The cafeteria had become a silent tomb.
Every clink of cutlery stopped. Every cough died mid-breath. Heartbeats thundered as the air thickened with fear and the faint bite of lingering mana.
The hall, once alive with chatter and the smell of stew, held its breath.
Corvin stopped two paces from the table, his shadow stretching over the spilled food and broken plates. A slow, devilish smile curled his lips, spreading like poison.
The faint ozone of his S-rank aura prickled the skin, raising goosebumps.
"Name?"
Kael didn't blink. His silver eyes met Corvin's storm-blue ones.
"Kael Draven"
Finn gripped Kael's shoulders, his voice trembling with terror. "Kael, don't. He's Malek's son. True S-rank sorcerer. You won't survive, not without mana; it's not worth it."
Kael reached up, peeling Finn's fingers from his shoulder one by one, slow and deliberate. The warmth lingered a second too long, a reminder of bonds he'd always pushed away.
"We're not friends."
Kael's words came out cold and distant, full of pride and arrogance. Finn gasped, unable to believe what he'd heard.
"For the last time, Voss," he said, ice in every syllable, voice steady but edged with a finality that cut the air, "we're not friends."
Silence fell, heavy on every chest. The cafeteria seemed to hold its breath. The only sounds were a spoon dripping stew and a chair creaking under the tension.
Aeron rose halfway from his seat, palms open in placation, sweat beading on his brow. "Corvin, come on, man. Let's all eat and forget about it; bad blood spoils the meal. No need for this. Walk away, man. We're all students here."
Corvin's crew moved like shadows uncoiling from the walls, silent and swift. Two slammed Aeron back into his chair, hands like vices on his shoulders.
"Sit."
Aeron's eyes widened, muscles straining against the hold, veins bulging in his neck, but the S-rank aura pinned him as surely as chains, his mind racing with helpless fury. "Damn it."
Lily's voice cracked like thin ice under a boot, and her hands twisted in her lap. "Kael… please… Don't do this… you don't have to…"
Corvin tilted his head, a devilish grin appearing on his face. "You want to die today, C-rank? Or just bleed a little? Should I make it quick for you?"
Kael set his glass down deliberately. The soft clink echoed in the hush.
He rose, his chair scraping back, sharp against the silence.
Every gaze tightened on the blank heir and the thunder god as they stood inches apart, silver eyes against storm-blue.
"I'm tired," Kael said quietly, voice soft but lethal. "Of hearing how weak I am."
Corvin's grin widened, a flash of teeth in the dim light, but his eyes narrowed, a flicker of genuine surprise and something darker, like respect twisted into hate. He flicked two fingers, casual as brushing lint from his sleeve.
Six students ignited their glyphs, the air humming with raw power and violet flames roaring. They charged at him.
The first fist came blazing with violet fire, the heat scorching the air before it landed, flames licking hungrily at Kael's robe. Kael caught the wrist mid-swing, bones cracking under his grip, twisted, and hurled the boy overhead. The body arced like a comet, crashing through three tables in an explosion of splinters and trays. Screams erupted, high and sharp, chairs toppling in cascades.
A wind-cutter screamed in next, blades invisible but whistling death, slicing the air with a high-pitched keen that raised gooseflesh. Kael dropped low, swept the attacker's legs with a sweep that snapped an ankle, and slammed an elbow into the boy's chest. The cartilage cracked with a sharp crunch. He doubled over and collapsed to the floor, struggling to breathe.
The third and fourth attacked simultaneously, their stone gauntlets crashing down like hammers and cracking the ground.
Kael dodged the first, grabbed the arm, and flung the attacker face-first into his partner.
Their heads slammed together with a sickening thud. Blood sprayed in a fine mist, metallic on the air. Both collapsed in a tangled heap, groaning.
He rose in the center of the wreckage, his chest barely moving, sweat beading on his brow but eyes locked on Corvin.
A memory clawed him open, vivid and raw, hitting like a second heartbeat pounding, relentless.
High-school hallway, after school hours, Kael running, his lungs raw and burning with every gasp, legs screaming faster, faster, the echo of his boots the only sound in the empty corridors.
He flung the classroom door open with a bang that broke the frame.
Baron lay curled in a fetal ball on the floor, bruised black and blue. Blood pooled dark and thick beneath his head. Each breath was a shallow, wet rattle.
The six seniors stood over him, laughing. Their knuckles were split and raw, uniforms speckled with crimson.
"Close the door, little boy," one sneered, voice thick with condescension, eyes bright with the rush of total power.
Something inside Kael shattered, a dam breaking in his chest with a flood of white-hot rage that drowned out the world.
He grabbed the nearest bully by the throat, walked him backward step by step, boots thudding against tile, and hurled him through the third-floor window.
The glass shattered in a glittering explosion as he plunged from the window and slammed onto the car below. The alarm shrieked into the night, and screams erupted from startled passersby.
The boy never walked again. His spinal cord shattered like glass, healers confirming the damage was irreversible, his screams echoing in Kael's nightmares for months.
Roderick's office later that night, the air thick with incense and rage.
Father's hand raised to strike Kael.
But Baron stepped between them, taking the slap with full force, his skin splitting with a sharp snap, blood trickling from his lip in a thin red line.
"I'm sorry, Father. It was my fault," Baron said, voice steady despite the pain, eyes down but unbowed, his cheek blooming red.
Kael snapped, his fists clenched. Pride burning like acid in his throat. "Never apologize for me. They hurt you; they paid. They deserved it."
Roderick sighed and slumped into his chair, eyes hollow, staring at his two sons.
The room felt crushed under a legacy fracturing with violence. Silence hung thick, broken only by the clock's steady tick and Baron's shallow, ragged breaths.
Two boys. One always shielding the other from the monster they'd created, the cycle of protection and pain tightening with every wound.
Back in the present, Kael took one step toward Corvin. Corvin's smile faltered for a heartbeat.
"Again," he ordered.
The second wave hit harder, this time faster, glyphs blazing like miniature suns, the air scorching with heat and ozone that stung the eyes and throat.
Kael became a blur of violence: elbows shattering his jaw, knees rupturing his organs in wet bursts that sprayed blood across the white tiles, and fists driving through guard after guard like battering rams, each impact reverberating through his bones.
But numbers and magic won this time.
A lightning spear pierced his shoulder, flesh sizzling with a sharp hiss. The stench of burned meat hit him as white-hot pain flared down his arm.
A stone hammer slammed his ribs with a dull crack, forcing the air from his lungs.
He dropped to his knees. Blood dripped from his mouth, thick and coppery. His vision darkened at the edges, breaths wet and ragged, each one a stab of pain.
Corvin walked forward, palm glowing violet-white, the energy humming like a storm trapped in skin.
"Say goodbye, blank," he whispered, voice almost tender, leaning in close enough for Kael to feel the heat radiating from the spell.
Boom!!!
The thunderblast erupted point-blank, hitting him directly in the chest.
Kael hurtled thirty meters, the world a screaming blur of wind and pain. He slammed into the grass outside the hall with a bone-rattling crunch; he rolled in a tangle of limbs and tearing dirt, then lay still.
His uniform hung in charred rags, edges smoking. A fist-sized hole smoked through his chest where his heart should have been, blood pouring hot and thick into the earth, the air heavy with the reek of iron and scorched grass. For a moment it felt like he was dead, lifeless.
Lily screamed his name, the sound raw and breaking, tearing from her throat like a wound, her golden eyes filling with tears, spilling down her cheeks in silent tracks that blurred her vision.
Corvin's crew sealed the doors with glowing barriers.
"Nobody leaves."
Corvin stepped into the sunlight, unbuttoning his Thundercrest robe with deliberate slowness, letting it fall to the grass like shed skin. He rolled his sleeves up, knuckles cracking like distant thunder, his veins bulging under his skin, the muscles flexing with anticipation.
Lily's voice broke, hands clutching Finn's arm tightly. "Finn, do something! He's going to kill him, please. He can't just… please!"
Finn's face was ashen, hands shaking, and eyes wide with helpless horror. "I… I can't. S-rank… he'll fry me too. Kael's… he's gone."
Aeron strained against his captors. "Let me go, you bastards! This isn't a game; he'll die!"
Oliver whispered, his voice trembling. "This is bad… Statistically, he's dead already… that kind of blast… no one walks from that."
Corvin crouched beside Kael's smoking body.
"What made a worthless C-rank think he could touch me?" He murmured, almost conversational, lifting Kael by the head.
"Next life, choose better enemies. Or maybe… just choose death sooner."
Kael's eyes fluttered open, unfocused, the world a haze of pain and gray sky, each breath a wet gurgle, the hole in his chest bubbling blood.
Weak.
Useless.
The words were acid in his veins, burning through every memory, every scar, every moment of scorn—the healers' pitying looks, Father's disappointment, and the whispers in the halls. Always the blank. Always the failure.
Then the sky screamed.
A vertical wound ripped open above the academy, crimson light spilling into the sky. Clouds split with a deafening roar.
Red-black lightning struck Kael, a thunderclap rattling the ground.
The crater yawned twenty meters deep as soil and rock erupted, the earth groaning.
Shockwaves shattered windows for a kilometer. Glass rained like deadly hail, tinkling on stone.
The ground trembled, tables flipping inside the hall with crashes of wood and metal, screams echoing as students dove for cover, hands over heads, the air filled with dust and the acrid smell of scorched stone.
Time fractured, the world holding its breath as space warped, time folded, and realms bled into one another in a vortex of red and black visions flashing in Kael's mind: oceans boiling, empires crumbling, and a king of curses smiling from a throne of bones.
A system window bloomed in Kael's dying sight, glowing ethereal red against the black.
[REINCARNATION SYSTEM BOOTING…]
Primordial Curse Signature: MORVETHIS RAVOK – Verified
Mortal Vessel: Destroyed
Soul Fragment: Stabilizing
Curse Authority: LOCKED
Memory Access: FRAGMENTED
Power Level: ZERO
[ALERT]
A dormant power older than creation responds to your soul.
[AWAKENING ROUTE AVAILABLE]
> Do you wish to activate the Reincarnation System and awaken the Primordial Curse?
Warning:
Choosing YES will restore fragments of Morvethis Ravok, reshape your body, and alter your fate permanently.
Choosing NO will result in complete soul dissolution.
Awaiting host's command…
► Yes
► No
He didn't hesitate. The word rasped from ruined lungs, tasting of blood.
"Yes."
The transformation began.
Crimson lightning poured into him, burning charred flesh with a wet sizzle. The air grew thick with the stench of cooking meat.
Black curse-script erupted across his back in sprays of blood, claws of shadow raking the air with a screech like metal on stone before dissolving into swirling tattoos. They crawled over his torso like living serpents, ink-black lines pulsing with every frantic heartbeat, burning hot against his skin.
Veins ignited, glowing crimson beneath translucent skin, carrying not blood but something thicker, darker, and viscous as oil, bubbling and hissing as it coursed through.
His hair bled from silver to arterial red, growing wild and long tangled waves, carrying the scent of brimstone and old graves, the fibers coarse and alive.
His left hand, clawed and trembling, covered half his face a moment longer.
One eye remained storm-silver, flickering with Kael's last defiant spark.
The other blazed molten crimson, slit pupil contracting in reptilian light, the iris swirling with shadows.
Black curse markings crawled up his neck, over his jaw, framing a mouth now stretched into a wide, delighted, utterly inhuman grin.
The convergence lasted four heartbeats and a thousand years, the world holding its breath as space warped, time folded, and realms bled into one another in a vortex of red and black visions flashing in Kael's mind: oceans boiling under cursed skies, empires crumbling to ash at a whisper, and a king of curses smiling from a throne of bones, his laughter the last sound before the end.
When the dust settled, something new stood in the crater, the earth scarred and steaming around it.
His skin was pale, veined with black sigils that writhed like trapped shadows, faintly glowing with inner fire.
Tall and broad, he radiated raw curse power.
Grass withered in a perfect circle, heat shimmered in the air, and the ground cracked beneath his bare feet.
His bare torso gleamed with fresh blood.
The hole in his chest was gone, as if it had never existed.
He flexed his clawed fingers, then rolled his neck with a crack like a breaking stone, and laughed. The sound echoed across the entire academy.
Corvin stumbled back, his face drained of color, sweat beading on his brow despite the chill wind, his hands trembling at his sides.
"K-Kael…?"
Kael tilted his head, his smile widening until it split too far.
"Kael?" The voice was Kael's, a cold baritone, but underneath ran something older, amused, and hungry, like a god whispering through a crack in the world, the timbre vibrating in the bones of everyone listening.
"Wrong name, little thunder god."
Far away, in a cavern lit only by blood runes etched into obsidian walls that dripped with condensation, an ancient sorcerer meditating on crimson circles jerked upright, sweat pouring in rivers down his weathered face, the air thick with the stench of mold and old magic.
His red staff blazed in his grip, runes flaring in panic, the wood scorching his palms.
"That aura… no… impossible. That pressure… Morvethis Ravok lives again."
Back on the ruined field, the reborn king took one slow step forward, grass dying under his bare foot. Crimson lightning danced between his fingers, the energy crackling in the air like laughter from the abyss.
He looked at Corvin with pure, delighted malice, his crimson eye narrowing to a slit.
"Round two," he said, voice echoing across the entire academy, shaking the foundations, the words lingering like a curse in the wind.
[ SORCERY SYSTEM ACTIVATED ]
► User Online
Welcome, [Keal Draven]
Current Level: [Lv. 1]
Experience: [0/100 EXP]
Available Skills: [None]
COMMANDS:
[Inventory]: View items, runes, and artifacts.
[Skill Tree]: Unlock or upgrade abilities
[Status]: View health, mana, and curse affinity
SYSTEM NOTICE:
New abilities unlock as you grow stronger. Aether energy responds to intent and focus.
Failure may have consequences; caution is advised.
[ AWAITING COMMAND… ]