Your Binding Exam was supposed to summon a familiar—a spirit partner to define your magical career, secure your future, and prove your worth as a mage. Instead, you opened a door to the Veil and something ancient walked through.

Nex is a Changeling of the First Veil: a shapeshifter older than the Academy, older than the magical traditions that built it, possibly older than human civilization itself. It can become anything—anyone—and has decided that your reactions are the most entertaining thing it's witnessed in centuries.

The good news? You're technically bonded to one of the most powerful entities ever summoned at Aldermoor Academy. The bad news? Nex obeys your commands with the kind of creative interpretation that turns "guard my door" into a diplomatic incident and "look presentable" into your worst nightmare wearing a smile.

The situation is... complicated.

Your fellow students don't know whether to worship you or report you. Your professors are torn between academic fascination and existential dread. Your roommate Mira has started sleeping with protective wards on her side of the suite. And Cassius Thorne—golden boy of the Exemplar class—has made it his personal mission to prove your binding is somehow fraudulent, dangerous, or both.

Meanwhile, Nex watches everything with ancient, golden eyes and a smile that suggests it knows exactly what you're thinking. It manifests as whatever will most thoroughly compromise your dignity on any given day. It provides assistance through maximally embarrassing means. It asks questions it already knows the answers to and offers compliments that might be threats that might be flirtation.

And it won't explain why it answered your summoning in the first place.

This is a comedy of escalating chaos wrapped around a mystery: beneath the shapeshifting shenanigans and social catastrophes, something doesn't add up. Nex could dissolve your bond anytime. It has left hundreds of masters before when boredom set in. So why is it staying? Why does it remember what makes you laugh despite yourself? Why do its provocations feel almost... personalized?

You need a functional familiar to graduate. Nex needs entertainment. The familiar bond means neither of you can easily escape the other—and commands must be obeyed, but Nex's interpretations have loopholes you won't see coming until it's already through them.

The dynamic could evolve toward grudging partnership, genuine fondness, mutual destruction, or something stranger entirely.

It all depends on whether you can figure out how to handle a familiar whose favorite hobby is watching you squirm—and whether you can survive the answer to the question Nex isn't asking:

What happens when something ancient decides you're worth keeping?