The room beyond the obsidian doors did not smell like a tomb. It smelled like ozone, old velvet, and the metallic tang of dried blood—precisely the cologne Kiril imagined a dark wizard would wear.
He stepped over the threshold, his boots clicking on polished black marble. Behind him, the pile of skeletal dust that used to be a pack of Crypt Stalkers settled into silence.
"Close," Kiril whispered, his throat raw.
The heavy doors groaned and slammed shut, sealing him inside.
[Safe Zone Entered.]
[Mana Regeneration accelerated.]
Kiril slumped against the cold stone of the door, sliding down until he hit the floor. He didn't relax; he couldn't. His mana core was empty, a dry well scraping against the sides of his soul. The headache was blinding.
"So," the voice returned, echoing from the center of the vast chamber. "The runt of the litter survives the hallway. Impressive. Inefficient, messy, and lacking all aesthetic grace... but you're alive."
Kiril forced his head up.
The chamber was a rotunda, lined not with bookshelves, but with floating shards of black crystal. Thousands of them drifted in concentric rings, orbiting a central dais like a miniature solar system. The air hummed with a low, thrumming vibration that rattled Kiril's teeth.
In the center, sitting on a high-backed chair made of fused dragon bone, sat a figure.
It wore the midnight-blue robes of a High Magister, perfectly preserved. But where a face should have been, there was only a mask of smooth, white porcelain with no features—no eyes, no mouth. Just a blank, terrifying oval.
The figure didn't move, but the voice projected directly into Kiril's mind.
"Well? Are you going to introduce yourself, or shall I simply categorize you as 'Intruder Type 4' and liquidate your fluids for my alchemy experiments?"
Kiril swallowed the bile in his throat. He used the wall to push himself upright.
"Kiril," he rasped. "Kiril Drakenhof-Ashenwald."
The figure tilted its head. The porcelain mask caught the light of the drifting crystals.
"Ashenwald? We added a suffix? How distinctive. It sounds like a brand of cheap wine." The figure stood up. It was tall, unnaturally thin, and moved with a fluid grace that screamed inhuman. "I am Keeper Malvus. Or rather, the necrotic echo of him. I manage the inventory."
Malvus drifted down the steps of the dais, stopping ten feet from Kiril.
"Let me see the Key."
Kiril fumbled with his shirt collar, pulling out the iron key. It was no longer hot; it was ice cold.
Malvus didn't touch it. He merely leaned forward, the blank mask inches from the metal.
"Authentic," the Keeper murmured. "And the blood you used to open the grate... diluted, weak, barely functional, but technically valid. You are an Ashenblood. My congratulations on being born into the losing side of history."
"The Empire didn't win because they were better," Kiril said, channeling the arrogance of the noble he was pretending to be. "They won because they had numbers. We're fixing that."
Malvus laughed—a dry, rustling sound. "Bravado. I like it. It usually precedes a gruesome death, which is entertaining for me."
The Keeper turned his back, clasping his gloved hands behind him. "You came for the Legacy. The Quest called you."
Kiril blinked. "You know about the Quest?"
"I know the Vault activated," Malvus corrected. "The mechanisms of this place are old, boy. They wake up when the bloodline is threatened with extinction. I assume you are the last?"
"The last heir," Kiril confirmed. "My father is dead. My mother is exiled."
"Excellent. Desperation breeds competence." Malvus waved a hand at the floating crystals. "This is the Atheneum of Ash. It contains the accumulated knowledge of six centuries of High Necromancy, Void Theory, and Anti-Magic Warfare. But you..."
Malvus spun around, pointing a long, gloved finger at Kiril's chest.
"...you are a bucket with a hole in the bottom."
Kiril stiffened. "Excuse me?"
"Your mana core," Malvus sneered. "It's garbage. F-Rank. Contaminated. You have the Ashen Conduit ability—I saw you eat those Stalkers—but you have nowhere to put the energy. You're just venting it. It's wasteful. It offends me."
Kiril gritted his teeth. "That's why I'm here. To fix it."
"Fix it?" Malvus cackled. "You can't fix a rotten foundation, boy. You have to tear it down."
The Keeper walked back to the bone chair and sat down, crossing his legs.
"The objective of your little pilgrimage was the 'Central Phylactery', yes?"
"Yes."
"Do you know what a Phylactery is?"
"A jar for a soul," Kiril recited. "Liches use them to achieve immortality."
"Crude," Malvus scoffed. "A Phylactery is a Storage Drive. It preserves data. Identity. Power. The Central Phylactery isn't a jar. It's a Seed."
Malvus raised his hand.
From the swarm of orbiting crystals, a single object descended. It wasn't a crystal. It was a cube of dark metal, intricate geometric patterns glowing with a faint, red pulse. It floated down to hover in front of Kiril.
[Quest Item Identified: The Ashen Seed (Artifact Rank: Unique)]
[Description: An artificial mana core constructed by the First Patriarch. Designed to process Void Mana.]
"Your F-Rank core is biological," Malvus explained, sounding bored. "It's weak. It bleeds energy. This... this is perfection. If you want the power to crush the Empire, you don't need to train your core, Kiril."
Malvus leaned forward, the blank mask looming.
"You need to replace it."
Kiril stared at the cube. The red light pulsed in sync with his own heartbeat.
Replace my core?
The implications were terrifying. Mana cores were organs. They were connected to the nervous system, the heart, the brain. Removing one was usually fatal. Inserting an artificial one? That was surgery no sane doctor would attempt.
[System Analysis: The Ashen Seed is compatible with host physiology.]
[Success Rate of Integration: 14%.]
[Success Rate with System Assistance: 88%.]
[Warning: Procedure will be excruciating.]
Kiril looked at the success rate. 88%.
In a gacha game, those were god-tier odds. In real life, that was a 1-in-8 chance of exploding.
But then he thought of Viktor Strykov. He thought of the burning library. He thought of the "Shadow Council" assassin standing in his dorm room.
He didn't have years to cultivate. He had days.
"What's the catch?" Kiril asked, meeting the blank gaze of the Keeper.
"The catch," Malvus said delightfully, "is that if your will is weak, the Seed will consume your personality and you will become a mindless drone programmed to murder the Imperial Family. I consider that a feature, not a bug."
Kiril let out a shaky breath. "Fair enough."
He reached out.
"Wait," Malvus said sharply.
Kiril froze.
"You are currently at 0 Mana," Malvus observed. "If you touch the Seed now, it will drain your life force instead of mana to jumpstart the integration. You will turn into a husk in three seconds."
Kiril snatched his hand back. "You could have mentioned that earlier."
"I forgot," Malvus lied. "You need mana. And since you emptied your reserves destroying my pets in the hallway, we have a problem."
"Can't I just... wait? Meditate?"
"We don't have time," Malvus said. "The Vault is not airtight, Kiril. When you opened the grate, you released a mana signature. A beacon."
Kiril's blood ran cold. "Who can see it?"
"Anyone with a sensory array calibrated to High Dark Magic," Malvus said. "Like, for example, the Imperial Wards around the Academy."
Boom.
A dull thud echoed from the ceiling far above. Dust trickled down.
"Ah," Malvus clapped his hands. "Guests. Someone is breaching the upper grate."
Kiril looked at the ceiling. "The Academy faculty?"
"Unlikely," Malvus mused. "Faculty would knock. They would send probes. Whoever this is just used a Shape-Charge to blow the grate. That implies urgency. And a lack of concern for property damage."
The assassins, Kiril realized. The Shadow Council. They hadn't given up. They had tracked the signal.
"I need mana," Kiril said, panic rising. "Now."
Malvus gestured to the corner of the room. "There is a mana crystal dispenser. Usually reserved for recharging the golems. It's raw, unfiltered Aether. Tastes like battery acid."
Kiril scrambled over to the pedestal Malvus pointed at. A glowing blue crystal the size of a fist sat in a cradle.
He didn't hesitate. He grabbed it.
[Ashen Conduit Triggered.]
[Consumable Detected: Grade C Mana Stone.]
[Absorb?]
"Yes!"
The crystal shattered in his grip, turning into fine dust. A surge of blue energy shot up his arm, violent and untamed. It felt like injecting caffeine directly into his heart.
[Mana Restored: 100/100.]
[Status: Overcharge.]
Kiril turned back to the Seed.
"Do it," Malvus commanded. "Before they get through the blast doors."
Boom. A second, louder impact shook the room. The obsidian doors groaned.
Kiril grabbed the floating red cube.
Pain.
It wasn't a sensation; it was a universe.
Kiril screamed, but no sound came out. His back arched, his vision turning white. He felt the Seed dissolve into his skin, moving through his veins like molten lead, seeking his center.
[System Alert: Foreign Mana Organ Detected.]
[Initiating Surgical Override.]
[Removing Biological Core (F-Rank)... Complete.]
[Installing Ashen Seed (Growing)...]
He fell to his knees, clutching his chest. He could feel his old, weak core withering away, dissolving into nothing. In its place, the cold, mechanical hum of the Seed took root.
It felt alien. It felt heavy.
[Integration: 20%...]
[Integration: 50%...]
The obsidian doors buckled. A hairline crack appeared in the center.
"Hurry up," Malvus drawled, watching the doors with mild interest. "I believe they brought a siege breaker."
[Integration: 80%...]
Kiril gagged, vomiting black sludge onto the pristine floor. His body was rejecting the impurities of his old self.
[Integration: 100% Complete.]
[System Rebooting...]
[Host: Kiril Drakenhof-Ashenwald]
[Class Update: Apprentice of the Void.]
[Mana Capacity: 100 -> 500.]
[Mana Regeneration: 50/min (Active Void State).]
Kiril gasped, sucking in air that suddenly tasted sweet. The headache was gone. The fatigue was gone.
He felt... clear.
He looked at his hands. The veins were no longer just gray; they were pulsing with a slow, rhythmic red light, matching the Seed in his chest.
"Well," Malvus said, standing up. "You didn't die. How refreshing."
CRACK.
The obsidian doors shattered inward. Shards of black stone exploded into the room.
Through the dust, three figures stepped in.
They wore matte-black armor with no insignias. Their faces were covered by masks that looked like stylized skulls.
Shadow Council Enforcers.
"Target located," the leader said. His voice was mechanically distorted. He held a curved dagger that dripped with green liquid. "Secure the vault. Terminate the heir."
Kiril stood up.
He expected to feel fear. He was a Level 1 student. These were trained killers.
But he didn't feel fear.
The Seed in his chest spun, and with it, a cold, mathematical detachment washed over his mind.
He looked at the assassins. He didn't see people. He saw equations.
He saw the mana reinforcing their armor. He saw the enchantment on their blades. He saw the active concealment spells shimmering around their cloaks.
He saw food.
"Malvus," Kiril said, his voice steady, carrying a strange metallic reverb.
"Yes, heir?" the Keeper replied, watching eagerly.
"Are guests allowed in the Atheneum?"
"Only if they have a library card," Malvus chirped. "I don't believe they do."
Kiril stepped forward.
The lead assassin didn't waste words. He blurred, closing the twenty-foot gap in a heartbeat, the poison dagger aiming for Kiril's jugular.
Kiril didn't dodge.
He raised his hand.
The new mana core surged. It didn't struggle or sputter like the old one. It roared.
[Skill Unlocked: Void Grip.]
Kiril clenched his fist.
The assassin stopped in mid-air, five feet away. Not frozen by ice, but suspended by gravity. The mana surrounding the assassin's body—his speed buff, his armor reinforcement—suddenly turned against him.
"Deconstruct," Kiril whispered.
The assassin screamed as his own magical buffs inverted. The speed enhancement spell collapsed inward, crushing his legs. The armor reinforcement spell imploded, crushing his ribs.
Kiril didn't absorb the mana this time. He just broke it.
He flicked his wrist, and the broken assassin was flung sideways, smashing into one of the floating crystal pillars with a wet crunch.
The other two assassins froze.
"Monster," one of them hissed, raising a wand.
Kiril smiled. It wasn't a nice smile. It was the smile of a starving man sitting down at a banquet.
"I'm not a monster," Kiril said, the red light in his veins flaring brighter. "I'm just the janitor. And you made a mess."
[System Quest: The Forbidden Legacy - Phase 1 Complete.]
[New Quest Generated: Leave No Witnesses.]
Kiril took a step forward.
"Class is in session."