Ash clung to the crumbling groves of District Five like a second sky, thick enough to choke on.
Ezra Valentine hunched beneath a shattered stone archway, knuckles scraped raw, stomach gnawing at itself from hunger.
Snowflakes drifted from the bruised sky, painting the world a smudged grey-blue.
The world beyond the slums—beyond the soot-streaked spires and rust-choked factories—felt like a dream someone else was living.
Here, in the gutter-veins of Arkanis' lowest district, the air tasted of iron and broken promises.
Ezra tightened the threadbare scarf around his neck and forced himself upright, brushing uselessly at the dirt and snow clinging to his sleeves. His boots, caked in last night's freezing rain, squelched against the cracked pavement. The weather here was a curse all its own—flooding one day, freezing the next.
A gust of wind stirred the refuse at his feet.
He clutched the stolen registration papers closer to his chest. Forged. Sloppy work. They wouldn't survive a real inspection.
But he only needed them to last long enough to slip through the handlers' checks.
The Academy didn't care about paperwork.
It cared about two things: power—and loyalty to the Crown.
Everything else could be faked.
He moved through the labyrinth of market alleys, keeping his head down. Around him, the slum's heartbeat thudded on—vendors hawking worthless goods to buyers who couldn't pay, hollow-eyed children digging through garbage heaps, crooks loitering in doorways with dead stares.
No one noticed him.
No one cared.
He slipped into a half-collapsed tram station near the district's northern wall. A rusted railcar—once polished black and gold—now sagged under decades of graffiti and decay.
Ezra climbed aboard, settling into a cracked vinyl seat, the weight of every wrong choice pressing against his spine.
The tram groaned as it shuddered to life.
It would take him straight to District One.
Straight to Blackspire Academy.
He let his head fall back against the cold window, letting the tram's rattling drown out the pounding fear behind his ribs.
If he failed… there would be no second chance.
The Empire didn't need the weak.
The tram whined as it climbed the broken hills, leaving District Five behind. As the smog thinned, Ezra caught glimpses of the higher districts—District Four, District Three. Cleaner. Brighter.
Walled off and towering above the filth, like palaces raised on bones.
Even the air smelled different here.
Ezra curled his fingers tighter around the edge of his seat.
District Five was a place people only left two ways—inside a coffin, or inside a lie.
And he was carrying the biggest lie of his life straight into the heart of the Empire.
He tugged his threadbare coat tighter around himself, trying in vain to savor what little warmth it offered. His fingers, dry and cracked from the cold, ached with every movement. Dried blood flaked from the corners of his mouth where the frost had split his lips. He chewed on his lip, trying to distract himself from the hunger gnawing at his insides.
The tram jolted beneath him, each rattle scraping up his spine like nails dragged across bone.
Ezra closed his eyes, trying to steal a moment of rest—
—but the low murmur of conversation nearby tugged him back to consciousness.
A cluster of passengers huddled a few rows down, bundled in the same threadbare coats, passing a battered flask between them. Their laughter was brittle, tinged with something desperate.
Useless drunkards, Ezra thought.
"…telling you, they're waking up again. The old gods. The Celestials—whatever you want to call them. You can feel it in the air."
Ezra cracked one eye open, staring up at the stained ceiling.
He resisted the urge to roll his eyes so hard they might fall out of his skull.
Gods. Forgotten Powers. Lies.
He'd grown up choking on those same stories—hollow promises whispered by dying drunks and washed-out mystics. Fairy tales for people desperate to believe someone up there still cared about the rot festering down here.
Ezra knew better.
If gods had ever existed, they had long since abandoned them.
He shifted in his seat, pulling his scarf higher over his mouth.
The stolen papers dug against his ribs—a sharp, cold reminder that belief didn't feed you.
Lies did.
Tricks did.
Survival did.
He turned his head toward the window, resting his forehead against the cracked glass.
Outside, the world blurred past in smears of ash and soot.
Collapsed towers half-buried under snow. Wrecked districts, hollow and forgotten, like corpses left to rot at the Empire's edges.
His reflection stared back at him—tired eyes, hollow cheeks, a boy trying to wear a man's ambition like armor.
Outside, the scenery blurred faster—resident houses, backyard gardens, nice neighborhoods he would never belong to.
For a moment, he let himself remember.
Not a face.
Not a voice.
Just the feeling.
The weight of a freezing body beside him—other kids, no family, no home—gone stiff by morning.
The smell of rust, piss, and dying fires.
District Five had no saviors. No saints.
You either learned to steal, lie, and kill—
—or you rotted where you stood.
Ezra closed his eyes. Tightened his fists.
There was nothing left for him back there.
Only forward.
The tram gave a lurch as it began to slow.
Through the haze outside, massive gates loomed into view—silver iron crowned in gold glyphs, slick with rain and frost.
The checkpoint into District Two.
A mechanical hiss split the air.
The tram doors clattered open.
Ezra's gut twisted.
Two figures in gleaming dark armor boarded—Nexus Enforcers. Their visors mirrored black, no eyes to meet. Each carried a resonance pike slung at their side and the heavy, casual air of men who had beaten more than their share of "vagrants."
Behind them, handlers in drab uniforms followed—officials responsible for sorting the "worthy" from the trash.
The inspection had begun.
Passengers shifted uncomfortably in their seats.
Some looked down.
Some clutched their documents tighter.
Ezra sat very still.
The enforcers moved methodically through the tram, barked orders sharp against the dead air.
"Papers!"
"Hands where we can see them!"
"Stand when called!"
Someone near the front—a man reeking of cheap gin—fumbled his registration papers. They slipped from his trembling hands. One of the enforcers grabbed him by the collar, yanked him to his feet like a sack of meat.
"Forgery," one of the handlers announced, voice clipped.
The enforcer didn't even hesitate.
A crack of light.
A scream.
The man crumpled on the floor, unconscious—or worse—before being dragged off the tram.
Ezra didn't move.
His heart thundered against his ribs, sharp and ragged.
The stolen papers burned like fire inside his coat.
Closer.
Closer.
A shadow fell across his seat.
"Papers," a voice ordered.
Ezra raised his head slowly, keeping his movements deliberate, unthreatening.
He pulled the crumpled papers free and handed them over without a word, lowering his eyes like the slum-rat he was pretending not to be.
The handler snatched the papers, scanning them with a small resonance lens.
Ezra saw it immediately—the faint shimmer where the forgery frayed at the edges. The moment the lens hit it, the lie would crumble.
He acted before he could think.
Flicking the tiniest whisper of resonance from his fingers—a trick he'd learned from watching street mages—he pushed a thin, desperate pulse through the papers.
A shimmer.
A blur.
The signature glyph flickered back to life, stable for just a heartbeat longer.
The handler frowned.
Scanned again.
Grunted.
"Move along," he said at last, tossing the papers back at Ezra like they were garbage.
Ezra caught them before they hit the floor, head bowed.
He said nothing.
The enforcers moved on.
He sat frozen for a long minute after they passed, every muscle aching from tension.
Then, slowly, carefully, he leaned back against the glass again.
And just like that—he had made it.
He was inside.
The tram rolled forward.
Upward.
Toward a future he wasn't sure he believed in.
Toward Blackspire Academy.
The clean air hit him like a slap.
Gone were the smoke-choked skies and broken towers of District Five.
Here, the streets gleamed under rain-slick stone.
Towers soared overhead like spears aimed at the heavens.
Enchanted lamplights burned gold against the falling dusk, illuminating banners of the Empire—white and gold, stitched with the ancient sigil of Arkanis: a crown, a blade, and a broken chain.
Ezra shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
The people outside the tram moved like gods among men—cloaked in magic-threaded robes, faces shining, untouched by desperation.
Even the children clung to their parents' hands like treasures instead of burdens.
They didn't see him.
Not really.
To them, he was invisible.
Nothing but a shadow passing through.
The tram shuddered to a final halt at the last station.
Ezra rose stiffly to his feet, tucking the papers back inside his coat.
He stepped onto the platform, boots squeaking slightly against polished stone.
Before him, across a narrow causeway, rose the monolithic silhouette of Blackspire Academy.
It looked like a fortress carved from shadow.
Spiked towers, black stone walls etched with old warding runes, banners whipping in the sharp winter wind.
It loomed over the city like a vulture over a battlefield.
The Empire's beating heart.
Where they trained the Empire's future generals. Its commanders. Its enforcers. Its living weapons.
Ezra tightened his scarf and stepped forward.
One foot in front of the other.
Toward the gates.
Toward whatever waited beyond.