Chapter 356 – Echoes of Terror

Chapter 356 – Echoes of Terror

Kai stilled at the mouth of the stairs. The screams rebounded over the walls of the cavern, carrying notes of pain and terror. His senses stretched through the tunnels to pinpoint their source. Where his range failed, the wave of ominous whispering revealed the direction. The moss’s faint luminescence highlighted the entrance of the farthest tunnel on their right.

“Is that…” Alden stared into the darkness. His taut shoulders betrayed his steady facade.

All those what-ifs they had discussed suddenly didn’t seem so silly. If they found a student in danger, it was a matter of ensuring their enchanted bracelet would teleport them to safety. Yet their speculations didn’t account for the broken seal in the chamber below—or the threat pressing down on them.

Another raw scream pierced the cold, underground air.

Something was terribly off, and they had no time to figure out what. Each passing instant dragged the weight of a boulder.

Dammit, I should be over this reckless shit.

Before Kai consciously acknowledged it, his mind had already set his course. His eyes flicked to Alden. In a glance, their intent aligned, faces set in grim determination.

“Let’s go,” Kai gestured to the tunnel, his roommate already moving, steps as swift and quiet as the rocky ground allowed. They didn’t need to say more—they had discussed this part. When time was of the essence, it only heightened the need for caution. Rushing would just add more people to the list in need of rescuing.

Three sharp grooves carved the bluish moss into the passage. Again, Kai ignored Hallowed Intuition’s suggestion to turn away.

A faint scream echoed in the distance, almost too weak to distinguish.

Whatever went wrong, they were inside the Trials—a school test. He wore insurance on his wrist. A whole team of Fourth Circle mages was probably monitoring them at this very moment.

Uh… Hobbes? What do you mean they aren’t watching?

A deluge of impressions flooded the bond.

Kai stalked closer to Alden, weaving a cloak of Shadow as he tried to understand what his familiar meant and ignored his roommate’s pointed look—another question for later.

Slow down. Are the professors watching or not? You said there were many peeping scripts around here… What do you mean they were watching, but aren’t anymore…?

The more Hobbes rambled, the less he understood, and the deeper the knot in his gut grew. The cat never had much patience for explaining the obvious, and his thoughts weren’t usually so skittish.

Were the scrying arrays malfunctioning, or simply inactive? It stood to reason that the academy couldn’t monitor every one of the thousands of first-year students at once. Could Hobbes have misunderstood?

Creeping over a slick rock, sharp gravel pressed in his palm, his mind split in seven ways to scout against an ambush. No more screams. The underground had returned to its quiet dripping and rustling air.

He couldn’t spare the attention to interpret Hobbes. The academy’s actions didn’t change the immediate situation. Instead, he tried a different approach.

Do you know what’s happening ahead? Who screamed?

The bond turned quiet, then rang with unease. Images flashed, blurred by a cat’s alien acuity in the dark. Kai was puzzling out the muted colors when Alden stabbed a finger in his ribs and sharply gestured.

Ahead of them, the glow of quartz spilled over the twisting cavern, stretching the shadows along rough walls. Slowing their approach, they stepped on the larger rocks to avoid the crunch of pebbles.

A cold gust brought the coppery tang of blood—a starkly clear answer to his doubts. Alden stiffened before quickening his pace.

Wait, dammit.

Kai drew the Shadow veil tighter. His hand grasped empty air, wishing for the weight of a sword. Spells would have to do. The passage ended at the ruin of a large door. Jagged planks dangled from torn hinges, brushing his arm as he passed through. Splinters and twisted iron ground/crackled underfoot, still smoldering with wisps of shattered enchantments.

Pale quartzes lit the small chamber. A mosaic of numbers and runes covered the walls, likely the key to some unknown challenge. Sparing it a passing glance, Kai fixed his attention on the girl crumpled in a pool of blood on the carven floor.

Deep gouges carved across her chest and stomach, hands vainly clutching at her wounds. White bones peeked amidst the gurgling red where her ribs snapped like twigs. The dress that might once have been white was now streaked with spreading crimson, clinging wetly to her body.

Blonde hair framed her pale face, eyes staring blankly at the ceiling. Kai didn’t need to feel her pulse to know she was dead. Mana streamed from her figure, slow and irreversible.

He crept toward the warm pool of blood. Whispers pounded his head, insistent but not imminent. The silver bracket gleamed on her wrist—for all the good it did. Despite his certainty, he still knelt to search for a heartbeat he knew wasn’t there.

“Is she… is she dead?” Alden stood on the threshold, wearing a stiff mask. From his tone, he’d already guessed at the truth.

“Yes. It’s too late. We were too far to help,” Kai said, not sure if for Alden or himself. Bloody smears trailed toward the passage across from them. The marks looked like none of the beasts he’d met, not helped by the rough cavern floor. “Do you have any idea what did this?”

Alden approached the body with measured paces. “I— No. Nothing I’m confident in. It could be twenty different creatures.” He fell silent, scanning the tracks. “It’s strange, though. Why didn’t she trigger the script on her bracelet?”

“She might not have had time.”

Among their barebones information, Dumbledore’s twin had taken time to specify that the enchantment took ten seconds to teleport them out of here. It had seemed short, yet plenty to kill a human several times over.

Alden shook his head. “Even if she died, the bracelet should have still carried her corpse away. To lay here, she must not have channeled her mana into it.”

“Hmm… maybe she panicked?” Kai tried, furrowing his brows. Plenty of people froze up against a beast, but from the repeated screams, she suffered quite a bit before dying. How could she not send a wisp of mana to her wrist? “Are you sure that’s how the enchantment works?”

“I am. The mana charge is embedded within. Once you trigger the script, there is no need to complete the activation. That’s how House Astares usually engraves escape devices.”

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I’ll take your word on that.

The more Kai saw, the less he liked it. Beneath the overpowering iron tang, another pungent odor lingered. Thanks to Rain’s Perception exercises, he could match it to the scent he’d caught from the gate below.

The stifling underground gloom, the threat of unseen creatures—it all dragged him back to his worst months in the Sanctuary.

His breath caught, shallow, as if the air itself had thinned. Tightness coiled in his throat. Cold, clammy prickles ran across his skin. His heartbeat thudded louder than his thoughts. The world narrowed. Sounds sharpened, urging him toward action.

Calm down. It’s just a test.

He wasn’t stranded in some hidden realm. The looming pressure from Hallowed Intuition fell short of a Green beast’s weight—dangerous, yes, but his skills also had grown. Whatever mess the academy threw him in, he could handle it. Or at least survive it. He just had to be careful.

First… what do we do?

Kai gently closed the girl’s vacant blue eyes, then stepped back from the overpowering stench of blood. “It’s strange. Beasts kill to feed and grow. Especially if they escaped from the gate. Why hunt her all the way here and leave without feeding?”

Unless it’s one of the academy’s precautions to leave the bodies intact. Though they’ve already fucked up letting a student die, so…

“It is odd,” Alden said, leaning closer. “Have you checked if her heart is still there? I’m no expert on subterranean beasts, but I know of creatures that only consume certain organs.”