Rain still blanketed the city of Draegor when Kian Thorne emerged from the dungeon, soaked and trembling, the Boneblade Knight hidden beneath a layered illusion cast by the Codex. The world hadn't changed. Neon still flickered over crumbling stone, the Guild Tower still loomed with cold indifference, and the streets still crawled with the powerful and the forgotten.
But something in Kian had shifted.
Draegor was a sprawling megacity built atop ruins of an older civilization, a place where technology and magic collided under flickering skies. Entire sectors were controlled by Guilds and corporations, and the outer districts—like the one Kian called home—were mostly ignored by law and order.
Kian lived in Sector 9, also known as Ashridge. It was a mid-tier zone bordering the Eastern Expanse, filled with cramped apartments, unlicensed vendors, and black-market enchanters. His house stood at the end of a crooked alley, a worn three-story building leaning slightly left from structural decay. Most of the outer layer was patchwork stone and metal, but the core foundation remained solid. Inside, the space was modest but sufficient.
Three rooms. A shared living area with mismatched furniture and an old fireplace rigged to a mana battery. Two small bedrooms—one converted into storage—and a rooftop access hatch. It could've comfortably housed three or four people. But now it held only Kian.
He walked without purpose at first, guided only by instinct. His legs ached, his chest burned, and his mind reeled with everything he'd seen. The book, the voice, the power. It didn't feel real, but the dull pain in his muscles and the phantom thrum of the Codex embedded in his chest told him it was.
He reached his attic before sunrise. The sky behind the haze of rain was beginning to turn silver. He closed the door quietly, then collapsed against it. Water dripped from his coat, pooling on the floor. The Boneblade Knight remained invisible, silent, unmoving in the corner of the room. A ghost that answered to him.
He stared at it for a long moment.
"I have no idea what I'm doing," he whispered.
The knight said nothing. It didn't need to. Its obedience was not conditional. Not like people. Not like the Guild.
Kian pushed himself to his feet and peeled off his soaked clothes. His body was a patchwork of bruises, scars, and malnourished lines. He remembered the System warning.
Mana Circulation: Weak. Physical Constitution: Malnourished. Musculature: Inadequate.
The Codex had given him power, yes, but it came with expectations. A training protocol had already been engraved into his mind like a second heartbeat.
Training Protocol Activated:
– Daily Physical Training: 3 Hours
– Mana Channeling: 1 Hour
– Meditation: 30 Minutes
He looked around the cramped attic. No training equipment, no mana crystals, not even enough space to stretch fully without knocking something over. He'd have to improvise.
So he did.
Kian began his training that very morning, using the tavern's rooftop as a makeshift gym. He ran laps until his lungs felt like fire, lifted broken furniture weighted with bricks, and practiced balance along the slippery edge of the roof.
Each movement hurt.
Each breath came with effort.
But the System acknowledged his effort. A flicker of recognition, a slow increase in stamina, a faint warmth in his limbs when he focused his breath.
Mana Channeling was harder. His circuits were underdeveloped, tangled, and stubborn. When he tried to draw mana from the atmosphere, it resisted, like trying to pull water through a cracked funnel. But the Codex assisted, guiding the flow, burning a path with aching precision.
By the time the sun had risen high enough to burn through the clouds, Kian lay on his back, gasping, sweat mixing with rain.
He felt like he'd been broken and rebuilt with spit and thread.
But he was alive.
More than that, he felt awake.
The Boneblade Knight stood at the edge of the rooftop, silent as always, watching.
Kian looked at it.
"You, me, and a world that wants us dead," he muttered.
The knight didn't respond.
That day, he ate the last of his stale rations. They tasted like dust and regret. His coin pouch was empty. He had nothing left to sell, no official Guild access, no bounty claims. If he wanted to survive, he needed a source of income. Fast.
By evening, he returned to the city's edge. The Eastern Expanse remained quiet. No patrols. No signs that anyone else had found the dungeon. The illusion cast by the Codex likely hid the door from uninvited eyes.
Good.
He wasn't ready to share.
Instead of going back inside, he circled the Expanse, searching the ruins for salvage. Old battlefields and collapsed Guild camps littered the outskirts. Dangerous, yes, but full of potential loot.
He found remnants of broken weapons, half-spent mana cores, a cracked visor with low-grade enchantments. Junk to the average Hunter. Gold to someone with nothing.
By nightfall, he returned to the undercity market. A place where regulations ended and necessity ruled. He kept his head down, voice low.
The stall vendors didn't care who he was. They cared about what he had.
He sold the cracked visor and focus stone, traded the mana cores for preserved rations, and managed to walk away with a few silver crowns jingling in his pocket.
Barely enough to last the week.
But it was something.
As he stepped back into the alleyway, a figure blocked his path.
Tall. Armored. Face hidden behind a chromatic mask. A crimson insignia pulsed faintly on their shoulder.
Crimson Pact.
A real Hunter.
Kian's heart stumbled.
"You were seen entering the Expanse," the masked figure said.
Their voice was distorted, genderless, and hard to read.
"I was scavenging," Kian answered carefully.
"Unrated Gate opened yesterday. Official Guild investigation hasn't started. Anyone entering without clearance could be considered obstruction."
"I didn't go near the Gate."
The lie came easy, but the way the figure tilted their head made Kian wonder if they believed him.
After a long silence, the Hunter stepped aside.
"Stay away from it. No second chances."
Kian nodded and left without a word.
He didn't breathe easy until he reached the rooftop again.
The Codex pulsed in his chest, faint but constant. It had not warned him of the Hunter. It only whispered of the next Trial.
First Trial: Bind what death cannot hold.
The knight had been the first. There would be more.
He stared out across the city, the lights dancing in the mist.
If the Guild knew what he'd become, they would hunt him. Not question. Not negotiate. Just eliminate.
Soulbound Necromancers were forbidden for a reason. The power they wielded, the corruption they risked. Too much, too dangerous. But the Codex hadn't corrupted him. Not yet. It had given him purpose.
He couldn't run. Not forever.
So he would become stronger.
Stronger than fear. Stronger than hunger. Stronger than the Guild.
The dead obeyed him.
And someday, so would the world.
End of Chapter 2