Chapter 847: A Change
Chapter 847: A Change
After the gathering at the eastern training arena, the next two days moved faster than expected.Some students wrote their final theory papers the very next day. Others had theirs the day after, depending on which departments and special tracks they had chosen. Forgemastery students disappeared into workshops and returned with ink-stained fingers and the dead-eyed expressions of people who had been asked to explain mechanisms they usually preferred to build.
Alchemy students walked out of their theory rooms looking as though half the questions had tried to poison them. Tactical Espionage students, few as they were, left their examination with expressions so unreadable that other students immediately decided they did not want to know what kind of paper Professor Kaine and Lady Seraphina had prepared.
The week did not slow down for anyone.
Yet within those same two days, something changed.
It was not formal. No academy announcement declared Sheila Granger commander. No board of instructors stood before the second-years and confirmed Edith Roswell as vice commander. No banners shifted, no titles were written into the official structure, and no ceremony took place.
But among the second-years, the shift became palpable all the same. The debate Chris had created to weaken Sheila had turned into something else entirely. It had become the moment many students needed in order to see her tested in public and not crumble.
Chris had gathered an audience for himself.
By the end, it had served Sheila better than him.
The majority of second-years began falling onto the same page. Sheila was the commander choice. Not because everyone adored her, and not because every doubt vanished in one afternoon, but because she had handled pressure before witnesses in a way that felt real.
She had not dodged Chris’s practical questions. She had not hidden from Percy’s shadow. She had not made leadership sound like popularity dressed in pretty words. She had spoken of structure, roles, discipline, trust, and survival in a way that made students believe she had been thinking about more than winning the title.
Edith’s position beside her also became easier to accept.
Once Sheila explained why Edith made sense, many students seemed to remember things they had already known but had not yet placed into the commander discussion. Edith had always been composed. Edith had led before. Edith was not loud, but when she spoke, people tended to listen. She had the kind of practical steadiness that did not demand attention but earned it by being useful.