The underground armory of the Awakened Academy was vast, smelling of oil, cold iron, and damp stone.
Long, parallel racks stretched deep into the dim subterranean hall, holding thousands of weapons forged from heavy, industrial-grade steel.
They were not Memories—they possessed no soul essence, no magical enchantments, and no divine lineage.
They were simple, physical tools designed for training: longswords, spears, heavy warhammers, dual daggers, curved sabers, and massive kite shields.
Dozens of Sleepers walked through the aisles, their excited voices echoing off the arched stone ceiling.
“Look at this balance,” a boy from Caster’s group remarked, lifting a polished arming sword with a pommel shaped like a soaring falcon.
“Double-tempered steel. My family’s instructor uses a similar blade.”
“The spears have better reach,” another student replied, testing the weight of a ten-foot ash-wood shaft.
“Master Jet said the beasts in the Dream Realm don’t care about duel etiquette. Keeping them at a distance is the only way to survive the first wave.”
Sunny walked slowly down the third aisle, his hands tucked deep into the pockets of his dark training jacket.
He ignored the ornate, silver-trimmed rapiers and heavy broadswords that the legacy students favored.
His dark blue eyes scanned the lowest shelves—the racks where the plain, unpolished infantry weapons sat covered in a light layer of machine grease.
‘A weapon isn’t a status symbol,’ Sunny thought, his inner voice flat, cynical, and detached.
‘It’s an extension of an intention.
If it’s too long, it gets stuck in narrow alleyways or cave walls.
If it’s too heavy, you get exhausted after five swings and a scavenger bites your arm off while you’re panting.’
He paused in front of a rack containing medium-length curved blades—single-edged, slightly weighted near the tip, designed for fluid, hacking movements rather than rigid thrusts.
He reached out and wrapped his fingers around the leather-bound hilt of a simple short sword.
The metal was cold.
The weight was familiar, yet slightly different from the chipped shortsword he had stolen from the dead soldier in his Nightmare, and far lighter than the black, heavy obsidian dagger he had lost in the mountain chasm.
Sunny lifted the blade, turning it slowly in the dim fluorescent light of the aisle.
Swish.
He brought the sword down in a quiet, minimal arc, stopping the tip precisely two inches above the stone floor.
He didn’t use strength; he simply let gravity and the weight of the steel do the work, his wrist adjusting slightly at the last fraction of a second to control the momentum.
‘Not bad,’ Sunny evaluated internally.
‘Unremarkable.
Unimposing.
Perfect.’
“A short sword?” a voice echoed from behind him.
Sunny didn’t jump.
His shadow, lying flat on the floor behind his boots, had already warned him of the approaching footsteps three seconds prior.
He turned slowly, keeping his expression dull and unbothered.
Standing a few paces away was the silver-haired girl he had seen earlier in the main lobby.
Up close, her striking grey eyes were even more intense—clear, cold, and entirely devoid of hesitation.
She wore the plain white training uniform of the academy, a long, elegant straight sword resting casually in her right hand.
“It lacks reach,” the girl said, her tone calm, neutral, and matter-of-fact.
“Against larger Nightmare Creatures, you’ll have to get past their talons just to land a shallow cut.”
Sunny looked at her, then down at his short sword, and then back up at her face.
He remembered his Flaw. You are reading on g.com, the official source.
He couldn’t lie if she asked him a direct question, but she hadn’t asked one yet—she had simply made an observation.
“Reach doesn’t matter if you’re already under their belly,” Sunny said softly, his voice raspy and low.
“Big monsters don’t look down at their own feet.”
The silver-haired girl studied him for a long, quiet moment.
Her grey eyes lingered on his relaxed posture, his unrefined grip on the leather hilt, and the way his body naturally angled itself to keep a pillar between them.
“Nephis,” she said simply, introducing herself.
Sunny hesitated for a fraction of a second, his mind weighing the name.
‘Nephis…
Changing Star of the Immortal Flame clan.
The last remnant of a fallen legacy.’
“Sunless,” he replied.
Nephis nodded once, her expression unreadable.
“You move like someone who has spent a lot of time avoiding eyes.”
“In Sector 25, if people look at you, it usually means they want to take your shoes,” Sunny said, his tone dry and devoid of humor.
A faint, almost imperceptible shift touched Nephis’s cool grey eyes, but she didn’t laugh.
“The combat trial begins in ten minutes. Master Jet isn’t going to hold back.”
She turned on her heel, her white training uniform swishing softly as she walked toward the central sparring ring, her straight sword held loosely at her side.
Sunny watched her walk away, his eyes narrowing slightly.
‘Changing Star,’ Sunny thought, his shadow creeping up to his heels.
‘She’s dangerous.
Not because she’s strong, but because she looks at this room the same way I do—like a battlefield full of future corpses.’
Ten minutes later, all fifty Sleepers were gathered around the central sparring arena—a massive, circular pit lined with impact-absorbing mats and surrounded by high steel railings.
Master Jet stood in the center of the ring, his hands folded behind his back, his crimson cybernetic optic glowing with a dull, rhythmic light in the dim hall.
“Selection is over!” Jet barked, his voice carrying effortlessly across the large chamber.
“You have your steel. Now let’s see if any of you actually know how to use it.”
He pointed a thick, calloused finger at the crowd.
“Pair up. No soul essence amplification, no Aspects, no Memories. Pure physical technique and footwork. If you drop your weapon, you lose. If you step out of the ring, you lose. Begin.”
The arena instantly erupted into activity.
Pairs of Sleepers stepped onto the mats, the sharp CLANG and CRACK of steel striking steel filling the subterranean air.
Caster was already in the middle of a ring, his movements fluid, elegant, and terrifyingly fast as he disarmed a heavy broadsword wielder with two swift, precise parries, sending the opponent’s weapon clattering across the floor in less than ten seconds.
“Next!” Caster’s evaluator called out, writing down high marks on his digital tablet.
Sunny stood near the edge of Ring 4, his short sword held low, waiting for his assigned partner.
A tall, broad-shouldered youth stepped onto the mat across from him.
It was the same boy who had scoffed at Sunny’s low physical impact score during the baseline evaluation.
“Hey, slum kid,” the boy chuckled, rotating his heavy shoulders to stretch his muscles.
“Try not to break a wrist when I block you, alright? I don’t want Master Jet docking my points for hurting a beggar.”
Sunny didn’t answer.
He didn’t raise his sword into a formal guard.
He simply stood there, his knees slightly bent, his dark blue eyes tracking the boy’s center of gravity.
‘He’s top-heavy,’ Sunny analyzed, his mind cool, detached, and methodical.
‘His grip on the hilt is too tight.
He thinks his reach and weight advantage mean he can just crush me in one heavy downward swing.’
“Begin!” the instructor called out.
“Take this!” the broad-shouldered boy yelled, stepping forward with a powerful, diagonal slash designed to shear through Sunny’s guard and force him off the mat in a single blow.
The heavy steel blade whistled through the air.
Sunny didn’t block.
Blocking a two-handed sword with a light short sword without soul essence was suicide—the impact would snap his wrist or force his own blade back into his teeth.
Instead, Sunny took a half-step to the left—a tiny, minimal movement that cost him almost zero energy.
SWISH!
The heavy bastard sword sliced through empty air, passing less than an inch away from Sunny’s chest.
Because the boy had swung with all his strength, the momentum carried his heavy shoulders forward, pulling his balance off-center for a fraction of a second.
In that single, fleeting window, Sunny didn’t swing his sword.
He didn’t try to deliver a dramatic strike.
He simply stepped forward, wedging his lead boot behind the boy’s right heel, and gave his exposed shoulder a light, firm shove with the flat of his short sword’s hilt.
TRIP.
“Woah—!”
The tall boy let out a shocked gasp as his own momentum, combined with Sunny’s foot placement, sent him tumbling headfirst over Sunny’s leg.
He crashed heavily onto the blue sparring mat face-first, his bastard sword slipping from his numb fingers and sliding out of the ring.
The entire exchange had taken less than three seconds.
Sunny didn’t boast.
He didn’t smile.
He simply stepped back, lowering his short sword to his side, looking down at the groaning boy on the floor with a flat, unbothered expression.
The ring instructor stared at Sunny in dead silence for two seconds before tapping his tablet.
“Winner: Sunless. Time: Three seconds.”
Across the arena, near the central railing, Master Jet leaned against the steel bar, his glowing crimson optic zoomed in on Sunny’s calm, unreadable face.
A quiet, dark grin broke across Jet’s scarred mouth.
“No stance. No wasted movement. Used the kid’s own weight to throw him,” Jet muttered softly to himself, tapping his comms pad.
“That wasn’t a dojo technique. That was a street brawl instinct.”
Sunny stepped off the mat, fading back into the shadows near the wall, wiping the light dust from his boots.
As he stood in the quiet gloom of the subterranean hall, his shadow glided smoothly across the stone floor, curling around his boots like a silent, satisfied hound.
The training had begun.
And the roach was just getting started.