Three months passed in a blur of travel and emergencies. Kami and Thorwald's century moved through the eastern provinces, responding to outbreaks and Pneuma-based threats that seemed to appear with suspicious regularity.
A village where corrupted Pneuma from a tainted well had turned half the population into violent, mindless husks—Kami drained the corruption and purified the water source, but not before five people died in the chaos.
A monastery where monks practicing forbidden meditation techniques had accidentally opened themselves to parasitic Pneuma entities—Kami extracted the parasites one by one, learning in the process that some forms of spiritual corruption were harder to distinguish from the host than physical disease.
A battlefield where the bodies of fallen soldiers had been left unburied for weeks, their residual Pneuma coalescing into vengeful spirits that attacked the living—Kami consumed the spirits, absorbing not just their energy but fragments of their final memories, their terror and pain and rage.
Each incident strengthened him. Each feeding made the hunger louder.
And each mission felt increasingly orchestrated, as though someone was deliberately exposing him to progressively more dangerous and morally ambiguous situations.
It was Thorwald who finally said what they were both thinking.
"We are being manipulated," he announced one evening as they made camp in a forest clearing. "Every assignment we receive, every 'random' outbreak we are sent to investigate—they are all tests. Someone is measuring your limits, seeing how much you can consume before you break."
"I know," Kami said quietly. He sat cross-legged by the fire, his dark robes making him nearly invisible in the gathering dusk. "The Silent Legion. They are building a profile, documenting my capabilities. Every report I file, every technique I use, it all goes into their evaluation."
"Then we stop filing detailed reports. We tell them the minimum necessary and keep your true abilities hidden."
"That will only make them more suspicious. No, Thorwald—we have to play their game for now. Prove that I can be trusted with greater and greater power." Kami's hands clenched. "But I am reaching my limits. The hunger is constant now. I suppress it every moment of every day, and it costs me more each time. I dream of feeding, brother. Not nightmares—dreams where feeding feels good, feels right, where draining people of their Pneuma is justified and natural."
Thorwald's expression darkened. "You need to return to the Academy. See Grand Master Maximus, get help with the control techniques—"
"No. If I return now, if I admit I am struggling, they will pull me from the field. Either lock me in the Tower of Observation again or assign me to the Silent Legion permanently." Kami met his brother's eyes. "I will endure. I must."
But two weeks later, a letter arrived that changed everything.
It came by Imperial courier—a rider whose horse was enhanced with Pneuma to travel at inhuman speeds, carrying messages that could not be delayed. The letter bore the seal of the Academy itself.
Thorwald opened it and read aloud:
"'To Centurion Thorwald Van Hellsin and Imperial Physician Kami Van Hellsin: You are hereby summoned to the Imperial Academy of Pneumatic Studies in Aurelius for the Tenth Anniversary Gathering of the Class of Year 4. Attendance is mandatory for all graduates currently within the Empire's borders. You will report within fourteen days. Signed, Grand Master Aurelius Maximus.'"
Kami felt something cold settle in his stomach. "Mandatory attendance. They are summoning all the graduates who are still alive and serving."
"A reunion," Thorwald said, but his tone suggested he found that as unlikely as Kami did. "Or another evaluation. They want to see how we have developed after two years in the field."
"They want to measure our growth. Our advancement. Our usefulness." Kami took the letter and studied it. "And they want us to see each other—to compare ourselves, to compete, to remind us that we are all tools in the Empire's hand."
"Then we go. Show them you have maintained control. Prove you are not the threat they fear."
But when they arrived in Aurelius fourteen days later, Kami immediately sensed that something was wrong.
The city felt different. Tenser. The Pneuma flows that ran through the capital's streets and buildings had been modified, strengthened, turned into something almost defensive. New guard towers had been erected around the Academy. Soldiers patrolled the streets in greater numbers, their Pneuma signatures indicating elite units rather than standard legionaries.
"The Empire is preparing for war," Thorwald observed as they rode through the gates. "Look at the fortifications. The troop deployments. This is not peacetime posture."
The Academy itself was unchanged physically, but the atmosphere had shifted. Where once it had been a place of learning and competition, now it felt like a military installation. Students trained with greater intensity. Masters walked the halls with hands on weapons. Even the servants moved with wary efficiency.
They were directed to the dormitories to prepare for the evening's gathering. Thorwald returned to his old warrior barracks, greeted warmly by former classmates who had also been summoned. Kami climbed the familiar stairs to his tower room, expecting to find it sealed or repurposed.
Instead, he found it occupied.
A figure stood at the window—the same window where Kami had spent so many nights watching the city and fighting his hunger. The figure turned as Kami entered, and he recognized her immediately.
Julia. His partner from the Resonance test, the nervous girl who had been brave enough to synchronize with a Devourer.
She was different now. Two years in the field had hardened her—her silver Pneuma signature was stronger, more refined, and she carried herself with confidence rather than fear. She wore the robes of an Imperial Healer, marked with commendations for service in the northern provinces.
"Kami," she said, her voice neutral. "They assigned me to your old room. I hope you do not mind the intrusion."
"It was never truly mine. Just a comfortable cage." Kami studied her. "You have grown stronger. Your Pneuma capacity has nearly doubled."
"Two years of healing battlefield wounds will do that. Constant channeling, constant pressure, constant need." She turned back to the window. "I have saved hundreds of lives, Kami. Soldiers who would have died from their wounds, from infections, from Pneuma depletion. I am good at what I do."
"I sense a 'but' coming."
"But I have also watched hundreds die. Wounds too severe to heal, corruption too deep to cure, soldiers who used their last Pneuma to kill one more enemy and left nothing for me to work with." Her reflection in the glass looked haunted. "And I thought of you. Of how easily you drained that plague in Ferrum, how you pulled corruption from patients I could not help. Your Devourer nature makes you better at this than I will ever be."
"My Devourer nature makes me a monster playing at being a healer," Kami corrected quietly. "You save lives through skill and compassion. I save lives by consuming disease. We are not the same."
"Perhaps. But the dead do not care about the method, only the result." She finally turned to face him fully. "Why did Maximus summon us all back, Kami? The official reason is celebration and reunion, but I do not believe that."
"Neither do I. The Academy does nothing without purpose."
They discovered the true purpose that evening.
The gathering took place in the Academy's grand hall, where two hundred graduates had assembled—all those who had survived their two years of Imperial service. Kami recognized many faces: Cassius Tiberion, now a decorated Tribune with three combat commendations; Marcus, the stocky boy from the Resonance test, now an administrator who had helped build two new roads in the western provinces; Cassia, the speed specialist from Thorwald's dormitory, now a Legion scout with a reputation for impossible reconnaissance missions.
They had all changed. Grown harder, stronger, more refined in their abilities. But they had also grown wary, their easy camaraderie from student days replaced by professional distance and calculating assessment.
Thorwald moved through the crowd easily, greeting old friends and swapping stories of service. But Kami remained at the hall's edge, feeling the collective weight of two hundred Pneuma signatures pressing against his senses. So much life-force in one space. So much potential feeding.
The hunger whispered constantly: Take it. Just a little from each. They would never notice. You would become so strong...
"Still fighting yourself, I see."
Cassius Tiberion approached, a goblet of wine in hand, his Tribune's insignia gleaming. He had grown into his aristocratic bearing—taller, broader, his Pneuma signature burning with white-blue intensity that marked him as one of the Empire's elite wielders.
"Every moment," Kami replied honestly. "But I notice you are not keeping your distance anymore. No longer afraid I will drain you?"
"Oh, I am still afraid. But I have learned fear can be respected without surrender." Cassius took a drink. "I have killed seventeen men in the last two years, Devourer. Barbarian raiders, mostly. Some deserters. One corrupted Pneuma-wielder who had turned cannibal. And each time I killed, I thought of you. Of how easily you could drain the life from someone. How you choose not to."
"Is this your version of an apology?"
"This is my version of acknowledgment. You are dangerous. You will always be dangerous. But you are also... restrained. Disciplined. I still do not trust you, but I respect what you have chosen to be."
Before Kami could respond, a gong rang out—deep and resonant, silencing all conversation.
The Seven Masters entered the hall, with Grand Master Maximus at their center. The old man looked even more ancient than Kami remembered, as though the two years had aged him a decade. But his Pneuma still burned with undimmed power.
"Graduates of the Imperial Academy," Maximus's voice filled the hall without need for enhancement. "You were summoned here not for celebration, but for revelation. The Empire faces a crisis. One that requires the full mobilization of our most talented Pneuma-wielders."
Silence. Absolute and tense.
"The northern borders have collapsed. Three legions destroyed, their Pneuma drained completely by an enemy we do not fully understand. Entire villages emptied of life, their populations' Pneuma consumed by something that moves through our territory like a plague."
Murmurs of shock and fear ran through the hall. Three legions—fifteen thousand soldiers—destroyed? It was unthinkable.
"We believe," Maximus continued, his ancient eyes sweeping the assembled graduates, "that someone has discovered how to create Void Wraiths in significant numbers. Not the ancient constructs, but new ones. Improved ones. The enemy is using Devourer techniques on a massive scale."
Every eye in the hall turned to Kami.
He felt the weight of their stares, their fear and suspicion crystallizing into certainty that somehow, he was responsible. That his existence had shown the enemy what was possible.
"The Devourer is not responsible," Maximus said sharply, cutting through the rising murmurs. "If anything, his expertise may be our only defense against this threat. Which is why—" he paused, letting the silence build, "—I am forming a special task force. Seven of you will be selected to investigate the northern border, to determine the source of these Wraiths, and to eliminate the threat before it spreads further south."
He gestured, and seven names appeared in glowing Pneuma script in the air above his head:
Thorwald Van Hellsin - Combat LeaderKami Van Hellsin - Pneuma SpecialistCassius Tiberion - Second in CommandJulia Argentus - HealerMarcus Ferrus - LogisticsCassia Velocita - ReconnaissanceDecimus Blackhand - Heavy Combat
"These seven have demonstrated the skills, temperament, and power necessary for this mission," Maximus announced. "You will depart in three days. You will investigate, report, and if possible, eliminate the source of the Wraith plague. Failure is not acceptable. The Empire's northern territories depend on your success."
The hall erupted in noise—questions, protests, fear. But Kami barely heard it. He was looking at the list of names, at the specific combination of talents Maximus had assembled.
This was not a rescue mission. It was an execution squad.
And he was either the weapon they intended to use...
Or the target they intended to eliminate.
Later that night, after the gathering had dissolved into anxious clusters of conversation, Kami found Thorwald on the Academy's roof—the same roof where they had once shared stolen wine and worried about the future.
"They are sending us to die," Kami said without preamble. "Or they are sending me to die and you are collateral damage."
"I considered that," Thorwald admitted. "But I think it is more complicated. Maximus genuinely believes you are the only one who can stop these Wraiths. Your Devourer nature is the perfect counter to their draining techniques."
"And if I lose control in the process? If fighting Devourers makes me become one fully?"
"Then I will do what must be done." Thorwald's hand rested on his sword hilt. "I am your brother, Kami. I love you. But I am also a Centurion of the Empire. If you become a threat to innocents, I will stop you. Even if it kills us both."
Kami felt something break inside him—not in surprise or anger, but in relief. His brother understood. Would not hesitate. Would not let sentiment override duty.
"Thank you," Kami said quietly. "For loving me enough to kill me if necessary."
"Let us hope it does not come to that. But Kami..." Thorwald turned to face him fully. "If these Wraiths are using Devourer techniques, if someone has learned to replicate your abilities and weaponize them—you need to understand what that means."
"It means my existence proved it was possible. That by being what I am, I showed the enemy a path to power."
"It means," Thorwald corrected, "that you might be the only one who understands how to fight them. Not just through power, but through knowledge of how the hunger works, how the draining functions. You are not the cause of this threat, brother. You might be the cure."
Three days later, the seven-member task force departed Aurelius heading north, toward the collapsed borders and the Wraith plague beyond.
They rode in grim silence, each member processing the magnitude of their mission. Three legions destroyed. Thousands dead. An enemy that could drain Pneuma on a massive scale.
And leading them into that nightmare was a Devourer who fought his own nature every moment.
Kami rode at the column's center, feeling the weight of expectations and fears from his six companions. They needed him to be strong enough to fight the Wraiths, but controlled enough not to become one himself.
It was an impossible balance.
But then, Kami had been living on impossible balances his entire life.
The only question was: how long could he maintain it when surrounded by enemies that reflected his darkest nature?
He would soon find out.
The northern border—and whatever horrors awaited there—lay only days ahead.