The Extra's Rise-Chapter 530: Shadow (1)

"Wow, I can’t believe it," Aria said with the sort of grin that belonged to a younger sibling who had just discovered her older brother had done something simultaneously scandalous and heroic. Her hand flew up to cover her mouth in mock shock, but the gleeful mischief dancing in her eyes was about as subtle as a meteor strike in a monastery.

I had just returned from spending the night at the Imperial Palace. The Imperial Palace. You’d think that level of social impossibility would buy me at least a moment’s peace at home, but apparently not.

My mother, Alice, being the seasoned emotional strategist she was, simply greeted me with a knowing nod and one of her brightest smiles—the kind that said she had noticed everything and had already formed several detailed opinions about it. She had clearly pieced together exactly what my absence meant, and just as clearly decided not to interrogate me about it immediately. Which, in the complex world of maternal politics, was both a mercy and a warning.

Aria, however, possessed all the social restraint of a supernova in a crystal shop.

"I already ate," I said preemptively, hoping to head off any potential maternal fussing while also avoiding the increasingly predatory look my sister was directing at me. It was the expression of someone who knew secrets, or was fully prepared to invent them if I didn’t provide satisfactory confirmation of her suspicions.

Alice turned back toward the kitchen with a spring in her step, humming a cheerful little melody that immediately put me on high alert. She was far too happy about this situation. Either she was genuinely thrilled that I hadn’t accidentally created an international incident by insulting the Empress, or she had already started mentally planning wedding arrangements with the imperial family.

Which, to be completely honest, wasn’t entirely off the mark.

Aria leaned in conspiratorially, as if she suspected the walls themselves might be equipped with surveillance equipment. She dropped her voice to what she probably thought was a whisper but sounded more like controlled excitement barely contained by teenage discretion.

"Did you actually eat breakfast with her family?" she asked, her eyes bright with the kind of anticipation usually reserved for gossip of legendary proportions.

’Wow, how did she figure that out so quickly?’ Luna’s voice echoed with amusement in my mind. I found myself wondering the same thing. I hadn’t told anyone about the specifics of my visit. There had been no official announcements, no leaked information to social networks, no palace press releases. Just an incredibly tense and politically charged meal shared around a very expensive dining table.

"Yes," I answered simply, because attempting to lie to Aria was not only pointless but potentially dangerous. She had developed an almost supernatural ability to detect deception, and once she caught you in a lie, she became absolutely relentless in her pursuit of the truth.

Her eyes widened to approximately the size of dinner plates, her jaw dropped in theatrical shock, and she immediately launched into the kind of dramatic overreaction that could power a small city.

"Oh my god, you actually sat down and ate with the Emperor and Empress after everything that happened? Brother... how are you even still alive right now?"

I didn’t respond immediately, partly because I was still processing that question myself. The memory of Empress Adeline’s carefully calculated smile—the kind that suggested she was already measuring me for a very specific type of future trouble—remained vivid in my mind. And then there was Emperor Quinn’s intense scrutiny, the way he had studied me throughout the entire meal as if trying to determine whether I was made of tempered steel or fragile glass.

Instead of attempting to explain the complex dynamics of imperial family politics over breakfast, I reached out and deliberately messed up Aria’s carefully styled hair. It was petty, immature, and incredibly satisfying in the way that only sibling interactions could be.

"Hey!" she yelped indignantly, immediately swatting at my retreating hand with the righteous fury of someone whose morning routine had been completely destroyed. "I spent twenty minutes styling it this morning!"

"Yes," I replied with deliberate calm, "and now it looks exactly as chaotic as your imagination tends to be."

She crossed her arms and launched into a full-scale pout, her cheeks puffing up with indignation like an offended hamster. But beneath all that practiced teenage defiance, I could see something else entirely. Pride. Genuine admiration. The kind of wonder that came from realizing that her older brother had not only survived a night at the most powerful palace in the empire but had somehow managed to navigate breakfast with the imperial family without starting a war.

The moment of levity faded as I noticed something in her posture, a subtle shift that made me pay closer attention.

"Anyway, Ms. Rank 100," I said, attempting to inject some playful teasing into my voice, though it came out less sarcastic than I’d intended. "Don’t you want to improve your standing?"

Aria’s defensive mechanisms activated immediately. She folded her arms across her chest in the universal gesture of impending teenage resistance and turned her head away with that particular sharp tilt that adolescents had perfected somewhere between developing angst and cultivating ego.

"I can’t help it," she muttered, her voice carrying an undertone I hadn’t expected. "The other students were just born different from me."

That stopped me cold. Her tone wasn’t angry or sassy or dramatic in the way I’d grown accustomed to hearing from her. It was flat. Hollow. Like someone who had practiced not caring because caring too much had become too painful to sustain.

"Hey," I said gently, all teasing forgotten.

She looked up at me then, and I saw something in her eyes that hit me like a physical blow. Not tears—not yet—but something far more dangerous. Resentment mixed with exhaustion, the kind of deep frustration that builds up in your bones when sustained effort meets an immovable wall again and again and again.

"You know I’m not wrong, Arthur," she said, her voice sharp around the edges like broken glass. "I was lucky to even get accepted into Slatemark Academy. Lucky. I’m not like you."

I found myself without an immediate response. What could I possibly say? Some empty platitude about hidden potential? A motivational speech about hard work conquering everything? She would see through that kind of hollow encouragement in seconds. Nobody understood their own limitations quite like someone who had been repeatedly told they were supposed to be exceptional.

She turned away from me then, her voice dropping to barely above a whisper, but somehow it rang louder and clearer than anything else in the room.

"After all, without natural talent, everything else is meaningless, isn’t it?"

The words landed with devastating accuracy, cutting deeper than they should have. Maybe because they contained too much raw honesty. Too much painful truth that neither of us really wanted to acknowledge.

Aria was currently mid-Yellow rank, which by most reasonable standards wasn’t actually terrible. But at Slatemark Academy—now undisputedly the premier magical institution in the world since Mythos Academy had been... well, effectively destroyed—being mid-Yellow rank was barely enough to keep your head above water. The competition was fierce, the standards were astronomical, and mediocrity was treated like a contagious disease.

And when it came to talent... I couldn’t lie to myself about the fundamental inequity of our situations.

I had been blessed with advantages that most people could only dream of. Grade 6 swordsmanship talent that allowed me to learn techniques that others couldn’t even comprehend. Soul Resonance with Luna that granted me capabilities beyond normal human limitations. Intelligence sharp enough to bend entire systems to my will when necessary. A constellation of natural gifts that, when combined, had transformed me into something approaching legendary status.

And the most frustrating part? I hadn’t asked for any of it. These abilities had simply been there from the beginning, like cheat codes built into my personal operating system that I hadn’t even known existed until I started playing the game of life at the highest levels.

But Aria? She had none of those advantages. She was working with Dad’s old Grade 4 sword art—reliable and well-tested, certainly, but not revolutionary or groundbreaking. She hadn’t been born with a Gift that could alter reality around her. No rare elemental affinities that would make her techniques naturally more powerful. No secret bloodline abilities waiting to be unlocked. No divine interventions or cosmic coincidences.

Just pure, grinding effort. And even that had natural limits that couldn’t be overcome through willpower alone.

To push your mana rank beyond the glacially slow pace dictated by your natural talent ceiling, you had to be willing to walk through hell itself. Or worse, you had to genuinely want to walk through hell because something inside you demanded that level of sacrifice. The way I had done out of sheer necessity, driven by circumstances that had left me no choice but to transcend normal limitations or die trying.

Aria didn’t have that kind of desperate fire burning inside her. Or maybe she did, but it had nothing substantial to fuel itself on, no great purpose or driving ambition that could justify the kind of suffering required to break through talent barriers.

’What can I actually do for her?’ I wondered, watching her walk away with shoulders tense and jaw set like she was preparing to fight a world that didn’t even know her name existed.

The question haunted me because I genuinely had no answer. There was no guidebook for dealing with siblings who hadn’t been chosen by fate, no manual for helping someone you love when the universe had simply decided to distribute its gifts unequally.

Sometimes, being exceptional just made you more aware of how cruel that exception really was.