The Ascender's Legacy [A CHAOTIC STORM LITRPG]

"Light and darkness are not mere elements to be wielded nor simple concepts to be understood. They are the twin forces that shape perception itself—the silent architects of all contrast, meaning, and existence. To categorize them either as elements or concepts is to misunderstand their nature, for they do not simply shape reality; they are the very reason reality can be shaped at all."

Ascendant Candidate Tiberius Lightus

Year 2200, Ragnarok.

Five minutes before Yurin's icon manifestation.

Aodhán stumbled out of his cell and nearly collapsed from the pain coursing through his body. Every part of him ached, and even the simple act of standing sent sharp waves rippling through his limbs.

Groaning, he trudged down the hall toward the other students. Many were sprawled across the floor, breathing hoarsely as they tried to recover from the exercise. Some had already dozed off, while others—like Cyrus and Harnoth Darkwater—were still stretching their muscles, eyes narrowed and focused as if it were the most important task in the world.

Aodhán spotted Daruk and Andrew hunched together in a corner and slowly made his way to them. He collapsed beside them with a groan.
"By the Ascendants! My entire body aches."

"I'm amazed you even lasted that long," Daruk chuckled, having caught his breath. "Those torturous sessions with Eldrith must be paying off."

Sighing, Aodhán let his head fall back with a dull thud. Daruk was right. As much as he hated to admit it, Eldrith's brutal method of training pain resistance was effective. His endurance had grown by leaps and bounds—far beyond what it once was.

Not that he was about to thank Eldrith.
"They're helping," he muttered, eyes closed and tone begrudging. "Still got a long way to go, though."

"Well, at least you've started the journey," Andrew muttered, scowling—a look that seemed foreign on his usually composed, sage-like face. "My pain resistance is so bad I could barely survive the tenth volley of arrows."

Aodhán raised a brow, chuckling despite himself. "It's that bad?"

"It is." Andrew's scowl deepened. "I need to start working on it immediately. This entire exercise was a disgrace."

"Well, at least you did better than half the class," Daruk quipped.

Aodhán laughed. "I'm not sure that's the compliment you think it is."

"It's fine," Andrew shrugged, giving Daruk a side-eye. "A little more salt on my wounds won't kill me."

They all laughed—until Aodhán suddenly frowned, confusion flickering across his face.
"Wait... where's Yurin?"

Daruk smiled smugly and stretched out a hand toward Andrew. "Pay up, dude. I win."

Andrew let out another scowl, producing a single gold coin and handing it over. Turning to Aodhán, he muttered, "Your only consistent trait is inconsistency. How did it take you more than two minutes to notice Yurin wasn't here?"

"Because my entire body was in agony and I just wanted to breathe," Aodhán shot back. "Sorry if Yurin's absence wasn't the first thing on my mind after what we just went through."

Daruk chuckled, tossing the coin into his spatial ring before pointing to a nearby cell door. "He's still in there. The only one left."

Aodhán frowned. "What's he still doing in there? You think he's trying to surpass us all?"

"It's not a competition," Andrew muttered under his breath. "But... maybe. He is the fastest of us."

"Still, he should've come out by now." Aodhán's brows creased with concern. A thought occurred to him. "You think this has something to do with his icon phrase? The whole 'never giving up' thing?"

Daruk hummed thoughtfully. "Could be. But surely, he sees the irony—this exercise isn't meant to have an end. If he doesn't give up, he might never leave."

Andrew frowned but didn't argue. Icon phrases were strange. He couldn't say much about them—he'd gotten his icon all at once, without the usual complications. Yurin, however, wasn't so lucky.

Yurin had always hated giving up, whether in battle or study. And with an icon phrase like I will never give up, you'd think he was destined to manifest his icon with ease. But icon phrases were the ultimate control freaks—unyielding and demanding, trying as they tried to force one's actions to embody them without consideration.

In Yurin's case, the phrase made it incredibly hard for him to give up, even though it was the obvious way forward. It heightened Yurin's unwillingness to give up, slowly warping him into a relentless and unceasing person who finished everything to the end before resting.

It had seemed like a good phrase at first, but reality and logic had punctured holes into it too quickly for that delusion to last. The phrase was a bomb waiting to explode, and if Yurin didn't find a way to change it, Andrew was certain it would be the death of him.

"I'm sure he'll stumble out of there soon," Aodhán muttered optimistically, and Andrew nodded, trying to believe it too.

They all turned to watch the cell door, expecting Yurin to come stumbling out at any moment. But when ten minutes passed with nothing, their worry deepened.

They weren't the only ones concerned. Whispers spread through the crowd of students, eyes darting toward the cell door with growing unease.

Ayisha, Scarlett, and Gwendolyn soon joined them, brows furrowed in concern. They settled beside the others, and after a moment, Gwendolyn asked, "Do you think he's passed out in there and we're just sitting here worrying for nothing?"

"He's conscious," Aodhán said at once, shutting the thought down. His frown deepened—he could sense a steady, continuous flare of light energy from the cell. The exercise didn't require any skills or abilities, but even the simple action of dodging, especially at the speeds they were moving, required a small yet steady consumption of energy.

Besides, if Yurin had passed out, Coach Harvey would've dragged him out already. The fact that both he and Miss Greene had locked themselves in the watch station made it clear something was up. Narrowing his eyes at the station, Aodhán muttered, "Shouldn't they have come out by now to tell us what's going on?"

He had barely even finished speaking when [Core Sense] suddenly flared, picking up an astounding amount of light energy. Aodhán rushed to his feet immediately, and the others did the same. They had no idea what was happening, but they figured if Aodhán thought something was wrong, then it probably was.

"What is going on?" Ayisha asked. But before Aodhán could respond, light exploded from Yurin's cell—a wave of golden brilliance bursting outward, spiraling upward in a radiant coil. It pierced the gym's transparent roof like a divine beacon, and for a heartbeat, the light was all Aodhán could sense. Other cores vanished from his perception, drowned out by the brilliance. Shadows fled, consumed by the celestial glow as the gym turned to gold.

The light shows soon subsided, revealing the awed faces of all his classmates as well as their cores. Many had their mouths opened in shock, while others stared at the cell door cautiously, their expressions curious.

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"Is that what I think it is?" Ayisha asked in the hush that followed—but once again, Aodhán didn't get a chance to reply.

Coach Harvey and Miss Greene burst out of the watch station, appearing beside the cell in a blink. A few students instinctively stepped back, fearful that Yurin had earned a seal and might erupt any second. But Aodhán moved the other way, stepping forward with purpose.

He was ten feet away when Miss Greene raised a hand, halting him. "Do not come any closer," she said, her eyes sharp with warning.

"He's not under the influence of the twisted effect. I can sense it."

"Stay where you are," she repeated firmly. Aodhán obeyed, gaze fixed on the cell. Yurin's core burned like a beacon in his senses—brilliant and blinding—but it didn't churn or roil like it should have if a seal had just formed. Instead, the energy rested inside him, calm. Steady. Like the surface of a lake.

It was an icon.

Aodhán's heart swelled with excitement and wonder. Yurin had done it. He'd found his ideal. Meanwhile, Aodhán was still far from his own. There had been moments, flashes over the past month, where he felt close—felt something raw and real—but he hadn't shaped it into words yet. Still, with Yurin and Andrew beside him now, it felt like only a matter of time.

Daruk and the others arrived, eyes locked on the cell. "What's happening now?" one of them asked.

Aodhán smiled. "We'll find out soon enough."

As if summoned by the words, the cell doors twisted open.

Yurin stepped out, transformed.

He looked nothing like the boy who'd entered nearly an hour ago. The air shimmered around him, not from heat, but from the sheer brilliance he radiated. His golden irises had turned prismatic, shifting subtly through colors unseen. Two rings still circled them, but they'd changed. The white outer ring was now razor sharp, and the silver ring of willpower had grown, providing a perfect contrast to the gold irises, which made them seem even more profound—an endless well of radiance.

His hair had grown a bit longer, the golden strands nearly as uncomfortable to stare at as the smile that bloomed on his face a moment later. However, the biggest change was the glowing tattoo that now marked his wrist. It wasn't too big, barely the size of a tennis ball, but it shone with an intensity and power that made all the other changes seem mundane in comparison.

Aodhán had no idea what the icon did, but from the blinding smile on Yurin's face, he suspected it was great. Before he could analyze more of his friend's aesthetic changes, Yurin launched himself forward, shouting, "I fucking did it."

Laughing, Aodhán caught him and spun him around to congratulate him. The others joined in, and soon, the whole class walked forward to do the same, hugging and shaking him to congratulate him.

When that finally ended, Coach Harvey spoke. "Congratulations, Yurin, I am very proud of how you handled the exercise. You truly are the epitome of unrelenting perseverance." To the rest of the class, he said. "This concludes the first day of the exercise, and I couldn't have been happier with the way it ended. This shows that if you put your mind to overcoming this exercise, there is so much you can gain, so much you can learn."

"Now, many of you are going about the exercise all wrong, but we'll deal with that tomorrow as our time is almost at an end." He grinned and added,. "It's in your own best interests to meditate on this exercise and begin coming up with ways to overcome it. Have a good day."

The students trudged out of the gym. Not too sweaty, most of them didn't bother with a shower, but Aodhán and his friends did. Whispering excitedly. He, Andrew, and Daruk followed Yurin to the bathroom to get a closer look at his icon.

When they reached the stalls, Aodhán asked. "What does it say?"

Without hesitation, Yurin shared the system message with them, smiling as he watched their eyes widen in amazement.

"Light speed?" Daruk asked, his voice barely a whisper. "Have you tested it?"

"Not yet, but I don't need to. I already know what it does."

"What does it do?" Andrew asked with a frown. "Icons are usually large-scale attacks, but I don't really see…oh! Oh fuck."

It was the first time Andrew had cursed ever since he gained his icon, so Aodhán knew that whatever he had just realized was definitely big. This cluelessness was killing him, but apparently, it was killing Daruk even more.

"Will you guys stop speaking in parables and just tell us what the fuck is going on?"

"It's not an attack icon." Andrew reasoned aloud, mentally joining his realizations together in real time. "It's a speed icon."

Yurin nodded. "Depending on how much willpower I have, I can achieve true lightspeed, bypassing the laws of time and motion. For a set amount of time, I can be everywhere at once. It's crazy, truly. I doubt I can actually achieve it all now, but with my current pool of willpower, I can probably cover the entire academy in an instant. I can be everywhere before anyone can even perceive me."

"Wow." Those were all the words Aodhán had, and it seemed Daruk was downright speechless. True lightspeed was insane, and although he doubted Yurin could actually hold the icon for more than a few seconds before his willpower bottomed out, the mere fact that he was even capable of it in the first place was crazy.

In essence, Yurin had become a speedster like the fictional characters from Earth's comics. Thinking about that made Aodhán wonder if his friend would ever gain the ability to go back in time if he ran fast enough.

He didn't mention it, though, not wanting to give Yurin ideas yet, but he was genuinely happy for him. Shaking his head in amazement, he congratulated Yurin again.

Andrew chuckled and said to Yurin,. "If your icon is anything like mine, then it has subtly enhanced everything about you. We should test it out."

"How should we do that?" Yurin asked with a frown, but Aodhán had already acted. He threw a punch, leveraging his willpower to push his speed and perception to the max in an instant. Time slowed slightly. His fist rocketed forward, and yet, Yurin was almost a blur to his enhanced perception as he moved to stand behind him and tap his shoulders in an instant.

Aodhán wasn't even sure he had the time to blink. One moment, Yurin was standing in front of him, and the next, he was behind him, having seemingly teleported.

At least he had managed to follow, but it seemed Daruk and Andrew hadn't even sensed anything. Yurin had become that fast even without activating his icon. How much faster would he be with the icon?

"Oh, my fuck!" Yurin exclaimed, surprised by his own speed, and with a whoop of excitement, he did it again and again, practically running circles around them while they futilely tried to follow his movements. After nearly ten minutes of constant failure, Aodhán gave up and decided it was high time he began devoting more of his attention to introspection and understanding himself.

However, one thought troubled him. How would his status as a transmigrant affect his ideals? He was Az'marthon's legacy. Would that play a part in his phrase, or was it unnecessary?

They left the gymnasium a few minutes later and quickly made their way to the cafeteria for breakfast. Talk of Yurin's icon had spread to the students of other years at that point, and as they made their way to the cafeteria, they found more lingering eyes on them than usual.

At this point, almost every single member of this group had made their genius debut. Aodhán with his familiar, Andrew with three seals and an icon all at once, and Yurin with an icon before the advanced level. Only Daruk was left, and although many might consider him ordinary, those with insight and a discerning spirit knew that wasn't the case.

One such person was Principal Zatya, who made sure to keep an eye on him at all times. An inheritor such as Daruk was special, and she wouldn't rest until she found what about him tickled her fancy so thoroughly.

Lunch in the cafeteria had been interesting, and when they were finished, they made their way to the hall for AAT102, where they found Professor Jorendil already waiting, a thick, dusty tome in hand.

As usual, they headed for the middle row, but before Aodhán could settle into his seat, Professor Jorendil called out, "Aodhán Brystion? A moment of your time, please."

Aodhán jogged toward the stage and greeted him. Professor Jorendil acknowledged the greeting with a nod before pulling him to the side, their backs now to the students.

Leaning in slightly, he whispered, "I wanted to speak with you after the auction last term, but… well, things got in the way. However, I'm ready now. I've heard your herb-gathering skills are exceptional, and I could use someone like you. I need a substantial amount of awakened plants for a project I'm working on. Would you be willing to assist me?"

Aodhán smiled, already anticipating this request. Nodding, he replied, "Of course, Sir. For a price."

Professor Jorendil grinned. "Money isn't the issue. The real challenge is getting into Nilhal. But I have contacts, and they can pull some strings. Are you sure you're up for this? There won't be any agents to limit the number of creatures, even though they're only at the evolved class."

"I'm sure."

"Good. We'll discuss the details later."

With that, Aodhán returned to his seat and joined his friends. A moment later, Professor Jorendil began his lecture, gesturing to the holographic screen that flickered to life with the topic: The Concept of Threshold Breakthroughs.

"Today," Professor Jorendil began, "we're going to discuss threshold breakthroughs—more commonly known as milestone breakthroughs. We're all familiar with these milestone tiers, but today I want to focus on how these breakthroughs affect the spirit and a person's overall advancement."

The class continued for the next two hours, and though Aodhán tried his best to stay focused, his thoughts kept drifting. He couldn't help but think about his weekend plans—paying off his debts, the forge matches, and now his mission with Professor Jorendil.

When class finally ended, they all exited the hall and started making their way to one of the training halls to prepare for the selection process.

Just as they stepped out, a notification pinged in Aodhán's mind. It was from Aldric, and Aodhán quickly opened it.

His heart sank immediately, and he cursed under his breath. "Fuck."

"What happened?" Daruk asked, concerned.

Aodhán hesitated for a moment before responding, his voice low. "Aldric's been arrested. He needs bail."