The Extra's Academy Survival Guide Novel Yonder Novels & Stories

That he hadn’t been left behind. “You’ll find him,” Nylo said, reading my thoughts. “Dax is alive. I can feel it.” I nodded faintly, clinging to that hope like a lifeline. But time was running out. The wagon creaked onward through the night, wheels grinding over gravel. The sounds of burning Moonfell grew quieter behind us. The darkness ahead stretched on and on, swallowing the path in front of us. I didn’t know where they were taking me. I didn’t know who this Alpha Kaden was.

“But I got this.” “Like the blade ritual?” Akira says, blade flashing. “You’re strong.” “Thanks,” I say, light burning another scout. “We need to move!” We guide survivors through the forest, dodging more scouts, my light burning a path through the dark. They’re weak, some barely walking, their light fading from hunger and fear. “Stay close!” I yell, light flaring. “We’re almost there!” “You’re doing great,” Jude says, shadows shielding us. “Like the hidden realm?”

Chapter 42: BURN EVERYTHING TO THE GROUND Xander – Crescent Moon Pack, Arena The arena stretched before me like a vast, jagged wound in the earth, its dark stones standing in stark contrast to the pale light of dawn that began to seep over the horizon. This was no ordinary battleground—it was a place of finality, where destinies were forged in blood and pain. The air felt suffocating, charged with the weight of countless lives that had been decided in this very space. Each breath I took tasted like dust and anticipation, a sharp reminder that today, everything would change.

Uniform on, hair still dripping, I stomped into the lecture hall five seconds before Professor William started breathing fire. The man was mid-lecture about interdimensional tariffs when Inara kicked my shin. “You going?” she whispered. “To what, my own execution?” She opened her mouth to answer, but William's voice cut through the room, “...and we are honored to welcome Elites Zaiden and Zyran Kross, who will be leading this year’s mandatory survival excursion to the Lycan Dominion.” Mandatory. My stomach dropped. The doors at the back of the hall slammed open and in walked trouble in duplicate.

NOVA I didn't sleep well. That's what happens when you try to live a life that isn't yours and survive in a den of monsters. But I haven't forgotten the main reason that brought me to the academy. And that's why I'd sneaked into the library a few minutes ago. It's almost seven a.m. Therefore, I have to be quick about this. My fingers skim along the books on the shelf in the Ceremony and Culture section, and finally, I find a red book. It's titled "The Red Moon Tournament."

"I'm not asking you to fight for me." "Good." She stood up, that damaged eye socket somehow more expressive than the remaining eye. "Because we won't. When he comes, you're on your own." She walked away. I sat by the fire, wrapped in a blanket that smelled like other people's survival, eating food I hadn't earned, carrying a baby that would be born into this wasteland. Kael settled beside me. "Welcome to the Deadlands." "Does it get better?" "No." He looked at the camp—at the broken wolves moving between smoking fires, at the shelters that wouldn't survive a strong wind, at the territory that wanted all of them dead. "But you learn to survive anyway. That's its own kind of strength."

After training for two solid hours, she was drenched in sweat and exhausted to the bone, yet she felt strangely comfortable afterward. If she wanted to survive and live better than others, she had to keep improving. Nicole made a schedule. Two hours a day for physical training. Three hours studying traditional medicine. Another two hours teaching herself basic surgical knowledge. The storage space held over 100 books, all quietly taken from the university library. She could work through them over the coming years. She had also grabbed psychology books. Those needed attention, too. In the apocalypse, people didn't just die from disasters. The ones who survived longest were often no longer nor

HELENA By the gods, what had that man led me into? His words echoed in my head. “If you survive the next stretch” he had said. “You will reach places where you stop needing help from strangers.” Did that mean I had to survive whatever was in that damned village? Just what in the gods name was in that village, what did I have to survive by accepting help from this stranger?

When the Program told me I could return, I felt no joy. Only emptiness. The next time I opened my eyes, I was staring at a white hospital ceiling. Machines beeped beside me, and my throat burned as if I had been asleep for years. A nurse saw me wake and rushed over. “You’re safe,” she said. “You were caught in a dockside explosion. Sophia Lane didn’t survive.” My fingers tightened against the sheet. Sophia was dead. Before I could speak, the nurse added, “There was another survivor. A young man named Luca. He woke up this morning.”

He had dark curls, green eyes, and a calm smile that carried no pity. “Miss Vale?” I looked at him. “I’m Adrian Bellini. My family funds part of Professor Shaw’s closed project. She asked me to make sure you got back safely.” I remembered Professor Shaw mentioning the Bellini family once during a project meeting, but I had never met him before. “Hello, Mr. Bellini,” I said. Behind me, Dante did not follow. This time, I did not look back. The car door opened. Beyond the city, the institute waited: the lab, the project, the life I had once thought I would never live long enough to claim.