Lia very quickly realized that something was off. The glint in the eyes of the Undead has changed. It happened in an instant, but there was no mistaking it. Something transpired behind those unnatural eyes. Raising her sword and swinging it as hard as she could, it landed on the Undead's arms that he raised above his head at the last moment. Everyone heard a loud crash and then a crack, watching the ancient armor throw sparks in all directions while Lia's burning sword melted its way through its wrists. She severed the Undead's hands with a swift, unhindered stroke, watching him kick out, jumping backward swiftly, building the distance between them. Lucian was already on his feet, but Lia, still focusing on the Undead, shot forward while shouting.

"I can deal with it!" She flourishes her sword once more, not letting it gain its footing. Nobody but a select few understood what happened. Rinzen, Ceiline, and Aurora were on their feet but hesitated to jump down because nobody acted yet.

"Sit back!" Lauron's voice ordered them while a few students directly fainted when the blackish-green miasma seeped out from the Undead's hands, reconnecting the severed wrists and dragging them along in the air.

"Was this planned?" Koadriana asked, her throat dry.

"No," Lauron replied through their bracelet. "The Undead was examined by me. It was not an Intelligent Variant… But it is 2000 years old… it may have been… in hibernation." He murmured, trying to find an excuse as to what was happening. "Sit tight for now! Don't interfere!"

On the battlefield, the Undead lifted the war hammer from its back silently before it smashed down against the earth, causing a small earthquake and shaking Lia out of balance. It was clearly using the hammer to forcefully utilize an earth-element spell, something that was the body's original talent. With an animalistic shake of its body, he shot out, already upon Lia, hammer in hand, swinging it from left to right. It was seemingly an unavoidable attack that should have landed and smashed her body as she was still in the middle of regaining her balance. Yet before it could touch her skin, Lia teleported, appearing at its right, slashing against the armored body once more.

Her flame's intensity was doubled, snuffing out the sparks that flew off the armor, and it was seeping into the new crack, trying to burn away the Undead from the inside. Using the force behind Lia's slash, it twisted its body and stretched out its now fixed, free hand, intending to grab Lia by her skull while her blade was lodged into its sides.

The Undead's body was surrounded by that nasty, unnatural miasma at all times by now. As if something was seeping out from the body that did not belong in it. Just being close to it could make any mage lose focus and fall into a panicky state. Many in the stands were already affected by it, especially the younger students. They were unable to keep their eyes on the battle, wanting nothing more but to leave. Just escape this gut-wrenching feeling that it evoked in all of them.

"Hmph!" Lia scoffed, already conquering her fears, and now she focused on one thing only, killing him. She let go of the hilt of her sword before teleporting away and reappearing in mid-air above the Undead. With a pull, the invisible strand of mana connecting her to her weapon reacted and flipped, rising to fly back into its master's hands.

The Undead was clearly surprised, and Lia also noticed that it had become different since the change in its green eyes. It was less animalistic, less instinctive, and more like an actual human… or beast folk. Yet that also brought forth that he wasn't as quick to react to her teleportations. He was simply not used to it, and his instincts were overridden by a higher cognition.

"It won't be able to cut through my body…" The Undead thought, trying to analyze Lia's movements in those seconds while exchanging moves, "She can cross through the Sea of Souls… troublesome. I will need to capture her there and bring her away..." But then his thought process stopped as the sword did something completely different instead of cutting into him.

Its blade came apart as if breaking into dozens of small but sharp pieces. Many on the spectator's side thought Lia's artifact broke apart, shrieking out, and only the Misfits remained relatively calm. Her now whip-like weapon wrapped itself around the Undead's arm while her feet landed on the tip of the war hammer held up in his other one.

"You are dead. Stay that way!" She sneered, and it happened faster than the Undead could think about it.

Her flames turned blue for a brief moment, and the Undead was flash-frozen into place. From the outside, its body was now glinting in a blue, frosty light, while a thin layer of ice covered him from head to toe, along with its armor and weapon. Lia watched the green eyes while it happened and could see an unspeakable shock and terror in them, which actually stunned her. So much so that she only pulled on her whip a second later to shatter the whole body of the Undead into hundreds of pieces before setting it ablaze, burning it until nothing but the molten pool of metal and ash remained behind. For everyone watching, it was as if Lia mastered ice-based spells besides fire. They thought that the moment her artifact changed shape and form, it helped her switch between elements. Nobody thought that it was a mix of two opposing magic.

"What was that…?" She asked herself, remembering the look the Undead gave her before she killed it. But there was no one to answer her.

…
….
…..

Back in Nowhere, the three meditating disciples suddenly shook as the formation below them flickered before going silent, losing its light. All of them vomited out a mouthful of blood, collapsing. Their forms became unstable and slightly transparent as if they were ghosts and not real people at all. The blood that came out of them turned green and released pure essence that was much more valuable than anything else. They looked up horror-struck, watching the others' eyes, trying to see what happened that made them almost die… Their souls were connected by the formation; the forceful split caused irreparable damage to their forms, something that was sure to send all of them back to being worthless outer disciples. It was at that moment they noticed. Their fourth companion was unmoving. He was still kneeling in place, looking solid as ever but unmoving.

"What did you do?!" One of them asked, getting up and touching him, but then he shattered into tiny, frozen pieces before melting into nothing but pure essence, making them scream out and try to get as far as possible from him, fearing that they would melt just like him. They never learned what happened, and neither did they recover, remaining half-ghostly souls, existing between life and death because of one… simple… mistake.

…
….
……

"Is this true?" A stern voice asked, belonging to Lakhmu, the head of House Marduk.

"Yes," Lucian answered serenely, facing the Six in his office, or more precisely, their transparent projections. Only Rinzen stood next to him physically.

"It evolved while fighting my girl?" Reyra questioned, sounding surprisingly joyful and happy about it. "Hah! None of her brothers managed to induce something like that!"

"Because it did not happen for four thousand years!" Rangi, leader of House Honu, interjected, raising his voice. "This is a clear sign we entered our Second Dark Age! I would not laugh about that!"

"I would." Reyra countered, rolling her eyes, "I just did."

"Atta girl!" Lakhmu smiled, loosening his grim look. "She is right! We can't fall into despair, or we already lost this war!"

"I don't know." Kaznak, the head of House Nerifit said, watching them, "I also have a report to make."

"Oh yeah!" Reyra clapped, "The boys just got back, but they are resting! They said they would tell me after a good sleep what happened down there!"

"It was almost a disaster." Dalal shrugged, "I was just reading the death reports. We averted something big, thanks to your sons."

"And to our combined forces." Kaznak corrected her quickly, "Our losses are minimal… but yes. Rangi is right; we entered another Dark Age!" He said grimly, explaining what they found in that old sub-realm. "The fact that a normal Undead evolved while fighting against one of our children clearly indicates what is happening, not to mention an ambush on us! This was planned. That means Intelligent Variants starting to make moves because they are ready to try again! We should wake the dragons!" Kaznak ended his speech with a heavy statement.

"No." Reyra and Lakhmu said simultaneously.

"I concur." Rangi and Rinzen agreed after a brief pause, the latter continuing. "They are only to be woken up when we are facing too many Intelligent variants or they start using weaponized beasts."

"Still…" Rangi said, his voice a little bit dry and weary. "We are at war. Accelerate Phase 1. Send out the message to all leaders of countries, kingdoms, city-states, to every place of power! Let the leaders know we have entered the Second Dark Age. Tell them to start preparing for war!"

"Tell them to do it gradually," Lakhmu added. "Don't pour the cold news on their people at once! We want to avoid panic and a descent into chaos! What we need in times like this is ORDER!"

"We are already raising armies." Dalal said, watching them, "Our subordinates are in preparation for Phase 2. All those who were honoraries of our people have already returned. We just waiting for them to be deployed."

"My Mother and the Council," Rinzen spoke up after Dalal finished, "Are in the process of checking on the hibernating mages and getting ready to wake them up if necessary."

"Ah, yes… yes…." Rangi nodded rapidly, finally smiling a little. "It will be good to meet some old friends."

"You know that the return of the old generation means we enter Phase 3," Dalal said, sounding almost like she was scolding him.

"Sorry." Rangi answered with a faint smile, "My old bones miss some dear friends. Those who remain awake and stroll the land of Meriath are few and far between. Most of them chose to sleep instead, unable to bear the merciless passing of time."

"Let's not discuss this now," Reyra said, crossing her arms and watching the rest. "We are not even in Phase 2!"

"My Institution is ready to distribute its collection on a moment's notice," Lucian said, finally finding a point where he could join the conversation.

"We will send you a list later." Lakhmu looked at him, "We need to see who is worthy of getting one, who is still alive, and who advanced into the Three Ri stage so they wouldn't need their old artifact."

"Who would have thought," Reyra joked nonchalantly, "that the Dark Age includes a ton of logistics and paperwork for us, eh?"

"Hmph…" Dalal, Kaznak, and Honu scoffed at her statement while Lakhmu laughed out as Rinzen only flashed a little smile.

"You guys are no fun!" Reyra shrugged, "Liven up a little, will you? We are the pillars of Meriath! We ought to show everyone that we are not afraid! We have to shine so the rest of the people won't think darkness rules their every day!" She looked at each and one of them. "When their leaders look depressed and worried, the soldiers will falter! We can't afford to lose morale before anything even begins!" By the end, it sounded like Reyra was the one scolding the other five, and without saying goodbyes, her transparent figure gradually dissipated, clearly not happy with the lot.

"That bouncing joyball is right!" Lakhmu slapped his belly, laughing. "We knew this would happen one day! Best to face it the correct way!" And with that, he was also gone.

Everyone slowly disappeared, leaving Lucian and Rinzen alone in his office while the moon shone down on the snow-covered Academy.

"Don't you need to head back?" Lucian asked Rinzen, who was looking out of his window, watching the silver snow twinkle in the moonlight.

"My Mother and the Council can do their thing. Always did… They say I should focus on getting stronger only."

"No, that was not what I meant." He chuckled, "Aren't the Misfits throwing a party?"

"Oh." She looked at him, thinking a little and nodding. "Right." She murmured, and then, with surprisingly hurried steps, she left his office, leaving behind a grinning Headmaster.