Chapter 23: The Drowning Depth

"Teleport Student Serina to the medical bay immediately," Professor Marcus commanded, his voice cutting through the tense atmosphere.

The Monitoring Control Room fell into intrigued, contemplative silence. Everyone present understood what they were witnessing—something far more significant than a simple examination.

What was unfolding in Zone 3: Frostwind Tundra was a perfect representation of what it truly meant to be a mage, a martial artist, a practitioner of skill and art. More fundamentally, it represented what it meant to be human—that simple, burning understanding of feeling. The heat to live and survive, the desperate desire to be immortal in thought and memory, the refusal to fade quietly into obscurity.

That primal fire was flaring brightest in Zone 3.

Despite the inherently cold nature of the frozen tundra, it was burning more brilliantly than any other testing ground today. And after many long years of teaching, Professor Marcus genuinely hadn't witnessed anything quite like this in his entire career at Aethermoor Academy.

Three students experiencing awakenings simultaneously.

It was as beautiful as a butterfly emerging from its cocoon, as inevitable as spring following winter. The burning passion radiating from that distant battlefield made Professor Marcus itch with similar fervor—a deep, almost physical need to teach this student, to guide this raw potential into something magnificent.

Professor Vincent adjusted his mechanical augmentations, which whirred anxiously. "Indeed, it seems Serina's safety is now at considerable risk. The rampage of a newly awakened special element user is notoriously unpredictable.

"We absolutely cannot afford another incident like the Darkwood Massacre fifteen years ago."

His artificial eye focused on the display with unnerving precision. "Particularly because this awakening seems exceptionally violent. That slash technique wasn't simple compression like Aurora's Compression Dominion.—it appeared to be actual separation of space itself. It might be a stretch to conclude definitively, but we know certain royal bloodlines have historically carried similar reality-warping powers."

With a tap on the console, golden teleportation light consumed Serina's unconscious form, whisking her to safety.

Professor Gareth's hands constantly squeezed the armrests of his chair, creating small stress cracks in the metal. "What about Student Ashen? Should we extract him as well?"

Among all the faculty present, Gareth was the most blunt about expressing his emotional reactions—his concern was written clearly across his weathered face.

Professor Kazuki hummed thoughtfully, studying the displays. "No, he's conscious and stable. Look."

The camera zoomed onto Ashen. The white-haired dragon heir sat against a partially melted tree, staring at the two distant combatants with a blank expression that mixed surface jealousy with something deeper—a profound understanding of what it meant to wield special element magic. Yes, he knew that weight intimately. He'd watched it from the front-row seat of Aurora's shadow his entire life.

Professor Kazuki's eyes sharpened dangerously. "If anything, get Raul out of there immediately. I understand the pedagogical value of awakening experiences, but we must exercise caution. Raul is someone who wouldn't hesitate to go all the way, to push students beyond their breaking point. And Student Agni looks like he's a hair's breadth away from complete physical collapse."

He gestured at the screen showing Agni swaying on his feet. "Raul has thoroughly broken the established rules of elimination rounds. This has escalated beyond examination protocol."

Professor Marcus didn't disagree, nodding slowly. "Yes, it would be necessary to intervene when Student Agni reaches his absolute limit. But not before."

His voice took on a philosophical tone. "It would be incredibly cruel to take away his meal after he's finally discovered his hunger. He's taken a genuine leap into the ocean of self-consciousness, into understanding his own existence and potential. It would only be appropriate to wait until he either learns to swim... or drowns."

His eyes never left the screen. "We must observe how deeply he can sink into his own understanding before he's forced to surface.

The implications hung heavy in the air—they were willing to let this continue to the very edge of fatality, purely for the sake of a student's growth.

The camera finally zoomed fully onto Agni's face.

He stared at Raul with his transformed void-slit eyes

Behind the black mask that had hidden nothing from the beginning, Raul lay completely bare to Agni's supernatural perception—a living embodiment of pure, unfiltered passion.

The four heart circles that had been spinning steadily were now accelerating dramatically. No—they weren't just spinning faster. They were spreading, branching outward like parasitic vines. Like serpents climbing a tree, those mysterious energy pathways wrapped themselves around Raul's primary mana circuit, merging the two systems into something unified and terrifying.

Agni blinked once, slowly.

He nearly found himself fainting right then and there. The overwhelming heat that had sustained him was rapidly fleeting, draining from his extremities like water through a sieve. His body was already losing all sensation, quickly becoming completely numb and cold. He couldn't feel anything apart from his brain and the pathway down his spine—those two areas still burned with feverish intensity.

The contrast was nightmarish. It felt like wearing a thick, cold-soaked coat in the dead of winter while standing in a blizzard. Inside that freezing shell, his chest felt like a water pouch with his heart swimming loosely inside it, unanchored and desperate.

His right arm felt impossibly loose, like it was preparing to simply slip off his body entirely. The flesh hung on his bones like wet fabric slipping away from a frame, while the bone itself felt like a broken tree branch—just one gentle tug away from falling completely. Only his thin blood vessels held the entire structure together before its unavoidable collapse.

I can't let this end, Agni thought desperately, fighting against the darkness creeping into his peripheral vision. I don't want to faint. I don't want to sleep now. Just an inch more. Just one step further into this feeling.

Then his eyes widened with sudden realization.

He couldn't move well enough to close the distance himself. His legs wouldn't cooperate. But he didn't need to move—he needed to bring Raul closer.

His left hand—the only limb still responding properly—reached out and grabbed the geometric lines surrounding Raul's body that only he could perceive. He pulled, yanking on reality itself.

"Phase Grasp!"

Raul suddenly felt an inexplicable tug, an invisible force grabbing his entire body and pulling him directly toward Agni. His eyes widened behind the mask, then he grinned with savage joy. "Yes! Less talking, more fighting!"

He was dragged close against his will

Agni's right fist connected with Raul's hastily-raised forearms in a desperate strike. The moment of impact, Agni released the compressed spatial lines holding Raul in place.

"Phase Burst!"

The geometric lines bent violently, then shattered like breaking glass. The stored kinetic energy detonated point-blank.

Raul blocked the strike with crossed arms, but his eyes widened in genuine shock. This strength—!

The force behind that punch was absurd. It hit as hard as Ashen's draconic-enhanced strikes, which should be physically impossible for someone with Agni's tiny, malnourished frame. Unless Agni had trained extensively in aura reinforcement techniques, which he absolutely hadn't according to his own evaluation.

As Raul was pushed back slightly, still managing to hold his ground, he noticed something horrifying.

Agni's right arm simply slipped down.

First at the wrist, then the elbow, then the shoulder—the entire limb came apart like poorly-sewn fabric being unwrapped.

The old wound that had never properly healed

simply unwrapping under stress.

Old injury, never fully regenerated, Raul noted clinically even while fighting.

Before he could capitalize on this weakness, he felt his own face being grabbed.

Agni punched him with his remaining left arm.

Phase Grasp X Phase Burst!

The dual activation of spatial manipulation and explosive force created a devastating synergy. Raul's jaw shattered completely, torn clean off in a spray of blood and broken teeth. His face maintained its impossible smile even as the lower half separated, pure adrenaline and passion overriding pain.

Agni's eyes suddenly widened to their maximum extent as he heard it—that beautiful, addictive sound.

The rattling of chains around his heart, as if invisible links were gently massaging the organ itself. The sensation started from his brain, traveled down his spine, wrapped around his heart with tender precision, then terminated at the lower end of his vertebrae. The complete circuit activated.

His superheated body temperature spiked once again in response. His void-slit eyes reignited with renewed intensity, all twenty-four slits sharpening into perfect geometric precision as focused awareness flooded back.

He felt it, He knew what it meant thanks to serina..

CHAIN STRIKE !!!

Then Raul's hand clamped around his throat like a mechanical vice.

"HOW DEEP ARE YOU GOING TO SINK, AGNI?!" Raul screamed with genuine exhilaration, his regenerating jaw making his words slightly distorted. "THIS IS MADNESS! THIS IS ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL!"

His technique activated with crushing force. "Titan Slaying Arts: Crushing Fang!"

Raul's right hand squeezed Agni's throat with strength.

Agni felt his windpipe beginning to collapse, his vision darkening rapidly.

Raul's left fist pulled back, fully charged and ready to connect with Agni's skull like a hammer driving a nail into soft wood. The killing blow.

He chuckled loudly despite his missing jaw, the sound wet and broken but filled with pure, unfiltered joy.