Chapter 731: Left In Awe (1)
Back within the Dark Knight Academy, the Eastern Grand Hall had fallen into a silence so complete that even the faint hum of the suspended Myst lamps seemed louder than it should have been.
The massive chamber, which had spent the last several days filled with quiet analysis, measured discussions, murmured evaluations, and occasional sharp commentary from instructors watching their students struggle through Nalim, now felt as if every voice in it had been stolen at once.
Dozens of magical screens still floated throughout the hall, each displaying different students scattered across the realm, but for once, almost none of those screens mattered. No one was watching Maxwell reinforcing himself near the ravine. No one was studying Sheila’s methodical movements across the frozen riverbank. No one was making notes on Ariana’s cautious avoidance of direct confrontation, nor Dylan’s increasingly chaotic attempts to somehow survive through wit, luck, and enough destruction to make any instructor sigh.
Every eye in the hall had been drawn to one screen.
Liam Hunter’s.
The screen had already shifted into playback, replaying the events from the moment Liam had appeared between Charlotte and the Berserker, shielding her from the descending claw that should have crushed her into the forest floor.
From there, the image continued forward, showing the explosion of flame that had torn them both away from the Berserker’s strike, the reveal of the evolved Sync-class demon through the smoke, and the way its dark red eyes had fixed on Liam as if the rest of Nalim no longer mattered.
The hall watched as the fight escalated into something that none of them could comfortably call an assessment anymore. It was no longer a student surviving a hostile realm. It was no longer a reckless encounter between a gifted second year and a dangerous demon.
What unfolded on that screen was a battle that belonged somewhere else entirely, something closer to what experienced knights and elite combat instructors expected from high-level field operations rather than a sixteen-year-old student in the middle of a mid-semester test.
The screen replayed Liam being struck through the forest the first time, then rising again, then meeting the Berserker with hybrid javelins formed from flame and shadow. It replayed the moment he launched the demon through the trees, beating it from one section of the forest to another with explosions erupting from each impact.
It replayed the river explosion where the aquatic Advanced Horror was destroyed beneath the water, followed by Liam’s return with his left arm glowing white-orange, his entire presence sharpened into something dangerous and unfamiliar.
Then came the latter part of the fight, the part that made even the most seasoned instructors lean forward without realizing it. Liam’s movements had changed completely. His body, injured beyond what should have allowed continued combat, began moving with a horrifying clarity.