The royal capital was already drenched in panic by the time Lencar slipped deeper into its inner districts. Screams echoed through the narrow streets, the frantic footsteps of civilians mixing with the distant clashing of magic. The tremors had begun spreading outward like ripples from a stone tossed into a quiet lake.
But Lencar's movements were steady—silent, methodical, deliberate.
His figure, shrouded in a dull gray cloak, melted seamlessly into the shadows as he moved. Every few steps, he slid into an alley, let the darkness swallow him whole, and reemerged several blocks away. His composite magic—Umbral Traversal—expanded and sharpened with each use. A growing network of shadow-paths stretched across the capital, carved through instinct, training, and his rapidly evolving mana sensitivity.
He traveled like a ghost.
Unseen.
Unheard.
Untraceable.
His destination wasn't a fixed location. He followed pressure—raw magical pressure that pulsed through the capital like a beacon. Charred mana, ancient and corrupted. A type that felt like rot, like something dead pretending to be alive.
Necromancer magic.
It was faint here, stronger there, and then—
A violent fluctuation surged from a plaza ahead.
Lencar stopped mid-step.
"…That direction."
He dissolved into a shadow and reappeared on a rooftop overlooking an open courtyard. His eyes narrowed as he recognized the scene below.
Yuno.
The prodigy of the Hage village. Cloaked in the swirling aura of wind magic, his golden necklace faintly shimmering—not just reacting, but resonating. The spirit dwelling within it was awake, circling him with the faintest trace of shimmering light.
Across from him stood a woman clad in revealing, provocative, and heavily ornamented magical attire. An unmistakable figure with long lashes, cruel eyes, and a twisted smile of vanity.
Catherine.
A high-ranking member of the Eye of the Midnight Sun. And a user of Ash Curse Magic—one of the most troublesome affinities to fight at close range, especially for a magic knight who wasn't prepared for her draining abilities.
Lencar crouched low against the roof, body merging with the shadow cast by a broken stone pillar. He didn't move. Didn't breathe too loudly. Didn't announce himself.
Instead, he analyzed.
Catherine was in mid-sentence, her voice sweet and poisonous.
"So young… so much mana… you're practically glowing! A little doll like you shouldn't be wasting all that wonderful life-force on fighting."
Black ash spiraled around her fingers like smoke rising from a cursed incense burner.
Yuno swept his hand outward. "Wind Blade Shower!"
Hundreds of razor-sharp slashes of compressed air shot toward her.
Catherine merely smiled and raised a hand.
"Ash Barrier."
The black ash swirled around her in a dome-like shield, swallowing the wind blades whole. The spells dissolved upon contact, vanishing like wisps of mist.
Lencar's eyes narrowed.
Catherine's absorption rate… higher than I expected.
Her ash magic didn't just block. It drained. The moment magic touched her curses, it lost integrity—its mana stripped away and consumed.
Yuno didn't know that.
Yuno didn't need to know that.
He was fighting on instinct, on spirit, on raw finesse—and yet…
Catherine chuckled, taking light, mocking steps across the battlefield.
"You're lovely, really. Your mana… it's pure and fresh. Not like the stale, bitter mana of those old nobles." Her expression twisted. "Mm… I want it."
Yuno's brows furrowed. He fought well, kept distance, maintained pressure, but the ash kept spreading. The more Catherine used her magic, the wider her area of influence became.
Soon, the courtyard was blanketed by a thin veil of ash drifting gently downward like black snow.
A trap.
Yuno didn't notice it yet.
Lencar did.
Lencar saw everything from the beginning.
But he stayed hidden.
He watched.
He calculated.
He waited for the moment the timeline demanded him to move.
Yuno took a deep breath, his grimoire spinning faster. "Sylph!"
A burst of shimmering light surged behind him as the small wind spirit appeared, her tiny face frustrated.
"Hey! Don't you dare underestimate us!"
She circled Yuno rapidly, her presence strengthening his spells.
Yuno inhaled deeply, magic swirling around him. "Wind Spirit Creation Magic…"
Catherine rolled her eyes.
"Seriously? All that mana and you're still barking like an adorable puppy."
Yuno fired a massive wind arrow that generated a vortex of compressed air around it. "Spirit Storm Arrow!"
Catherine's eyes gleamed in amusement.
"Darling… that's exactly what I wanted."
The ash on the ground began to tremble.
Lencar tensed.
Here it comes.
Catherine clasped her hands together.
"Ash Absorbing Formation."
A massive ring of cursed ash erupted from the ground beneath Yuno. Like a mouth opening to devour prey, it unleashed a spiraling column of black energy straight upward.
Yuno's expression twisted in shock.
The storm arrow exploded harmlessly against the formation, its mana devoured instantly. The spirit wind around his body sputtered, flickered, and dimmed.
"Wha—?"
His knees trembled.
Catherine licked her lips.
"Mmm… delicious, delicious… you have such wonderful mana."
Yuno's body faltered again. His grip on his grimoire loosened. His vision blurred.
Catherine stepped toward him, ash swirling around her hips like a deadly dress.
Poor Yuno tried to cast another spell, but only a weak wind flickered at his fingertips.
Sylph's cry echoed across the plaza. "Yuno!"
But the spirit was fading too—her very form flickering, dissolving under the powerful draining field.
Catherine smiled.
"There we go… that's more like it. Let me have… all of it."
She tapped her staff on the ground.
"Life-Force Drain."
A large stream of black ash spiraled up around Yuno like a vortex. His body lifted an inch off the ground, as though some invisible force was pulling him upward.
His voice grew faint.
His eyes fluttered.
His body trembled violently.
And then—
Yuno collapsed.
His body hit the ground with a harsh thud, unconscious.
Sylph dissipated into particles of green light, forced back into his necklace.
For a moment, the world grew quiet.
Catherine giggled and moved toward him with predatory slowness.
"That was delightful… now to finish—"
Her voice died.
Because the shadows shifted behind her.
Like a ripple across a silent pond.
Catherine's smile faded as she sensed a presence—a calm, cold, almost suffocating mana pressure unlike any she had felt among the capital's defenders.
From the shadow of a broken fountain, a figure stepped out.
A hooded man with sharp eyes, a relaxed posture, and a faint aura that seemed to absorb the very light around him.
Lencar.
He didn't rush forward.
He didn't shout.
He didn't tremble with rage or panic.
He simply walked out of the shadow and stood between Catherine and the unconscious Yuno.
Catherine blinked.
Then grinned.
"Well, well… who's this handsome little intruder? Another magic knight toy for me to play with?"
Lencar didn't answer.
He looked down at Yuno first.
His expression barely shifted.
Then he turned his eyes toward Catherine.
"Move," he said simply.
Catherine laughed. "Oh, sweetie. You must be confused. You should be the one moving. Preferably into my arms so I can drain you properly."
She raised her hand.
The ash around her swirled violently.
Lencar stepped forward.
Not quickly.
Not dramatically.
Just a calm, controlled step that made the air around him distort.
His cloak fell away. The shadows beneath him thickened.
Catherine hesitated.
"…You."
Lencar's mismatched mana signature—unnatural, impossible to categorize—made her skin crawl. Even she, a high-ranking cultist, felt something wrong in the air.
She forced a seductive grin back onto her face.
But it wasn't as confident anymore.
"What are you supposed to be?"
Lencar cracked his knuckles.
"…The one who told you to move."
Catherine snarled. "Don't get cocky!"
Her ash magic erupted upward, a massive tidal wave of cursed smoke surging toward him.
Lencar didn't move.
Instead, the shadow at his feet tore open.
And the entire wave of ash collapsed into it—devoured by darkness like a swallowed ocean.
Catherine's eyes widened.
"What—?!"
Lencar looked at her with cold indifference.
"You drain mana," he said quietly. "I drain shadows. If you can absorb what is mine… try."
Catherine stepped back instinctively.
The fight had shifted.
The hunter felt hunted.
And Lencar finally allowed his mana to rise—slowly, steadily—like a beast spreading its wings.
The shadows behind him rose.
The air trembled.
And Catherine realized, far too late, that she was never the predator in this encounter.
She was prey.
Lencar stepped forward.
The confrontation had begun.