Morning bled into Facility 6 in soft, clinical light—panels along the ceiling warming from slate to pale gold. The place always hummed before anyone spoke, a quiet mechanical breath that made it feel like the walls were listening.
Zeyra was already in the compact main area, hair tied back, sleeves pushed to her elbows. A skillet hissed under her hands; steam curled from a pot beside it. She worked like she did everything else—precise, unsentimental—folding greens into a protein mash, pressing flat rounds of grain on a hot plate until they blistered. The smell was clean and peppered, awake.
Liora drifted in first, quiet as a thought. She set out bowls and cups without asking, counting under her breath—six, always six—then moved to the kettle and flicked the heat. "I can take over the bread," she offered.
"I've got it," Zeyra replied.
Theo arrived with a half-powered slate tucked under his arm, eyes still fogged with sleep. "Morning," he muttered, then did a double take at the counter. "Wow… you already made food."
Zeyra flicked him a look. "Try not to act surprised."
Kael shouldered through next, hair a mess, shirt only half-buttoned. He paused at the doorway like he'd hit a barrier. "Why is it bright? Who authorized bright?"
"You did," Zeyra said, sliding a round onto a plate. "When you forgot to close the window last night."
Kael groaned and collapsed onto the nearest stool. "If anyone needs me, I'll be reliving last night's existential crisis."
"You mean the part where you were definitely going to tell the scary Concord guy to his face that he talks too much?" Theo said without looking up.
"I was considering it."
"You didn't," Liora murmured, lips tugging.
Myren appeared without sound, hood down as always. He collected the plates Zeyra finished and set them on the table in neat arcs, then stood there for a beat as if listening for something only he could hear. He didn't speak. He rarely needed to.
Rai was already at the table—no one had noticed when he sat—hands folded, eyes on nothing. He blinked when Kael dropped into the seat opposite him, then reached automatically for a cup as Liora poured tea down the line.
They ate like people who weren't sure when they'd be allowed to sit again. Zeyra's skillet mix vanished faster than she expected; the bread went with it. Conversation limped at first, then found a rhythm.
"Okay," Kael said around a mouthful, "but can we acknowledge that he walked in, renamed reality, and then called us rooklings? Like, with a straight face?"
Zeyra tore a flatbread in half. "He wasn't wrong."
"Painful," Kael sighed.
Theo tapped his slate awake and started scrolling. "If we're now a Unit, we should at least start pretending like one."
Liora watched the steam rise from her cup, thoughtful. "He said six months. That's not… long."
"It's enough," Zeyra answered. No hesitation.
Rai ate slowly, attention somewhere behind his eyes. "He looked at each of us like he already knew how we'd fail."
"He probably does," Theo said. "That's what mentors do. Or… whatever Concord calls them."
"My favorite part was 'your time pretending this place is a school is over,'" Kael said. "Because I definitely wasn't pretending. I was genuinely delusional."
Zeyra nudged a second flatbread toward him without looking. "Eat more. Be less loud."
He grinned despite himself and obeyed.
The room softened around the edges as they settled—metal chairs scraping, cutlery clicking, the ordinary rituals that made even a sterile facility feel like it belonged to them for a moment. The tension from the night before didn't vanish; it just thinned, wound into the small domestic sounds until it was bearable.
Theo set his empty bowl down and finally looked up. "Whatever happens today," he said, "we don't make it harder for ourselves. Agreed?"
Zeyra nodded once. Liora mirrored it. Myren's answer was a quiet tap of knuckles against the table. Rai glanced up, met each of their eyes in turn, and gave the smallest tilt of his head. Kael threw in a lazy salute that earned him a flat stare from Zeyra and a snort from Theo.
They finished in companionable silence, the kind that made the facility's hum feel less like a machine and more like a heartbeat. Plates stacked. Cups gathered. Zeyra wiped the cooktop clean in steady circles while Kael packed the plates to the sink. Liora rinsed the kettle. Myren returned chairs to their exact places without being asked.
Rai lingered at the table, fingers tracing the faint seam in the metal surface, gaze unfixed. The night before pressed at the edges of the room again—Lucan's voice, the names they'd spoken, the weight of timelines they hadn't agreed to.
Theo opened his mouth to say something else—then the wall display at the far end of the common space pulsed awake, its blank surface flooding with light.
The six of them froze.
A deep blue crest of Idryma shimmered onto the wall screen, the emblem sharp and alive with its usual authority. Then text scrolled across in clean, efficient lines, each word landing with finality:
UNIT SIX—REPORT TO THE TRAINING ARENA.
TIME: IMMEDIATE.
Kael groaned first. "See? Knew breakfast was a trap." He shoved the last half of his bread into his mouth, muffling the words as he set down the plates in the sink.
Zeyra set down her rag, jaw tightening. "Stop whining. It was going to come sooner or later."
Theo's eyes flicked over the message again, already cataloging its wording. "No time window. No delay. 'Immediate' means Lucan's already there."
"Or watching us right now," Liora added quietly. Her tone wasn't nervous—just observant. She finished her tea in one steady swallow and stood, smoothing her uniform.
Rai rose without sound, his chair scraping softly. The others followed, some faster than others. Kael made a point of dragging his feet until Zeyra shoved his shoulder on the way out.
The walk down the corridor carried the feel of a march—steel walls, soft strip-lights guiding the way, the facility's hush pressing close around them. Every step reminded them this wasn't a school hall or some casual classroom trek.
They reached the bulkhead door at the end of the hall. Its frame glowed faintly with the same circuitry that powered the whole facility. Theo pressed his palm to the side panel; it scanned him, then disengaged with a hiss.
The door split open, revealing the training arena.
It was vast. A sphere more than a room, walls latticed with glowing grid-lines that shifted faintly like code. The air itself carried a low vibration, as if simulations slept just beneath the surface, ready to manifest. Floor panels adjusted beneath their boots, responsive, alive. The place had no center, and yet the center pulled all attention.
Lucan stood there.
He wore the same black-trimmed coat as the night before, but here in the arena the man seemed sharper, his presence amplified by the space itself. His hands were clasped behind his back, stance easy but immovable, like he had been waiting not minutes, but hours.
"You're late," he said flatly.
Theo stiffened. "The message came just—"
"Irrelevant," Lucan cut in, voice echoing through the sphere. "A unit arrives before it is told to. Anticipation, not obedience, defines survival."
Kael muttered under his breath, "Great. We're in the survival lecture era."
Lucan's gaze swept across all six, silencing even Kael. It was the kind of look that made excuses collapse before they were spoken.
"I asked for your Eidon names yesterday," Lucan said, tone shifting but not softening. "But not what they do." His eyes narrowed slightly, measuring them. "That changes today."
He let the words hang, heavy, before adding:
"You'll show me yours. Not with speeches. Not with theory." His shoulders squared, the faintest grin tugging at the corner of his mouth—humorless, edged. "With combat."
Then, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, he said:
"All six of you. At once. Against me."
For a heartbeat, silence hung in the arena.
"All six—what?" Kael barked a laugh, incredulous. "That's not training, that's—"
"—suicide?" Lucan finished for him, one brow raised. "Perhaps. But if you think six awakened Eidons can't overcome one man, you've already failed before striking."
Zeyra's eyes narrowed. "You're testing coordination."
"I'm testing everything," Lucan corrected.
Liora shifted uneasily but didn't step back. Her fingers toyed with the hem of her sleeve, eyes locked on the mentor. "You mean we're supposed to use our Eidons against you? Really use them?"
Lucan's gaze snapped to her, sharp as a blade. "Do you think the world will pull its punches to spare your nerves? Yes—use them."
Theo was already adjusting the strap of his goggles, his analytical calm masking the spark in his chest. "Six against one…" He glanced at Rai. "We'll have to move together."
Rai said nothing, but his eyes—usually hollow, unreadable—watched Lucan with something harder beneath.
Myren's hood shadowed his face, his silence louder than Kael's outrage. Yet the faint flex of his jaw showed readiness.
Lucan stepped back a single pace, boots ringing against the reactive floor. With that step, the entire arena pulsed alive—the grid on the walls sharpening, the panels humming beneath their feet.
"Come at me however you like," Lucan said, spreading his arms slightly. His presence filled the space like a pressure. "If you hold back, I'll know. If you falter, I'll break you. And if you hesitate—" His voice cut like steel. "—you'll already be down."
Kael cracked his knuckles, grin returning despite himself. "Fine. Don't blame me if I scuff that fancy clothing."
Zeyra exhaled, steadying her stance. Theo's eyes darted, calculating spacing. Liora swallowed once and raised her hands. Myren lowered his head, sinking deeper into stillness.
Rai simply stepped forward, wordless, his gaze never leaving Lucan.
The mentor smirked faintly.
"Show me your Eidons."
The tension was coiling, each of them bracing for the inevitable clash, when Theo froze mid-adjustment of his goggles. His expression shifted—not fear, but realization, sharp and heavy.
"…We fucked up."
Everyone turned to him at once.
"What?" Kael snapped, already half-ready to charge.
Theo shook his head, exhaling slowly. "Think about it. We never sat down and actually talked about our Eidons. Not what they do, not how they work. We just… moved as if we were a unit because the academy shoved us together. But in reality?" He looked around at them, his gaze steady. "We're blind to each other. Coordination is impossible if we don't even know what the rest of us can do."
Silence fell over the group. Even Lucan tilted his head slightly, a trace of amusement flickering across his face.
Zeyra's lips pressed into a thin line—because he was right.
Kael clicked his tongue. "Damn it. Guess charging in might not be the play after all…"
Liora lowered her eyes, guilt tugging at her chest. "He's right… we skipped the most important part."
Myren remained silent under his hood, but his fists clenched once at his sides—agreement without words.
Lucan's smirk widened as he folded his arms. "Finally. Someone notices. You thought teamwork was just standing side by side? That's not unity. That's proximity." His voice hardened, each word a hammer. "A true unit exposes its core—strengths, weaknesses, fears. Only then do your Eidons stop working against each other and begin to overlap."
Theo's jaw tightened. "So this fight is already lost before it begins."
Lucan's eyes sharpened. "Maybe. Or maybe it's your chance to find out what kind of unit you really are."
He dropped his arms, the hum of the arena growing louder around them. "So—will you still charge me blind? Or will you adapt right now?"
Theo lifted a hand sharply. "Wait."
Lucan's brow arched. "Wait?" His tone was amused, almost mocking. "On the battlefield, no one waits."
Theo's voice was steady, but his eyes burned with certainty. "This isn't the battlefield. It's training. If you want to see us as a unit, then give us ten minutes. Just ten—to stop fighting blind."
Lucan studied him for a long moment, then gave a single nod. "Ten minutes. Not a second more."
The arena lights dimmed slightly in acknowledgment, and the six gathered close.
Theo adjusted his goggles and looked at them one by one. "We screwed up. We never actually talked about what our Eidons do. No coordination, no chance of working together. So we fix that now. I'll start.
Mine's Visus. Perception, sight, awareness—call it what you want. I see everything. Movements, patterns, possibilities, the smallest flicker. It doesn't have a limit… only me. If you think you can surprise me, you can't."
Zeyra's voice was cool, cutting through. "Arbitris. I can define anything as crime. I can make you feel the weight of your sins. If I deliver judgment, you must abide—resist, and the weight of your sins will crush you. It isn't mercy. It's law."
Kael flexed his gloved fingers, smirking faintly. "Tabes. Everything decays under my touch. Solid, stable—it doesn't matter, I can unravel it until nothing's left. That's why I wear these gloves. To keep your bones intact."
Rai's voice came softer, but heavy. "Nullis. I can turn things into… nothing. Strip them of form, of meaning—just gone, as if they never were."
Liora hugged her knees slightly before lifting her gaze. "Memoria. I can draw memories out—yours, mine, the world's fragments. I can share them too. But memories aren't gentle. Once they're seen, they stay."
Finally, all eyes turned toward Myren.
He pulled his hood lower, voice calm and sharp. "Silens. I silence sound, thought, even will within my reach. It devours noise—friend or foe alike. In silence, there is nothing but stillness."
The group sat in a tense circle, their truths laid bare. Each power wasn't just strength, but danger—both to enemies and themselves.
Theo nodded firmly. "Good. Now we fight smart, not blind."
The arena lights blazed back to full, and Lucan's voice thundered:
"Time's up. Show me if words mean anything against me."
Theo pulled down his goggles slightly, the glass catching the arena lights. His voice cut through their ragged breaths.
"Listen. We're not stronger than him, but we can chain him. Kael, you go first. Force him to react. Liora, you search for something—anything—in his memory that pins him down. Zeyra, if one of us slips, you call Judgment. Myren, if that fails, silence his options. Rai…" Theo's gaze lingered on him. "…you're our last card. If nothing else works, turn on the void stuff."
He drew a breath, eyes narrowing.
"I'll try to predict his movements and give backup."
Rai nodded once. The others settled.
Across from them, Lucan flexed his hands, expression unreadable. "A plan, then. Good. Plans show me where to break you."
"Kael, now," Theo snapped.
Kael launched, he removed his gloves—hands flaring with rot-heat. His opening cross ripped the air—
"Pivot left—now!" Theo called.
Kael slipped past empty space—Lucan had already blurred, reappearing at Kael's flank.
"Back elbow—duck!" Theo fired, and Kael dropped as Lucan's hand skimmed the air where his head had been.
Theo's cadence sharpened. "Three-step burst coming—brace. He'll feint right and move left—Kael, intercept—now!"
They moved as one—almost.
Lucan's gaze flicked to Theo. The floor ghosted under his boots; his tempo shifted, not just faster—staggered, breaks and surges that bent rhythm itself.
"Correction—Kael—behind you!" Theo barked, voice catching as his sight outpaced their bodies.
Lucan slid through the narrowing gap, a hand tapping Kael's wrist—rot fizzled as the strike was redirected into empty air.
"Not bad," he said, and then he was inside their formation—too close, too calm—unspooling their plan one measured touch at a time.
Kael roared, hands igniting with decay, but Lucan slipped inside his guard and tapped his chest. Kael's knees buckled as though his strength had been bled out in a single instant.
"Liora!" Theo called.
"Memory won't hold me," Lucan murmured as Liora's threads lashed toward him, desperate to anchor him in fragments of the past. He pivoted, flowing between them, fingers brushing her temple. The threads unraveled into wisps, dissolving before they could bind. Liora gasped, falling back.
"Zeyra—you're up!"
Zeyra's eyes burned. "Lucan Thorne, you stand trial. Crime: arrogance. Sentence: submission."
The weight of judgment pressed—but Lucan's tempo shifted. His stride fractured into a blur of stuttered steps, each faster than the last, until the pressure broke like glass underfoot. He reached her shoulder, two fingers pressing lightly, and she crumpled under the aftershock of her own demand.
"Hold him—Myren!"
Myren spread silence like a curtain, muting the world to nothing. For a moment, Lucan's steps lost sound, their rhythm blunted. Myren dared to believe it worked—until Lucan smiled. His movement simply accelerated before he was caught in it, leaving the stillness behind like discarded skin. Myren staggered as a palm clipped his hood.
Only Rai and Theo stood.
Theo's eyes widened, perception flooding him with possibilities of Lucanʼs movements—each one ending the same way: Lucan breaking through. His throat went dry, but he forced a shout. "Rai—now!"
Rai raised his hand. The void unfurled, black nothingness yawning wide.
Lucan didn't slow.
He accelerated.
One heartbeat, he was before the abyss; the next, he was beside Rai, a hand resting against the boy's wrist, pushing his arm gently aside. The void snapped shut, harmless.
Theo froze. He saw the movement before it happened, predicted every step, yet still couldn't stop it. His vision shattered into useless noise.
Lucan stood at the center of their broken formation, hands behind his back, not a bead of sweat on his brow. One by one, the six lay scattered around him—winded, frustrated, silent.
"Better," he said evenly. "But not nearly enough."
His voice carried like iron across the arena.
Lucan stopped, folding his arms behind his back. His eyes burned with quiet authority.
"Understand this: Eidonic combat isn't about throwing force at an enemy. It isn't about waiting for the strongest ability to land. Eidonic combat is the collision of selves. When you wield your Eidon, you wield who you are. Every strike you make, every barrier you raise, every judgment you pass—it is your soul on display."
He let that hang, like a weight pressing down on them.
"Without clarity, you are weak. Without understanding, you are children waving blades too heavy for your hands. And worse still—you have no unity. Six fragments flailing alone, pretending to be a unit."
He stepped back, voice lowering but cutting even deeper.
"You gave me names yesterday. Today, you gave me fragments of yourselves. But until you give me all—until you stand here without fear of who you are—you will never stand as a unit worthy of survival."
Lucan's expression hardened, and his tone shifted, slower, heavier, like he was dragging something out of them.
"You think I only saw what you showed today? No." His eyes narrowed. "I watched you the other day. In the trial."
The words hung like a blade above them.
"What you faced—those rooms, those illusions, the weight pressing in on you… You thought it was chance? You thought it was some random test Idryma threw together? No. That was the Path Trial. The very first step of your journey."
He turned away for a moment, as if the weight of his own words needed space to breathe.
"You were split, each into your own empty chamber. But those chambers weren't empty, were they? What you saw, what you felt, was yours alone. Not conjured, not fabricated—dragged out of the marrow of who you are. Every fear, every shame, every fracture in your self."
He looked back at them, gaze like iron.
"And you failed."
The sting in his words was merciless. Kael clenched his fists, Zeyra lowered her head, Liora's breath hitched, Myren's hooded eyes flickered, Theo bit down hard on his lip, and Rai's face was unreadable as ever.
Lucan's voice cut sharper.
"You've awakened, yes. But at the same time—you haven't. You've touched your Eidon, but you haven't touched yourselves. You don't even realize what it means to stand in your truth. That's why so many lose their way after awakening. Without confronting what you are, your Eidon eats you alive. You lose yourself until there's nothing left."
He let that sink in, then continued:
"That trial is called the Path Trial for a reason. It forces you to choose—to begin shaping the path you'll walk. Not strength. Not victory. Self. And if you cannot come to terms with your selves… if you cannot reconcile who you are with who you wish to become… then you will lose your self entirely. And you will not leave Idryma alive."
His hands folded behind his back, his voice low and merciless.
"I'll groom you. I'll put you through fire and break you apart until you learn to hold together.
Lucan's gaze didn't waver as he continued, his voice steady but edged with steel.
"I'll give you one thing—time. Five days. That's all you have. In five days, you'll be thrown into the Path Trial again. And this time, there will be no excuses, no stumbling blind through your own shadows. You'll either come to terms with your selves… or you'll be consumed by them."
He let the silence stretch, making sure the words buried themselves under their skin.
"If one of you fails, I'll fail you all. Idryma doesn't need half-broken shards—it needs a unit that stands as one. If you can't manage that, then Unit Six dies here, with your names scrubbed out like you never existed."
The threat was delivered not as cruelty, but as inevitability. His tone didn't rise, didn't shake—it was cold fact.
"Other units have faced this same wall. Most fell. And you will too, unless you begin to face the truth of yourselves. I won't hold your hands. I won't play savior. I'll carve you open until you either bleed out or learn to stand."
His eyes narrowed, glinting sharp.
"Five days. That's your mercy. Prove to me you're worth the name Unit Six."