The next day,

Author

It started with small things - the kind no one would have noticed if they had not been watching for them, the kind that rarely make it into official reports or council minutes. But Aria noticed. She always did.

She stood at the edge of the beginner’s portal ring one crisp autumn morning, watching a group of six omega-tier students check their gear. Just three months earlier, these same students had been assigned only to menial tasks: cleaning training halls, restocking potion shelves, hauling rubble from the upper yards. They had been barred from entry-level dungeon runs entirely, told their magic was too weak, their instincts...