(Anya Volkov's Perspective)
I am in my study, the door sealed. The air is still, purified by the Aetheric climate controller my father had installed. On my desk, my own notes on Aetheric dynamics lie open, the elegant equations and precise diagrams a testament to a system of perfect, understandable logic. A system that, as of an hour ago, has a gaping hole in it.
I have replayed the memory a dozen times, analyzing it with the dispassionate clarity that earned me an IAP of 85.
Fact: The training dummy, Model 3-Gamma, is constructed from reinforced ironwood, bonded with a low-grade petrification resin. Its tensile strength is rated to withstand repeated impacts from cultivators up to Rank 10.
Fact: Lin Fei, for all his bluster, is a Rank 3 Initiate. His "Stone Fist" technique is crude. I calculated the kinetic energy of his impacts; they were barely sufficient to cause the surface-level indentations I observed.
Fact: The subject, Ren, registered zero Aetheric output. The academy's ambient sensors, my own senses—nothing. He did not channel, he did not project. He placed his hand on the dummy.
Fact: The dummy disintegrated. Not shattered, as from a powerful blow. It crumbled. The structural failure was catastrophic and total, originating from within.
The conclusion is impossible. The force required to cause such a failure from a single point of contact would be immense, far beyond what any Initiate could produce. To do so with no measurable Aetheric expenditure violates the First Law of Aetheric Transference. Energy cannot be created from nothing.
He is not a person. He is an unsolvable equation. A variable that breaks the beautiful, perfect machine of the world. I feel no jealousy towards him. Jealousy is for rivals who play the same game. He is playing a different game entirely, one whose rules I cannot begin to decipher. And the not knowing… the not knowing is an intellectual agony I find completely intolerable. I must have the solution.
(Ren's Perspective)
Ren sat on the edge of his cot in the bleak, quiet room that had become his sanctuary. He felt a grim satisfaction from the afternoon's events. It was not the joy of victory, but the quiet affirmation of his own progress. He had faced a challenge, applied his knowledge, and achieved his desired result. It was a clean, logical process.
He knew, however, that the consequences would be anything but simple. He had not just broken a training dummy; he had broken the fragile understanding his peers had of him. He had replaced their scorn with fear, a far more dangerous and unpredictable emotion.
As expected, the summons came. It was delivered by the same silent academy servant, but this time the man did not meet his eyes, his bow deeper and more fearful than before.
He found Elder Tian in the archive, not the garden. The old man was standing before a high shelf, a single, ancient-looking scroll unrolled on the reading table before him. The air in the room was heavy with the weight of forgotten history.
"Do you know what you have done?" the Elder asked, his voice a low murmur that seemed to be absorbed by the surrounding books. He did not look at Ren.
"I demonstrated a principle of controlled force," Ren replied.
"You demonstrated a forgotten and dangerous art," the Elder corrected, finally turning. His face was not angry, but gravely serious. "What you did was not a simple trick. In the pre-imperial texts, it is referred to by several names. The School of Unmaking called it 'Integrity Sundering'. The Ourosi texts you read about called it a form of 'Resonant Cascade'. It is the art of finding the precise resonant frequency of an object's structural bonds and amplifying it until the object shakes itself apart from the inside."
He gestured to the scroll on the table. "It is an art that was declared forbidden by the first GAMA High Council. Not because it was too powerful, but because it was too subtle. An assassin could use it to make a fortress wall collapse days after he had simply leaned against it. A rival could use it to make his enemy's own Aetheric Artifacts disintegrate in the middle of a battle. It is a terrifying, insidious weapon."
Ren stood silently, the true weight of his actions settling upon him.
"Lin Fei's fear will now curdle into a true, deep-seated hatred. He will see you as a monster that can unmake him with a touch," the Elder said, his eyes intense. "Anya Volkov's genius, which you have now publicly stumped, will turn from mere curiosity into a dangerous obsession. She will seek to dissect your methods, to solve the equation you present. You have made powerful enemies and drawn the attention of the cleverest girl in your generation."
The Elder rolled up the ancient scroll, his movements slow and deliberate. "Your public displays have become too disruptive. They create fear and instability. More importantly, they create data points for the Spirit Lumina Pagoda to analyze. You are to be a ghost, but you continue to haunt the halls in spectacular fashion."
His gaze became hard as iron. "For the next month, you are confined to this Elder's Pavilion. Your training in the garden and your research in this archive will continue uninterrupted. But you will not set foot in the main academy grounds. You will not attend classes. You will not interact with any other student."
He paused, letting the gravity of the sentence land. "You have become too dangerous, and too interesting, to be seen."