The stone amphitheater of the training center felt different this afternoon. The air did not carry the usual scent of mocking whispers and dismissive laughter; it was thick with a heavy, expectant silence that vibrated against Regulus's reflective surface.
Perched on Crispin's shoulder, the Emperor assessed the room. He perceived the alteration in the social hierarchy before any communication occurred.
The students who had previously sneered at the "smith's son" and his "puddle of jelly" now stood in tight, wary clusters. Lucien was among them, his black dragon whelp tucked under one arm; its smoking scales were a dull, defeated gray.
The girl with the golden dragon watched Crispin with unblinking curiosity. A focused assessment of his new, unshakable stance had replaced her earlier casual curiosity.
"Tamers," the Elder's voice rang out, rolling across the stone like a strike on an anvil. "Today, we test the limits of adaptability. Many of you possess beasts of great power, but power without precision is merely a loud failure."
The Elder gestured to a cage of petrified wood at the center of the pit. Inside, a Glint-Wing bird paced restlessly. Its feathers were shards of polished sun-crystal that caught the light and fractured it into a blinding kaleidoscope.
To Regy, the bird was a nightmare of high-frequency vibrations and erratic thermal spikes—a creature built for a speed that defied standard biological tracking.
"Crispin Thorneborn," the Elder announced. "You will face Sera's Glint-Wing. Your aim is not destruction, but containment."
Crispin stepped down into the pit. The Shadow-Twilight spear in his hand hummed with a cold, steady resonance. Regy felt the Anchor's resolve—a warm, golden hue in the bond that acted as a structural frame for his own growing mass.
The thought appeared as a sharp needle of gold. It is fast, Crispin. It does not move like a drake. It moves like light.
The cage door snapped open.
The Glint-Wing did not fly; it vanished. One moment it was on the stone, the next it was a streak of gold light reflecting off the vaulted ceiling. Regy's multi-faceted sensory array struggled to lock on.
The bird struck with a sonic shriek, its crystal-edged wings raking across Crispin's shoulder before he could even raise his weapon.
"Regy, mace form!" Crispin shouted, pivoting on his heel as he adjusted his center of gravity.
Regy launched. Mid-air, his quicksilver mass elongated and hardened, snapping into the heavy, spiked head of a Morningstar.
He synchronized his internal density with Crispin's swing, pouring the weight of his stored mass into the strike. The mace cut through the air with a roar, but the Glint-Wing was gone. It banked off a stone pillar with a grace that defied physics.
It is baiting the weight, Regy realized, his new intellect analyzing the bird's flight patterns. We are too heavy. Too predictable.
Crispin grasped for air as the bird dived again, its talons clicking against the stone inches from his boots. The students on the terraces leaned forward. Their hearts transmitted a frantic, jagged frequency of excitement.
Regy rippled back onto Crispin's shoulder. He signaled they needed to change the architecture. He drew upon the Aethereal Long Blueprint. His liquid-silver surface churned as scales expanded into a miniature, draconian shape. He took flight, his quicksilver tail beating the heavy air of the pit with a rhythmic, metallic hum.
For several minutes, the pit was a theater of aerial pursuit. The silver long chased the golden light, weaving between ceiling beams and banking against the arches. Regy unleashed a jet of brilliant blue dragon-fire—the refined heat he had learned from Ebony—not to strike the bird, but to create a thermal wall that forced the Glint-Wing lower.
The bird shrieked in frustration, its crystalline feathers glowing with intense heat. It dived toward the stone floor, intending to use its superior speed to lose the long in the shadows of the lower terraces.
"Now!" Crispin roared.
Regy didn't just follow; he anticipated. He collapsed his long form mid-flight, falling like a silver star toward the stone. As he struck the ground, he transitioned into the cave-spider form.
Eight jointed legs erupted from his mass, their adaptive nodes locking into the granite with the unnatural stability of his gravity-ore. He maintained his familiar slime shape to maximize his center of mass.
He scuttled up the vertical wall of the pit. The Glint-Wing banked to avoid the wall, but Regy was already there. He launched from the stone, metallic chitin reflecting the blinding kaleidoscope of the bird's feathers. He struck the bird's back, compounding his momentum into a crushing force.
Mid-air, Regy engaged his Neurotoxin Synthesis. He did not bite to kill; he pinned the creature's wings against its body with his silver mass. His spider-legs wrapped around the bird like a closing gauntlet. They hit the ground with a thunderous thud that shook the amphitheater floor.
Regy sat atop the struggling bird. His metallic fangs rested against the Glint-Wing's throat. His golden-ringed eyes narrowed with dominance. The Glint-Wing went still, its crystal feathers dimming as it acknowledged the Sovereign's weight.
"Time!" the Elder called, his voice echoing in the absolute silence of the pit.
Regulus did not move immediately. He felt the bird's rapid heartbeat beneath his mass. He looked up at the Elder, then at the terraces.
A single clap started from the girl with the golden dragon, then another. Within seconds, the amphitheater erupted. The students were on their feet, cheering. They applauded with a respect that Regy felt as a physical warmth—a resonance of recognition that finally overwrote the "scavenger" label.
Regy flowed back into his orb shape and hopped onto Crispin's shoulder. Crispin looked at the crowd, then at the Elder, his spine straight and his breathing perfectly synchronized.
"He isn't just a slime," the Elder said softly. "He is the sovereign of the deep."
Regy flexed his tiny, translucent bicep one more time. He was no longer a problem. He was a king who had learned how to hunt, and the city finally understood that in Eldir-Vahn, mass was only the beginning.