House of Blood

The plummet through eight hundred feet of collapsed mountain bedrock was silent, save for the rush of displaced air and the wet, squelching impact of falling flesh.

The central floor of the Sunken Arena had vanished entirely into the Sub-Basement Siphon. Tons of maroon-stained sand, shattered iron portcullises, and the mutilated carcasses of Depth-Hounds poured downward into the black void, settling with a heavy, wet THUD on the floor of the ancient drainage vault.

Dense, bone-chilling fog instantly engulfed the crash site—a thick, crimson mist smelling of iron, sour bile, and ancient stagnant blood.

TAP.

Valerian landed on his feet on a pile of crushed basalt, his knees flexing two inches to absorb the kinetic force.

He did not ignite a single microgram of Dragonic or Blood Shadow mana.

His dark-mithril suppressor guard remained cold against his left forearm, completely inert.

He drew no spell, relying strictly on the natural elasticity of his physical body to dissipate the shockwave.

Around him in the blind darkness, the rest of Cell One was recovering.

”Solene! Casper!” Lyra Medeis’s voice cracked through the fog, tight with panic.

Her spatial perception bubble was flared out three feet around her, vibrating violently as it struck the corrupted, dense atmosphere.

”Is anyone down here?!”

”I’m... I’m here,” Casper choked out, coughing up wet sand as he pulled himself from a pile of bone fragments.

His gilded solar armor was dented, covered in black grease.

”My... my barrier broke on the way down! Solene, where are you?!”

”Keep your voice down, you fool,” Princess Solene’s cold voice echoed from twenty paces to the left.

She stood atop a fallen stone column, her ivory rapier drawn, her platinum braids completely unruffled despite the drop.

Pale azure ice-mana flickered around her blade, illuminating the cavernous space.

The vault was vast—a forgotten second-era drainage chamber carved directly into the basalt roots of the Citadel.

The walls were lined with colossal lead pipes, many of which had ruptured, leaking black grease and pale, bone-white parasitic fibers onto the wet stone floor.

Standing in the center of the debris field, his unadorned iron longsword held low at his side, was Senior Cadet Gareth Vance.

The First Blade did not look at Casper or Solene.

His pale, sunken eyes were fixed entirely on the shadow cast by the ruined archway forty feet ahead.

Beside him, Principal Elias stood in total silence.

The ancient High Elf appeared no older than twenty, his slender frame draped in dark robes that didn’t hold a single speck of dust.

His luminous silver eyes—imbued with the Divine Appraisal of the World Tree—glowed like twin moons in the gloom.

His terrifyingly calm presence deadened the cold drafts sweeping through the subterranean vault.

”The Ninth Lord isn’t here,” Principal Elias said softly, his ancient voice echoing off the damp basalt walls like grinding stone.

”The spatial signature was a decoy—a dormant flesh-seed planted in the alchemical plumbing during the Second Era, catalyzed by the Abyssal Pheromone.”

Gareth Vance didn’t lower his guard.

His sword blade remained steady as a frozen glacier.

”Decoy or not, Principal, the entire lower floor has been converted into an illegal laboratory. Look at the masonry.”

Elias raised his pale hand, his Divine Appraisal piercing through the fog to read the underlying mana-structure of the vault walls.

Beneath the wet moss and weeping stone lay intricate, Third Era sealing arrays—not designed by the Citadel’s founders, but grafted on illegally within the last fifty years.

The arrays were designed to harvest high-density cadet mana and drain it directly into Sector Three.

”A long-term infiltration,” Elias murmured, his silver eyes flashing with quiet, cold fury.

”Stolen mana, missing students, artificial vessel creation... someone has been conducting forbidden experiments right beneath our boots.”

”We aren’t alone down here,” Gareth Vance warned softly, his body dropping into a razor-sharp martial stance.

From the deep mist surrounding the perimeter of the vault, wet, unnatural clicking sounds echoed.

CRACK-CRACK-CRACK.

Dozens of figures detached themselves from the shadows.

They were not mutated beasts.

They were third-year enforcers and lower-level maintenance staff who had gone missing over the past three months—their torsos hollowed out, their ribcages inverted into snapping, tooth-lined traps, their movements controlled entirely by bone-white parasitic fibers woven directly into their spinal cords.

”Flayed constructs,” Gareth whispered, his eyes narrowing.

”The Mad Doctor’s work... Xul’Gorgoth’s lingering horror.”

”Casper! Solene! Form a defensive ring!” Lyra screamed as she spotted the horde closing in.

”They’re surrounding us!”

Casper raised his hand, his face white as chalk as he tried to channel his solar core.

”I’ll... I’ll burn them! Solar Burst—”

”Touch your magic and you die!” Gareth Vance roared, his voice cutting through Casper’s panic like a whip.

”These constructs feed on raw mana! If you cast a spell down here, you’ll feed their fiber-nodes and blow this entire vault to pieces!”

Casper froze, his hand trembling as he lowered his fingers.

”Then... then how do we fight them?!”

”With steel and footwork,” Gareth said coldly, stepping forward.

”Pure martial theory. No mana.”

The horde of flayed constructs surged forward, their inverted ribcages snapping like iron jaws, their inverted legs scraping against the wet stone floor in a horrifying, asymmetric rhythm.

Gareth Vance moved first.

The First Blade became a shadow of pure lethality.

He did not ignite his mana core.

He relied entirely on Satsu-ki—a suffocating, iron-heavy killing intent that radiated from his sword tip.

The sheer psychological weight of his intent forced the parasitic fiber-nodes inside the closest constructs to violently contract in instinctual recoil.

SWOOSH! THWIP!

Gareth’s dull iron blade shifted three times within a single breath, severing the white thread anchors at the napes of four constructs with mathematical precision.

”Solene, take the left archway!” Gareth ordered while deflecting a snapping bone-jaw with the flat of his blade.

”Valen, cover the right flank! Show me if that clerk’s footwork holds up when the dark eats the room!”

Valerian stepped into the darkness on the right flank without a word.

Beneath his black linen blindfold, his spatial awareness mapped every vibration of the damp air, every microscopic tension in the stone floor.

He could see the hidden spatial shear of the vault—a subtle three-degree warp caused by the illegal sealing arrays along the walls.

A flayed construct—formerly a heavy-armored third-year enforcer—lunged at Valerian from the fog, its inverted ribcage opening wide to crush his skull.

Valerian didn’t draw on his dragon cores.

He didn’t ignite his Blood Shadow mana.

He didn’t even shift his center of gravity.

Instead, he executed a flawless, unreinforced physical counter-technique: the Flowing Willow Parry.

CLANG!

His scarred iron sword struck the precise mechanical pivot point of the construct’s inverted shoulder joint.

Using thirty pounds of pure physical torque, Valerian redirected the monster’s five-hundred-pound momentum directly into the stone pillar behind him.

THACK!

The construct’s skull shattered against the granite pillar.

Before the parasitic fibers could adjust to the impact, Valerian’s blade flicked upward in a short, six-inch arc, cleanly severing the central fiber-stem at the base of the neck.

The construct collapsed instantly into a pile of lifeless meat and wet salt.

Beside him, Gareth Vance severed another construct’s nape, his pale eyes tracking Valerian’s every movement through the crimson fog.

No wasted energy, Gareth thought, a cold shiver running down his spine despite the heat of battle.

No telegraph in his stance.

He didn’t just parry that strike—he calculated the exact tensile strength of corrupted bone and broke it with zero mana reinforcement.

Gareth shifted his stance, stepping closer to Valerian as five more constructs rushed them from the gloom.

”You’ve fought flayed constructs before, Cadet Valen.”

”I read about them in the Sector C archives, First Blade,” Valerian replied smoothly, his sword executing a precise, low-guard deflection that sent two bone-blades skittering off his iron crossguard.

”Page forty-two. Anatomical vulnerabilities of parasitic thread-hosts.”

”Books don’t teach a man how to step inside a spatial warp without losing his balance,” Gareth spat, his blade flashing in a blinding horizontal arc that decapitated three targets simultaneously.

”Your body reacts to danger two seconds before the wind even shifts. Who taught you that footwork?”

”A very strict fencing instructor in the lower slums,” Valerian lied, his tone completely flat, devoid of emotion.

High above them on the central stone column, Principal Elias watched the battle unfold.

His silver eyes gleamed with ancient, terrifying clarity through his Divine Appraisal.

He isn’t using mana, Elias noted internally, his High Elf mind analyzing the micro-vibrations of Valerian’s muscular system.

Not a single drop.

Yet his physical efficiency matches that of a century-old sword master.

And the way his shadow curves away from the torchlight...

Elias raised his pale hand, signaling Gareth with a subtle flick of his fingers.

Test him.

The Principal’s unspoken command echoed directly into Gareth’s mind through the World Tree’s root-network.

Push his Satsu-ki to the limit.

See if the dragon or the Blood Shadow bleeds out.

Gareth Vance acknowledged the order with a microscopic nod.

Without warning, as a massive flayed construct lunged between them, Gareth didn’t strike the monster.

He shifted his grip, his iron longsword pivoting ninety degrees in mid-air, redirecting the full, concentrated weight of his legendary Satsu-ki directly at Valerian’s throat.

It was not a friendly spar.

It was a lethal, high-level execution strike delivered by the academy’s greatest upperclassman swordsman—a blade capable of reading the hidden rhythms of any opponent’s breath.

”Show me your true face, Valen!” Gareth growled, his sword whistling through the damp air like a falling guillotine.

The world seemed to slow to a crawl inside Valerian’s perception.

Deep within his spiritual realm, Aurelix’s golden soul-manifestation purred with dark, razor-sharp anticipation, her nine phantom tails lashing out.

”Master...” Aurelix hissed in his mind. ”He’s testing your reflexes. Let me crush his soul-core—”

No, Valerian commanded cold as ice.

If I release a single drop of mana, the Principal’s Divine Appraisal will brand me as an anomaly.

Valerian didn’t draw his sword to block.

He didn’t use a spatial step.

Instead, he engaged in pure, high-level physical sword theory.

As Gareth’s blade descended within a hair’s breadth of his neck, Valerian leaned his head back three-quarters of an inch—just enough for the lethal edge to shave a single thread from his black blindfold.

Simultaneously, Valerian twisted his left wrist, driving the pommel of his dull iron sword directly into the flat of Gareth’s blade.

TAK!

The tiny physical contact broke the vector of Gareth’s strike by half a degree, sending the lethal longsword burying deep into the basalt floor between Valerian’s boots.

Gareth’s pale eyes widened in sheer, unadulterated shock.

He had put the full weight of his legendary intent into that stroke—an attack that had felled veteran knights and mutated beasts alike.

Yet the blindfolded clerk had dodged it with three-quarters of an inch of physical clearance and a pommel-tap.

”Your killing intent is sharp, First Blade,” Valerian said softly, his voice remaining flat, calm, and utterly undisturbed as he stood inches from Gareth’s blade.

”But you leaned too heavily on your right heel during the execution. A three-degree tilt.”

Gareth stared at Valerian, his chest heaving as he slowly pulled his iron blade from the stone floor.

”You... you didn’t even drop your posture.”

Before Gareth could reply, Principal Elias descended from the column, his tall, slender frame landing silently between them on the wet stone.

His luminous silver eyes fixed on Valerian, scanning every bone, muscle, and breath in the boy’s body.

”The constructs are cleared,” Elias said quietly, his voice carrying the weight of eight centuries.

”The lower vault is compromised. We are returning to the surface.”

Elias turned his silver gaze toward the dark tunnel leading deeper into Sector Three—where the illegal laboratory pipes vanished into the gloom.

”High Marshal Valerius will handle the official report,” Elias continued, his tone cold as arctic ice.

”Cell One will be awarded passing marks for the Sunken Arena trial.

But remember this, Cadet Valen...”

Elias leaned in slightly, his youthful High Elf face inches from Valerian’s blindfold.

”...the shadows beneath this academy are growing long. And when the lower vaults truly breach... a dull iron sword will not be enough to save your friends.”

Valerian bowed his head slightly, his hand resting on the hilt of his unadorned weapon.

”I am merely a clerk, Principal. I will do my best to keep my boots dry.”

As Cell One began their ascent back up the stone stairwells toward the surface, Gareth Vance walked a pace behind Valerian, his hand gripping his sword hilt so tightly his knuckles turned white.

He didn’t use mana, Gareth thought, his mind racing as he stared at the back of the blindfolded boy’s coat.

He didn’t use a single spell.

But that wasn’t the footwork of a commoner.

That was the footwork of a monster holding himself back.

High above in Sector A, as the morning sun broke through the storm clouds over the Vanguard Citadel, the political fronts were already beginning to shift.

Representative Mirain was preparing her official inquiry into the lower vault breach, unaware that the hidden trap—and the Seventh Child of Prim—was already walking back into her world, his blindfold damp with the blood of the abyss.