The shuttle landed without ceremony.
No flags. No medics rushing forward. No sirens or system-wide announcements.
Just a smooth touchdown in the middle of the temporary base camp set up outside the testing grounds—a spread of tents, blinking towers, and flat dirt patches packed with exhausted staff and students.
A low-ranking officer walked up to the ramp as it lowered, clipboard in hand, expression neutral.
He didn't ask questions. Didn't greet anyone.
He just stepped aside as the students filed out one by one.
No one pushed.
No one spoke.
They were too tired, too bruised, too busy trying to understand how they were still breathing.
The air here felt sharper. More real. Like the weight of the forest had stayed behind.
But the silence hadn't.
The camp buzzed softly—voices, movement, the hum of mana scanners being wheeled between rows of stretchers.
Students lay in makeshift recovery pods, bandages glowing faintly as spells held cuts together.
