The alarm became Valoris's enemy and companion in equal measure.

  04:45 every morning, fifteen minutes before mandatory wake-up, and those fifteen minutes still mattered. She'd learned that lesson on the very first day and never forgot it. The difference between scrambling and prepared. Between surviving another day and becoming another statistic.

  Together We Stand, Divided We Fall read the poster on the barracks wall across from her bunk; standard issue motivational material that had been there since day one. She'd stopped seeing it consciously weeks ago. It had become wallpaper. Background. As natural as breathing.

  Three months into first year, and the routine had carved itself into her bones.

  Wake. Dress in the dark (muscle memory now, hands finding uniform components without conscious thought). Make bunk to regulation standards (corners tight, blanket aligned, inspection-ready even though inspections only happened randomly). Service Above Self etched on the metal frame where she'd see it every morning, words worn smooth by generations of hands. Claim bathroom slot before the morning rush turned it into warfare. Be ready when 05:00 struck and the rest of the academy erupted into chaos.

  By the time Squad Kade-07 assembled for morning PT, Valoris had been awake long enough for her brain to engage fully. It was the only advantage she had.

  The running hadn't gotten easier. Her body had just learned to hurt differently.

  Five kilometers every morning, and Valoris still struggled. Not enough to wash out – she'd improved past that threshold somewhere – but enough to understand viscerally that some people were built for this and she wasn't one of them. Her legs burned. Her lungs screamed. Her cardiovascular system staged daily protests against the abuse she inflicted on it.

  But she ran.

  The morning's motivational broadcast crackled through the training ground speakers as they assembled: "Pilots are humanity's shield against the dimensional threat. Every day of training is investment in survival. Every moment of sacrifice protects those who cannot protect themselves." Commander Thrace's voice, recorded months or years ago, playing to each new cohort like a prayer before battle.

  Valoris barely heard it anymore. Just another part of the soundscape, like the crunch of gravel under her feet or the huffing breath of Milo struggling behind her.

  Ahead of her, Zee moved with the efficiency of someone who'd been running from things her entire life. No wasted movement. Breathing steady. Pace locked at exactly what was required; not showing off, not holding back, just executing with professional precision. She'd lap Valoris eventually (always did on the long runs), come back around, sometimes pace her for a few minutes before pulling ahead again.

  "Keep your breathing even," Zee had told her during week two, when Valoris was gasping and considering whether washing out might be preferable to this daily torture. "Four steps in, four steps out. Match it to your stride. Don't think about the distance. Just the next breath."

  It had helped. Marginally.

  Behind Valoris, Milo was struggling worse than she was. He was never going to be a runner, his gangly frame fighting itself with every stride, glasses sliding down constantly despite the strap he'd added. But he kept moving. Fell behind the main group, stayed within tolerance, crossed the finish line every morning with the kind of stubborn persistence that suggested he'd calculated exactly how slowly he could run without washing out.

  Saren ran with mechanical precision three meters ahead with a perfectly consistent pace, perfectly controlled breathing, everything optimized for maximum efficiency. She made it look easy. Which meant it was hard, because Saren never made anything look hard. She just executed flawlessly and judged everyone else for being less capable.

  Quinn ran alone, counting. Always counting. Steps or breaths or distance markers or something only they could perceive. Their pace was erratic; sometimes too fast, sometimes too slow, as though physical exertion was just a variable in whatever calculations consumed their attention. But they always finished within tolerance. Always.

  Month three, and Squad Kade-07's aggregate PT scores had climbed from bottom quartile to middle tier. Not because everyone got better. Because Zee's exceptional performance averaged with everyone else's adequate-to-poor showing, and the academy calculated squad metrics as collective rather than individual.

  Valoris finished her run at the nineteen-minute mark; respectable for most students, mediocre for her squad, devastating compared to Zee's fourteen-minute-thirty-second time. She bent double at the finish line, hands on knees, trying not to vomit while her body reminded her that she wasn't naturally athletic.

  "Physical excellence is the foundation of pilot capability," the speakers reminded them as morning PT concluded. "Your body is your first weapon. Maintain it. Honor it. Make it worthy of the responsibility you'll carry."

  Standard closing speech. Same words every morning. Valoris's mind had learned to filter them out like white noise.

  "You're getting faster," Zee said, appearing beside her with barely elevated breathing. Not sarcastic. Just stating fact.

  "Still slower than half the year," Valoris managed between gasps.

  "But faster than last month. That's what matters." Zee handed her a water bottle from somewhere. "Squad needs you functional. You're functional enough now."

  It wasn't a compliment, just tactical assessment. But coming from Zee, who made most things sound like criticism by default, it felt almost warm.

  Combat drills followed running.

  The training grounds spread across three hundred meters of packed earth and reinforced obstacles. Recruitment posters lined the perimeter walls, dramatic images of pilots standing victorious over entity corpses, slogans like "Strength Through Service" and "Guardians of Humanity" printed in bold letters that had faded from exposure but never quite disappeared.

  Valoris noticed them sometimes. Most days she didn't. They'd become furniture. Decoration. Part of the landscape that didn't require conscious attention.

  Squad Kade-07 assembled with forty other squads for morning conditioning: push-ups, pull-ups, core work, flexibility exercises that made Valoris's muscles scream in languages she didn't know existed.

  Then combat fundamentals.

  Three months in, and Valoris had learned to fall correctly, to take hits without breaking, to deliver strikes with sufficient force while maintaining control. She would never be exceptional. Zee still threw her on the mat regularly during sparring, Saren could dismantle her defensive positioning in under thirty seconds, even Milo occasionally landed hits through sheer unpredictable chaos. But she wasn't completely hopeless anymore.

  "Better," Zee said after throwing Valoris for the third time that morning. She offered a hand up. "You're reading my tells now. Not fast enough to counter yet, but you see them coming."

  Valoris accepted the hand, let Zee pull her to her feet. Everything hurt. "What tells?"

  "I shift weight to my rear foot before committing to throws. You started compensating in week eight. Not enough to avoid the throw, but enough to land better." Zee's expression was neutral, professional. "Keep working on it. Eventually you'll counter instead of just falling gracefully."

  "Your encouragement is overwhelming."

  "You want encouragement, get a cheerleader. You want functional combat capability, work with me." Zee reset to starting position. "Again. Try to actually stop the throw this time instead of just predicting it."

  They went again. Valoris read the weight shift, tried to counter, failed, hit the mat with bruising force. Got up. Tried again. Failed again. Repeated until the drill rotation moved to different partners.

  Three months of this. Three months of being thrown, struck, grappled, and generally reminded that tactical brilliance didn't translate to physical capability. But she was improving. Slowly. Grudgingly. Measuring progress in bruises that hurt slightly less than before.

  Across the training ground, other squads worked through their own drills. Squad Thorne-03 moved with fluid efficiency that still made Valoris envious. Kaito and his squad had maintained first place ranking since formation day, their coordination improving from excellent to exceptional. Squad Volkova-55 was ranked second, their combat scores incredible. Squad Park-17 held third place through pure academic dominance.

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  Squad Kade-07 had climbed from sixty-first to forty-seventh over three months. Still below average. Still struggling. But no longer completely hopeless.

  "You're overthinking again," Saren said during their sparring rotation. She'd just executed a perfect joint lock that left Valoris's arm twisted at an uncomfortable angle, not quite painful, but definitely uncomfortable. "I can see you calculating. By the time you've worked out the counter, I've already committed to the next move."

  "Working on it," Valoris gritted out.

  "Work faster." Saren released the lock with clinical precision. "In real combat you won't have time to diagram your response. You need to develop combat instinct, not just tactical knowledge."

  The contempt in her voice had softened slightly over three months from actively hostile to merely professional disapproval. Progress, sort of.

  They reset. Saren moved with mechanical efficiency, testing Valoris's defenses with systematic precision. When she found an opening, she exploited it immediately. When Valoris managed to defend, Saren adapted and tried something else. No wasted movement. No emotional investment. Just cold execution.

  It was, Valoris had learned, how Saren approached everything.

  Academic classes began at 09:00 after morning PT and breakfast.

  The classroom wing felt different from the training grounds. It was quieter, more controlled, walls lined with educational displays showing dimensional topology diagrams, entity classification charts, historical timelines of the war. "Knowledge is the foundation of service," read the inscription above the main lecture hall entrance. Standard academy philosophy, carved in stone decades ago.

  Dimensional Theory occupied the first block, three hours of dense material about substrate composition, reality boundaries, corruption mechanics, entity dimensional topology. The kind of abstract concepts that made most students' brains hurt.

  Valoris excelled here. Finally, something her preparation had actually prepared her for.

  She sat in the front row of the tiered lecture hall, tablet out, taking notes with focused efficiency while Professor Kaine – Petra's father, Valoris had learned, which explained why Petra was so brilliant at support systems – explained the mathematical frameworks underlying dimensional barriers.

  The lecture hall's walls displayed the same educational posters she'd seen throughout the academy: diagrams of dimensional overlap zones, infection progression timelines, pilot service records showing optimal career trajectories.

  "The substrate exists simultaneously in multiple dimensional states," Professor Kaine was saying, holographic models rotating above his desk. "Neither fully in baseline reality nor fully in adjacent dimensional space. This quantum superposition allows for consciousness-directed manipulation during summoning, but also creates inherent instability that manifests as corruption when exposed to baseline physics for extended periods."

  Valoris typed rapidly, capturing concepts, cross-referencing with previous material, building mental frameworks for understanding how dimensional mechanics translated to practical piloting. Around her, other students struggled with varying degrees of success.

  Two rows back, Saren was also taking extensive notes. She had a different approach than Valoris, more systematic categorization, but equally focused. They'd never discussed it, but Valoris suspected Saren was building comprehensive study materials that she'd review obsessively later. Perfectionism as survival strategy.

  Near the back, Milo had his tablet out but was drawing diagrams that probably had nothing to do with dimensional theory. Engineering modifications, likely. Unauthorized improvements to equipment that would get him written up again. He caught Valoris looking and gave a sheepish wave before returning to his sketches.

  Zee sat in the middle tier, following along adequately but clearly not excelling. Combat and tactics were her strengths. Abstract theory was something she endured because the academy required it. Quinn wasn't visible. They preferred the isolated seats at the far edges where they could track the entire lecture hall while taking notes with obsessive precision.

  "The dimensional barrier broke nearly a hundred and fifty years ago," Professor Kaine continued, transitioning into historical context that appeared in every course eventually. "The first breach occurred here in the Altai Mountains."

  He pulled up archival footage they’d all seen before; grainy, decades old, showing the moment reality tore. The rift opening like a wound, spreading faster than containment protocols could respond, creating the permanent dimensional scar that defined modern existence.

  "The entities' dimension exists adjacent to ours," he explained. "Separated by dimensional membrane that normally prevents interaction. When that membrane was ripped open, it created permanent passage. Entities began emerging within months. Their dimension appears to be experiencing catastrophic collapse. It’s a timeline correlating precisely with the barrier breach, suggesting a possible causal relationship that remains unconfirmed."

  The footage shifted to early entity observations. Valoris thought they looked confused, panicked, as much as anyone could tell from alien geometry.

  "Early contact attempts showed sapient characteristics," Professor Kaine said matter-of-factly. "But communication proved impossible to sustain. Dimensional physiology proved incompatible with our reality. Entity presence creates corruption zones that expand continuously, threatening human habitation. It's currently unknown if this is a migration, a deliberate invasion, or an exploration into our reality. Diplomatic solutions were explored but ultimately deemed infeasible given the inability to communicate and the existential threat to human civilization."

  He pulled up corruption zone projections, models showing how dimensional overlap would spread if entity emergence continued unchecked. Within fifty years, massive regions would become uninhabitable. Within a century, human civilization would face collapse.

  "The initial instability proved to have cascading effects, creating breaches in other locations such as Montana Territory and the Kingsford incident. Thus: military response became necessary," he concluded. "Pilots to engage emerging entities and protect civilians. Academy systems to train those pilots. Dimensional substrate harvesting to create mechs capable of fighting beings that exist partially outside baseline physics. The system you're entering isn't perfect. But it's effective. And effectiveness ensures humanity's continued existence."

  The logic was presented as self-evident. Inevitable. The only possible response to impossible circumstances.

  Valoris copied it all mechanically, feeling something uncomfortable twist in her chest. The way Professor Kaine described it made the war sound like natural disaster response rather than... what? She didn't have words for the discomfort but questioning it felt dangerous. So she kept taking notes and didn't ask uncomfortable questions.

  "The corruption rate increases exponentially with exposure duration," Professor Kaine continued, moving past history into medical reality. "Initial contact produces minimal effects: cellular-level changes, minor neural pathway optimization for improved dimensional resonance. But sustained exposure over months or years creates cumulative damage that becomes irreversible."

  He pulled up medical images that made Valoris's stomach clench. Pilots showing different stages of corruption: early (barely visible shimmer to skin), moderate (silver scarring, motor control degradation), advanced (extensive physical transformation, psychological instability, dimensional coherence failure).

  The images looked disturbingly like her grandmother.

  The progression was clinical in its documentation: Stage One showed faint silvering at extremities, barely noticeable except under specific lighting. Stage Two featured spreading metallic discoloration, tremors in hands, occasional dimensional flicker where the pilot's body seemed to exist in two places simultaneously for microseconds. Stage Three showed extensive physical transformation; skin taking on substrate-like qualities, motor control severely compromised, reality anchoring becoming unstable.

  Stage Four wasn't shown. Professor Kaine moved past it quickly with just: "Terminal corruption. Retirement mandatory."

  "Average pilot career length is eight to ten years before corruption advances to retirement threshold," he said matter-of-factly. "Some pilots show higher resistance and last twelve to fifteen years. Others degrade faster, requiring retirement after five or six years. The variability isn't fully understood, but appears related to individual dimensional resonance sensitivity and cumulative exposure intensity."

  He pulled up a chart showing pilot longevity statistics across fifty years of service. The average held steady at 8.7 years. The curve was remarkably consistent with very few outliers on either end, most pilots clustering around that central figure like it was law rather than biology.

  "Current medical research focuses on corruption suppression protocols," Professor Kaine added. "Various pharmaceutical interventions show moderate efficacy at slowing progression. Gene therapy approaches are under investigation. But as of now, corruption remains the inevitable consequence of pilot service. The question isn't whether you'll corrupt, but how long you'll remain deployable before corruption compromises your capability."

  Eight to ten years. The same timeline Commander Thrace had outlined. The same mathematics everyone accepted as inevitable.

  Valoris copied the statistics mechanically, trying not to think about her grandmother's trembling hands, her silver eye, the way she moved through shadows like smoke. Trying not to calculate how many deployments she'd have before those Stage Two symptoms started appearing in her own flesh.

  That's what awaits you, the thought arrived unbidden. That's the price. You knew this.

  She kept taking notes.

  "Substrate harvesting occurs in corruption zones," Professor Kaine continued, his tone suggesting this was routine technical information rather than something horrifying. "Areas where dimensional overlap is severe enough that entity matter destabilizes. The refined substrate you'll eventually bond with comes from processing this harvested material; purifying dimensional matter, stabilizing its quantum state, preparing it for consciousness imprinting during summoning."

  A student in the back raised their hand. "Where exactly does the substrate come from? You said it's harvested from corruption zones, but what specifically are we harvesting?"

  Professor Kaine paused, something flickering across his expression too quickly to interpret. "The substrate exists at dimensional boundaries. Where reality overlaps. The material itself is neither fully entity matter nor fully baseline matter; it's the transitional substance between dimensional states. Harvesting involves extraction from zones where this transition material has accumulated."

  The lecture continued for another ninety minutes, covering bonding mechanics (consciousness imprinting during summoning creates permanent neural pathways that allow pilot-mech connection), synchronization theory (sustained connection improves mech responsiveness but accelerates corruption), and long-term pilot health management (regular monitoring, suppression treatments of limited efficacy, mandatory retirement protocols when corruption exceeds operational thresholds).

  By the time Professor Kaine dismissed them, Valoris had filled twelve pages with notes and her head ached with information density.