Midnight at the National Hunter Academy was strictly monitored. Military patrols roamed the courtyards, and mana-detecting sensors swept the corridors every ten minutes. It was supposedly the most secure facility in the country.
To Elias, it was just a minor inconvenience.
He sat on his dorm room bed, dressed in his black hoodie. He checked his System map, trying to pinpoint the source of the dark mana he had sensed earlier during his duel with Leo.
"The concentration is deepest in the Restricted Sub-Basement 4," Elias muttered. "That's below the academy's main mana reactor."
He didn't need to break the door down or pick any locks. He was a Necromancer. The shadows were his domain.
Elias stood up and stepped into the dark corner of his room. He channeled a tiny fraction of his mana, letting himself sink entirely into the shadows, a high-level stealth technique he had mastered in his past life. He merged with the darkness, sliding under his locked dorm door and gliding silently along the walls of the academy corridors.
He bypassed three military patrols and two magical sensor grids without making a single sound. He moved like spilled ink across the floor, descending deeper into the facility.
Sub-Basement 1. Sub-Basement 2. Sub-Basement 3.
As he reached the heavy steel doors of Sub-Basement 4, the air grew incredibly cold. The ambient mana here was thick, suffocating, and reeked of ancient blood. It felt exactly like a high-tier Gate, but one that had been intentionally sealed away rather than cleared.
Elias reformed his physical body in the dimly lit corridor, standing before a massive blast door covered in glowing, complex sealing runes.
'Why would the military build an academy on top of a sealed dungeon?' Elias thought, his eyes narrowing. 'Unless they aren't trying to keep it sealed. They're using the students' latent mana to feed it.'
Before he could investigate the runes further, Elias's instincts—honed by ten years of brutal warfare—screamed at him.
He didn't turn around. He simply tilted his head slightly to the left.
Swish!
A silver dagger, glowing with deadly violet mana, sliced through the empty space where his throat had been a millisecond before.
Elias pivoted on his heel, his hand shooting out like a viper. He grabbed the wrist of his attacker, halting their momentum instantly.
Standing in the shadows was a girl. She looked to be around his age, wearing a sleek, form-fitting black combat suit. She had striking silver hair tied in a short ponytail, and eyes that glowed like polished amethyst.
She was fast. Incredibly fast. A normal A-Rank would have been beheaded before they even knew she was there.
"You dodged that," the girl whispered, her voice a mix of shock and icy calm. She tried to pull her wrist back, but Elias's grip was like a steel vise. "Let go."
"An Assassin class," Elias said softly, his eyes analyzing her aura. "And a high-ranking one at that. You aren't in the Elite Class. Why is an S-Rank Assassin sneaking around the basement?"
The girl's amethyst eyes widened slightly. She had masked her presence entirely; no magical sensor in the world should have been able to read her rank. Yet this guy—the so-called 'B-Rank Summoner' who humiliated Leo earlier today—read her like an open book.
"Who are you?" she demanded, her free hand reaching for a second dagger strapped to her thigh.
Elias's shadow rippled. The massive, pitch-black hand of the Hobgoblin Elite, Iron, emerged from the floor and gently wrapped its shadowy fingers around the girl's throat. It didn't squeeze, but the threat was absolute.
The girl froze. The sheer, terrifying pressure radiating from the shadow was completely overwhelming.
"I ask the questions," Elias said, his voice flat. "Who are you, and what are you doing at my door?"
She swallowed hard, realizing she was entirely outmatched. "Aria. Aria Sterling. And I'm not here for you. I'm here for what's behind that door."
Elias raised an eyebrow. The Sterling family. They were one of the oldest and most secretive Hunter bloodlines, known for producing lethal assassins who worked directly for the government's black-ops division.
"My family caught wind that the military was hiding an 'Irregular Gate' beneath the Academy," Aria explained quietly, her eyes darting to the massive shadow hand around her neck. "I enrolled to investigate. That door is the entrance."
Elias looked at the runic blast door. An Irregular Gate. Those were dungeons that didn't follow the System's normal rules. They were wildly dangerous, often collapsing and causing massive casualties, but they also contained the rarest artifacts in existence.
"I see," Elias said. He snapped his fingers, and Iron's hand melted back into the shadows. Elias released her wrist. "Well, Aria Sterling. You can go back to your dorm now. I'll be taking it from here."
Aria rubbed her wrist, glaring at him. "Are you insane? The sealing runes on that door require a team of A-Rank Mages to dispel. You can't just walk in."
Elias ignored her. He walked up to the blast door. The sealing runes glowed bright red, warning of lethal magical feedback if tampered with.
He didn't try to dispel the magic. He simply placed his hand flat against the steel.
"Blood," Elias commanded.
From his shadow, the Commander-Grade Death Knight materialized, towering over both of them. Aria took a staggering step back, her breath hitching as she felt the apocalyptic aura of the Level 20 Boss Monster.
"Break it," Elias ordered.
Blood raised his massive crimson claymore, the dark aura swirling violently around the blade. With a single, devastating swing, he brought the sword down on the blast door.
BOOM!
The A-Rank sealing runes shattered like cheap glass. The massive steel doors groaned, buckled, and were violently violently blown off their hinges, crashing into the dark cavern beyond.
A wave of putrid, freezing air rushed out of the darkness, carrying the distinct sound of thousands of bones rattling together.
Elias stepped over the broken doors, staring into the pitch-black abyss of the Irregular Gate.
He looked back over his shoulder at Aria, who was staring at him in absolute, dumbfounded shock.
"If you're going to follow me, try not to die," Elias said casually, before disappearing into the darkness.