Chapter 85: Ashen Wolf
The private chamber was silent, save for the quiet hum of the holoscreen as it displayed the live feed. The Dean sat alone, his presence a stark contrast to the opulent halls of the Academy. His office was not one of grandeur but of purpose—functional designs with a singular focus on efficiency. He had never been one for excess. Power was not measured in ornamentation but in influence, and few in the Confederacy wielded more than him.
He hadn't been this excited in years. On the screen, Orion Reyes' score stood as an anomaly.
1,000 Academy Credits.
It's not like it's impossible to get 1,000 credits before the Academy starts—some have achieved it, though only as a result of the two trials' scores being combined. But only two people did so in the Gala even before the first trial.
The official on the other end of the transmission stood at attention, awaiting instruction. The Dean did not acknowledge them immediately. His eyes remained fixed on the data.
Orion Reyes had simply exceeded expectations.
The last person to achieve something comparable was his own adoptive daughter.
The Dean exhaled slowly. He was not a man easily impressed, nor one to make decisions based on sentiment. For decades, he had shaped the Academy into what it was—a proving ground for the Confederacy's elite. He had seen the ambitious and the arrogant, the gifted and the desperate. He had seen those who thought their names alone would carry them, and those who believed raw strength made them invincible.
But Orion Reyes had demonstrated something neither privilege nor brute force could replicate—conviction.
The Dean finally addressed the waiting official. His voice was calm, deliberate. "I wonder if he could back his words."
A brief hesitation on the other end. "He's reckless, but—"