All eyes turned toward her at once, but she did her best to avoid eye contact.
Nope.
Not today.
Taking a slow breath, she stepped out of the crowd and headed for the platform.
The whispers around her faded until all she could hear was the sound of her own footsteps.
The closer she got, the bigger the Nexus Orb looked.
Runes drifted across its crystal surface while soft light shifted beneath the sphere.
For some reason, her palms were sweaty.
Which was ridiculous, honestly.
It was just an evaluation.
People had been standing under that thing all morning without any problems.
There was no reason to think anything different would happen to her.
Probably.
Elora stopped beneath the Nexus Orb and looked up.
The massive crystal sphere slowly rotated above her.
For a moment, nothing happened.
The arena stayed quiet—hundreds of students were watching.
Above her, the crystal sphere just kept spinning at its slow, steady pace.
One of the instructors glanced up.
“Begin.” The runes across the surface of the Nexus Orb brightened instantly, like they’d been waiting for their cue.
A Soft silver glow spilled through the crystal.
This was normal.
She’d seen plenty of students go through this.
Their mana got scanned, their affinity popped up, and then it was over.
It was easy, simple, and usually done in seconds.
Seconds passed.
Then a blue light appeared inside the sphere.
A few instructors nodded automatically.
Water affinity.
Nothing weird.
Except—right after that—blue flickered.
Elora frowned.
The color dimmed for a moment, then another light surged up next to it.
Green.
Dual affinity?
Nearby students grew excited as soon as the second color appeared.
They cheered loudly.
Then green flickered across the orb.
A moment later, red appeared as well.
Blue, green, and red glowed together.
The instructors stopped writing, as though even their pens didn’t know what to do.
The red held for a second…
then all three colors started swirling, as if the orb couldn’t decide where to land.
The cheering changed into a low murmur spread through the crowd.
Elora glanced around, hunting someone who looked confident.
“…Is that supposed to happen?” Nobody answered.
Her palms were slick with sweat now.
She bit her lip and looked down.
The Nexus Orb kept shifting as blue, green, and red light flickered across its surface.
Then gold flashed, followed a second later by silver.
None of the colors stayed for long.
They flared up, disappeared, and were replaced before anything could settle.
The atmosphere in the arena shifted as the runes began moving faster and faster across the orb’s surface.
A faint crackling filled the air—thin and electric, like static building up before a storm.
Elora frowned.
This didn’t feel like a regular evaluation anymore.
The crystal sphere pulsed as the colors vanished, reappeared, and vanished again.
Above her, the Nexus Orb flickered violently, as if something inside was fighting against the scan itself.
One professor stepped forward while another looked up in surprise.
“What is happening?” “I don’t know.” That answer landed like a splash of cold water.
Inside the orb, the colors blurred—blue, red, green, gold, silver—all spinning so fast Elora couldn’t track them anymore.
The runes raced, every movement sharper than before.
Then, without warning, everything stopped.
The runes froze.
And then— Crack!
The sound echoed across the arena and cut through every thought at once.
A thin fracture appeared along the surface of the Nexus Orb.
For a heartbeat, nobody moved.
The entire place seemed frozen in that impossible second.
Then the mana exploded into a burst of blinding white light.
Several students threw up shields.
Others just flinched and covered their eyes.
Elora’s arm went up in front of her face—her body already expecting it.
The light lasted only a few seconds.
Then it vanished.
Silence crashed over the arena.
Slowly, Elora lowered her arm and looked up.
The Nexus Orb was still floating above her.
The runes had stopped moving, and the colors inside the crystal were gone.
But the fracture remained, cutting across the surface like a scar.
There was no result.
Elora blinked.
“…That’s not good, is it?” Across the arena, instructors stared at the cracked orb in confusion.
One professor started whispering to the others.
Another examined the crack like maybe it would fix itself if he frowned hard enough.
Whispers spread through the rows.
“What happened?” “Did the orb break?” “I’ve never seen anything like that.” Even Elora didn’t know what to think.
The silence stretched across the arena until the lead instructor finally stepped forward.
He glanced from the damaged artifact to Elora before taking a slow breath.
“…The evaluation is temporarily suspended.” Whispers turned into a low hiss as everyone looked at her.
“Is that normal?” “What kind of affinity was that supposed to be?” “Did she break it?” “I don’t think that’s how artifacts work.” Elora tightened her grip on her bag and quietly made her way toward the edge of the courtyard.
She felt very visible.
Above the arena, a cluster of instructors had gathered around the Nexus Orb.
Even from a distance, something was clearly wrong.
The crack remained visible across the crystal surface, and the professors seemed far more interested in it than in the students around them.
One instructor pointed toward the damaged section while another responded with a sharp shake of his head.
Their discussion looked serious, but Elora couldn’t make out a single word from where she stood.
The conversations around her weren’t much more helpful.
“What happened?” “Did the orb really crack?” “Has that ever happened before?” “I’ve never heard of anything like this.” Neither had she.
A few academy staff members moved through the arena, trying to calm everyone down, but the atmosphere never quite recovered.
Curious glances kept coming her way before quickly disappearing whenever she looked back.
Elora pretended not to care, but she wasn’t very convincing.
On the highest viewing platform sat Headmaster Aurelion Arkhavel.
Even from across the arena, he looked completely calm, as though a damaged artifact and several concerned professors were nothing worth worrying about.
Standing beside him was a young man in a dark academy uniform.
Elora didn’t recognize him, but she noticed him anyway.
While everyone else seemed focused on the Nexus Orb, his attention appeared to be elsewhere.
For a moment, she had the uncomfortable feeling that he was looking directly at her.
Then he smiled, but it wasn’t a friendly smile.
It was the kind of smile people got when they found exactly what they were looking for.
Before she could think about it any further, one of the professors hurried up the stairs toward the headmaster.
The professor leaned in and whispered something in his ear.
Elora watched Aurelion’s expression change.
Then his gaze swept across the arena and landed on Elora.
Just like that, she had a really bad feeling about where this was going.
The noise of the crowd seemed to fade away.
For one impossible second, it felt like the entire academy had disappeared, leaving only those distant silver eyes fixed on her.
Yeah.
This was definitely not over.