"Kael Ardyn."
I walked onto the field.
I have to complete the mission also.
I stood in the center of it and thought about what Hiratsuka had said.
Show what you have and how you use it.
I started with Ether Authority.
The mana responded imdiately, drawing from nature the ambient field around the training ground dense enough that the aspect could run without significant internal cost. The light it produced moved along my arms.
I cast Vector Authority across a section of the field to the left at full strength, but enough to show the chanics. The earth in that section compacted under seven tis gravity, the grass flattening, the stone beneath cracked.
Then I released it and cast Aether Step.
I went forty ters and held the position, moving through the air above the field with the control I had been building in the gap between coming down and going back up since the early mornings at the estate. The mana cost was significant but within what I had for fifteen minutes of output.
I ca down and let the Ether Authority reconfigure.
Then I thought about what I had not shown yet.
Sanguine Pulse was Nythera’s technique and I had not decided how much of what she had taught I was putting on display today. I set it aside.
Crimson Veil I used for ten seconds the compressed blood mana running across the surface of my skin, absorbing the minor impacts I generated against the nearest stone formation, the technique visible only in the way the stone’s impact distributed rather than landing cleanly.
Hiratsuka’s pen was moving.
Last.
I raised my hand and tried to build Hell’s Fire.
The field around it warped slightly. The temperature dropped rather than rose because the fla did not belong to the heat category despite looking like it should.
I held it for thirty seconds.
And suddenly a puke a mouthful of blood.
"What the hell!" I muttered.
The system flickered.
[The skill Ether Authority is locked using again will cause imnse pain next ti.]
Huh!
Then I closed my hand.
I walked back to the observation line.
Hiratsuka was looking at where the fla had been rather than at .
***
After the final candidate completed their assessnt Hiratsuka stood.
"You all are mournels."
"Observations will be brief ones today. Full individual feedback tomorrow morning before the first session begins."
She looked at Lina.
"The spirit arts combination healing distribution and sustained flight simultaneously is the most imdiately useful dual-output technique I have seen from an incoming student in four years. The limitation is transition ti between outputs. Address that."
Lina nodded.
"Rael. The dual contract is real. The control at the boundary is not finished. You know that. Stop performing it until the performance matches the capability."
His jaw tightened.
"Valtier. The domain is complete. The illusion of precision is excessive. You spent more mana on accuracy than the assessnt required, which tells the accuracy is a habit rather than a choice. Habits in combat beco predictions. Predictions beco counters."
Sylvaine looked at her with complete composure.
"Ardyn."
"Find the limit of what is yours before you lean on what was given to you."
I said nothing.
***
The session ended .
The twelve of us began moving back toward the main building. I was walking back along the edge of the field when I heard soone fall into step beside .
Lina was walking with Aria, the two of them talking in low voices about sothing.
I looked to my left.
The novel’s female lead walked beside .
She was looking at the field rather than at .
"Hell’s Fire," she said. "I have read about it. Academic sources. Historical accounts from the third daemon incursion. I have never seen it cast."
"Now you have,"
"The blue flas, The accounts describe it as consuming everything it touches."
"The accounts were written by people who saw it from a distance,"
She looked at then.
"You knew that from experience rather than sources,"
"Yes."
"How close."
"Close enough,"
She held the answer for a mont without pushing it further, which told sothing about her that I filed alongside everything else I had filed.
"My na is Elysia Valecrest. , Since we will apparently be in the sa class for the foreseeable future."
"I know,"
"You know my na,"
"I know several things, so of them relevant to you specifically."
She was quiet for a mont.
"That is either reassuring or concerning, I have not decided which."
"Both, Depending on the day."
She smiled.
"The lightning, This afternoon. You held it back."
She looked at .
"What you showed Hiratsuka was mid-level, The technique was accurate and the control was clean and it was a mid-level spell. You made a decision before you walked onto the field about how much to show."
She was watching now with full attention.
"Hiratsuka noticed, she just did not comnt on it."
"You read people," she said.
"I read situations People are part of situations."
The main building was ahead. Other students from the S class had reached the entrance.
"That is a strange answer," .
"Yes,"
"It is also an honest one.
We walked the rest of the way to the entrance without talking.
At the door she stopped and looked at one more ti .
"Well see you tomorrow.’
"Tomorrow,"
She went through the door.
I stood at the entrance and thought about the novel that had been written around this person built from the beginning to show the world through her lens.
I went through the door.
Behind , Hiratsuka’s voice reached from the training ground entrance.
"Ardyn."
"The blood mana," she said. "Whoever taught you that technique has been fighting for a very long ti."
I turned.
She was standing with her cup and her docunts.
"Are you marked?"
"Yes"
She looked at for a mont.
"Tell them I said their control work is still so of the best I have seen, whoever they are.
She walked back toward the training ground.
****
[Task completed.]
[Reward received successfully.]
[Received a gift from higher beings.]
[Massage chair.]
Huh!
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