Rayan didn't like the way the silver-haired girl kept watching him.
Not curious, not hostile — calculating. Like she was already deciding whether he would live or die.
After the ceremony, students were divided into groups for the Initial Evaluation.
Cassian smirked as he was sent to the advanced testing field.
Rayan, however, was sent to Hall Seven.
Hall Seven was different.
No grand marble. No instructors waiting with polite smiles.
Just a long, dim corridor ending in a circular chamber marked with shifting runes.
Five other students were with him — all looking nervous. The silver-haired girl stood at the far end, speaking quietly to a robed examiner. The mark on her palm glowed faintly in the torchlight.
The examiner turned to them.
"Your evaluation is simple. Survive for ten minutes."
The floor beneath them rippled like water.
Suddenly, the room wasn't a room anymore — it was a forest, cold mist curling between blackened trees. The air stank of rot.
From the shadows, shapes moved.
Dozens of them.
Thin, pale creatures with too-long limbs and eyeless faces.
One of the students screamed and bolted — the nearest creature pounced, dragging him into the dark.
This isn't a test, Rayan thought. It's a hunt.
He yanked the Eternum Grimoire from his satchel. Its pages flipped on their own.
Page 4: The Binding of False Flesh.
The runes etched themselves into his vision. He slammed his palm to the ground, chanting the incantation. Invisible chains burst outward, wrapping around the nearest three creatures, squeezing until their bodies collapsed into piles of grey dust.
The other students stared at him in shock — but the silver-haired girl didn't move.
She just smiled faintly.
The mist thickened, and a low growl rolled through the forest.
From between the trees, a larger creature emerged — twice Rayan's height, its skin stretched tight over glowing veins.
It wore a crown of bone.
And on its chest, faintly glowing, was the same mark as the assassin's dagger.
The silver-haired girl's voice drifted through the mist, calm and deliberate.
"Let's see if the Vessel can bleed."