Three hours had passed since the System initiated.
Inside the classroom, Elara and the remaining students huddled together in the dark. They had listened to the horrific sounds of tearing flesh and screams echoing through the school, praying the barricaded door would hold.
Suddenly, footsteps approached. Step. Step. Step.
The students held their breath.
KNOCK. KNOCK.
"Open up. It's Kael."
Elara scrambled to her feet and pushed aside the desks barricading the door. She unlocked it and pulled it open.
The students gasped.
Kael stood in the doorway, but he looked completely different. His school uniform was ruined, soaked in black and green blood. In his right hand, he held a sleek, obsidian dagger that seemed to absorb the light around it—the Monarch's Dagger. His eyes were cold, calculating, and carried a heavy aura that made the air in the room feel dense.
He looked less like a high school student and more like a veteran god of war.
"The school's interior is clear," Kael said evenly. "I've killed the immediate threats. But the tutorial barrier is shrinking. We need to leave the building and head to the safe zone at the city center."
"Y-You cleared the school?" the class president stammered. "By yourself?!"
Kael ignored the question. He tossed a handful of basic iron swords and rusty daggers onto the floor—loot he had gathered from the lower-level monsters.
"Arm yourselves," Kael ordered. "I will lead the way, but I won't babysit you. If you fall behind, you die."
As the students hesitantly picked up the weapons, Elara approached Kael. She looked at his bloody knuckles and the terrifying dagger at his side.
"Who... what are you, Kael?" she whispered, her eyes full of a mixture of fear and awe.
Kael looked down at the future Ice Empress. A faint smirk played on his lips. "I'm the guy who's going to make sure the world doesn't end this time."
He turned and walked down the hallway.
As they exited the front doors of the high school, the true scale of the apocalypse revealed itself. The city of Seattle was burning. Plumes of black smoke rose into the shattered sky. Massive, gargoyle-like creatures circled the skyscrapers.
But Kael wasn't looking at the monsters. He was looking at a notification screen that only he could see.
[Server 'Earth' Update]
[Player 'Kael' has reached the top of the Tutorial Rankings.]
[A Constellation of the 'Dark Faction' has sponsored you 10,000 Coins.]
[Warning: Due to your anomalous growth, a 'Hunter' has been dispatched by the System to eliminate the glitch.]
Kael's grip tightened on the Monarch's Dagger. A System Hunter? That was an enemy that usually didn't appear until Year 3.
High on a nearby rooftop, a figure cloaked in shifting silver armor stared down at Kael, its glowing red eyes locking onto him.
The real fight was just beginning.
"Let them come," Kael whispered into the wind. "I'll devour them all."