Chapter 1: The Weight of Seven Minutes

Ariana hurried down the deserted college hallway, pushing her body to move faster than it usually cared to go. She knew this specific wing of the campus was always quiet, which usually gave her relief. However, right now the silence only amplified the frantic sound of her sneakers on the polished linoleum, highlighting just how fast she was moving and exactly what she was trying to outrun. She checked her thin wristwatch again, feeling a spike of cold dread in her stomach as the digital display confirmed the time. She was already seven minutes late for the most restricted and arguably the most talked-about class on campus. That was an unacceptable number of minutes for a college course, and definitely for this college course, which already carried the weight of a severe warning.

She could not remember the last time she was late for anything important, which only made this moment feel worse. She should have left the dorm ten minutes earlier, considering the unexpected delay at the coffee cart. Instead, she had paused, foolishly believing the quick stop was necessary and totally worth the risk. Now, the potential consequences felt disproportionately large for something as small as wanting an extra caffeine fix. Everybody knew the rules about this class, even those who were lucky enough not to be enrolled. Rumors surrounded Professor Elias like a low-lying fog, always suggesting a level of strictness that bordered on the terrifying. She had tried to dismiss those whispers as collegiate exaggeration, but deep down, a part of her believed every single story. That belief was now squeezing the air from her chest.

Ariana rounded the final corner, seeing the heavy, dark wood door of Room 401 ahead. The door itself looked different from every other classroom door on campus, somehow thicker, more solid, and imposing. It seemed designed to hold secrets in and keep distractions out, and just approaching it felt like crossing a boundary. She slid the last few yards, stopping abruptly a few feet away, needing a deep breath before making contact. Her hand felt clammy as she reached for the cold brass handle. She tried to turn it, hoping for the smooth give of a standard classroom lock, but the heavy knob remained completely inert, resisting her force. The door was solidly, unambiguously locked.

She tried again, twisting the handle with more deliberate force, maybe even bruising her palm a bit. The mechanism was dead, clearly set against any casual interruption. This was not a normal classroom where a student could simply slip in late and try to blend into the back row without anyone noticing. This was Elias’s domain, and entry was controlled. The realization that she was stuck outside already felt like a public failure, even though the hallway remained empty. She was locked out, and waiting was her only choice, a fact that made the anxiety burn hotter in her throat.

Standing outside the dark, silent door, Ariana became intensely aware of the sounds filtering from within the classroom. They were low, indistinct, certainly not the clear tones of a lecture. Instead, she heard the smooth, low timbre of the professor’s young voice, punctuated by long periods of weighted silence. It sounded like he was speaking seriously, perhaps even lecturing Lucas and Jordan, her two intimidating classmates who had undoubtedly arrived exactly on time. She tried to focus on the content, pressing her ear slightly toward the wood, but the thick door swallowed most of the sound. She only caught fragments, enough to know the formal, high-stakes tone of the conversation was flowing without her.

The atmosphere of the hall suddenly felt charged, hostile even. She could almost feel the eyes of Lucas and Jordan on the other side of the wood, knowing they were aware of her late arrival, waiting for the spectacle of her entrance. Lucas, with his dark, easy confidence, and Jordan, who possessed a quiet sort of power that was always unsettling. Both of them were campus golden boys, three years older, and already established in the unofficial college hierarchy in a place far above her own. She was shy, nineteen, and now she was the one forcing an interruption, the disruption in their perfectly scheduled discipline. A flush of heat rose in her face, fueled by a mounting sense of acute anxiety. She needed to be anywhere else but standing frozen in front of Room 401.

Every second she spent waiting felt stretched, magnifying the small crime of tardiness into an international incident. She meticulously checked her watch once more, watching the seconds tick over, feeling the delay compound. She stood there, frozen in place like a poorly rendered statue, for what felt like an eternity but was probably only forty-five seconds in reality. The silence from inside stretched the tension until it was almost unbearable.

Then, just as she was considering knocking—a terrifying, risky move—the heavy door was sharply pulled inward. The sudden movement startled her, causing her to involuntarily recoil a step. Elias stood framed in the doorway, a presence that instantly commanded the entire space. Even though he was only twenty-four, barely five years older than her, he carried himself with an authority that felt decades deep. He wore a crisp, dark suit that seemed too formal for a college classroom but perfectly matched the rigid discipline he projected.

He did not step aside, not even a slight movement of his shoulder. He remained blocking the entrance, forcing Ariana to immediately halt her nervous shuffling and face him directly. The hallway suddenly felt very small and tight, closing in around her, and she had nowhere to look except into his dark eyes. They were focused entirely on her, completely devoid of warmth or recognition of her discomfort. He did not ask what she wanted, or even acknowledge her frantic rush. There was only the silence and the judgment hanging in the air between them.

The moment stretched into something heavy and definitive. Ariana felt her chin lower slightly under the sheer weight of his intense gaze, a reflex of automatic deference. She was standing before the door not as a student with a right to enter, but as an intruder who needed permission. Elias held the door open for only a fraction of a moment longer, ensuring she understood the pause was significant, marking the threshold between the outside world and his controlled environment. Then, with a concise, almost sharp motion of his hand, he gestured for her to enter the room. There was no verbal greeting, no clipped ‘come in,’ just the silent but absolute command of his hand.

Ariana managed a small, automatic nod, stepping past him into the confined space of the classroom. The room was oddly sparse, dominated by a large, polished mahogany table where Lucas and Jordan sat, and Elias’s imposing desk at the front. The room felt even smaller than the hallway had, trapping her instantly.

As soon as she was fully inside, moving only a single step toward the center of the room, Elias pivoted on his heel and shut the door with a controlled, audible click. The sound was definitive, sealing her inside with the consequences of her seven-minute delay. He did not look at her again immediately, instead turning his attention to the two seated students, though his posture made it clear she was the focus of the next moments.

Lucas and Jordan were watching her with an unsettling stillness. Lucas, leaning back in his chair, wore an expression of detached interest, a slight, almost imperceptible curvature around his mouth that suggested amusement. Jordan, sitting ramrod straight, looked entirely unreadable, his dark eyes simply tracking her movement and the professor’s reaction. Their silence was just as loud as Elias’s impending lecture.

Elias stepped around his desk, moving with an economy of motion that made his presence even more impactful, and rested his hands flat on the polished wood. He spoke, and the tone of his voice was low but carried a steel edge that cut through the silence. He started by addressing the late student with a formalized precision that stripped away any last remnants of her casual student identity.

“Ariana Jolie Vesper.”

The sound of her full name, enunciated carefully, pause after pause, in Elias’s deep register, was startling. It was formal, cold, and utterly removed from the casual register of college life. The use of her middle name, which she rarely ever heard spoken aloud, intensified the moment. Lucas shifted slightly in his chair, and Jordan’s entire posture seemed to freeze instantly. Elias’s voice was the sound of absolute authority, and it silenced any movement from the two classmates, who now watched, perfectly subdued, waiting for the ritual to unfold.

Ariana stood before the desk, completely exposed and suddenly acutely aware of how small the distance between her and Elias actually was.

Elias’s gaze was direct, sweeping across the three students, then settling back solely on her. He did not shout or raise his voice, instead using volume as a tool of precision. He enunciated one single, absolute classroom rule, the first dictum of this new discipline.

“Punctuality is not merely expected in this course.” Elias paused, letting the implication hang. “It is required.”

He held her eyes, ensuring the force of the word required landed squarely, not just as a policy, but as a personal demand. It was a rule not about convenience, but about compliance. He drew a deliberate breath, delivering the final, crushing line.

“Tardiness will never be excused. Not under any circumstances that you can present to me.”

Ariana felt her heart thud heavily against her ribs. She wanted to explain about the coffee cart, about the unforeseen delay, but the cold weight of his instruction made it clear that any explanation would be further considered an unwanted excuse rather than context. Excuses were weakness, and excuses were forbidden.

He moved away from the desk, taking a slow, measured step toward her side of the room. He did not encroach on her personal space, but the proximity suddenly felt overwhelming.

“Seven minutes, Miss Vesper, is a significant amount of the mandated class time.” He spoke softly now, but the reduction in volume made the words more intimidating, forcing her to lean in slightly to catch the full texture of his meaning. “Time that I designated for the progression of this discipline, and time that your colleagues set aside to be here.”

He motioned toward Lucas and Jordan with the slightest flick of his wrist. They were silent witnesses, the measure by which her failure was judged.

Elias then specified the exact form of her immediate consequence. It was not a punishment in the conventional sense of a detention or a verbal reprimand, but a structured humiliation designed to enforce the submission hierarchy instantly.

“You,” Elias stated, his tone flat and unyielding, “will immediately articulate a precise apology. I will hear you acknowledge two things: the absolute breach of the required standard, and the fact that you have wasted our time.”

He stepped back toward the desk now, returning to his position of formal authority, making it clear this was a performance required solely for his appraisal and the observation of the others.

“The statement must be complete, Miss Vesper. It must be loud enough for your colleagues to clearly hear every word, and it must contain no additional context or excuse. Simply a statement of fact and regret.”

Ariana’s throat felt dry. The command was simple enough, yet performing this formal submission ritual in front of Elias and the two older students felt like an impossible hurdle. Her shyness, her natural reticence, screamed against the public display of immediate failure. Nevertheless, she knew with absolute clarity that debate or refusal would only invite a far harsher consequence. Obedience needed to be immediate, total, and delivered without any hesitation.

She took a small, shaky breath, her gaze fixed on the polished wood of the floor, not wanting to meet Elias’s demanding eyes or the interested stares of Lucas and Jordan. She delivered the demanded and specified apology quietly, but with enough projection that the words carried clearly in the silent room.

“Professor Elias, I apologize unreservedly for my seven minutes of tardiness.” Her voice cracked slightly on the second word, betraying the anxiety she felt. She hurried through the specified confession. “I understand this constitutes an absolute breach of the required standard, and I apologize for wasting your mandated class time, as well as the time of the other students present.”

The words felt stiff and unnaturally formal on her tongue, but she said exactly what had been required, ticking off the elements of the instruction like a student completing a mandated form. She stood there, waiting, utterly exposed by her own statement.

Elias accepted the mandated expression of regret with a curt, minimal nod. It was a purely functional acknowledgement, not a sign of forgiveness, merely the acceptance of the required action. He moved swiftly, shifting the energy of the room without any emotional transition. The moment of humiliation was over, dealt with as efficiently as a necessary bureaucratic chore, and now the curriculum had to resume.

He did not refer to the tardiness again, not even glancing at her, turning his attention to the subject at hand as if the seven minutes had never happened.

“We turn now,” Elias stated, his voice returning to a smooth, instructional cadence as he addressed the entire room, including Ariana, who remained standing stiffly near the door, “to the practical application of hierarchy studies within the context of historical female submission.”

This meant the lessons about theory were becoming personal immediately. Ariana felt a new, colder panic replacing the stress of her late arrival. The course description had been clear, dealing with historical acts of submission, but she had assumed the application would remain within the realm of academic discussion and essay writing. Elias’s quick transition made it clear that assumption was completely worthless.

“The theoretical concepts surrounding the subjugation of the individual must be understood by the body as well as the mind,” Elias explained, lecturing to Lucas and Jordan but pointedly keeping Ariana in his line of sight. “Therefore, all rules and all theoretical studies will be reinforced by mandatory practical exercises.”

Ariana realized the hierarchy he spoke of was not merely historical. She was clearly at the bottom of the classroom order—the student late, the one who performed the forced apology, the one who needed to be disciplined. Lucas and Jordan were the observers, the neutral (but definitely judging) upper echelon. Elias was the apex of this enforced hierarchy.

He walked over to a small whiteboard near his desk, picking up a dry-erase marker. His movements were precise, devoid of any wasted energy. He began to draw a simple, stylized image of a kneeling figure, writing a foreign word above it.

“Our first practical exercise,” Elias announced, articulating the word with careful respect, “is based on the required study and eventual perfect public performance of a historical 17th-century Japanese ritual: the Dogeza.”

He turned back to the students, his expression coolly challenging. “This ritual, originating in the highly structured social order of the Edo period, is one of the most severe public forms of complete deference. It is historically utilized by women of lower station, or those who have committed an offense, to apologize and to request mercy from a social superior. It is an act of total prostration, leaving the subject entirely vulnerable.”

Elias paused, looking directly at Ariana, making the connection between her recently stated apology and the upcoming performance brutally clear.

“This is an exercise that demands absolute precision, Miss Vesper. It requires the kneeling, the forehead pressed flat to the floor in a specific manner, and a posture of complete and demonstrable surrender, for a specified duration of time.”

He tapped the marker lightly against the desk.

“This performance will not be graded on historical knowledge but on demonstrable compliance and the perfection of the form.” He swept his eyes across all three of them, making sure the weight of the instruction was carried equally.

“The assignment, which is non-negotiable, is the required study of this ritual’s precise form and historical context." Elias then stated the condition for the performance, making it the unavoidable introduction to their next meeting. “You will all be prepared to publicly demonstrate the Dogeza at the start of our next mandatory class. Your execution of this exercise will determine the parameters of your initial standing within the internal classroom hierarchy.”