glaukopsis
Six teenagers. One villa on a lake. An exam nobody can actually describe.
Vestian University is the name people say quietly, years later, in job interviews. It's what your professors write in recommendation letters, hoping they earned it too. But there's no direct way in. First, you have to survive a summer at Villa Aurelia: six strangers from across Europe, a nameless app that already knows too much about you, and three adults watching your every move without ever telling you when the real test is happening.
Each of them showed up with a version of themselves ready to perform: the guy who always knows what to say, the photographer who documents everything except what actually matters, the quiet one carrying a family secret he's never told anyone, the girl who makes people laugh so they'll notice her, the one who calculates everything except what he's starting to feel, the influencer who built her whole identity herself because no one ever gave her anything.
Between bonfires by the lake, games that turn out to be more than games, and an app that seems to know them better than they know themselves, they're all forced to face the same uncomfortable question: how much of who you are is actually yours, and how much is just a scar you haven't named yet?
ITMT: Is This My Trauma