Chapter 59: Aptitude Test (11)
The roar of twin elemental storms shrieked like banshees across the yellow brick road as the two winged lion guardians unleashed their fury.
One, a white-bearded colossus of crackling frost, bellowed a cone of glacial death that turned air into sleet and stone into ice.
The other, its mane a molten furnace of wild firelight, followed with a howling roar that unleashed a dragon’s worth of flame in a blinding inferno.
Fire and ice, ruin and death, tore toward the ragtag band of examinees in a synchronized tide of annihilation.
Lucien clenched his teeth and braced himself.
His fingers, red and blistered, curled tighter around the straps that bound Balt to his back.
He could feel the heat racing forward like an incoming tidal wave, taste the frost in the back of his throat like blood.
The pain in his arms, the ache in his legs, the unbearable sting across his raw back where the scalding water had peeled flesh, all of it blurred into a numb, frozen second of hopelessness.
He closed his eyes.
He had led them here.
And this was how it ended.
‘I'm sorry’, he thought.
But the end never came.
Not in flame.
Not in frost.
Not in death.
Lucien opened his eyes.
And in that moment, the impossible happened.
A thin, wavering wall of translucent mana, shimmering like glass veiled in smoke, stood before him, stopping the elemental blast just inches from his face.
The wall trembled and cracked, but it held.
His gaze dropped, and beside him stood her, the girl with the wand who had first arrived at the cave carrying her sick friend.
Her hair was frayed, part of her face singed raw and bleeding.
She was shaking, he could see the tremor in her knuckles, but her eyes… her eyes burned.
With fear.
And determination.
One hand gripped her wand, guiding a swirling gust of wind upward to redirect and dissipate the worst of the fire and frost.
The other hand, fingers trembling, was outstretched, maintaining the fragile, singular barrier that kept Lucien from being disintegrated.
He turned, and saw the others, mages and casters, some on their knees, some leaning on one another, casting barriers in a disorganized but courageous line across the road.
No two were the same, some golden, some blue, some shimmering like rippling water, but each one added to the next like a stacked bulwark of stubborn resistance.
Some were flickering.
Some cracked.
Some already falling apart.
But they were standing.
‘They were still standing.’
Those who couldn’t cast barriers were using whatever they had, wind spells, elemental shields, sheer will.
One boy had shoved a fallen log into the path of the breath attacks just to buy an extra second.
Others threw rocks, ice, arrows, not to hurt the lions, but to protect the mages from breaking.
Corin and the other melee fighters had formed a half-ring around the wounded, their backs to the mages, weapons drawn.
They bore the brunt of the concussive force, shielding the younger or weaker examinees with their own bodies.
Blades dug into the frost-slick ground to anchor themselves.
Some had burns.
Others had cracked ribs or torn sleeves.
One girl had lost a shoe but still stood, barefoot, between her friend and the fire.
‘They are standing. Even now…’
‘Why?’
A stinging smack clapped across both his cheeks from behind, nearly knocking his head forward.
“Oi!! Snap the hell out of it!”
Came Balt’s strained voice, just inches from his ear.
Lucien blinked, dazed by both pain and clarity.
“I didn’t let you carry me like a princess for this long just to see you break down now,” Balt growled.
“You got us into hell, Lucien. And guess what?”
Another smack.
This one with a bit more sting.
“You’re gonna liberate us from it.”
Lucien felt Balt’s weight on his back.
His old robes wrapped tightly around his torso were soaked in sweat and blood.
The warmth from Balt’s body burnt against Lucien's spine like an ember refusing to die.
“They followed you,” Balt whispered now, a rasp as fire and frost still clashed outside.
“Every single one of them. Through that insane plan. Through monsters. Through guardian after guardian. Through hell itself.”
Lucien’s lips trembled.
“I’m not giving up,” Balt said.
“Because I can’t. I have dreams, damn it. I’ve got a whole village counting on me. I have to move forward, even if I have to crawl.”
His voice cracked, just a little.
“So don’t you dare give up now, Lucien. Don’t you dare make their fate be for nothing. They still believe in you. I still believe in you.”
Lucien looked again at the line of examinees, all of them bleeding, blistered, half-frozen, but defiant.
A girl clutching a broken wand, refusing to step back.
A boy missing his glasses, still channeling magic with one hand and shielding another with the other.
Shoulder to shoulder, holding the line.
And he… he was at their center.
Not by power.
Not by bloodline.
But by choice.
His chest swelled, not with pride, but with resolve.
It didn’t matter if he wasn’t the strongest.
Didn’t matter if he wasn’t the bravest.
He was their center.
And right now, he needed to think.
Lucien gritted his teeth, eyes narrowing.
His voice rang out, hoarse, cracked, but clear.
“Fall back five steps! Mages reinforce barriers- Others! Buy them time! On my mark- we split the lions!!”
The examinees moved without hesitation.
Without question.
Because Lucien had spoken.
And they believed.
Hope, like a long-dormant flame, roared to life in their hearts.
They weren’t doomed.
They weren’t broken.
They weren’t done.
Not yet.
Not today.
***
Lucien untied the makeshift ropes that held Balt against his back with a trembling urgency.
His shoulders ached, his burns throbbed, and yet none of it registered as he knelt beside his friend.
Balt’s face was pale, his jaw clenched from pain, but his eyes never wavered.
“I’m putting you down here,” Lucien said, lowering him gently onto the uneven road.
“Rest. You’ve done more than anyone could’ve asked.”
He turned to the girl with the wand, the one whose determination had shielded them all from annihilation just moments before.
“Keep him safe. Just for a second.”
She nodded, her eyes flicking between Lucien and Balt, then back toward the lions.
“Go,” she said.
“We’ll hold.”
Lucien ran.
Or at least tried to.
His boots slid across the ice-slicked road, catching on patches of frost left behind by the lion’s elemental breath.
Each step was a scramble, a desperate, half-controlled stumble forward.
He saw Corin ahead.
One of his eyes was shut tight, blood trickling from a gash on his scalp, staining the side of his face in a sickly line.
His great axe hung limp in his grip, but the second he saw Lucien, he pulled himself together, standing a bit straighter, forcing a crooked grin.
“Corin!”
Lucien yelled, catching up with him.
“When you hit the lion the first time, when its barrier flared, did your axe bounce off, or did it feel like hitting a solid wall?”
Corin blinked, dazed and bloodied.
His eyes shifted to the beast statues, his grip on his axe shifting as he tried to remember.
“It bounced,” he muttered.
“Hard. Like… like hitting rubber or a spring. Why does that matter?”
The sword-and-shield wielder next to him, armor dented and scorched, growled in frustration.
“We’re fighting for our lives, and you’re asking about textures now?!”
But Lucien’s mind was already racing.
“That means it’s reactive,” he muttered.
“A trigger-based spell, not a passive one.”
The swordsman took in the info as his demeanor shifted to intrigue.
“Wait. You mean-”
“Yes,” Lucien cut in.
“There’s an activation delay. It senses incoming mana or kinetic force, then casts its barrier as a reflex.”
The swordsman exhaled.
“So if we can strike in that sliver of time…”
Lucien nodded, breath hitching.
“We break them. That’s our opening.”
He turned to the others, voice rising over the chaos, loud and clear despite the ringing in his ears.
“Listen! Everyone! The winged lions- They don’t have a solid barrier like us! They’ve got reactive shields! That means they don’t stay on all the time- They respond to attacks! The fact that they have such defenses means they’re afraid of being hurt! That means they can be hurt!! And if they can be hurt-”
He raised his voice to a yell, forcing every ounce of conviction into his throat.
“-then they can be destroyed!!!!”
Murmurs rippled through the exhausted crowd.
The flames in their eyes flickered.
A few tightened their grips.
Others stood straighter.
Lucien spun around to the melee fighters nearby.
Their armor was cracked, their faces smeared with blood and soot, but their gazes were locked on him now.
“Raise your weapons,” Lucien said.
The swordsman lifted his battered blade.
A spear glinted.
An axe, chipped and streaked with stone dust, came to rest on a shoulder.
Lucien looked forward, narrowing his eyes at the twin statues still poised across the road, wings extended, jaws aglow with elemental menace.
“We’re going to make them bleed stone.”
He took a breath, raising his arm.
***
The air in the viewing hall was thick with unease and disbelief.
One by one, the invigilators who had once dismissed the Ruby Sector found themselves crowded around the arcane mirrors, each projection flickering with scenes of chaos and desperate resistance along the yellow brick road.
“Gods above,” one of them murmured, his voice barely more than a breath as he watched the glowing projection.
“They’re still standing…”
The image rippled and focused, centering on a lone girl with a wand in one hand and her other arm stretched forward, trembling violently as she maintained a wind spell.
At the same time, a soft shimmer of translucent light surrounded those behind her, a barrier.
“She’s dual casting,” someone else said with disbelief.
“That’s a third-year Academy technique at the earliest.”
“She doesn’t even look-,” muttered another.
“And yet she’s keeping up with this?”
“No, not keeping up- holding the line.”
“She won’t last,” an older, more experienced invigilator grunted, arms folded.
“None of them will. Look at the way they’re burning out. Mana sync is faltering. Half of those formations are a breath away from collapse.”
“Most of them are injured. Exhausted. They’ve been running and fighting nonstop for hours.”
A younger invigilator leaned in toward the main mirror, narrowing his eyes.
“But that Crowley boy is moving again.”
That got everyone’s attention.
The crowd shifted, murmurs rising.
Lucien’s figure, battered and frost-scorched, was seen darting across the battlefield, slipping over frozen tiles, shouting toward the melee fighters who were barely upright.
“He’s gathering them,” said the young man.
“He’s not backing down.”
“There’s a plan,” someone said grimly.
“There always is,” a senior invigilator replied, shaking her head.
“But making a plan and executing one in the face of those guardians… that’s two entirely different battles.”
“And the guardians aren't letting up,” another added, pointing at the image of the twin winged lion statues hovering ominously, their stone bodies crackling with internal mana as they built up another elemental onslaught.
“It’s a miracle they’ve made it this far.”
Behind them all, a slow set of footsteps echoed through the tower chamber.
Administrator Vaencel had been silent until now, arms clasped behind his back as he stood at the far end of the room, gazing at the ever-shifting magical projections of all sectors.
His expression was unreadable, but those who had worked under him long enough noticed the subtle tension in his jaw, the faint furrow of his brow.
He turned toward the exit.
“You two,” he said, gesturing at a pair of logistical aides near the door.
“Gather the healers. I want three full medical tents prepared. Mana restoration specialists. As many beds as we can manage. And coordinate with the gate, make sure nothing gets in their way once the examinees reach the checkpoint.”
One of the aides blinked in confusion.
“Administrator Vaencel… you want us to prepare now? The battle’s still-”
“It will be ending soon,” he said simply.
They stared.
And then, moved.
No one questioned further.
They had learned not to.
Back at the viewing mirrors, the other invigilators watched as, amidst crumbling barriers and scorched roadways, the battered, bleeding remnants of Ruby Sector began to regroup.
Lucien Crowley was speaking to the front line.
The wind had shifted.
The fight in them was not out of steam just yet.
