Chapter 133: Captain Arros Elara had tried to bridge the gap in their first year. Tried to be friendly, to draw him out, to make him engage with the world. He’d shut her down repeatedly until she stopped trying. Now she just watched him from a distance. With worry and something else in her eyes. Admiration, perhaps? Fear, maybe? His mother — Arros’s mother — had written regularly at first. Cheerful letters about village life, asking about his studies, saying how proud they were. Finn replied occasionally. Short, perfunctory responses that provided no real information. Eventually, her letters became less frequent too. And through it all, the hollow numbness persisted. He’d grown stronger. Significantly stronger. He was now a Grade 2 Adept at seventeen, which put him years ahead of the standard progression curve. House Valeris had taken notice, naturally. There was talk of special assignments. Of fast-tracking him to Master rank. But none of it mattered. Because in two years, despite everything, Finn hadn’t experienced a single moment that felt defining enough to trigger the tether. He’d faced magical beasts. Excelled in tournaments. Solved complex magical problems. None of it was significant enough. And the growing fear — the one he wouldn’t let himself fully acknowledge — was that maybe there was no tether. Maybe Madoc had been wrong. Maybe he was just... stuck here. Trapped in the past, living out Arros’s life for however many decades it took, until he died. Or maybe the tether required something more extreme. Something that would genuinely threaten his existence. A moment where life and death balanced on a knife’s edge. He’d started seeking those moments out deliberately. Taking riskier missions. Volunteering for dangerous assignments. Pushing himself harder in training. He wasn’t suicidal per se. But he was definitely not careful every time he went out on missions. The other students called him brave and insane. But Finn knew he was just desperate. "Arros." He turned to find Instructor Myris approaching. The older woman was one of the few Master-rank instructors he actually respected. She was sharp, direct, and always to-the-point. She wasn’t someone that wasted time on pleasantries or nonsense fluff. "Instructor." "You and Elara have been selected for a mission." She handed him a sealed scroll. "Magical beast outbreak near the western border. Town called Greystone. You’ll be team leader for a squad of five Grade 1 Adepts." Finn unrolled the scroll, scanning the details. It was a standard containment operation. They were to go there and first, try to see if they could clear the lines, then if not, they were to hold a balance until Master-rank support could come down to assess the source and eliminate it. "When do we leave?" "Tomorrow at dawn. There’s a second team being sent as well — students from House Merrick’s academy. You’ll coordinate with their leader once you arrive." Instructor Myris studied him carefully. "This is a significant responsibility. Leading your peers at your age. Are you prepared for it?" "Yes," Finn said flatly. "You always are." Something in her tone suggested disapproval. "Arros... you’ve excelled at everything we’ve thrown at you. Your magical control is exceptional. Your combat instincts are nearly flawless. But..." "But?" he prompted when she hesitated. "But you need to remember you’re leading people. Not chess pieces. They’ll need more from you than cold, tactical assessment." Finn nodded once. "Understood." He didn’t understand at all. And didn’t particularly care to. In this world, to him, people were variables in an equation. Factors to account for. Nothing more. Instructor Myris sighed. "Dismissed. Get your team together and brief them." . . . The team assembly was quick. In total, it was Finn, Elara, and three Grade 1 Adepts he barely knew — Torin, Maris, and Vex. They looked competent enough. And they were all looking at him with varying degrees of respect and wariness. Obviously they knew of his reputation, and that was why despite the fact he was younger and of a lesser grade than they were, they kept mute about any misgivings they had towards him. "Magical beast outbreak at Greystone," Finn said without preamble. "We are to hold the perimeter. Kill what we can. Report anomalies to command. Any questions?" Torin raised a hand. "What kind of beasts?" "Unknown. We’ll assess on arrival." "And the House Merrick team?" Maris asked. "We coordinate but maintain separate command structure. Don’t rely on them. Don’t expect them to save you if things go wrong." Elara frowned. "Aren’t we meant to work together?" "We will. But our priority is our mission, our team. Theirs is theirs." Finn’s tone left no room for argument. "Pack for two weeks. We leave at dawn." He dismissed them and returned to his room to prepare. Day 789 in the past, he wrote in his journal that night. Mission to Greystone tomorrow. Leading a team of five. Maybe this will be it. Maybe something significant enough will happen. Maybe I’ll finally get to go home. Or maybe I’ll just keep counting days like a prisoner. Keep going through the motions. Keep waiting for a defining moment that may never come... He closed the journal and lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling in the dark. . . . The journey to Greystone took four days. They traveled on horses, and Finn led from the front the whole time, setting a pace that bordered on punishing. Behind him, on many occasions, Torin, Maris, and Vex exchanged glances questioning the strength of Finn’s balls when he just kept moving without stop. But they tacitly kept silent. Pushing themselves past their limits, if only to save face. Elara rode beside him in silence, occasionally glancing his way with that same concerned expression she’d worn for two years. Finn saw it, but like always, he ignored it. The landscape changed as they traveled west. The manicured fields and orderly forests near the capital gave way to wilder terrain. Dense woods with trees that hadn’t been cut in generations. Rocky hills that made the horses pick their way carefully. And everywhere, the ambient mana felt... different. Thicker in some places, thin and patchy in others. "Something’s wrong with the mana flow here," Vex muttered on the third day. He was their best sensor, able to detect disturbances in ambient mana better than most Grade 1 Adepts. "It’s not uniform. There are dead zones, then sudden spikes." Finn had noticed it too. The mana density fluctuated wildly the closer they got to Greystone. In some clearings, it felt as dense as the capital. In others, it dropped to levels he hadn’t experienced since leaving Millhaven. "Could that be causing the beast outbreak?" Maris asked. "Possibly." Finn kept his eyes on the path ahead. "Magical beasts are drawn to high mana concentrations. If the density is spiking and dropping irregularly, it might be driving them toward denser areas." "But what causes mana fluctuations like that?" Torin pressed. Finn didn’t answer because he didn’t know. And admitting ignorance served no purpose. They reached Greystone on the afternoon of the fourth day. The town was larger than Finn expected. It wasn’t quite at a city level, but it was surely far beyond a village level. Stone walls encircled it, though they were only fifteen feet high and showed signs of hasty, recent reinforcement. Wooden stakes had been driven into the ground outside the walls at irregular intervals, showing that they were a desperate addition. Guards in mismatched armor manned the gates. They looked exhausted, holding their weapons in loose grips like people who’d been on high alert for too long. And in reality, they actually had. "Valeris Academy?" one guard asked as they approached. "Yes. Captain Arros, with a containment team." Finn dismounted smoothly. "Where can we find the town administrator?" "Town hall, center square. But you’ll want to head to the eastern barracks first. That’s where the other academy team is quartered. House Merrick arrived two days ago." Finn nodded and gestured for his team to follow. They led their horses through streets that were utterly quiet. Shops were shut tight. The few people out moved quickly, farting their gazes about like they were being hunted. The town was wholly overcome with fear — A deep, pervasive fear. "How bad is it to cause this...?" Elara asked quietly as they walked. "Bad enough." Finn studied the defensive preparations visible everywhere. The barricades at intersections, the archers’ positions on rooftops, hastily made artifacts of protection hung on doors literally everywhere. "This isn’t a standard outbreak. This has been going on for a while," he muttered softly, looking up at their destination that they’d finally arrived at. The eastern barracks turned out to be a converted warehouse. Inside, they found the House Merrick team — six students in expensive armor that bore their house crest, along with their supplies and equipment. Their captain was easily identifiable. She was tall, dark-haired, with the kind of confident bearing that came from being born into nobility. When Finn entered, she was in the middle of giving orders to her team, gesturing at a map spread across a table. She looked up as Finn approached, and very quickly, her expression shifted into scrutinizing assessment and then settled to a subtle sneer of dismissal. "You must be the Valeris team." Her tone suggested she’d already decided they were inadequate. "I’m Captain Lyssa Merrick. Grade 1 Adept, two years of field experience." "Captain Arros." Finn didn’t offer his grade or experience. Let her underestimate him. "What’s the situation?" Lyssa’s eyebrow raised slightly at his directness. "Beast attacks have been occurring nightly for three weeks. Started with small raids — D-rank creatures, easily handled by the town guard. But they’ve been escalating. Two nights ago, we had our first C-rank horde. Six dead, twelve wounded." She pointed to the map. "The attacks are coming from the Thornwood Forest, here to the east. The beasts emerge at dusk, attack until dawn, then retreat. We’ve been reinforcing the eastern defenses and conducting daytime patrols to thin their numbers." "Have you determined what’s driving them?" Finn studied the map. The Thornwood forest was marked as a known magical beast habitat, but not one that typically produced problems. "Not yet. Master-rank support was supposed to arrive three days ago to investigate the forest directly, but they’ve been delayed." Lyssa’s frustration showed through her composed facade. "We’ve sent reports back requesting additional support or new orders, but communications have been... inconsistent." Her last word was a beat delayed. Finn filed that fact away. "Show me the defensive positions." Lyssa hesitated, clearly unused to being given commands by someone she outranked in House hierarchy. But after a moment, she gestured to the map and began explaining their setup. Finn listened, occasionally asking pointed questions that made Lyssa’s team shift uncomfortably. He identified three weak points in their perimeter within minutes, along with two places where they’d positioned archers poorly for crossfire. "You’re leaving the northern approach undermanned," he said flatly. "If I were a beast with any intelligence, I’d feint east then circle north while your forces are committed." "The northern approach has a natural choke point—" Lyssa began defensively. "Which means nothing if they’re not confined to ground movement. Can any of the beasts fly?" "Well... yes, but—" "Then you need aerial coverage or elevated positions to cover that area. Your current setup leaves it completely exposed." Silence. Lyssa’s jaw clenched hard. One of her teammates — a boy with a Merrick family resemblance — spoke up. "Who made you the tactical expert? You’re younger than basically everyone here." Finn turned his flat gaze on the boy. "Age is irrelevant. Only results matter. Your defensive setup has three critical vulnerabilities that would get people killed in a coordinated attack. Do you want me to list the rest, or should we fix them before nightfall?" The boy’s face twitched and he stared at Finn for a few seconds as if something was going to happen. But then he tore his gaze away and said nothing. Lyssa’s expression was neutral the whole time. "Your... observations are noted. I’ll take them under consideration." "Do that." Finn turned to his own team. "Torin, Maris, inspect the eastern wall defenses directly. I want a full assessment by sunset. Vex, check the mana patterns around the perimeter. See if there are any unusual fluctuations near the weak points. Elara, with me. We’re meeting with the town administrator." He walked out without waiting for confirmation from Lyssa that he could leave. Behind him, he heard Elara excuse them politely on his behalf before hurrying to catch up. "That could have gone better," she muttered once they were outside. "It went fine." "You just alienated the other team’s captain and insulted her tactical planning in front of her subordinates." "I identified problems that needed fixing. Whether she takes offense is her concern, not mine." Elara sighed. It was a sound he’d heard too often in the past two years. "One day, your complete lack of social awareness is going to cause real problems." "Probably." Finn didn’t slow his pace. "But today isn’t that day. We have work to do."