Lily was still fuming by the time their Applied Combat exams rolled around. “I can’t believe this. Go ahead and invalidate all my work, won’t you? Stupid…” she bit off the rest of the sentence with a growl, pacing back and forth on the pavement in front of the school, furiously enough that she was half sure she was running a furrow into the ground. “Utterly asinine. Beyond moronic.”

Avyr flicked his tail amusedly, the tip of it catching the early-morning sunlight. “I don’t disagree. This feels… targeted.” They’d arrived at the Academy amongst the earliest of their group— so early that the building hadn’t even been opened yet. He, at least, had taken the news a lot better than she had… though maybe that was more because he was in a much better position as an Opening cultivator hitting a whole stage down than she was as a mortal cultivator hitting a whole stage up.

She grimaced, trying her best not to do something like… kick the ground. Or Avyr. A stubbed toe would be the end result of both. “They’re trying to stop us, specifically. They can’t get away with this. They can’t.”

“We’ll just have to beat them anyways.” Calmly… but Lily knew Avyr enough to hear that subtle hint of danger

beneath his murred voice. A real danger, not the playful thing she was often on the other edge of. Anger of an alien kind.

It was reassuring, almost, to not be the only one to feel cheated.

She tried to settle herself. Key word tried— she’d already been nervous enough about the exam before she’d been told that everything she’d practiced exhaustively for months had just been invalidated by a quirk of authority abuse, and now… two days, not even, and a strategy that was still essentially untested for how much they’d practiced.

Avyr stilled slightly, ears perking up— and that was the only warning Lily got before Instructor Ceng stopped beside them. “Huh. You two are here early. I’m technically not supposed to let you in early but…” he shrugged lackadaisically, which was almost depressingly in character for their Applied Combat instructor. “I mean, technically the principal and the councillor aren’t supposed to be playing political games with my glass, so there’s really no harm. C’mon, standing out here has got to be uncomfortable, let’s get backstage.”

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“I don’t think students are supposed to be backstage in the stadium…” and he was already walking away. Lily glanced at Avyr, who just tilted his head in amused confusion, and sighed. “Whatever. I would like to be inside.” It was rather muggy at the moment, and she’d heard rumors that the backstage was actually quite nice.

Instructor Ceng unlocked a worn side door, leading through a cramped side-passage beneath the seats that ended in a similarly rusted door. Beyond that, though was a rather nice room, replete with couches and chairs and even a fridge plastered in sticky notes telling what belonged to what. Their instructor didn’t even pay those a second glance, merely swinging it open and grabbing a can of soda. Or well, she hoped it was soda at least. The thought of their teacher drinking before the most important exam of their lives to date was… not entirely a pleasant one.

“Alright.” He crashed on one of the couches, then motioned to the others. “Don’t mind it. Everyone else here can get so stuck up. I mean— they don’t really understand what it’s about, you know? The elite classes are elites. You’re not just training to get good grades— you’re training to be cultivators, and the violence of cultivation changes for no man.” He paused for a second— “or cat. I can’t wait to see your matches, Avyr… they could stop you from sparring, but they couldn’t stop you from this.” His smile, so viciously… “I want to see the violence that a second step cultivator is truly capable of. The savagery. The bloody victory! Show me what a monster is really made of—”

“Really?” Lily flinched at the familiar voice. A voice she’d never be able to forget— “that’s uncouth. If Avyr’s a monster, what do you think of me?”