Episode-733
Chapter : 1445
But he didn't sleep. He waited.
He waited until the moon was high. Until the campus was silent.
Then, he went to the dungeon. Alone.
He unlocked Jamie's cell. Jamie was awake. He was braiding a piece of straw.
"Lloyd?" Jamie asked. "Did you bring the comb?"
"No," Lloyd said. "I brought an apology."
"For what?"
"For leaving you in here," Lloyd said. "But it was necessary. You were safer here."
"Was?" Jamie asked. "Am I not safe anymore?"
"No one is safe," Lloyd said. "The harvest is coming."
He sat down. "Jamie, I need you to think. Think hard. The gold in your room. Did anyone visit you? Did anyone have access?"
"Only the cleaning staff," Jamie said. "And... Rubaiya."
Lloyd froze. "Rubaiya?"
"She came by," Jamie said. "Last week. She said she wanted to borrow a book on fencing theory. She said she was interested in the 'geometry of the blade'."
"Did you give it to her?"
"Yes. I went to the shelf to get it. She waited by my desk."
"Your desk," Lloyd said. "Where the gold was found."
It was circumstantial. But it was there. Rubaiya had access. Rubaiya had a reason.
"Did she say anything else?" Lloyd asked.
"She asked about the sword," Jamie said. "Tom's sword. She asked if it was heavy. If it felt... alive."
"Before the attack?" Lloyd asked sharply.
"Yes. Two days before."
Lloyd stood up. His heart was pounding.
Rubaiya knew about the sword before the attack. She planted the gold. She pushed the narrative.
She was the traitor.
Or she was being set up too.
"It's never simple," Lloyd sighed.
"Is Rubaiya bad?" Jamie asked, eyes wide. "She is scary, but is she bad?"
"I don't know," Lloyd said. "But I'm going to find out."
He looked at Jamie. "Listen to me. Tomorrow, I'm going to create a distraction. A big one. When I do, I want you to be ready."
"Ready for what?"
"Ready to run," Lloyd said. "Or ready to fight. Can you fight, Jamie? Without a sword?"
Jamie stood up. He struck a pose. "I am a weapon, Lloyd. My body is a blade."
"Okay," Lloyd said. "Let's hope you're a sharp one."
He left the cell. He walked out of the dungeon.
He looked up at the stars. The web was tangled. The players were hidden.
But he had a thread. A single, golden thread leading to Rubaiya.
"Tomorrow," Lloyd whispered. "We pull the thread."
He walked back to the tower. He had to prepare. If Rubaiya was the enemy, she was dangerous. She had the [Absolute Pierce] spirit. She could cut through anything.
Lloyd touched his chest. He felt the hum of his own power. The Demon Gates. The Steel Blood.
"I can cut too," he thought.
The investigation was over. The confrontation was coming. And class was about to be dismissed. Permanently.
Lloyd Ferrum sat in his office in the Old Tower, staring at a diagram he had drawn on the wall with chalk. It looked less like a battle plan and more like a collection of angry squiggles.
"Okay," Lloyd said to the empty room. "Let's review. Jamie is innocent because he's an idiot. Daniel is innocent because he's gullible. Tulip is innocent because she's too busy organizing tea parties. That leaves... the ghost."
He was talking about the mysterious woman in the market. The dealer. The one who had vanished into thin air.
But Lloyd didn't believe in ghosts. He believed in people wearing sheets.
"Someone on the inside is helping her," Lloyd muttered. "Someone smart. Someone who knows the Academy's defenses. Someone who can deflect suspicion onto everyone else."
His thoughts kept drifting back to Rubaiya. The strategist. The woman who had been so eager to accuse Jamie. The woman who had conveniently "found" the gold in Jamie's room.
"It's too neat," Lloyd thought. "She's playing 4D chess while everyone else is playing checkers. But I don't have proof. I have a gut feeling, and gut feelings don't hold up in court. Especially when the judge is a princess with a sword."
Just then, the alarm bell rang. Again.
"Seriously?" Lloyd groaned. "Can we go one week without a magical catastrophe? Is that too much to ask?"
He grabbed his coat and ran out.
The chaos was in the Enchantment Hall this time. Students were screaming and running out of a classroom. Smoke was billowing from the windows.
Chapter : 1446
Lloyd arrived just as a girl stumbled out, clutching her wrist. She was wearing a silver bracelet that was glowing with a sickly, pulsating purple light.
"It won't come off!" she screamed. "It's burning me!"
The bracelet was tightening. It was cutting off her circulation. Her hand was turning blue.
"Stand back!" Lloyd ordered the crowd.
He didn't hesitate. He didn't wait for a plan. He acted.
He stepped forward, right into the girl's personal space. He grabbed her wrist. The cursed energy lashed out at him, trying to infect him.
"Nice try," Lloyd whispered.
He activated his [Black Ring Eyes]. His sclera turned pitch black. His irises glowed with a ghostly blue light.
"Seal," he commanded.
He didn't use brute force. He used precision. He targeted the flow of mana inside the bracelet. He placed a conceptual seal on the energy source, effectively putting a cork in the bottle.
The purple light flickered and died. The bracelet loosened. It fell off the girl's wrist and clattered to the floor, now just a piece of cold, tarnished silver.
The girl gasped, clutching her bruised arm. "Thank you... thank you, Professor."
"Go to the infirmary," Lloyd said gently. "Get that checked out."
He watched her go. Then he turned to the crowd of students and faculty who had gathered. They were staring at him. They had seen his eyes change. They had seen him stop a curse with a glance.
"Listen up!" Lloyd shouted. His voice was commanding. He decided to gamble. He decided to set a trap.
"I have found the solution," Lloyd announced, lying through his teeth. "I have discovered a method to reverse the energy flow of these cursed items. I can trace the mana back to its source. Tonight, I will perform a ritual in the Old Tower. I will find the traitor. And I will end this."
It was a bluff. A massive, dangerous bluff. He couldn't trace the mana back to the source. But the traitor didn't know that. If the traitor believed him, they would panic. They would try to stop him.
"Class dismissed," Lloyd said.
He picked up the dead bracelet with a handkerchief and walked away. He felt eyes on his back. Burning eyes.
"Take the bait," Lloyd thought. "Come and get me."
He spent the rest of the day preparing. He fortified the tower. He set up sensors. He told Mina to stay in her room and lock the door.
Night fell. The Academy was silent. Lloyd sat in the center of his lab, the bracelet on the table in front of him. He waited.
Hours passed. Nothing happened. No assassin. No shadow monster.
"Maybe I'm wrong," Lloyd thought, feeling a creeping doubt. "Maybe they didn't buy it."
Then, he felt it. Not a sound. A presence.
It wasn't coming from the door. It wasn't coming from the window. It was coming from inside the room.
Lloyd spun around.
Standing in the corner, blending perfectly with the shadows, was a figure. It was a student. A boy named Kian. He was quiet. Unremarkable.
But his eyes were glowing. Not with fear, but with a dull, yellow light.
"Professor," Kian said. His voice was wrong. Distorted. "You should not have interfered."
"Kian?" Lloyd asked, standing up. "What are you doing?"
"Kian is sleeping," the voice said. "We are awake."
Kian raised his hand. A wave of force hit Lloyd, slamming him against the wall.
"Okay," Lloyd wheezed. "Possession. Classic."
Kian didn't attack with a weapon. He attacked with his mind. Illusions filled the room. Lloyd saw the floor turn into lava. He saw the walls closing in. He saw spiders dropping from the ceiling.
"Cheap tricks," Lloyd growled. "You think you can scare me with spiders? I live with three women who want to marry me. Spiders are a vacation."
He closed his eyes. "Activate. [All-Seeing Eye]."
He opened his eyes. The illusions vanished. The lava was just stone. The spiders were dust motes.
He looked at Kian. He looked through Kian.
And he saw it.
Clinging to Kian's back, wrapped around his spine like a backpack made of smoke, was a spirit.
It wasn't a cat. It wasn't a sleek predator.
It was a leech. A giant, spiritual leech with too many eyes and a mouth full of needle-teeth. It was feeding on Kian's mana, piloting his body like a meat puppet.
"That's disgusting," Lloyd said.
He recognized the energy signature. He had seen it before.
When Rubaiya had shown him her "cat" spirit.