[The City of Bond Street – Guild of Preservation Branch]
[Underground Archives]
[One Hour Before the Mud Ritual]
"So, you are the recruit."
Old Man Uriel spoke slowly, dragging out the words as if he had all the time in the world. He adjusted his thick glasses, peering at Lucian with eyes that had seen too much history.
Lucian nodded respectfully. "Mr Aziz sent me down. He said you would explain what I need to do."
"Sit down, kid." Uriel gestured a bony hand toward the wooden chair opposite the red sofa.
Lucian sat, keeping his back straight. The smell of old paper and dust was comforting in a strange way, a sharp contrast to the metallic scent of blood he was used to.
"So, what will be my job?" Lucian asked, cutting to the chase.
"Hmm... let's see." Uriel pulled a small, tattered notebook from his pocket. He licked his thumb and slowly turned the pages. "You are nineteen. Newly Awakened. Tier 1. So, your job for now... is to learn."
Lucian blinked. "Just learn?"
"You expected to be fighting dragons on day one?" Uriel chuckled, a dry, raspy sound. "We pay you fifteen pounds a week to stay alive and get smarter. Dead recruits are bad for business."
He tapped the notebook. "We are currently in the year 2081, the era of the Fourth Dark. Since the arrival of the System and the Crucible, history has been... messy."
Lucian looked at the notebook, then at the old man. "Do you need the book to remember the year?"
"Don't judge me, boy," Uriel grumbled, though there was no heat in it. "My memory isn't what it used to be. The erosion takes us all eventually."
He cleared his throat. "Anyway. The Crucible. You survived the trial, which means you have a Sequence. Your duty in this Guild is simple: Assist the senior members in hunting Awakened criminals, and more importantly, kill the monsters that spill out from the Mirror Dimensions."
Uriel closed the notebook with a soft thump.
"That is all for today. Go home, get some rest, and come back tomorrow at 10 AM. We will have a lot to talk about then."
Lucian stood up. It felt too easy, but he wasn't going to complain about easy money.
"Understood," Lucian said. "I will see you tomor—"
ZOOM.
The air in the room didn't just change; it died.
Suddenly, the warmth of the yellow lamps vanished. A bone-deep cold, colder than the freezing wasteland of the Tutorial, slammed into the underground chamber.
It wasn't just cold temperature. It was the chill of the grave.
"Urgh..." Lucian grabbed his chest.
The pressure was immense. It felt as if the ceiling had collapsed on top of him. His knees buckled, and he slammed into the stone floor. Across from him, Old Man Uriel collapsed off the sofa, gasping for air.
[WARNING: MENTAL CORRUPTION DETECTED]
[Tier Disparity: Immeasurable]
[Constraint: Sin of Pride... FAILING.]
[CRITICAL ERROR: Unknown Entity Detected.]
Lucian's vision blurred. The shadows in the corners of the room began to stretch and scream. He could see translucent spirits—hundreds of them—rising through the floorboards, wailing silently as they were dragged toward the center of the Capital, Westminster.
What... what is happening? Lucian thought, his mind fracturing. Why is the System failing?
"Old man..." Lucian rasped, crawling forward. "What... is..."
Uriel didn't answer. The old man was coughing up blood, his frail body seizing under the spiritual pressure.
It felt like the end of the world.
And then, just as quickly as it had started—it stopped.
The cold vanished. The spirits dissolved. The crushing weight lifted.
[System Rebooting...]
[Passive Trait: Sin of Pride – ACTIVE]
[Status: Fear Immunity Restored.]
[Triggering Skill: Shadow Weave (Auto-Heal).]
Lucian gasped, sucking in huge gulps of air. A red light flashed in front of his eyes as the System forcibly stabilized his mind and stitched up the capillaries that had burst in his nose.
"Now you want to work?" Lucian cursed the System, wiping blood from his face.
He didn't wait. He scrambled over to Uriel. The old man was slumped against the bookshelf, pale as a sheet.
"Hey! Wake up!" Lucian grabbed Uriel's shoulders and hauled him back onto the sofa. He grabbed a pitcher of water from the table and held it to the old man's lips.
Uriel drank greedily, coughing as the water washed down the blood in his throat.
"Death..." Uriel whispered, his eyes wide and trembling behind his cracked glasses. "Death is here."
"Death?" Lucian asked, his heart still racing. "What does that mean?"
"The Angel of Death," Uriel choked out. "Samael. "He" isn't supposed to be here. "He" was at the Dead Sea... but "His" presence... it was coming from the Capital. From Westminster."
Lucian froze.
He knew the hierarchy. Angels were myths. Living gods.
"Something must have happened in the Capital," Uriel said, his voice gaining a little strength. "A fight? A betrayal? I don't know. But that pressure... that was "Him"."
Lucian looked at the ceiling. "We have Angels walking on land? I thought that was just a story."
"It's real," Uriel said grimly. He tried to stand, but his legs wobbled. "We need to go upstairs. Grace is a Zero—a normal human. If that pressure hit us this hard... she might be dead."
Lucian's eyes widened. "Grace."
He grabbed Uriel's arm, supporting the old man's weight. "Let's go."
They moved as fast as they could, climbing the spiral stairs. The silence in the building was heavy now.
When they reached the lobby, they found her.
Grace was lying on the floor behind the reception desk. She wasn't moving.
"Grace!"
Lucian rushed over. He checked her pulse. It was faint, thready, but there. She was alive, but deeply unconscious. Her mind had simply shut down to protect itself from the terror.
Lucian picked her up effortlessly—his Strength stat making her light as a feather—and laid her gently on the velvet sofa in the waiting area. Uriel splashed some cold water on her face, but she didn't stir.
"She's in shock," Uriel muttered, checking her eyes. "She'll survive, but she won't wake up for a while."
The old man stood up and walked to the glass doors of the Guild branch. He looked out toward the west, toward the massive golden walls of Westminster, the Capital.
Most of the Guild's combat forces, including Azrael, had deployed to the city of Victoria Street to help with the bombing victims. Bond Street was empty. Defenseless.
"What the hell is going on in the Capital?" Uriel whispered, fear etched into his wrinkled face.
Lucian stood beside him, looking at the distant skyline. The sky over Westminster was turning a sickly, bruised purple.
The war had barely started, and the world was already breaking.