Blood of the Broken Blade
Toby Rook only wanted one thing: to graduate from the Imperial War Academy and save his family from crushing debt. Instead, he gets murdered before his first day. When Toby intervenes to....
Toby Rook only wanted one thing: to graduate from the Imperial War Academy and save his family from crushing debt. Instead, he gets murdered before his first day. When Toby intervenes to protect a mysterious old man, an Imperial captain drives a blade through his heart. But death isn't the end. Toby awakens beneath the Academy with a broken black sword and the voice of Aurelian Veyr, a legendary warrior who died 317 years ago, trapped inside his head. There's just one problem. Toby has no martial channels. In a world where warriors rise through strength and vital force, he possesses neither. Even Aurelian's legendary knowledge cannot make his body do what it was never built to do. Now Toby must survive brutal Academy training, uncover the secrets of a sword that demands the blood of sworn enemies, and somehow graduate before his family's debts destroy everything he's fighting for. And the Imperial captain who murdered him? He's one of the Academy's instructors. As an unlikely friendship grows between a stubborn young man and an arrogant, long-dead legend, Toby begins to discover that the Empire's greatest heroes may have left behind its darkest secrets. **He came to the Academy to save his family. Surviving it might change the Empire.**