Silence settled like dust after the ceremony.
The crystal remained dark. No light. No resonance. No aura.
A priest muttered awkwardly, "No aura response detected…"
Murmurs exploded. Whispers turned sharp.
"The Ryvera's son… aura-less?"
"A disgrace…"
A blade of humiliation twisted in Xarl's chest. The buzz of voices blurred. His feet felt glued to the ground, cold and heavy.
And then — warmth.
His father's hand rested gently on his shoulder.
"Xarl," he said, voice calm but resolute, "a man's worth is not measured by the glow of a crystal. You are my son — with or without aura."
That gentleness… it hit harder than any insult.
Xarl's breath caught. His vision blurred.
Because in that moment, what he truly remembered wasn't the shame of the ceremony — but a memory from Earth.
He was fourteen. Top of his class. Holding a national academic award, standing at the gates of his expensive home. His father hadn't even looked up from his phone. His mother's only comment was, "Try harder next time."
Even then, he'd forced a smile.
But this... this warmth. This unconditional acceptance. It broke something.
He cried — silent tears, chest trembling, heart raw.
Later that night, his family sat around him. No one brought up the ceremony. No one pitied him. Instead, they offered something greater.
"Let me teach you medicine," his mother said, handing him a basket of herbs. "Your hands can still heal."
"Come train with me," his brother Rovan grinned, tossing him a wooden sword. "No aura means more reason to be sharper."
His father dropped scrolls and ancient books on his lap. "Study history. Master the forgotten arts."
Even his sister, usually too busy teasing him, gave him a wink. "I'll show you how to sneak out of lectures and still get top marks."
From that moment, Xarl made a decision.
If the world denied him aura, he would conquer it without one.
And so began his journey.
Days blended into weeks. He learned to identify herbs by scent alone. He practiced sword drills until his arms went numb. He failed more times than he could count. Once, he misread an ancient glyph and nearly blew up the family's garden.
"You boiled what with powdered flame root?" his mother had gasped.
"...I thought it was dried lemongrass."
The explosion singed his eyebrows.
But he learned.
He laughed with his brother during sparring, debated strategies with his father, and memorized every historical battle in the royal archives. Even when he failed, he never gave up — and each failure became a lesson.
Once, he collapsed during a spar. Face in the dirt, ribs bruised. Rovan knelt beside him and offered a hand.
"You gonna quit?"
"No," Xarl gritted out, grabbing the hand. "Just... resting."
Eventually, he mastered everything his family gave him.
His body grew faster, sharper. His mind became a weapon.
The town still whispered. Still mocked.
But Xarl never bowed.
And then… one night changed everything.
He was studying alone under a dim lantern, tracing a spell formation in an old book when—
[System Initializing…]
[Foreign Soul Detected. Calibrating Core Functions…]
A translucent blue screen floated before his eyes.
He froze.
"What…?"
It vanished.
He rubbed his eyes. Looked around. Nothing. Only the soft rustling of pages and the crackle of fire.
The next day, he searched every book he could find. Nothing mentioned "systems." Nothing described floating screens.
But deep in the back of his mind — from Earth — he remembered stories. Games. Web novels. Interfaces like this.
"No way… it's real?"
That night, the screen returned.
[Welcome, Xarl.]
[System Online.]
[Task 001: Enroll in Embra Academy.]
He stared at the glowing letters.
His world had just changed.
But what was this system? Where had it come from? Why now? Why him?
He had no answers.
But he had something he hadn't before:
A new path.
Xarl steps outside into the moonlight, eyes locked on the floating task.
He clenches his fists.
"Embra Academy… I'm coming."
The screen shimmered silently beside him.
And this time, he didn't feel powerless at all.