Chapter 11: Chapter 11: Bait
"Eyes of the Eternals."
Lucian whispered the activation, and the world shifted. His crimson eyes flared — then bled to gold.
The golden gaze settled on Ryan, and information flooded Lucian’s vision like water through a broken dam.
╔═════════════════════════╗
║ ◀ EYES OF THE ETERNALS ▶ ║
║ ║
║ Name: Ryan Duncan ║
║ Age: 17 ║
║ Race: Human ║
║ Bloodline: Nil ║
║ ║
║ Cultivation Base: ║
║ Mid Neophyte Realm ║
║ ║
║ Mana Capacity: 1,650 MPU ║
║ (Base: 1,100 MPU) ║
║ (Cultivation Boost: x1.5) ║
║ ║
║ Abilities: ║
║ ├─ Ice Creation — A-Rank ║
║ └─ Critical Mind — C-Rank ║
║ ║
║ Combat Skills: ║
║ ├─ Movement: Basic Footwork (Adept)║
║ ├─ Weapon: Ice Sword Form (Novice)║
║ └─ Defense: Ice Barrier (Novice) ║
╚═════════════════════════════════╝
Lucian’s eyebrows rose.
Two abilities.
A-Rank Ice Creation and C-Rank Critical Mind. The kid was a dual awakener. The statistical probability was less than 0.01% — these were the people governments fought wars over, the ones who became national treasures overnight.
And he’d been hiding in an orphanage, protecting children.
I underestimated you, Ryan Duncan.
Lucian dismissed the ability, his eyes fading back to crimson. "Let’s go."
They moved out of the orphanage in a tight group — Ryan in front with the kids, Lucian behind, his Blood Sense expanded to its full two-hundred-meter range. The crimson web of life pulsed in his mind, mapping every heartbeat within range.
Clear left. Clear right. One signature sixty meters ahead — normal zombie, shuffling away from us. We’re good.
"Vehicle. Now."
They found a vehicle twenty meters from the orphanage gate — a mana-powered van. The back was empty, cargo space more than enough for five children.
Lucian opened the side door. "Kids in. Quickly."
The children scrambled inside, Mei helping the younger ones, the boy with the rabbit clutching his toy to his chest. Ryan moved toward the driver’s seat—
"Ryan."
He stopped.
"Can you drive?"
Ryan looked at him like he’d asked if water was wet. "Of course I can drive. Why—"
"You’re driving." Lucian walked past him toward the passenger seat. "If I drive, these kids will be traumatized for life."
Ryan stared at him for a moment, then understood. He’d seen how Lucian moved, how Lucian fought. The man was a predator — efficient, brutal, indifferent to collateral damage. Putting him behind the wheel of a vehicle full of children was probably a recipe for nightmares.
"Fair enough."
The engine hummed to life. Ryan pulled out of the parking spot and onto the street, driving slowly, carefully, keeping the noise to a minimum.
"There’s a provision store three blocks east," Ryan said quietly, eyes on the road. "We should stop. Pack enough food to last months. We don’t know what we’ll find at the academy."
"Starlight Academy," Lucian said. "In Vienne City."
Ryan glanced at him. "You remember."
"Clara talked about it constantly. Hard to forget."
Ryan’s mouth twitched. "Yeah. She was... excited about it."
The provision store was a large supermarket — windows shattered, interior dark, but structurally intact. Lucian scanned it with Blood Sense before they entered.
"Clear. Move."
They packed quickly. Canned goods. Dried foods. Bottled water. Medical supplies. Blankets. Anything that could be stored and wouldn’t spoil. Lucian shoved it all into his Shadow Storage, the items vanishing into the cold darkness at his feet.
Ryan watched, mouth slightly open.
"What?" Lucian said, not looking up.
"That’s... your ability? Shadow storage?"
"Part of it."
"Huh. I thought you were a light-type."
"I am."
"Then how—"
"Ryan. Focus."
Ryan snapped his mouth shut and went back to packing.
Lucian paused at the back of the store. A door led to an adjacent unit — a gun shop. The reinforced glass counter was smashed, but the display cases behind it were still stocked.
Mana-powered firearms. Designed specifically for this world — weapons that channeled small amounts of mana through specialized barrels to accelerate projectiles to speeds impossible with conventional gunpowder. Effective against normal humans and low-rank beasts. Useless against anything above D-rank.
But against normal and Early Neophyte zombies? Perfect. And it would save his mana.
He took two pistols — compact, lightweight, each with a magazine of twenty mana-enhanced rounds. He checked the safety, loaded them, and tucked one into his waistband and the other into his jacket.
"Lucian?" Ryan called from the front. "We should—"
A groan.
Lucian turned. A zombie was lurching toward them from the back aisle — grey skin, milky eyes, wearing a tag on its chest that read "MANAGER - JEAN-PAUL."
*PAM.*
The pistol barked once. The bullet punched through Jean-Paul’s forehead with pinpoint accuracy, and the zombie dropped like a marionette with cut strings.
Ryan stared.
"...Did you just shoot for the first time with perfect accuracy?"
"And since when do you use guns?"
"Since thirty seconds ago." Lucian was already walking toward the exit. "Let’s go."
---
Vienne City was forty kilometers from Old town.
Ryan drove in silence, navigating the ruined highways by memory and instinct. Lucian sat in the passenger seat, eyes closed, Blood Sense extended to its maximum range, mapping the route ahead like a living radar.
Every zombie within two hundred meters appeared as a sluggish grey pulse in his mind. He directed Ryan left, right, around, through — avoiding the large herds, weaving through the gaps, keeping them off the main roads where the congestion was thickest.
"You’ve got three abilities, don’t you?" Ryan said suddenly.
Lucian opened one eye. "What makes you say that?"
"The way you’re navigating. You know where every zombie is before we see them."
Lucian closed his eye. "Maybe."
Ryan didn’t push it.
They entered Vienne City limits as the second hour ticked by.
Fires burned in isolated pockets. Bodies littered the streets. The walls — shorter than Lyon’s, maybe fifteen meters — had been breached in multiple places, gaps torn open by something large and violent.
"The academy is on the north side," Ryan said, eyes scanning a street sign. "Another five kilometers—"
Lucian’s Blood Sense screamed.
"Ryan—"
They came from the side streets. Dozens of them — normal zombies pouring out of alleys and storefronts like water from broken pipes. Ryan swerved, and the van clipped a cluster of them, bodies bouncing off the hood.
Then he saw the others.
Mid Neophyte realm zombies. A pack of six, moving in coordinated formation, wearing the remnants of police uniforms. Their bodies glowed with residual mana, muscles bulging beneath grey skin, eyes fixed on the vehicle with a predatory focus that normal zombies didn’t possess.
"Shit—" Ryan floored the accelerator.
The van surged forward, but the Mid Neophyte zombies were fast. They matched the vehicle’s speed easily, flanking it, their fists hammering against the sides.
*BAM! BAM! BAM!*
The kids screamed. Mei pulled the youngest close.
"They’re keeping up!" Ryan yelled.
"I see them."
Then a Late Neophyte appeared.
It stepped out of a building directly in their path — massive, grey, a former hunter or soldier, its body radiating mana that made Lucian’s Blood Sense flare. It planted its feet and swung.
BOOM.
The van flew.
The impact lifted the vehicle off the ground and sent it spinning through the air like a discarded toy. Inside, chaos — screaming children, Ryan shouting, the world spinning outside the windows—
Lucian’s Blood Manipulation erupted.
Crimson threads shot from his body, wrapping around each child in an instant, forming thick cocoon shells of hardened blood that locked them in place, cushioning them against the impact.
"Ryan— the roof!"
Ryan understood. His hand shot up, ice forming around his fingers, and he grabbed the van’s roof with a frozen grip and tore. The metal screamed as it ripped free, and cold air rushed in.
"JUMP!"
One by one, they bailed — Ryan first, clutching two kids, his Ice Creation forming a slide of frost beneath their feet to cushion the landing. Then Mei, pulling the youngest boy, sliding down the same ice path. Lucian went last, blood cocoons still protecting the remaining children, hitting the ground in a crouch.
The van crashed into a building behind them and exploded.
And from a side street, Lucian saw them — a group of survivors, maybe fifteen people, watching from behind a barricade. Armed. Organized.
They’d used the van as a distraction, Ryan thought seeing that their vehicle stepped on some bags of blood which attracted the zombies.
"Bastards," Ryan breathed, ice already forming around his fists.
But Lucian wasn’t looking at the survivors.
He was looking at the Late Neophyte zombie, which had already turned toward them, its dead eyes glowing with residual mana.
And beyond it, deeper in the city, a much larger signature was moving fast towards this direction.
Peak Neophyte. And it’s heading straight for us.
"Ryan," Lucian said quietly. "Take the kids and run."
---
