"Is it possible," Soren muttered, remembering he had forgotten to change it due to more important matters, "to have the license issued with only my first name? Or... to change the registered surname?"

The clerk looked up, blinking in surprise. "I’m sorry, but our records must match your official identification. To change the name on your license, you would first need to update your legal ID at the Civil Registry."

Soren had expected this answer, yet he couldn’t suppress a small surge of disappointment. The rigid bureaucracy of the Bureau was as cold as the people who had given him that name in the first place.

"I see," he replied, sliding his ID back toward himself. "Then, is it ok if I come back to finalize the license later? And if so, how much time do I have before the registration expires?"

The clerk nodded understandingly. "That is fine. The promotion data remains valid in our system for three days. After that, you would need to retake the mana measurement at the very least."

"Three days. Thank you," Soren said, offering a curt nod. "I’ll be back soon."

He turned and made his way through the sterile lobby, the weight of his task list growing. He had five days to clear three gates, and now he had added a legal name change to the mix.

It was a tight schedule, but he refused to let his life and existence be tied to a house that had discarded him without hesitation. He would rather sprint through the bureaucracy of a name change than carry that name for one more day now that he had the chance to cut it away.

As he stepped out of the building, the late afternoon sun hit his face. Soren stopped at the top of the stairs and let out a long, heavy sigh while looking up at the sky.

"Nothing is ever simple," he whispered to the drifting clouds.

Then, he continued walking, his footsteps echoing against the pavement as he began to weigh his options. Changing the name was a certainty, but the specifics were a different matter entirely.

Should he simply remain a man with a single name? He wasn’t sure if the law even allowed for that, and practically speaking, it felt incomplete. Besides, he was married now. Having a shared surname would serve as a formal anchor, a quiet proof to the world that he and Ethea were a family, a unit that belonged to one another.

"Should I just... choose a new one?" he mused, the thought crossing his mind like a stray spark.

It was a tempting idea. No, it was probably the only logical option he had.

’Then...’

He could pick something entirely new, a name with no history, no baggage, and no ghosts attached to it. He could build a legacy from scratch. But as the possibilities swirled, names of stars, his favorite characters, or old legends, he felt a sudden hesitation. This wasn’t a decision that affected only him anymore after all.

He let out another short sigh, a faint puff of air in the afternoon breeze.

"Yeah," he muttered to himself, "it’s better to discuss this with her first."

Ethea was the other half of this new life. It was only right that whatever name they carried forward was something they chose together. He felt a small, grounding sense of warmth at the thought. For the first time in his life, he wasn’t a lonely kid just trying to survive the next storm, but a man finally building a home of his own.

However, as he settled into the back of a taxi for the ride home, a sharp realization began to take shape in his mind. His family had been entirely silent since the wedding. Aside from the cold finality of the disownment papers, there had been nothing.

He wasn’t dwelling on a lack of fatherly affection since he knew his father far too well for that. His father was a man who only viewed people as assets to be exploited, and the family elders were no different, obsessed with "geniuses" while discarding anyone they deemed "trash."

If they had any inkling of his current situation, that the son they threw away was already clearing Gates and rising through the ranks, they would have appeared the second they found out. They would have used every legal and emotional lever to drag him back under their control.

But they hadn’t appeared, which meant they were still in the dark.

’But why?’ Soren wondered, staring out at the cars.

After pondering a bit, he could only think of two reasons. Either they truly didn’t care about him at all and had severed every possible tie to cleanse their name of him, or someone else was intentionally blocking the information from reaching them.

The thought of an invisible hand filtering the news of his growth was both a relief and a concern. If someone was hiding his progress from the house, he had to figure out their motive and identity. They could very well be the people behind Ethea’s accident.

If the latter were true, the situation was far more precarious than he had initially feared. There would be little point in struggling if a powerful, unknown force was already controlling every variable behind the scenes.

Soren fell silent, squinting his eyes as the city lights blurred past the taxi window.

’...Let’s see how it goes first.’

Fortunately, he had intentionally set a bait during the promotion exam by showing just enough talent to be notable, but not enough to be unbelievable. If someone were truly monitoring his every move, they would definitely take action against him again soon.

If nothing happened, then it meant the people responsible for Ethea’s curse and accident weren’t the ones currently watching them.

But then, who could it be?

He turned the possibilities over in his mind.

If...

If he were the enemy who sent the assassin that day, and if the goal was simply to see Ethea dead, he wouldn’t have played these games. He would have sent a much stronger assassin to finish the job instantly instead of wasting resources on half-measures.

The logic didn’t track, leaving him in a state of confusion similar to his family’s silence.

"Hmm..."