The man in the white suit stepped through a shimring silver doorway and entered a vast, pristine chamber of white stone and glass.
The walls glowed faintly with living light and dozens of floating hologram monitors drifted lazily in the air like leaves on a calm river.
This was his monitoring room just like the one Agatha and thr ither World Master had. It hung suspended between dinsions, invisible to mortals, yet deeply tied to their fate.
He walked without hurry, hands still in his pockets, shoes making no sound. A thin smile curved his lips.
"Open feed," he said lazily.
The largest hologram pulsed, flickered, then expanded. It showed a teenage boy’s face with slightly ruffled dark hair, tired eyes, a slouched posture that tried to hide a sharp mind.
The boy’s na was Jack Kessler.
The man narrowed his eyes in amusent.
"Hmm," he murmured, stopping in front of the projection. "You don’t look like much, kid. You even look so weak."
He tilted his head, the smile widening.
"But sohow... you got lucky. You found one of my pieces."
The hologram replayed the mont Jack touched the Silvercoil Spear. The readings spiked and he noticed it.
"Impressive," the man said to himself. "Most of them pass by these things without even noticing. But you, either by instinct, or fate have found it."
He circled the hologram, watching it like a curator studying a rare animal.
"They’ll want to report this," he muttered, referring to the Bureau above him. "But they don’t need to know yet. Let them focus on rebuilding after that... Uhh, incident."
His tone soured briefly. The anomaly. The disaster that tore through the Higher Realms. The Higher beibgs were killed and a lot of domains broken because of the corruption. It will take a long ti to recover from the damage.
So now the balance must be restored step by step.
"They decided to increase the frequency of Selection Stages," he said to no one. "Fine by . I always enjoy watching fresh candidates scramble around in panic. The weak die. The clever adapt and every once in a while, soone like that appears."
His eyes returned to the face on the screen.
"I wonder if you will stay clever? Will you be fun to watch?"
He reached out and tapped the edge of the screen with a finger.
"I gave you a head start. Let’s see what you do with it. Maybe... just maybe, soone else will get lucky next. That should make this more fun."
He turned away and vanished into another corridor, whistling a cheerful tune.
---
The next day arrived in a quiet hush, still wrapped in the faint mist of dawn.
Clyde stepped lightly down the creaking stairs of the old house. The air was cold, the silence stretched. He entered the living room and noticed it imdiately that no one was there.
The couch where his uncle usually lay sprawled like a king was empty. The TV was off. No beer cans, no shouting.
He let out a slow breath through his nose.
"Good. Maybe they finally got the ssage," he muttered.
He scoffed, a bitter smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. "They just needed a little push... and suddenly they scatter like rats."
His gaze swept over the cluttered room.
"Jack endured this place for years," Clyde thought. "Trapped, humiliated, beaten down. Waiting for sothing to change but that never did."
Well, change had co now.
"Hopefully, the kid can have a little peace now while I wear his body." Clyde thought.
Without wasting another second, he grabbed his jacket and put the Silvercoil Spear inside his pocket before heading out the door.
The morning air in the park was crisp and fresh. A few joggers passed by. The world still turned as if nothing had happened.
But Clyde knew better.
He spotted Mina near the familiar stretch of grass where they usually t. She was already going through warm-ups and she looks faster and more focused than before.
Her movents were sharp. Her breathing steady. The fear from last night still lingered in her eyes but now it was buried beneath her determination to survive.
She noticed him and waved him over.
Clyde joined her without a word, and together they began their routine.
They stretching, jogging then doing so calisthenics. Nothing special, but it felt heavier today. Like the air itself knew ti was running out.
When they finally finished, they dropped onto a bench under a tree, catching their breath.
Clyde glanced around the park, cautious. Then he move his hand to his pocket and pulled the spear out just enough for Mina to see the glimr of the coiled silver shaft that still in the size of a small tube.
Her eyes widened.
"Thisis probably why that man found ," he said in a low voice,
Mina leaned closer, careful not to draw attention. "What... is it?"
"I don’t know," Clyde lied smoothly, eyes on the horizon. "Looks like an artifact or so kind of old weapon."
Mina reached out but stopped herself, unsure. "It looks like have so kind of energy."
Clyde nodded, wrapping it again. "This also dangerous."
He didn’t ntion what it could do yet. He didn’t say that it was a magic weapon.
He didn’t show her how the weapon will be turn into a spear when he poured a sliver of magic power into it like what he did the night before, and he definitely didn’t ntion that he could already control the flow of that power through instinct alone.
Because he knew that the World Master might still be watching.
So for now, he would keep the truth close. Let them think he was lucky.
When the apocalypse finally began, when fire fell and cities burned and monsters tore through the veil of reality, then he would show them.
Then the World Master would only think of him as a prodigy.
So one would question how ready he really was.
---
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