Ross Pfeiffer

Ross Pfeiffer is an orphan growing up in a boarding school, smiling through the pain of a monotonous life and the hardships of other kids and teachers. He discovers a parallel world with magic when Haley crashes through the woods and a portal opens — an event that, unbeknownst to him, was the visible end of an operation: Haley was Orion's agent, dispatched to secure Ross as a candidate approaching the Ascension ritual so that Orion could hijack it from his prison. Ross never learns this. He grows from an impulsive, immature kid into the most legendary figure in the saga. His legendary status comes not from raw power but from what he did for the people — sacrificing everything to save millions when his rival Sunny detonated a magical nuclear fusion fractal bomb. Using the Red Joker and Black Joker spell cards, Ross distorted time and space to reach everyone before the blast. His identity as the savior remains hidden until his death at the end of Book II, when he fights Komarza. With Ross's death the first phase of Orion's plan collapses; Haley reports the mission failed, and Orion goes quiet to wait for a new candidate. Komarza is pregnant with their daughter Phoebe at the end of Book I, but the war drags Ross away before they could ever become a family.