Conscript's Awakening

Warrick was a farmer. Then the conscription officers arrived, and he became cannon fodder. For years, the kingdom has maintained a tenuous stalemate with the Portals — violent tears in reality that spew nightmare beasts upon the land. Commoners die holding the line while the magical elite, the Resonants, live in comfort behind high walls. That's the system. That's always been the system. But at the Mandatory Awakening Trial, the testing crystal didn't register Warrick as powerless. It shattered. Warrick hadn't failed the awakening. His power had absorbed it. He possesses something the Resonants have never encountered — the ability to devour and unravel magic itself. A power that can't be measured, classified, or safely ignored. Pulled from the doomed infantry and thrown into the treacherous politics of the elite Arcanum Academy, Warrick must hide his true nature while mastering an ability that grows more dangerous with every use. High-born mages fear his potential and despise his origin. The Portals are stabilizing at an alarming rate — which means something is controlling them. And Warrick is beginning to suspect he may be the only weapon capable of stopping what's coming. If the Academy doesn't execute him first. For fans of dark progression fantasy, class-warfare magic systems, and protagonists whose power breaks the rules entirely.