The hall was already alive with clatter and voices when he arrived. Students looked up as he entered—late, distinct, impossible to ignore. His black hair and eyes marked him, his dark-red uniform drew whispers, and when he asked the servant for additional plates of meat despite the generous portions already before him, the attention doubled.
Damien ignored it all. He sat at a corner table, ate quickly but with deliberate grace, savoring the relief of food filling the void his training had carved.
His gaze wandered once—toward the dais where professors dined. There, Professor Veyra stood rigid, her golden eyes blazing as she hissed words at Dreadmore. Whatever she said left the man silent, his expression stiff as stone. The others at the table shifted uncomfortably, some sneaking glances toward Damien, as though he were somehow at the heart of the matter.
Eventually, Veyra turned sharply and stormed out of the hall, her presence leaving a crack in the hall's composure. Dreadmore followed, his usual menace dampened into something almost… human.
Damien turned away, unease flickering. Was that about me? It better not be.
He ate quickly, finished his second helping, and slipped out without another word.
Back in Room 999, Damien changed into casual clothes before finally whispering, "System. Show me the interface."
The glowing script unfolded before his eyes:
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
[PATH SYSTEM]
Host: Damien
Current Stage: Rank 1 (10%)
Primary Path: Strength — Body Evolution
Secondary Path: Soul (Rank 0)
Core Attributes:
Might: 10 + 3 — Physical strength and destructive capability.
Endurance: 9 + 4 — Resistance to injury, fatigue, and pain.
Speed: 8 + 3 — Movement speed, agility, and reaction time.
Vitality: 10 + 4 — Life force and recovery rate.
Aura Control: 2%
Body Control: 47%
Spells: —
Passive:Mind Castle (0%)
Active: —
Body Arts: —
Weapon Arts: —
Restrictions:
– The System will not provide spells, Body Arts, or Weapon Arts.
– Nightmares will intensify the stronger the host becomes. (Advance in the Path to avoid further complications.)
– Host will not gain talents he does not already possess, nor receive help related to them.
System Directive:"Follow the guidance of the system to reach 100% progress in Rank 1. (No need to focus on learning or understanding cultivation techniques.)"
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Damien's lips curved faintly. Rank progress from 3% to 10% in just two days. His strength was climbing and control was rising.
It wasn't much, but it was a start.
And for Damien, that was enough.
His eyes swept the stat lines again. The increases in Might, Endurance, even Vitality—clear proof that his grind had results. But his gaze snagged on the spell section.
Finally.
Mind Castle.
And this time, the system could guide him.
Without wasting another breath, Damien willed it to begin.
****
The world shifted.
Inside his consciousness, he saw it: a faint orb—his soul. Around it, an illusionary castle slowly took shape, walls rising and towers reaching upward, intricate and labyrinthine. Its stones shimmered faintly, half-real, half-smoke.
A fortress of the mind. A safeguard for his soul, mind and memories.
But his triumph turned to horror as his eyes fell back to the core.
His soul.
It was covered in cracks. Thin, countless fissures spread across its surface like glass ready to shatter.
Damien froze. His chest feeling hollowed.
…It's damaged.
He reeled, cold dread sweeping through him. The reason his soul rank was so low—the reason Albert dismissed it was probably because the soul itself was broken.
His pulse hammered.
"System—" he rasped. Then, with a snap, he unmuted Albert. "What the hell is this? Did you do this? Did the system damage my soul?!"
Albert's laughter never came. His voice was low, solemn.
"No. This… I just noticed it myself, Damien. After merging, I was too busy recovering my energy. I didn't pay attention to your soul's state. But now… now I see it. It seems.... I underestimated you."
Damien's teeth clenched. "Underestimated?"
Albert sighed. "I thought you had no talent in soul cultivation. But this explains everything. Your soul was damaged, probably not long after you were born. That's why the soul rank is low, how can the soul increase in rank when it was in the midst of healing. It makes sense now, maybe this is why the academy will invited you here, maybe it saw your immense talent and also saw your soul healing itself"
Damien swallowed, his feeling throat tight. His mind spun with memories—Albert telling him he had no talent, dismissing his potential. Even at that time when he was doubting his intelligence, Damien already felt Albert was underestimating him.
He stared at the cracked orb, fury and despair warring inside him. If the soul itself is broken… then how the hell am I supposed to climb higher?
Finally, he forced the words out. "How do I fix it? And how long will it take?"
Albert's tone softened. "Your soul is already healing itself. Look closely. The cracks are healing—thin, but mending. Practicing Mind Castle will accelerate it. Slowly, yes, but surely. And when it's whole again…"
He paused.
"You may rise faster in the Path of Soul than even I thought was possible for you."
Damien sat silent, absorbing all of this. His chest tightened. Rage. Relief. Vindication. All tangled up together. He had always known Albert underestimated him. These cracks in the soul… the damage… who had done this? And why?
Before the thought could spiral deeper, Albert broke into laughter—sudden, wild, gleeful.
"Oh, but before we go too far—Damien, I still can't get the image out of my head. You, in the training room today… running naked, looking like some tragic gladiator with—"
"System, Mute him again." Damien's voice snapped like a whip.
Silence.
****
Damien started to focus on the spell again. He forced his mind back to the system's guidance, shutting out the gnawing fatigue tugging at his body. The instructions were deceptively simple, almost elegant in their phrasing, yet each word carried the weight of punishment. Focus on the mental structures. Layer the walls. Align memory, anchor thought. They sounded like neat instructions on a parchment, but in practice, they demanded more from him than flesh or spirit had ever been asked to give.
Minutes passed in silence, broken only by the uneven rhythm of his breathing. At first, it was a dull pressure behind his eyes, as though someone pressed the edge of a stone into his skull. But the pressure sharpened quickly, spreading like fire along invisible cracks in his mind. He felt the strain of building, tearing, and rebuilding all at once. His jaw tightened until his teeth groaned against one another. Still, he endured.
By the tenth minute, endurance became torment. His body betrayed him, writhing against the floorboards as though to crawl away from the agony rooting itself in his soul. Tears forced themselves from his eyes, unbidden and unwanted, searing trails against his cheeks. His hands clawed at his scalp as if he might dig the pain out by force. It was not the burn of muscle or bone—it was deeper, primal, the sensation of knives carving at the very fibers of his existence.
"System—!" The word tore out of him like a gasp, jagged and desperate. "Why—why does it hurt this much?!"
The reply came without sympathy, only with truth—cold and absolute.
[Because the host's soul is damaged. For any cultivator, the forging of a Mind Castle strains thought and spirit. But for you… each step rakes across broken edges. Every motion will cause host alot of pain.]
The words hung like a death sentence. Damien's chest heaved as he rolled onto his side, drenched in sweat, lips trembling with the effort to stay silent. Slowly—agonizingly—the storm of pain ebbed, like molten lead cooling sluggishly through his veins. But the damage lingered, a shadow carved into every nerve.
When at last he opened his eyes, his vision swam, blurred through a haze of tears he hadn't realized were still clinging to his lashes. He blinked them away. And then—
He froze.
There, standing quietly in the dim corner of his chamber, was Professor Veyra. Her golden eyes, normally steady and distant, now glimmered wide with alarm. The pale cast of her face betrayed emotions her voice rarely did—concern, unease, something perilously close to fear.
Damien's pulse thundered in his ears, so loud it almost drowned out the silence between them. He forced himself upright, each movement stiff, unwilling to let her see weakness. His hands trembled as he wiped the wetness from his cheeks in one rough, dismissive motion. His mind screamed for composure, for control, for walls stronger than any Mind Castle he could yet forge.
She parted her lips, hesitant, as though caught between her duty as a teacher and her instinct as a human being. The question hovered there, fragile, unspoken—Are you all right?
But Damien did not let her speak. His voice lashed out before hers could form, sharp with bitterness, cutting with the weight of pride wounded by exposure.
"So tell me, Professor…" His gaze locked onto hers, cold and accusing, though the raw edge of pain still lingered behind it. "…is it common practice in this academy for teachers to sneak into their students' rooms at night?"