The aftermath of the courtyard battle was a silent, tense affair. Academy medics, their faces grim, arrived on floating stretchers. One team attended to Kanochi, who was groaning in pain, his body wracked with a coldness that no blanket could warm. Another team cautiously approached Kiran's motionless form, checking for signs of life before lifting him onto a second stretcher. The teachers who arrived shot wary, unreadable looks at Shadaiku, who still stood frozen in the center of the devastation, his fist smoking slightly.
Gashuki was the first to move. He walked over to Kanochi, ignoring the medics for a moment. He looked down at the boy who had been so fiery and was now so broken. "You're an idiot," Gashuki said, his voice low. It wasn't an insult, but a statement of fact. "Charging in like that against an unknown power. It was reckless."
Kanochi could barely open his eyes, but he managed a weak, pained smirk. "Yeah… well… someone had to…" he rasped before a fit of coughing took him.
Mileina rushed to Shadaiku's side. "Your hand!" she gasped, seeing the red, raw skin and the faint magical energy still crackling over his knuckles.
Shadaiku finally looked away from Kiran's retreating stretcher. He looked at his own hand as if seeing it for the first time. "I… I don't know how I did that," he whispered, his voice trembling. The fear of Kiran was now mixed with a terrifying awe of his own power.
"We need to get you to the infirmary too," Mileina said firmly, her nurturing instinct overriding her shyness. She gently took his uninjured arm.
Gashuki nodded, his rigid demeanor softening a fraction. "Come on." Together, he and Mileina helped a shaky Shadaiku and supported the barely-conscious Kanochi, following the medics out of the ruined courtyard. For the first time, they weren't four individuals. They were a unit, bound together by a shared, terrifying secret.
The next few days saw a shift within their group. The petty arguments and rivalries seemed trivial now, washed away by the reality of what they were facing.
Shadaiku and Kanochi, in particular, found an unexpected common ground. They were placed in adjacent beds in the infirmary, a room that hummed with healing magic. The silence between them was initially awkward.
"He really did a number on you," Shadaiku said finally, breaking the quiet.
Kanochi, his body heavily bandaged, turned his head with a wince. "You're the one to talk. You look like you tried to catch a thunderbolt with your face."
A small smile touched Shadaiku's lips. "Felt like it." He grew serious. "I… know him. Kiran. From before."
Kanochi listened as Shadaiku, his voice low, recounted the humiliating beating he'd taken back in the city, how powerless he'd felt. "I froze when I saw him here," Shadaiku admitted, shame in his voice. "All my speed, all my clever plans… just gone. I was that scared kid in the alley again."
To his surprise, Kanochi didn't mock him. He just nodded. "I know that feeling. The anger… it just takes over. Makes you stupid. Makes you strong, but stupid." He looked at his own bandaged hands. "You saved my ass out there. That was… the opposite of stupid."
"It was an accident," Shadaiku said honestly. "I just panicked and punched."
"Maybe," Kanochi said. "Or maybe that's what this power is. Maybe it's not about control like the teachers say. Maybe it's about… feeling it. Really feeling it."
It was the beginning of a truce, built on shared vulnerability and a mutual enemy.
Meanwhile, Gashuki and Mileina brought them food and updates. The academy was buzzing with rumors about the "monster" new student and the four transfers who had fought him. They were becoming infamous.
Gashuki, ever practical, began treating their situation like a military campaign. "We need to train. Together. Whatever that was that Kiran used, it wasn't normal academy magic. It was something darker. And he'll be back."
Mileina agreed. "The earth… it shivers when he's near. It feels sick. We have to be ready."
The four of them, for the first time, were in agreement.
Kiran awoke in the infirmary alone, hours later. The school had deemed his injuries self-inflicted and his isolation necessary. His body ached, but his pride was shattered. As soon as the medics released him that night, he stormed out, a vortex of humiliation and rage.
He went straight to the place where his destiny had changed: the darkest corner of the outdoor gardens, where the shadows were thick enough to drink.
"Is this what I asked for?" he snarled at the silent darkness, his voice a raw whisper. "Humiliation? Disgrace? To be beaten by that… that *insect*?!"
The shadows seemed to coil tighter. The air grew deathly cold.
"I understand how you feel."
The voice was a physical presence, slithering into his mind. Kiran whirled around, but there was nothing there.
"NO!" Kiran yelled into the void, his fists clenched. "You! I thought you gave me what I wanted! Ultimate power! You're a scam! A deceiver!"
"No," the voice replied, its tone chillingly calm. "The power was real. You felt it. You let your guard down. Your arrogance blinded you. You were so confident you could crush Shadaiku that you did not see the counter-attack coming."
"Because you fortified me!" Kiran shot back. "You made me strong!"
"Yes, I did," Kurozai's voice echoed, a hint of impatience creeping in. "But the strongest armor is useless if the warrior does not watch for the arrow. You were overconfident. You saw a pest and tried to crush him with a force meant for a giant. You wasted my gift, and it backfired. The fault, vessel, is your own."
Kiran seethed, but a cold logic was cutting through his anger. The voice was right. He had been toying with Kanochi, savoring his victory. He had seen Shadaiku as no threat at all. He had been a fool.
"Before you continue," Kiran said, his voice dropping to a dangerous low. "Show yourself. I won't be spoken to by a voice in the dark."
For a moment, there was only silence. Then, the darkness in front of him began to congeal. It pulled itself together, rising from the ground like a pillar of living night. It grew, towering over Kiran, taking a vaguely humanoid shape but with no distinct features. And then, two points of light ignited within the shadowy form. They were not eyes of fire or light, but pools of pure, violent purple energy that swirled with ancient malice. They fixed on Kiran, seeing through him, into him.
Kiran stumbled back a step, his breath catching in his throat. A primal fear, the kind felt by prey in the presence of an apex predator, froze his blood. This was no mere spirit. This was something infinitely older and more powerful.
"Do not be afraid," the figure intoned, its voice now resonating from the terrifying form. "It is I, Kurozai. You asked for my visage. Do you find it… displeasing?"
Kiran swallowed hard, forcing his fear down. This was power. True, terrifying power. This was what he had craved. "No," he managed to say. "It is… worthy."
"Good," Kurozai purred. "Now, you will listen. The boy, Shadaiku, did not beat you with his own strength. Nor did the fiery one, Kanochi. They are merely vessels."
"Vessels?" Kiran asked, intrigued.
"They, along with two others—Gashuki and Mileina—were specially blessed. Chosen by my… siblings." The word was dripping with venom.
"Gashuki? Mileina?Who are they?"
"You may not know them yet. But you will. They were blessed for one purpose: to defeat me."
Kiran's eyes widened. "To defeat you? Why? Who are you?"
The purple eyes flared. "Do you know who I am, Kiran?"
"No."
The shadowy form seemed to expand, its presence filling the entire garden. The very light of the moons died as it spoke.
"I AM KUROZAI. I AM A FALLEN GOD."
The words hit Kiran with the force of a physical blow. "A god? He had made a pact with a god."
"A… fallen god?" Kiran whispered, his mind reeling.
"Once, I stood among them," Kurozai began, his voice taking on the cadence of an ancient story. "We were five. Emberlyn of the eternal flame, Kagerou of the raging storm, Akira of the unyielding earth, Hiroki of the forged steel… and I, Kurozai, of the gentle, balancing shadows."
He spoke of the early days, painting a picture of a perfect, harmonious creation. He described his role not as a thing of evil, but as a necessary part of the whole—the quiet night, the soft shade, the contrast that gave beauty to the light.
"But they grew arrogant in their creation," Kurozai's voice twisted with bitterness. "The fire saw only its brilliance, the lightning its glory, the earth its permanence, the metal its strength. They began to see my shadows not as balance, but as a flaw. A blemish on their perfect world. They pushed me to the edges, diminished my role, mocked my domain as one of fear and absence, rather than rest and depth."
He weaved a tale of subtle exclusion and growing resentment. He spoke of ideas rejected, of contributions ignored.
"I did not seek to destroy their world," he lied smoothly. "I sought to improve it! To show them a grander design, where shadow was not the servant of light, but its equal! A world of greater contrast, of deeper meaning! But they would not listen. They called my vision a corruption. They saw my ambition as a threat to their precious, fragile order."
He described the final confrontation not as a betrayal, but as a tragic defense.
"They turned on me. All four of them. They combined their power not to talk, not to reason, but to excise me. They violated our sacred pact and cast me out, labeling me 'betrayer' to hide their own jealousy and fear! They could not tolerate a vision greater than their own!"
Kiran listened, utterly captivated. In Kurozai's telling, he was not the villain, but the victim—a brilliant visionary betrayed by his lesser, jealous siblings.
"Now, they hide in their celestial realm, too weak to face me directly, so they send children to do their dirty work. They bless mortals like Shadaiku and Kanochi with stolen power, turning them into weapons against me. You were not beaten by a boy, Kiran. You were beaten by the cowardly influence of the god of lightning."
The story was a masterpiece of manipulation. It fed Kiran's pride, his sense of being wronged by the world, and justified his own dark ambitions.
"Now you know the secret," Kurozai said, his form leaning closer, the purple eyes burning. "You cannot fight them alone. You must become more. You must forge the students of this academy into an army. Make them fear you, then make them follow you. Together, we will eradicate the influence of my siblings from this world. We will tear their precious vessels apart. And I will reclaim my rightful place as the supreme god."
The shadowy hand extended, offering not just power, but purpose. A righteous crusade.
"Do this for me," Kurozai's voice became a seductive whisper. "And I will grant you anything. Everything. You will stand at my right hand. Every soul in this academy, every person in this world, will bow at your feet. Shadaiku, Kanochi… they will kneel in the dirt before you. You will have the power you have always craved, and the respect you have always been denied."
Kiran saw it all. The adoration. The fear. The absolute power. It was everything he had ever wanted, handed to him by a god. The humiliation in the courtyard was now a necessary lesson. A stepping stone.
He dropped to one knee, bowing his head before the terrifying, magnificent entity.
"I will, Lord Kurozai," he said, his voice firm with newfound conviction. "You can count on me. I will not disappoint you."
"See that you do not," Kurozai replied. "Rise, my champion. My general. Go and claim your army."
And with a sound like a collapsing star, the immense shadowy form dissolved back into the nothingness from whence it came, leaving Kiran alone in the garden. But he was not the same. He was no longer a angry boy. He was the chosen vessel of a god. And he had a war to win.
A slow, dark smile spread across his face. "Let the Celestial Guardians have their four gods. They would soon learn what it meant to face a fallen one."