Chapter 225: The Silence After the Storm
[Sky Island – Sector 4 Alleyway]
"Sorry, Dad," I muttered to the wind, imagining the look on his face if he could see now. "I’m definitely on the front lines."
I was crouched in the shadow of a water tower, watching the plaza below.
The dia drones were buzzing everywhere, tiny silver spheres zip-lining through the air. They were focusing on the flashy battles—Leon’s white fire, Alastor’s silver slashes, Vane’s gravity wells.
"Good," I whispered. "Keep watching them."
I looked down at the Scabbard in my hands. It was the most important item in the entire ga lore right now. If the caras saw holding the sealed Excalibur, my life as an "Extra" was over. I’d be drafted by the Church, the Council, or assassinated by the Cult within the hour.
I needed to hide it.
My dinsional pocket? Too low-rank. The Holy energy of the sword disrupted spatial magic. It wouldn’t fit.
I scanned my surroundings. I was on a roof overlooking the rear of the Hero Honour Hall. The Hall itself had been blown open by the initial ritual blast.
My Quantum Analysis Mind highlighted sothing in the rubble of the Hall’s vestry.
A heavy, lead-lined chest used for transporting unstable mana crystals. It was sitting in the ruins, cracked but intact.
"That’ll do," I hissed.
I activated [Swift Step], dropping from the roof into the alley. I moved through the shadows, avoiding the patrols of Void Stalkers that Leon hadn’t cleared yet.
I reached the rubble. I shoved the Scabbard into the lead chest and slamd the lid. I wrapped the chest in a heavy tapestry I ripped from the wall—one depicting the First Hero—and hoisted it onto my back.
It looked like I was looting. Good. "Greedy student looting during a crisis" was a much better narrative than "Student wielding the God-Sword."
...Master... look...
Nox’s voice poked at my mind. He wasn’t looking at the sword. He was looking at the crater in the center of the plaza, where the Void Walker was being crushed by Councilor Vane.
The demon was bleeding.
But it wasn’t blood. It was chunks of raw, crystallized space-ti.
[Item Detected: Void-Heart Fragnt]
[Rank: S (Material)]
[Description: A piece of a high-ranking demon’s core, severed by gravity magic. Contains condensed spatial laws.]
My eyes widened.
In the ga, that material was a key ingredient for upgrading the [Dinsional Storage] skill to [Void Vault]—a storage space that could hold living things and divine artifacts.
It was lying right there, in the middle of the battlefield, glistening like a jagged black diamond.
Nobody else wanted it. To a normal mage, it was radioactive waste. Touching it would rot their hand.
But I had Nox. And I had a ring that boosted my stats by 20%.
"Risk versus reward," I muttered, the gar in taking the wheel.
The caras were focused on Leon, who was currently decapitating a Void Knight with a roar that shook the caras.
"Now."
I dropped the chest in a safe corner.
I sprinted.
I didn’t use stealth. I used speed.
I dashed into the open plaza, weaving between the gravity wells Councilor Vane was dropping.
"Kid! Get back!" Alastor roared from across the square, spotting .
I ignored him. I slid across the pavent like a baseball player stealing ho base.
My hand snatched the [Void-Heart Fragnt]. It burned, a cold fire that bit through my glove.
Inventory.
The system pinged. The hazardous material vanished into my storage.
...Yummy... Nox drooled ntally.
"Not for eating," I scolded internally. "For crafting."
I pivoted on my heel to run back, but a shadow fell over .
One of the Void Walker’s tentacles, severed by Cessias but still thrashing with independent life, lashed out. It was as thick as a tree trunk.
I couldn’t dodge. I was mid-turn.
CRACK.
A shield slamd into the ground between and the tentacle.
It wasn’t Alex. It wasn’t Chris.
It was a wall of pure, solid light.
I looked up.
Eric William stood there. He wasn’t looking at . He was looking at the cara drone hovering ten ters away.
"Go, commoner!" Eric shouted, his voice perfectly modulated for the broadcast. "I will hold the line!"
He cast a glance at , his eyes screaming, ’You owe , and everyone saw save you.’
I almost laughed. He was farming reputation points.
"Thanks, Young Master," I said, putting extra emphasis on the title.
I scrambled back, grabbing my tapestry-wrapped chest from the corner.
I had the Sword. I had the S-Rank material. And I had just played the role of "helpless student saved by a noble" on live TV.
My alibi was bulletproof.
As I retreated into the shadows, the sky above finally gave way.
The Void Walker, pinned by gravity and pierced by light, let out a sound that shattered every remaining window in the city.
It imploded.
A shockwave of black energy swept over the island, knocking the caras offline for a second.
When the feed returned, the demon was gone.
Councilor Vane descended, his violet robes fluttering. He landed in the center of the plaza, looking imperious and untouched.
But the real story wasn’t the Councilor.
It was the students.
Leon Lionheart stood atop a pile of defeated void beasts, his white fla fading, his sword raised to the sky.
The surviving students—Aurelia, Eric, Lyra, and even my own team, who had arrived from the hotel ruins—were rallying around him.
They were battered, bloody, and exhausted. But they were alive.
And the world was cheering.
I watched from the alleyway, sitting on my stolen chest of divine weaponry.
"Not a bad show," I whispered, pulling a healing potion from my belt and downing it. "Protagonist gets the glory. Extra gets the loot. Everyone wins."
My phone vibrated.
[Victor: Boss. The market just reacted to the broadcast.
Aegis Holdings stock is up 15% because people saw our logo on a supply crate in the background of Leon’s fight.
Also... did you just steal a chest from the Honour Hall?]
I smirked, typing back.
[: I didn’t steal it. I’m securing it for safekeeping.
Tell the team to get ready. The ’Sky Island’ arc is over.
The ’Awakening’ arc begins now.]
I looked at the notifications scrolling past my vision.
[Quest Complete: The Shadow of Sky Island.]
[Rating: S]
[Rewards Calculating...]
[Hidden Objective Complete: Secure the King’s Seal.]
[Reward: Access to the ’Legacy of Arthur’ Questline.]
I leaned my head back against the brick wall.
"Vacation," I said to the empty alley. "Next ti, I’m just going to a beach."
____________
The silence that followed the implosion of the Void Walker was heavier than the battle itself.
The screaming wind had died. The crimson barrier had dissolved into flakes of fading mana that drifted down like red snow.
In the center of the devastated plaza, Councilor Vane stood amidst the smoking crater. He didn’t look like a man who had just crushed an SS-Rank entity; he looked like a man who had stepped in sothing unpleasant and was annoyed by the ss.
He tapped his staff against the ground.
Thump.
A pulse of purple gravity washed over the square, flattening the remaining debris and extinguishing the last of the magical fires. It was a display of casual, absolute control that made every student and instructor shiver.
I shrank back into the shadows of the alleyway, clutching the heavy, tapestry-wrapped chest.
My heart was hamring against my ribs—not from fear of the demons, but from proximity to that man.
Councilor Vane. The Gravity Monarch.
In the ga, he was a neutral faction leader who eventually beca an antagonist due to his obsession with order. He had a passive perception skill that could detect lies through fluctuations in gravity caused by a person’s heartbeat.
If he looked at , and I lied about what was in this box, I was dead.
’Stay small,’ I told myself. ’You are an ant. You are an Extra. You are furniture.’
City Lord Cessias descended from the sky, his white robes tattered, his face pale. He landed beside Vane, leaning heavily on his World Tree staff.
"Councilor," Cessias rasped, bowing low. "Your arrival was... tily. The barrier prevented us from signaling sooner."
"The barrier was sloppy," Vane said, his voice cold and echoing. He didn’t look at Cessias; he was inspecting a smudge of soot on his violet sleeve. "The Cult has grown bold if they think they can cage a Council territory. Where is the security grid? Where is Vena?"
"Compromised," Cessias admitted, sha coloring his tone. "They jamd the core."
Vane scoffed. "Incompetence. The Council will be taking direct oversight of Sky Island’s reconstruction. And the investigation."
His gaze finally lifted, sweeping over the plaza. It passed over the exhausted students—Leon, Eric, Lyra—with barely a flicker of interest. To him, they were irrelevant.
Then, his eyes narrowed. He looked toward the ruins of the Honour Hall.
"The Relics," Vane stated. "The Sword of Light. Is it secure?"
I held my breath. This was it.
( To be Continued)
Reviews
All reviews (0)