Chapter 90: _ I Am No one’s Doormat!

"I don’t know! She left no crest or name! She was just a woman who died in a dirt hut on the edge of the village!" I said, my voice rising as frustration began to boil beneath my panic.

Eldritch uncrossed his arms, drumming his calloused fingers against the edge of the desk. "Are you willing to give me the exact directions to where your adoptive mother lives in Stonewick?"

A greasy feeling settled in the pit of my stomach.

Why would a combat professor at the premier dragon academy care about a mere housewoman living in a mud-brick cottage? Why was he interrogating me about my bloodline behind closed doors?

I narrowed my eyes, pressing my back against the armchair. "Is everything alright, Master Eldritch? Why are you asking me about my mother’s home?"

Eldritch’s expression didn’t change. "Everything is perfectly fine, initiate. I am simply curious about your true origin. Ever since the heartstone incident during the ball... when a markless girl somehow caused an ancient artifact to flare, people in high places have been asking questions. I prefer to find my answers directly."

He stood up from the edge of the desk, walking over to his chair and sitting down. He picked up his quill, dipping it in ink.

"Give me the exact directions to your adoptive mother’s cottage. Do that, and I will personally award you twenty merit marks for today’s exercise."

I stared at him in utter confusion. "Twenty marks? But... Master, you already awarded my squad twenty marks for taking second place in the Gauntlet!"

Master Eldritch paused, holding the quill mid-air. He looked up at me, and a mocking laugh escaped his throat.

"Awarded you marks?" Eldritch chuckled, shaking his head as if I had just told a hilarious joke. "That is a bold assumption, Initiate No-One. How could you possibly be awarded marks for an exercise you didn’t actually participate in?"

My blood turned to pure ice.

"What?"

"The rules of the exercise are absolute," Eldritch stated calmly, leaning back in his tall chair. "Marks are awarded exclusively to squad members who navigate the course, capture sparks, and deposit them into the vault. You were not in a squad. You stood on the dais beside me as an unranked observer. You received zero marks."

I sat frozen in the chair while my mind spun into complete chaos.

I couldn’t believe my ears. Just minutes ago, I had actually felt a tiny spark of genuine gratitude toward this man. I had thought he was different. I had thought that despite his rugged, harsh exterior, he was one of the few instructors who actually saw my worth... a professor who had shielded me from getting trampled and given me a role to help my friends.

It was all a lie.

He was no better than Headmistress Maisie, or any of the other corrupt, rotten faculty crawling through the halls of Last Bastion. He hadn’t been protecting me. He had been isolating me by holding my academic standing hostage so he could squeeze personal information out of me. He was exploiting me.

A furious heat erupted in my chest, burning away the last lingering traces of my fear.

"You’re taking away my marks?" I hissed, my hands clenching into tight fists against my knees. "I operated the master snare! I saved Miriel from plummeting into a pit! I dropped the platform to secure our squad’s placement! I did the work!"

"And you did it remarkably well,. Which is precisely why I am offering you a chance to earn those marks officially. All it costs you is a simple set of directions to a cottage in Stonewick." Eldritch pointed out.

He set his quill down on the desk, tapping his calloused fingers against the wood.

"So, Initiate No-One... let us make this very simple. Which would you prefer to do? Give me the information I need... or start your very first term at Last Bastion with a failing zero on your official record?"

This was our very first practical test. It was a foundational score that would follow me for the rest of the year. A zero on day one would mark me for immediate academic probation, leaving me vulnerable to expulsion or worse.

I’d be a liar if I said the temptation to just speak the words—to give him a street name, a landmarks list, anything to secure those twenty merit marks—didn’t cross my mind.

It would have been so ridiculously easy. I could have secured my academic standing, kept myself off the probation list, and walked out of that office with a passing grade on my very first test.

But as I looked at Master Eldritch’s calculating eyes, I just knew there was no way in hell I was succumbing.

I was done. I was done being used, manipulated, threatened, and trampled on by powerful men who thought they owned the ground I walked on. First Prince Ajax with his blood-locked bracelet, then Prince Ivar with his mind manipulation, Prince Zev with his chaotic possessiveness, Prince Remus with his mysteriousness, Raice with his kiss and threats... and now a professor who thought he could dangle my grade like meat before a starving hound.

If I gave him my mother’s real location, I might be putting the only person who had ever truly loved me in some unknown danger. If I gave him fake directions, a military commander like Eldritch would uncover the lie within days and destroy me anyway.

I slowly stood up from the armchair, drawing myself up to my full height.

"Keep your twenty marks, Master Eldritch. I’d rather start this term with a zero than hand you a weapon to use against my family for whatever evil purposes you have in store."

Eldritch’s eyes widened at my defiance but he didn’t yell. He simply sat motionless behind his desk, watching me as if seeing me for the very first time.

I walked straight out of his office.

My heart was pounding against my ribs, my chest heaving with a mixture of adrenaline, rage, and lingering fear.

A zero.

I had just willingly accepted a failing grade on my very first practical test. In Last Bastion, a zero was a bloodstain on your official record. It meant a permanent target on my back for every instructor looking for an excuse to purge commoners.

Let them try, I thought bitterly, clutching my bag tightly against my ribs as I stepped out of the faculty wing and headed toward the main academic lecture building.

I survived the Stonewick trenches. I survived a Sylven in the drainage grates. I can survive an academic zero.

The afternoon sun was beginning to dip behind the mountain spires, casting bloody shadows across the cobblestone courtyards. Students were streaming between lecture halls with voices echoing as they hurried to their second-period classes.

I picked up my pace, intending to find Bren and Miriel so I could explain why I’d been held up in Eldritch’s office.

But as I rounded the tall archway leading into the central academic courtyard, my feet skidded to a dead halt.

Standing near the base of the staircase were two wardens and they were escorting two students down the steps.

The two students were Miriel and Bren.

Miriel looked like she was on the verge of tears, her face deathly pale as her fingers clutched her satchel to her chest. Bren walked beside her with her chin held high and her jaw tightly set, but her eyes were across the crowded courtyard... searching.

A panic that was far more brutal than anything I’d felt in Eldritch’s office erupted in the center of my chest.

No. No, no, no.

Were my friends being arrested?! Had Warden Clement already made his move regarding the Sunken Arch? Or had Master Eldritch retaliated the exact second I walked out of his room?!