Morning had already settled over the captured fortress by the time Nocthyrael began to wake. Pale light filtered through the narrow windows of the master chamber and reached the bed in a soft strip, while the distant sounds of movement elsewhere in the fortress remained muted behind the thick stone walls. Nocthyrael stirred against Noctis without immediately moving away, one arm resting across his chest and most of her body tucked comfortably against his side.
Her eyes opened slowly, and she raised her head just enough to look at him. Finding Noctis still beside her seemed to satisfy whatever thought had made her check, because she immediately lowered her head again and tightened both arms around him. She settled her cheek against his chest and closed her eyes as if waking had been a temporary inconvenience.
"Last night was too tiring."
Noctis looked down at her while she made herself more comfortable instead of showing any intention of leaving the bed. He had already been awake for some time, but there had been no urgency while Marcus and Adrian were handling the fortress and nothing outside required his immediate attention. Still, morning had been moving on without them for long enough. "You should get up."
"No, just five more minutes. It is too comfortable right now." Nocthyrael tightened her arms slightly after saying it, making clear that she had no intention of helping him accomplish that. Her breathing slowed again, although Noctis could tell she had not fallen back asleep.
He allowed the silence to continue for several seconds before drawing breath to speak again. Nocthyrael's eyes opened immediately, and before he could get another word out, she pushed herself upright and swung one leg over him until she sat astride his waist. Noctis had barely lifted his gaze toward her when she leaned down and kissed him, cutting off whatever he had been about to say.
Her hands settled against the sides of his face while the kiss lingered, and Noctis's arms moved around her without hesitation. Nocthyrael stayed close when she finally lifted her head, her hair falling forward around them while she looked directly into his eyes. "Stop talking and telling me to get up. Instead, persuade me in a different way to get up."
She kissed him again before he could answer, and this time Noctis wrapped both arms firmly around her and pulled her closer. The kiss deepened as Nocthyrael settled against him with considerably more energy than she had shown while complaining about being tired. Whatever she had meant by another five minutes lasted far longer than that.
By the time the two of them finally left the master chamber, several hours had passed. The captured 1-Star Fortress had been active long before either of them appeared, with fallen angels patrolling the walls and transformed clergymen maintaining the wards, checking the approaches, and helping the people evacuated from the destroyed 3-Star Fortress settle into the available quarters. The sudden relocation had created plenty of work, but Marcus and Adrian had already organized enough of it that the fortress continued functioning without Noctis needing to direct every detail himself.
Marcus had spent much of the morning receiving reports from the walls and assigning the fallen angels where they were needed, while Adrian had done the same with the transformed clergy. By the time Noctis entered the central courtyard, neither man looked as if he had been standing around waiting for him. The Academy students had considerably less to occupy them, though Shirayuki, Fuyumi, Lilithra, and Gorath had found a shaded section of the courtyard and seemed content to remain there until it was time to leave.
Rengar sat nearby on a low stretch of stone and watched the movement along the walls whenever something caught his attention. Bahamut had eventually decided that waiting while awake served no purpose and was sleeping across a broad section of the courtyard with his head resting between his forelegs. Nobody had bothered disturbing him while Noctis and Nocthyrael were still nowhere to be seen.
Several of the fallen angels noticed them as they approached. Sophia glanced between Noctis and Nocthyrael before a small smile appeared, and Eva understood almost as quickly when she saw how relaxed Nocthyrael looked. Elena and Hannah noticed soon afterward, while Claire remained quiet and folded her arms a little more tightly when the reason for the delay became obvious.
Nocthyrael saw the reactions and showed no embarrassment. She stayed beside Noctis with the same comfortable ease she had carried since leaving the chamber, and the lingering satisfaction in her expression only made the guesses easier. Noctis ignored the looks altogether and waited until Marcus, Adrian, Rengar, and the four Academy students had gathered close enough before explaining that they were returning to the Demon Academy because he needed to meet with the Vice Principal and the Demon God had also asked to see him.
That immediately changed the attention of the Academy students. Shirayuki and Fuyumi became more serious, while Lilithra stopped watching the women behind Noctis and turned fully toward him. Gorath remained quiet, but even he understood that a direct summons from the Demon God was not something that happened as part of an ordinary return to the Academy.
Noctis told Marcus to remain at the fortress and keep the fallen angels in control of the defenses until he returned. Marcus acknowledged the order with a firm, "Yes, Master," and Noctis gave Adrian essentially the same instruction for the transformed clergy, telling him to coordinate with Marcus if anything changed while he was gone. Adrian answered, "Understood, Master," without asking for anything further because both men had already been carrying out those responsibilities throughout the morning.
There was little else to explain. Marcus understood the patrol routes, the defensive positions, and the strength available to him, while Adrian knew the wards and the internal organization of the clergy. Noctis had given them authority because he expected them to use it, and leaving the fortress for a while did not suddenly make either group incapable of acting without him.
Claire remained with the other fallen angels and did not complain when it became clear she would not be joining the trip. Her disappointment showed briefly, but Noctis acknowledged her with a slight nod before moving on, making it clear that leaving her behind was simply part of keeping the fortress secure. Claire returned the gesture and stayed where she was.
When everything else had been settled, Noctis looked toward the sleeping dragon. Rengar followed his gaze and walked over to Bahamut, placing one hand against the heavy foreleg and shoving firmly enough to get his attention. "Come on. We're leaving."
Bahamut opened one eye and stared at his brother for several seconds before finally raising his head. Rengar waited without bothering to argue with the look, and Bahamut eventually pushed himself upright, stretched his forelegs, and opened his wings enough to loosen them after spending most of the morning asleep. By then the Academy students were already moving because none of them needed to be told how to ride him.
Shirayuki and Fuyumi climbed into familiar positions behind Bahamut's shoulders, while Lilithra and Gorath settled farther back where the ridges along his body offered comfortable support. Rengar followed and took his usual place without any ceremony. Noctis mounted near the base of Bahamut's neck, and Nocthyrael sat beside him before immediately wrapping both hands around his left arm and resting her head against his shoulder.
Noctis glanced toward her once and found her already comfortable. There was no reason to comment on it, so he simply settled into place while Bahamut prepared to leave. A short while later the dragon launched from the courtyard, carried them above the fortress walls, and turned toward the Demon Academy once he had gained enough height.
Noctis looked back briefly as the fortress receded behind them. Marcus and Adrian had already returned to their duties, and the people inside the stronghold continued moving through the morning without gathering to watch him leave. That suited him better than having everyone behave as though the fortress stopped functioning whenever he was absent.
The flight settled into a familiar routine once Bahamut reached a steady pace. Shirayuki and Fuyumi occasionally spoke while watching the terrain below, Lilithra rested comfortably farther back, and Gorath seemed perfectly content to remain silent for most of the journey. Rengar watched the landscape until there was nothing new about it, while Nocthyrael stayed beside Noctis with her head against his shoulder and her arms still looped around his left arm.
Noctis had known since the previous day that the Genesis Interface had changed, but there had been little reason to examine it while the aftermath of the battle demanded his attention. The evacuation had come first, followed by returning to the captured fortress and dealing with Nocthyrael after she had watched an entire region disappear around the 3-Star Fortress. The night and most of the morning had been occupied for different reasons, leaving the flight as the first uninterrupted stretch of time he had possessed since the reconstruction of his body.
He shifted his attention inward and opened the Genesis Interface. The new structure was considerably cleaner than the one he had used before, with the major functions now divided beneath three broad branches rather than spread through the growing collection of categories the old Blood Grid had accumulated over time.
[Genesis Interface]
[Blood Grid]
[Genesis Core]
[Blood Space]
Blood Space remained familiar enough that Noctis left it alone for the moment. Genesis Core interested him because of what had happened to his body, but the Blood Grid had been the foundation of his progression for most of this life, so he opened that first. The crimson lattice appeared across his vision with enough of its old organization intact that he had no difficulty recognizing Active Skills, Passive Skills, Doctrines, Bloodline, and the deeper sections connected to Blood Memory.
He moved through the Grid out of habit and went looking for the resource section. When he failed to find it where it had once been, he assumed the restructuring had simply placed it somewhere else, which would have been reasonable given how much of the interface had changed. A more careful search through the available categories proved otherwise.
The old essence ledger no longer existed. Blood Essence, Iron Essence, Faith Essence, Soul Essence, Beast Essence, Wraith Essence, Apex Essence, and every other resource balance tied to the previous version of the Blood Grid were gone. Noctis searched for a converted total or some new universal reserve that might have absorbed them, but nothing on the interface suggested that any of those balances had survived the restructuring.
That irritated him more than he expected. Some of the old resources had reached ridiculous amounts by the time the Grid stopped using them regularly, with Blood and Beast Essence climbing beyond a billion and Iron accumulating into the hundreds of millions. Others had remained far lower because they required particular enemies, materials, or circumstances, but those were often the reserves he had been most careful about spending.
He could remember long periods when he deliberately saved certain resources because he expected later evolutions to demand them. Plenty of enemies had provided small amounts that seemed insignificant at the time and only became useful after months of accumulation, while rare creatures or relics sometimes gave him a resource he might not see again for a very long time. None of that effort had carried into the new system.
"That's irritating."
Nocthyrael lifted her head when she heard him speak and looked at his face for a moment. Noctis was focused on something she could not see, and nothing around them suggested that the comment had anything to do with the flight or an approaching threat. She waited long enough to make sure he was not about to say more, then rested her head against his shoulder again without asking him to explain.
Noctis appreciated that and checked the Blood Grid one last time before accepting the result. There was no hidden ledger and no conversion waiting under another category. The old essences had simply been wiped clean.
He was not pleased about it, but there was little reason to remain angry once the practical reality became obvious. Those resources had only possessed value because the old Blood Grid accepted them, and keeping enormous numbers attached to currencies that no longer had a function would not have given him anything. The loss still irritated him because he had earned those reserves, but irritation was not enough reason to keep searching for something the interface had clearly discarded.
Noctis moved into the Skills branch and began checking the locked portions of the lattice. The first node he selected no longer carried an essence price or a collection of different requirements. Instead, the interface showed only the state of the skill itself and whether it had been selected for development.
[Locked]
[Proficiency: 0%]
[Development Target: Unselected]
When Noctis opened the development option, the interface gave him a single explanation stating that Genesis Points gained through qualifying actions would advance the selected skill's proficiency. There was no visible Genesis Point balance, no indication that points were stored somewhere else, and nothing resembling the old resource system where he could build a reserve and spend it wherever he wanted.
He checked several other locked nodes and found the same structure each time. Every skill had a proficiency percentage, and each could be chosen as the current development target. That made it clear that Genesis Points were not a replacement currency in the usual sense.
They represented progress.
Under the previous Blood Grid, Noctis could acquire resources from one activity and use them much later for something completely unrelated. Blood Essence gained from enemies months earlier might eventually pay for a skill evolution that had not even existed when those enemies were killed. Rare currencies could sit unused indefinitely until the Grid finally offered something worth spending them on.
The new system removed that separation. A locked skill needed to be selected, and whatever Genesis Points the Genesis Interface later awarded would contribute directly toward the proficiency of that target. The raw point total was apparently unimportant enough that the interface did not even bother showing it, leaving the proficiency percentage as the only number Noctis actually needed to track.
The wording about qualifying actions interested him more than the percentage itself. The interface did not claim that every kill, feeding, battle, or repeated use of a skill would provide Genesis Points, which meant progress could not simply be reduced to how many weak enemies he could destroy in a given amount of time. Whatever standard the Genesis Interface used, it expected something more meaningful than repetition for its own sake.
Noctis could work with that. If every action generated progress automatically, he could choose a locked ability and spend days repeating something trivial until the percentage reached one hundred, which would make the new system little more than another kind of farming. Limiting Genesis Points to actions the interface actually recognized as worthwhile prevented that problem without forcing him to manage another set of currencies.
He still did not know exactly what qualified. A difficult battle might, while an ordinary kill might not. Discovering something relevant to the selected skill could matter, and using a related ability under genuine pressure might count where casual repetition did not, but Noctis had no reason to invent rules the interface had not yet demonstrated.
The first time he actually received a Genesis Point notification would tell him more.
He checked several locked skills but did not select a target. His current abilities already covered enough areas that there was no need to choose something blindly simply to test the new system. Movement, blood manipulation, close combat, ranged attacks, weapon creation, regeneration, defense, control, and the rest of his existing arsenal gave him enough options to wait until he had properly reviewed the Grid before deciding what he wanted to develop next.
Before leaving the Blood Grid, Noctis checked Blood Memory. Gallery, Monster Info, Previous Information, and Journals were all still present, and the records he opened remained intact. That mattered considerably more than the loss of the resource ledger because rebuilding a currency balance was one thing, while reconstructing years of accumulated knowledge and memories would have been another problem entirely.
He spent enough time moving through the entries to satisfy himself that the restructuring had not damaged anything important. The information he had acquired through enemies, creatures, observations, and earlier events remained available. Once that was clear, he returned to the top level of the Genesis Interface and opened Genesis Core.
[Genesis Core]
[Cultivation Status]
[Cultivation]
[Secondary Jobs]
Cultivation Status seemed like the obvious place to begin, especially when Noctis had not deliberately practiced any cultivation method since the transformation of his body. He expected little to be waiting there because the meridian network had only formed the previous day and there had been no time to begin cultivating properly.
Instead, the section opened into three already populated categories.
[Qi Cultivation Method(s)]
[Body Cultivation Method(s)]
[Soul Cultivation Method(s)]
Noctis opened the Qi list first and immediately found far more entries than expected. He selected the first one, recognized it after reading only a small portion of the information, and opened another. That one was familiar too, followed by a third and then several more.
The connection became obvious quickly.
These were cultivation methods he had read in the Demon Academy treasure vault.
Noctis remembered the time spent there clearly. The vault contained far more than weapons, relics, ingredients, and materials intended for immediate use, and he had taken advantage of the opportunity to read manuals and records whenever something interested him. Blood Memory made retaining that information easy, while the memories carried from Haotian allowed him to understand cultivation texts that would have taken an inexperienced reader far longer to decipher.
The limitation had never been comprehension. Noctis understood how the methods were supposed to work and could compare their principles against Haotian's experience, but the body he possessed at the time simply did not contain the structures those techniques assumed. Their circulation routes referred to meridians that did not exist inside him, and their acupoints and smaller channels belonged to a cultivation anatomy his vampiric body had never developed.
Body cultivation methods suffered from the same problem because many relied on energy circulating through specific channels before being directed into flesh, bone, organs, or other physical structures. Soul cultivation methods were often even more dependent on the relationship between spiritual circulation and the meridian network. Noctis could understand all of it, but understanding a method and possessing a body capable of practicing it were two different things.
He had read the manuals anyway.
Now the Genesis Interface had recognized them.
Noctis moved into Body Cultivation Methods and found another substantial list containing techniques he remembered from the treasure vault. Soul Cultivation Methods produced the same result. Nothing suggested the Genesis Interface had invented new knowledge or inserted techniques he had never encountered, which meant the system was cataloguing information that already existed inside Blood Memory rather than giving him something for free.
That distinction mattered to him. If the methods appeared because he had already studied them, then the new cultivation framework was making use of his past choices rather than bypassing them. The time spent reading techniques he could not yet use had simply become more valuable after the structure of his body changed.
Noctis shifted part of his awareness away from the interface and examined the meridian network itself. One hundred and eight major meridian points now existed throughout his body, all of them open, with smaller channels branching between them and connecting the larger points into a continuous internal network. The structure had remained stable since the reconstruction, and focusing on it deliberately made the difference between his old body and the new one impossible to ignore.
Haotian's memories gave Noctis more than enough context to understand what he was sensing. He had no need for the Genesis Interface or the Demon Academy to teach him what meridians were, how circulation functioned, or why an open network mattered. What interested him was the way this particular network had become part of the Genesis Vessel.
It did not feel grafted into him.
Noctis had undergone enough physical transformations to recognize the difference between something newly added and something that truly belonged. Bloodlines, altered organs, inherited traits, and other changes could integrate extremely quickly under Genesis, but there was normally still some sense that the body had accepted something it did not previously possess. The meridians felt different.
They were as natural as anything else inside him.
Noctis followed several of the major routes with his awareness and encountered no resistance where the channels connected. There were no sealed points waiting to be opened and no incomplete pathways that required repair before they could carry energy properly. The reconstructed god-body had formed around the meridian system rather than receiving it as an addition afterward.
That explained why Cultivation Status could suddenly recognize so many manuals.
The techniques had not changed.
His body had.
Noctis returned to one of the Qi cultivation methods and opened its information more carefully. The Genesis Interface arranged the details more cleanly than the original manual, allowing him to review the circulation route, the purpose of the method, and the principles behind it without working through the entire text again.
Another category sat beneath the main information.
[Additional Effects]
Noctis opened it and found that the method provided more than a way to gather and circulate energy. Its particular structure produced additional benefits tied to the way it handled cultivation, and when he opened a second Qi method, the effects were different.
He compared several.
A method built around smoother circulation naturally favored control and stability, while another that compressed energy more aggressively produced different advantages. A third organized its circulation around another principle and carried its own benefits as a result.
The differences were not decorative.
Each method actually mattered.
Noctis moved into Body Cultivation Methods and found the same pattern. Methods centered on reinforcement produced effects related to physical strengthening, while others emphasized recovery or the relationship between cultivated energy and the body. The Soul Cultivation Methods also carried their own effects, with the benefits changing according to the kind of spiritual development each method pursued.
The interface did not indicate that Noctis already possessed those effects merely because he knew the techniques. That made sense. Cultivation Status was recording methods available to him, not pretending that reading a manual was equivalent to practicing it.
Noctis began comparing the methods more critically after that.
Haotian's memories made many weaknesses easy to see. Some techniques used circulation routes longer than necessary, losing efficiency each time a cycle passed through the network. Others forced energy through the body more aggressively than required because their creators compensated for poor control with raw pressure.
Not every limitation represented bad design. Several methods were simply specialized and depended on particular constitutions, affinities, or physical traits. They could be excellent for the right cultivator and nearly useless for someone else.
Noctis's body could probably endure methods that would injure ordinary cultivators, but that was not enough to make them worthwhile. Being strong enough to survive an inefficient method did not make the method efficient. If he eventually chose to cultivate one of the techniques stored here, he intended to do so because its principles were useful rather than because his body could brute-force the consequences.
He opened another method and noticed several areas that Haotian would have corrected almost immediately. Noctis recognized the same problems, but he closed the entry instead of beginning to rewrite it. There was no reason to spend the journey rebuilding the Demon Academy's cultivation library before he had even chosen what he wanted to practice.
The interaction between multiple methods was another question the Genesis Interface did not answer. Noctis could see numerous Qi, Body, and Soul techniques, but nothing indicated whether Genesis Core allowed several methods to be cultivated simultaneously, how compatible techniques affected one another, or what happened if two methods used contradictory circulation principles. The system might preserve them separately, integrate compatible benefits, or impose restrictions he had not yet encountered.
Noctis left those questions unanswered.
There was no benefit in pretending he knew how Genesis Core worked before testing it.
He returned to Cultivation Status and looked over the three populated categories again. He had expected the new framework to give him the ability to cultivate, but he had not expected the knowledge collected earlier in the Demon Academy to become immediately relevant. The discovery meant he could begin from a much broader foundation whenever he finally decided which methods deserved his attention.
Noctis opened the Cultivation branch next. Its contents were considerably smaller, showing only the framework for Active Skills and Passive Skills rather than filling itself with every technique he knew. He understood the distinction immediately because Cultivation Status represented methods available through knowledge, while the Cultivation branch would have to represent what he actually developed through practice.
Secondary Jobs followed the same principle.
Haotian's memories included experience with formations, alchemy, crafting, medicine, beasts, inscriptions, and a wide range of other cultivation-related professions. Blood Memory added knowledge gathered throughout Noctis's current life. Genesis Core did not automatically list every one of those disciplines as a profession he had personally developed, which prevented inherited knowledge from being mistaken for work this body had actually performed.
Noctis approved of that separation.
If a Secondary Job appeared later, he wanted it to represent something he had actually learned, practiced, or established under the current cultivation framework. There was no need to fill the menu simply because the knowledge existed somewhere inside him.
After spending more time comparing the different sections, Noctis returned to the highest level of the Genesis Interface. The separation between Blood Grid and Genesis Core was much clearer now than it had been immediately after his reconstruction.
The Blood Grid remained responsible for the abilities, doctrines, bloodline functions, and evolution that had followed him throughout this life. Its old essence economy was gone, and locked skills now advanced through Genesis Points and proficiency instead of resource purchases. Genesis Core handled cultivation itself, including the methods he knew, the development that would come from actually practicing them, and the secondary professions connected to that path.
Blood Space remained separate from both.
That arrangement gave him two distinct ways to progress without forcing everything through the same resource pool. Genesis Points were not something he accumulated for cultivation, and cultivation did not need to compete with Blood Grid skills for another universal currency. The two systems could develop according to their own rules.
Noctis still disliked losing the old essences.
Understanding why the new structure no longer needed them did not make the years spent accumulating those balances disappear.
Nocthyrael shifted against him after some time and lifted her head. She looked at his face for a moment before asking, "Good changes?"
Noctis considered the wiped essences, then the new proficiency system, the cultivation methods already catalogued under Genesis Core, and the one hundred and eight open meridian points that made those methods usable.
"Mostly."
Nocthyrael studied him for another second and seemed satisfied with that answer. She tightened her arms around his left arm, rested her head against his shoulder again, and left whatever he had been examining to him.
Noctis closed the Genesis Interface and returned his attention fully to the journey.
Bahamut had covered a considerable distance while he was occupied. The rougher wilderness around the fortress had gradually given way to broader roads, scattered settlements, and familiar regions Noctis remembered from previous journeys between the Academy and its surrounding territories. Nothing happened during the remaining flight that required him to reopen the interface or interrupt the others.
When the Demon Academy eventually came into view, Bahamut adjusted his course without being told. He already knew where he could land without causing problems, and the students below were familiar enough with the dragon that his approach attracted attention rather than panic.
He settled into one of the larger open grounds and allowed everyone to dismount. Noctis and Nocthyrael came down near the front, while Rengar, Shirayuki, Fuyumi, Lilithra, and Gorath followed from farther back.
Bahamut had barely folded his wings before he began lowering himself toward the ground.
Rengar looked at him and said, "You just woke up."
Bahamut turned his head toward his brother and stared at him.
Rengar waited for a moment, saw that Bahamut had no intention of reconsidering, and let the matter go.
Bahamut's body began compressing as crimson light gathered around him. His wings, limbs, tail, horns, scales, and the rest of his physical form folded inward until the enormous dragon became a dense orb of circulating light, which moved toward Noctis and entered through the center of his forehead.
The small runic mark there brightened once before settling beneath the skin again.
Rengar watched the faint trace disappear. "He did that on purpose."
"Probably."
That was enough discussion about Bahamut.
Noctis started toward the Academy, and the others followed.
The students around the arrival ground paid more attention to him than they had during earlier returns. Bahamut was already familiar to many of them, but Noctis had changed since the last time most of the Academy saw him.
His appearance remained recognizable. His silver-white hair was still tied high behind him, his crimson eyes had not changed, and his face remained the same pale and youthful one students had seen before. The Genesis Regalia was new, but the armor alone did not explain why people who had encountered Noctis previously kept watching after he passed.
Noctis was not releasing his aura or deliberately applying pressure. The difference was quieter than that. His presence had settled after the reconstruction, and people capable of sensing power could tell that something about him was more complete even if they lacked the context to identify the reason.
He did not stop to study every reaction.
Several students moved aside when necessary, conversations lowered as the group passed, and a few instructors watched longer than they normally would have. Noctis continued through the Academy with Nocthyrael beside him and Rengar on the other side, while the four Academy students followed behind.
Shirayuki eventually commented that everyone kept looking at him. Noctis glanced toward one of the nearby training areas and replied, "They did that before," which earned a quiet correction that they had not done it like this. He saw no reason to worry about it and told her they would get used to it, while Lilithra added from farther back that the rumors could simply get worse instead.
"That too," Noctis said, and the conversation ended there.
The Academy itself required little attention from him. He had walked these routes often enough that training courts, residential sections, and administrative buildings no longer felt unfamiliar. Returning after the previous day's battle was different only because the place occupied a different position in his life now than it had when he first entered as an Academy student.
A senior attendant met them before they reached the Vice Principal's office. He had clearly been told to expect Noctis because he did not ask why the group had returned, instead telling him that the Vice Principal had been waiting and leading them through the quieter administrative corridors.
When they reached the office, Shirayuki and the others remained outside because there was no reason for them to sit through Noctis's report. Nocthyrael and Rengar entered with him, and the Vice Principal gestured toward the chairs across from his table once they were inside.
The table was covered with reports from several sources, along with maps of the region surrounding the destroyed fortress. The Vice Principal told Noctis that six different accounts had reached him since the previous day and that they mostly agreed until Malgoryth appeared. After the evacuation, everyone had been too far away to see the rest clearly, so he wanted Noctis to fill in only the part the witnesses had missed.
Noctis had no problem with that as long as the report remained limited to information the Academy actually needed. He had no intention of explaining Sovereign Apex, the internal mechanics of Genesis, the absorbed god-cores, or every technique he had used during the fight. Most of that had nothing to do with the Academy's security.
"Malgoryth helped against Aurelion at first," Noctis explained. "During the fight, the Royal Demon King contacted him and told him who I was. After that, he turned on me and tried to attack from behind while Aurelion was still fighting."
The Vice Principal did not appear shocked by the betrayal itself. He knew Malgoryth well enough by reputation to say that it sounded much closer to what he expected from the Royal Demon God. Noctis saw no reason to spend more time discussing Malgoryth's motives and simply told him that he had killed Malgoryth first, then killed Aurelion afterward.
That part made the Vice Principal sit back and reconsider several of the reports in front of him. He had suspected at least one of the gods died because of what had been felt from the region, but both deaths had not been confirmed by anyone close enough to witness them. Noctis's statement settled that question without requiring another round of clarification.
The evacuation was easier to explain because the surviving occupants already knew what happened. Noctis had moved everyone out before the final stages of the battle because he knew the fortress and surrounding area would not survive what was coming. The Vice Principal accepted that decision without criticism, especially when the reports showed how much land disappeared afterward.
When he asked what actually destroyed the 3-Star Fortress, Noctis answered plainly that it had been his attack. The Vice Principal looked at him for a moment, then at the maps and witness reports spread across the table, before admitting that the answer explained why several descriptions sounded exaggerated enough that he had initially doubted them.
"They probably aren't," Noctis told him.
The Vice Principal glanced toward Nocthyrael, perhaps hoping she might offer a more restrained version of events, but she remained calm beside Noctis and gave no indication that anything he said was exaggerated. That seemed to settle the issue.
The only part of the reports Noctis refused to explain was the enormous crimson pillar that appeared after the battle. He confirmed that it had happened afterward rather than being another attack, but left it there. The Vice Principal understood the boundary and told him that as long as whatever caused it was not a threat to the Academy, he did not need every detail.
"It isn't," Noctis said, and the Vice Principal accepted the answer.
Once the report was finished, the conversation shifted to a less urgent problem. Noctis was still formally registered as a Demon Academy student, which had been simple enough when he was merely abnormally strong for one. Killing two gods made the classification considerably harder for the Academy to treat as ordinary.
Noctis did not see why that required an immediate change and reminded the Vice Principal that he was still enrolled. The older demon gave him a tired look and explained that enrollment was not the part causing trouble, although he eventually decided there was no point trying to solve the issue before the Demon God had spoken with him.
They agreed to leave Noctis's official status alone for the moment. The Vice Principal also admitted that several instructors would rather not be assigned to test or spar with him anymore, which Noctis solved by saying, "Then they shouldn't."
The Vice Principal almost smiled. "I was considering the same solution."
There was little reason to keep Noctis after that. The Vice Principal told him that the Demon God had already asked to see him once the Academy finished collecting its own account of the battle, and that whatever happened around the 3-Star Fortress was connected to matters beyond the loss of one stronghold.
Noctis had assumed as much.
He left the office with Nocthyrael and Rengar, found the Academy students still waiting outside, and followed the attendant farther into the inner parts of the Academy. None of the students pressed for details, and the walk remained quiet as the ordinary training and administrative areas gave way to sections protected by heavier wards and used by far fewer people.
Eventually the attendant stopped and explained that the Demon God wanted to speak with Noctis alone. Nocthyrael accepted that without argument and told him she would wait outside, while Rengar remained with her and the Academy students farther back.
Noctis entered by himself.
The Demon God was waiting near a broad table covered with maps, books, and several objects Noctis did not recognize. The room was practical rather than ceremonial, with no throne or formal audience arrangement, and the Demon God simply gestured toward the chair across from him once Noctis approached.
"I wanted to see you after what happened yesterday," he said after Noctis sat. His attention stayed on Noctis for a while, though it was focused less on the Genesis Regalia than on the body underneath it. "You're more stable than before. Whatever happened after the fight finished something."
"The god-body changed," Noctis said.
"I can see that much. I'm not asking how." The Demon God mentioned the crimson pillar that appeared afterward and said it had been difficult to miss, but Noctis told him it was not intentional. That seemed believable enough because the Demon God already knew Noctis generally avoided attracting attention without a reason.
He did not ask Noctis to repeat the battle report. The Vice Principal had already passed along what mattered, including Malgoryth's betrayal and the deaths of both gods. Instead, the Demon God explained that he had known who Aurelion and Malgoryth were long before Noctis became involved in the conflict and had dealt with the larger powers behind both sides for years.
That was the part Noctis wanted to hear.
"The bodies you fought were real," the Demon God explained, "but they were not the original bodies of either god. They were divine avatars."
Noctis understood the concept easily enough, but the cores he absorbed made the distinction worth clarifying. When he asked whether the avatars possessed real god-cores, the Demon God confirmed that they did and explained that avatars at that level were not hollow shells or puppets remotely controlled through every action. They possessed genuine divine flesh, independent god-cores, their own consciousness, and enough autonomy to live and operate on this planet for years.
That matched everything Noctis experienced in the battle. Aurelion and Malgoryth had made their own decisions, adapted their tactics, reacted emotionally, and fought as living beings rather than extensions waiting for commands from somewhere else. Calling them avatars did not make either fight less real.
It did mean the original bodies were still alive.
Noctis cared more about what happened to the avatars' memories than the simple fact that originals existed. The Demon God confirmed that those memories eventually returned to the true body, although the timing depended on distance, sect barriers, the condition of the original, and other factors.
That immediately changed the value of everything Aurelion and Malgoryth had witnessed.
Their true bodies would eventually know what happened in the fight. They would know Noctis's appearance, Genesis Step, the Bloodfang Reapers, the weapons he used openly, his control over blood, and the attacks that had failed to affect him the way the avatars expected.
They would not know everything.
Neither avatar had seen the entire Blood Grid or understood how Genesis worked. Seeing Genesis Step did not reveal its full mechanics, and witnessing one use of an ability did not automatically explain every limitation or variation attached to it. Even so, the originals would know enough to prepare more seriously if Noctis encountered them in the future.
"That gives them information," Noctis said.
"Yes. More than I would prefer, but only what the avatars actually experienced." The Demon God reached for a folded map near the edge of the table while explaining that the memory issue was only part of why he called Noctis back to the Academy. Killing those avatars had consequences outside the local conflict because neither god originated from this planet.
When he opened the map, Noctis needed a moment to identify the world they were on because it occupied only one part of a much larger network. Routes extended beyond the planet toward other territories and worlds, with boundaries and regions that had never appeared on the maps ordinary Academy students used.
Noctis had already suspected something like this. The Church possessed too much structure, too many relics, too many powerful figures, and too many resources to be completely isolated, while the demonic side showed the same pattern through the Royal Demon authority, the fortress network, the Academy, and the presence of multiple gods.
"The Academy isn't independent," Noctis said after studying the map for a while.
"Not in the way most people here understand it," the Demon God replied. The Royal Demon Kingdom existed under the same broader structure, while the Church Noctis had encountered represented only the local organization of another much larger power.
The Demon God explained that the conflict on this world belonged to a much older struggle between two outer sects. The demonic side ultimately operated beneath the Nine Hells Sect, while the Church and the holy powers supporting it belonged to the Celestial Dawn Sect. The Academy, Royal Demon authority, fortresses, Church organizations, and holy territories on the planet were local branches, proxies, or associated powers rather than the highest authorities on either side.
Neither name meant anything to Noctis yet, but the structure made sense of several things that had previously seemed disconnected.
The use of divine avatars was part of that structure. Sending an avatar allowed a god to maintain a genuine presence on the planet without moving the original body into contested territory, which carried far greater costs, risks, and political consequences. Both sects could therefore maintain god-level influence without turning every dispute over a fortress or regional resource into a direct confrontation between true gods.
Noctis studied the routes around the planet while listening. He understood why avatars were useful, and he now understood why killing one did not simply remove the god behind it from existence. What remained less obvious was why two powers operating on such a scale cared enough about this particular world to maintain multiple gods here in the first place.
"What makes this planet worth that much effort?"
The Demon God shifted the map closer so Noctis could see several marked regions that did not correspond to the kingdoms, churches, fortresses, or territories he already knew. He explained that those visible powers represented only the surface of the conflict, while the real value of the planet depended on what existed beneath those territories, the resources found here, and the routes and locations connected to the world.
Noctis kept his attention on the map while the Demon God continued, allowing the explanation to move naturally from the factions themselves into why both of them had been competing over the planet long before Noctis arrived.