The clouds twisted into unnatural spirals overhead, blotting out the stars. The moon—once bright and silver—bled red across the sky, casting the quiet forest in a hue of omen. Wind howled through the trees, but it carried no scent, no chill. Only whispers.
At the edge of the forest clearing where the school had been built stood the girl.
No longer the child he remembered.
She was taller now. Wiser. Her presence thicker, heavier—like the pressure of an ancient tomb freshly cracked open. Her robe billowed in the wind, woven from threads of screaming souls that writhed and clawed but could never tear free.
Behind her, the forest bowed.
And from its depths, they came.
Shadows.
Thousands of them.
Some tall and monstrous, others small and broken—each one bearing a fragment of a soul he had once consumed and abandoned.
Some wore his face.
Others… wore his family's.
Inside the courtyard of the school, the students stirred.
A low, instinctive dread washed over every soul present—like a memory not their own, whispering warnings from lifetimes ago.
His son stood at the edge of the training field, sword drawn. Though only twelve, his aura rippled with a confidence unnatural for his age—honed under the King of Silence and shaped by inherited instinct.
His daughter sat atop the rooftop, legs crossed, eyes closed.
But she was not asleep.
She was waiting.
"They're here," she whispered.
He stood atop the main gate, arms folded, cloak fluttering in the same cursed wind that bent trees into unnatural shapes.
He watched the girl approach, her army stretching endlessly into the shadows behind her.
"You're late," he said coldly.
She smiled. "You're not surprised."
"I saw this the moment I devoured my first soul," he replied. "I just hoped you wouldn't grow teeth."
"I grew more than teeth," she purred. "I grew purpose."
She raised a hand.
The shadows behind her shifted, contorted—faces emerging, mouths gaping, arms reaching. They screamed without sound.
He knew what they were.
They were the unprocessed. The lost. The broken memories and fractured identities he never took the time to resolve.
The consequences of unchecked consumption.
They had gathered behind her.
And now they wanted their master back.
Inside the school, panic spread like wildfire.
But not among the children.
Among the shadows.
The 3,000 souls he had forged into protectors trembled. Not from fear of battle. They had fought gods and beasts. But from recognition.
Some of the things approaching had once been them.
Old fragments. Castoffs. The corrupted remains of who they were before he claimed them.
Now, they had returned—incomplete, but hungry.
"Master," whispered one of the elder shadows, kneeling at his feet. "If we fight them… we may lose ourselves again."
He looked down, voice calm.
"You won't fight."
The shadow blinked. "But—"
He shook his head. "I will."
He descended from the gate in silence, boots landing on scorched earth that remembered war.
"Do you want the throne?" he asked her.
The girl tilted her head. "There is no throne anymore. You shattered it."
"Do you want the power?"
"I am the power," she said.
"Then what do you want?"
She paused.
Her voice softened, just enough to slice through bone.
"I want you to feel what we felt."
The ground exploded.
Not from magic.
From rage.
She launched herself forward, faster than lightning, her fist colliding with his chest. A normal being would've vaporized. He slid back an inch.
His turn.
He stepped once—and the world blurred.
They collided in the space between time. Fists, shadows, claws, and flame. Reality bent with every clash. Each blow tore open small tears in the veil between worlds.
Students watched from the windows in horror and awe.
It wasn't a duel.
It was a war.
Compressed into two bodies.
In the middle of it all, he reached for her throat and whispered:
"You are not real."
And she responded, eyes burning gold:
"Neither were you."
The fight raged for hours.
Mountains shattered. Rivers turned backward. The sky bled colors that had no names.
But eventually, silence returned.
The girl knelt on the battlefield, robe tattered, eyes dimming.
He stood above her, not victorious—just breathing heavier than usual, blood dripping from a cut that wouldn't close.
She looked up, a strange peace in her smile.
"You didn't kill me," she said.
"I never wanted to," he murmured. "I wanted to forgive myself."
She closed her eyes. "Then maybe… you've finally devoured enough."
And with that, her body dissolved into ash and light—no scream, no resistance.
Just acceptance.
The hunger had been faced.
And for now, at least…
It had been fed.
He turned back toward the school, where his children waited, watching.
The wind had died.
But in the back of his mind, something still echoed.
Not a voice.
Not a warning.
A promise.
There are worse things than hunger.
And they were coming.