Chapter 145: It’s Starting
Somewhere else in the forest, a group of six students moved between the trees.
They were talking amongst themselves, relaxed enough that the conversation had drifted away from hunting and into the easier territory of complaints about academy workload and what they were planning to eat when they got back. Nobody was on high alert. There hadn’t been any reason to be.
But something felt slightly off.
None of them could name it. It wasn’t a sound or a sight or anything concrete enough to point at. Just a vague, nagging wrongness sitting beneath the surface of an otherwise ordinary afternoon walk through the forest.
They ignored it.
Then one of them noticed the road.
It appeared between the trees ahead. It was a clear, open path cutting naturally through the forest, the ground flat and easy underfoot compared to the dense undergrowth they had been pushing through for the past hour. No thick roots to step over. No branches cutting across at face level. Just a clean route forward.
"Finally some easier ground," one of them said.
The group turned onto it without hesitation and kept walking, their conversation picking up again as the going became smoother.
None of them felt the shift.
None of them noticed that the trees around them were subtly wrong. That what their eyes were showing them did not quite match the rustling their ears were picking up, or the way the air moved against their skin. The illusion was not strong enough to be dramatic.
It didn’t need to be. It only needed to be convincing enough that six tired students wouldn’t stop to question a conveniently clear path.
And it was exactly that convincing.
Fifty meters behind them, standing motionless between two wide trunks, a hooded figure held both hands slightly raised. Between his palms, a magic circle rotated in slow silence. A pale and dim, barely visible even up close. His vertical eyes were fixed on the group ahead, tracking their movement with patient precision.
The path he was showing them was real enough in feel and texture.
What it led to was another matter entirely.
He watched them move further along the road and allowed himself a slow breath.
Everything was going smoothly.
---
On Damien’s side of the forest, the mood had been light.
The group was making good progress, their kill count building steadily, and the conversation between hunts had kept the atmosphere easy and relaxed.
Leonard was in the middle of a loud retelling of something that had apparently happened during a previous training session that he felt had not been given its proper recognition, while Zack listened with the quiet patience of someone who had long since learned to let Leonard talk himself out.
Lyria walked near the middle of the group, half listening, her pink eyes drifting occasionally to the trees on either side out of habit.
"Well I am wondering what Noah and Kaelan might be doing, where they might be right now. Both of them got different teammates while we were lucky."
"He got good teammates. Both Ken and Marina are amazing."
"That’s true. I didn’t know about this before but ken is also pretty strong. he act like lowkey but got hidden talent i guess. " It was Arisha who spoke this.
"same goes for Marina. She’s really good at scouting. Her mana control is also amazing. Sad we didn’t get chance to see her fight seriously during VR." Damien said.
"You know who was behind it...why we didn’t get to see other students in full action."
"yeah...it was Noah. He looks cute from outside but totally opposite from inside. "When Arisha said this everyone went silent.
Lyria shook her head and then she looked behind her.
She frowned.
She looked again, more carefully this time, scanning the rear of the group from one side to the other.
"Where is Emma?"
Leonard who was going to comment on Arisha’s words suddenly stopped.
Damien turned immediately.
The group came to a halt and every head swiveled back the way they had come. The forest path behind them stretched empty between the trees. No brown ponytail. No gauntlets catching the light. No sound of footsteps following.
Emma was simply not there.
"Emma?" Damien called out, his voice cutting through the forest quiet.
Nothing came back.
"Emma! Where are you!" Leonard’s voice was louder, less controlled.
Still nothing.
The group fanned out slightly, eyes moving fast across the surrounding trees, checking between trunks and through the undergrowth in every direction.
"She was just here," Arisha said, her golden eyes narrowing. "I saw her not even five minutes ago."
Then Leonard grabbed Damien’s arm.
"There, is that her?"
Damien looked.
Far ahead through the trees. At least a hundred meters, maybe more, a figure in academy uniform was moving fast. Brown hair loose from what had been a ponytail. Grey uniform visible in flashes between the trunks as she ran.
She wasn’t jogging. She was running with purpose, arms pumping, moving in a direction that had nothing to do with where their group had been heading.
"Emma!" Damien’s shout was sharp and loud.
No response. She didn’t slow. Didn’t look back. Just kept running like she either couldn’t hear him or wasn’t listening.
Damien didn’t spend another second thinking about it.
"Everyone follow her right. We need to get her. Dammit what happened to her!!"
The group broke into a run.
They pushed through the undergrowth fast, branches catching at sleeves and roots threatening to catch feet, the distance between them and Emma’s figure staying stubbornly wide despite their speed.
Damien was fastest and pulled ahead naturally, eyes locked on the grey uniform visible between the trees.
Something was wrong. he had hunch of it.
He didn’t know what yet. But the feeling from earlier. the shadow he had seen moving at the edge of his vision, the thing he had convinced himself was imagination came back to him now with considerably more weight.
This was only the beginning and he already knew it.
