Crizz stumbled free from the pull, his limbs trembling as though they had been submerged in ice water for hours.

His breath came in ragged bursts, panic etched deep into his features, but instinct screamed at him to get as far from that swirling cloud of destruction as possible. He didn't look back.

The moment his boots hit clear ground beyond the churning smoke, he bolted, practically tripping over his own feet, his robes dragging like chains behind him.

The sound of his retreating footsteps was frantic, mismatched—a far cry from the proud stride he had worn when approaching Vonjo earlier.

The gate area was dead silent save for the slow settling of dust.

The thick veil of smoke still swirled where Vonjo had been buried under that crushing wave of attacks.

Teachers stood with hands still faintly glowing from the remnants of their curse techniques, their breathing uneven, their eyes straining against the haze.

Somewhere in the back, a younger instructor whispered, almost hopefully, "Maybe… maybe that did it."

But the hope was fragile.

It took a long, dragging moment before the air began to clear.

The dust swirled outward in lazy spirals, revealing the jagged cracks in the courtyard floor, the scorch marks, and the embedded shards of stone. And there—standing in the dead center as if he had been there the entire time—was Vonjo.

Untouched.

Not a burn on his clothes, not a speck of ash clinging to his shoulders. His posture was loose, casual, his hands shoved lazily into his pockets as if he had merely been waiting for the smoke to lift so they could see him.

His gaze swept over the crowd of stunned teachers, and he tilted his head slightly, lips curling into an almost bored grin.

The bullet comments ignited instantly—only he could see them, scrolling like a digital tide at the edge of his vision:

[CrimsonTiger45]: LOL they actually thought that would work?

[GhostPeanut88]: This is peak comedy—teachers teaming up just to look stupid.

[DeadlyBeanSprout]: Bro's basically immortal. You don't kill Vonjo; Vonjo kills you.

[MurderDumpling77]: Just pack up and go home, clowns.

[BloodAndBoba]: HAHAHAHA they threw the whole school at him and he didn't even flinch.

It went on, relentless and mocking:

[SharkBoyXD]: Did they forget his skill name? ENDLESS. DOOM. You can't "end" endless.

[HexNoodles]: Someone get them a dictionary.

Vonjo's grin twitched wider, and he casually lifted a hand in greeting. "Yoh," he said simply, his voice slicing through the tense quiet like a knife through silk.

The teachers didn't respond.

Some clenched their fists tighter, others glanced around as if unsure whether to retreat or prepare for another attack.

That uneasy stillness stretched until a sound shattered it.

From the far edge of the courtyard came a raw, strangled scream.

Heads snapped toward it. Crizz stood there, or rather, collapsed against a pillar, clutching at his chest with both hands as if something inside him had been violently ripped away. His eyes were wide, glassy, darting around like a trapped animal's.

"I… I can't—" His voice cracked, high and trembling. "I can't feel it! My curse energy—where is it?!"

Panic laced every syllable, his tone spiraling higher with each word. He tried again, closing his eyes, summoning every ounce of concentration he had honed over decades. He pushed, willed, demanded the energy to flow. Nothing. Not even a spark.

"No, no, no!" He slammed a fist into the wall beside him, desperation flooding into rage. "It's not—It's not working! Where is it?! I can't feel it, I can't feel anything! This—this isn't—"

Each attempt was louder than the last, his voice cracking as the truth sank in deeper with every failed effort. His hands shook violently, his breathing turned ragged, and a strange emptiness began spreading across his face, replacing panic with something worse—pure dread.

The other teachers exchanged uneasy glances. A few stepped toward him, muttering to one another. And then, almost as one, they turned toward Vonjo.

"What did you do to him?" one demanded, voice tight.

Vonjo tilted his head, his smirk returning.

"You," another teacher barked, "what exactly have you done?"

Even the principal's voice had lost its usual controlled edge. "Speak. Now."

Vonjo let the silence stretch a beat too long, letting their nerves wind tighter before finally shrugging. "I turned him into a mortal."

Gasps rippled through the gathered crowd.

He chuckled at their expressions, a low, almost lazy sound at first, but it quickly picked up into something sharper. "What's with those faces? Ohhh, you thought your curse energy was permanent, didn't you? Thought it was untouchable? Cute."

In the corner, Eugene froze. He knew that tone. He'd seen it yesterday, but he was also speechless to it. After all, right before Vonjo had stripped several people bare of their power, sparking the city lockdown and dragging Eugene and his father into a mess that had nearly cost them everything. But Eugene stayed silent. This was not the moment to speak.

Vonjo, meanwhile, spread his hands as if about to deliver a lecture. "It's simple, really. Curse energy isn't some mystical, immortal gift. It's just fuel—fuel that runs through channels in your body, stored in places you've trained to hold it. What happens if I reach in and drain that storage? You run dry. And what happens when I don't just drain it, but collapse the channels themselves?"

He tapped his temple with one finger. "You stop being a curse user altogether. No regeneration. No recovery. Not unless you start from scratch like some wide-eyed novice—assuming you even survive long enough to do that."

He took a step forward, his gaze locking on Crizz. "Your curse core is gone. Hollow. You're just a man now—a mortal who can't even light a candle with a thought."

Gasps turned to stunned silence. Some of the teachers looked almost ill.

Vonjo grinned wider, baring his teeth. "Honestly, I should charge for this service. There's something satisfying about watching someone go from snarling in my face to realizing they're just… ordinary. It's almost poetic."

And then—he laughed.

It started as a low rumble, shoulders shaking, and then erupted into a full, unrestrained fit.

He doubled over, gripping his sides as if the sheer absurdity of the situation was physically overwhelming him. His laughter was jagged, wild, the kind that made the hairs on the back of your neck stand up because you couldn't tell if it was genuine joy or the edge of madness.

"Ohhh, the look on your face" he wheezed between laughs. "Like a child who dropped his only toy into the ocean! Priceless! Absolutely priceless!"

The sound echoed through the courtyard, filling the space that had been silent moments before. No one moved. No one dared.

The principal, a silver-haired man whose eyes were usually stern but steady, now looked almost unrecognizable—his brows knotted, jaw tight, voice simmering with an anger he rarely unleashed.

Vonjo, of course, wasn't intimidated in the slightest. He stood there with a cocky half-smile, arms folded, his posture screaming defiance.

His gaze darted lazily from one furious teacher to another, like a cat in a room full of barking dogs, not a shred of fear in his eyes.

The murmur of outrage broke into a low roar as one of the older instructors took a step forward, their aura flaring. But before anyone could act, Eugene cut through the tension like a blade.

"Please, calm yourselves," Eugene said, bowing his head respectfully to the teachers. His tone was measured, almost pleading, but his voice carried enough weight to be heard clearly over the rising noise. "I understand your anger, but this isn't the way—"

He didn't even get to finish.

"Calm down?!" one of the teachers snapped, his voice sharp as broken glass. "You expect us to stay calm after what he's just done?"

"Do you even understand the consequences, student?" another barked, her fingers curling into her sleeves as if holding herself back from casting a spell right then and there.

Vonjo gave a short, derisive laugh, the sound slicing through the heated air. He stepped forward, not toward Eugene, but toward the crowd of furious teachers, his eyes gleaming with dangerous amusement.

"If you're that angry," Vonjo said casually, "then by all means… attack me. Go ahead."

A few of them actually twitched at his words, their auras spiking.

"I'll even make it worth your while," Vonjo continued, his grin widening, voice dropping to something darker. "Hit me, and I'll turn you into normal humans. Permanently."

The words landed like a hammer blow. The hallway seemed to shrink, the silence that followed more suffocating than the shouting from moments ago.

Several teachers instinctively took a step back, as if distance alone could shield them from the threat.

Normal humans.

It was a fate worse than death for a curse sorcerer. Losing your powers meant losing your place, your identity, your purpose. You became just another vulnerable, powerless being—someone who could neither fight the demonic threats nor protect the barrier between their world and hell.

Even the most reckless among them hesitated now. The dangerous glint in Vonjo's eyes wasn't bluff; they all knew it.

The principal's voice broke the frozen moment. "What will happen now?" he asked, his tone stripped of his earlier anger. It was low, grim, carrying a weight that seemed to settle over everyone present. His eyes locked on Vonjo, but the question was for the entire hall.

"We needed Crizz," the principal continued, his voice tightening. "And we needed his help. He was one of our few remaining powerhouses—one of the veterans capable of guiding newly awakened curse users before they lost control."

At the mention of Crizz's name, the tension in the room shifted. Several teachers lowered their gazes, their anger bleeding into something heavier: dread.

"And now," the principal said, his voice dropping to a near whisper, "he's nothing but a normal human."

The unspoken truth hung between them: without Crizz, without others like him, they were crippling their own defenses at the worst possible time.

Outside the Academia's walls, trouble was already brewing. The bullet comments streaming from the crowd's crystal feeds reflected the growing panic among spectators.

—"Vonjo's fucked."

—"Barrier's cracking—why's he playing games right now?"

—"We literally need every curse sorcerer we've got."

—"A teacher's gone human… who's gonna train the next batch?!"

—"We're running out of time!"

And they were right to panic. The barrier between humans and hell wasn't just a metaphor—it was a real, fragile construct, one that had begun to splinter in ways even the experts couldn't fully repair.

Every time a piece of it weakened, the stench of sulfur grew stronger in the air, and the shadows in the corners of the world seemed to move just a little closer.

The cracks were widening faster now.

When the barrier broke, there wouldn't be a trickle of monsters—there would be a flood.

Humanity had been clinging to survival because of a fragile balance: curse sorcerers standing at the walls, veterans like Crizz leading the charge, keeping the newly awakened from burning themselves out or turning into the very things they fought against.

Without enough mentors, those new powers would flare wild, uncontrolled, creating more chaos than protection.

And that was just the visible threat.

In the places where the cracks in the barrier had already deepened, hell's influence was seeping into human hearts, coaxing out the darkest impulses, feeding on envy, rage, greed—turning human sins into fuel for something far worse.

The result? Demonoids.

They were born not from magic experiments or rituals, but from the twisting of human souls under hell's touch.

A man's jealousy could grow until it warped his flesh into scales and claws.

A woman's spite could sharpen her teeth and turn her laughter into a predator's snarl. The stronger the sin, the stronger the monster.

And lately, they were multiplying.

Every day, reports came in from the outskirts: more Demonoids appearing, more settlements wiped out before help could even arrive.

Cities that had once been safe zones now kept watchtowers manned around the clock, not for armies, but for the crawling, flying, shrieking horrors that had once been people.

The Academia's own walls were beginning to feel the strain. Every rumble in the distance could have been another crack in the barrier or another Demonoid pounding on the outer gates.

And now Vonjo had removed one of their key defenders from the board.

The principal's knuckles whitened as he gripped the edge of his desk, his voice quieter now but edged with desperation. "We're running out of teachers. Out of leaders. Out of time. Every hour, the situation outside worsens, and inside, we're crippling ourselves."

A heavy silence followed. Even the younger instructors, who moments ago had been ready to strike, now shifted uneasily. The gravity of their predicament pressed down on them like a stormcloud.

Vonjo, for once, didn't have a ready retort. His grin had faltered, replaced by something unreadable. Maybe it was dawning on him—just how deep the damage went.

The principal turned away, rubbing his temple as if warding off a headache, while the other teachers exchanged grim looks. The truth was, none of them had a solution. Even if they found someone to replace Crizz's teaching duties, it would take years for them to reach his level of mastery.

Meanwhile, the cracks in the barrier weren't going to wait.

Vonjo looked around at their faces, saw the fear and the uncertainty. Then, in a voice that was almost too casual for the moment, he finally spoke.

"That's all?" he said, tilting his head slightly. "I'll replace him."