On the sixth day.
Kael’s body ached, but it was a good ache, one that ca from progress.
Every muscle in his arms carried a subtle heaviness and his once-slender fra now held a faint sharpness, a strength honed by relentless swings of his heavy sword.
That evening, while the other students remained in their private training rooms, Kael stood at the edge of Arcadia Academy’s courtyard, staring toward the darkened hills beyond the city walls.
His eyes narrowed.
"Ravencall Watchtower..." he muttered, adjusting the strap of his sword.
"If the novel’s events haven’t changed, there should be eighteen demons there tonight."
This was no reckless impulse.
Kael wasn’t simply chasing danger, he was testing his strength in the novel.
He still rembered the plotline from the novel he’d read.
In that story, Ravencall was a side-quest location filled with low-to-mid rank demons.
They were deadly to an untrained student, but not impossible for soone with skill, cunning, and the right preparation.
Kael had all three.
That night.
The path to Ravencall was eerily silent.
Only the occasional call of a nightbird broke the stillness as Kael made his way through the dense trees.
He kept one hand on his sword and the other brushing against the rough bark of ancient pines.
"Selena gave the right direction. How does she know everything exactly?", Kael said to himself.
When the shadow of the old watchtower finally lood ahead, Kael crouched behind a boulder and studied the ruins.
The structure was a crumbling remnant of an age-old war, its stone walls scarred and blackened by ti.
Faint flickers of dark energy leaked from the cracks like smoke.
Through the moonlight, he spotted them—the demons.
Their twisted shapes slithered between the broken stones, each one cloaked in a thin veil of shadow.
Kael counted carefully.
"One...two...three..."
His lips moved silently as he marked each target.
"...Eighteen. Just like in the novel."
(If the number matched, maybe fate was still following the story.)
That gave him an advantage.
Kael drew his heavy sword, the blade reflecting a faint shimr of moonlight.
His breathing slowed.
The first demon didn’t even have ti to hiss.
Kael slipped behind it, his blade cutting through the air with brutal precision.
The creature fell in a burst of black mist, collapsing without a sound.
Another crouched near a broken pillar, sniffing the cold air.
Kael’s steps were silent as he approached from the blind side.
A swift upward slash severed its neck.
The demon dissolved into smoke, leaving behind the faint scent of burnt iron.
One by one, the hunt continued.
Kael’s mories of the novel guided him: which demon patrolled where, which one would notice a missing comrade first.
He used the ruins themselves to mask his presence, darting from shadow to shadow.
By the twelfth kill, sweat clung to his forehead.
His breath ca sharp and steady.
"Six more," he whispered.
"Almost done."
The last two demons were stronger, their bodies were larger.
They fought back, screeching and lashing out with blackened talons.
Kael’s heavy sword t their strikes with sparks, the clash ringing through the ruins.
But strength and planning were on his side.
Two precise thrusts ended them both.
Kael lowered his blade, chest rising and falling with controlled breaths.
"Eighteen demons are all dead now," Kael muttered.
Just as he turned to leave, a faint shimr caught his eye.
It flickered in the rubble near the largest demon’s corpse—a strange silver glow pulsing like a heartbeat.
Kael frowned and approached cautiously.
Nestled in the cracked skull of the fallen creature was a small, crystalline object the size of a marble.
It glead with an inner light like a liquid moonlight had solidified inside.
"What... is this?" Kael murmured, kneeling down.
The glow pulsed once, sending a faint vibration through the ground.
He reached out, fingers brushing the surface.
"A... core?" He tilted his head.
"The novel never ntioned this..."
Curiosity overca hesitation.
He pried the strange object free.
The mont it left the demon’s forehead, the glow dimd slightly, but the energy within remained potent.
His instincts scread of value.
"If this thing held even a fraction of the demon’s power, it could be worth a fortune—or serve as a source of strength."
"Better not leave it behind," he muttered, slipping it into his pocket.
Kael quickly checked the other corpses.
To his astonishnt, every demon had a core.
Each one shimred faintly, though none as brightly as the first.
One by one, he extracted all eighteen, carefully tucking them into his inner coat.
The weight against his chest felt strangely comforting.
Far away, in a cavern deep beneath the forest, a figure stirred.
The Shadow Disciple, a servant of the greater demon, abyss warden, was in the demon’s whereabouts.
His eyes snapped open as an invisible tremor rippled through the dark web of his senses.
"My... soldiers," he hissed.
"Their essence... is fading."
He reached out with his mind, tracing the threads of demonic energy that connected his minions.
But sothing—soone—was severing those threads with surgical precision.
"Eighteen... all at once?" His fingers twitched.
"Impossible. Who dares to kill them all?"
His awareness stretched toward Ravencall Watchtower, but the energy was muddled.
The killer was careful, leaving no spiritual trail.
The Shadow Disciple rose to his feet.
A wave of black mist coiled around him as he stepped through a portal of shadow.
Back at the watchtower, Kael adjusted his uniform and gave the silent ruins one last glance.
"That should be enough for tonight," he said.
"Ti to leave before sothing stronger."
He moved quickly, slipping through the forest paths.
Every instinct told him to avoid a prolonged stay.
If a shadow disciple or stronger creature was nearby, he wasn’t yet strong enough to face it.
Kael vanished into the night.
The Shadow Disciple erged from a swirling vortex of darkness burning with fury.
He stepped among the scattered corpses, boots crunching on shattered stones.
The sll of blood and dissipating energy filled the air.
"All of them are dead"
"Not a single soul left... and the cores are gone."
His fingers brushed the empty forehead where the silver crystal had once pulsed.
A snarl tore through the silence.
"Who dares steal from ?"
"Who hides from my gaze?"
He clenched his fist, shadows writhing around his arm like living serpents.
But no matter how he stretched his senses, the killer’s scent remained elusive.
"Very well," he whispered.
"Whoever you are... I will find you."
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