The sky above Xyrus Academy was painfully clear the morning it happened.
Cael remembered thinking how beautiful it looked.
Sunlight poured across the marble walkways and polished towers, glinting off crystal windows and catching in the fountains that lined the central courtyard. Students moved lazily between classes, laughter drifting through the air.
It felt ordinary.
Too ordinary.
Cael stood along the upper balcony of the disciplinary wing, fingers resting lightly against the stone railing. His mid-silver core rotated steadily within him, calm, controlled.
But the air was tight.
Mana shifted strangely.
Like a tremor beneath the surface.
His eyes narrowed slightly.
It's today.
The explosion tore through the eastern wing without warning.
Stone erupted outward in a violent bloom of fire and debris. The shockwave cracked windows and hurled students from their feet. Screams followed instantly, shrill and disoriented.
Cael didn't think.
He stepped off the balcony.
Wind caught him mid-fall, cushioning his descent as his eyes flared sky blue.
The world sharpened.
Mana threads became visible—every fluctuation, every hostile signature.
Barriers were rising across the courtyard. A massive dome shimmered into existence, enclosing a cluster of students.
Arthur.
Of course.
Outside the barrier—
Figures moved.
Students.
But not students.
Their bodies were distorted by something foreign. Veins blackened beneath skin. Mana signatures bloated and unstable.
Demon leeches.
Cael exhaled slowly.
"Right on time."
One of the enhanced traitors lunged toward a group of first-years near the shattered fountain.
Cael vanished.
The air distorted as gravity folded beneath his step. He reappeared between the attacker and the students.
The traitor swung wildly, strength magnified grotesquely.
Cael raised one hand.
The world bent.
Gravity increased tenfold around the attacker. The courtyard stone cracked under the sudden pressure as the boy's body slammed face-first into the ground.
Fire ignited in Cael's other palm—not wild, not explosive. Controlled. Precise.
It lanced downward.
The demon leech embedded in the attacker's spine shriveled under the heat.
The body stopped moving.
"Run," Cael said calmly to the frozen students behind him.
They ran.
More attackers flooded the courtyard.
Lucas Wykes stood among them, laughing.
His transformation was worse than the others. Muscles grotesquely expanded, veins pulsing dark beneath stretched skin. Mana poured from him in violent surges, barely contained.
"So this is the great Xyrus Academy?" Lucas roared. "Pathetic!"
He smashed his fist into the barrier Arthur maintained. The dome trembled.
Cael moved again.
Lightning cracked across the courtyard as he intercepted two traitors charging toward the student council wing. Arcs of white energy struck cleanly, frying the parasites within them without incinerating their hosts entirely.
Another attacker leapt from above.
Wind exploded outward from Cael in a compressed blast, shattering stone and sending the body hurtling across the courtyard.
He didn't slow.
Ice spears formed in a rapid array behind him, launching forward in a deadly volley. They pierced limbs, pinned enemies, froze leeches solid.
Sound rippled outward next—a concussive wave that ruptured the air itself and knocked a cluster of attackers flat.
Students stared.
They had heard the nickname whispered in adventurer circles.
Sky-Eyed Demon.
Now they understood why.
But Cael wasn't smiling.
He could feel it.
A different presence.
Watching.
Draneeve stood near the outer edge of the chaos, calm amidst destruction. His expression was composed, almost analytical.
Their eyes met briefly across the burning courtyard.
Draneeve didn't look surprised.
He looked curious.
Then the barrier cracked.
Cael's attention snapped back to the dome.
Arthur strained inside it, defending students as attackers hammered at its surface.
And then—
The mana shifted.
Inside.
Elijah.
For the briefest second, Cael felt something ancient and wrong awaken.
The barrier shattered outward in a violent pulse.
Elijah collapsed as Draneeve moved instantly, catching him before he hit the ground.
"No—" Cael stepped forward.
Lucas intercepted him.
"Not so fast!" Lucas snarled, slamming into him with monstrous force.
The impact cratered the courtyard stone.
Cael slid back a few feet, boots grinding against shattered marble.
Lucas charged again, faster than before.
Cael didn't hold back.
Gravity warped violently around them. The air thickened, pressure multiplying with each second. Lucas's enhanced body fought through it, roaring as he swung again.
Cael met the strike with reinforced earth beneath his feet, redirecting the impact upward. Lightning burst from his palm at point-blank range.
Lucas staggered—but didn't fall.
"Is that it?!" Lucas howled, mana spiraling chaotically.
Cael's eyes burned brighter.
"Pathetic."
He lifted his hand.
The ground beneath Lucas inverted. Stone folded inward like liquid as gravitational force compressed downward.
Lucas dropped to one knee under the sudden pressure.
Then Arthur arrived.
Fire roared around him—not controlled, not restrained.
Rage burned in his eyes.
Cael stepped back deliberately.
This was not his kill.
Lucas laughed once more—
And then Arthur moved.
The fight was short.
Brutal.
Final.
When it ended, Lucas Wykes lay broken across the courtyard stones.
Silence followed.
Smoke drifted through the air. Buildings smoldered. Students sobbed quietly in the aftermath.
Draneeve was gone.
Elijah was gone.
The academy was in ruins.
Cael stood amid the wreckage, breathing steady despite the destruction around him. His eyes dimmed slowly, the sky-blue glow fading back to normal.
Arthur stood a few paces away, chest rising and falling heavily.
Their gazes met.
No words.
They both knew this was only the beginning.
Moments later, the air shifted again.
Power descended.
The Lances.
Their presence pressed down like judgment.
Arthur, covered in blood and standing over Lucas's corpse.
Cael watching.
He did not interfere.
Not now.
Not yet.
The Disciplinary Committee stood fractured but alive.
The academy would never be the same.
War was no longer a distant possibility whispered in rumors.
It had arrived.
And as Cael looked over the destruction—at the broken stone, the smoke, the fear settling into young faces—he felt something shift inside him.
He had held back for years.
No more.
If Agrona wanted war—
Then the he would give him one.