Chapter 354: Before Time

It was early, at 4 a.m… when no one was awake. Kael couldn't find himself asleep.(I cannot sleep like others when I know what's going to happen in the future.)

Kael woke up, stretched his muscles, and said,

"It's time to train."

He walked through the corridor, but he met someone he didn't expect to see so early in the morning.

"Senior… What are they doing so early in the morning?"

Not one, but three seniors were in the corridor, talking among themselves.

(What are they doing, waking up so early just so they can talk? What bullshit, man.)

He carried no emblem of distinction, no badge marking him as particularly gifted. He was just another first-year, unranked, who stayed behind the stronger ones.

At least, that was what the others believed.

He didn't want any trouble, so he walked with his head lowered, because there was no other way to go around them to reach the training room.

"Watch where you're going, loser!"

Kael looked up but didn't say anything.

Another senior, who was tall, looked down at Kael with a glancing eye, as if he could kill with that stare.

"Well," he said, his voice carrying a harsh tone, as if he were trying to make it sound dangerous. "Aren't you going to apologize?"

Kael swallowed, not because he was afraid, but because he was irritated.

(Why don't they train themselves instead of doing this? Maybe they will be the first ones killed when the war happens.)

"Why should I say sorry to them when I didn't do anything wrong?" he muttered to himself so others wouldn't hear.

Kael had learned early that attention were the things he should avoid, or else there would be more trouble.

The word "sorry" was hard to bring out of Kael's mouth.

He took a long breath.

"I'm… sorry," he replied quietly. "I didn't see…"

But the senior in the middle cut in. "You didn't see? The corridor is three paces wide. Are you blind?" Another chuckled from behind.

Kael thought that from the beginning he should have ignored them and walked past, it would have been much better. So he tried to walk through them.

"Did we say you could move?"

"I already apologized," Kael said.

"Do you think that makes it even? What? Just saying sorry? You disrespect us in the corridor and think it fixes everything?"

"I didn't mean any disrespect." Kael kept his gaze lowered.

One of the seniors talked with his two friends and laughed. "Okay, we will let you go if you walk through that door," he pointed to the last door, and continued, "frog jumping."

Sigh!

It was too much for Kael. When he hadn't done anything wrong, he finally said,

"I don't want trouble."

"Trouble?" the senior repeated. "You think this is trouble? This is a lesson."

"Who are you guys," he said in a normal voice, "to teach me a lesson?"

They chuckled.

"You bastard. Here we are giving you a chance, but you don't want to take it, huh?"

One senior moved forward toward Kael and grabbed his shirt around the neck.

"You are nothing here. People like you… yup, like you, only exist to learn your place."

"Is there a problem?"

The voice cut through the corridor. It was Professor Kelden. He stood at the far end of the hall.

The seniors withdrew their hands immediately.

"Professor, no problem at all. Just advising a junior on corridor etiquette."

Professor Kelden's gaze shifted from the seniors to Kael.

"Is that so?"

Kael forced himself to stay steady and said,

"Yes, Professor. It was my mistake."

The professor's eyes lingered on the seniors.

"Third-year students should focus on their training. If I see you advising first-years again, you will be assisting me in the vault for a month."

"Understood, Professor."

"Good. Return to your rooms."

The seniors stepped aside.

(Man! What is really happening out here today, so early in the morning?)

As Kael passed through them, one of the seniors murmured under his breath, just loud enough for Kael to hear,

"Saved by timing."

Kael said nothing and left.

"I thought of training Abyss-Touched Vessels, but I didn't expect there to be people waking up so early."

(It would be better if I train outside the campus. I've got a few hours before class begins.)

He slipped off his coat and folded it with steady hands.

"Today I already wasted my time,"

Kael thought about the power he had gained from the dungeon.

He closed his eyes.

He whispered the name.

"Abyss-Touched Vessel."

Immediately, the pain came and tore through him. His veins felt like they were filling with fire. Bones groaned, stretching, hardening. He dropped to one knee.

"Why is this so hard? This is…stronger than I thought." His teeth clenched so he could bear the pain. Sweat ran down his body like he was bathing.

Inside his own core…

He was able to see smoke, black and red, moving like living fire.

It was rushing wildly and washing against the sides of his heart, trying to free itself.

Kael attempted to manage it, to direct it, but it was too powerful against his own vitality.

What seemed like an eternity, he fought it out, every pulse a battle between him and the power within.

After so much effort, he was able to unite himself with it.

The smoke settled and joined with his.

He opened his eyes.

Kael felt a joy deep in his heart. "Yes… I did it…"

"Let's see. From the nobles, I read that power, when the Demon Lord used it, shattered everything, and even the wounds generated itself."

He clenched his fists. He could feel his veins pulsing with a strength he had never felt before.

(This… is insane.) It felt like something he couldn't describe, something he could only feel.

Even the small stones were shaking from its power.

"All right… let's see," he whispered.

He pushed, not a strike, just a simple push against the thick tree.

The impact sounded like a drum.

Trang! Trang!

The thick tree shattered.

"What the…."

But he could feel every fiber of his body pulling away, his mana completely drained, all at once. He felt completely exhausted.

"Ahhhh… so much…!" Kael gritted his teeth, staggering back. Sweat poured down his face, but the small cuts on his knuckles twitched and sealed almost instantly.

His voice trembled, half excitement, half disbelief.

"Let's see once more."

He focused everything again, but due to low mana and strength, he couldn't bring back that power.

(If I want to use this, I have to train myself harder than I am now, to make myself stronger… only then can I control it.)

Bell rang!

Kael flinched, his eyes wide.

"Damn… the professor will scold me if I'm late… Yesterday I already got a warning."

Even though he felt exhausted, he ran like a dog, trying to reach before the professor.

"Uffff… What am I doing? I'll die before everything even begins, shit man!"

Kael looked up, and something caught his eyes—dust and smoke rising from the academy.

"What the… f**k? What's happening out there?"

Kael pushed forward, heart racing, and what he saw froze him in place.

The courtyard was chaos. Students screamed in fear. Professor Salvia was protecting them, while Elysia, Edwin, Jin, and some seniors helped her.

Kael's brain went blank. What he was seeing felt unreal.

It was only one demon causing all that chaos. And that demon was called Eimo (the soulless evil)… that demon should only appear after Edwin and Elysia graduate.

"No… this shouldn't be here. Not yet. How is that possible?"

"Why… why now? It should be later… much later… not now."

"This… this isn't right. The timing… it's all wrong."

His thoughts collided and fractured, thousands of ideas spinning in his head, telling him to run, to hide, to do something, but not to get foolishly near it.

A memory flashed to him suddenly, Celcillia…

It was the demon who killed Celcillia…