AT THE OTHER SIDE...
The examination room exhaled comfort like a sedative—too much comfort for what was coming. The air conditioning hummed a mechanical lullaby. Heavy curtains smothered the windows, sealing out the afternoon sun until the room existed in its own pocket of timeless dimness. Everything about the space whispered rest, relax, lower your guard.
At the very front, Mr. Desmond Graves waited.
His presence shattered the room's false peace. He sat with the stillness of a coiled spring, his gaze sharp enough to dissect intention from posture alone.
When the door opened before him, one eyebrow lifted—a gesture so slight it might have been imagined, yet somehow conveyed the weight of profound disappointment, as though the universe itself had committed an etiquette violation he couldn't quite articulate.
Rukawa entered first, offering a slight bow. Cultural reflex. Respectful. Precise.
Javi followed, squaring his shoulders. "Morning, Mr. Graves."
Graves' eyes flickered over them—measuring, cataloging, filing away. "Gentlemen." The word carried no warmth. "I assume your mentors were thorough in their briefing."
"Richard walked us through everything twice." Javi's tone stayed even, professional. No jokes. Not here. "We know what's expected."
"My mentor was... detailed." Rukawa's voice remained quiet, but there was weight behind it. "We understand what we've been preparing for."
What we've been preparing for. Not what you want from us. The distinction was deliberate—acknowledging the test without conceding control.
Graves tapped one finger against his knee, a metronome of consideration. Then: "I should clarify one additional variable." He paused, letting the silence stretch. "Today, I will be supervising you personally."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop.
Javi felt his stomach tighten, but kept his expression neutral. A glance passed between him and Rukawa—quick, loaded with unspoken oh shit.
"That's..." Javi searched for the right word. "We appreciate the attention, sir."
Appreciate was doing a lot of heavy lifting there.
Graves' attention shifted like a spotlight, pinning Rukawa in place. "You've gone quiet, Mr. Hiroshi." His tone was almost conversational. Almost. "Second thoughts?"
Rukawa met his gaze without flinching. "No, sir. Just... processing."
"Processing."
"I prefer to understand the full picture before I speak." Rukawa's jaw tightened slightly. "My culture taught me that words said too quickly are often wasted."
Something flickered across Graves' face—too fast to name, but close to respect. "Your father sounds like a wise man." He stood, adjusting his cufflinks with surgical precision. "Most people today treat silence like a disease to be cured with noise."
He gestured toward the interior door. "Shall we?"
Rukawa stepped aside, hand extended toward the entrance. "After you, Garcia."
Javi shot him a look. Really? You're doing this now?
Rukawa's expression remained perfectly neutral as he turned to close the door behind them with a soft, deliberate click.
Graves' eyebrow arced upward. "Manners. How... refreshingly archaic."
"Politeness is in my nature," Rukawa said, deadpan.
Javi snorted before he could stop himself, then immediately tried to turn it into a cough.
Graves' lips twitched. Not quite a smile. Something more dangerous than amusement.
Then they saw the room's layout.
Two desks. Ten meters apart. Sterile. Isolated.
Test papers. Pens. Alarm clocks.
Javi's eyes traced the distance, calculating. "Cozy."
"Intimate," Graves corrected, his tone bone-dry. "I thought you'd appreciate the space to... focus."
"Right." Javi walked to his desk, fingers drumming once against his thigh. "Focus. Got it."
Rukawa moved to his station without comment, settling into his chair with the careful economy of someone who'd trained in meditation. His hands rested flat on the desk, palms down, grounding.
Graves positioned himself between them, equidistant. A referee. An executioner. "The format is straightforward: one hundred questions, three minutes total." He tapped the alarm clock on Javi's desk. "After each answer, you'll strike the clock. This measures your reaction time—how quickly thought becomes action."
Javi did the math instantly. His throat went dry. "That's... what, under two seconds per question?"
"One point eight seconds, to be precise." Graves' smile was razor-thin. "I have faith in your... instincts, Mr. Garcia."
The way he said instincts made it sound like both compliment and challenge.
Rukawa spoke without looking up from his blank test paper. "And if we can't maintain that pace?"
"Then you can't." Graves' shrug was minimal. "The test doesn't adjust to your comfort. You adjust to its demands. That's rather the point of examinations, wouldn't you say?"
"Just checking if there's partial credit," Rukawa said mildly.
"There isn't."
"Understood."
Javi gripped his pen, thumb sliding over the smooth barrel. One point eight seconds. No room for doubt. No time to second-guess. Just move. Trust. Execute.
Great. My two least favorite things: speed and certainty.
Across the room, Rukawa's eyes had gone distant, calculating. One point eight seconds means commitment. Zero hesitation. His fingers flexed once. I haven't felt this kind of pressure since the entrance exams.
A smile ghosted across his face. Good. I was getting complacent.
Their eyes met across ten meters of charged space. Javi raised his eyebrows: You ready for this?
Rukawa's nod was fractional: Let's find out.
Graves surveyed them both, his expression unreadable. "One final note." He let the words settle. "No collaboration. No signals. No communication of any kind." His gaze sharpened. "In short, gentlemen—no cheating."
Javi and Rukawa rolled their eyes in perfect synchronization.
"Seriously?" Javi muttered.
"As if we'd need to," Rukawa added, almost to himself.
Graves' smile widened by a millimeter. "Good. Then we understand each other."
The alarm shattered the moment.
BEGIN.
Javi's hand moved on instinct—pen to paper, circling answers before his conscious mind could interfere. Trust the gut. Ignore the voice screaming are you sure? Move. Always move.
Tap. Circle. Tap. Circle.
The rhythm became his heartbeat.
Rukawa's approach was different—each answer weighed in the fraction of a second before commitment. Not slower. Precise. Where Javi flowed like water, Rukawa moved like a blade—deliberate, calculated, lethal.
Tap. Consider. Circle. Tap.
The first fifty questions blurred past. History. Science. Math. English. Logic puzzles.
Easy. Almost insultingly so.
Javi felt himself grinning. Okay, this is actually fun. When did tests become fun?
Rukawa's irritation sharpened with each simple question. This isn't a challenge. This is clerical work.
Graves watched them both, arms crossed, expression giving nothing away. But his eyes—his eyes were tracking every movement, every hesitation, every surge of confidence.
Show me, his posture seemed to say. Show me what you've learned.
Ninety seconds in, the test changed.
Both boys went still—not frozen, but focused.
Javi's grin sharpened. There you are.
Rukawa's eyes lit up. Finally.
__
Question 50:
You enter a silent room. A chair lies knocked over. A cup spins on the floor, still in motion. A window stands open.
You have less than two seconds to decide what this tells you.
A. Someone left the room seconds ago—the cup still has kinetic motion.
B. The open window was the escape route.
C. The knocked chair means there was a struggle.
D. All clues point to an interrupted routine, not a planned exit.
Javi's mind went into overdrive. Shit. Any wasted second is disaster. Think fast. FASTER.
Time seemed to slow—the curse and blessing of cerebral instinct kicking in. His thoughts crystallized: I need to eliminate the impossible first. Work backward from physics.
Rukawa's pupils dilated slightly, the only external sign of his brain accelerating to combat speed. Physics doesn't lie. Motion requires recent causation. The cup is the key—everything else is noise.
His pen moved without conscious direction, circling A. Someone left the room seconds ago—the cup still has kinetic motion.
I've seen this scenario in simulations. Trust the data. Trust the science.
Javi's internal argument raged: Struggle? No—too obvious. Interrupted routine? Maybe, but something feels off. The cup... spinning objects don't stay in motion long. Basic physics. It HAS to be recent. It has to be—
His pen found the page, circling A with decisive pressure.
This is right. I know it's right.
Both rookies looked up simultaneously—their eyes meeting across the ten meters. A shared understanding passed between them.
Mr. Graves caught the expression on their faces. For the first time, his features genuinely softened—just a fraction, just for a moment.
There it is, he thought. The spark. They're beginning to see it.
As Javi and Rukawa tore through the remaining questions, Graves saw beyond the present moment—saw the future versions of these young men, standing shoulder to shoulder with the greatest detectives their world had ever produced.
Just like; Sherlock's apprentices indeed.
Then the final alarm rang.
Both pens dropped simultaneously.
Javi exhaled hard, running a hand through his hair. Rukawa's shoulders relaxed by degrees, his breathing deep and controlled.
Graves approached, footsteps measured. He collected their papers, scanned them with the efficiency of long practice, then looked up.
"Interesting."
Javi's exhaustion evaporated. "Wait—interesting? That's it? That's all you're giving us?"
Graves' eyebrow climbed. "What exactly were you expecting, Mr. Garcia? A standing ovation?"
"I mean, I wouldn't say no to one, but—" Javi gestured at the papers. "We just answered a hundred questions in three minutes. That deserves more than 'interesting.'"
"Does it?" Graves tilted his head. "You both performed adequately. You answered correctly." He paused. "But your methodologies diverged significantly. One of you trusted instinct. The other relied on calculation." His gaze moved between them. "Both approaches succeeded here. But I wonder—when the stakes aren't theoretical, when there's no alarm clock to ground you—which method keeps you alive?"
Rukawa's head tilted slightly, reading between the lines. "You're saying this wasn't the real test."
"Oh, it was a test." Graves set the papers aside. "Just not the only one."
Javi groaned. "Of course it wasn't. Why would it be?"
"Because competence on paper means nothing in the field." Graves turned toward the back of the room, where a door blended into the wall. "Theory is comfortable. Reality is not."
He pulled the door open.
"Follow me."
Javi stood, shooting Rukawa a look. "Please tell me you saw this coming."
Rukawa rose smoothly, his expression unreadable. "I expected something more."
"More? More?" Javi gestured at the test papers. "That wasn't enough?"
"That was warmup." Rukawa's eyes had that distant focus again—the one that meant he was already three steps ahead. "The real test is what comes next."
Javi stared at him. "How are you so calm about this?"
"Because I'm ready for it." A pause. "Aren't you?"
Javi opened his mouth. Closed it. Richard's warning echoed in his head: 'The second phase breaks people, Javi. It's not about what you know—it's about who you are when everything you know stops working.'
"Yeah," Javi said finally, trying to sound more confident than he felt. "Yeah, I'm ready."
They stepped into the corridor—narrow, dim, smelling faintly of earth and old stone. The walls seemed to press in. Somewhere ahead, machinery hummed its patient, mechanical breathing.
Javi lowered his voice. "Richard told me the second phase is supposed to be way harder. Like, 'possibly traumatizing' harder."
Rukawa glanced at him. "And?"
"And? That doesn't worry you even a little?"
"Should it?" Rukawa's tone was genuinely curious, not dismissive. "We've trained for this. Our mentors prepared us. Worrying won't change what's waiting."
"Yeah, but—" Javi huffed out a breath. "Don't you ever just... feel things before they happen?"
"I do." Rukawa's voice dropped lower. "I feel ready."
Their footsteps echoed—too loud in the oppressive quiet.
Graves stopped abruptly before a weathered back door. He turned, and in the low light, his eyes gleamed.
"A back door?" Javi frowned. "Where the hell are we going? The basement? A dungeon? Please don't say dungeon."
"Somewhere... less structured than this building allows." Graves' hand rested on the door handle. "Your written test measured cognitive speed. Deductive reasoning under time pressure." He pushed the door open. Cool air rushed in, carrying the scent of moss and decay. "This next phase measures something more fundamental."
Beyond the threshold: forest.
Not the manicured grounds of the academy. Wild forest. Ancient trees twisted toward a sky barely visible through the canopy. Shadows moved wrong—too thick, too deliberate.
"Adaptive intelligence," Graves continued. "The ability to think, deduce, and survive when the environment itself resists your presence."
Javi stared into the darkness between the trees. "You've got to be kidding me."
"Do I look like I joke, Mr. Garcia?"
"No, but I keep hoping you'll surprise me."
Rukawa stepped forward, eyes scanning the treeline with the intensity of a predator assessing territory. His shoulders had squared. His breathing had steadied. Whatever nerves Javi was fighting, Rukawa had locked his away.
"How long do we have?" Rukawa asked.
"Until you return." Graves stepped aside, gesturing toward the forest like a host welcoming guests to dinner. "Or until you don't."
Javi's laugh came out strangled. "That's... really not comforting, sir."
"It wasn't meant to be." Graves met both their eyes in turn. "Your mentors taught you cerebral instinct—the marriage of intuition and analysis. Now prove you can use it when comfort is gone and clarity is a luxury."
He paused.
"Welcome to the next phase, gentlemen."
_
Rukawa's eyebrows lifted—a rare crack in his composure that immediately set off alarms in Javi's head. His voice came out quieter than usual, almost uncertain. "This feels... off. Wrong, somehow."
Javi's entire body tensed like a wire pulled taut. His eyes darted between Rukawa and the forest entrance, trying to read what his partner was sensing. "Okay, hold up—if you're getting bad vibes, what does that mean for me? Should I be panicking right now? Because I'm this close to panicking."
Mr. Graves' smirk returned—brief, surgical, like a scalpel catching light. The expression transformed his usually stern face into something almost predatory. "That depends entirely, Mr. Garcia."
He tilted his head with mock curiosity, studying Javi like a specimen under glass. "Do you believe anxiety serves a productive purpose? Or is it merely noise cluttering your cognitive processes?"
He gestured toward the forest with deliberate slowness, each movement calculated for maximum psychological impact. The trees beyond seemed to shift in response, shadows deepening. "The forest doesn't care about your intellect, your training, or your achievements. It operates on older rules. Primal ones. Rules written before civilization taught you to think your way out of danger."
Javi's eyes narrowed, his instincts—newly honed through weeks of brutal training—screaming warnings he couldn't quite articulate. "Yeah, see, I really don't like how you just said that. The ominous pause, the cryptic phrasing, the whole 'ancient rules' thing." He crossed his arms defensively, a barrier between himself and whatever Graves was implying. "You're not seriously planning to just... dump us in there and walk away, are you?"
"Dump you?" Graves' chuckle was soft, almost paternal—which somehow made it infinitely worse. The sound carried amusement but no warmth. "What a crude characterization, Mr. Garcia. I prefer to think of it as... immersion therapy." He clasped his hands behind his back, the picture of academic composure. "I'll be observing from a distance—watching your choices, evaluating your instincts, measuring how quickly theory translates to practice. I'll intervene only when absolutely necessary."
His pause stretched like elastic about to snap. The silence itself felt weighted, oppressive.
"You won't be entirely alone."
"Entirely," Javi repeated flatly, latching onto the word like evidence in an interrogation. "That's a really comforting word choice, thanks. Really settles the nerves. Super helpful."
Rukawa spoke up for the first time since his initial observation, his voice carrying that distinctive calm that made people listen. "What constitutes 'absolutely necessary,' sir?"
Graves' smile widened fractionally. "An excellent question, Mr. Hiroshi. One I suspect you'll understand the answer to intuitively... or not at all." He stepped aside with a theatrical flourish, as though welcoming them to a grand estate rather than what increasingly looked like a nightmare given physical form. "The test begins the moment you cross that threshold. I suggest you don't waste time deliberating. Time, after all, is a resource you can't recover."
Javi and Rukawa exchanged a loaded glance—years of partnership compressed into a single look. In that moment, entire conversations happened in silence.
This is insane, Javi's expression said.
Agreed. But we're doing it anyway, Rukawa's answered.
Stay close?
Always.
"Well," Javi muttered, rolling his shoulders to release tension that wouldn't leave, "guess we're doing this. No backing out now, right?"
"Apparently not," Rukawa replied evenly, though his hand flexed once—a tell Javi recognized. Rukawa only did that when he was preparing for violence.
They turned together, their footsteps synchronized through countless hours of training, and stepped into the forest.
The change was immediate and visceral.
The comfortable afternoon warmth of the academy grounds vanished, replaced by a damp chill that sank into their bones. Their footsteps crunched on dry leaves and brittle twigs—each sound amplified to an almost painful degree in the suffocating quiet. No birdsong. No insect buzz. No rustling of small animals in undergrowth.
Just their breathing and footsteps.
Wrong, Javi's instincts whispered. Everything about this is wrong.
They'd barely made it ten steps when Graves' voice cut through the trees like a blade through silk.
"Before I leave you to your work—"
Both boys stopped mid-stride, boots grinding into dead leaves. They turned back as one.
Graves stood at the threshold they'd just crossed, half-bathed in the normal sunlight of the academy grounds, half-swallowed by the forest's unnatural shadow. The contrast was stark, symbolic—civilization and wilderness separated by an invisible line. His gaze pinned them with surgical precision, the way a biologist might observe lab subjects.
"Remember this, gentlemen." His voice carried perfectly through the dead air, defying natural acoustics. "You see, but you do not observe. Learn the distinction—or fail. There is no middle ground."
The words hung in the air like a curse or a blessing—impossible to tell which.
Then he spun on his heel with military precision and melted into the shadows between trees on the academy side, vanishing as completely as smoke in wind. One moment present, the next simply... gone.
Javi stared at the empty space where Graves had stood, a chill running down his spine that had nothing to do with temperature. "And there he goes. Called it." He tilted his head back, scanning the dense canopy overhead with suspicion, looking for the glint of camera lenses, the slight shimmer of magical surveillance, anything. "So... how's he watching us? Cameras hidden in the trees? Trained birds with really good memory? Psychic connection? How do you think he will watch us?"
Rukawa sighed, already moving forward deeper into the forest, his footsteps careful and measured. "Mr. Graves always has his methods. We've learned that much." He ducked under a low-hanging branch that seemed to reach toward them. "Wondering about his surveillance wastes mental energy we'll need for actual survival."
"That's not creepy at all," Javi muttered, following close behind. "Not even a little bit creepy. Totally normal teacher behavior."
A beat of silence settled over them like a heavy blanket. The forest seemed to absorb sound, swallowing their voices almost before they finished speaking. Only the distant cry of a bird—too far away, too isolated, wrong species for this region—and the whisper of wind through leaves that barely moved despite the breeze.
The trees are too close together, Javi noticed with his newly trained observational skills. And too far apart in other places. No pattern. No natural distribution. This was arranged.
He scanned their surroundings more carefully. The ground was covered in dead leaves—normal enough—but underneath, the soil looked dark. Too dark. Almost black. And there were no fallen branches, no rotting logs, none of the natural debris you'd expect in a mature forest.
Clean, he realized. Someone cleaned this place.
Javi finally broke the oppressive quiet, his voice almost too loud in the muffled atmosphere. "So... what's the actual plan here? We just wander around until something terrible happens? Because that seems to be the pattern lately."
Rukawa paused, considering their options with his characteristic thoroughness. He pointed toward where the trees seemed to thin slightly—or at least, where the shadows weren't quite as deep. "We move with purpose, not aimlessly. We observe everything. We adapt to whatever we encounter." His dark eyes scanned the treeline methodically. "And we assume everything is a test until proven otherwise."
Javi's grin was sharp despite the circumstances, his defense mechanism kicking in automatically. "Wow. Inspiring. Really gets the blood pumping. Should I take notes? Start a journal? 'Day one in the murder forest—'"
"If it helps your focus."
"It doesn't."
"Then don't."
"You're no fun when you're in tactical mode, you know that?"
"I'm not here to be fun. I'm here to keep us alive."
The bluntness of that statement killed Javi's humor instantly. Because Rukawa was right. This wasn't training. This wasn't a classroom exercise. Whatever Graves had planned, it was designed to push them to their absolute limits—and possibly beyond.
They fell into rhythm together, footsteps synchronized through weeks of partnership and practice. Javi found himself naturally taking position slightly behind and to the right of Rukawa—the formation they'd developed instinctively. Rukawa's observational skills were sharper for immediate threats, while Javi's pattern recognition worked better with a slightly broader view.
After several minutes of tense silence, broken only by their careful footsteps and the occasional unnatural whisper of wind, Rukawa spoke without breaking stride. "Garcia."
"Yeah?"
"What's your interpretation of Mr. Graves' final instruction?"
Javi kicked at a loose pebble, watching it skitter into the undergrowth before disappearing with a soft sound that seemed too loud. He took his time answering, actually thinking through his response instead of defaulting to humor. "The whole 'see versus observe' thing?" He exhaled through his nose. "I mean... he's not wrong, as much as I hate to admit it. We look at stuff all the time—clues, patterns, crime scenes, people. But actually observing?"
He shook his head, remembering all the times Gwen had caught details he'd missed, all the times Richard had pointed out connections he'd walked right past. "That's where most people screw up. Hell, that's where I screw up constantly. Gwen's always on my case about it."
He gestured broadly at the towering trees surrounding them, their trunks thick and ancient, bark textured with age and secrets. "Like right now. These aren't just trees taking up space, making the forest look foresty. The distance between them—" He paused, measuring with his eyes. "—it's inconsistent. Some are five feet apart, others fifteen. That's not natural growth. Someone placed these."
Rukawa's head turned slightly, his interest clearly piqued.
Javi continued, warming to his analysis, his brain finally clicking into the mode Gwen and Richard had been training into him. "And the way wind moves through branches—it's wrong. Wind should flow, create patterns. This just... stops and starts randomly. The moss on the bark—it's on all sides of the trees, not just north-facing. And the roots—" He pointed. "—look at how they break through soil. They're exposed in weird places, like someone dug them up and replanted them wrong."
He squinted upward at the canopy, pieces clicking together in his mind. "It all means something. We just need to figure out what. Is it a maze? A trap? A puzzle? All three?"
Rukawa had stopped walking entirely, now studying their environment with renewed intensity. "I hadn't noticed the root systems," he admitted quietly. "Good observation."
Javi felt a small flush of pride at the compliment. Rukawa didn't give those lightly.
"So what about you?" Javi prompted. "Think we just walked face-first into some elaborate deathtrap? Or is Graves just testing our paranoia levels?"
Rukawa's nod was measured, thoughtful, his analytical mind clearly processing multiple scenarios simultaneously. "I think we should operate under the assumption that everything here is hostile until proven otherwise. This forest feels... constructed. Intentional. Artificial."
"Right?" Javi's voice dropped instinctively, as though something might be listening. And hell, maybe something was. "It's like someone built a fake forest, but couldn't quite get all the details right. The uncanny valley of woodland environments."
Rukawa's analytical mind was already cataloging inconsistencies, filing them away for later pattern recognition. "The foliage density is inconsistent with the academy's documented geographic location. We're in England—there shouldn't be trees like these growing naturally here."
He gestured to what looked like an oak, but the bark pattern was subtly wrong. "The temperature differential between sun and shade is too extreme—we're talking fifteen, maybe twenty degrees. That's not natural. The light quality is wrong—too diffuse, like it's being filtered through something we can't see."
His eyes narrowed, and Javi could practically see the calculations happening behind them. "Either we've been physically transported to another location through some kind of spatial manipulation—"
A sharp CRACK shattered the air nearby, echoing through the trees with unnatural volume.
Javi's entire body shifted instantly into a combat-ready stance Richard had drilled into him, hands rising defensively, weight balanced on the balls of his feet. "—Or somebody's really good at illusions and really wants us to think we're somewhere else."
Rukawa shook his head slowly, his expression troubled in a way Javi rarely saw. Then his eyes went wide—genuinely shocked, all calculated calm temporarily shattered. "Garcia. Turn around. Now."
The urgency in Rukawa's voice—the actual fear bleeding through his usually impeccable control—made Javi's stomach drop. He spun.
The academy—its familiar Gothic silhouette visible through the trees just moments ago, solid and real and there—had vanished. Completely. As though it had never existed at all. Where there should have been stone walls and windows and the comforting sight of civilization, there was only more forest. Endless forest stretching into the distance.
"What the—" Javi's head whipped around frantically, searching desperately for something familiar. A building. A path. A landmark. Anything. "Where the hell did it go?! Buildings don't just disappear! That's not—that's not how reality works!"
His voice was rising, panic clawing at his throat. He forced himself to breathe, to think, to not give in to the fear that wanted to swallow him whole.
Rukawa scanned their surroundings with mounting urgency, his usual calm fracturing at the edges like ice under pressure. His hands had curled into fists—another tell. "It's confirmed now. This isn't simply a forest with some magical properties. They've either manipulated our perception of reality through advanced illusion magic—"
He paused, jaw tightening as he considered the more disturbing option. "—or they've manipulated reality itself. Spatial distortion. Dimensional folding. We could be in a pocket dimension, a separate space that looks like our world but operates on different rules."
Javi dragged both hands through his hair, tugging slightly as if the pain might wake him from this nightmare. "Okay. Okay, this is officially insane. This is beyond insane. This is—" He gestured wildly at the empty space where the academy should be. "—this is what insane people call insane! How are we supposed to find our way back if we don't even know where back is? If the academy doesn't exist anymore?!"
Rukawa moved to lean against a nearby tree, arms crossed, forcing his breathing to steady through pure discipline. Javi could see him deliberately slowing his heart rate, invoking whatever meditation techniques Diana had taught him. "Then we focus on what Mr. Graves told us. His instructions are the only constants we have. Everything else—" He gestured at the impossible forest. "—is variable. Unreliable."
Javi mirrored him, pressing his back against rough bark that felt too real to be illusion—every groove and ridge distinct against his spine. But then, the best illusions always felt real, didn't they? "Right. The cryptic 'see but don't observe' thing."
He studied the dappled patterns of light filtering through leaves, trying to apply his earlier analysis. The light was coming from... where? The sun should be at a specific angle based on time of day, but the light seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere, creating shadows that didn't quite align with their sources.
"So we stop looking at the forest as a whole and start examining the pieces,"
Javi continued, talking through his thoughts. "Break it down. Individual observations. Don't assume anything is what it appears to be."
"Yes." Rukawa's gaze moved methodically through their environment, processing data with the precision of a computer. "Wind direction and consistency—does it change or remain constant? Light refraction patterns through foliage—are they physically possible? Bird calls—" He paused, tilting his head. "Actually, have you noticed we've only heard one bird since we entered?"
Javi listened. Rukawa was right. Just that one distant cry, never repeated. "That's... yeah, that's weird. Forest should be full of sounds. Insects, birds, small animals."
"Precisely. The silence is artificial." Rukawa continued his analysis. "Tree placement we've already noted as suspicious. Root systems appear manipulated. Ground composition—" He crouched, running his fingers through the dark soil. "—this earth is too rich. Too perfect. Like someone mixed an ideal growing medium rather than letting natural soil develop over centuries."
He stood, brushing dirt from his fingers. "Every detail we dismiss as insignificant could be the key to navigating out. Or surviving whatever comes next."
Javi groaned, tilting his head back against the tree trunk. "You make it sound so simple when this forest is probably the size of a small country. Could be infinite for all we know."
"It's not simple." Rukawa's honesty was almost comforting. "But it's necessary. We either solve the puzzle or—"
"Or what? We die? Get trapped here forever? Fail out of the academy?" Javi laughed without humor. "Great options all around."
A rustling sound cut through their conversation—definitely closer than before. Deliberate movement through undergrowth, not the random scatter of wind-blown leaves.
Both boys snapped toward it in perfect synchronization, muscles coiling, breaths held.
"Please tell me you heard that too," Javi whispered, his voice barely audible even in the dead silence. "Please tell me I'm not losing my mind."
Rukawa's eyes had gone sharp, tracking movement he couldn't quite see yet through the dense undergrowth. "Something's close. Very close. Forty, maybe fifty feet."
"Something. That's specific."
"I can't see it yet."
"That's not comforting!"
Without a word—without needing words—Javi ducked behind Rukawa's broader frame, crouching low to make himself a smaller target. "Age before beauty. You check it out."
Rukawa couldn't quite suppress the amused quirk of his lips despite the tension. "I'm three months younger than you."
"Semantics. Details. Not important right now. Go."
"Your logic is flawed."
"Your face is flawed. Go."
Rukawa moved forward with fluid, practiced silence—the kind of movement that spoke of serious training, possibly military, definitely dangerous. He kept low, using trees as natural cover, each footstep placed with deliberate care on bare earth rather than dry leaves. His breathing had slowed further, almost imperceptible.
Javi watched from behind cover, heart hammering so loud in his ears he was certain it would give them away. His newly trained observation skills cataloged everything: the way Rukawa's weight shifted, how his hands stayed loose and ready, the angle of his head as he processed sounds and scents.
Then it emerged from the shadows between trees.
A wolf.
But not just any wolf. This thing was massive—easily twice the size of any natural wolf Javi had ever seen in books or documentaries. Black fur rippled over dense, powerful muscle. Its head swiveled slowly, deliberately, nostrils flaring wide as it sampled the air. Golden eyes scanned the forest with unnatural intelligence.
This wasn't an animal acting on instinct. This was something that thought.
Both boys turned to stone, every muscle locked in place.
Javi's whisper was barely breath shaped into words, more mouthed than spoken. "Don't... move... a single... muscle..."
Rukawa remained perfectly motionless, reading the wolf's body language like text. The creature's ears were forward—alert, searching.
Tail level with its spine—confident, not threatened. Hackles down—not aggressive yet. After several agonizing seconds where time seemed to slow to a crawl, Rukawa whispered back without moving his lips, the sound barely reaching Javi: "Can you run if I give the signal?"
Javi's hands trembled slightly despite his best efforts at control. He clenched them into fists to stop the shaking. "I mean... maybe? But that thing looks fast. Like, really fast. Olympic sprinter fast." He swallowed hard. "The second we bolt, it'll chase us down. That's what predators do—chase running prey."
Rukawa's eyes flicked upward, assessing their surroundings with tactical precision born from training Javi didn't fully understand. "Then we don't run horizontally. We climb vertically. Wolves can't climb trees."
Javi's response came out strangled, higher-pitched than he intended. "I'm sorry, did you just suggest we climb a tree with a predator twenty feet away? While it's looking at us?"
"Would you prefer to be its dinner?"
"That's—do you think that question matters now?!"
"It's the only question that matters right now."
Javi's gaze darted between the wolf—which thankfully hadn't moved yet—and the nearest sturdy oak. His internal calculator was screaming bad odds. The tree was ten feet away. The wolf was twenty feet away. Simple math said they could reach the tree first. But could they climb fast enough?
"...Fine. Okay. Fine," he hissed. "But that tree better not have weak branches, or I'm haunting you. Active haunting. I'll hide your stuff. Make weird noises at night. The full ghost experience."
Rukawa's voice dropped even lower, urgency creeping in. "I'll go first. Guide you up. Stay directly behind me. Match my movements exactly."
"Yeah, yeah, just hurry before—"
The wolf's head snapped toward them like a compass finding magnetic north. The movement was sudden, precise, terrifying. Its lips peeled back slowly, deliberately, revealing fangs designed by nature for tearing flesh from bone. A low growl built in its chest—a sound felt more than heard, vibrating through the air itself.
Javi's blood turned to ice water in his veins. His breath stopped. "Oh no. No no no no no. Did it—"
Rukawa didn't waste breath on words. He lunged for the tree.
"MOVE!" he barked, all pretense of silence abandoned.
The wolf exploded forward in the same instant, covering ground with terrifying speed.
They scrambled up bark that shredded their palms, adrenaline completely overriding pain. Javi's hands found holds he didn't know he was looking for, muscle memory from childhood tree-climbing taking over. The wolf's jaws snapped shut inches from Javi's ankle—close enough that he felt the displacement of air, smelled the creature's breath, hot and rank.
The beast slammed into the trunk with enough force to shake leaves loose from branches twenty feet up. The impact echoed like thunder. It immediately began circling below with murderous, patient focus, golden eyes never leaving them.
Smart, Javi realized with mounting horror. It's smart enough to know we have to come down eventually.
Javi clung to his branch like a shipwreck survivor clinging to driftwood, gasping for air his lungs couldn't seem to properly process. "Okay—okay—new plan. What's the plan now? Please tell me you have a plan now!"
Rukawa scanned from their elevated position, his tactical mind already working through scenarios and options. His breathing was controlled, measured, while Javi's sounded like he'd just run a marathon. "We wait. Assess. Observe its behavior patterns." He watched the wolf's circling with analytical intensity. "Wolves typically hunt in packs. If this one signals for reinforcements—"
"We're dead. Got it. Great. Fantastic." Javi's laugh was slightly unhinged, edging toward hysteria. "So we're officially tree hostages now. This is my life. Tree hostage. Future historians will write about the tree hostage incident of—what year is it? I can't remember. The stress is affecting my memory."
Rukawa shot him a look that was almost sympathetic, which somehow made everything worse. "Unless you have a better tactical suggestion."
Javi opened his mouth to argue—then deflated completely, shoulders sagging. "...No. No, I really don't. I've got nothing. Zero ideas. This is officially above my pay grade."
Tense silence descended like a physical weight. The wolf continued its patient circling below, never once taking its eyes off them. Occasionally it would pause, sit back on its haunches, and simply wait. The intelligence in those actions was deeply unsettling.
Then its gaze shifted. Locked. Focused exclusively on Javi with the intensity of a laser.
Javi felt the attention like physical weight pressing against his chest. His breath caught. Every hair on his body stood on end. "Okay, is it—why is it staring at me? Rukawa, why is it only staring at me? What did I do?!"
Rukawa frowned, studying the wolf's fixation with growing concern. His jaw tightened with realization. "Because you're broadcasting fear like a signal flare. Like a beacon visible for miles."
He shifted his position deliberately, placing himself more visibly between Javi and the wolf, using his body as a shield. "Predators are hardwired to detect fear—elevated heart rate, rapid breathing patterns, micro-movements you don't realize you're making, pheromones in your sweat. You're telling it you're prey."
"Well, I am prey right now!" Javi's whisper was harsh. "I'm literally treed by a giant wolf! How am I supposed to not be scared?!"
"Control your breathing. Now." Rukawa's voice carried command, the same tone he used during their training sessions. "Four counts in. Hold seven. Eight counts out. Do it. Panic identifies you as prey. Calm makes you harder to read."
Javi forced air into his lungs slowly, methodically, trying to remember the breathing exercises Diana had taught them. Four in. Hold. Eight out. But his knuckles were bloodless white on the bark, and he could feel his pulse hammering in his throat. "Easy... for you to say... when you're not... the one it's staring at..."
The wolf tilted its head—almost curious, like it was trying to figure them out. Then it did something that made Javi's blood run cold.
It began to climb.
Javi's voice cracked, shooting up an octave. "Oh, you have GOT to be kidding me! Since when—wolves don't—they don't CLIMB! That's not a thing wolves do! That's not in the wolf manual!"
Rukawa's expression went dark, dangerous. His entire posture shifted, and Javi recognized the change—this was Rukawa preparing to kill something. "Normal wolves don't. Which confirms this isn't a normal wolf. This is constructed. Magical. Enhanced somehow."
The creature's claws found purchase in bark, muscles bunching as it hauled itself upward with unnatural, horrible grace. Every law of physics and biology screaming this was impossible—yet happening anyway, right in front of them, undeniable and terrifying.
Javi stared at Rukawa, wild-eyed, panic clawing at his composure. "Okay, now what?! Please, please tell me you have a plan that doesn't involve us dying horrible deaths!"
Rukawa's voice went flat, decisive, cutting through Javi's panic like a knife. "We jump to the next tree."
"Are you OUT OF YOUR MIND?! Have you completely lost it?!" Javi gawked in frustration.
"Would you rather test if supernatural wolves can finish climbing? See how that experiment ends?"
Javi's gaze darted frantically between the ascending wolf—claws scraping bark, getting closer—and the neighboring trees. The gaps looked impossibly wide. Fifteen feet? Twenty? His distance judgment was shot to hell with adrenaline flooding his system. "I hate you. I want that on record. I hate you right now. I don't even know why do you have to be my partner, you know?!"
"This is not the time for complacency." Rukawa positioned himself on the branch, calculating angles and distances. "On three."
The wolf lunged upward—fangs snapping closer, so close Javi could count its teeth.
"One."
Javi's muscles coiled despite every instinct screaming not to jump, screaming that this was insane, that they'd fall, that they'd die.
"Two."
The wolf's breath was hot, rank, right there—close enough to taste the decay in its mouth—
"THREE!"
They launched into empty air just as jaws crashed shut on nothing but emptiness and disappointment.
Time stretched like taffy.
Javi saw every detail with crystal clarity—the wolf's frustrated snarl, lips pulled back over fangs, the dizzying drop below that seemed to go on forever, Rukawa's focused expression completely devoid of fear, the approaching branch that might or might not catch them, the leaves spiraling down from the force of their launch—
They crashed onto the neighboring tree's lower branches hard enough to knock wind from lungs, hard enough that Javi saw stars. He nearly lost his grip entirely—fingers slipping, body tilting toward the fall—before Rukawa's hand shot out, iron-strong, catching his wrist and hauling him against the trunk.
"Got you," Rukawa grunted. "I've got you."
Below, the wolf twisted mid-fall with impossible agility, hit the ground in a crouch that should have broken its legs, immediately whipping around toward them—hackles raised, rage burning in its eyes like golden fire.
But now they had distance. Precious, life-saving distance.
Javi gasped for air like a drowning man breaking the surface, his entire body shaking with adrenaline aftermath. "Okay—okay—new plan. We keep jumping tree to tree until this thing gives up or dies of old age or gets bored. Those are our options."
Rukawa nodded, already calculating trajectories to the next viable oak, mapping their route like a chess player thinking three moves ahead. "Agreed. Quickly. Before it adapts its strategy. These things can learn."
They didn't hesitate. Another leap. Then another. Then another.
Their movements becoming synchronized through necessity and trust, through partnership forged in training and tempered in crisis.
Javi learned to anticipate Rukawa's movements, to launch when Rukawa launched, to trust that the branch would be there, that his partner wouldn't lead him wrong.
Somewhere in the shadows—unseen, patient, evaluating—Mr. Graves watched with a slight smile.
Good, he thought. Very good. They're adapting.
"Now it makes sense!" Javi called out between jumps, his voice strained but steadier than before, adrenaline giving way to focus. "Richard warned me! He said the second phase would be brutal, but I thought he meant, like, hard questions! Really difficult math! Tricky logic puzzles! Not supernatural murder wolves trying to eat us!"
"Expect the unexpected," Rukawa replied, his tone almost philosophical despite their circumstances, despite literally fleeing through trees from a monster. "You should know that principle by now. It's been our entire experience here from day one."
Javi barked a breathless laugh, trying desperately to cut through the terror with humor because that's what he did, that's how he survived. "Yeah, especially with our delightfully unhinged professor orchestrating everything! Graves probably has a checklist! 'Test number two: supernatural wolf. Check!'"
Rukawa glanced back mid-leap, keeping the wolf in peripheral vision while planning their next move. "Mr. Graves clearly subscribes to a very... particular pedagogical philosophy."
"That's a fancy way of saying he's actively trying to kill us!"
"I don't think he's trying to kill us."
"What would you call this then?!"
"Character building."
"I hate character building! I want my character to remain un-built!"
They landed on another tree, pausing briefly—chests heaving, muscles burning with lactic acid, hands raw and bleeding from bark.
Javi exhaled hard, swiping sweat from his forehead with a shaking hand. "This stopped being a test about five minutes ago. This is just survival. This is— this is a nature documentary gone wrong!"
The wolf barked below—sharp, commanding, intelligent. Not the mindless sound of an animal, but something that felt like communication. Like it was calling for something.
Javi yelped despite himself, grabbing the trunk for stability. "And that thing just won't quit! Is it hungry? Pissed off? Offended by our existence? Does it have a personal vendetta against me specifically?! Did I insult its mother?!"
Rukawa held up one hand, his expression shifting from tactical focus to something else. Consideration. Calculation. "Wait. I have an idea."
Javi raised an eyebrow, still panting, sweat stinging his eyes. "Oh, you've got an idea? Now? After all the tree-jumping and near-death experiences? Please, please tell me it's a good one. Please tell me it's not 'let's jump into the wolf's mouth and hope for the best.'"
The wolf continued its relentless staring, its focus never wavering. Rukawa sighed, and Javi caught something in that sound—reluctance. Resignation. Determination.
"The creature's focus is exclusively on you," Rukawa said quietly, carefully, like he was explaining something obvious that Javi might not want to hear.
Javi grimaced. "Yeah, I noticed. It keeps looking at me like I'm a premium ribeye steak. Five stars. Michelin recommended."
Rukawa's next words came slowly, carefully measured. "I'm going down there."
Javi's hand shot out instantly, gripping Rukawa's arm with surprising strength, fingers digging in. "Whoa, whoa, WHOA. No. Absolutely not. Veto. That idea is vetoed. You are not about to walk up to that thing and try to—what, negotiate? Have a conversation? Ask it politely to leave?"
Rukawa's expression went cold—not angry, but lethal. The kind of cold that came from somewhere deep and dark and practiced. "I won't be talking."
The certainty in his voice made Javi's stomach drop. Not bravado. Not false confidence. Just flat, absolute fact.
"Rukawa—"
"I'll kill it."
The words hung in the air between them. Simple. Final.
Javi's grip tightened reflexively, his knuckles going white. "Woah no dude! Listen to yourself. That thing is built like a tank. It's the size of a small car. You don't have a weapon. You don't have anything. You're just—you're just going to go down there with your bare hands and—"
"I don't need anything."
The absolute conviction—not bravado, not posturing, just fact—made Javi pause mid-protest. He stared at his partner, really looked at him. The calm. The readiness. The complete and utter absence of doubt or fear. The way Rukawa's breathing had already steadied into a pre-combat rhythm.
This wasn't confidence. This was certainty born from experience.
Pieces clicked together in Javi's mind like tumblers in a lock.
"...You've done this before," Javi said slowly, realization dawning with cold clarity. "You've killed something like this. With your bare hands. Haven't you?"
Rukawa met his gaze. Didn't confirm. Didn't deny. His silence was louder than any words could be.
"When?" Javi pressed, needing to understand. "How? Why?"
"It doesn't matter."
"It does matter! You're talking about fighting a supernatural wolf!"
"I'm talking about surviving." Rukawa's voice was quiet but firm. "Which is what we're here to do."
A beat passed—heavy with implications neither would fully voice. The weight of whatever history Rukawa carried, whatever had taught him to speak about killing with such casual certainty.
Then Javi exhaled sharply and released his arm, fingers uncurling slowly. "Fine. Fine. But if that thing eats you, I'm telling Diana you died doing something monumentally, spectacularly stupid. And she'll cry. You know she'll cry. She'll be devastated."
Rukawa's smirk was brief but genuine, a flash of the friend beneath the warrior. "That would be unfortunate."
"Damn right it would. She'd never forgive me for letting you go."
"I'll try not to die, then."
"You better not. Because I am not explaining this to her. 'Oh sorry Diana, Rukawa decided to fistfight a demon wolf because he felt like it.' Yeah, that'll go over great."
"I'll send your apologies from beyond the grave if necessary."
"Not funny."
"Little bit funny."
"Not even a little bit."
Rukawa nodded once—acknowledgment, promise, goodbye—then dropped from the tree like a shadow detaching from darkness, like gravity was a suggestion rather than a law.
The wolf immediately whipped toward the sound, lips curling back in a vicious, anticipatory snarl. Saliva dripped from its fangs. Its entire body tensed, coiling like a spring. But Rukawa didn't retreat. Didn't hesitate. Didn't show even a flicker of uncertainty.
He sank into a low, predatory crouch—weight perfectly balanced on the balls of his feet, center of gravity lowered, hands loose and ready. His eyes locked on the beast's exposed throat with the focus of a laser.
Javi watched from above, heart in his throat threatening to choke him, as Rukawa's entire demeanor shifted. He'd seen Rukawa fight before—sparring sessions, training exercises, controlled demonstrations. This was different. This wasn't defensive. This wasn't restrained.
This was hunting.
The wolf hesitated for the first time since they'd encountered it. Ancient instincts suddenly screaming warning instead of prey. Something in this human's posture, his stance, his absolute stillness triggered recognition. Predator. Threat. Danger.
The moment stretched like a rubber band about to snap.
Then Rukawa moved.
Explosive. Controlled. Lethal.
He didn't wait for the wolf to attack. He launched himself forward, closing the distance before the beast could fully process the threat. His elbow snapped upward with devastating precision, catching the wolf's jaw mid-lunge with the full force of his body weight behind it.
The CRACK of bone echoed through the forest like a gunshot, reverberating off trees, seeming to shake the very air.
The beast yelped—actual pain in that sound, shock and agony—its head snapping sideways from the impact. It staggered, momentarily dazed, its perfect predator coordination shattered.
Rukawa didn't pause. Didn't celebrate. Didn't give it a single second to recover.
He pivoted fluidly on his back foot, his entire body rotating with mechanical efficiency, and drove his knee into the wolf's exposed ribs with surgical accuracy—targeting the floating rib, the vulnerable gap in natural armor, the place where bone met cartilage and organs lay unprotected beneath.
The impact sounded like a baseball bat hitting a side of beef.
The wolf crumpled, its legs giving out beneath it. It hit the ground hard, wheezing, each breath a struggle. Blood leaked from its mouth—internal damage, probably a punctured lung.
Javi couldn't breathe. Couldn't move. Couldn't process what he'd just witnessed.
The entire fight had lasted maybe five seconds. Five seconds.
And Rukawa stood over the dazed creature, breathing controlled and measured, expression carved from stone. Blood—not his—spattered across his forearm and the front of his shirt. He didn't look triumphant. Didn't look satisfied. He looked... professional. Like this was just another task completed.
"Holy... shit..." Javi's whisper was barely audible, awe and fear mixing in equal measure.
Rukawa looked up, meeting Javi's shocked stare. His dark eyes were calm, assessing, already moving past the violence to the next concern. "Come down. It won't attack again."
The absolute certainty in those words left no room for doubt or argument.
For once in his life, Javi didn't argue. Didn't joke. Didn't try to lighten the moment with humor. He just climbed down, movements mechanical, autopilot taking over while his brain tried to catch up with what had happened.
His descent was far less graceful than Rukawa's had been—hands still shaking slightly, legs unsteady like a newborn deer's. When he reached the ground, his boots hit the earth with a soft thud, and he just stared at the scene before him.
The wolf lay on its side, whimpering softly—all aggression gone, all threat eliminated. It wouldn't even make eye contact anymore. Its golden eyes stared at the ground, its tail tucked tight against its body. The proud, terrifying predator from minutes ago had become something... broken.
Submissive. Defeated. Afraid.
Javi edged closer, fascinated despite himself, despite the primal part of his brain screaming to stay away from the dangerous animal. "How... what did you do? That thing was ready to eat us five minutes ago! It was climbing a tree to get to us!"
Rukawa rolled his shoulder—the only acknowledgment of physical exertion, the only sign the fight had cost him anything at all. "Pressure points. Animals have them just like humans do—nervous system vulnerabilities, skeletal weak points, areas where force applied correctly causes maximum disruption with minimum effort."
He glanced at the retreating wolf, which had started to drag itself away, limping badly. "Strike with the right amount of force in the right location, and you can temporarily disable muscle groups, induce pain compliance, interrupt nerve function, or—" His eyes tracked the wolf's pathetic retreat. "—convince them you're a greater threat than they could ever be. Establish hierarchy. Dominance."
He watched as the creature limped away faster now, desperate to escape, tail tucked low, all dignity shattered. "It understands now. The lesson is learned. We're not prey. We're apex predators. Higher on the food chain."
Javi blinked slowly, processing, his worldview shifting slightly. "That's... that's actually terrifying. You're terrifying. You know that, right? Like, genuinely scary. I'm a little scared of you right now."
Rukawa's expression might have been amused—the corner of his mouth twitching upward almost imperceptibly. "Survival rarely looks civilized. Pretty techniques don't work in real combat."
"Yeah, well—" Javi glanced back at where the wolf had disappeared into undergrowth, leaving a trail of disturbed leaves and broken branches. "Remind me never to piss you off. Ever. For any reason. I'll just agree with everything you say from now on."
"That seems unlikely."
"Yeah, you're probably right, but still. Mental note: Rukawa is dangerous."
"Noted."
Javi shook himself, physically and mentally trying to reset, forcing his brain back into gear. They weren't safe yet. One threat eliminated didn't mean others weren't waiting. "Okay. Okay. Let's keep moving before we attract anything worse than supernatural wolves. Because apparently those exist now and I have to just accept that."
Rukawa nodded, already scanning the forest ahead with renewed focus, his tactical mind never really stopping. "Agreed. And this time—"
"Stay quiet, minimize our presence, don't broadcast fear like a radio signal, control my breathing, observe instead of just seeing. Yeah, I got it." Javi fell into step beside him, voice dropping to a whisper automatically. "No more smelling like prey. I'm a predator now. Apex. Top of the food chain. Totally believable."
"Precisely. Fake it until you make it."
"That's your advice? Fake it?"
"It works."
They moved cautiously through undergrowth that seemed to shift when they weren't looking directly at it—shadows lengthening wrong, trees appearing closer or farther than they should be, the ground feeling uneven in ways that didn't match what their eyes reported.
Both acutely, painfully aware that whatever this test was, whatever Graves had planned, they'd only scratched the surface.
The wolf had been a test. A challenge. But Javi had the sinking feeling it had also been a warm-up.
They walked in silence for several minutes, their footsteps careful, each sense heightened to painful awareness. Every rustle of leaves made Javi's heart skip. Every shadow that moved wrong made his muscles tense. The forest felt alive in a way normal forests didn't—watching, waiting, evaluating.
Finally, Javi broke the silence, keeping his voice low. "Can I ask you something?"
"You just did."
"Smart-ass. Can I ask you something else?"
Rukawa glanced at him, one eyebrow raised slightly. "Depends on the question."
"That thing back there. The wolf." Javi chose his words carefully. "You weren't scared. Not even a little. And you knew exactly where to hit it, how hard, what the result would be. That's not—" He paused. "—that's not training from here. From the academy. That's something else."
Rukawa was quiet for a long moment, and Javi thought he might not answer at all. Then: "My father believed preparation meant being ready for anything. Anything. Not just theoretical dangers."
"What does that mean?"
"It means he taught me to fight things that weren't human." Rukawa's voice was carefully neutral, giving nothing away. "Starting when I was very young."
Javi absorbed that, pieces clicking into place. "That's... that's kind of messed up. You know that, right?"
"Perhaps." Rukawa's expression remained unreadable. "But it kept me alive today. It's keeping us alive today."
"Whatever."
They lapsed back into silence, but it felt different now. Less tense. More comfortable. The kind of silence that came from shared experience, from trust built through crisis.
After another few minutes, Rukawa spoke again. "The trees are thinning ahead."
Javi looked up, surprised he'd been so lost in thought he'd missed it. Rukawa was right—the dense forest was gradually opening up, the undergrowth less tangled, the canopy less oppressive. Light filtered through more easily, though it still had that strange, diffuse quality that made it hard to determine the sun's actual position.
"Is that good or bad?" Javi asked.
"Unknown. But it's a change. Changes mean decisions."
"Cryptic. Thanks."
As they emerged into a clearing—small, maybe thirty feet across, roughly circular—both boys stopped instinctively.
The clearing was too perfect. The grass was uniform height, green and healthy despite the surrounding forest's dead leaves and dark soil. In the center stood a single object: a stone pedestal, waist-high, with something resting on top.
"Well," Javi said quietly. "That's not ominous at all."
Rukawa circled slowly, keeping to the edge of the clearing, examining it from multiple angles. "No tracks leading in except ours. No disturbance in the grass except where we're standing. The pedestal appears to be solid stone, no visible seams or joints."
"What's on top of it?"
"Can't tell from here. Too far."
Javi took a step forward, and Rukawa's hand shot out, stopping him. "What?"
"Could be trapped. Could be a test within the test. Could be a distraction while something approaches from behind."
Rukawa's eyes scanned the treeline surrounding them. "We need to be careful."
"Everything here is trying to kill us. Careful is my new default setting."
"Good."
They approached together, moving slowly, watching for tripwires or pressure plates or magical runes or any of the thousand ways this could go catastrophically wrong.
As they got closer, the object on the pedestal became clear: a compass. Old-fashioned, brass, with a glass face slightly fogged with age. The needle spun lazily, not quite settling on any direction.
"A compass," Javi said flatly. "In a supernatural forest where the academy vanished and wolves climb trees, we find a random compass."
Rukawa studied it without touching. "The needle isn't working properly. It should point north. Magnetic north at minimum."
"Maybe there's no magnetic field here. Maybe we're in a pocket dimension like you said."
"Possibly." Rukawa circled the pedestal. "Or maybe it's not pointing to magnetic north. Maybe it's pointing to something else."
"Like?"
"Like the way out."
Javi considered that. "Would Graves make it that easy?"
"Nothing about this has been easy. But he did say 'observe, don't just see.' Maybe the compass is the key. Maybe we're supposed to realize it's not broken—it's pointing to something we can't detect with our normal senses."
"So we take it?"
"I don't see another option. We can't wander randomly. We need direction."
Javi reached out, hesitated, then grabbed the compass quickly—like ripping off a bandage.
Nothing happened.
No explosion. No trap. No monster appearing. Just a brass compass, surprisingly warm in his palm, the needle still spinning lazily.
"Well," Javi said, "that was anticlimactic."
Then the needle stopped. Pointed. Not north. Not any cardinal direction on a normal compass.
It pointed directly at the densest, darkest part of the forest—where the trees grew so close together they formed an almost solid wall of shadow.
"Of course," Javi muttered. "Of course it points to the scariest possible direction. Because why would anything ever be easy?"
Rukawa studied the direction, his expression thoughtful. "That's where we need to go, then."
"Do we though? Do we really?"
"You have a better idea?"
"Run screaming in the opposite direction?"
"That's not a better idea."
"It feels like a better idea."
"Feelings aren't strategy."
"Feelings keep you alive sometimes!"
Rukawa actually smiled—genuine, warm, the expression transforming his usually serious face. "Trust the compass. Trust the process. Trust me."
Javi looked at him, then at the compass, then at the ominous darkness ahead. He sighed. "I really hate tests. Did I mention that? I hate tests so much."
"You may have mentioned it."
"I'm mentioning it again. For the record."
"Noted."
"Great. Let's go walk into the obvious deathtrap then. Because that's what heroes do, right? Walk into obvious deathtraps?"
"Heroes?" Rukawa's eyebrow arched. "We're students."
"Same thing at this school apparently."
They moved forward together, toward the darkness, toward whatever waited in the deepest part of Graves' nightmare forest.
And somewhere, in the shadows they couldn't see, in the spaces between heartbeats, Desmond Graves watched his students walk willingly toward the test's true beginning.
His smile widened.
"Watch closely—this is where the real world shows how it treats you."
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TO BE CONTINUED..