The news of the updated trial results spread through the Imperial Gifted Academy like a detonated plasma charge, reverberating across every communication channel in the central star domain.
At first, the update appeared as a single encrypted military notification flashing across high-level security grids. Then, someone leaked the underlying diagnostic classification, causing the file to bypass local administrative firewalls entirely.
Within minutes, every student terminal, personal Optical Brain, and central HoloScreen across the entire academy was flooded with the exact same shocking message:
[CADET RHAEVIA RYTHUNDEIR - MENTAL POWER: 3S.]
An absolute, suffocating silence lasted for exactly three seconds across the vast campus grounds.
Then, the entire Imperial Gifted Academy exploded into utter, chaotic hysteria.
"Three-S?!" a senior cadet shrieked, slamming his hands onto a cafeteria table as his terminal flashed red.
"Rhaevia Rythundeir?" his companion stammered, his eyes wide with unadulterated shock. "The E-rank Guide daughter of the Rythundeir Ducal House who just finished the Frontier Trial?"
"That has to be a fake report!" another student yelled across the crowded corridor, pointing at the floating numbers. "She was officially registered as an E-rank failure during the freshman intake!"
Cadets crowded wildly around holographic displays throughout the academy’s massive silver halls, shouting over one another in utter disbelief. Intense, panicked conversations erupted simultaneously in lecture halls, dining facilities, training grounds, and private dormitories.
The delicate young girl whom everyone had endlessly mocked as useless trash had suddenly, inexplicably transformed into one of the most powerful, terrifying Guides in the entire Empire.
And she was only twenty years old, an age considered barely grown in the interstellar era.
Senior cadets stared at the floating announcement in complete, speechless horror. The very same girl who had been openly ridiculed for her pathetic rank had become the greatest, most unexplainable anomaly in the history of the military institution.
Inside the faculty chambers, instructors received high-priority emergency communications one after another, their consoles blinking relentlessly.
High-ranking military officials demanded immediate, unrestricted access to her raw diagnostic records. Imperial research institutions transmitted formal, high-priority requests for her complete genetic, neurological, and mental-energy telemetry logs.
Multiple powerful noble families across the capital star sector immediately began making urgent, demanding inquiries through their private channels.
"Who authorized her high-level neural examination aboard the flagship?" a noble patriarch barked through a secure channel.
"Where is Cadet Rythundeir currently being transferred?" another official demanded, leaning over his terminal.
"Was the 3S classification independently verified by planetary sensors?" a senior researcher pressed frantically. "Release the complete diagnostic sweep log to our department at once!"
Every single outgoing data request and administrative query received the exact same automated, stone-cold system response:
[ACCESS DENIED - HIGH COMMAND OVERRIDE.]
Meanwhile, deep inside the luxurious estate of the Rythundeir Ducal House, a massive holographic display in the central tactical room suddenly illuminated with high-priority crimson text.
Three tall, impeccably dressed young men stood gathered around the glowing display, their faces darkening as they read the incoming notification.
They read the official document once. They read it a second time. Then they read it a third time in complete, heavy silence.
The eldest brother, a prodigy officer in the imperial fleet, narrowed his sharp eyes as his expression turned thoroughly icy.
"Who tested her mental capacity on that distant planet?" he asked, his voice dripping with danger.
The second brother, a formidable physical combatant, slowly cracked his knuckles, a terrifying pressure rolling off his shoulders. "Who allowed raw military personnel to examine our little sister without our family’s direct supervision?"
The youngest of the three brothers was already tapping his private optical brain, his face flushed with immediate protective anger.
"I am prepping the private shuttle right now," he declared fiercely. "We are going directly to the flagship."
Before any of them could step toward the private hangar doors, their mother’s elegant holographic projection materialized sharply through the household’s priority channel.
"Stop right where you are," she commanded firmly, her voice instantly halting her three sons in their tracks.
All three brothers froze instantly, turning their eyes toward their mother.
Duchess Rythundeir, a legendary 3S Guide whose name carried immense weight across the Empire, stared intently at her daughter’s glowing 3S classification.
Unlike her furious sons, she did not look instantly overjoyed or shocked by the sudden elevation. Instead, her dark eyes were filled with a deep, unsettling concern.
Her gaze narrowed as she reread the underlying technical metrics embedded within the official report:
[MENTAL POWER: 3S CLASS.]
A 3S Guide was an extraordinarily rare, transcendent existence capable of stabilizing entire planetary fleets.
However, something about the rapid nature of this specific result bothered her deep within her soul. Being a 3S Guide herself, she understood the complex, delicate mechanics of human mental pathways far better than anyone else in the room.
Mental energy pathways did not simply jump sequentially from an E-rank baseline directly to a 3S rating during a single diagnostic sweep.
That sudden surge was not a standard biological awakening. That was something far more unnatural, far more profound, and vastly more dangerous.
Her regal expression slowly turned utterly solemn as she looked up at her three sons.
"Something terrible happened to my daughter on that planet," she stated quietly, her voice trembling slightly.
The three brothers exchanged startled, uncertain glances with one another.
"What do you mean, Mother?" the eldest brother asked, his tone laced with sudden dread.
Duchess Rythundeir stood up straight, her posture commanding absolute authority as her eyes burned with cold determination.
"Prepare the ducal flagship immediately," she ordered, her tone turning as sharp as sub-zero steel. "We are going to see Rhaevia in person right now."
Across the star sector, military command centers continued receiving endless streams of demands for information from every major political faction.
Imperial research directors wanted to claim her for classified study. Ancient noble houses wanted to secure her through marriage alliances. The academy board wanted to bring her back to the capital immediately.
Everyone in the interstellar civilization wanted to uncover what had truly happened to the girl who had once been mockingly dismissed as useless trash.
However, before any external faction or noble fleet could establish direct contact with her, Major General Raevor Veyr issued an absolute, sealed military order from his bridge.
Every single electronic record connected to Rhaevia Rythundeir was immediately locked under high-level military encryptions. The diagnostic scan file was buried behind multi-layered quantum firewalls.
And even the orbital surveillance recording of her fights was restricted to maximum clearance. Every single external request for data was automatically rejected without exception.
Then, a final, definitive classification text appeared across the secure imperial military network, glowing in stark crimson light:
[RHAEVIA RYTHUNDEIR - AWAKENED 3S GUIDE.]
[SECURITY CLASSIFICATION: LEVEL ONE STRATEGIC SECRET.]