**Chapter 77: Attendance**
The blood sky began to thin at first period.
By the time the second bell rang across Willowbrook High, the red had faded to a sickly pink, then to ordinary morning blue with only a faint metallic aftertaste left in the air. Students who had spent weeks pretending the sky was normal blinked up at it like they had forgotten what weather looked like.
The teenagers went to school anyway.
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**Willowbrook High – Front Gates**
Kevin and Wyatt arrived together, the Mythical Matrix quiet under Kevin's uniform for the first time in days. Bangu already had his kit bag over one shoulder; the soccer game was tomorrow — Wednesday — and the coach had threatened to bench anyone who skipped training. Jackson walked with his hood up, mist carefully locked down. Carlton (Cryogenesis) moved through the senior corridor like a boy who had already graduated in every way that mattered; Grade 13, final term, ice kept strictly under the skin. Amadou (Meteor Boy) matched his pace, residual cosmic heat making the air above his hair shimmer.
Zayelle and Amon — Faar No Besa, the Harbinger of Life — walked a little apart from the others. Coming back from the Underworld had left marks. Their shoulders brushed once. Neither moved away. The chemistry was quiet, complicated, and still tasting of death and green shoots.
Lucifer Jr. and Koa entered through the side gate like students who had never been anything else. Ivan and what remained of his crew kept to the far edge of the courtyard, Lycer in human form for daylight hours. Tobias and Gabriel Morningstar occupied opposite ends of the same bench, black fire and Celestial light both carefully dimmed.
Jayden Lautalo felt the new presence before he saw him.
Takahashi Suguru — Gedanshi, transfer paperwork still warm — stood near the noticeboards with the calm posture of someone who had already measured every exit. Jayden's skin prickled. Something about the new boy sat wrong in the same way El Pombero sometimes sat wrong under his own ribs.
Takahashi turned, smiled politely, and walked straight up to Bangu.
"You're Bangu," he said. "Most athletic student in the school. Vertical leap, stamina, the way you read space on the pitch. I've been looking forward to watching you play tomorrow."
Bangu blinked. "Do I know you?"
"Not yet." Takahashi's smile did not reach his eyes. "I'm Takahashi Suguru. Transfer."
Jayden watched the exchange and filed the off-ness away for later.
---
**Corridor Outside the Staff Room**
Lupin froze so hard the students behind him nearly walked into his back.
Henrik Helsing sat on the low wall outside the staff room, scrolling through a phone like any other older teenager. Same cold grey eyes as the files. Same quiet hunter posture.
Lupin grabbed Huxley and Ri Kwon Jae and dragged them into an alcove.
"That is Vancouver Helsing's younger brother," Lupin hissed. "Henrik."
Ri Kwon Jae's face went flat. "As in… the Monster Hunter family."
Huxley's super smell flared. He inhaled once, carefully, and nodded.
"Yes. Silver, old blood, and that specific polish they use on the blessed rounds. It's him."
The three of them stared across the corridor at the boy who should not have been sitting in their school like the blood sky had never happened.
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**Library – Third Period**
Kevin and Wyatt were meant to be researching secondary sources. Instead Lancelot and Ignis slid into the chairs opposite them and spoke in low voices.
"Jennifer the chemistry teacher," Lancelot said. "Body jumper. She drains the hosts when she leaves. The only way to end her is to burn the original body — the first one she ever wore."
Ignis's hands flickered with contained flame. "We have a geneticist working the residual traces. We're going to find it."
Godfrey and Daniel leaned over from the next table.
"We'll help," Godfrey said. Daniel simply nodded, already looking like he was calculating routes and alibis.
Kevin started to answer — then the last of the red light outside the library windows died completely. Ordinary blue sky stared back. Wyatt frowned.
"The blood sky's gone."
A chair scraped.
Hemostro — the false Dracula, the one who had once worn the Blood Amulet and the red sky like a cape — stood between the history shelves holding a library book on advanced trigonometry. He looked younger than the legend he had tried to steal. Almost like a student who had been held back several centuries.
Vladimir the elf stared at him from the mythology section.
"What the fuck are you doing here?"
Hemostro lifted the book like evidence.
"You thought I was a grown adult? I still need education, dumbass."
The library went very quiet.
---
**Guardians of Destiny Society – Headquarters, Same Hour**
While the teenagers sat through lessons and pretended the world had stabilised, the adult and near-adult board assembled in the main hall.
Sasha Moya leaned against the arm of Dustin Krenjsi's wheelchair, voice low and amused. Dustin — paralysis blood, paralytic blades that unfolded from the chair's frame like silver confessions — smiled back with the calm of someone who had already accepted the new terms of his body and decided to stay dangerous anyway. The flirting was quiet, practical, and somehow still soft in the middle of the war room.
Nathan briefed the legion. Cain and Abel stood near the central table with the End Blade still quiet at Cain's side. Lucifer and Michael occupied opposite ends of the same conversation. Grug had finally spoken the seed planter's residual name into the record and then refused to repeat it. Sebastian kept one crystal eye on the medical feeds where Sally recovered. Bane's satellites swept clean blue sky and found it suspicious.
Then the temperature in the hall changed.
The Empty arrived.
It still wore Keisha Leister's corpse like a well-cut coat, but it had brought company. Behind it came The Emptiness — not a second body, not a twin, but the expanding absence that travelled with God's sister the way a shadow travels with a body that has decided it no longer requires light.
The Guardians moved as one.
Cain drew the End Blade. The weapon's finality made the air around it forget how to echo. Abel stayed at his shoulder. Michael's wings snapped open in white-gold fire. Lucifer's expression went sharp and almost delighted. Nathan's illusions layered the hall into killing grounds. Sasha's voice cut across the chaos assigning legion elements. Dustin's chair unfolded its paralytic blades with a soft, lethal click. Frost exploded across the far wall as Carlton's residual presence in the building answered the threat. Telekinetic pressure — Bandile was already on-site — slammed into the advancing absence hard enough to crack the floor.
The Empty smiled with Keisha's mouth.
The Emptiness simply spread.
The full fight that had been waiting since the gate opened finally arrived inside the walls that were supposed to keep the world safe.
Outside, above Willowbrook High, the sky stayed ordinary blue.
Inside the headquarters, the concept of ending and the concept of absence met the only blade that could unmake them, and the legion, the first brothers, the fallen, the loyal, and every power that had answered the red light threw themselves into the gap.
The school day continued three kilometres away, bells ringing, students moving between lessons, Bangu checking the time until tomorrow's soccer game.
The two realities shared the same morning for a little longer.
Then the headquarters walls began to scream.
**End of Chapter 77**