The light from the projection dimmed.
Golden glyphs dissolved like morning mist—clean, final, indifferent. No applause followed. No grand declaration. Just the quiet murmur of the crowd and the slow, inevitable return of normalcy.
The Candidate Trials had ended.
Valeria sat in the same booth, her posture composed, her tea now cold. She had watched it all—every moment. From the instant Lucavion raised his blade against Reynald to the quiet surrender of would-be challengers who knew they could not measure up. Mireilla's precise tenacity. Toven's decisive cruelty. The flicker of ambition, rising and falling like sparks across an ocean too deep for fire to reach.
But nothing—nothing—had matched the storm that Lucavion had brought.
The fight with Reynald had redefined the Trials.
And everything after it had been epilogue.
Even the air had known it.
