Previous Chapter Recap:
The weapon test at the academy was meant to be a simple formality, but for Moksh, it became a trial of a different kind. Forced to sign a contract by Grandmaster Elias, Moksh was plunged into a mysterious, inner-world test of will. He confronted his deepest fears and past failures, not with brute force, but by using his unique power to absorb and transform them.
This profound test was orchestrated by Galith, the cursed sword, which had been dormant until this moment. Galith, an ancient and powerful "great cursed spirit," explained that it never forgets and that it had chosen Moksh as a worthy wielder.
Having passed Galith's true test, Moksh emerged with the sword now bound to him, a source of immense power and newfound purpose. The experience unlocked a crucial piece of a puzzle left by his former mentor, Professor Kazuto: a riddle pointing to a vanished village in Japan called Sugisawa-mura. With Galith at his side, Moksh now has a clear objective: to investigate the village and uncover the truth behind Professor Kazuto's disappearance and the secrets the Grandmaster holds.
After that:
As the last rays of twilight bled from the sky, casting a bruised purple hue over the academy's ancient test grounds, Moksh strode through the dew-soaked grass. The air, thick with the lingering scent of ozone and scorched earth, clung to his clothes. Galith, the obsidian blade, felt like a familiar and unsettling weight at his side. He had passed the test, but the true trial, he realized, had just begun.
A whisper, as cold and sharp as the night air, slithered directly into his mind. "Moksh," the voice purred, "why did you ask me what my name was?"
He froze, his breath fogging in the sudden chill. "Don't spirits forget their memories when a contract is broken?" he murmured, the question a ghost of what he'd learned in a sunlit classroom. "That's what the academy teaches."
Galith's laughter was a low, dark ripple, echoing not in the air but deep within Moksh's skull. "That's for the ordinary spirits," the blade's essence scoffed. "The fleeting ones. I am not one of them."
"We?" Moksh's brow furrowed, but the word was lost to the first spatter of rain that began to fall, tiny as tears.
"Idiot," Galith hissed. "If you'd paid attention to more than just the combat forms, you'd know. The main spirits—the true powers of this world, the raw fire, the crushing earth, the endless water, the wild lightning, the boundless air, the pure light, and us..." The blade pulsed with a hungry energy, and the very shadows around Moksh seemed to writhe and deepen. "The cursed spirits. We remember everything. Every oath, every betrayal, every drop of blood ever spilled. We are the source. The others—lava, ice, clouds—they are just shadows, fleeting copies. I am the true thing. I am a great cursed spirit."
Goosebumps prickled Moksh's arms. He swallowed hard, the sound loud in the deepening gloom. "Say more," he whispered, a strange mix of fear and desperate fascination coiling in his gut.
"And you," Galith continued, its voice a velvet shroud of menace, "when you tried to break my contract, you thought I'd just vanish? No. I simply placed a curse on myself—to lie dormant. The power never left you, Moksh. It was only sleeping."
Moksh stared into the vast, unforgiving darkness, the weight of Galith's words pressing down on him. The night seemed to close in, hiding secrets in every shifting shadow, whispering of forgotten power and ancient betrayals.
Suddenly, footsteps crunched on the gravel behind him, a jarring intrusion into the moment. "So you passed." Pragya's voice, though soft, was a beacon in the dark.
Moksh turned, hardening his weary pride into a sneer. "Yes. I'm sure you hoped I wouldn't."
In the charged silence that followed, Galith's sly, triumphant voice wormed into Moksh's thoughts. You wouldn't have passed if I hadn't lifted the curse.
Pragya's composure flickered, her eyes shimmering with something Moksh couldn't quite place—guilt, or perhaps a darker ambition. "No, no," she said, her voice dropping to a near-whisper. "I just came to congratulate you."
Moksh scoffed, the sound bitter. "Enough with the niceties."
She persisted, her smile a sweet but brittle mask. Her gaze darted past his shoulder as if afraid Galith itself might manifest from the shadows. "Okay. Are you free tomorrow?"
Moksh hesitated, his heart caught between the chill of midnight secrets and the warmth of a rare, genuine invitation. Above them, storm clouds gathered, silent and watchful, as if the night itself was holding its breath, waiting to see what the cursed spirit would do next.