
by Olvin
Thirteen-year-old Rorik grew up in a traveling circus, surrounded by acrobats, animal tamers, and fire-eaters. His childhood smells of sawdust and smoke, and his first lessons in magic come not from professors but from performers who cannot begin to understand what this boy does with flame. When his father sells him for fifty gold coins to the stern mage Ignis, Rorik finds himself within the walls of Arkheim Academy. Runes of bondage are burned into his neck, and hatred blazes in his heart. Ahead of him lie years of training, street brawls, political conspiracies, and battles against creatures rising from the Abyss. By his side stands a handful of outcasts just like him: a thief, an alchemist, and a quiet archive servant with the eyes of a kingslayer. This is the story of how an abandoned child becomes a captain of the free skies. A story about the difference between power that burns and power that protects. About the price of freedom that cannot be bought but only forged within oneself through fire and pain. And about how sometimes a father throws his son into the flames so that the filth of the gutter will never consume him.
No streak history
One state-enhanced oracle order, filtered by each list. Observed Royal Road ranks remain separate ground truth.
Rank updated 23 Oct 2026, 22:48 UTC
Entry forecast updated 23 Oct 2026, 22:48 UTC
Ranking model: rs-public-oracle-state-v1
Forecast model: rs-model-entry-v1
Chart history contains only this ranking model's runs; legacy points are not spliced in.
Not enough recent follower history to estimate a shadow rank yet.
beats 19% of similar stories
not enough data yet
needs about a week of observations
Benchmarks: 8,060 active Royal Road stories, percentiles within the 20–49 chapters band, cohort of 2026-07-02. Conversion is measured as followers gained per 1,000 views lifetime.