He outlined the terms with the calm of a judge delivering an edict: Lord Star would lend Leroy a single relic. Leroy would have one week to master it and return it to Stargate—success or failure, the relic must come back. If Leroy fled or hid beyond that week, Lord Star would hunt him down like any other fugitive.

  “One week to master a relic? That’s suicide,” Leroy snapped, voice raw with disbelief. “You might as well kill me here.”

  Lord Star’s smile was faint but unyielding.

  “You’re the kind of young man who breaks into a Councilor’s home and holds his sister hostage,” he said. “Surely studying a little stone shouldn’t frighten you.”

  Leroy glared at him, but the older man’s calm was immovable, steady as the night itself. The fury drained out of him, leaving only exhaustion and a faint spark of curiosity.

  Without another word, Lord Star reached for the transmitter on his desk.

  “Bring me the Smaragdinus,” he ordered.

  Moments later, a soldier entered and placed a small object into his hand — a gemstone, emerald-green and softly luminous, no larger than two knuckles. It pulsed faintly, as if alive.

  Lord Star turned and held it out.

  “This,” he said, “is what you asked for.”

  Leroy frowned, staring at the stone as it gleamed between them.

  “How am I supposed to use it? Throw it at the enemy’s walls?” he asked dryly.

  Lord Star shook his head once.

  “No. You swallow it.”

  Leroy blinked, unsure if he’d heard correctly.

  “If I swallow it, how am I supposed to return it?”

  “Don’t concern yourself with that,” Lord Star replied evenly. “It’s the only relic I’ll offer you. If you refuse, give it back.”

  He extended his open palm — the invitation, or the warning.

  Leroy hesitated, then took the stone. It was warm against his skin, its green light dancing across his fingers like the shimmer of deep water. He could feel the hum of power, alien yet oddly welcoming.

  “You said it matches me,” he murmured. “Why?”

  Lord Star’s gaze softened, just slightly.

  “Because it responds to faith — not belief in gods, but in yourself. And you, Leroy Livingstone, are reckless enough to believe in your own conviction beyond reason. That’s what this relic demands.”

  He didn’t say the rest aloud.

  Smaragdinus, an S-Grade relic, one of the few known to bind to the body and evolve with its host. It could channel adaptive force through muscle, bone, or will.

  Focused on the limbs, it turned blows into seismic power.

  Spread across the body, it hardened flesh into armor even flight was possible when mastery deepened.

  But it had a flaw.

  If the wielder wavered — if doubt bled through faith — its light would dim, and its power falter.

  It required absolute belief.

  Lord Star saw it in the young man’s eyes: that raw, dangerous clarity born of grief. He was exactly the kind of fool who could make such a relic sing.

  Leroy looked once more at the glowing stone, then lifted it to his lips.

  “To hell with it,” he muttered and swallowed.

  For a moment, nothing. Then a slow, spreading heat unfurled through his chest, winding like liquid fire through his veins. His heartbeat seemed to echo inside his skull — steady, deep, resonant.

  But there was no pain. Only awareness, sharp and new.

  Lord Star watched quietly, the faintest glimmer of satisfaction in his eyes.

  When Leroy’s breathing steadied, the elder Councilor stood and motioned toward the manor’s great doors.

  “Now for your first test,” he said, leading Leroy outside into the cold dawn air.

  The eastern horizon glowed pale gold. Morning light spilled over the cliffs of Stargate, painting the towers in silver.

  Lord Star stopped at the threshold and turned to him.

  “Your challenge,” he said simply, “is to fly. Leave this place as the relic intends or you fail here and now.”

  “Huh… how am I even supposed to do this?” Leroy muttered, pressing his hand against the left side of his stomach, as if expecting the relic to reveal itself. Nothing happened.

  “That,” said Lord Star, “is for you to discover.”

  He patted Leroy’s shoulder, a surprisingly human gesture. “And you’d best hurry. Your week starts now.”

  Then, with a faint smirk, he added,

  “And stay clear of my courtyard, would you? I’d rather not have it destroyed when you crash into the ground.”

  Leroy opened his mouth to reply, but the Councilor had already turned, walking back into the silver-lit halls of Stargate.

  Near the doorway, Starmist stood waiting, her arms crossed, her expression still sharp with irritation.

  “Brother,” she said coldly, “why would you hand a relic of that power to a trespasser?”

  Lord Star paused, half-turned toward her. His tone was steady, almost amused.

  “Because, my sister, if my instincts are right… that man will become someone in the future.”

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  “He broke into our manor. That’s not instinct, that’s insanity,” Starmist snapped.

  “True,” said Lord Star, his eyes glinting faintly. “But risking your life for four comrades? That’s the kind of foolishness great good man are made of.”

  He left her with that, walking deeper into the corridor.

  For a moment, Starmist just stood there, her anger softening into reluctant thought. She turned toward the front windows, curiosity betraying her.

  Outside, in the pale light of morning, Leroy was still trying to master flight.

  He staggered across the grass, launching himself again and again, sometimes lifted for seconds before tumbling into the earth. A few soldiers tried to help him, catching him when his landings grew too rough.

  Then, at last, with a burst of determination and perhaps luck — he found the rhythm.

  The relic within him flared, its green light flashing through the veins of his forearms and eyes.

  With a shout that was half terror, half triumph, Leroy rose into the sky — unsteady, wild, but flying nonetheless.

  Starmist couldn’t help it; she laughed softly, shaking her head.

  “A hero?” she murmured.

  Two days later, Leroy had vanished into the wastelands beyond the city — training himself in silence among sand and rock, testing the strange new power that answered only to conviction.

  He learned to move with it, to harden his skin, to lift himself with nothing but will.

  But still… he didn’t trust it.

  When the third day came and he set out for the Cogworks facility where his unit had been taken, he wore his bulletproof armor, air-padding rig, and reinforced gauntlets — as if clinging to the past safety of commonfolk tools.

  For hours, he flew toward his destination, following the fractured signals of military distress beacons, until at last the black silhouette of the laboratory rose from the desert horizon.

  There was no stealth this time.

  Leroy crashed through the upper skylight like a meteor, the Smaragdinus flaring with emerald fury. He tore through steel walls and reinforced glass, the professors and guards too stunned to react. The so-called “mad scientist” who ruled the compound never saw him coming, the battle ended in hours, brutal and one-sided.

  But when the smoke cleared, the victory curdled into horror.

  In the cold blue light of the containment chamber, he found them.

  His four teammates.

  Their bodies were twisted with metal and wire, eyes hollow, their limbs half-machine, grotesque mockeries of the people he’d sworn to save.

  The experiments had failed. Their bodies had rejected the implants. Their souls, long gone.

  Leroy dropped to his knees among them, his breath shuddering.

  For a moment he couldn’t tell if the trembling in his hands came from the relic’s power… or from what it meant to have arrived too late.

  All that strength.

  All that conviction.

  And still he couldn’t save anyone.

  The Smaragdinus pulsed faintly inside him, its light dimming as his faith faltered.

  That night, Leroy Livingstone, the soldier who had broken into a Councilor’s home for friendship. Mourn quietly in that ruin.

  On the sixth day, Leroy returned to Stargate.

  He wore his full military uniform.

  He had failed his mission, but a promise was a promise. The relic had to be returned.

  He removed his beret, knocked once on the grand doors, and was escorted by a servant through the marble corridors into Lord Star’s study.

  Inside, Lord Star was not alone.

  He sat across from another man by the fire — an elder, robed, and calm, a cup of tea steaming in his hand. The two were deep in conversation, their voices low, until both turned as Leroy entered.

  Leroy stiffened immediately. He recognized the aura before the face.

  The other man was Cygnus Spellbane, the Sorcerer Supreme.

  Lord Star smiled faintly.

  “Cygnus,” he said, “this is the commonfolk I told you about.”

  Cygnus set down his cup, rose, and extended a hand. His grip was firm, his gaze impossibly sharp.

  Leroy bowed slowly, then sat when invited, posture straight as a soldier at review.

  He began to speak, haltingly at first, then with weight. He told them he had completed his mission. The professor was dead, his lab destroyed. He had buried his four friends with his own hands.

  He also said he wished to return the relic, and afterward, leave the army.

  He wanted to live quietly, as an ordinary man.

  Cygnus tilted his head, his voice smooth but carrying the weight of centuries.

  “Tell me, young soldier, do you truly believe you are ordinary?”

  Before Leroy could answer, Lord Star spoke — his tone warm but steady.

  “You’re the most deserving man to ever touch that relic, despite your failure.”

  Cygnus added,

  “People like you are vanishing from the All Realm, especially among the superhuman.”

  Leroy lowered his eyes to the floor. It felt less like praise than a judgment.

  The fire crackled. The two Councilors’ eyes gleamed in the flickering light.

  Then Cygnus leaned slightly forward, resting his elbows on his knees. His words fell like prophecy.

  “If you walk away now, you stain the very thread of power that has been written for you.”

  For a long moment, no one spoke. Leroy’s hands trembled slightly on his knees.

  Finally, Lord Star broke the silence.

  “What the Sorcerer Supreme means, Leroy, is this—”

  He placed a hand on the young man’s shoulder.

  “We wish for you to keep the relic. Not as a loan… but as your own. In return, we may one day ask for your aid at war against the League of the Transcendent.”

  Leroy’s gaze dropped back to the floor, shadow cutting across his face. He felt honored, yet unworthy.

  He had failed to save the people who mattered most. What use was power now?

  Lord Star and Cygnus exchanged a glance, the kind only men who had seen centuries could share — and then, with quiet understanding, Lord Star rose.

  He guided Leroy back toward the door, stopping at the threshold where morning light crept through the stained glass.

  “Keep the relic for now,” said Lord Star gently. “When you have your answer, return here. I trust you will, whatever that answer is.”

  Leroy looked at him, then bowed low, the gesture full of conflicted respect.

  When he stepped outside into the dawn air, the wind carried the faint hum of the relic deep within his chest — alive, waiting.

  Before reaching the front doors, Starmist descended the stairs.

  Seeing her, Leroy stopped and bowed his head, once again apologizing for the chaos he had caused during their first encounter.

  Starmist didn’t seem interested in revisiting the past.

  “So,” she asked in her calm, even tone, “are you joining us?”

  Leroy rubbed the back of his neck, awkwardly.

  “I… need a little more time to think.”

  “Then think fast, soldier,” she replied with a faint smile. “Wars don’t wait for people to find their resolve.”

  She walked past him and disappeared down the corridor, her steps echoing softly.

  When Leroy returned home, he spent the next three days in quiet reflection.

  The walls of his small quarters were bare, save for a single framed photograph — his old squad, smiling before their final mission.

  On the third day, something changed.

  He caught himself smiling again, not in pride, but in peace a kind of calm acceptance.

  He looked at the photograph and whispered,

  “All of you… thank you for saving me back then. I’ll carry this strength with your names and your honor.”

  He placed the photo on his desk, straightened his coat, and left.

  When he arrived once more at Stargate, Lord Star was waiting.

  Leroy knelt before him and stated clearly without hesitation, that he wished to join the ranks of the Weapon Master faction as one of the young superhumans.

  Lord Star smiled — that rare, approving smile that could warm or intimidate the entire room.

  The two men spoke for hours, of war, of the burdens that came with power.

  When Leroy finally took his leave, the night sky outside was filled with stars.

  In the courtyard, he found Starmist again, sitting on a stone bench, eating a small cake under the soft glow of the moon.

  She looked up at him with that familiar coolness.

  “So, what’s your decision, soldier?”

  Leroy grinned.

  “I think I’ll be needing your advice and probably your help for quite a while.”

  “Then I suppose,” said Starmist, smiling faintly, “we’ll have plenty of exciting times ahead in the All Realm.”

  “I’m counting on it,” he laughed, turning toward the gates.

  He walked down the marble steps, the wind rising around him.

  For the first time, he didn’t feel small.

  He didn’t feel lost.

  He walked forward, a young soldier, confident and unshaken, stepping into a future greater than himself.

  And that was the day the name The Green Wraith was born.

  One year later, he, Starmist, and Knight Quasar became known as the brightest trio of young superhumans in all of All Realm.

  Two years after that, the first Regal Vanguard was formed by the founding Council.

  The trio joined forces with every great superhuman across the realms, changing the course of the war against the League of the Transcendent.

  Among their ranks stood young and promising names that would echo through history, more or less they are known as Amaterasu, Susanoo, Bjorn, Remini, Sicilia, Lucretius, Raidbones, and Dryskull.