Chapter 187: Chapter 187— Happenings

Arlen glanced at his friends, then back at Johnmark. “I don’t even know who you are.”

“Johnmark, Crownspire Academy, Ashmar Federation.” He stepped forward, rolling his shoulders like a fighter warming up. “I want to test myself against Sparkshire’s supposed elite. You look competent. So let’s see if the Republic’s reputation is deserved.”

Arlen’s expression hardened. “You’re serious.”

“Completely.”

One of the Ashmar students—a girl with short-cropped hair—stepped forward. “Johnmark, we literally just arrived. Maybe don’t start a fight within the first hour—”

“I’m not starting a fight,” Johnmark interrupted. “I’m requesting a sanctioned spar. That’s allowed under the academy rules, right?” He looked at the instructors still standing near the building entrance.

Adept Kira , who’d been observing with barely concealed amusement, shrugged. “Combat training grounds are available. If both parties consent to the match, we won’t stop it.”

Arlen set his jaw. “Fine. Let’s do this.”

The crowd began moving toward the training grounds, excitement rippling through both Sparkshire and foreign students. Word spread quickly—an impromptu match, of a foreign student challenging a Sparkshire second-year, this was going to be interesting.

By the time they reached the designated sparring ring, nearly a hundred students had gathered to watch.

Johnmark entered the ring without hesitation, taking a ready stance that suggested his formal martial training. Arlen followed more cautiously, spear held in a defensive position.

“Rules?” Arlen asked.

“Standard academy rules,” Vex called from the sidelines. “First blood, submission, or incapacitation. Lethal force is prohibited. Core abilities are permitted. Begin when ready.”

Both students activated their cores simultaneously.

Arlen moved first—a probing thrust with his spear, fast but not committed. Testing range and response time.

Johnmark didn’t dodge. He let the spear strike his shoulder.

The wooden training weapon connected with a solid thunk, and Arlen felt the impact reverberate wrong. Not like hitting flesh. Like hitting something that absorbed and stored the force rather than dissipating it.

Johnmark smiled wider. “One.”

He blurred forward, closing the distance before Arlen could reset his stance, and drove a palm strike into Arlen’s chest.

The Sparkshire student went flying backward, crashing into the ring’s barrier with enough force to crack the reinforced wood.

The crowd gasped.

Arlen struggled to his feet, wheezing, blood trickling from his mouth. “What the—”

Johnmark beckoned with one hand. “Try again.”

Arlen did try—launching a combination attack that would have overwhelmed most opponents. A thrust, a sweep, an overhead strike, each one executed with technical precision.

Each one connected.

And each one fed Johnmark’s reserves.

When Arlen finally created distance, panting from exertion, Johnmark released everything he’d stored in a single devastating punch aimed at the ground.

The shockwave rippled outward, destabilizing Arlen’s footing and sending him sprawling.

“Yield,” Kira called before Johnmark could follow up. “Match concluded.”

Johnmark straightened, barely winded, and offered Arlen a hand up. “You’re technically skilled. But you telegraph your attacks. Work on that.”

Arlen stared at the offered hand for a long moment, pride and humiliation warring across his features. Finally, he took it.

The crowd erupted in mixed reactions—Ashmar students cheering, Sparkshire students silent and uncertain.

Johnmark turned to address the gathered audience. “Anyone else want to test themselves? I came here to learn how the Republic trains its warriors. Best way to learn is through combat.”

No one stepped forward.

Not yet.

But several students exchanged glances that promised future challenges.

Johnmark noticed and smiled. “Good. I look forward to meeting all of you.”

He left the ring like a champion exiting an arena.

—–

Theodore Selaris received the confirmation from three separate sources within an hour of Silas’s departure.

The infiltration specialist was gone. Deployed to Ashmar.

Theodore sat in his private study, reading through the intelligence reports, feeling something he hadn’t allowed himself to feel in weeks.

Opportunity.

Silas drey had been the primary obstacle to his plans. The boy who’d killed Gregor—Theodore’s enforcer, his muscle, his tool for applying pressure without direct involvement. Silas was dangerous in ways that made conventional retaliation impossible.

You couldn’t intimidate someone who was fundamentally predatory.

You couldn’t threaten someone who’d already demonstrated a willingness to kill preemptively.

So Theodore had retreated. Withdrawn his claws. Waited for a better opportunity.

And now it had arrived.

With Silas gone, the outpost squad was fractured. Their most dangerous member in his view, removed from the board. Their tactical cohesion disrupted.

Theodore pulled out fresh parchment and began writing carefully coded messages to his network of noble allies.

He wrote for an hour, crafting each message with precision, ensuring nothing could be traced directly back to him.

The strategy had evolved.

Direct confrontation had failed—Gregor’s death proved that. The outpost recruits were too dangerous when provoked, too willing to escalate to violence.

But violence wasn’t the only weapon.

Social isolation was always the go to approach. Resource denial. Exclusion from opportunities.

He sealed the messages and summoned a runner to deliver them.

Then he sat back in his chair, steepling his fingers, and allowed himself a small smile.

The game was resuming.

And this time, he wouldn’t underestimate them.

—–

Bright sat alone in the forge workshop long after Hendricks had departed for the evening.

The forge was cold—no active projects requiring heat—but Bright found comfort in the space regardless. The smell of metal and oil. The organized chaos of tools and materials. The sense of making something rather than destroying.

He’d come here to think.

Have you heard of soul force, boy? What exactly do you think it is?

Hendricks’ question had been haunting him for days.

Soul force. The fundamental energy that powered cores, enabled advancement, separated humans from Crawlers. Everyone talked about it. Everyone measured it. Everyone pursued it.

But what was it?

Bright closed his eyes, trying to sense his own soul force the way he sensed his cores.

The cores were distinct. Clear. Like individual instruments in an orchestra.

But beneath them, connecting them, something else hummed.

His soul force signature.

Bright reached for it consciously, trying to feel what made his particular energy different from anyone else’s.

And immediately noticed something wrong.

The signature wasn’t unified.

It felt… fragmented. Like multiple melodies trying to harmonize but not quite synchronizing. Overlapping frequencies that created dissonance instead of resonance.

He pushed deeper, ignoring the headache building behind his eyes.

There.

He could sense it now.

Multiple signatures. Not one soul force but several, each one corresponding to a component of his fused cores.

They’d been forced together through his fusion talent, merged into something greater than their individual parts. But the merger wasn’t perfect. The underlying signatures hadn’t fully integrated. They coexisted, overlapped, created interference patterns.

It was like trying to listen to three different songs playing simultaneously through the same speaker.

Functional, but chaotic.

Bright opened his eyes, breathing hard.

This is why advancement feels slower.

He wasn’t refining one soul force. He was refining multiple soul forces simultaneously, trying to harmonize contradictions into coherence.

Most people had one signature—one clear melody that grew stronger and more refined with each rank advancement.

He had two. Maybe more as he continued fusing cores.

Was this sustainable?

Could a soul even handle that kind of fragmentation long-term?

Bright didn’t know.

But he suspected Hendricks had known. Had recognized the fundamental problem in Bright’s advancement path from the beginning.

Think on this and get back to me. It would serve you well to not play on matters of the soul without deeply reflecting on what your soul actually is.

Bright stood, moving to the workshop’s window. Outside, the academy continued its evening routines. Students heading to dormitories. Instructors finishing administrative work. The machinery of institutional education grinding forward.

None of them knew.

None of them understood that his power—the overwhelming capability that made him untouchable in combat—came with a cost that might eventually destroy him.

Or drive him insane.

Bright pressed his forehead against the cool glass.

He needed answers.

And he suspected Hendricks could only provide some of them.

—–

The next morning, Bright emerged from Warfare Tactics lecture to find someone waiting in the hallway.

A student he didn’t recognize—a first-year like him, judging by the uniform markings. Average height, unremarkable features, the kind of person who blended into crowds without effort.

The stranger was staring at him with an intensity that felt wrong. Not hostile. Not challenging.

Desperate.

Bright slowed, evaluating. His spatial awareness detected no immediate threats. No weapons. No unusual core activity.

Just anxiety radiating off the other student like heat.

The stranger took a half-step forward, mouth opening like he was about to speak.

Then froze.

Bright watched internal debate play out across the stranger’s face—courage warring with fear, determination collapsing into uncertainty.

“Did you need something?” Bright asked, keeping his tone neutral.

The stranger flinched. “I— No. Sorry. Wrong person.”

He turned and walked away quickly, shoulders hunched, radiating the kind of panic that came from nearly making a catastrophic mistake.

Bright watched him go, spatial awareness tracking his retreat until he disappeared around a corner.

Something was wrong.

The stranger’s heart rate had been elevated. His hands had been trembling. And beneath the nervousness, Bright had sensed something else.

Deception.

It wasn’t malicious intent nor the predatory energy that preceded violence. But dishonesty nonetheless. Like the stranger was carrying information he desperately wanted to share but couldn’t.

Bright filed the interaction away mentally and continued toward his next class.

He’d see that student again.

And next time, he’d find out what the stranger was hiding.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

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