Chapter 106: His Encrypted Threat

The war in the south was bleeding the Church dry.

Raziel knew it because the supply wagons arriving at St. Celeste carried less food and more bandages every week.

He also knew it because minor academies near the border were shutting down, unable to defend themselves from the rebel attacks.

That morning, a wooden transport wagon stopped in the center of the main courtyard.

Father Marius stood by the gates, leaning on his dark wooden cane and didn’t look happy.

The director needed numbers to replace the apprentices lost in the St. Sophia disaster, but taking in refugees from failed academies was a desperate move.

Raziel watched from the second-floor cloister.

Fifteen novices climbed down from the wagon.

They wore dusty gray robes and carried small canvas bags, most of them looked terrified, they were kids who had seen the war up close and just wanted a safe place to sleep.

Raziel leaned against the stone railing and activated his interface out of pure habit, letting the system scan the newcomers.

[NPC: Novice — Level 3 — Gift: Minor Healing]

[NPC: Novice — Level 2 — Gift: Water Manipulation]

[NPC: Novice — Level 4 — Gift: Barrier]

Then, the last boy stepped out of the wagon, Raziel stopped breathing for a second.

The boy was about his age, maybe a bit taller, had pale skin, messy dark hair, and a posture that didn’t fit a tired refugee, and didn’t look around nervously like the others.

He just stared straight ahead, his eyes looking completely through the stone walls, the instructors and the other students.

Raziel noticed the boy’s wrists as he adjusted his bag. They were covered in thick, overlapping scars.

They weren’t battle wounds, more like the kind of marks left by heavy shackles worn for years.

Raziel focused his system on him.

[TARGET ANALYSIS: CAIUS]

[THREAT: MEDIUM]

[GIFT: ENCRYPTED]

Raziel gripped the stone railing.

Encrypted.

The system couldn’t read him.

This was the exact same error he had received when he tried to scan Mother Superior Celestine back at the sanatorium.

The system couldn’t process her because she was a Saint-Level anomaly hiding behind a fake profile.

’So what the hell is this kid?’

His new Umbral Paragon class kept his heart rate steady.

Caius was a plant, he had to be.

But who sent him?

High Inquisitor Aldric could have slipped a spy into the refugee group to watch Raziel after their interrogation.

Maybe Seraphina sent an assassin to finish the job she started in the catacombs.

Raziel stepped back from the railing and needed to keep a close eye on the new kid.

***

The refectory was loud during lunch.

Hundreds of wooden spoons hit wooden bowls.

The novices talked about the war, the rumors from the capital and the new transfers.

Raziel sat at his usual table near the back wall.

Lucian was sitting across from him, explaining a new defensive sword stance he had read about.

Lara was sitting next to Lucian, quietly eating her stew.

Raziel wasn’t listening to Lucian, he was watching the entrance.

Caius walked into the dining hall.

He didn’t grab a tray, didn’t look for the other transfers, walked in a straight line, navigating between the crowded tables with mechanical precision, and headed directly toward Raziel.

Lucian stopped talking.

He noticed the newcomer approaching and shifted his weight, his hand dropping below the table near his hidden dagger.

Raziel shook his head slightly.

A silent order to stand down.

Caius stopped at their table, he just pulled out the empty chair right next to Raziel and sat down.

He had no food, just rested his scarred hands on the table and stared straight ahead.

Lara frowned.

She closed her eyes for a fraction of a second, trying to read his emotional signature, and opened them immediately and looked at Raziel, alarmed.

She mouthed a single word: Nothing.

Caius was completely empty.

They sat in silence for two full minutes.

The noise of the refectory buzzed around them, but their table felt like it was trapped in a vacuum.

Finally, Caius turned his head.

His eyes met Raziel’s, they were a pale, washed-out gray, lacking any human warmth.

Caius spoke, carrying no inflection or tone. “Your power is interesting,”

Caius said. “Was it given to you, or did you take it?”

Lucian tensed up. “Hey, who the hell are you to—”

“Quiet, Lucian,” Raziel cut him off.

Raziel didn’t break eye contact with the strange boy.

He didn’t deny having power, lying to someone who already knew the truth was a waste of time.

Raziel leaned in slightly. “Who sent you?”

Caius smiled.

The muscles in his face pulled his lips up, but the smile didn’t reach his pale eyes.

It looked like someone wearing a human mask who hadn’t figured out how facial expressions worked yet.

“No one sends me,” Caius said smoothly. “I just arrive.”

Caius stood up, pushing the chair back.

He didn’t say goodbye.

He just turned around and walked out of the refectory, leaving the three of them sitting in absolute silence.

Lucian let out a breath. “Okay, that guy is a fucking psychopath.”

“He’s not a psychopath,” Raziel said, staring at the empty doorway. “He’s a weapon. I just don’t know whose hand is holding the hilt.”

Curfew fell over St. Celeste, plunging the academy into darkness.

Raziel was in his isolated room in the old wing and hadn’t touched his bed.

He stood by the narrow window, looking down at the inner courtyard.

His mind was running through variables.

If Caius was an Inquisitor, he would have tried to provoke Raziel into a confession.

If he was a cultist working for Seraphina, he would have tried to poison his food or stab him in the halls.

But Caius just asked a question about the nature of his power.

’Was it given, or did you take it?’

***

Raziel watched the empty courtyard below.

The moon was full tonight, casting a bright silver glow over the cobblestones and the stone statues of the saints.

A shadow detached itself from the arches of the cloister.

Raziel narrowed his eyes.

It was Caius.

The boy walked into the center of the courtyard, didn’t look around to see if there were guards nor try to hide.

He just stood right in the middle of the open space and looked up at the night sky.

Raziel stayed perfectly still by the window.

He didn’t activate [Shadow Echo].

He didn’t want to risk sending a mana pulse that Caius could detect, just watched with his own eyes.

Caius raised his scarred hands toward the moon, and the moon… looked back.

It didn’t happen slowly.

A thick beam of pure silver light shot down from the sky.

It bypassed the clouds and hit Caius directly in the chest.

Raziel gasped and stepped back from the glass.

The light didn’t burn Caius, it absorbed into his skin and for exactly one second, Caius’s entire body illuminated from the inside out.

Glowing geometric lines appeared across his face, his neck, and his arms.

Raziel’s breath caught in his throat.

He recognized those lines and knew that exact runic pattern.

It was the same violet and silver geometric structure that covered the Chalice of Oblivion.

The same energy signature that Celestine had used to try and rip his soul out in the dungeon.

The light vanished and the courtyard returned to normal moonlight.

Caius lowered his hands and walked back into the shadows of the cloister as if nothing had happened.

Raziel stood frozen by the window.

The Chalice of Oblivion was a relic from the pre-Church era.

An artifact of the dead gods.

Caius wasn’t an Inquisitor nor working for Seraphina’s cult.

He didn’t belong to the Church at all.

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