The silence in the Verdant Archive was usually a comfort. Today, it was a suffocating weight.
I sat at my desk, my eyes scanning the text of a history book, but my mind was processing a different set of data. Variable: Seraphina Vael. Status: Compromised. Threat Level: Critical.
Damien had noticed her. That was the line in the sand. If she continued to watch me, if she continued to dig, she wouldn't just find my secrets; she would find a shallow grave in the woods. Damien didn't hesitate with loose ends. He cut them.
I had to cut her loose first.
I sat on the Throne in my mental Keep. I looked at the problem through the window of pure logic.
Objective: Ensure Seraphina's survival.Method: Disassociation.Tactic: She believes there is a human trapped inside the monster. She is investigating to save the human. Therefore, I must kill the human.
I had to make her hate me. Not just dislike me, but despise me so thoroughly that she would turn her back and never look at me again. I had to break the last thread of hope she held.
I closed the book. The sound was sharp in the quiet room.
I stood up and walked down the aisle. I didn't try to be stealthy. I let my footsteps echo, a deliberate, arrogant rhythm.
She was at her table, surrounded by stacks of notes. She looked up as I approached. Her eyes were tired, but there was that spark—that relentless, intelligent spark of curiosity and pity.
"Lucian," she said softly.
I stopped at the edge of her table. I didn't sit. I loomed.
"You need to leave," I said. My voice was not angry. It was flat. Indifferent.
She blinked, confused. "Excuse me?"
"The Archive," I clarified. "You spend too much time here. You spend too much time watching me. It has become... distracting."
Her expression hardened. "I have a Level Four pass, just like you. I have every right to be here."
"Rights are a fiction written by the powerful to keep the weak content," I said, reciting a line Damien loved. "The reality is that you are annoying me. And more importantly, you are annoying him."
Seraphina went still. "Damien?"
"He sees you, Seraphina," I said, my voice dropping to a cold, intimate whisper. "He sees you staring. He sees you digging. He asked me today if you were going to be a problem."
I leaned in, placing my hands on her table, invading her space. "I told him you were harmless. A sentimental girl mourning her expelled friend, grasping at straws. But Damien... he prefers to be thorough."
Fear flickered in her eyes, but she held her ground. "Is that a threat, Lucian? Are you threatening me?"
"I am giving you a diagnosis," I said coldly. "You are looking for a redemption arc that doesn't exist. You look at me and you see a prisoner. You see a victim."
I laughed. It was a short, dry, chilling sound.
"You are projecting, Seraphina. You want me to be a victim because the alternative—that I chose this, that I am this—is too terrifying for you to accept."
"I don't believe you," she whispered, though her voice wavered. "I saw you in the courtyard. I saw the fear."
"You saw weakness," I corrected harshy. "And I purged it. Do you know what I feel now when I look at you? I don't feel guilt. I don't feel shame. I feel... bored."
I looked at her with the empty, gray eyes of the stranger in the mirror. I pushed my Soul Resonance outward, letting her feel the absolute, frozen void of my intent. No heat. No conflict. Just ice.
"Go back to your dorm, Seraphina," I said. "Go back to your petty noble life. Forget about Leonidas. Forget about me. If you keep staring into the abyss, eventually the abyss is going to notice. And unlike me, the abyss is hungry."
I straightened up, brushing an imaginary speck of dust from my sleeve.
"This is the only warning you will get. Next time, I won't speak to you. I'll simply hand your name to Professor Vane and let nature take its course."
She stared at me. Her mouth opened slightly, but no words came out. The pity in her eyes died. The curiosity vanished. In their place, a look of pure, unadulterated revulsion bloomed.
She finally saw it. She saw the monster. She accepted that there was no one left to save.
"You..." she choked out, standing up and gathering her books with trembling hands. "You are tragic. You think you've become strong. You've just become hollow."
She shoved past me, her shoulder striking mine hard, and stormed out of the Archive.
I stood there, listening to the sound of her retreating footsteps.
I waited until the heavy iron door slammed shut.
In my mind, in the Frozen Keep, a tremor ran through the walls. A crack appeared in the ice of the Throne Room floor. The memory of her revulsion, the hurt in her eyes, tried to scream.
Irrelevant.
I engaged the mental locks. I forced the walls to hold. I watched the memory of her face recede into a dark cell deep in the dungeon.
I was alone in the Archive.
Mission accomplished. Subject Seraphina Vael disengaged. Threat neutralized.
I walked back to my table, sat down, and reopened my history book. My hands were steady. My heart was slow.
I read the same paragraph three times before the words made sense.
Two days later, Professor Vane returned.
He burst into Damien's quarters while we were reviewing the weekly academy budget, clutching a strange, brass device that looked like a sextant crossed with a gyroscope. It was humming with a low, dissonant vibration.
"It works!" Vane squealed, his watery eyes manic. "The Compass! I tuned it to the frequency you provided, Mr. Greyfall. The warding frequency!"
He set the device on the desk. The needle wasn't pointing North. It was pointing unwaveringly Northwest, towards the Ironspine Mountains.
"It locked on?" Damien asked, standing up, his eyes wide.
"It's faint," Vane admitted. "Distance interference. But it is distinct. There is a source of that specific magical signature in the deep range."
Of course there was. The frequency I had given them was a standard, high-level containment ward used by Alastair. He had probably built a dozen vaults in those mountains for various clients over the centuries. None of them would hold the "Warden's Sigil," because it didn't exist. But the compass didn't know that.
"It's real," Damien breathed. He looked at me, beaming. "You were right, Lucian. The vault exists."
"Then we must act," I said calmly.
"Yes," Damien agreed. He turned to Vane. "Send the courier to Lady Vesper. Tell the Syndicate to mobilize the northern cell. We start the expedition immediately."
He turned back to the window, staring at the mountains as if he could already see the power they held.
"Three months," he muttered. "In three months, I will have the key. And then... the world changes."
I stood behind him, the perfect, loyal lieutenant.
"Yes, Damien," I said. "The world changes."
He was looking at the mountains. I was looking at him.
He had sent his hounds away. He was focused on a distant, fake treasure.
The academy was quiet. Seraphina was gone.
The board was finally clear.
Now, I could begin my own work. I had to enter the Scribe's Path. I had to open the Verboten Archive. And I had to find a way to stop the "door to the End" before Damien found his way back to it.
The winter was cold. But the spring... the spring was going to be bloody.
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[ Author's Note- Hey Guys. How are you guys doing? I Am Back. Just wanted to say that I am sorry, I was just not sure what to do, but I have decided to continue this story because I like this story very much, I have so many good ideas for this story, And I want to share this story with you all so much. So Here it is. Hope you all like it and support it.
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