Isra walked with him as far as the border of the Sacred Continent, then stopped there, exactly as they’d agreed from the start.
“From here you walk alone,” she said, crouching briefly to meet his eyes, though the distance wasn’t as far as it used to be.
“Not because we’re leaving you. Because you need to arrive there as a new student, not as someone who came with an escort.”
Lucifer nodded, adjusting the strap of his pack, which felt heavier than what was actually inside it.
“I know.”
“If something’s wrong,” Isra continued, “truly wrong, not just homesickness or a lonely first night, you know how to send word. Beelzebub’s already arranged everything.”
“I know,” Lucifer repeated, this time with the faintest trace of a smile, one he rarely showed.
Isra studied him for a long moment, then, breaking her usual habit of keeping her distance, pulled him into a brief, awkward but genuine hug.
“Take care of yourself, farmer’s son.”
“I’m not a farmer’s son anymore, starting today,” Lucifer said, though his tone wasn’t entirely convinced of the sentence itself.
“You’ll always be a farmer’s son,” Isra answered, releasing him.
“Whatever other titles they hand you out there.”
The Sacred Continent felt different from the very first step.
The air was lighter somehow, as if the place had been deliberately built neutral even down to its most basic elements.
The dirt path he’d been walking gave way to a wider, more carefully laid stone road, lined with trees he didn’t recognize, tall with silvery leaves that swayed gently even without enough wind to explain the motion.
He walked for nearly half a day before he finally saw it for the first time.
The Grand Academy of Elysara stood in the middle of a vast valley, not as a single building but more like its own small city, white stone towers rising among intricately carved domes, arched bridges connecting buildings separated by gardens and ponds, and above it all, a central tower far taller than the rest, its peak vanishing into thin clouds that seemed to gather there deliberately.
Lucifer stood at the top of the last hill before the path descended toward the main gate, staring at the view for a long moment.
He’d already read about this place in the books Beelzebub had given him.
He knew it was over ten thousand years old.
He knew the six academic tracks, the class system from F to S, even the faint rumor of a secret class that appeared in no official record anywhere.
But nothing he’d read had truly prepared him to stand here, alone, looking at something that felt larger than all of Yeun combined.
For the first time since leaving home, something close to nervousness settled genuinely into his chest, not simply a word he’d chosen to describe his feelings to his parents.
The main gate was guarded by two stone Golems, three times the height of a grown man, their eyes glowing a pale blue, perfectly still except when someone came close enough, at which point their heads would turn slowly to follow, evaluating in a way that wasn’t quite mechanical and wasn’t quite alive either.
Lucifer stopped directly in front of the gate, and one of the Golems, its voice echoing like stone grinding against stone, spoke.
“Name.”
“Lucifer,” he answered.
“Aldren.”
The surname felt foreign on his tongue, even though it was the only family name he’d ever had, taken from Bram’s own name years ago without much discussion, since every child in Yeun carried their father’s name and there had been no reason to make his any different, even though everyone in the village knew perfectly well he was no ordinary farmer’s son.
The Golem paused for a moment, as if checking something invisible, then its head nodded slowly.
“Accepted. Welcome to the Grand Academy of Elysara.”
The gate behind the two Golems swung open slowly, without the creaking sound doors that heavy usually made, revealing the academy’s main courtyard, filled with students of every age, race, and origin.
Lucifer stepped through, and for the first time in his life, not a single head turned to look at him.
He stood for a moment in the middle of the crowd, taking in a sight he’d never seen before.
There were elf children with pointed ears and long hair shimmering like moonlight, walking alongside a group of humans in the blue uniform of Imperium Asteria.
Two shorter, broad-shouldered dwarf children pushed a small cart full of books toward the library.
A child with faint scales along one arm, dragon-blooded, Lucifer guessed, sat alone under a tree, reading quietly, occasionally flicking something that looked like a small tail.
No one looked at him for more than a second.
No one whispered, no one edged away with a frightened glance.
Here, in the middle of a crowd this varied, he was simply one more new student among hundreds, and there was something deeply strange yet deeply calming about that feeling.
“You’re standing in the walkway, you know.”
The voice came from beside him, and Lucifer turned to find a boy about his own age, messy brown hair, carrying two bags that both looked too heavy for him, grinning widely.
“Sorry,” Lucifer said, stepping aside.
“It’s fine, everyone does it on the first day.” The boy set one of his bags down on the ground with a thud, extending a hand.
“Theo. From Dravorn. You?”
“Lucifer,” he answered, shaking the hand with a slight hesitation, unused to a gesture this friendly from a stranger.
“Heavy name,” Theo said, not unkindly, just honest in the way kids tended to be.
“Your parents into drama or something?”
“Something like that,” Lucifer said, choosing not to explain further.
Theo seemed satisfied with the vague answer, picking his bag back up and starting off toward one of the towers, gesturing for Lucifer to follow.
“You know your track yet? I signed up for Combat. My dad says if I can’t lift a sword bigger than my own arm by the end of the year, he’ll be embarrassed half to death.”
“Not yet,” Lucifer said, falling into step beside him.
“Just got here.”
“Same, honestly. Only got in around ten this morning.” Theo glanced at him briefly, his eyes full of genuine curiosity rather than suspicion.
“Where are you from? Don’t recognize your accent.”
Lucifer thought for a moment before answering, remembering Beelzebub’s advice about how to describe where he came from without lying, but also without revealing too much.
“Small village,” he finally said.
“Very small. You’ve definitely never heard of it.”
“Try me,” Theo challenged, grinning.
“Yeun.”
Theo frowned, thinking for a moment, then shook his head.
“Never heard of it. See? Told you.”
For the first time since stepping through the gate, something in Lucifer’s chest felt lighter than he’d expected.
Not because the conversation mattered.
Precisely because the conversation was entirely ordinary, two new kids introducing themselves, talking about small things like academy tracks and accents, none of it touching on prophecy, demon kings, or anything that had, until now, defined every adult he’d ever met.
They walked together toward the registration hall, and in the middle of a crowd of hundreds of new students from across the continent, for the first time in his life, Lucifer was simply a new kid named Lucifer, not the figure who’d made demon kings kneel or made a priestess of Gaia hold her breath.
He didn’t know that feeling, the simple calm of finally being ordinary, wouldn’t last forever.
But for that afternoon, he let himself enjoy it completely.