Emberbound Ascendant

He was supposed to be Emberfall City's brightest star. Now the Testing Stele reads **Third Stage** — again — and the laughter cuts deeper than the last time. Three years ago, the boy who made an entire city sit up and take notice stood at the center of the clan's pride. Now he's the waste they whisper about across the training yard, the son the patriarch cannot shield forever, the fallen prodigy whose Battle Qi refuses to move. Every year the same glowing characters. Every year the same sneers. *Third stage. Low grade. Pathetic.* Kael Vale has learned to keep his face composed while the needles land — learned to clench his fists where no one can see and let the storm gather behind a quiet smile. But the clan is already sharpening its knives, the elders are already asking why they should feed a waste, and his father's patience is a rope fraying thread by thread. One more humiliation and the rope snaps. When the mocking finally crosses a line that cannot be forgiven, will the fallen prodigy bow his head and take it like he always has — or will he show every last one of them what a third-stage waste is truly capable of? *Fallen prodigy · Underdog comeback · Clan politics · Battle Qi · Proving them wrong*