Warehouse district
Periun city,
Kettlia Region
Ashtarium
North American
October 20th, 2019
Nico hovered over the corpses of the fallen vampires, their mangled remains sprawled across the ground in grotesque shapes. Obsidian-feathered plumes floated around him in eerie silence—some glowing faintly with radiant energy, others hidden in spectral veils, their presence only felt, not seen. One of the feathers twitched slightly as he studied a severed limb in his hand, blood still dripping from its pale, lifeless fingers.
More vampires emerged from the shadows, their eyes glowing with primal hunger, fangs bared in predatory delight. Snarls echoed around the blood-stained corridor, but Nico didn't flinch. He wasn't looking at them—he was staring at the door behind them, its surface carved with ancient seals that pulsed with a dull red glow. That was his true target.
With utter disdain, he tossed the severed arm toward the approaching group. It landed with a wet thud, spattering blood across the floor—and yet Nico never slowed. He walked forward, calm and steady, each step deliberate.
One of the vampires growled and shouted something in a guttural dialect, but Nico didn't so much as glance back.
Then came the flash of steel—a blade arcing silently through the air toward the back of his head.
Instantly, a dozen black feathers erupted around him, runic inscriptions flaring with obsidian light. In that same moment, they moved—razor slashes of compressed blade-energy carved the air, so fast the vampires barely had time to scream. Their bodies convulsed as the feathers cut clean through their hearts, skulls, and spines.
It was over in seconds.
A rain of blood and ash fell in silence.
Nico didn't stop. Not even to look at the corpses now littering the hallway.
His eyes remained locked on the sealed door, expression unreadable.
"Pathetic," he muttered, almost absently, as the last feather drifted lazily back to his side, waiting for its next command.
To be perfectly honest, Nico hadn't intended to interfere—not at first. Silas' operations had always been a known variable, something the Warden Association tolerated within limits. But recent events had shifted the equation.
He had seen Jack face off against the gang distributing Lumen Grasp, and Nico knew exactly where that twisted substance came from.
Lumen Grasp—classified as a forbidden artifact by the Warden Association—was outlawed for a reason. A synthetic fusion of mana stimulant and soul corrosion, it was designed to enhance one's strength briefly... while eroding the spirit and destabilizing the mind. Only the criminal underworld dared to traffic it. So Silas was tied to it? That crossed a line Nico could not ignore.
He stood before the door now, palm resting on its center, feeling the faint resistance of the magical barrier woven across it. He recognized the signature—it was the same arcane sealwork layered over Silas' penthouse, defensive but subtle, meant to delay rather than destroy.
With a soft breath, Nico released a single obsidian feather. It hovered beside him, humming faintly with constrained power. Then, like a scalpel, it sliced through the barrier—a ripple of dark energy cleaving the spellwork apart as if it were nothing but mist.
The magical seal crumbled.
Without hesitation, Nico stepped forward and drove his foot into the door. The hinges shattered with a sharp crack, the door slamming inward.
The sight that greeted him confirmed everything.
Inside the room were crates—rows of them, stacked with cold precision. Shelves lined the walls, and on them were glass vials and black crystal containers, each glowing faintly with that sickly, luminescent hue. Lumen Grasp.
Enough to fuel a war in the underworld. Enough to ruin lives.
Nico's jaw tightened.
"So this is what you've been protecting, Silas," Nico murmured, his voice low and cold. His obsidian feathers floated around him like spectral blades, ready to draw blood at the slightest command. "Then I'm done watching from the shadows…"
He paused, eyes narrowing. The feather he had placed in Jack's shadow flared within his mind's eye—an anchor, a conduit. A flood of information surged into his consciousness, transmitted through that hidden tether. He saw the battle, the flashes of mana, the explosive clash between Jack and the thrall. He felt Jack's rising stress, the moment his Zone Drive failed, the surge of malevolent Vampiric mana, the danger he had faced alone.
"…Fucking Silas," Nico spat under his breath.
Without another word, the obsidian feathers dispersed into dark motes, and Nico's form dissolved into his own shadow—vanishing like a phantom. In the same breath, he emerged from Jack's shadow, materializing out of the ground with silent grace.
Jack jerked slightly, startled as Nico rose up behind him like a ghost pulled from the earth. Questions flashed across his face, but Nico held up a hand to quiet him.
His eyes scanned the battlefield. The charred earth. The splintered trees. The lingering heat from fire magic that had nearly gotten out of control. He could still feel the scorched breath of the crimson lances. Further away, the unconscious bodies of the gang members Jack had neutralized. Beyond them, the peaceful soul signatures of Jack's sleeping friends—untouched and unaware.
Nico's gaze flicked back to Jack. A hint of impressed approval glinted in his eyes, though his expression remained stoic.
"You did well," he said quietly. "Quick. Clean. No witnesses."
He raised a hand, and a halo of obsidian feathers formed above him. They shimmered briefly, then released a dense vapor of condensed mist—a spell woven into the feathers. Rain fell gently from above, cold and cleansing. The remaining embers and creeping flames were extinguished in seconds, the threat of a wildfire vanishing with them.
Jack exhaled. "You saw everything?"
"Enough," Nico replied. "It seems you poked enough feathers for them to finally respond,"
Jack opened his mouth, about to bring up the strange interference during his fight—the surge of unnatural mana and the fact that Wren had become a Thrall. But he stopped himself just in time. How could he explain how he knew that word? Nico hadn't mentioned anything about Thralls, much less about vampires or their hierarchies. And Jack hadn't yet told Nico about the Codex or what it had revealed to him.
Some truths, he realized, had to stay secret—at least for now.
Nico glanced toward the fading battle-scarred glade. "I'll handle the cleanup. Gather the rest. You? Go back. Try to enjoy what's left of your weekend."
Jack gave a silent nod, his thoughts heavy but his heart steady. He stepped back, then leapt up to a high branch, the wood barely creaking beneath him. With a final look at Nico, he vanished into the canopy, bounding from tree to tree on his way back to his sleeping friends.
Once Jack was gone, Nico turned his attention to the unconscious gang members strewn across the forest floor. With a flick of his fingers, the air rippled and his obsidian Blackvein feathers spiraled outward like dark petals in a storm. One by one, the gang members were lifted, wrapped in strands of shadow-threaded feathers, and sealed within the voidlike interior of Nico's dimensional storage.
Then he stepped over to Wren's broken form. Kneeling, Nico picked up the wand that had been used to channel the Vampiric mana. As he held it between his fingers, he felt it immediately—the resonance was wrong. Not natural mana, not even conventional magic. It was tainted… corrupted by a lineage of blood.
Vampiric mana.
But something else made his brow furrow.
This isn't Silas's signature, Nico thought. Too messy, not refined enough.
His feathers shifted, reacting to his unease.
"This must be one of his underlings doing," he muttered. With that, he spread his wings, the black feathers stretching wide, glinting faintly in the moonlight. With one powerful motion, he took off, disappearing into the sky—just another shadow swallowed by the dark.
****
Jack returned to the tent in silence, the adrenaline from the battle slowly bleeding out of his limbs. He slipped back onto the cot beside Carrie, who was still sound asleep. As if sensing his presence, her arms instinctively curled around him, her cheek nestling against his chest. Jack exhaled a long breath, the tension in his body loosening as he finally allowed himself to rest. Her warmth was grounding. Safe.
He closed his eyes, letting the night take him.
The morning came with soft light filtering through the canopy, casting golden streaks across the camp. After a quiet breakfast, everyone stirred with the familiar rhythm of departure. Sleeping bags were rolled, tents collapsed, supplies packed. Laughter echoed between the trees, masking any lingering unease from the night before.
Jack helped Carrie fold and secure her tent, their hands brushing occasionally, each touch laced with subtle affection. Nearby, Sarah glanced up, narrowing her eyes at the shifting wind.
"Is it just me, or did it get colder?" she asked, rubbing her arms.
"It feels that way," Amber agreed, glancing toward the treeline. Her gaze flicked briefly toward Jack before she turned away, brushing it off.
Jack didn't respond. Instead, he stood slowly, stretching to his full height as he and Carrie finished securing the final straps of her tent. He remained quiet, though his thoughts lingered on what had transpired deep in the woods—on Wren, the wand, and the presence of Vampiric interference. None of them knew what had really happened last night, and Jack intended to keep it that way.
Outside the forest, as the group reached the edge of Mistvale, Jack turned back. His gaze lingered on the forest's shadowy heart, the trees whispering in the wind like guardians of buried secrets.
He wondered when he'd return—and how different things might be when he did. Mistvale was more than a mystical forest. Beneath its surface lay veins of raw magical value, including the glowing Magic stones he'd discovered.
Magic stones are valuable in Manaborn society, he thought. Which means... I just found a treasure vault.
He narrowed his eyes slightly.
One I'll definitely be coming back for.
With that, he turned his back to the forest and walked on, the secrets of the night still locked behind his lips.
****
Roland's premier Meat shop
Periun city, Kettlia Region
Ashtarium Nation
North American Continent
October 20th ,2019
Nico stood once more in the underground chamber beneath Jacien's store, the low hum of arcane wards vibrating faintly through the stone walls. Laid across the floor like discarded debris were the unconscious bodies of Wren and his gang, dropped unceremoniously from the black-veined feathers of Nico's soulnest.
Because they had been stored within that metaphysical space, time for them had been frozen, stalling not only their injuries but also their natural recovery. Under normal circumstances, it would have taken hours for them to awaken. But Nico didn't have that kind of time. He needed answers now.
With a murmur, he released a focused pulse of mana from his palm, channeling it into a reawakening spell. A glowing sigil flared briefly in the air, sinking into Wren's body.
The gang leader stirred.
Wren gasped as consciousness returned, jerking upright—only to freeze when his gaze landed on Nico. His eyes widened with immediate dread.
Terror clawed at his gut.
As a Thrall—someone forcibly bound to a higher vampiric entity—Wren's instincts were no longer fully his own. And those instincts now screamed in agony at the holy aura radiating from the man in front of him.
Nico's presence was impossible to ignore. His Nephilim essence shimmered subtly beneath his skin, and to a Thrall like Wren, it felt like a blinding sun piercing through a crypt. It wasn't just fear—it was primal subjugation. A Thrall's blood knew to cower in the face of a divine-born.
Nico didn't move. His feathers drifted lazily around him, silent blades of judgment waiting for a command.
"You're awake," he said, voice cool, unhurried. "Good. We have a lot to talk about… and you're going to tell me everything."
Wren tried to swallow his panic, but the words caught in his throat.
The interrogation had just begun.
Outside the discreet storefront of Roland Priemer's meat shop, two vampires from the Blitz Fang Coven crouched silently in the shadows of a neighboring rooftop. Their eyes were fixed on a surveillance monitor embedded within a runed Magitech case—an advanced piece of enchanted equipment capable of peering through most spatial obfuscations, including the defensive enchantments veiling the shop below.
They had been watching since Nico began his interrogation.
The taller of the two—a gaunt, pale man with sunken eyes and long, ink-black hair tied loosely behind his shoulders—stood from where he had been lying. His partner, a compact, sharp-eyed woman with rich brown skin and chestnut hair tightly wound into a bun, continued to manipulate the controls on the monitor's arcane interface.
The man disassembled a telescopic-looking device, its enchantments still glowing faintly. As he carefully packed it back into its case, he spoke in a hushed voice laced with urgency.
"We must report this back to the Whisperer immediately. The Nephilim is here."
But before she could respond, a voice cut through the quiet rooftop air like a blade.
"Do you now?"
The temperature dropped. The two vampires turned at once, their bodies tense, only to freeze when they saw the figure hovering beside them, suspended in the air as if gravity itself had yielded to her authority.
Yomen.
Clad in radiant silvery-blue armor that shimmered beneath the moonlight, her presence was immediate and overwhelming. Her helmet bore the snarling visage of a wolf, and in her right hand, she held a massive silver lance wreathed in flickers of arcing electricity. Her armor hummed with latent energy, and the ambient pressure of a Master Realm aura descended like a crushing weight.
Both vampires' mouths opened in a soundless gasp—not to snarl, not to challenge, but to flee. Their instincts screamed at them to run.
But there was no time.
The sky above them rippled—clouds twisting into a vortex of silver stormlight. From that swirling darkness, a bolt of lightning descended, not ordinary but divine: argent and absolute.
The silver bolt struck with divine precision, and the rooftop was engulfed in searing radiance. Their bodies were incinerated in a flash, reduced to nothing but drifting ash.
Yomen hovered in the silence that followed, her eyes narrowing behind the wolf-shaped visor.
Jacien emerged from the shadows, his figure coalescing like dusk given form. He walked through the air with his usual casual grace, each step firm despite the absence of ground beneath him. His eyes flicked toward the swirling ash in the air—remnants of the vampires Yomen had incinerated moments ago.
A sigh escaped his lips.
"You could've left them alive," he said, voice calm but tinged with exasperation. "Would've been useful to interrogate them. That Thrall down there probably doesn't know anything beyond what he was told."
Yomen hovered silently for a moment, her wolf-shaped helm still glowing faintly with arcs of silver lightning. Then she replied flatly, "Nico could just summon soul echoes if he wants to interrogate them."
Jacien gave her a sidelong glance. "You know he doesn't like relying on necromantic arts. He's been avoiding them more and more lately."
"Then why not just use his Ability Factor instead?" she asked, a curious edge to her voice.
Jacien folded his arms. "With Nico, there's no real line between his magic and his Ability Factor. They're kind of the same."
Yomen gave a slow nod, acknowledging the truth of that with a faint hum of agreement. "Fair enough."
They both turned their gazes toward the shop below, where Nico was already finishing up. Even without seeing, they could sense it—his precise energy signatures moving in quiet harmony beneath the ground.
When Jacien and Yomen descended back into the underground chamber, they found Nico standing amidst the now-unconscious gang members, his feathers slowly withdrawing into his back like dissolving shadows.
Wren was slumped against the wall, pale and trembling. The red haze of vampiric corruption had been completely purged from his aura. Nico's holy mana still lingered in the air, sanctifying the space with its quiet resonance.
"It's done," Nico said without turning to them, his tone cool. "The Thrall's link is severed. The essence has been cleansed."
Jacien raised a brow. "That fast?"
Nico's feathers flickered. "His bond was weak. A disposable piece. Whatever vampire sired him didn't care if he lasted the night."
Yomen stepped forward, silver eyes behind her helm glinting. "Then we'd better find the one who did."
Jacien cracked his knuckles absently. "And soon. This whole situation smells like rot buried beneath perfume."
Nico finally turned to face them, his expression unreadable. "It's not just rot—it's the Blitz Fang Coven. And Silas… Silas is starting to make his move."
"That bastard won't stay quiet for long," Jacien muttered, his voice dark. "We just took out two of his agents. He'll retaliate. Especially with the Crimson Moon rising at the end of the month."
"Silas is definitely planning something," Nico said, eyes narrowing. "What I don't understand is his lack of caution. With me stationed here, you'd think he'd stay vigilant. But instead, he's growing bolder."
"He's still playing with pawns," Jacien replied. "Using proxies to stay within the rules."
"Exactly. Utilizing the criminal underworld doesn't technically violate the Accord," Nico said grimly. "He's exploiting that loophole. And now that Jack's proven too dangerous for the mundane side to contain… I'm worried about what Silas might do next."
"Does Jack know about the Vampires?" Yomen asked, her gaze sharp behind her silvery helm.
"I haven't told him," Nico admitted. His thoughts drifted to the Codex fragment lodged within Jack—an ancient anomaly he still couldn't fully decipher. "But… he might already suspect something. That Codex is awakening things in him. Insights. Intuitions."
"Then we'll need to keep closer watch on him—and his friends," Yomen said, turning to Jacien. "If Silas truly intends to move against Jack, then targeting the people closest to him would be the easiest strategy."
"I'll assign members of the Pack to keep eyes on them," she continued. "As for Lucy Ryan—I'll personally take responsibility for her protection."
Jacien gave a small nod. "Fine by me."
The room fell into a moment of tense silence, each of them turning inward, already calculating the next steps in a game that had just escalated beyond the board.