Chapter 5 — "The High School Dungeon"
The afternoon sky carried a threat—an electrical twinge across the city, like someone struck a bell in the air. Students filed into classrooms, their phones buzzing. Rumors traveled faster than the school bell. Then the first tremor hit, low and unnatural, as if a distant throat cleared.
In the central courtyard, a fissure split the stone. The Awakening Stone—the same artifact that had declared Long Hao talentless—began to throb with an unfamiliar light. Teachers screamed; announcements sputtered. A shimmering gate crawled open near the old amphitheater—an entrance of black smoke and violet lightning. Dungeons were rare in urban schools, but rifts responded to hotspots: large gatherings, concentrated talent energy, and—ironically—high stakes. The school's Awakening day had left residues.
Students fled, but the rift pulsed and vomited shapes—creatures more nightmare than animal. They were gaunt and pale, with elongated limbs and mouths too-full of needle teeth. Panic exploded.
Murong Yuer, who had watched Long Hao with a glacial scorn that morning, now stood frozen with fear. A teacher stumbled; a student tripped. Chaos bloomed.
A guild alert beacon went off across Ravenwood—S-rank teams pinged their positions. Sherlocking across the city, all the big organizations would respond. Yet the school gymnasium's doors were jammed and the children were trapped.
Long Hao stood in the doorway of the assembly hall, watching the creatures spill like black ink. He felt the sigil throb—ten percent, still small. The system's voice whispered, cautious.
[Rift Event Detected: Local Dungeon Emergent.][Danger Level: High — Low-tier minors present.][Quest Triggered: Protect Civilians — Reward: Core Fragment (Probable).]
His eyes narrowed. Protect civilians—easy words for someone who had once killed without remorse. But protecting them now had a different taste: public gratitude could be as valuable as secrecy; it could also bring unwanted attention. The system weighed and recorded, but left choice to him.
Long Hao stepped forward.
He moved not like a boy seeking glory but like a blade drawn from sheath. The creatures lunged—teeth snapped. He tasted the copper of the closest boy's panic and heard the metallic shriek of a teacher's ankle breaking.
He engaged.
Void Flicker first: the creatures' senses dulled inside his immediate radius, their strikes blurred and mistimed. Long Hao exploited the openings: a precise kick to a leg, a brief choke on a throat, a series of incapacitating palm strikes that left them stunned. He did not slaughter—he incapacitated, focusing on keeping people alive and building an impression that would be easier sold as necessity than as talent flaunting.
Each incapacitation gave him feedback. The system wrote new tiny numbers in the corner of his vision:
+0.2% unseal (minor)
The first creature dissolved into a puff of black smoke once subdued—its essence siphoned by a latent field he had not consciously triggered. The air tasted wrong. The sigil on his chest pulsed.
Teachers and students backed, amazed. Murong Yuer stood rigid. Cameras recorded. A corridor full of witnesses watched a so-called talentless boy move like the shadow of a god.
But news spreads differently than gratitude. Within thirty minutes, an official guild liaison—an envoy in charcoal suit—arrived, flanked by a caretaker team. He stepped into the hall, eyes scanning Long Hao with clinical interest.
"Student Long Hao," the envoy said, voice flat. "For your safety and the school's, we must request you evacuate with us for evaluation."
Long Hao's jaw tightened. The threat of being cataloged and displayed hung in the air. The system flashed a warning.
[Exposure Penalty Increased: Minor Flags Active]
Long Hao put a hand to his chest as if feeling the sigil, breathed slowly, and made a choice.
"No," he said quietly. "I'm not leaving anyone behind."
The envoy's mouth tightened. Behind him, the rift pulsed stronger. Long Hao could have stepped back and allowed higher forces to sweep the scene. Instead, he doubled down. He pushed, pulling a group of trapped students into a corridor, shielding them as another creature lunged and he deflected it into the open where a registrar team finished it off.
By the time the guild detachment stabilized the rift, the video had spread beyond school servers. Comments blew up—shock, awe, fear, and the inevitable rumor mill: Which talent is this? Is he the forbidden type?
Long Hao sat against a charred column as the dust settled. He could feel the system's small reward: the interface blinked.
[Core Fragment Acquired: +3% Unseal][Unsealing: 13%]
It was small, but it was progress.
Murong Yuer's eyes met his—no respect yet, but not the same cold sneer. The Long Clan's elders had more questions than answers. The envoy scribbled furious notes. Across the city, a number of guild inboxes lit up with his name. The global bounty tag in the system would take time to spread, but the envy and appetite for such an anomaly were immediate.
Long Hao rubbed his side where the old scar had been replaced by the new ache of exertion. He did not smile for the cameras. He only watched the horizon where the Core World's rumor would ripple outward, and he knew one certainty:
This was only the beginning. The system had shown him teeth; the world would show him fangs. He would learn to bite without spilling the secret of his maw.
Outside, Ravenwood breathed a ragged sigh. Inside, the sigil over his heart pulsed once. The Eclipse was unfurling.
[CHAPTER ENDS]