Location:Obsidian Academy — The Lower Hall
Date/Time:2 Ashwhisper, 9942 AZI — continuous
Realm:Lower Realm
"As a list," Ryo said. "I want to write this one down properly."
"Then write it." Jayde counted it off. "One. They come out of the Military Academy and nowhere else. Volunteers who came in at sixteen, who have had four years of drill, medicine, engineering, and formation work, and who have been told in plain words from their first month exactly what is under that mountain and exactly what a third means. They go down at twenty and not a day before."
"Why twenty?" Bai Shu asked.
"Because four years is what the training takes, and because a body that is still finishing is a body that breaks differently, and Eden will bore you about that for an hour if you let her." Jayde put her hand flat. "And twenty is the only limit in the whole of this. Not a year of study. Not a grade. An age and a pass."
"Two. Grade stops deciding it."
Zhong's head came up.
"How do you mean?"
