control. Why is control more important than capacity in a real fight?

Still manageable. I wrote down Lorien’s exact words from our class about channel strain and efficiency.

Flipping to page three, my confidence was feeling pretty solid. I kept reading down the line.

Question 4: A mage with a fire affinity and a water affinity attempts to channel both elements through the same mana path simultaneously. Describe the three stages of channel degradation that occur, and explain why the core cannot compensate for the damage.

I stopped.

I re-read the question.

I re-read it again, slower this time.

My eyes drifted down to the fifth question.

Question 5: In a mana-scarce environment, a fighter’s core is forced to generate its own mana without external input. Explain the two limitations of passive mana generation and why a core cannot exceed its natural recovery rate.

My mind went completely blank.

I kept scanning down the page. Question six. Question seven. Question eight.

The further my eyes traveled down the page, the more my soul felt like it was physically leaving my body.

What in the fucking world is this? Were these questions even in the textbook? Was there a secret second textbook I didn’t buy? Is Vance trying to murder us ?!

The confidence I had five minutes ago shattered into dust. The more I read, the more my brain felt like it was melting into useless soup. I slowly dropped my pen onto the desk with a quiet thud, rested my forehead against my open palm, and took a deep, ragged breath.

I happened to glance up.

Two rows ahead and to the right, Roan had also dropped his pen. He was slowly turning his head, his face pale, his eyes wide and hollow with despair. Our eyes locked across the exam hall. We didn’t need to speak or move.

In that single, shared second of complete mental devastation, both of us had the exact same, crystal-clear thought:

We are completely fucked.