Inside the manufactured dark, Zayden remained fully conscious.
He had entered this investigation knowing he could do this.
The transmigration had given him something the vessel’s original owner never possessed — a soul that didn’t belong to this world, and therefore couldn’t be fully read by the tools designed to read it.
He had tested the boundaries during Manher’s first probe.
Now he knew them precisely.
Faces, emotions, the texture of fear itself — he could sculpt these into something believable.
Into something that would hold under scrutiny.
Inside the crafted memory, the darkness dissolved into a modest room.
A sleeping figure — himself — lay peaceful and still.
Beside him, a glowing badge materialised in soft golden light, discovered simply, innocently, without drama or hidden cause.
I woke up and there it was.
That’s all.
Simple.
Believable.
Manher’s Cognitive Echo moved through it — crackling neural sparks mapping the contours of manufactured recollection.
His brow furrowed at the edges.
Something felt wrong, too smooth, too contained — but the narrative held its shape.
When the Echo faded, Manher surfaced and stood in silence for a long moment.
This was not the first time he had been inside Zayden Everhart’s mind.
The first session, days ago in the interrogation room, had produced something that made his skin crawl — a primordial presence pressing against the walls of normal perception like something enormous moving through shallow water.
He had said nothing to Harry then.
Had convinced him to release the boy early.
“I’m staking my career on this, Harry. The kid is clean enough. Let him go.” Harry had relented, reluctantly, out of respect for instincts he’d learned not to question.
Now the same undercurrent was there, buried under the controlled surface.
Manher reported only what Zayden had chosen to show him — calm, measured, perfectly consistent with the official account.
He omitted everything else.
He wasn’t entirely sure why.
But something told him revealing the anomaly would be the last mistake this particular boy ever had.
Officer Harry Carl’s cold eyes moved between them.
Suspicion dripped from every measured word.
“As per regulations — Zayden Everhart is cleared.” His voice was ice.
“He is eligible for the test.”
Zayden exhaled once, silently, and kept his expression neutral.
He noticed Manher watching him with that quiet, half-formed smile — the look of a man carrying knowledge heavier than his rank.
He chose silence.
Observation before speech.
Harry dismissed them with a short nod.
“Manher — training yard. I need a word with Priest Kenny.”
They slipped into the secret passage connecting the Church of Ligitaris to the CSF building.
The corridor was old stone, walls slick with damp, lanterns casting amber halos that barely held the dark at arm’s length.
Zayden felt it immediately — eyes on him, unseen and heavy, pressing against his back and shoulders like a physical weight.
Then, without warning, his body ignited.
A soft inner glow bloomed outward from his skin — warm and steady, like a torch brought to life.
The oppressive feeling shattered. This chapter is updated first at g.com.
The passage brightened around them.
Manher spun.
Tension flared across his features before it dissolved into a slow, intrigued grin.
“Well, well. The first gift wakes when fear brushes the spine.” He tilted his head, dark purple eyes gleaming.
“The Glow of Ligtirs. Not bad, kid.”
“So this is one of the abilities,” Zayden said, keeping his voice analytical and even.
Manher chuckled — something genuinely warm beneath the mystery he wore like a second uniform.
“Indeed. Move. At least we have decent light now.”
They emerged into the training yard — a wide, open expanse of worn grass sheltered by the surrounding buildings’ tall shadows.
Wooden training puppets stood scattered throughout, surfaces scarred from countless sessions.
Zayden stood quietly and catalogued everything: the cool evening air moving through the grass, the faint echo of hymns drifting from the church, the scar patterns on the nearest puppet that told him exactly what power levels had been tested here before.
He catalogued both officers too.
Harry: late forties, imposing, dark brown eyes carrying the weariness of a man who had chosen duty over everything else for decades.
Careful, suspicious — but not dishonest.
Manher: younger, energetic, burgundy hair framing a face that smiled easily but gave nothing away.
Dark purple eyes carrying something he kept deliberately to himself.
Two very different kinds of dangerous.
Manher returned carrying a heavy tome engraved in gold: Basic Knowledge of the Aethernal System and Aethriels.
“Since you already carry the badge, the full ritual explanation is largely formality,” Manher said, glancing around with that practised habit of checking for unwanted ears.
“But since you seem curious—”
“I’d like to know.”
Manher’s voice shifted into something more reverent, almost theatrical.
“One must stare into the sun for three unbroken hours — filled with genuine kindness and unshakeable hope. Never blink. Those who prove worthy receive the Badge of Ligtirs, symbol of Hope and Kindness. Those who fail—” A deliberate pause.
“Blindness claims their sight. Or the Primordial Angel claims their soul.”
With a flick of two fingers, Manher drew sparks from the air that assembled into a floating sigil — the exact emblem from the church spires, the hidden room tablets, the sworn diary.
It hung suspended above them, radiating gentle golden warmth.
At its centre, a luminous white-gold heart, pure and still.
Wings of light curved outward from both sides.
A radiant star pierced upward at the crown.
Two translucent hands formed from light, reaching upward from below — humanity lifting its prayers toward what existed above and beyond it.
The entire sigil pulsed with something that quieted the restlessness in his chest without asking permission.
The same symbol.
Everywhere.
What is it actually for?
He filed the question and said nothing.
Manher continued briskly — powers, then disadvantages.
Brain fatigue from heavy tactical use.
Unnatural, persistent hunger as the body struggled to fuel a heightened mind.
Heavy stamina drain when projecting light as physical force.
“You lean toward mental and magical combat,” Manher added practically.
“Physical training will be essential to keep you alive long enough to use any of it.”
The test.
Zayden stood centred in the yard, still as standing water.
He raised one hand, shaped his fingers into a pistol, focused his attention to a narrow deliberate point — and released.
Not perfect aim.
But clean, controlled power.
“Good instinct,” Manher said, genuine approval in his voice.
“Aim needs work. The control is already there.”
Next: evasion.
Manher blurred into motion — moving through the yard with the liquid speed of someone whose element lived in crackling quick energy.
Small sparks scattered from his fingertips in rapid bursts as he moved.
Zayden’s mind processed it.
Track the trajectory.
Read the gaps.
Don’t react — anticipate.
His body moved a half-beat ahead of the sparks each time, twisting aside before they arrived rather than reacting to where they’d been.
He missed three.
He avoided seven.
Manher slowed and stopped, breathing lightly, that enigmatic smile settled back into place.
“Raw talent. But talent without training is just untapped potential. You passed.”
From the far edge of the yard, Harry Carl stepped out of the shadows.
He had been watching in silence the entire time, arms folded, cold eyes calculating.
“The boy has potential,” he said quietly, almost to himself.
He stepped forward.
“You’ve cleared the test, Zayden Everhart. Tomorrow morning, seven o’clock — the Church of Ligitaris for formal registration.” His eyes didn’t soften even slightly.
“Do not be late.”
“Understood.”
He retraced his steps through the connecting passage and out into the open city streets.
The sun had set entirely.
Oil lamps flickered along the road like cautious, watchful eyes.
He walked steadily, letting the weight of the day settle across his shoulders without buckling under it.
A long day.
Good variables gained.
But as he walked, the thought he’d been holding at bay all afternoon finally surfaced and refused to be shelved again.
Manher had probed his mind twice now.
Both times he’d omitted the anomalies.
Both times he’d protected Zayden without explanation or evident motive.
Why?
A man like Manher, in a role like his, didn’t make those kinds of omissions by accident.
He made them because something — instinct, recognition, or something older — told him to.
He felt something in my mind that he recognised.
Something that surprised him.
What does Officer Manher Steve know about transmigrators?
Somewhere behind him, within the sleeping city’s heavy shadows, unseen eyes continued to watch him walk away — and the darkness where they stood did not move in any natural wind.
The strongest chains are not made of iron.
They are made of fear, doubt, and the truths we refuse to face.