CHAPTER 79 — BEYOND THE IMPOSSIBLE

The air was not cold. The wind was not harsh. There were no storm clouds in the sky.

Yet the air surrounding the medical wing of Mage Academy felt heavy enough to crush the entire city.

No one spoke in the corridor. No one moved inside the room. Teachers passing the door slowed their steps, looked through the glass for a few seconds, then lowered their heads and continued on their way.

Because Percy Grant lay on a white bed inside.

And Percy Grant was dead.

Clara sat beside the bed. She did not know how long she had been there. She held Percy's hand between both of hers, threaded her fingers through his, and pressed his palm against her chest.

It was cold.

Still cold.

Clara had stopped crying.

At least for a few minutes.

Then her eyes drifted to Percy's face, and it began again. Silently. Her shoulders trembling.

The same words kept circling inside her mind.

I waited for a month.

Clara squeezed her eyes shut. “Stop...”

The sentence did not stop.

You used to tell me even when you tripped over a stone.

Clara tightened her grip on Percy's hand.

“I was going to tell you.”

No one answered.

“I was going to tell you today.”

Percy's face did not change. Clara's breath broke apart.

“I really was... going to tell you today.”

Then she remembered his answer.

Today.

One word. It had destroyed every defense Clara possessed that day. Now it hurt far more, because for the first time, she understood what that word had meant to Percy.

“For me, today was one day...” Her voice struggled to emerge. “But for you...”

Fresh tears fell from her eyes.

“Every day for a month was today.”

Clara lowered her head onto Percy's hand.

The era of Percy and Clara is over.

“No.”

Stay away from me.

“No...”

I don't want to like you anymore.

Clara's chest tightened, but she could no longer object.

Percy had given her a month. Not a day. Not a single chance. A month.

All Clara had needed to do was speak.

And now Percy could not.

Adrian Wycliffe stood on the other side of the glass.

Normally, he always carried something: a book, a file, an exam paper, or some ridiculous note counting the years, months, and days until his retirement.

Now his hands were empty at his sides. His gaze never left Percy, yet his eyes seemed fixed on somewhere far beyond the body in that room.

This was not supposed to happen.

The same thought repeated in Wycliffe's mind.

This child was not supposed to be lying there.

Percy was talented. Even saying that felt inadequate. Calling him merely a successful student sounded almost insulting.

He could have changed the limits of humanity.

Perhaps he would have.

No.

He already had.

Wycliffe closed his eyes for a moment, and Percy's voice returned.

“Teacher.”

He remembered Percy standing before him, trying to explain the Orin drawn from outside the body.

“Don't try to feel the energy you take in as your own immediately.”

Wycliffe had frowned. “What do you mean?”

Percy had pointed at his chest.

“You know your own Orin. You've known it for years. You can feel the rhythm of the energy you've purified. Instead of mixing what you draw from outside into it... first learn to separate the two.”

Wycliffe had listened in silence.

“If you can feel the foreign energy as clearly as you feel your own, you can understand what your Core is rejecting.”

Wycliffe had tried.

Once.

Twice.

Ten times.

And then the wall that had stood before him for years had cracked.

AWAKENED CORE: LEVEL ONE.

The first thing Wycliffe had said had not even been about magic.

“Percy...”

The child had looked at him. “Yes, Teacher?”

“Thank you.”

Percy had merely smiled. “You're welcome.”

Wycliffe opened his eyes. The same child lay motionless beyond the glass.

He had occasionally overlooked Percy's behavior. Yes. Perhaps more often than he did for the other students.

Not when Percy hurt someone. Not when he abused the rules. But when he acted spoiled, shouted something ridiculous, asked meaningless questions in the middle of a lesson, complained, “Teacher, is this exam really necessary?”, laughed with Nathaniel, or argued with Clara.

When he was a child.

Because Adrian Wycliffe could see Percy growing up too quickly. While everyone else tried to turn him into something stronger, smarter, and greater, Wycliffe had sometimes wanted to let him remain seven years old.

His lower lip trembled.

“Percy...”

His voice was almost inaudible.

“Percy.”

One tear rolled down his face. Then another. Wycliffe rested his forehead against the glass.

“How am I supposed to retire now?”

No answer came.

“You can't leave me alone with these children.”

His voice broke.

“Percy...”

A hard impact echoed from the other end of the corridor.

BAM!

The wall cracked. Galahad's fist was buried in the stone.

No one turned to look at him, because no one there was in any condition to stop him.

Galahad's head hung low. Blood ran between his fingers, but he could not feel the pain.

There was only one word in his mind.

Big brother.

“Big brother... will you teach me too?”

Another memory.

“Big brother.”

“What happened?”

“Clara hurt me.”

“What did you do?”

“Nothing.”

“Percy.”

“I did a little something.”

Another.

“BIG BROTHER!”

“What?”

“Look!”

“I'm looking.”

“LOOK HARDER!”

Galahad closed his eyes.

After losing his little brother, he had continued breathing for years, but he had not felt alive.

Then Percy had appeared before him.

“Bro.”

One word. Without permission. As if they had known one another for years.

At first, Galahad had seen the brother he had lost inside Percy. Then one day he realized he no longer loved Percy because Percy reminded him of that brother.

He loved Percy because Percy was Percy.

And now...

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from NovelPhoenix; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

He had failed to reach him again.

“Leon.”

The hand buried in the wall curled into a fist.

“Leon Ashford.”

Galahad raised his head. There were tears in his eyes, but none in his voice.

“I will kill you.”

Even so, he did not leave.

Percy was inside, and Galahad could not abandon him a second time.

News of Percy's death spread through Awakeners City too quickly to control.

Leon heard it too.

His first reaction was silence.

Then he laughed.

For the first time in a long while, he truly laughed.

“He's dead.”

He repeated it to himself.

“He's really dead.”

His life had been ruined because of Percy. At least, that was what Leon believed.

His academy was gone. His family's privileges were gone. The weight of his surname had vanished in a matter of hours.

But Percy was dead too.

A broad smile spread across Leon's lips.

“At least...”

He closed his eyes for a moment.

“I took your life.”

His laughter rose again, but it did not last.

New notifications appeared on his Shiri.

His mother.

His father.

Both had been arrested by order of the Council.

Then he saw his own face.

WANTED.

The notice had been distributed across the entire security network of Awakeners City. Leon's smile slowly disappeared.

He could not stay here. He could not return to the academy. He could not go home. He could not move openly through the city.

After a moment, a place came to mind.

His uncle's hidden house.

Very few people knew of it. If he could reach it, he could disappear for a while.

Leon pulled his hood over his head and set out.

Time had no meaning in Percy's room.

Hours passed. Night came. Morning followed. One day passed, then another half day.

Percy's body remained in the same place.

And Clara's hand remained around his.

Eleanor had tried on the first night.

“Clara.”

Clara did not raise her head.

“Rest for a while.”

“No.”

“I'll hold his hand.”

Clara's fingers tightened around Percy's.

“No.”

“Clara...”

“I promised.”

Eleanor fell silent. Clara's voice trembled.

“I said I wouldn't let go again.”

Galahad tried a few hours later.

“Clara.”

“No.”

He had not even finished his sentence.

Elizabeth Olsen tried as well. Clara looked at her. Her eyes were swollen, her face pale, and her lips dry.

Yet she had not released Percy's hand.

“I promised.”

Olsen said nothing. She only looked at Clara, then at Percy.

My personal student.

Talent had not been the only reason she chose Percy. She had seen talented children before. Exceptionally talented ones.

Percy was different.

His character...

He was a child. Absolutely a child. He pulled hair. He argued with stones. He never missed an opportunity to annoy Clara. He shouted when he achieved something and sulked when he lost.

But sometimes, something appeared in his eyes that did not belong in a seven-year-old.

At first, Olsen had thought it was intelligence.

It was not.

Holar Jun's purpose in giving Percy his first real mission had been simple: show him the outside world, teach him that monsters were real, and make him understand that battle was not an arena.

Percy had seen the monsters.

But he had also seen the dead.

And Percy's first thought had not been of himself.

What if Clara dies?

Then Arthur. William. Nathaniel. Charlotte. Daniel. Marcus. All of them.

What would he do if he lost them? What would he say to their families? What could he tell someone's mother?

What did it feel like to say, I couldn't protect them?

Percy had thought about all of it. Then he had thought about their training, about his own strength, and most importantly, why he wanted to become stronger.

Percy had never wanted power to destroy things. He did not care how many things he could erase.

He wanted to protect.

Olsen stared at Percy's motionless face.

“You were seven years old,” she whispered. “You weren't supposed to think about these things.”

A tear slid down her cheek.

“But you did.”

Footsteps began gathering outside the door. A few at first, then more.

The students of Class 1-A had heard the news and arrived one by one. No one truly managed to stop them.

Nathaniel was at the front.

The instant he stepped through the door and saw Percy, he stopped. His breath caught as if someone had struck him in the chest.

Then he walked forward. Faster.

“President.”

Percy did not answer.

Nathaniel moved closer.

“President.”

William stood behind him without his glasses.

Nathaniel called a third time.

“President...”

William's voice was very low. “He isn't the president anymore.”

Nathaniel spun around.

“Shut up.”

William froze. Tears were running down Nathaniel's face.

“He's my president.”

Silence settled over the room.

Nathaniel sniffed.

“Always.”

He looked at Percy.

“He trained me. He made me stronger. He even became the reason for the food I've eaten... and all the food I'll eat.”

Normally, someone would have laughed after that sentence.

No one did.

Nathaniel's lips trembled.

“I was the child everyone thought was weak.”

He remembered the days before the tournament. Percy and Clara training him for hours. His broken arm. The healing. Trying again. Percy saying the same thing every time.

Again.

“When I didn't believe in myself...” Nathaniel lowered his head. “He believed in me.”

William said nothing.

For the first time, he truly had nothing to say.

His mind was always working. One possibility. Two. Ten. Probabilities.

William had been the first person to teach Percy to watch not only what his opponent did, but what they might do. The shoulder. The angle of the foot. The eyes. The center of gravity. The tiny signs that revealed a movement before it began.

Percy had listened, then asked questions, then asked more.

And that was what William loved most about him.

Percy never left what he learned where he found it. He took it, tested it, lost, tried again, and eventually turned it into something of his own.

Before long, William began seeing the things he had taught Percy inside Percy's battles—sometimes used in ways William himself had never considered.

William's eyes filled.

Perhaps he had not been among Percy's first teachers, but he had been one of the first to see how hungry Percy was to learn.

He always asked.

“Why?”

“What if I step here?”

“What if he doesn't do that?”

“Isn't there another possibility?”

And when he received an answer, he never merely memorized it. He tried to understand.

William removed his glasses and looked at Percy. Only a few words escaped him.

“The president I chose...”

His voice broke.

“My president.”

Charlotte covered her mouth. She tried not to cry.

She failed.

“Idiot.”

No one asked whom she meant.

Charlotte looked at Percy.

“Do you know how many times you gave me a headache?”

She smiled, but the tears did not stop.

“You argued with William. You argued with Clara. You argued with Arthur. You drove Nathaniel insane.”

Nathaniel nodded through his tears. “True.”

For an instant, Charlotte's smile grew. Then it fell apart.

“You drove me insane too. But when you were in the room... people laughed.”

She lowered her head.

“You were supposed to keep annoying us for years.”

Arthur had not spoken until now. His legs grew heavy as he approached Percy's bed.

He stopped and stared at his rival for a long time. Finally, his lips parted.

“Weren't you supposed to be my rival?”

Richard Green stood a few steps behind his son.

Arthur's eyes reddened.

“Weren't you?”

He looked at Percy's face.

“What happened, Percy?” His voice rose. “How can you die this easily?”

Richard placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Son...”

Arthur did not pull away, but he did not calm down either.

“Father.”

Richard fell silent.

Tears began streaming from Arthur's eyes.

“He told me I needed to become a shield. And he was right. I used to do nothing but attack. I thought hitting harder was enough to win. Giving up my old attacks was difficult, but I changed. I developed in the way that suited me because he told me...”

His voice broke completely.

“Become a shield.”

Arthur looked at his hands. He remembered a street years ago, when both of them had been much smaller. Arthur stepping in front of Percy and raising his shield. Then another attack coming—and Percy stepping in front of Arthur.

Arthur covered his face with both hands.

“Father...”

Richard pulled his son against him. Arthur was sobbing like a child now.

“I couldn't be his shield. He protected me. I couldn't protect him.”

Richard held him tighter.

“I couldn't protect him.”

“Arthur...”

“I COULDN'T PROTECT HIM!”

Richard had no words, because his own eyes were fixed on Percy.

He remembered facing a seven-year-old child in the past. Percy healing Arthur, lifting him instead of humiliating him.

Remain my rival. Not a parasite.

Then he thought of the Resonance technique. Percy had not hidden it, sold it, or kept it as his personal advantage.

He had given it to the world.

A tear slipped from Richard's eye. Then another.

“You were our source of joy, child.”

Ethan stood beside the door. He said nothing for a while, then sniffed.

“He made me run a thirteenth lap.”

Nathaniel looked at him through his tears.

Ethan pressed his lips together. “I wish he would make me run one more.”

Marcus did not speak. He simply moved beside the door and watched their surroundings as always, as though he would allow no one to disturb Percy when he woke.

Daniel lowered his head. Sophia crouched behind Clara. Amelia was crying. Theodore leaned against the wall. Elias, Lucas, Noah, and Adrian could not find the right words.

For the first time, an entire class of children did not know what to do.

Because the person who had always pointed them somewhere, even in their worst moments...

was lying in that bed.

Eleanor listened to all of it in silence, but she could not look at Percy. Every time she did, another memory returned.

“Auntie.”

Her face crumpled. Her heart melted every time Percy called her that.

Holar had wanted to give him a childhood. That was why he had taught Percy little beyond the foundations in his earliest years.

Eleanor had been unable to resist.

“What harm could teaching him a little do?”

And so she had begun, asking nothing in return.

One day Percy had disappeared. When Eleanor went looking for him, he returned carrying crookedly cut apples, pears, and a few other fruits arranged on a small plate.

“Auntie.”

Eleanor had stared. “What is this?”

“You taught me.”

“Yes?”

Percy had offered her the plate.

“So I brought you something too.”

Eleanor had laughed that day.

Percy had never lost his respect for her. He teased her, ran from her, and sometimes drove her mad, but he never forgot the line between them.

To Eleanor, Percy was not somebody else's child.

He was like her second son.

Her gaze shifted to Holar.

The strongest man in the world. The First Awakened. Humanity's savior. Absolute Will. The man who had stood alone before millions of monsters.

Now he looked so weak that Eleanor feared a touch might knock him over.

Holar sat beside Percy with one hand still in the boy's hair. He had barely moved from that spot for a day and a half.

His mind, however, had gone much further back.

The first light.

That glow descending from the sky.

When Holar saw him inside it, he had not understood what he was looking at.

Then...

A baby.

He had been bound so he would not move during the journey. His little arms and legs could barely shift.

Holar had undone the restraints and taken Percy into his arms for the first time.

The baby stared at him for a few seconds.

Then he smiled and grabbed Holar's beard.

“Ah.”

He refused to let go. Holar tried to pull his head back. Percy held tighter, then moved on to his hair.

Holar had laughed for the first time that night.

“What are you?”

Percy could not answer. He only pulled his hair.

After a while, the little head settled against Holar's chest, and Percy fell asleep without fear—as though he had known the man holding him for years.

Holar looked at the same face now.

Years had passed, but suddenly he could no longer see the seven-year-old lying in the bed. He saw the baby pulling his beard.

His lower lip trembled.

For the first time in two thousand years, tears came easily.

“Percy...”

He placed a hand against his grandson's cheek.

“When I first held you...”

His voice failed. Holar Jun could not finish the sentence.

Clara raised her head for the first time.

She had felt something.

At first, it was faint. The cold in Percy's hand had changed.

Clara frowned and tightened her grip.

Warmth.

Tiny, but real.

Her eyes widened.

“...Percy?”

No one reacted.

Clara straightened. “Percy?”

Olsen turned. Galahad pushed away from the wall. Holar's hand froze against Percy's cheek.

And then a voice was heard.

It did not belong to a human. It did not come from a room or from any single point.

It was as though the universe itself had spoken.

[FIRE ELEMENT AFFINITY: 19% → 20%]

Olsen's eyes widened.

“No...”

Then came a second message.

[REQUIRED CONDITIONS MET.]

A red spark appeared at the center of Percy's chest.

[LOCKED ATTRIBUTE AWAKENING.]

Holar stood. Clara's fingers locked around Percy's hand.

[FLAME OF THE CHAOS FIRE DRAGON — AWAKENED.]

This time, everyone heard it. Those inside the room. Those in the corridor. Class 1-A. Richard. Wycliffe.

All of them.

Then the voice changed.

Greater.

Heavier.

[ACHIEVEMENT BEYOND THE IMPOSSIBLE!]

William's eyes opened wide.

“What...?”

[CONGRATULATIONS, PERCY GRANT.]

A small flame formed above Percy's heart, but it burned nothing. Not the bed. Not his clothes. Not Clara's hands.

The flame entered Percy.

[FINAL REQUIREMENT FOR LOCKED ATTRIBUTE MET.]

One second.

[REQUIREMENT: DEATH.]

Everyone in the room froze.

Clara's lips parted. Olsen took a step forward.

“Death...”

[REQUIREMENT MET.]

[REVERSAL INITIATED.]

Something moved beneath Percy's chest.

Holar's eyes widened.

Flame began spreading through Percy's veins, but this was not ordinary healing. It did not close wounds or repair dead cells.

The flame of chaos was returning what had happened to its previous state.

[BODY CLOCK REVERSING.]

[SOUL CLOCK REVERSING.]

The lightning scars on Percy's chest began to disappear. Burned tissue returned. Severed connections reformed.

But the process did not stop there.

The vessels around his heart changed. His blood was changing. The energy spreading through every artery was different.

Chaos.

Fire.

The two could no longer be separated.

It traveled through every vessel extending from Percy's chest—to his shoulders, his arms, his wrists, his fingertips, his legs, his feet, his brain.

Every cell seemed to be born again at once.

[CURRENT FIRE ELEMENT BEING REPLACED.]

[FIRE ELEMENT → FLAME OF THE CHAOS FIRE DRAGON.]

[CURRENT AFFINITY: 20%.]

The hand Clara held grew warm.

Truly warm.

Her breath caught.

“Percy.”

One finger moved.

Clara screamed.

“PERCY!”

Holar leaned forward. Galahad's mouth fell open. Olsen stared at Percy's chest.

A muscle shifted. Then Percy's foot. The muscles in his leg tightened. His brow drew together ever so slightly.

Clara was crying, but she no longer knew why.

“Percy...”

A faint expression appeared on his face, as though he were waking from a very long and uncomfortable sleep.

Then his heart beat.

THUMP.

No one in the room breathed.

Once more.

THUMP.

Olsen's knees nearly gave way. Beyond the glass, Wycliffe pressed both hands against it.

Only one word escaped Galahad.

“Brother...”

Percy's eyelids trembled.

Clara did not release his hand.

“I'm here.”

Once more.

“Percy, I'm here.”

Percy's eyes slowly opened.

The first person he saw was Clara.

Her hair was disheveled. Her eyes were swollen. Her face was covered in tears.

Percy looked at her for several seconds. The corner of his mouth curved ever so slightly.

“Hello...”

Clara's mouth opened.

Percy's voice was barely audible.

“My sweet little troublemaker.”

Then he closed his eyes.

Clara felt as though her heart might stop. Olsen immediately leaned over him.

One second.

Two.

Then she raised her head, laughing through her tears.

“He's sleeping.”

Percy Grant...

This time, he was only sleeping.