With the official scan finally behind him, Jup made it to Applied Resource Survey carrying a public Unranked label and no better explanation for it.
Applied Resource Survey met in one of Phoenix Academy’s older lower-level classrooms, the kind built half for teaching and half for controlled accidents.
Reinforced tables ran in rows across the room.
Locked crystal cases lined the side wall.
Scanner lamps hung from adjustable arms above the demonstration bench, and a large district map covered the front display with tunnels marked in thin white lines beneath the school.
Jup’s attention fixed on the scanner lamps.
Sample readers, Triōhnah said before he could ask.
They map crystal density and container output.
They are not aimed at students.
And if somebody changes the mode?
Then the lesson ends early.
Students called the class Crystal Appraisal because that was what most of them cared about.
Officially, Applied Resource Survey trained second-year students to identify aether crystals, grade their stability, track surface veins, and recognize excavation hazards before anyone was allowed near supervised tunnel work.
This unit was different because it was the first time Phoenix Academy put real samples on the table and treated the tunnels beneath the school as more than lines on a map.
Unofficially, the class taught sector kids how to turn scraps into food money and rich kids how to talk about labor without ever needing to do much of it.
Jup took a seat near the middle with Robert sliding in beside him.
Nia sat two rows over, while Marcus dropped into a seat near the back loudly enough to make sure people noticed he was there.
Mr. Puntue stood at the front table in a dark gray instructional coat, sleeves pressed clean, collar clipped with a small Phoenix Academy pin.
He looked like a man who believed dust was something that happened to other people.
His gaze swept the room and paused on Jup.
The pause was brief, but everyone noticed it anyway.
“Settle,” Mr. Puntue said.
The room lowered into a restless quiet.
He touched the table display, and the front screen shifted from the tunnel map to a clean rotating image of an amber crystal suspended over a column of appraised values.
“Aether crystals,” he said, “are the reason half of you made it to school this morning. Transit systems, comm docks, heat regulators, hallway strips, medical field packs, construction tools, battery reserves, and domestic backup systems all depend on refined aether output.”
Robert muttered, “The vending machine ate my credit twice last week.”
Mr. Puntue glanced his way.
Robert sat straighter.
“Aether crystals are also one of the few resources Phoenix Academy permits students to collect during supervised survey hours,” Mr. Puntue continued.
“Anything found above the hundred-foot boundary may be submitted for appraisal, exchanged for district credit, deposited into a student vault, or used toward survey certification.”
A few students perked up at the word exchanged, while the upper-track side of the room looked mostly bored.
Jup understood both reactions.
In Sector Seven, a low-grade crystal could mean lunch, transit, replacement shoes, or a tool part that kept a family machine running another month.
For high-district students, digging through school tunnels for weak crystals was something to complain about for a grade.
Mr. Puntue gestured to the map.
“Phoenix Academy maintains access to man-made survey tunnels beneath the lower campus. The first hundred feet are reinforced and monitored for student training. Beyond that boundary, entry is prohibited.”
A few students shifted at the word prohibited.
“Valuable crystals are usually found deeper,” Mr. Puntue continued.
“Stable veins form under pressure, distance, and time. That depth requires licensed dig teams, structural engineers, hazard crews, and district-approved extraction permits. Professional crews dig beneath schools, transit routes, old infrastructure, and city zones every week. Students do not follow them.”
Robert whispered, “Specific.”
Jup studied the map longer than he meant to.
A thin pressure moved behind his eyes.
Most of the tunnel lines were pale and ordinary, but one route near the lower edge of the display seemed heavier than the others, as if the map had been drawn over something it could not show.
Jup blinked, and the sensation faded.
Mr. Puntue changed the display again, bringing up a series of crystal grades.
“Crystal digging is labor. Necessary labor, but labor all the same. The safest areas have been worked for years, and most upper-tunnel finds are utility grade at best.”
A boy from the upper-track side leaned back in his chair.
Cassian Rowe had a clean uniform, an expensive wrist comm, and hair cut with the kind of precision people paid for without thinking about it.
“My family doesn’t exchange anything below Grade Three,” Cassian said, just loud enough to carry.
“We vault it.”
A few students near him smiled.
Robert muttered, “Some of us enjoy eating.”
Jup almost lowered his head out of habit, then stopped himself.
Mr. Puntue heard Robert but ignored him.
He preferred disruptions that came from money.
Phoenix Academy liked to call itself integrated.
Sector kids called it crowded.
Rich-district parents called it character building, then filed the tuition under corporate outreach.
“Resource Survey prepares some of you for field labor, some for appraisal certification, and some for management oversight,” Mr. Puntue said.
“Regardless of your intended path, basic identification remains essential.”
His attention returned to Jup.
“Mr. Amon.”
A few students turned before Jup answered.
“Since CMAS has invented a category for you and told the rest of us nothing,” Mr. Puntue said, “you will observe unless directly instructed. There is no handling protocol for an Unranked student.”
A laugh moved through the back of the room, and Marcus seized it.
“Only Amon could fail ranking so hard the system had to make up a word.”
More laughter followed.
Nia did not join in.
Robert turned halfway in his seat.
“The whole school workshopped that one Friday.”
Marcus’s smile sharpened.
“Nobody asked you, Cross.”
“Yet here we are, both contributing.”
“Enough,” Mr. Puntue said.
His voice cut cleanly through the room, but his gaze stayed on Jup as if Jup had caused the interruption by existing in the wrong category.
His hands stayed on the desk.
The old instinct would have been embarrassment: heat in his face, a clench in his throat, that familiar need to become smaller until the room moved on.
Instead, every crystal case along the wall seemed faintly present.
He could feel them, barely but enough.
The locked cabinet along the wall felt occupied in a way glass and metal should not.
Each crystal sat behind the case with a quiet density, like something holding its breath.
Mr. Puntue opened the front case and removed three samples, placing them on black pads beneath the scanner lamps.
“Sample A,” he said, touching the first.
“Common utility-grade aether crystal: amber clarity, stable output, minor storage decay.”
The scanner beside it lit.
AETHER SAMPLE A
UTILITY GRADE
OUTPUT: LOW STABLE
EXCHANGE VALUE: STANDARD
“Sample B.” Mr. Puntue touched the second crystal, a cracked blue-gray shard.
“Damaged battery crystal: unstable casing, poor retention, no approved household use without refinement.”
BATTERY GRADE
OUTPUT: UNSTABLE
EXCHANGE VALUE: REDUCED
Then he touched the third.
No visible charge sat near the surface, and the scanner lamps pulled no response from it.
“Sample C,” Mr. Puntue said, “is exhausted. Clouded lattice, no visible core response, no meaningful output, and no exchange value beyond training credit.”
Marcus leaned forward.
“Trash crystal,” he said.
“Clouded lattice, dead center, no charge response.”
Mr. Puntue nodded once.
“Correct.”
Marcus looked toward Jup.
“Even D-tier could see that.” His smile widened.
“Well. Most D-tier.”
The class laughed again, but the sound thinned before it reached him.
Jup had already dropped beneath the surface of the crystal.
To everyone else, Sample C was dead: cloudy shell, no charge response, no clean return, no exchange value.
The scanner confirmed the surface reading because it could not reach what was folded inside.
A thin display flickered at the edge of his sight.
[MATERIAL IDENTIFICATION ACTIVE]
[MANA CRYSTAL: DORMANT]
[OUTER SHELL MASKING DENSITY]
[APPRAISAL ERROR DETECTED]
His hands stayed flat on the desk.
Mana crystal.
The words carried a different weight from aether crystal.
Aether was the word printed on school maps, exchange boards, utility bills, and government-approved appraisals.
It was the word people used after they had turned something old into something taxable.
Mana felt closer to the truth.
A finer sensation separated itself from the rest.
It followed the buried vein inside the crystal instead of the crystal itself, a narrow path of energy curling behind the cloudy shell toward one weak seam.
[SKILL IDENTIFIED: MANA THREAD Lv. 1]
Mana Thread?
“A fine-sense skill. Follow where mana moves before you force it.”
So this is mine?
“Yes. Your body formed the pathway. I recognized the shape.”
Do not touch it.
I wasn’t going to.
Your right hand disagrees.
Jup glanced down and found his fingers had crept forward by a few centimeters.
Traitor hand.
Focus, Jureel.
He drew his hand back slowly before anyone else noticed.
The crystal stayed silent on the table.
Inside Jup, something kept reaching.