
by Nikki D
Twelve years ago a sixteen-year-old student walked through the Temple of Ryss at night. Twelve guards. One cut each. He put the Viceroy on one knee, never spoke a word, and was gone before the second watch arrived. By morning they were striking his name from the records. The name was Ren. Hiro was never supposed to matter. A foundling from the cargo docks, raised in the Temple by the same Viceroy, brought up on archive scrolls and other people's aphorisms. Today is the examination — the one day he has to prove he wasn't a mistake. He puts his hands on the sword, reaches down into the planet's living current, and lights three dobas at once. The Order has seen that exactly once before. Nobody tells him what it means. He gets a School — Seirin, the green path — two comrades named Kai and Mick, and a mentor with reasons he doesn't share. Everyone on Ryss says Ren went mad. Hiro, alone by a fire with three empty slits in his own hilt, counts what he knows — twelve men, twelve clean cuts, not one wasted — and stops believing it. What this is: - Swordsmanship that runs on Senshi — the planet's living energy, drawn up through the body into Orel steel through the dobas cut in the hilt. No chants, no status screens, no menus. The "System" in the title is a star system: one sun, five planets, and a humanity living on them on terms it never set.- Progression you can count. A student fills one doba. Not every master fills six. Every one costs something, and when a blade is asked for more than the man holding it has, it goes to glass in his hands.- A mystery that starts with the official story and a boy who doesn't fit it: what actually happened that night, and why someone who never met Ren keeps ending up where Ren stood.- More than one set of eyes. Most of the book is Hiro's. Some of it belongs to the people deciding what to do with him — and, in time, to Ren.- Dark and adult. Graphic violence, profanity. Nobody in this story is safe because they're young. On the AI-assisted tag: the story is mine — plot, world, characters, every fight. English isn't my first language; I write in Russian and use AI to translate and edit. That's what the tag is for.
| # | Title | Words |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Chapter 4: Before the Forest | 0 |
| 2 | Chapter 5: Shadows and Roots | 0 |
| 3 | Chapter 6: Fragility and Light | 0 |
| 4 | Chapter 7: Eyes of the Forest | 0 |
| 5 | Chapter 8: Forging the Vessel | 0 |
| 6 |
| Chapter 9: The Mirror of Falling Water |
| 0 |
| 7 | Chapter 10: Shadow Over the Council | 0 |
| 8 | Chapter 11: Seven Months in the Shadows | 0 |
| 9 | Chapter 12: Steel and the First Breath of the Abyss | 0 |
| 10 | Chapter 13: Steel in the Beast's Hide | 0 |
| 11 | Chapter 14: The Illusion of Ash and the Call of the Old Temple | 0 |
| 12 | Chapter 15: Anatomy of a Betrayal | 0 |
| 13 | Chapter 16: The Steel of Middle-City and Broken Toys | 0 |
| 14 | Chapter 17: Dust, Blood, and Flame | 0 |
| 15 | Chapter 18: Iron Rain | 0 |
| 16 | Chapter 19: Digital Locks and Breached Carapaces | 0 |
| 17 | Chapter 20: Sins of the Sons and New Orders | 0 |
| 18 | Chapter 21: Poison in Golden Goblets | 0 |
| 19 | Chapter 22: The Hound's Instinct and the Ray in the Shadow | 0 |
| 20 | Chapter 23: Sparks in the Ashes and the Path of the Dragon | 0 |
| 21 | Chapter 24: The Whisper of the Forest and the Dance of Chaos | 0 |
| 22 | Chapter 25: Idiotic Orders | 0 |
| 23 | Chapter 26: Fall of the Gods and the Rise of the Ray | 0 |
| 24 | Chapter 27: Fragments of Memories | 0 |
| 25 | Chapter 29: Teacher and Student | 0 |
| 26 | Chapter 30: Ash in a Vacuum | 0 |
| 27 | Chapter 28: Shadows of the Past and the Illusion of Flow | 0 |
| 28 | Chapter 31: The Illusion of Dawn | 0 |
| 29 | Chapter 32: The Illusion of Safety and Shadows of Doubt | 0 |
| 30 | Chapter 33: Secrets of Seirin and the Whispers of the Slums | 0 |
| 31 | Chapter 34: Reading Steel | 0 |
| 32 | Chapter 35: Night Conversations | 0 |
| 33 | Chapter 36: Memories in the Dark | 0 |
| 34 | Chapter 37 The Red Executioner and the Night Reckoning | 0 |
| 35 | Chapter 38: The Sky That Came Early | 0 |
| 36 | Chapter 0: Twelve | 0 |
| 37 | Chapter 1: Three Dobas | 0 |
| 38 | Chapter 2: The Council of Thirteen | 0 |
| 39 | Chapter 2.1 : Who Takes Him | 0 |
| 40 | Chapter 3: The Night at the Waterfall | 0 |
| 41 | Chapter 3.1: Seven | 0 |
| 42 | Chapter 3.2: The Patch | 0 |
| 43 | Chapter 3.3: We Were Not Saved | 0 |
| 44 | Chapter 3.4: Three | 0 |
| 45 | Chapter 39: Fifty | 0 |
| 46 | Chapter 40: The Viceroy | 0 |
| 47 | Chapter 41: A Circle Drawn in Chalk | 0 |
| 48 | Chapter 42: Three Blocks | — |
| 49 | Chapter 43: One Day Late (Part One) | — |
| 50 | Chapter 43: One Day Late (Part Two) | — |
| 51 | Chapter 44: Compatible With Life (Part One) | — |
| 52 | Chapter 44: Compatible With Life (Part Two) | — |
| 53 | Chapter 45: Fire Against Fire | — |
| 54 | Chapter 46: Nowhere To Go | — |
| 55 | Chapter 47: There Are More Of Them | — |
| 56 | Chapter 48: The Fast Way Down | — |
| 57 | Chapter 49: The Scarlet Trail | — |
| 58 | Chapter 50: The Feeling | — |
| 59 | Chapter 51: The Shape of Madness | — |
| 60 | Chapter 52: Two Stars | — |
| 61 | Chapter 53: Clear the Sector | — |
| 62 | Chapter 54: No Colour | — |
| 63 | Chapter 55: Those Who Were Disbanded | — |
| 64 | Chapter 56: Here, I Am the Law | — |
| 65 | Chapter 57: You Come Second | — |
| 66 | Chapter 58: One More Traitor | — |
| 67 | Chapter 59: What Was Never Written Down | — |
| 68 | Chapter 60: In One Piece | — |
| 69 | Chapter_01: A Shadow Over Ryss 2 months ago | 0 |
| 70 | Chapter_02: Echoes of the Abyss and the New Path 2 months ago | 0 |
| 71 | Chapter_03: Silence and the Forеst 2 months ago | 0 |
| 72 | Chapter 35: Night Conversations 1 minute ago | 0 |