Five weeks flew by like they were five minutes.
The Academy had its rhythm and Rush fell into it — morning lectures on history, magic foundation, alchemy. Combat exercises under Captain Malon. Magecraft with Professor Argonean. Evening sessions under Rosetta. That was the schedule for everyone.
For Rush it was never enough.
He trained after the sessions ended. Practiced Frieren in the dark when the training grounds were empty. Focused inward. Toward his fractured core during every quiet moment — in lectures, between exercises, lying on his bed at night before sleep took him. Five weeks of this. Every day.
The progress was real. Not astonishing. Just — real.
His mana suppression improved first. Rosetta's suggestion had seemed simple and proven difficult. It had taken most of the first week to locate the sensation at all. Three seconds of active suppression on the fifth day, lost immediately. Then longer. Then longer. By the fifth week he could hold it for five continuous minutes before the focus slipped.
Five minutes wasn't much.
It was enough.
In those five minutes his barriers held. Constructs formed larger and more stable. His magic — limited as it was, constrained by a fractured core that Rosetta's methods could improve but not repair — became more efficient. He could make two barriers at once now. Not strong ones. Not ones that would stop anything significant. But two separate mana barriers maintained at once, which was two more than he had been able to make five weeks ago.
Jennifer had tested them. The barriers held longer than before — now taking a punch from her to break. That was Jennifer.
The frost control was a different story entirely.
It didn't develop the way his magic did. By the end of the first week he could freeze water, fluids, small objects. By the third week the constructs had arrived — thin walls of ice shaped from the air around him without requiring water or surface to work from. By the fifth week the environment was his.
Fifteen meters.
Within fifteen meters Rush could control the temperature, produce frost anywhere in that radius, shape ice from the moisture in the air itself. The Phantom Sleeper had done this effortlessly — the cold a condition of its presence. Rush wasn't effortless yet. But the gap between what he was doing and what the Phantom Sleeper had done was closing.
Frieren was his now. Completely. Not a borrowed ability anymore. A part of him. Part of his biology, his consciousness, the Neuroverse.
Beelzebub had said nothing about it for two weeks.
Then one morning after a pre-dawn session:
"You are becoming difficult to underestimate, child."
Coming from Beelzebub, that was high praise.
****
He wasn't the only one working.
Every student in the Academy trained like the trials were already happening. The corridors between sessions sounded different than they had in the year's first months — focused, urgent, and energetic.
Richard trained like something was chasing him.
Rush had watched it across five weeks of shared sessions — the amber fire mana running hotter each week, output increasing with each passing day. His combat integration — magic and physical combat working as one rather than alternating — had developed into something genuinely difficult to plan against.
Rosetta was the main reason behind such a drastic development. Not only Richard but every student under her mentorship had shown growth.
Richard was motivated.
Rush understood the motivation. Not all of it — there were layers to Richard Dragonean that Rush didn't have access to and wasn't going to be given access to. But the surface layer was clear enough.
Richard didn't want to be better than Rush. He wanted to be better than a Ryanheart. Better than the name his father had refused to avenge.
Rush wanted to be the best.
Different targets. Same fuel.
****
The Hexan Crucible meant different things to everyone who was going to compete in it.
For the commoner students — and there were some — it was a path. The Academy accepted talent regardless of birth, one of the few things Rush genuinely respected about institutional life. Being noticed by the right eyes at the right moment could change the trajectory of a life. Heroes and Archmages and Faction leaders watched the Crucible. They remembered faces. They made offers.
For the noble students it was legacy. Proof of position. The aristocratic world ran on demonstration — you didn't hold rank because your family had held it, you held it because you continued to prove you deserved to. The Hexan Crucible was one of the largest stages in Etherion for that proof.
Rush understood this differently from most noble students.
There was a story to it.
The Ryanhearts hadn't always existed. Before his father there was no Ryanheart family. No estate. No crest. Erwin Ryanheart had been an orphan with unknown origins, surviving a world that wasn't designed for orphans. Elyse Worldword had found him. Had seen something in the boy that she thought was worth cultivating.
What Erwin became after that was not a secret exactly — but it was not discussed in comfortable company.
The name Ryanheart was a mask. Chosen by his father. Mention 'Erwin' in a room and nothing happened. Mention Ryanheart and everything changed — in the air, in the posture of the people who heard it. The name carried weight that no bloodline had given it.
Erwin had built that weight himself.
And the weight came with enemies. Most aristocrats envied him. Envied what an orphan boy had achieved — Dukedom, and the Ryanhearts.
And Rush was the heir to the Ryanhearts.
The Hexan Crucible was his chance to carry the name forward. Announce himself in the aristocratic world.
"This is what the Ryanhearts are. Not generosity. Not coincidence. This."
He trained with that in mind — before dawn, after dusk, and every session between.
****
And then the five weeks were over.
Students gathered in the central plaza where squads were listed on the information board. Names appeared on it in clean luminescent script.
Every first-year was watching.
Rush stood with his friends — Nia to his left, Slavic and Ethan slightly behind, Jennifer to his right.
Rush scanned the list.
SQUAD THREE:
· Rush Ryanheart
· Ethan Takahashi
· Amber Valerius
He read his name. Read the names beside it.
Ethan — his friend with a katana, minimal speech, and maximum understanding.
Amber — a petite girl with brown hair, brown eyes, and Richard's companion during Hunter's Willow. Technically precise. An even better spellcaster than Ethan.
He looked at the next entry.
SQUAD TWO:
· Richard Dragonean
· Patricia Aetos
· Kurt Aetos
Murmurs had already spread through students.
"That's definitely the strongest squad."
And they were correct. Richard's fire affinity and combat integration. Patricia's weapon control and magic precision. Kurt's adaptive magic and aggressive output. They were formidable.
Rush looked at it for a moment.
Then at the next.
SQUAD ONE:
· Jennifer Wolfheart
· Slavic Petrova
· Nia Whispers
Slavic made a sound beside him.
"Jennifer," he said. "And Nia."
"Good," Rush said.
Slavic looked at him.
"Good?"
"Yes. See the way squads are formed," Rush said. "The Academy made sure to pair students who never trained together."
Slavic considered this.
"That's the reason they announced squads just a week before the trials."
"Yes."
Rush turned to Nia. She was reading the names, completely composed.
"Different squad," Rush said.
"Yes."
"Don't lose."
Something moved at the corner of her mouth.
"I never do."
Rush looked at the screen one more time.
Now it really looks like the trials for the Hexan Crucible, he thought.