Chapter 47: Entrance Exam (9)

The skies over Vadena were still grey, but no longer threatening.

The rain had relented, leaving behind puddles that reflected the towering city structures and the bustling energy of the capital.

Steam curled from vent grates and street-side stalls alike as Lucien and Balt walked side by side, their boots clicking against the cobblestones slick with water.

Their first stop was the Postal Guild Office, a squat but orderly building with a clock tower affixed like a stiff collar.

Inside, the place was all brass and bureaucracy, neat rows of cubicles, runners darting in and out with sealed letters, and long queues of impatient senders tapping their feet.

Lucien stood at the front desk, gripping a fresh sheet of parchment tightly as he finished scribbling out a letter:

[To the D’Claire Estate - Attention: Sir Richardson or Vaelira,

I’ve made it to the capital, though not without… complications. I was pickpocketed shortly after arriving and have found temporary lodgings thanks to the kindness of some generous strangers. I humbly request that additional funds be sent back with the carriage driver when he returns in two weeks. I will be preparing for the exam until then.

Also, please don’t worry. I’m fine.

-Lucien]

The guild clerk weighed the envelope, tsked at the water stains on Lucien’s coat, and handed him the token indicating it would be dispatched by private carrier that same evening.

Outside, the city unfolded in all directions like a living mosaic, market stalls brimming with sizzling skewers and glass jars of powdered reagents, nobles in carriages hurrying through rain-muddied intersections, mages walking with glowing familiars at their heels.

“This place is… a lot,” Lucien muttered as they moved through a busier district.

“Welcome to Vadena,” Balt replied with a tired grin.

“The city where your wallet disappears faster than your hopes.”

They passed through a square filled with enchanted fountains dancing to invisible music, through a row of mage-run bookstores that made Lucien's eyes sparkle, and finally came upon it:

The Academy Exam Center.

It loomed ahead like a fortress of ambition, ten sprawling stories of white marble and stormglass, built into an entire city block like a monument to higher learning and unforgiving expectations.

Runes glowed faintly on its surface, constantly shifting, and the air around it thrummed with latent magic.

The sidewalks outside were choked with students, hundreds of them, if not more, some reciting spells under their breath, others scribbling into notebooks, all vibrating with an anxious, caffeine-fueled intensity.

Lucien gawked.

“It’s like a temple... or a battleground.”

“Yeah,” Balt said, “but with more crying.”

He darted off to a nearby food cart and returned with two paper-wrapped, roasted potatoes dripping with butter and salt.

He handed one to Lucien and dropped onto the curb with a grunt.

“Here. Eat something. You look like a lost librarian.”

Lucien took the potato gratefully and sat beside him.

The scent alone restored some of his energy.

They ate in silence for a while, watching as a girl nearby repeatedly failed to conjure a basic shield spell and screamed into her textbook.

“So,” Lucien finally asked, “how’d you end up in this madness? Gunning for a seat in the academy, I mean.”

Balt scratched his neck, chewing thoughtfully.

“Ah. That old tale.”

He leaned back against the stone wall behind them, rainwater dripping from a pipe nearby.

“I’m from a fishing village by the ocean. Real cozy place, unless you count the constant storms, giant sea beasts, and weird glowing rocks under the water.”

“Sounds... welcoming.”

Balt snorted.

“Right? So anyway, the village has two jobs: fishing or brinestone mining. That’s it. If you’re born there, you pick one and shut up about it.”

Lucien raised a brow.

“So you ran away?”

“No, no. I wish it was that dramatic,” Balt said, laughing.

“One day, when I was barely toddling around, I managed to crawl into the docks and grabbed an old fishing rod. Turns out the damn thing was carved with ancient runes, nobody knew where it came from. But as soon as I touched it, it lit up like a festival torch.”

Lucien blinked.

“That... sounds like a sign.”

“Exactly what they said.”

Balt made air quotes with his greasy fingers.

“‘The Chosen One,’ ‘Ocean's Gift,’ ‘Little Prophet Boy.’ You name it. Suddenly, everyone was bringing me scrolls and tutors and feeding me mana-infused seaweed.”

Lucien coughed.

“Mana seaweed?”

“It’s disgusting,” Balt said grimly.

“And slimy.”

Lucien chuckled.

Balt continued, “So yeah, they pushed me into magic before I could even say the word. The moment I was of age, they packed my things, kissed me on the forehead, and shoved me onto the next caravan heading to Vadena. No pressure, right? Just... save our dying village with magic.”

He laughed again, but there was something tired behind it.

Lucien glanced at him, more thoughtful now.

“You really have a whole village counting on you?”

Balt shrugged.

“Yeah. I guess. Sometimes I think they just didn’t want to deal with the weird kid who made things float when he sneezed.”

Lucien smiled faintly, the roasted potato suddenly heavier in his hand.

“Well... for what it’s worth, I think you're doing great. You helped a stranger in the rain. That already counts for something.”

Balt turned to look at him, squinting like Lucien had grown another head.

“Are you trying to one-up my sad backstory with compliments now? You nobles are terrifying.”

Lucien laughed.

And for the first time since he’d arrived in the capital, it didn’t feel quite so cold.

They sat there for a while longer, watching the academy building glow faintly in the mist, looming with promise and peril in equal measure.

Somewhere deep inside, Lucien tightened his grip on his satchel.

The entrance exam was coming.

And he wouldn’t let himself fail.

***

The day of the exam arrived cloaked in a tense hush.

Even the weather seemed to sense it, the skies above Vadena were a dull, heavy grey, clouds thick and unmoving, as though the world itself was holding its breath.

The streets leading to the Academy Exam Center were flooded with bodies.

Students of all races, regions, and ranks shuffled forward with grim determination, their voices hushed, their eyes set.

Lucien stood beside Balt near the registration archway, the both of them carrying little more than satchels filled with quills, ink, and a lifetime of hope.

“Well,” Balt said, adjusting the collar of his patched-up jacket, “this is where the ‘fun’ begins.”

Lucien cracked a smile.

“If by fun, you mean voluntarily walking into ten floors of academic suffering, then yes.”

They reached a marble platform, where staff in formal robes checked each examinee’s slip and sent them toward different staircases.

A grim-faced clerk took Balt’s slip and pointed toward the fifth floor.

“Looks like I’m heading to the fifth circle of hell,” Balt muttered.

He looked at Lucien and extended his hand.

“Hey. Whatever happens, don’t freeze up in there. You’ve got this.”

Lucien shook it firmly.

“You too. Save me a seat at the top.”

Balt grinned.

“I’ll try not to pass out from stress before then.”

And just like that, the crowd swept them apart.

Lucien’s own slip directed him to the fourth floor.

A stone staircase curled upward like the inside of a shell, echoing with the sound of hundreds of feet and nervous whispers.

When he stepped onto the fourth floor landing, a mage guide in violet robes ushered him wordlessly into a large, circular hall filled

with rows upon rows of desks.

Tall, stained-glass windows lined the walls, casting fractured beams of mana-infused light onto the floor.

At the very front stood the exam overseer, an elderly woman with silver-threaded robes and eyes that glowed faintly blue.

Lucien walked to his assigned seat, third row from the front, and sat down.

His hands trembled slightly as he unpacked his quill and ink bottle.

‘Breathe. Focus.’

He glanced around.

Some examinees were murmuring spells to steady their nerves; others were rubbing charms, whispering prayers, or muttering formulas.

Lucien closed his eyes for a moment.

‘This isn’t the first exam I’ve taken. I’ve done this before. Countless times.’

Then, his confidence wavered just a little.

‘But it’s the first one where people can set themselves on fire because they conjugated a magic phrase wrong.’

A bead of sweat trailed down his temple.

Just as his nerves were about to snap, the great bell tolled.

A deep, thunderous sound that reverberated through the hall like a heartbeat.

The overseer raised a hand, her voice calm but commanding.

“The written portion of the Twilight Crown Academy Entrance Examination will now commence. You have three hours. Any use of external tools, illegal enchantments, or communication magic will result in immediate disqualification. Papers will be levitated to your desks shortly.”

A rustle filled the room as enchanted stacks of parchment glided through the air and settled before each student.

A pale-blue question sheet followed, snapping into place at the top of the stack like a flag declaring war.

Lucien stared down at his.

Then, he blinked.

And let out a breath of cautious relief.

The questions weren’t impossible.

In fact, many of them covered subjects he had studied over the past few weeks: history, magical theory, mana flow diagrams, ethical regulations surrounding spell usage, even a case study on the Ley Line Crisis he had forced himself to read during the nausea-inducing carriage ride.

‘Doable, he thought. This is doable.’

He dipped his quill in ink, hands steadier now, and began to write.

Outside, the city of Vadena carried on in motion.

But inside that exam hall, for Lucien, the world had narrowed to a single sheet of paper and a future waiting to be earned, one question at a time.

***

Lucien scrawled his answer to the third question, his wrist already aching and his ink-smudged fingers stained like he’d just wrestled a squid.

He paused for a breath, wiping a bead of sweat from his brow, only to smear more ink across his temple.

And then, quietly, in the deep and private recesses of his soul, he cursed the quill.

‘Of all the miserable tools in this blasted magical world, he thought bitterly, I get handed a goose feather dipped in tears and despair.’

It wasn’t even a good quill.

The nib scratched against the enchanted parchment like a drunkard clawing their way through a closed window.

His letters looked like they were mid-transformation into eldritch sigils.

The ink refused to flow when he needed it to, and gushed like a nosebleed when he didn’t.

‘They have fountain pens in this world. I’ve seen them. I’ve used one. Hell, I’m pretty sure someone somewhere is already working on magical gel pens or some rune-infused ballpoint monstrosity.’

He stared at his pitiful handwriting. His answer to question four looked like it had been transcribed by a man in the middle of a seizure.

‘And here I am’, he lamented, ‘writing what is essentially the Arcane Constitution of an Empire with a bloody feather like I’m some half-starved poet crying into a bottle of cheap wine.’

Lucien nearly snapped the quill in frustration.

‘Sure, fine, he admitted. Maybe giving every examinee a high-end fountain pen would bankrupt the academy. But couldn’t they let us bring our own at least?’

Then a darker thought entered his mind.

‘Wait… what if someone once tried to bring a self-writing quill? Or a spell-imbued pen that corrected grammar and suggested better sentence structure mid-answer?’

He could imagine it, some noble’s spoiled prodigy bringing in a magical calligraphy assistant that practically took the test for them.

The kind of enchanted monstrosity that whispered, "Are you sure you want to say ‘arguably’? Consider ‘indisputably.’"

Lucien shuddered.

‘Yeah… okay. Maybe I get it.’

Still, this quill?

It deserved to be buried in a cursed bog.

He shook his head violently and whispered to himself, “Focus.”

There was no time for a breakdown.

He still had ten more questions to go, and only a little over an hour left.

He stared down at the pages and switched mental gears.

‘This is just like the last-minute cramming sessions with my sister. You just need to survive long enough to crawl over the finish line.’

With a determined breath, Lucien pressed quill to page again and blazed forward, well, as much as the cursed utensil would allow.