Villainous Instructor at the Academy
Chapter 185: Warning

Chapter 185: Warning

Evercrest didn’t finish his sentence.

Because the moment he turned toward the bookshelf, a rune flared beneath his feet.

Not one of mine.

Not one of the Academy’s, either.

Just an echo. A pulse from something that recognized him.

He paused.

And in that instant, I saw it—not the man, not the legend, but the creature beneath the flesh. The ghost of an age so old it could only wear mortality like a borrowed cloak.

"...It’s begun," he murmured.

I didn’t ask what.

I didn’t need to.

The air in my quarters was shifting. Heavy. Metallic. Like the breath before a lightning strike.

"Prepare your class," Evercrest said. "No more games. No more secrets."

He turned.

"And keep Cassandra close."

Then he vanished.

Not teleported.

Just... ceased to be here.

As if he had never knocked at all.

Two hours later, I found Felix in the hallway outside the infirmary.

His eyes were red.

"She’s awake," he said quietly.

I entered without knocking.

Cassandra sat cross-legged on the bed, staring at the ceiling like it had whispered something obscene. Her eyes tracked me before her head did.

"Professor," she said, calm. Too calm. "I saw you."

I didn’t move. "When?"

"In the memory field," she replied. "You were screaming."

That wasn’t what I expected.

I walked to her bedside. "Do you remember what else you saw?"

She frowned, then shook her head—slow, deliberate. "Only threads. Symbols. A child made of clay. A name with too many syllables and no vowels."

"...Charming."

"I think I died," she added.

That made two of us.

We gathered in the war hall that evening. I didn’t wait for them to settle.

"We’re leaving the campus."

Half of them looked ready to bolt. The other half already had their hands up.

Mira was the first to speak. "Field trip?"

"To the Veins," I said. "Specifically, a ruin five miles beneath the eastern ridge. The Grimoire thinks it’s important. So do I."

Julien whistled. "You want us to go into a pre-Akaran labyrinth with that thing flaring up again?" He pointed at the Grimoire, now wrapped in three containment seals and still pulsing like it wanted to bite someone.

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because it’s already coming to us," Cassandra answered, voice flat. "Something is bleeding through the seams."

The others turned.

And for once, no one argued.

That night, I stood on the edge of the teleportation gate, wards humming behind me, the Grimoire clutched tight.

Lysaria hadn’t returned.

Evercrest hadn’t sent word.

But the nursery was only the first thread.

And if I didn’t follow the rest—

Someone else would.

Someone who didn’t care who got torn apart in the process.

I looked back at my students. My class.

They looked terrified.

Good.

Terror meant they hadn’t been consumed yet.

"Stay close," I told them.

Then I activated the gate.

The world unraveled.

And the ruin opened its mouth.

He turned toward my bookshelf, gazing over the arranged volumes without touching them. A flick of his fingers, and one of the tomes—Principia Runestra—floated down, opening midair with a rustle of aged parchment.

"You still read this?" he asked, voice almost curious.

"It’s a decent primer," I said. "Useful for teaching students who aren’t born with starlight in their veins."

He smiled then. Faint. Distant. The kind of smile someone wore while remembering something long buried under layers of dust and regret.

"I wrote this," he said.

I blinked.

"...What?"

"Under a different name, in another age. Before the Collapse. Before the Reweaving. Before we chose order over understanding."

He let the book close gently. It hovered for a second longer, then returned to its place on the shelf without a whisper.

"What you saw," he said, turning back to me, "was never meant for your eyes."

"I didn’t ask for it."

"No," he agreed. "The Grimoire did."

That silenced me.

Because he was right.

He walked deeper into the room, brushing past one of my etched wards. It fizzled—wavered—then allowed him through. Of course it did. He was older than most of the laws that governed this world. The runes knew to fear him.

"The nursery," he continued, almost conversational now. "Was a cradle of potential. A place where spellforms were gestated—not written, not taught, but grown. That pillar... it holds echoes of minds that dreamed in runes."

"And now it’s bleeding."

He gave a slow nod. "Something cracked it. Or someone. We are trying to determine how."

I hesitated. "You’re not... blaming Cassandra?"

"Not yet." His gaze pinned me again. "But she’s the variable. And the Grimoire—the one bonded to her professor—is the trigger."

I met his stare. "She’s still a child."

"She’s a vector," he said softly. "And so are you."

My hands clenched. "Then what do you want, Headmaster?"

"I want you to keep doing exactly what you’re doing," he said, surprising me.

"...You’re not removing me?"

"Lucian," he said, using my name like a knife, "you’re the only faculty member insane enough to probe ancient magic without immediately trying to weaponize it."

"That feels like a compliment and a death sentence wrapped in one."

He almost chuckled. "Perceptive."

He walked to the center of the room, where the floor runes still glowed in their faint ring—flickering like something half-asleep.

"They’re learning," he murmured. "Your students. More quickly than expected."

"They don’t have a choice."

"No," he said. "They don’t."

He looked back at me. "The Vault you entered wasn’t supposed to exist. It manifested because your Grimoire resonated with a rupture in the Pattern."

"That’s supposed to make sense?"

"To you? Eventually."

He let silence hang for a moment, studying me like one might a particularly stubborn spell that refused to crack.

Then: "You’re walking a thread, Professor Drelmont. One that runs across forgotten history, buried gods, and things far older than magic."

"Any tips?"

"Don’t fall off."

He turned to leave.

Then paused at the threshold.

"When the Grimoire calls again," he said without looking back, "follow it."

I frowned. "I thought you said I wasn’t supposed to see what’s under the Academy."

He didn’t answer directly.

Instead, he said, "I said it wasn’t meant for you. That doesn’t mean you’re not needed."

And with that, he vanished—no flash, no fanfare.

Just... gone.

The runes flared once in his wake.

Then faded.

That night, the Grimoire didn’t stay silent.

It whimpered.

A low, shifting pulse of ink and light that breathed beneath my fingertips.

When I opened it, there were no words.

Only a symbol.

A new rune.

Scrawled in the center of the page, bleeding into the margins, repeating like a mantra—

Listen. Listen. Listen.

Beneath that, a map.

But this one wasn’t underground.

It was in the sky.

And at the center of it...

...a tower I had never seen.

Yet somehow, remembered.

To the east of Noctis Ardentis. Beyond the veil of normal routes. Beyond even the barrier forests.

The Grimoire pulsed again.

And in the next room, Cassandra began to hum in her sleep.

Not a lullaby.

A warning.