Nobody spoke after that.
Not Zeven.
Not Dak.
Not anyone.
The candidates moved forward like ghosts.
The road stretched ahead, illuminated by moonlight and scattered torches placed along its edges.
The forest remained beside them.
Silent.
Watching.
The severed hand had disappeared behind them.
Yet nobody could forget it.
Every candidate now walked closer to the center of the road.
Nobody wandered near the trees.
Nobody complained.
Even Dak remained unusually quiet.
That alone was unsettling.
Hours passed.
The night deepened.
The crowd slowly thinned as the road widened.
Groups separated naturally.
Some moved faster.
Others slower.
The five boys stayed together.
Instinctively.
As if being alone suddenly felt dangerous.
Eventually Ozias broke the silence.
"So..."
Nobody answered.
"So we're just pretending that didn't happen?"
Dak immediately shook his head.
"No."
"Good."
"Because I won't be sleeping for the next five years."
Despite everything, a few nervous laughs escaped.
The tension loosened slightly.
Only slightly.
Then Matthew glanced toward the guards walking alongside the road.
"They weren't surprised."
Everyone looked at him.
"The guards."
"They already knew."
Nobody argued.
Because it was obvious.
Those men had heard the screams.
Seen the fear.
Seen the hand.
And none of them had reacted.
Not even a little.
As if what happened was normal.
As if it happened often.
That thought was somehow worse than the hand itself.
The road climbed higher.
The terrain became rougher.
The trees grew older.
Taller.
Twisted.
Their trunks looked almost black beneath the moonlight.
At some point Zeven noticed strange marks carved into several trees.
Long scratches.
Deep enough to cut through bark and wood alike.
Five parallel lines.
Far larger than any animal claw.
Some stretched higher than three meters.
Dak noticed them too.
"What made that?"
Nobody answered.
One of the nearby guards overheard.
He didn't even turn around.
"You don't want to know."
Dak immediately regretted asking.
The moons slowly crossed the sky.
One silver.
One blue.
One crimson.
Their combined light painted the forest in unnatural colors.
Everything seemed wrong.
Beautiful.
And wrong.
The deeper they traveled, the more Zeven felt it.
Nexis.
Not inside himself.
In the world.
The air carried it.
The trees carried it.
The ground carried it.
It flowed through Nythara like invisible rivers.
At first he thought he was imagining it.
Then he noticed something strange.
Whenever he focused...
He could almost feel where it moved.
Tiny currents.
Tiny streams.
Weak.
Barely noticeable.
Yet present.
The sensation disappeared the moment he lost concentration.
He frowned.
Interesting.
"Look."
Kael suddenly pointed ahead.
Everyone raised their heads.
And froze.
Far in the distance.
Above the horizon.
Lights.
Thousands of lights.
The outline of massive walls.
Gigantic towers.
A city.
Varkas.
Even from this distance it looked enormous.
The candidates around them began whispering.
Some stared in awe.
Others in relief.
It was proof.
Proof that civilization existed beyond the road.
Proof that Nythara wasn't entirely monsters and darkness.
Dak smiled for the first time in hours.
"We're finally getting somewhere."
A nearby veteran candidate overheard him.
The man laughed.
A harsh laugh.
"You think that's your destination?"
Dak frowned.
"What?"
The man pointed toward the distant city.
"That's just Varkas."
The smile slowly disappeared from Dak's face.
"What do you mean just Varkas?"
The veteran looked at him.
Then at the city.
Then back.
"The Academy isn't there."
Silence.
"What?"
"The Academy is three weeks beyond Varkas."
Nobody liked that answer.
Not one bit.
The veteran laughed again and continued walking.
Leaving five increasingly depressed boys behind.
Hours later the road entered a narrow canyon.
Steep stone walls rose on both sides.
The air became colder.
The wind disappeared.
An uncomfortable feeling settled over everyone.
Then it happened.
A scream.
Not from the forest.
Not from ahead.
Above.
Everyone looked upward.
A dark shape crossed the sky.
Huge.
Too huge.
Only visible for a second against the crimson moon.
Wings.
Massive wings.
Then it vanished into the darkness beyond the cliffs.
The entire road froze.
Nobody moved.
Nobody breathed.
Even the guards looked up.
One of them cursed under his breath.
"What was that?" Ozias asked.
The nearest guard answered immediately.
"Keep walking."
That wasn't an answer.
And somehow it was worse.
Because it meant the answer was something they didn't want to hear.
Eventually dawn began approaching.
The darkness weakened.
The forest retreated.
The cliffs opened.
The road widened once more.
The candidates continued marching.
Exhausted.
Silent.
Uneasy.
And as the first rays of sunlight touched the distant walls of Varkas...
Zeven couldn't shake a strange feeling.
The feeling that crossing worlds had not been the beginning.
It had only been the first step.
And somewhere ahead...
Something was waiting for him.
Something that already knew his name.
The sun rose slowly over Nythara.
For the first time since arriving in this world, the boys could properly see the land around them.
And what they saw wasn't comforting.
The forest that had haunted them during the night stretched endlessly across the horizon.
Ancient.
Dark.
Unnatural.
Mist clung to the trees even under daylight.
The road remained the only safe thing in sight.
Thousands of candidates continued forward.
Exhausted.
Hungry.
Silent.
The excitement from crossing worlds had died long ago.
Now there was only determination.
And fear.
Especially after what had happened to the man who left the road.
Nobody spoke about it anymore.
Yet nobody had forgotten.
The walls of Varkas grew larger with every passing hour.
At first they looked like distant mountains.
Now they dominated the horizon.
Massive black stone walls rose hundreds of feet into the sky.
Countless banners fluttered above them.
Dark blue cloth marked with silver symbols none of the boys recognized.
Towers lined the walls.
Huge towers.
Built not for beauty.
Built for war.
Zeven found himself staring.
Stonehaven suddenly felt tiny.
Insignificant.
Everything on Earth felt small compared to this.
The city looked ancient.
Like it had survived thousands of years.
Maybe more.
"How many people live there?"
Dak asked.
Nobody answered.
Not even Kaelen.
But one of the nearby guards overheard.
"Depends."
Dak frowned.
"On what?"
The guard continued walking.
"On how many survived the winter."
The answer sent chills through several candidates.
The guard never elaborated.
The road eventually widened into a massive plain.
Candidates filled it completely.
Thousands.
Perhaps tens of thousands.
All moving toward the same destination.
Zeven noticed something strange.
The closer they got to Varkas...
The fewer smiles he saw.
People looked nervous.
Tense.
Watching the walls.
Watching the soldiers.
Watching each other.
Almost as if everyone understood something.
The real test hadn't started yet.
A loud horn suddenly echoed across the plains.
The sound rolled like thunder.
Deep.
Ancient.
Powerful.
The crowd stopped moving.
Another horn answered from somewhere inside the city.
Then another.
And another.
The walls seemed to come alive.
Huge gates slowly began opening.
The sound reached them moments later.
Stone grinding against stone.
A noise so heavy it felt like the earth itself was moving.
Dak stared.
"That's a gate?"
Nobody blamed him.
The gates were enormous.
Large enough for giants to walk through.
Large enough for entire armies.
As they approached, Zeven noticed the soldiers stationed around the entrance.
Hundreds of them.
Maybe thousands.
Every single one carried weapons.
Not ceremonial weapons.
Real weapons.
Used weapons.
Their armor bore scratches.
Dents.
Scars.
These were not guards.
These were survivors.
Men and women who had seen battle.
And unlike the candidates...
They looked at the forest.
Not the road.
Not the newcomers.
The forest.
Always the forest.
As if that was where the true danger waited.
The crowd slowly passed beneath the walls.
The moment Zeven crossed through the gate...
He stopped.
Everyone did.
Varkas was enormous.
The city stretched farther than he could see.
Stone streets.
Massive buildings.
Markets.
Barracks.
Towers.
Temples.
Forges.
Everything seemed larger than life.
Yet something felt wrong.
There was no laughter.
No excitement.
No joy.
The city was alive.
But not happy.
People moved with purpose.
Soldiers marched constantly.
Mercenaries walked armed.
Even ordinary citizens seemed alert.
Like everyone lived expecting something terrible to happen.
"Why does it feel like we're in a military camp?"
Matthew muttered.
Because it did.
Nobody wandered aimlessly.
Nobody wasted time.
The city felt prepared.
Prepared for something.
Or someone.
The candidates were directed toward a massive square near the center of the city.
Thousands gathered there.
More arriving every minute.
A giant black platform stood ahead.
Several officials waited upon it.
None looked friendly.
One woman especially caught Zeven's attention.
Tall.
White-haired.
Cold eyes.
No visible weapon.
Yet her mere presence felt dangerous.
More dangerous than any soldier they had seen.
The moment she stepped forward...
The entire square became silent.
Instantly.
No shouting.
No conversations.
Nothing.
Even Dak shut up.
A miracle.
The woman looked over the crowd.
Thousands of candidates.
Thousands of futures.
Thousands of possible corpses.
Then she spoke.
Her voice wasn't loud.
Yet everyone heard it.
Perfectly.
"Welcome to Varkas."
Silence.
"You survived the road."
Nobody cheered.
Nobody celebrated.
The woman continued.
"That was the easiest part."
The square became even quieter.
Somehow.
"You stand at the threshold of the Institution."
Her cold eyes swept across the crowd.
Many lowered their gaze.
Zeven didn't.
For a brief moment...
He felt as if she looked directly at him.
Then the feeling vanished.
"Many of you believe you have already proven yourselves."
Her expression remained emotionless.
"You haven't."
The words struck like a hammer.
"No rank."
"No talent."
"No bloodline."
"No world of origin."
"No family name."
"None of it matters."
Candidates shifted nervously.
The woman pointed north.
Beyond the city.
Beyond the walls.
Toward distant mountains barely visible on the horizon.
"The journey begins there."
Silence.
"The weak will fail."
"The foolish will die."
"The unlucky will die."
"The strong will also die."
Nobody moved.
Nobody breathed.
"Welcome to Nythara."
Then she smiled.
And somehow...
That smile was more frightening than everything else she had said.
That night, as the candidates settled into temporary barracks inside Varkas, sleep refused to come easily.
For the first time since arriving in Nythara...
The boys were surrounded by walls.
By people.
By civilization.
They should have felt safer.
Instead...
Zeven found himself staring through a small window toward the northern mountains.
Something waited beyond them.
Something important.
Something dangerous.
And deep inside his chest...
The strange power awakened by the Necklage seemed to stir.
As if it sensed it too.