Chapter 47: Unsealing(Castle bonus chap)

Karl reached into his storage and took out the Unsealing Token.

The moment it appeared beside the Death Stick, both items reacted.

The Death Stick began trembling in his hand as dark patterns moved faintly across its surface, while the token grew brighter with every passing second.

[Compatible Unsealing Token detected.]

[Death Stick — First Seal available for removal.]

Karl barely looked at the notification.

Unseal it.

[First Seal removal beginning.]

The token dissolved immediately and countless dark particles poured into the Death Stick, and a dense wave of Death Energy erupted around Karl as the weapon began changing.

The furniture around his bedroom trembled slightly from the sudden disturbance.

Noctis, who had been sleeping comfortably near the corner of Karl’s bed, opened one eye and stared at him for a moment before lazily shifting farther away.

Karl ignored him, strange black patterns spread across the Death Stick one after another, disappearing beneath its surface as quickly as they appeared.

Several seconds later, the trembling stopped.

[First Seal successfully removed.]

Karl immediately opened the weapon’s information.

Before he could properly check it, the System spoke.

[Host remains within First Transition.]

[Death Stick’s equipment tier remains restricted to Mortal Tier.]

Karl raised an eyebrow.

So unsealing it doesn’t increase the tier?

[Incorrect.]

[Death Stick is growth-type equipment.]

[Its equipment tier will automatically advance alongside Host’s future Transitions.]

[Removing seals may increase its equipment rank, unlock abilities and restore previously inaccessible forms.]

Karl understood immediately, he had not even completed his First Transition yet, so the Death Stick itself could not advance beyond Mortal Tier.

Its rank, however was another matter.

[Death Stick rank increased.]

[Epic Mortal → Legendary Mortal.]

Karl’s mood improved immediately.

More notifications followed.

[Death Domain strengthened.]

[New ability unlocked.]

[New weapon form unlocked: Grim Reaper Form.]

Karl’s attention stopped on the last notification.

Weapon form?

The Death Stick moved in his hand before he could ask.

Its body lengthened rapidly as black material spread from one end, extending outward before curving into an enormous blade.

Within seconds, the strange stick-like weapon had disappeared completely.

A long black shaft now rested in Karl’s hands, while a massive curved blade extended from its upper end with faint Death Energy moving along its edge.

Karl stared at it for several seconds.

A scythe... finally.

For the first time since he had received the Death Stick, its appearance actually matched its name.

The System opened the ability information.

[Grim Reaper Form]

[Death Stick may transform into its restored combat form.]

[Upon activation, Host becomes completely immune to all incoming attacks for five seconds.]

Karl’s expression changed.

Completely immune?

He read the line again, there was no limit depending on the strength of the incoming attack.

For those five seconds, attacks simply could not harm him.

Five seconds initially sounded short, but Karl had ten years of combat experience telling him otherwise.

Against genuinely powerful professionals, five seconds could decide a battle several times over.

If timed correctly, Karl could simply ignore an opponent’s strongest attack and continue moving through it without needing to defend himself at all.

Naturally, such an ability could not be used repeatedly without restriction.

Once the invulnerability was activated, Grim Reaper Form entered a one day cooldown before it could provide the same effect again.

Even then, Karl was more than satisfied.

The strengthened Death Domain had also expanded the area in which his undead received its effects, while reducing some of the burden placed on Karl when using Death-related abilities inside it.

Karl turned the scythe slightly in his hands.

Now this is what an Unsealing Token should give.

Unfortunately, everything that had happened in his bedroom over the last several minutes had not exactly been quiet.

Footsteps quickly approached from outside,karl looked toward the door just as it opened.

Mira entered first.

"What are you doing? I heard—"

"AAAAAH!"

Her sentence stopped midway as her foot had landed on something hard near Karl’s bed.

Mira looked down, the pale spine Karl had summoned earlier was bent slightly beneath her shoe.

Then it moved, its individual segments twisted as the entire thing suddenly writhed beneath her foot.

"AAAAAH!"

Karl nearly dropped the scythe.

Mira jumped several steps backward while the support undead twisted across the floor.

"What the hell is that?!"

Karl hurriedly stored it before she decided to stab the thing.

"Calm down! It’s mine!"

Mira stared at him.

"THAT DOESN’T MAKE IT BETTER!"

Leon appeared at the doorway moments later after hearing the scream from down the corridor.

He looked at Mira, then Karl, and finally at the enormous black scythe resting in Karl’s hands.

"What did you do?"

"Nothing."

Mira pointed toward the place where the spine had disappeared.

"He had some disgusting moving spine lying on the floor!"

Leon slowly looked toward Karl and sighed."what’s it!?"

"It’s an undead."

"A spine."

"A support-type undead."

"A moving spine."

"Marshal rank."

Leon paused.

"Tf...Never mind, that’s actually pretty good."

Mira looked between the two of them as though both had lost their minds.

Noctis remained stretched across the bed and had somehow already fallen asleep again despite everything happening around him.

The tiny Heaven-Eating Crow was perched nearby as well, watching the entire situation with obvious amusement.

Eventually, Mira calmed down enough to stop glaring at Karl.

"Next time you decide to leave a moving body part on the floor, warn people."

"Fine."

Karl changed the Death Stick back into its normal form and stored it away.

The three remained in the room afterward.

Arthur had forbidden Karl, Leon and Mira from leaving the Reed estate for the next six days, and after almost a month outside followed by Forgotten Cave, none of them were in much of a hurry to do anything anyway.

For the first time since their awakening, they actually had several days without an immediate dungeon, fight or other problem demanding their attention.

Leon eventually dropped into one of the chairs.

"So."

Karl looked toward him.

"So what?"

Leon leaned back.

"Which academy are we actually going to?"

Mira glanced toward him.

"You’re already assuming we’ll all go to the same one?"

Leon looked genuinely confused.

"Why wouldn’t we?"

Karl leaned back against the bed, it was something every newly awakened student in the Human Alliance eventually had to decide.

The examination six days from now was not simply something held within Ardent City.

It was the Human Alliance National College Entrance Examination, conducted throughout the Alliance at roughly the same time.

Nearly every major academy recruited through its rankings.

A student’s performance could determine which academies were willing to accept them, how many resources they would receive and which major organizations started paying attention afterward.

Naturally, thousands of academies existed throughout Human Alliance territory.

But only a handful stood at the very top.

Asterion Central Academy had remained there for generations.

Located within the Alliance’s Capital city, it accepted only a small fraction of the best candidates each year, while many of humanity’s strongest professionals had passed through it at some point.

Its current Dean made it even more interesting to Karl now.

Arthur’s words from earlier returned to him.

Only fifty-nine people in recorded history had become Anathemas before reaching Level 500.

Only three had survived and one of them was the Dean of Asterion Central Academy.

Karl became slightly thoughtful, there were other academies near the top as well.

Sovereign Academy possessed thousands of years of history and enormous influence among many of the Alliance’s ancient families.

The First Military Academy focused heavily on direct combat, battlefield command and professionals intending to enter the military or eventually serve within the Outer Domain.

Asterion Arcane Academy was particularly famous for Mages, researchers, formation users and professions requiring advanced theoretical training.

There were several others capable of competing with them depending on the profession involved.

Leon apparently needed none of that consideration.

"Central Academy."

Mira raised an eyebrow.

"That quickly?"

"Obviously."

Leon looked toward her.

"If I’m taking the national examination anyway, why would I aim for second place?"

Mira gave him a flat look.

"Getting accepted isn’t decided by what you aim for."

She had originally considered several academies that offered better resources for assassination-related professions, but everything that had happened over the past month had changed the situation considerably.

"If my ranking is enough, Central Academy would probably be the best choice."

Leon nodded immediately.

"Good."

Then both of them looked toward Karl.

"What about you?"

Karl did not answer immediately, in his previous life, choosing an academy had never really felt like a choice.

His family, Seraphina, the Vale family and the expectations surrounding his awakening had influenced nearly every important decision he made.

None of that mattered now and he had no reason to follow the same path again.

More importantly, after everything Arthur had explained about Anathemas, Asterion Central Academy had suddenly become far more interesting.

Its Dean was one of only three people in recorded history known to have survived being marked before Level 500.

Karl, Leon and Mira had all been marked at Level 99.

If there was anywhere they might eventually find useful information without blindly exposing themselves to unknown people, Central Academy was certainly worth considering.

Karl finally shrugged.

"Central sounds fine."

Leon smiled immediately.

"Then it’s decided."

Mira sighed.

"That’s not how admissions work."

Leon waved her concern away.

"We’ll deal with that after we take first, second and third."

Karl looked toward him.

"And which one of us is getting third?"

Leon became quiet.

"Actually, forget I said anything."

Karl almost laughed, there were still six days before the examination, and their final rankings would determine what choices they actually had afterward.

There was no reason to decide every detail now.

But for the first time since his regression, Karl genuinely began thinking about what would come next.