The students returned home as usual, enjoying a five-day break before the exams that would await them upon their return. Yet even during the rest, Cassian didn't abandon the habit that had accompanied him for the past ten years of his life. Sitting at the small desk in his basement, he immersed himself in reading the Rithzargul, the grimoire from which Lilvyra had emerged. In the past, those ancient and indecipherable characters had confused him, but now, since that demon's appearance, he could understand every formula and spell with astonishing clarity.
What he read left him petrified—terrified yet mesmerized. Within those pages were forbidden spells, prayers to Nyratalir, the Primordial Shadow, and occult rites passed down through his family for generations—the very ones for which his father had been condemned.
