The Imperial Academy.Subterranean Level 4 - Advanced Martial Arts Gymnasium.Day 2 of the New Regime - 05:30 PM.
After enduring the grueling, physically demanding obstacle courses of Professor Avalon practical combat class, followed immediately by another mind-numbing, two-hour theoretical lecture from Professor Vane, Rudeus finally had a moment of reprieve.
Or, rather, what ordinary students would call a reprieve. For Rudeus, the end of the academic day merely signaled the beginning of his true work.
Rudeus lay flat on his back on one of the padded inclination benches in the subterranean gymnasium, staring blankly up at the high, vaulted ceiling. It was currently 5:30 in the afternoon. At this hour, the massive facility was still relatively populated. Several groups of upper-class Knight Commander students were grunting through their mandatory weightlifting routines, their expensive, sweat-wicking uniforms clinging to their heavily muscled frames.
Despite his infamous reputation as the Blackfyre 'Defect', it seemed that none of them currently gave a single, solitary damn about why he was here. The unspoken rule of the subterranean gym was an ironclad code of iron and sweat: if you were down here bleeding on the mats, you were afforded a baseline level of apathy, if not respect. Furthermore, the official exemption letter bearing the seal of the Academy Council, safely tucked in his gym bag, ensured no prefect dared to question his presence.
Rudeus pushed himself up from the bench, his entire body screaming in protest. The brutal DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness) from his first midnight session had not faded; it had merely compounded with the exhaustion of the day's classes.
He walked over to the bank of heavy, kinetic-absorption treadmills.
He didn't start with a light jog. He slammed the heavy iron lever forward, instantly cranking the gravitational drag to a punishing level, and began to run.
His breathing immediately turned ragged. His malnourished, frail legs felt like they were moving through wet cement. He continuously, relentlessly used the treadmill to train his cardiovascular stamina into the absolute maximum threshold his current biology would allow. Because, from a purely tactical standpoint, that was literally his greatest, most glaring weakness: his endurance.
'If I still had my own System right now...' Rudeus sighed inwardly, the rhythmic thud-thud-thud of his boots on the heavy belt serving as a metronome for his misery.
'If I had the System, I could at least receive a tangible, dopamine-inducing notification to know if my stats leveled up. I would hear that familiar chime. [Stamina has increased by 1 point].'
He gritted his teeth, sweat pouring down his pale face, stinging his eyes.
'I miss that instant gratification. Now, the only notification I get that my body is changing is the agonizing sensation of my muscle fibers literally tearing themselves apart.'
Rudeus proceeded to run for a full, unbroken hour, completely ignoring the burning in his lungs and the alarming, dark spots dancing at the edges of his vision.
By 7:00 in the evening, the dinner bells chimed across the Academy. The gymnasium rapidly emptied out as the senior students flocked to the grand dining halls to replenish their calories.
Rudeus was finally the only one left. The silence of the cavernous room returned, heavy and absolute.
And yet, he didn't pay any mind to his solitude. In fact, he preferred it. It meant he could push himself to the absolute brink of failure without aristocratic eyes watching him collapse.
He moved away from the cardio section and approached the heavy, rune-etched barbells.
For the next three hours, he subjected himself to a gruesome, highly calculated regimen of compound lifts. He deadlifted. He bench-pressed. He executed heavy rows. Because his body was so incredibly weak, the actual weight on the bar was embarrassingly low, but the relative intensity was astronomical.
He pushed through a gruesome, agonizing three sets of squats, his spindly legs shaking violently under the cold iron.
"Haah... haah... haah... hooooh!"
Rudeus finally racked the barbell on the final rep, his arms completely giving out. He collapsed backward onto the rubber mat, gasping desperately for air, staring up at the luminescent crystals on the ceiling.
"That's... that's an improvement," Rudeus wheezed, a weak, triumphant smile touching his lips. He had managed three more repetitions today than he had yesterday. It was a microscopic victory, but it was a victory.
He forced himself to sit up, his hands trembling as he reached for his enchanted thermal canteen.
He unscrewed the cap and downed half a liter of ice-cold, electrolyte-infused water in a single, uninterrupted gulp.
"Ahh~ that's the absolute spot!" Rudeus groaned, wiping his wet chin with the back of his hand.
He rested his forearms on his knees, his crimson eyes locking onto his own reflection in the polished mirror spanning the far wall. The boy looking back at him was pale, drenched in sweat, and terrifyingly thin, but the posture had already changed. The cowering, hunched shoulders of the victim were gone, replaced by the straight, unyielding spine of a Vanguard Captain.
Rudeus looked up from his reflection to the ceiling, his mind pivoting to his overarching operational timeline.
"I need to hurry," Rudeus muttered aloud, the sound echoing in the empty gym. "Because exactly three months from now, the mandatory First-Year Dungeon Simulation will commence. But—"
Rudeus let out a sharp, cynical sigh, running a hand through his damp green hair.
"Goddamnit. If I had known earlier that the simulation was specifically structured as a competitive, practical combat tournament among the noble houses, I should have just executed my escape plan and fled this academy already. The risk of exposure is incredibly high."
He paused, a dark, dangerous spark igniting in his crimson eyes. The cynical scowl slowly melted into a predatory, chilling smirk.
"But... it's alright."
He looked back at his reflection in the mirror. He didn't see himself. He saw Aemond's smug, punchable, aristocratic face.
"Because this tournament means I can finally go directly against him, right? Under official, sanctioned Academy rules."
Rudeus saw this upcoming tournament not as an obstacle, but as a monumental, golden opportunity to beat Aemond's ass into the dirt in front of the entire Imperial Court.
He clenched his hands into tight, white-knuckled fists. The anger wasn't entirely his own. It was a burning, residual fury inherited directly from the original soul of the boy who had suffered a decade of torment in silence.
"I can finally get your revenge soon," Rudeus whispered, his crimson eyes gleaming with a terrifying, absolute promise of violence.
He pressed his hand against his chest, right over his heart, speaking to the ghost that lingered in his soul.
"Soon, I can finally deliver your revenge."
"Little brother."
***
The Crucible.Months 1 to 3.
He spent his time, his days, and his agonizingly long nights training in that subterranean gym, while the rest of his privileged classmates were out enjoying their opulent, carefree lives.
While Aemond attended lavish tea parties to consolidate his political backing, Rudeus was deadlifting until his calluses ripped open and bled onto the knurling of the bar. While Princess Veronica was busy having bespoke gowns tailored for the upcoming seasonal galas, Rudeus was running on the high-gravity treadmill until he vomited bile into the nearby wastebins.
He didn't just train his body to lift heavy objects. Rudeus spent his three months meticulously, painfully teaching this frail, aristocratic vessel how to fight.
Not how to spar. Not how to defend in a fencing tournament with padded points. He trained this body how to survive. Because survival—ruthless, uncompromising survival—was his absolute, singular goal from the very first moment he had reincarnated into this hostile world.
He utilized every single lethal technique, every dirty, pragmatic style of close-quarters combat (CQC) he had mastered during his thirty-two years as a soldier on Earth. He spent hours shadowboxing in the dark, retraining his neural pathways to execute Vanguard-standard joint locks, throat strikes, and disarms without hesitation. He visualized fighting Lycans, Void Stalkers, and arrogant Nobles, forcing his new muscles to adapt to the explosive, fast-twitch reflexes required to shatter bones.
But physical strength was only half the equation.
His most intensive, draining training sessions were purely psychological. He spent hours sitting perfectly still in the center of the mat, his legs crossed in deep meditation.
He had to learn how to completely suppress and hide his [Killing Intent].
In his past life, his killing intent was a massive, blunt instrument. It was an aura of terror that leaked out of him constantly, a side-effect of his trauma and the corrupting nature of the Black Death trait.
But in the Imperial Academy, surrounded by highly perceptive Archmages, elite royal guards, and literal Demon Generals in disguise, a leaking aura of murder was a beacon that would get him instantly killed. He couldn't afford to let anyone sense the predator lurking beneath the skin of the Defect.
So, he practiced. He gathered the cold, abyssal fury in his chest, let it rise to the surface, and then violently forced it back down, compacting it, compressing it until it was nothing more than a microscopic, invisible point of absolute zero buried deep within his soul.
He knew that this concealed intent was his ultimate trump card. When the time came, he wouldn't project an aura to scare his enemies. He would simply unleash it at the exact moment of the strike.
It would be a scalpel, not a bomb.
***
Three Months Later.The Imperial Academy.Central Atrium - Morning of the First-Year Practical Exams.
The atmosphere in the grand hallways of the Academy was entirely different today. The usual hum of relaxed, aristocratic gossip had been replaced by a tense, vibrating, nervous energy. The scent of floral perfumes was entirely overshadowed by the acrid smell of nervous sweat and polished armor polish.
Today was the commencement of the highly anticipated First-Year Practical Combat Tournament.
"Hey... are you actually ready for that practical exam today?" a young, slightly overweight noble student asked his friend, his voice trembling as he clutched a heavy stack of theoretical combat textbooks to his chest.
"Nahh, man," his friend, a tall, incredibly lanky boy with the crest of a minor barony stitched onto his blazer, replied. His mood had visibly darkened, a shadow of genuine dread crossing his face at the mere thought of failing this tournament.
"I know I have absolutely zero chance in the arena. I drew the 14th bracket. I'm up against one of the martial initiates from the Northern Marches."
Even though this technically counted as a standard, graded practical exam, every single student knew the unspoken reality. This was a public exhibition. The high-ranking nobles, the Imperial military recruiters, and even some members of the Royal Court would be watching from the amphitheater stands. He knew with absolute, terrifying certainty that if he failed in his very first fight—if he was disarmed or forced to yield in under a minute—he was completely screwed. He would instantly become a laughingstock among the other noble houses, bringing immense, unforgivable shame to his family name.
The overweight noble student looked at him and let out a long, highly sympathetic sigh.
"I-I mean... me too, honestly," he stammered, wiping a bead of sweat from his brow. "I know I'm completely screwed. My offensive casting speed is atrocious under pressure. Seriously, we should have spent our free time training in the lower levels instead of playing cards in the commons."
"I completely agree, man. If I survive today, I swear to the Goddess I'm going to start—"
Before the lanky noble could finish his desperate vow of future self-improvement, someone walking briskly down the corridor bumped heavily into his shoulder.
The impact was solid, feeling like he had just been casually side-swiped by a moving wall of granite.
"He-hey! Who the hell do you think you are—?!" the lanky noble barked, spinning around, fully intending to verbally dress down whoever had dared to break his personal space bubble.
The words died instantly in his throat.
The noble student's eyes widened to comical proportions as he took in the sight of the person he had just collided with.
It was a young man with vibrant, impeccably styled forest-green hair and striking, brilliantly sharp crimson red eyes.
But it wasn't the coloration that rendered the two nobles completely speechless. It was the sheer, undeniable physical presence of the boy.
He was wearing the standard, required dark-grey practical combat uniform, but it looked as though it had been tailor-made to contain a completely different species of human. The fabric stretched taut across an incredibly broad, heavily muscled chest and wide, powerful shoulders. The sleeves of the tunic were rolled up to the forearms, revealing thick, dense musculature where thick, vascular veins corded beneath his pale skin, pulsing with every subtle movement of his hands.
His face, previously gaunt and sickly, had filled out perfectly. The sharp, aristocratic cheekbones remained, but the hollows had vanished, leaving behind a jawline that looked like it could cut diamond. He possessed a rugged, highly masculine, dangerous beauty that could effortlessly charm any girl who happened to catch a single, passing glance of him in the hallway.
"KYAAAA~!!!"
A sudden, ear-piercing, highly stereotypical shriek erupted from a cluster of female students gathered near the nearby fountain. Several of them dropped their books, their hands flying to their flushed cheeks as they openly stared at the passing demigod.
"Woah," the overweight noble student breathed, his jaw literally hanging open in absolute awe.
His lanky friend swallowed hard, completely forgetting his anger. "What... what type of physical build is that? Is he a senior Knight Commander?"
"Why are you asking me, man? I don't even know where the gym is located!" the overweight noble whispered back, terrified the titan might hear them.
"It's a peak mesomorph type of body build, perfectly optimized for explosive kinetic output and sustained endurance," a calm, highly authoritative voice chimed in from behind them.
The two first-years turned to see a Third-Year Senior—identifiable by the gold braiding on his collar—leaning casually against a marble pillar, watching the green-haired boy walk away with a look of profound, almost fearful respect.
"Haha," the Senior chuckled, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "You first-years are completely out of the loop. You know, I almost exclusively use the subterranean gym for my advanced gravity training. And every single night, without fail, I always see that specific kid down there."
The Senior shook his head in disbelief.
"I hear from the night-shift prefects that he regularly spends his time down there grinding the iron until 1:00 or 2:00 in the early morning. Every single day. No rest days. Haah... to think he could actually achieve that level of flawless anatomical reconstruction in a mere three months. It requires a level of psychotic, borderline suicidal discipline that I have never witnessed in this Academy."
"Wh-what?! Three months?!" the overweight noble and his friend shouted in unison, their voices cracking in profound shock.
They looked at each other, a sudden, desperate fire igniting in their eyes.
"Le-let's go to the gym! Right now! We need to lock in!" the lanky noble yelled, grabbing his friend by the sleeve.
"He-hey! Idiots! What about your mandatory morning classes and your exam brackets?!" the Senior shouted with a heavy sigh of disappointment as he watched the two first-years literally drop their textbooks on the floor and sprint frantically down the hallway in the direction of the Subterranean wing. "Ugh. These impulsive brats."
Further down the grand corridor, the green-haired guy smiled warmly as his highly enhanced hearing easily picked up what the Senior and the frantic batchmates had said about him.
While the surrounding groups of noble girls were literally screaming into their hands and looking at him like a pack of starving wolves who wanted to devour him whole, the guy simply offered a casual, devastatingly charming wave of his hand toward their cluster.
"KYAAAA!!!" one of the more delicate female students screamed, her eyes rolling back into her head before she genuinely, gracefully fainted onto the marble floor from the sheer, overwhelming shock of blushing so hard.
'Finally,' Rudeus thought inwardly, feeling the familiar, comfortable weight of a fully weaponized physique. 'I finally managed to achieve my foundational build from my past life. I've hit the physical baseline.'
He cracked his knuckles, the sound sharp and crisp.
'Let's go. Second phase of the master plan—'
He clenched his fists, feeling the dense, coiled power resting beneath his skin.
'—Success!'
The incredibly handsome, heavily muscled, green-haired man was none other than Rudeus Maximilian Blackfyre.
And he was no longer a defect.
***
Lecture Hall 4B - Department of Arcane Theory.08:00 AM.
Rudeus confidently strode into the lecture hall, not a single second late.
He didn't skulk in the shadows. He walked down the center aisle with the heavy, unhurried gait of an apex predator patrolling its territory.
As he made his way to his usual seat in the third row, a profound, eerie hush fell over the entire classroom. Dozens of aristocratic heads turned. Most of his classmates were staring at him with a mixture of absolute confusion, disbelief, and poorly concealed awe. The whispers started immediately, buzzing like a hive of disturbed bees.
Rudeus ignored them all. He reached his desk, pulled his chair out with a casual scrape of wood, and sat down.
Two rows behind him, sitting in his usual spot, Aemond Blackfyre was currently undergoing a massive, catastrophic internal crisis.
Aemond was staring at the back of his half-brother's thick, incredibly broad shoulders, his icy grey eyes wide with absolute, unadulterated shock. He knew precisely who that guy was, even though his physical silhouette was completely, utterly unrecognizable from the scrawny, hunched boy he had tormented for a decade. He definitively knew who it was because of his signature, vibrantly unique green hair and those terrifying crimson red eyes that had haunted his nightmares for the last three months.
'Thi-this is absolutely impossible! Ho-how?!' Aemond screamed inwardly, his mind frantically rejecting the reality before him.
He couldn't accept it. His weak, pathetic, crying brother—the defect he was supposed to step on to elevate his own status—was suddenly built like a veteran gladiator.
Aemond clenched his teeth so hard they audibly ground together. He clenched his fists beneath his desk in impotent, terrifying anger.
Over the last three months, terrified by the killing intent Rudeus had shown him with that pencil, Aemond had panicked. He had utilized a massive sum of his personal, untraceable allowance to secretly hire three different cells of mid-tier assassins from the lower districts of the Capital to quietly eliminate his brother while he traversed the Academy grounds at night.
But every single one of those assassination contracts had failed.
The assassins had simply vanished into thin air. No bodies were found. No ransom notes were sent. They just ceased to exist. Until this very moment, Aemond still didn't have a single clue who was actively protecting his brother in the shadows.
(Aemond, of course, was blissfully unaware that the Head Maid of the East Wing, acting as the Deathstalker, had personally intercepted and systematically slaughtered every single amateur assassin that dared to step foot near the dormitories, ensuring her valuable intelligence asset remained untouched.)
Aemond took a deep breath, forcing his panic down, replacing it with his deeply ingrained, toxic arrogance.
Then, a dark, cruel smirk spread across his handsome face.
'Right! There is the mandatory practical exam tournament tomorrow!' Aemond laughed inwardly, his eyes locking onto Rudeus's broad back. 'That's exactly right! So what if he managed to lift some heavy iron and change his physique? Muscles don't equate to magical prowess or high-tier combat technique! He is still a magically crippled defect!'
Aemond leaned back in his chair, his confidence returning in a rush of arrogant adrenaline.
'I will completely, publicly humiliate him right in front of everyone! The Emperor's emissaries will be there! Father's retainers will be there! I will break his legs in the arena and prove once and for all that a Defect is nothing but a Defect!'
Aemond eagerly, desperately expected to humiliate his brother in front of everyone, exactly as he had always done when they were young children playing in the courtyard.
But, completely unbeknownst to the arrogant, sheltered teenager, this Rudeus was entirely different. He wasn't a boy playing with wooden swords. He was a thirty-two-year-old war veteran who had spent the last three months honing a body specifically designed to execute lethal Vanguard CQC tactics.
In short, Aemond was spectacularly, monumentally fucked.
Suddenly, the heavy oak doors of the lecture hall slammed shut.
The whispers died instantly.
Professor Vane walked into the classroom.
However, unlike his usual, impeccably groomed appearance, the Senior Arcanist looked remarkably haggard. His usually pristine crimson robes were slightly frayed at the edges, and one sleeve bore the faint, distinct scorch mark of a highly concentrated holy-fire spell. Deep, dark bags hung under his cold eyes, and his severe features were drawn tight with an unspoken, constant stress.
Vane stepped up to the podium, dropping his grimoire with a heavy, exhausted thud.
"Okay, class, let's dispense with the pleasantries and start—"
Before Professor Vane could finish his opening sentence, his eyes swept over the third row. He stopped dead. His cold eyes widened slightly in genuine surprise.
"Wh-who are you?!" Vane demanded, pointing a long, bony finger directly at Rudeus.
Rudeus leaned back in his chair, raising a casual, incredibly confident eyebrow.
"You seriously don't recognize me, Professor?" Rudeus asked, his deep, resonant voice easily carrying across the silent hall.
"Ahh... no? Do I know you? Are you a newly transferred student from the Northern Martial Academy?" Professor Vane asked, his tone laced with genuine, unfeigned confusion. He scanned the boy's massive physical frame and confident posture, finding no match in his mental roster of the pathetic first-year class.
Rudeus let out a long, highly theatrical sigh, shaking his head.
"It's me, Professor. Rudeus Blackfyre. Remember? The student who was precisely two minutes and fourteen seconds late exactly three months ago?"
Vane froze. He stared at the boy, his sharp eyes scrutinizing the green hair and the crimson eyes. The magical signature was incredibly faint, almost non-existent—exactly like the Defect's—but the physical vessel holding it was entirely unrecognizable.
"Ahh." Professor Vane finally exhaled, giving a slow, almost appreciative nod.
"Nice growth, Student Rudeus," Vane stated, his voice dry but carrying a rare hint of genuine professional respect. "Highly commendable discipline. It seems you have put your nocturnal hours to efficient use."
"Thank you, Professor," Rudeus nodded back smoothly.
"Then let us officially start the class. Everyone, open your theoretical textbooks and turn immediately to page 275. We are discussing the volatility of abyssal mana conduction."
As the sound of rustling pages filled the room, the hushed, frantic murmurs of the students immediately resumed.
"Tha-that's actually Rudeus? The notorious Defect of the Blackfyre Duchy?" one of the female students whispered fiercely to her desk mate, her face flushing as she stole a sidelong glance at his broad shoulders.
"I mean... he literally just told the Professor he is Rudeus Blackfyre, right? So we really shouldn't question it. Let's just open the book already before Vane docks our points," her friend replied, her hands shaking slightly as she frantically started searching for page 275, though her eyes kept drifting back to the third row.
The murmuring was loud and highly disruptive, but surprisingly, Professor Vane let it entirely slide. He wasn't paying attention to the class's lack of discipline. He was staring intently down at his own notes, his mind clearly preoccupied with far more pressing, lethal matters.
Rudeus, too, completely ignored the whispers of his peers. Instead, his crimson eyes were focused entirely on analyzing Vane's haggard, damaged appearance.
'Seems he has already been heavily found out by the Night Ravens,' Rudeus deduced, a cold, highly satisfied smirk playing on his lips. 'And he has clearly suffered a significant amount of damage from their initial assassination attempts. Amanda has been busy.'
Rudeus casually shifted his gaze toward the front corner of the classroom.
His smirk widened into a full-blown, predatory grin.
He didn't see Gavin. The twitchy, bespectacled lapdog's desk was completely empty.
'I bet my entire allowance that pathetic little traitor was already snatched up, thrown into a dark cell, and brutally interrogated by the Deathstalker by this point,' Rudeus laughed inwardly, feeling a profound sense of tactical accomplishment. 'Haha... that motherfucker absolutely deserves it. Fucking snitch.'
Rudeus pulled his textbook from his satchel, opening it casually to the required page. But his mind was already jumping ahead to the next tactical hurdle.
'I nearly forgot about this guy,' Rudeus thought, his eyes sliding slightly to the right, catching Aemond glaring at him from the corner of his eye.
'Seriously, I bet my life what he is thinking about right now is a grand, elaborate plan to make me utterly humiliated in front of everyone in the practical exam tournament tomorrow. He wants to break me.'
Rudeus closed his eyes for a second, feeling the dense, explosive power resting in his newly forged muscles.
'Sorry, brat. This Rudeus is not the same crying punching bag anymore. After three months of absolute hell, I have already successfully conditioned this body to reach the exact same physical baseline level as my younger self back on Earth, back when I was constantly getting into brutal, bare-knuckle street fights in my Senior high school.'
He opened his eyes, staring blankly at the dense magical text on page 275.
'Which essentially means... I could easily, effortlessly beat you into a bloody coma tomorrow without even needing to use a fraction of my killing intent.'
Rudeus leaned forward, resting his chin on his hand, his thoughts taking a slightly more frustrated, analytical turn as he began to actually read the lesson.
'Though, honestly... it is incredibly weird and frustrating for me that I still cannot actively awaken my [Black Death] trait at will. Or should I even still call it a trait if it functions more like a locked, conditional ability for now?'
Rudeus had spent his entire three months not only training his physical body and retraining his combat reflexes to survive, but he had spent countless hours meditating, trying desperately to force the dark power to manifest. And yet, his power, the [Black Death], remained stubbornly dormant, a heavy weight sitting uselessly near his core.
He had tried everything he could think of. He had pushed his body to the brink of physical exhaustion to trigger a survival response. He had even, in a moment of supreme tactical desperation a month ago, deliberately called Amanda back to the subterranean gym and goaded her into attacking him, hoping the sheer, lethal pressure of an assassin's blade would force the trait to awaken to protect him.
He had suffered another gruesome, bloody "lesson" from her trench knives for his trouble, nearly losing an eye in the process, but the trait remained completely locked. It simply refused to answer his call. It needed a specific, emotional or conceptual catalyst that he hadn't yet encountered in this peaceful academy setting.
'Sigh. Whatever. The physical gains will have to be enough to crush a spoiled teenager,' Rudeus thought, shaking off the frustration.
'Let's just start reading and actually focus on this incredibly boring lesson. Because tomorrow morning is the official start of the Midterm Practical Examinations... and I genuinely do not want to get a zero on the written portion of Professor Vane's theoretical examination, even if he is a Demon General currently fighting a covert shadow war against Imperial assassins.'
Rudeus picked up his freshly sharpened pencil, ready to take notes on the volatility of abyssal mana, looking exactly like a model, albeit heavily muscled, aristocratic student.