The week doesn’t feel long. It feels tight.

  The day after sparring with Finn and Banks, the Academy has taken on a different rhythm. Nothing official changes. There are no announcements, no banners, no reminders posted anywhere. The schedule stays the same. Meals are served at the same times. Bells ring when they always have.

  But everyone knows.

  When Kai and I walk through the halls, conversations soften without stopping. People glance, then look away again. Not out of awe or envy. Just awareness. The kind you give to something that’s about to happen whether you want it to or not.

  Some students ask questions. Most don’t. The ones who do keep it practical.

  “How many attempts do you get?”

  “Are you nervous?”

  “Who else is up?”

  I answer them honestly. Kai does too. No one lingers. No one wishes us luck. That feels deliberate. Luck has nothing to do with it.

  Training ramps up without warning.

  The instructors don’t announce it. They don’t need to. Drills simply run longer. Rest windows shrink until they barely exist. Corrections stop being verbal almost entirely. A tap to the ankle. A shove to the shoulder. A staff rapped against the floor to mark where you should have been standing.

  If you fall, you get up. If you lag, the pace increases instead of slowing. If you hesitate, you feel it immediately.

  By midweek, my calves burn constantly. Not enough to injure, just enough that I’m aware of them with every step. My hands ache in that deep, dull way that means grip strength is being tested more than speed.

  Kai doesn’t complain. Neither do I. No one does.

  Sparring rotations change daily. Sometimes hourly. We’re pushed against people we don’t normally work with. Taller. Shorter. Faster. Sloppier. More cautious. The point isn’t to win. The point is to adapt without wasting effort.

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  That’s what the instructors watch.

  Finn and Banks get folded into the rotations naturally. Not as a special case. Just another pair to rotate through. When we end up grouped together, it isn’t for a full duel. It’s controlled pressure work. Two on two. One pushes while the other recovers. Switch. Rotate. Collapse space, then release it.

  Finn sets the tempo every time. He doesn’t mean to dominate. He just does. His energy fills the space, forcing reactions. Banks anchors him, controlling spacing and recovery with quiet precision. Where Finn commits, Banks stabilizes. Where Finn risks, Banks makes sure it doesn’t cascade.

  Kai adapts faster than I expect under fatigue.

  I don’t comment on it. I just adjust around him.

  By the third session, the four of us stop needing hand signals. Finn presses. I meet him. Banks cuts off Kai’s exit. Kai pivots instead of retreating. It isn’t planned. It just happens.

  After one particularly brutal rotation, Finn drops to a knee, laughing breathlessly, and looks up at me.

  “You guys do this all the time?” he asks.

  Kai shrugs. “Yeah, mostly.”

  Banks studies us for a moment longer than Finn does. He doesn’t say anything, but his eyes are sharp. Measuring. Not us individually, but how we move when we’re tired.

  That night, Kai asks a question.

  It isn’t emotional. It isn’t dramatic. We’re walking back to our room, staffs slung over shoulders, the halls quieter now.

  “When Finn pressures,” he says, “do you want me closer or wider?”

  I think about it for a second. Not long. “Closer,” I say. “You control space better than I do when I’m backing.”

  He nods once. That’s it. No follow up.

  It isn’t fear he’s checking for. It’s alignment.

  Evenings settle into a pattern. We eat early. Light meals. Enough to recover, not enough to slow us down. Conversation stays minimal, not because there’s nothing to say, but because nothing needs to be said.

  We run through forms once in our room. Slowly. Deliberately. No correction unless something feels off. When it does, we adjust without comment and move on.

  Cultivation comes last.

  It’s never abstract. Not for me. It’s pressure and heat and breath stacking until my bones feel heavy and my skin prickles. Fatigue settles deeper than muscle, down into joints and marrow. I stay there until it stabilizes, then let it go.

  Kai finishes slightly before I do, as usual. He waits without pacing.

  When we lie down to sleep, we settle back to back like always. Touch steady. Familiar. No discussion.

  The night before the exam comes quietly.

  There’s no surge of nerves. No restless energy. If anything, the Academy feels subdued. Even the instructors move with less noise, their presence heavier without being obvious.

  We lie in the dark, backs pressed together. I can feel Kai’s breathing slow and even out.

  After a while, he speaks.

  “We’re doing this the same way,” he says.

  It isn’t a question about strategy. Not really.

  “Yeah,” I answer immediately.

  He exhales. Not relief. Just confirmation. Sleep takes us quickly after that.

  When morning comes, it doesn’t feel like an ending or a beginning. It just feels like the next step, and that’s exactly how it should be.