Seven years passed like a heavy fever dream within the halls of "Shadow Citadel." I was no longer that helpless infant writhing on a stone slab; now, I was "Adrian," Number (01), the one who survived every deletion attempt.
I am seven years old now, but thanks to the magical "fodder" and the mana I regularly siphoned, my body possesses the build of a ten-year-old—tempered like steel with eyes as cold as a deep well. I wasn't sent to the front lines that day; the sorcerer Igor decided I was "too precious to detonate early" and turned me into his personal project.
I stand now in the gray training yard, surrounded by nine other children—all that remains of "Batch 666." We are the "Black Elite," as they call us, or "Suicide Pawns," as I know from the novel's draft.
"Adrian! Focus!" barked the instructor, a half-human, half-shadow entity, brandishing a wooden sword coated in dark energy. "You do not parry with your hand; you parry with your will! Make the darkness flow from your crest into your blade!"
I feigned a stumble, dropping to one knee in the dirt.
It's still too early to reveal my full strength, I thought, wiping sweat from my brow. In the novel, any pawn showing capabilities beyond the 'Assimilation' limits is executed. I must remain slightly 'above average,' but never a 'genius' who rouses the sorcerers' suspicion.
While I pretended to be exhausted, my senses scanned the area. Over these years, I had developed an ability I dubbed "Editor's Eye." I could see the mana flow in the bodies of instructors and guards as if they were lines of text. I knew where their weaknesses lay and where their energy faltered.
"You're weak today, Number 01," mocked Number (07), a hulking, coarse-featured boy who always tried to prove he was the rightful leader of the batch. "Perhaps Master Igor was wrong about you."
I didn't answer him. I looked at my small hands, covered in countless scars.
In these seven years, I had learned how to turn the "poison" they fed us into an "antidote" for my power. The crest on my shoulder, intended to drain me, had been secretly "reprogrammed." Now, it no longer sucked my energy; instead, it acted as a "filter," absorbing mana from the surrounding air and storing it in a secret core within my bones.
That night, Igor visited me in my cramped cell. He no longer wore his mask; his face looked paler, his eyes more sunken.
I felt the coldness of his hand on my hair. I felt a violent urge to snap his fingers, but I maintained absolute composure.
"What is the mission, Master?" I asked in a voice mimicking childhood innocence, even as my mind analyzed his every movement.
Igor flashed a gruesome smile. "You will pretend to be a survivor from a scorched village. The Knights of Light will find you. Because your features look entirely human, and because of your superior ability to suppress your darkness, they will take you into their camp... into the heart of the 'Academy of Light' itself."
I furrowed my brows in feigned confusion. "But Master... didn't you tell me when I was small that I would be the 'Heart of the Incantation'? You said a shadow beast would carry me and I would explode in the midst of their army to annihilate them... Has the plan changed?"
Igor stopped smiling, his hawk-like eyes searching me. A heavy silence filled the cell before he let out a dry laugh that sounded like breaking glass.
"That was the plan of those idiotic 'Military Commanders,' Adrian. They wanted to waste my masterpiece on a single explosion that ends in minutes. I have vetoed that entirely... You will not be a mere stupid bomb."
He leaned into my ear and whispered, "I have chosen you, along with Number 02 and Number 03. Only you three, out of the seven remaining from Batch 666, will be my 'Private Disciples.' As for the other four? They are the fuel to be thrown to the beasts and the explosions—distractions for the heroes while you and the others slip like silent daggers into the flank of the World of Light."
My face paled slightly—and this time, it wasn't acting. So, the seven survivors wouldn't stay together.
"You and the others will undergo intensive training under my personal supervision in the coming months," Igor continued, heading for the door. "You will learn how to breathe 'Light' without it burning your insides, and how to smile at Saints while planning to slaughter them. The rest are just noise... but you, you are my 'Masterpiece' yet to be finished."
He stepped out and slammed the iron door, leaving me in the darkness of my cell. I leaned my back against the cold wall, my breath quickening.
Igor has manipulated the plot, I thought sharply. In the novel, Batch 666 had no survivors infiltrating the Academy; they died early in the first horrors of the war. Is this because of me? Because I absorbed energy differently, did Igor change his mind and see the potential for a spy instead of a bomb?
I looked at my hands in the dark. The plan had become far more complex and dangerous. Infiltrating the Academy meant living under the watch of the most powerful Light Mages. A single mistake would mean immediate "deletion."
However, there was a silver lining. If Igor wanted me as his private disciple, it meant access to magical manuscripts and knowledge unavailable to ordinary pawns.
"Fine, Igor... you want me to be your silent dagger?" I whispered to myself, sparks flickering in my eyes. "I will be. But always remember... a dagger has no loyalty to the hand that holds it, only to the heart it pierces."