CHAPTER 105: OUTCLASSED

Outside in the academy grounds, everywhere was calm. The students slept, the soldiers patrolled, and Principal Kael and Cecilia were handling everything related to their new discovery.

But back at the infirmary, two men were fighting for their lives.

The assassins’ blades flashed, their weapons making a faint whistling sound as it cut through the air.

They fought like the cornered wolves that they were, fighting even better than expected now that their cover was gone, and their target knew of their presence.

But they were still losing. Badly.

For every shadow they managed to cut down, two more rose in its place. Claws of living darkness raked across their armor, forcing them back into a corner, step by step.

Their grunts and curses mingled with the echoing laughter of the shadows, a cacophony that drowned out reason.

Noah leaned lazily against the wall, arms folded, his grin wide as he watched the whole thing.

"Look at you. Professionals, aren’t you?" He laughed. "You guys must pride yourselves on being the knife hidden in the dark. Great killers whose targets never even knew what killed them."

His shadows surged forward, their forms growing denser with each pulse of mana.

The assassins slashed, parried, and ducked, but their movements were slowing down as the shadows fought harder, giving them no space to rest.

"And yet... here you are, outclassed by fragments of me. Not even me. Just pieces."

The shorter assassin snarled, spinning into a low crouch, his dagger plunging into a shadow’s torso. The shadow hissed, dissolved into smoke, then reformed behind him, clawing a streak of blood down his back. He cried out, stumbling.

The taller one roared, swinging his curved blade in a wide arc. It tore through three shadows at once, scattering them like mist. But they were back before he could breathe, their claws digging into his arm, forcing him to his knees.

Noah chuckled, the sound low, almost amused. "Do you feel it yet? The futility?"

He tilted his head, his eyes glowing faintly in the gloom. "You’re not fighting shadows. You’re fighting me. My rage. My pain. My broken soul. And I have more of that than you could ever handle."

The assassins cursed, fighting with desperation now, backs pressed against each other. Sweat gleamed on their foreheads.

Their skills were still top notch, but their movements had quickly grown sloppy and frantic. The shadows surrounded them on all sides, closing them off and pressing in tighter, their claws scraping against steel, tearing at their clothes, cutting shallow lines across their flesh.

One of the assassins roared, stabbing upward at a shadow that lunged from the ceiling. The blade pierced it, but the shadow wrapped around the steel, yanking it free. The weapon clattered across the floor, swallowed by the black tide.

"Outclassed." Noah said again, his grin twisting cruelly. "You must know it now. You came here thinking you were the hunters. But hunters don’t end up bleeding. Hunters don’t end up as prey."

The assassins gasped for breath, their weapons slipping from their fingers as the shadows closed in.

They tried to push back, but the darkness coiled around their wrists and ankles, dragging them down.

Claws slashed, leaving crimson lines across their arms, their faces, and their legs. Their curses turned to grunts of pain.

Noah yawned. "Pathetic." He straightened from the wall, raising his hand.

The shadows froze in the middle of a lunge, claws inches from throats.

The assassins sagged in relief for a heartbeat, then stiffened as the shadows tightened their grip, twisting their arms behind their backs, forcing them down onto their knees.

Their weapons were gone. Their bodies dripped blood from a dozen shallow cuts.

Noah stepped forward, each footstep echoing faintly in the deathly silence that followed. His shadows parted for him, bowing their heads as he walked through them.

One of the shadows slithered away, returning moments later with a wooden chair it had fetched from the far side of the ward. It set it down with a flourish.

Noah sat slowly, crossing one leg over the other. He rested his elbow on the chair’s arm, his chin against his knuckles, his burning orange eyes cold.

His shadows stood behind him like a twisted crown, their eyes glowing faint red and blue, their whispers faint but hungry.

Before him, the assassins knelt, held down by stronger shadows. Blood dripped from their chins onto the ward’s polished floor. Their chests heaved, their eyes wide, darting between Noah and the shadows that restrained them.

Noah smirked. "Now that you’ve stopped squirming, we can talk."

He leaned forward slightly, tilting his head to the side a tiny bit. "See, you made a mistake. You didn’t just fail your mission. You walked into my ward, into my shadows. And now... you belong to me."

He spread his hands, the shadows tightening their hold on the assassins, making them groan in pain.

"You see, I just returned from a... vacation. It was a bit of a learning experience, but I’m glad to say that I now know one or two things about getting... answers out of people."

Noah grinned, leaning back in his chair.

"Do you know the most important part of getting answers out of someone?" He asked. "It’s actually quite simple. It’s to create an environment where no matter what happens, you can be assured that your... guest would not be taken out of your hold. That means cutting off communication to the world outside."

Noah clapped, and some of his shadows dissolved, until they blanketed the walls of the ward, stopping any sounds from leaving.

He chuckled, turning back to the wide-eyed assassins. "Cool, isn’t it? They’re quite useful, if I do say so myself. But that’s not why we’re here, is it?"

"It’s time," he whispered, his grin widening, "to begin the investigation."

His shadows began laughing as one, their voices overlapping, until the sound became a twisted echo that filled the ward like a hymn to madness.