CHAPTER 29: The Twenty-Ninth Fracture

The morning light touched Saaya’s hair before it touched me.

She was still asleep, breathing softly beside me on the beds we’d pushed together since returning from the Hidden Fracture. Her hair spilled across the pillow like ink in water—blonde strands catching the early sunlight through the open window. There was something fragile about the moment. Something untouchable.

For the first time in what felt like forever, we weren’t running.

No collapsing realms. No fractal echoes. No gods watching from above.

Just… peace.

I shifted slightly, careful not to wake her. But the movement stirred her anyway.

Her eyes blinked open—slow, dazed, violet—and found mine. A soft smile pulled at her lips.

“You were watching me again,” she said, voice hushed with sleep.

“You were glowing again,” I murmured, brushing a strand of hair from her face.

She reached up and lazily hooked her fingers around mine, holding my hand against her cheek.

“Don’t tease me.”

“I’m not.” I leaned in, just enough for our foreheads to touch.

“I don’t think I ever want to wake up alone again.”

Her fingers squeezed mine gently.

“Then don’t.”

We stayed like that for a while, the world distant and quiet, until the academy bell rang faintly in the distance—a reminder that peace didn’t last forever.

“Classes,” she muttered.

“Unfortunately.”

She groaned and pulled the blanket over her head.

“Tell them I reversed time and we already went.”

I laughed. “That might’ve worked if we hadn’t just reset causality last week.”

Eventually, we got out of bed and into our uniforms. Her hand brushed against mine as we both reached for the same book—then lingered.

The quiet between us wasn’t empty anymore.

It was shared.

Earned.

Later That Day – Academy Courtyard

Principal Lyra stood at the center of the courtyard, surrounded by murmuring students. When she spoke, her voice cut through the noise like a calm blade.

“Today’s lecture is postponed,” she said. “We have a more pressing matter.”

She paused and looked to the sky—then back to us.

“A letter arrived this morning. From another magic academy.”

The air around us stilled.

“They’ve heard rumors. About a science user. A survivor of the fractures.”

Murmurs rippled through the crowd. Eyes shifted—toward me.

“They’ve issued a challenge,” Lyra continued.

“An inter-academy trial. Their strongest students against ours. Magic versus magic… and science.”

I raised a brow. “Why now? What do they want to prove?”

Lyra’s gaze was sharp but calm.

“That academy’s always stood on a pedestal—looking down at the rest of us. They see science not as a breakthrough, but as weakness. And now that we harbor a user of it, they’re using this as a chance to reassert their superiority.”

Saaya’s hand tightened around mine.

Lyra continued, her voice unwavering.

“This will be a contest. Four of our best against four of theirs. Sukara—you don’t have to accept, but—”

“I’ll fight,” I said before she finished. “This place… it’s becoming my home.”

Saaya stepped forward. “Then I’ll fight too.”

Lyra nodded, satisfied. “Good. Then we’ll need two more to join you. We have a week to prepare and they will be coming here since they issued the challenge.”

From the edge of the crowd, Alric turned silently and began walking away—shoulders tense, eyes forward.

I watched him as he left my field of vision.

Saaya stayed close beside me, but I could feel something in her shift—like the calm between us had been cracked, just slightly.

When the courtyard began to clear, she tugged gently on my sleeve.

“They’re not just challenging our academy,” she said quietly. “They’re challenging you.”

I turned to her.

“You think this is personal?”

“It feels like it.” Her gaze dropped. “You’re the only one from outside the Fractures. The only one who came back with something they can’t understand. And you’re changing things, Sukara.”

I reached out, brushing her fingers again. “Do you think I shouldn’t fight?”

“No,” she said, after a moment. “I think you have to. But that doesn’t mean I’m not scared.”

Her voice cracked slightly on the last word. She looked away, blinking quickly.

“They’ll come for you differently than they come for the rest of us. Not to prove something. To end something.”

I squeezed her hand. “Then we’ll show them how wrong they are.”

She nodded, but her grip didn’t loosen.

And for the first time in days, I felt the weight of the gods again—only this time, it was wearing the face of another academy.