The next day was… Thread Practice Day.
Sparring day, to be exact.
For everyone else, it was exciting. Their first real use of their awakened powers in supervised combat. For Hachi, it was something else entirely.
It was humiliation on schedule.
The practice fields behind Astra High shimmered with containment barriers. Magic-dampening wards glowed faintly under the grass. Drones floated above, recording the matches for review. Students gathered in a wide circle, buzzing with anticipation.
"Thread users will spar in matched pairs," Instructor Noma announced. "Non-lethal force only. No forbidden techniques. Victory is declared when your opponent yields, is immobilized, or is knocked from the ring."
Her eyes scanned the group. "Threadless students will observe and assist with scoring."
The air chilled around Hachi.
That word again.
Threadless.
He kept quiet, standing with the rest of the support students at the edge of the ring. Most didn't even look at him. One or two smirked with pity. He ignored it all.
Just get through the day.
Pairs were called out. The battles began.
Flashes of fire, arcs of ice, gravitational pulls. Students darted, flipped, skidded through the arena with joyful chaos. One kid, Jin, had telekinetic control over coins and used them like railgun bullets. Another, Maya, warped her body like liquid.
The crowd cheered.
Then, inevitably—
"Hachi," Instructor Noma called.
He froze.
"You'll spar with Reo."
There was a pause. The students around him murmured.
Reo stepped forward, smiling a little too wide. His Thread? Compression Heat. He could superheat air molecules in a confined radius—basically, a walking pressure cooker.
"But I'm…" Hachi started.
"We need to evaluate your baseline aptitude," Noma said flatly. "You may not have awakened, but all students train combat fundamentals."
"Translation: get in the ring."
Hachi stepped into the practice circle.
Reo bounced on his heels, clearly enjoying the attention.
"Don't take it personally," he said, stretching his arms. "They told me not to go hard."
Hachi said nothing. He just tried not to show how fast his heart was beating.
A buzzer sounded. "Begin!"
Reo struck fast—too fast.
His left hand swept forward, and the air around Hachi shimmered with heat. He jumped back instinctively—but not far enough. The edge of the pressure wave grazed his arm, searing pain into his shoulder.
The crowd winced.
"Stop flinching!" Reo shouted. "You gotta move, Threadless!"
Another blast.
Hachi ducked—barely. His legs screamed. His breath caught. Reo wasn't holding back at all.
A third wave came at him—and something changed.
In an instant, CoreView activated.
His left eye burned.
Not with fire—but with focus.
The singularity bloomed. The ring spun clockwise.
And suddenly… Hachi saw.
The heat wave wasn't just random—it was a construct, a fragile one. He could see its origin vector, the center of air compression, the weak seam where it destabilized just before ignition.
He could also see Reo's movement pattern—where his weight was shifting, the second before he attacked.
Everything slowed.
And Hachi moved.
He stepped through the opening between Reo's pulses, shifted low, twisted around the incoming burst—and reached for Reo's wrist.
The moment his fingers brushed it, CoreView flared again.
New data flooded in.
Reo's internal temperature had spiked 0.4 degrees. His adrenaline surged. His knees were 0.3 seconds away from locking as a result of overextension.
A counterattack formed in Hachi's mind—instinctively.
He pivoted, grabbed Reo's arm, and flipped him clean over his shoulder.
Reo hit the ground with a thud.
Silence.
Then—
"What the hell?" Reo gasped, stunned.
He looked up at Hachi like he was seeing a ghost.
Instructor Noma narrowed her eyes. "Match paused."
The students broke into whispers.
"Wait—wasn't he Threadless?"
"That throw—did he see that attack coming?"
"I didn't even see him move."
Hachi backed away, his eye fading back to normal. The glow disappeared just before the teacher's gaze locked onto him.
She said nothing.
But her eyes lingered.
After practice, Hachi sat in the locker room, unwrapping his burnt shoulder. It hurt, but not nearly as much as the confusion swirling in his head.
That wasn't normal. That wasn't even human reflex.
His left eye pulsed faintly in the mirror of his locker.
CoreView Level 1 — Thread Analysis Unlocked.Perceive heat vectors, limb trajectory arcs, biomechanical strain, and Thread overclock states in humanoid combatants. Precision reflex threading active.
He closed his eye quickly.
A knock at the door.
It was Instructor Noma.
She didn't enter—just watched him through the crack.
"That throw was... exceptional," she said.
Hachi nodded slowly.
She hesitated, then added, "Report to Lab Room A3 tomorrow morning. Quietly."
Then she was gone.
As the door closed, Hachi turned to the mirror again.
Only his left eye shimmered.
A single ring, spinning clockwise.