The moon hung high over the Ravenshade estate, a pale, unblinking eye watching through the gaps in the heavy velvet curtains.
The clock on the mantle chimed three times. The witching hour.
Inside the room, the breathing of the invalid was steady and rhythmic. In. Out. In. Out. To any observer, Kael Ravenshade was deep in restorative slumber. Even the night nurse, who had checked on him ten minutes ago, had adjusted his blanket and left with a satisfied nod.
But the moment the door clicked shut, Kael's eyes opened.
There was no drowsiness. The transition from feigned sleep to total alertness was instantaneous. It was a switch flipped in the dark.
Kael threw the heavy duvet aside. The cool night air hit his skin, raising gooseflesh on his arms. He looked at them—thin, pale, the muscles wasted away to stringy bands clinging to bone. He flexed his fingers. They trembled. Not from fear, but from weakness. The neural pathways were firing lightning-fast commands, but the hardware was rusted.
"Disgraceful," Kael whispered.
He swung his legs over the side of the bed. His feet hit the floor. His knees buckled immediately.
In his past life, he had marched for three days with a spear through his gut. He had held a mountain pass against a legion of shadow-beasts until his armor fused to his skin. Pain was just information. It was data telling him which parts of the machine were compromised.
Right now, the data was screaming: System Failure.
Kael gritted his teeth and forced his legs to straighten. He didn't use the bedpost for support. He needed to know exactly how much gravity this body could fight on its own.
He stood. He swayed like a sapling in a gale, sweat instantly beading on his forehead.
"Stabilize," he commanded his own biology.
He closed his eyes and triggered the Abyssal Respiration. He inhaled, visualizing the air not as oxygen, but as fuel. He pulled it down into his stomach, compressing it, then forcing it outward into his limbs.
Burn.
The mana in his blood woke up. It was sluggish, like cold oil, but it obeyed. It rushed into his calves, his thighs, his lower back. It wrapped around the atrophied muscle fibers, acting as a temporary brace.
The trembling stopped.
Kael opened his eyes. He was standing perfectly still.
"Better," he murmured.
He began to move. He didn't do push-ups or sit-ups; those were crude tools for a body that had raw material to work with. He had none. Instead, he began the Kata of the Weeping Willow—a basic, foundational exercise from the Imperial Academy meant for flexibility and balance.
To an outsider, it looked like slow-motion dancing. He shifted his weight to his left foot, extending his right hand in a slow, fluid arc. He pivoted. He dipped.
His mind overlaid a phantom image over his reflection in the mirror. He saw his past self—clad in black iron, moving with the force of a landslide. He tried to match that phantom.
Snap.
A tendon in his shoulder popped painfully. Kael ignored it. He pushed the mana into the joint, soothing the inflammation instantly.
The body remembers, he thought. But it is a memory written in fading ink. I need to re-write it in blood.
He completed the form. Sweat was now pouring off him, soaking his thin nightshirt. His heart hammered a frantic rhythm against his ribs. He was exhausted after five minutes of light movement.
"Physical capacity: 5%," Kael assessed coldly. "If I were attacked by a common thug right now, I would have to rely on a surprise kill. Anything prolonged, and I die."
He walked to the window, leaning against the frame to catch his breath. He looked down at his hands again.
Physical strength would take months to rebuild. He didn't have months. The diary he hadn't yet found, the enemies lurking in the shadows, the "accident" that put him in this coma... the clock was ticking.
He needed an equalizer.
Kael turned his palm upward.
"Let's see what the Core can do."
In the world of Eryndor, mana was color-coded. Red for fire, Blue for water, Green for wind, Brown for earth. Light and Dark were the rare affinities, Gold and Black.
But when Kael looked inside himself, he saw none of those.
He saw Gray.
It wasn't the gray of a cloudy sky. It was the gray of ash. The gray of the Void. It was a color that devoured light rather than reflecting it. In his past life, he had wielded the Black mana of pure destruction. This... this was something else. This was what happened when destruction sat stagnant for seven years. It had calcified.
"Manifest," Kael whispered.
He focused his will into the center of his palm.
Usually, projecting mana outside the body required a conduit—a wand, a staff, or a sword. To shape raw mana into a physical form without a medium was a feat reserved for High Mages or Sword Saints.
Kael didn't care about rankings. He cared about results.
The air above his palm began to distort. It shimmered like heat rising from pavement.
A spark of gray light flickered. Then another.
Focus. Condense. Sharpen.
He visualized a blade. Not a fancy ceremonial sword, but a shiv. A simple, double-edged dagger meant for slipping between ribs.
The mana groaned. It resisted. It wanted to disperse back into the atmosphere. Kael clamped down on it with his mind, an iron vice of willpower.
Obey.
With a sound like a whisper of silk, the blade formed.
It hovered three inches above his skin. It was translucent, made of smoky gray energy that swirled violently within a contained shape. It hummed with a low, menacing vibration.
Kael studied it. It was unstable. The edges were fuzzy.
"Sharper," he hissed.
He poured more focus into the edges. He stripped away the excess energy, refining the shape until it was razor-thin. The fuzziness vanished. The blade became a solid, distinct triangle of gray light.
It was beautiful. It was silent.
Now, the test.
Kael looked around the room. He needed a target. He couldn't damage the furniture; Rowan would notice. He couldn't mark the walls.
His eyes landed on the bedside table.
There was a heavy brass candlestick holder, and in it, a thick wax candle that had been extinguished hours ago. The wick was black and curled.
Kael stepped closer.
He held the mana blade steady. His hand was shaking from the physical strain, but the blade itself remained motionless, suspended by his mind.
He needed to cut the wick without knocking the candle over.
A normal sword required a swing. A mana blade required only intent.
Kael took a breath. He channeled the Academy Style: Flash Draw.
Execute.
His hand didn't seem to move. It was a blur, a twitch of motion too fast for the unenhanced eye to follow.
Zan.
A soft sound, like a page turning.
Kael stood frozen, his hand already back at his side, the mana blade dissipated into gray mist.
He looked at the candle.
The candle hadn't moved. The black, curled wick still sat atop the wax.
Failure?
Kael reached out and gently blew a breath of air toward the candle.
Whoosh.
The top half of the wick—a piece no larger than a grain of rice—slid off the bottom half and fell onto the brass table.
The cut was microscopic in its perfection. The candle hadn't even wobbled.
Kael let out a long, slow exhale.
"Perfect execution," he whispered.
The skill was there. The "War God" instincts were intact. He could visualize the kill, and his mana could execute it.
But then, the backlash hit.
Kael gasped, clutching his chest. His knees gave way, and he collapsed onto the rug. The world spun violently. Black spots danced in his vision.
Creating and controlling that small blade for thirty seconds had drained nearly 40% of his current mana reserves. His core was pulsing painfully, throbbing like a bruised heart.
"Stamina..." Kael wheezed, curling into a ball on the floor to manage the nausea. "Garbage."
He lay there for a minute, waiting for the room to stop spinning. He had the lethality of a viper, but the endurance of a sickly child. If he missed that first strike, if the fight dragged on, he was dead.
He needed to be smarter. He needed to be ruthless. He couldn't fight fair.
Creak.
A floorboard groaned in the hallway.
Kael's head snapped up. Footsteps. Light, hesitant. Not Rowan—Rowan walked with a heavy, tired gait. Not a guard—no metal clanking.
Someone was outside his door.
Kael scrambled. He dragged himself up from the floor, using the bedframe for leverage. He threw himself under the covers, yanking the duvet up to his chin. He slowed his breathing instantly. Abyssal Respiration: Concealment Mode.
His heart rate dropped. His face relaxed.
The door handle turned slowly.
The door opened a crack. A sliver of light from the hallway spilled across the floor, cutting through the darkness.
Kael watched through his eyelashes, his breathing shallow and even.
A small figure peeked in. Big eyes. Brown hair.
Zara.
She stood there for a long moment, clutching a book to her chest. She looked at the bed, then her eyes scanned the room. She looked at the window Kael had been standing by. She looked at the rug where he had collapsed.
Did she see the sweat on his brow? Did she sense the residual mana in the air? The gray energy had a specific, metallic smell, like ozone before a storm.
Zara took a step inside. She sniffed the air.
Kael didn't move a muscle. I am asleep. I am a dream.
She hesitated. Then, she backed out slowly, pulling the door shut until it clicked.
Kael waited ten full seconds. Then he opened his eyes.
"She's sharp," he whispered.
He looked at the brass candlestick on the table. The tiny piece of cut wick lay there, a silent testament to what he was capable of.
He reached out and flicked the piece of wick onto the floor, grinding it into the carpet with his thumb until it was nothing but dust. No evidence.
Kael Ravenshade lay back on his pillow, staring at the canopy of his bed. His body was screaming in pain, every muscle fiber torn and aching. His core felt empty and bruised.
But for the first time in seven years—and perhaps for the first time in two lifetimes—he smiled. A real smile, a predator's smile.
He closed his eyes.
Tomorrow, I start the hunt.