Supreme Hunter of Beautiful Souls-Chapter 154: Drug Dealer.

The shadows embraced Kael like a familiar cloak, his presence merged with the living darkness that slithered through the forgotten corners of the Academy. The three boys hurried along, constantly glancing over their shoulders, descending through ancient corridors and maintenance tunnels that most students didn't even know existed.

Kael hunted them like mist woven into the floor itself.

The flickering light of magical torches on the walls barely touched his form, and even the detection spells active in the passages failed to reach him. Umbra, silent, glided like smoke beneath him, feeding the fusion with the shadows. This wasn't a trick — it was his nature.

The three students slipped into a narrow passage behind the South Wing, a spiral stone staircase that led to a forgotten subterranean level. Down there, moss and roots covered the walls, and the remnants of an ancient wall suggested the area had once been a temple or fortress before being absorbed into the Academy's structure.

Kael kept a distance just far enough to remain unnoticed, but close enough to hear each of their quickened breaths.

"Are you sure it's this way?" whispered the youngest, looking up at the ceiling as if expecting something to fall on his head.

"He said the meeting point changed. Sword's patrol nearly caught him last week," replied the oldest, holding a small vial glowing with a faint purple light, hidden beneath his cloak.

"This is getting way too dangerous…"

"Being weak is more dangerous," retorted the third, spitting on the ground. "Or do you really think you'll get through this year's Internal Tournament with apprentice-level mana?"

Kael narrowed his eyes. 'So that's it… they're drugging themselves to advance faster.'

The chamber ahead was a circular stone room, its pillars covered in runes worn down by time. An old ritual site — or a sacrificial one. The walls were coated in a thin veil of glowing fungus, emitting a greenish hue that made everything look even more morbid.

'Did this place exist in Azalith? What the hell is this...' Kael muttered.

He then heard Ahri's voice in his head. 'It didn't. This is dimensional magic,' she answered firmly.

At the center, standing beside a cracked ritual slab, a figure awaited them.

He wore a dark hood and a robe of worn fabric stitched with silver-threaded symbols. His face was hidden behind a wooden mask carved with animalistic features — long eyes, a wide smile, and fangs etched where the mouth should be.

"You're late," he said, his voice echoing softly through the chamber. "Thought you'd been caught by someone from Sword... Those guys are a pain."

Kael narrowed his eyes. 'So this guy already knows how Sword operates... Interesting. As far as I know, our patrol routes are secret.'

"We had to change paths. Some woman was patrolling the central corridor — that crazy professor who looks like a Demon Hunter," one of them murmured nervously.

'Must be talking about Eva…'

The masked figure nodded calmly. From within his robe, he pulled out a small box made of dark wood. He set it down on the slab and opened it slowly.

Three glass vials. Purple liquid, so thick it looked like clotted blood. It shimmered with a light that pulsed — as if breathing.

The boys stepped forward, eager.

"Same formula?" asked the oldest, running a hand along one of the vials.

"Yes. Essence fragment extracted from the same arcane root. Distilled with low-value souls and catalyzed with mana from an abyssal creature. The mixture is unstable — but extremely potent."

'There it is. Confirmed. It does come from Yggdrasil,' Kael thought as he slowly stepped into the shadow of the boy furthest back… yes, literally into his shadow.

He paused for a second, staring at the three.

"As you probably already know… this is the same drug that killed two students a few weeks ago. I'm warning you—it has consequences."

The three of them hesitated. One of them swallowed hard. Kael, motionless in the wall's shadow, felt his pulse quicken. That confirmation was all he needed.

"I-I heard they turned into Berserkers… is that true?"

"Yes," the masked figure said. "They became beasts. Mindless, soulless beasts, bodies overflowing with raw, uncontrolled power."

"Is there a way to… to avoid that?" one of the more anxious ones asked.

"Minimal dose. A single drop under the tongue. Nothing more." The seller's tone was cold, surgical. "You're not prepared to handle more than that. Even an intermediate mana circle can collapse if it tries to bind the compound all at once."

Kael caught something important in that. The compound wasn't just ingested… it was fused to the user's mana network. An inner ritual—almost a pact with something unknown.

"If you take too much…" the masked man continued, "you'll be consumed. The compound wants more. It burns soul and flesh to fuel its burst of power. There's no balance—only hunger."

The three boys looked hesitant now. But the light in their eyes wasn't fear—it was desire. The kind that comes with the promise of power. The kind that drowns out reason.

"And what about payment?" one of them asked.

The masked figure chuckled, dry and low.

"Already received. Your patron made the deposit in crystallized essence. One gram per vial. Fair price. He also left a message…"

Silence. The air grew heavier in the chamber.

"Do not fail. Or you'll be recycled."

The boys paled, but none dared to protest. They took the vials with trembling hands. Kael watched, red eyes glowing softly within the darkness like coals in some ancient inferno. With each second, his fury sharpened. His resolve solidified.

And then… he moved.

The shadows on the wall swelled like a living sigh, and from them, Kael emerged. Soundless. Relentless. A dark silhouette, cloak rippling, infernal eyes gleaming—like a predator born from the womb of night.

Before any of the boys could react, a gloved hand seized the neck of the nearest one. A sharp crack echoed through the chamber as Kael lifted him from the ground with ease, like a rag doll. The vial slipped from the boy's hand, shattering on the floor and releasing a faint purple mist that hissed into nothingness.

"How adorable…" Kael's voice cut through the air like a cold blade, laced with disdain and venomous irony. "A drug dealer. Surrounded by desperate little children pretending they have any control over what they're taking."

The other two staggered back, wide-eyed, nearly tripping over themselves. The masked figure didn't move—he simply watched.

The boy dangling in Kael's grip thrashed, trying to cast something, anything, but Kael's grasp on his throat drained his mana with a methodical cruelty, like a goblet being emptied one bitter drop at a time.

Kael turned his head slightly toward the masked figure.

"You have two seconds to convince me not to turn your bones into necklaces for orphan children."

The masked man didn't answer immediately. He merely tilted his head, as if observing an interesting phenomenon. The wooden mask caught the greenish light of the room, but his eyes—if they existed beneath—were unfathomable voids.

"Shame I won't be around to see that," the masked man said, voice low and composed, raising his hand. A snap of fingers echoed through the room—a quick gesture, like the start of a teleportation spell or dimensional shift.

But nothing happened.

Silence.

Then, a lazy and slightly bored voice cut through the air:

"Sorry... but you're stuck with that guy."

The masked man froze. Slowly, he turned toward the voice.

There, sitting nonchalantly on the cold stone floor, was a small nine-tailed fox. Her white fur shimmered with a silvery glow, and her eyes—supernatural gold—looked at him with absolute disdain. The energy she radiated was suffocating, though subtle. It felt like the space itself bent to her will.

"W-what...?" the masked man began, alarmed.

But before he could complete any spell, a brutal impact hit him from the side.

One of the young boys, thrown with inhuman strength, crashed into him with a sickening crunch. Both were flung across the room, slamming into the far wall hard enough to crack the stone. The sound of bones breaking and a muffled scream of pain followed.

"GHHK—ARGH!!"

Kael lowered his arm calmly—the same one he'd used to hurl the boy. His gaze shifted to the last remaining youth. The boy was trembling so violently he could barely stand. His eyes were wide, lips quivering, the vial he once held now forgotten on the ground.

Kael approached slowly, like a predator savoring the prey's fear.

Then he smiled. A cold smile. A smile that didn't belong to a man.

"How about you tell me everything?" he said, voice low but sharp as a blade. "Or I'll kill you. Slowly. You know…" his eyes gleamed blood-red, "...I've killed children before."

The boy, in shock, took a step back—and wet himself.

The sound of liquid hitting the ground echoed in the complete silence. Kael simply stared.

"Pathetic."

Meanwhile, across the room, the masked man coughed blood, struggling to rise. His cloak was torn, his body covered in bruises, but his will endured. He raised a fist, forcing the air around him to thrum with dense, ritualistic magic.

"Invocatio Fracturam…" he murmured. "Exilium... Dimensionis!"

A rift began to open behind him, spinning like a black spiral. A dimensional rupture spell. A last resort.

But before he could finish the incantation—

CRACK.

Kael appeared in front of him like a living shadow—silent and instantaneous. The masked man barely had time to raise his eyes before two crimson-glowing hands clamped down on his arms.

"Trying to leave?" Kael whispered, eyes blazing. "Not so fast."

Then he pulled.

With a wet, grotesque snap, the masked man's arms were torn from the shoulders. Blood sprayed in thick arcs, staining the floor. A scream of unimaginable pain erupted from his throat, but Kael didn't flinch. He held the bloody arms like trophies.

"This spell?" he said, throwing one of the arms into the dimensional rift, which immediately fizzled into black sparks. "Cancelled."

The masked man collapsed to his knees, gasping, his face twisted in agony, his cloak soaked in blood.

Kael crouched down, face-to-face with him.

"Now... you're going to tell me everything. Or…" he dug his fingers into the man's collarbone, "…I'll keep pulling pieces off you until there's only a mouth left—and then I'll sew that shut too."

The nine-tailed fox walked slowly to Kael's side, sitting elegantly as if watching a trivial play.

"I like when you do this," she said with a yawn. "But if you could leave at least the head... I'm curious about this idiotic cult."