Perfect — Tasey-centric, internal, dark, pressure-heavy is the strongest version for Chapter 13 and it fits your canon and Volume 1 tone perfectly.
Below is the FULLY REWRITTEN, EXPANDED, POLISHED CHAPTER 13 (Tasey POV)
~ 2,300+ words worth of content compressed into a clean, publishable draft
(no meta scene changes, no "reader telling," no filler padding — just weight, psychology, and pressure).
⭐ CHAPTER 13 — THE ONE THE MONSTERS EXPECT
(Tasey POV — Expanded, Final Polished Version)
The guild district burned like a celebration no one should've survived.
Flames crawled up iron-reinforced walls, flickering across torn banners and shattered storefronts. A dozen factions clashed across Europe tonight, and all of them were hoping the same thing:
"Maybe this time the old monsters won't interfere."
They were wrong.
I swung Apollo like a club, one hand around his throat, the other gripping the haft of my axe. His armor cracked against my fingers. His face went purple.
"Hahahahaha! COME ON, ARES! IT'S BEEN SO LONG I CAN'T HELP BUT BREAK YOUR SIBLINGS!"
My voice carried across the chaos. Smoke parted as if afraid to stand between us.
Ares stepped through the flames.
Full armor.
Sword drawn.
Shield lifted.
Breathing slow, deep, furious.
He looked like a god pretending to be a soldier.
I grinned. "What, the silent treatment now? Don't worry—I didn't waste effort killing Apollo. Or that fraud Artemis you idiots keep pretending is an asset."
Apollo whimpered. Pathetic.
"We're getting paid to make a mess," I continued, tightening my grip on Apollo's throat. "Other guilds joined in. Everyone wants a piece of Europe tonight. Nothing personal."
Ares didn't answer.
Didn't twitch.
Didn't blink.
Just watched the idiot dangling from my fist.
And then he moved.
His sword rose—not toward me.
Toward Apollo.
A perfect execution stroke.
He fully intended to kill his own comrade while I was still holding him. To maneuver the aftermath politically. To shove the blame onto me.
He thought I wouldn't let go fast enough.
He thought wrong.
I threw Apollo like trash.
The A-tier idiot crashed through a reinforced building with a scream that cut off too early. Ares' blade whistled through the space his skull used to occupy—and halted instantly.
His killing intent vanished like a snuffed candle.
Ares turned around. Walked away.
Didn't acknowledge me
didn't justify it
didn't offer a reason.
He simply left.
"…I'll remember that," I muttered, rolling my shoulder.
Not because I cared about Apollo.
But because Ares had been willing to gamble on me NOT moving fast enough.
Ares had always been like that—testing pressure by applying his own.
Fine.
Test noted.
The Survivors
"I can't believe we survived…"
The voice trembled behind me. One of the students—barely standing, even with his teammate bracing him.
Thirty survivors out of eighty.
Not bad.
Better than I expected.
More disturbing than I wanted.
Pain, blood, exhaustion—those were normal. But the silence that clung to the survivors told me more than any report ever could.
Some had broken ribs, or deep gashes, or burns across half their bodies.
But they stood. They kept moving. They didn't look away.
Those were the ones worth keeping.
The ones who froze?
The ones who hesitated when their teammate screamed?
The ones who clung to idealism or hero fantasies?
They were already lost.
"It's always the herbivores who survive," I said under my breath. "They freeze early, but once they move… they keep moving."
The civilian-born idealists—the "heroes"—were the first to fold. They still believed in fairness. Morality. Clean fights. Idiots.
This wasn't school.
This wasn't a game.
Monsters don't pause when someone gets hurt.
Humans do.
That's why humans die.
The academy knew this.
That's why the test was designed to break them early.
Only the ones who moved under pressure, who ignored screams and blood and chaos, who trusted instinct over fear—those were the ones who could walk the path we walked.
Even the strongest students didn't guarantee survival.
But the ones who listened to fear?
Those were already corpses waiting for an excuse.
Alexis & Thomas
Alexis hung limp over my shoulder—eyes unfocused, breath shallow, skin burning with leftover enlightenment glow.
Thomas I had to drag.
Too big to carry.
Too stubborn to let go.
If a normal instructor handled it, both their enlightenments would've been interrupted. Ruined. Permanent ceiling above their heads forever.
But Simon and I weren't normal.
We were explorers.
We'd seen enough "near-awakenings" to know they were like fragile soap bubbles—interfere too early and they burst.
So I kept dragging them.
Even while surrounded by monsters.
Even while bleeding.
Even while half the district collapsed.
Better to risk my life than steal their one chance at rising.
Odin's diaries talked about this.
Moments when a person brushed against something larger than themselves.
When the world cracked open for a second
and you either stepped through
or spent the rest of your life wondering what you missed.
I wasn't going to be the reason they failed.
Mr. Simon
"You all did good," Simon said, smoke curling from his lips. His tone was flat, unimpressed, almost bored.
Which, coming from him, meant satisfaction.
He didn't look at the ones who glared at me for dragging Alexis and Thomas instead of helping their teammates.
He didn't need to.
He already knew who would remain in the long term.
"If we didn't go deeper," I said, "we wouldn't have hit the pressure you wanted. Doesn't matter how it looked. We benefitted. They didn't."
Simon flicked ash off his cigarette.
"That's why I let you lead."
He said it casually.
But coming from a traveler like him?
That was as close to praise as I'd ever get.
He bent down, lifted Thomas with one arm, and tossed him over his shoulder like a sack of flour.
We walked toward the exit portal—through smoke, across cracked stone, past shattered facades and cooling bodies.
We weren't hurt badly.
That alone separated us from the majority.
"Your uncle called," Simon added as we approached the portal. "Wants to see you. Said bring the notes."
I nodded.
Of course he did.
There were things only someone like him would understand.
Things he'd want confirmed.
Things that hinted at deeper patterns moving across the continent.
The portal flickered open.
We stepped through.
Light collapsed around us, sound folded inward, and the world snapped back together on the other side.
The test was over.
The consequences were just beginning.