Wrath's Virtue

Aurelion turned and walked towards the door, leaving Merric standing alone in the center of the room, staring at the dust on the floor.

Just as Aurelion's hand touched the handle, Merric's voice cut through the silence.

"Wait!"

Aurelion paused, then slowly turned back, a single eyebrow raised in question.

"You made a deal with the Clan Leaders," Merric said, his voice strained but regaining a measure of composure.

"And we challenged you according to that deal. And there will be more to come. You know that, right?"

"Why are you telling me something I already know?" Aurelion asked.

"Clans try to recruit those they see as talented," Merric continued, forcing himself to sound reasonable, pragmatic.

"We were given an order to that effect. That's why Emil challenged you. There is no need to continue some things."

A smile touched Aurelion's lips as he looked at Merric. "Are you really that afraid of my retaliation?"

"I'm not afraid," Merric shot back. "But there is no need to escalate things. We can overlook what you did last night."

Aurelion's smile didn't waver. "So let me get this straight. I am prepared to take on an entire clan for a single spear that was taken from me... but you are offering peace, for your own clan's weapon, which was shattered and thrown away like trash?"

The amusement vanished from Aurelion's face, replaced by a sudden, chilling tension. His voice was a disgusted growl.

"You people are truly fucking pathetic."

He didn't say another word. He just turned, opened the door, and left, leaving a stunned and utterly humiliated Merric in his wake.

As Aurelion walked away from the training hall, the familiar buzz of the courtyard felt different.

He could feel the eyes on him, hear the whispers that died the moment he turned his head. But where there might once have been a sliver of satisfaction, now there was only a profound and hollow disgust.

He looked at a group of Northern students sparring nearby, their movements clumsy and full of wasted energy. He saw a few Saharan students laughing loudly, their emotions worn openly on their sleeves. He saw a beastkin girl lovingly petting her wolf companion. And in all of them, he saw the same thing. Weakness.

They were so fragile. So predictable. Their pride was a brittle shield, their courage a fleeting spark.

Merric's clan had the dare to challenge him, but not the conviction to face the consequences. They had offered peace not out of wisdom, but out of fear. And fear was a scent Aurelion could no longer tolerate.

It was an intellectual solitude, a deep, gnawing loneliness that came from being surrounded by insects pretending to be lions.

"All of them," he thought, his gaze sweeping across the courtyard. "They are all the same. Loud, emotional, and breakable."

He didn't bother speaking to anyone. He didn't seek out his friends. He simply walked through the parted crowds, a silent void in the heart of the Academy's boisterous life, and made his way back to his dormitory.

He entered his room and shut the door, the solid click of the lock a welcome barrier against the pathetic world outside.

In the quiet solitude of his chamber, he felt the tension in his shoulders ease slightly. Here, at least, there was silence.

And on his desk, there was something else. A small, folded piece of parchment that had not been there that morning.

He picked it up. There was no seal, no identifying mark. Just an elegant, looping script written in dark ink.

"Be in the courtyard at midnight, little light."

No signature was needed. Aurelion knew at once who it was from.

The note was a brief respite, a flicker of interest in a day filled with mind numbing banality. He placed it back on the desk. He had his own preparations to make.

The moon climbed high into the sky, casting long, shadows across the grounds of the Academy.

The lively chatter of the day had been replaced by the quiet chirping of crickets and the whisper of the wind through the trees.

Inside his darkened room, Aurelion stood by the window. But he was not just standing in the darkness.

The familiar golden aura that clung to him was gone, swallowed by the new, hungry energy he now commanded.

His form was wrapped in a cloak of shifting, light devouring shadows, a personal abyss that made him one with the night.

He watched the courtyard below, his gaze patient, analytical. After a few more minutes of observation, he moved towards the open window.

With the silence of a falling leaf, he slipped out, his fingers finding easy purchase on the stone casement below as he began a controlled descent, moving from one window ledge to the next until he reached the ground floor.

"They must have increased the dormitory security after what I did yesterday," he thought.

"I must be careful." From the corner of his eye, he could see the silhouettes of several guards stationed near the main entrance.

He kept to the shadows of the building, his feet making no sound as he broke into a near silent run on the balls of his feet. Once he had put a safe distance between himself and the dormitory, he paused.

"Vespera asked me to be in the courtyard. Which means she will find me. But before she appears, she needs to be sure that no one else is around."

He turned his head and headed back towards the familiar grove of trees.

With a light, effortless leap, he landed on a thick branch, standing perfectly balanced among the leaves, a predator in its perch.

"I can surround myself with darkness, but Vespera can become one with the shadows. She could be following me even now. Let's try this again."

He entered his state of Void Focusing, extending his senses, examining the flow of energy around him. "I felt a flicker of something last time she arrived. Now... let's try something different."

He brought his palms together. A sharp hissing sound disturbed the quiet of the night as a thick plume of steam billowed from between his hands.

"She should already knows where I am. Hiding from her at this stage is pointless," he reasoned.

"But that doesn't mean she can approach me secretly."

He began to spread the steam he was creating, directing it with his will, forming a slowly expanding, circular mist around his position.

Five meters in diameter. Then seven. Then ten. As the ethereal edge of his vaporous net brushed against a nearby tree, he felt it.

A flicker of distortion in the shadow of a thick oak. Instantly, his feet crackled with blue energy and he launched himself, leaping from branch to branch through the night, closing the distance in a heartbeat. He willed the cloud of steam to follow, a swirling white serpent in his wake.

He landed on the branch where he'd felt the disturbance, but there was nothing there.

Then he felt another ripple, this time from where he'd just been. He smirked.

"Are you playing games with me, Vespera?" he murmured into the night.

He felt the next distortion from a tree directly behind him. He continued to produce steam, a constant, roiling cloud now centered on his location.

At the same time, the mist that filled the area began to thin, dissipating into the cool night air until it was no longer visible.

He directed the new, fresh steam towards the tree behind him where he'd felt the last flicker, while letting the older, invisible steam linger around him.

This time, Aurelion felt no ripple.

But he did feel something brush against the edge of his invisible, dispersed cloud of vapor. It was directly behind him.

He spun in an instant, his hand lashing out, fingers curled like talons.

His hand closed on empty air as a shadow detached itself from the night, sidestepping his grasp with impossible grace.

It flowed around him, a whisper of displaced air, and then he felt a gentle, deliberate touch on his shoulder.

Aurelion released his control over the invisible cloud of steam, letting it dissipate into the night.

He stood up on the branch and turned his back.

Vespera stood there with a pure amusement on her beautiful face. "Found you, little light."

A smirk played on Aurelion's lips. "I found you first, Vespera."

She averted her gaze for a fraction of a second, a flicker of something that might have been annoyance. "Only because you knew I was coming, and you blatantly prepared a countermeasure, little light."

She looked back at him, her purple tinged eyes glinting in the moonlight. "Will you be able to find me when you don't know I'm coming?"

"No," Aurelion admitted without hesitation.

"But soon, I will be."

"I have many more little tricks, little light," Vespera purred.

"And I see you've started to learn some of your own. And you use them quite effectively. Leaving the pieces of a boy's spear on his bed... I don't typically use my skills in such a way. My goal, after all, is to maintain my secrecy. But you, you clearly prefer to draw all eyes to you."

"I just like putting people in their place."

"I know, little light," Vespera replied, her voice dropping to a velvet whisper.

"You tried the same on me."

"It seems to have worked," Aurelion shot back.

Vespera let out a soft giggle. "Don't be so sure of that, little light."

"If you say so, Vespera."

Aurelion then raised his hand. His energy turned black and coalesced around it.

It became a void, a devouring darkness that swallowed the pale moonlight, making his arm seem as if it had vanished into nothingness.

He looked at Vespera.

"Is this enough to begin learn your techniques?"