During the carriage ride, Vis keeps returning to the stranger’s claim about “Adoption,” the impossible ability to sense and take Will that belongs to someone else. He connects that claim to earlier moments he could never fully explain: sensing danger during the Iudicium, reacting before Lanistia attacked at the Aurora Columnae, and instinctively drawing the Heart of Jovan to his hand as he fell with Emissa’s blade in his stomach. By concentrating on the carriage itself, Vis finally manages to faintly sense its imbued Will and accepts that the forbidden ability is real.

Vis arrives with Livia and Darius at the Circus Sciacca, where the silence between Vis and Livia remains strained after Livia’s earlier outburst. An older Sextus, Caeso Tullius, introduces himself as Vis’s examiner, notes that Vis is late, and leads him into the arena. Inside, Vis sees a vast circus being used not for racing but for formal Will assessments, with candidates performing different tests while observers record their results.

As Vis surveys the arena, he realizes the examination is much larger and more politically charged than he expected. He recognizes several academy acquaintances, including Felix, Marcellus, Leridia, Iro, Indol, and Aequa, and he notices that the candidates appear to come only from Governance and Religion, not Military. Seeing Aequa unsettles Vis because he still needs answers about why Callidus was not protected during the Iudicium. In the stands, senators in purple-striped togas gather in tense groups, and their grim discussions make it clear that matters beyond routine advancement are in play.

Tullius begins with basic questions, asking how much Will Vis can theoretically use and confirming that Vis has not yet been assigned a specific Governance duty. Tullius then moves to the first practical test: Vis must self-imbue and throw a massive boulder as far as possible. Because Vis has only one arm, the task is physically harder for him, and he briefly considers whether underperforming would be safer; however, he decides that holding back would leave him powerless to influence anything. Vis floods himself with ceded Will, prepares his body carefully, senses the stone’s faint imbued pulse, and secretly reaches for it through Adoption just as he roars and launches the boulder, ending the chapter before the result is shown.