The sun rose slowly, casting a quiet, indifferent light over the world. Red birds glided through the sky, landing on tall roofs as their sharp cries echoed in the streets of Ash City. Their eyes swept the streets below, suddenly freezing when they spotted a fresh corpse in a dirty alleyway.
Dark, abyssal crows hovered around the corpse, devouring it quietly.
A person passing by froze when they saw the corpse. Surprise flickered in their eyes, but then as though it was nothing unusual, their initial surprise was quickly replaced by indifference. A moment later, they started walking again as if they saw nothing.
This was the Underground of Ash City.
Seeing a random corpse on the streets was nothing unusual, if anything, sometimes seeing nothing was more unusual.
Far from this alleyway, in the Whiskerbarket's Apartment, a crimson-haired young man stepped out of his unit. His eyes calmly swept below the building, seeing a couple of homeless people loitering around on the streets.
One of them seemed to have caught his gaze, glancing back at him. Zeke frowned and stopped staring. After scanning the vicinity, he looked at his wrist and noted the time on the Herta ID.
It was still 7:37 AM and his classes in the academy started at 9:30 AM. There were still a couple of hours before then, so Zeke planned to explore the Underground a little. He turned his head slightly and glanced at the mirror, noticing something off.
"Hmm.."
Zeke adjusted the tie on his uniform slightly.
"There."
The academy's uniform consisted of a white polo layered beneath a long, dark gray coat marked with silver. A black tie hung loosely from his neck, swaying gently as he moved. Below his waist, dark gray slacks matched the coat, giving him a refined appearance.
Although he still gathered looks along the way, Zeke noticed that it wasn't as bad as before. He let out a small smile, shaking his head subtly. How ironic of him to celebrate losing others' attention. It seems he had really changed…
Zeke brushed such thoughts aside and observed his surroundings as he walked, memorizing the general direction. There were a lot of high-rises in the Underground, which made seeing over far distances close to impossible. Even navigating through the streets was difficult, but he didn't really had any destination in mind, so he was just walking around casually.
***
Zeke explored the Underground for more than an hour and then went to the academy ahead of time. It wasn't that he had already explored all of the Underground, but simply because he got tired of walking around.
Upon entering the academy, he didn't go to the main building or the training facility, but chose to check the grand library instead.
It was the only academy facility that he hasn't explored yet, it was worth a look at least.
Very soon after approaching it, he realized the grand library didn't disappoint its 'grand' title. From the outside, it was a massive tower with an ancient design, giving a timeless impression. It was bigger than both the main building and the training facility, standing over 200 meters tall.
The inside was even more impressive; an innumerable number of shelves were lined up symmetrically across the interior, filling the library with the smell of leather and paper. Wooden reading desks were placed near the walls, almost all of them occupied by the students of the academy.
The library had five floors. In the center, a large circular gap could be seend, allowing Zeke to see the upper floors from the first floor. He looked around and saw a staircase that led to the second floor, but a sign was placed in front of it that forbade students without a floor pass to go upstairs.
Zeke looked around the library for a while and then borrowed a history book. He showed his Herta ID to the librarian and took the opportunity to ask about the upper floors. The librarian answered him briefly, enlightening his thoughts.
Unlike the first floor, the upper floors had considerably fewer books, but their contents were far more precious than those on the first floor. Starting from the second floor and above, there were certain secret techniques and insights from other Rankers.
Zeke thanked the librarian and went to find a seat in the corner. The book he borrowed was called 'The History of the Blueblood Domain in Red Land', as for the reason, he was just curious since he knew about the Blueblood Domain.
After a moment of reading, he was immediately immersed in the book. He was someone who loved reading to begin with, and he liked the process of learning new things. Besides the book, Zeke also appreciated the silence in the library.
Unfortunately, he was probably going to be a rare visitor in the library since he needed to train more than he wanted to read.
'As I thought, this is about the S-rank dungeon—Blueblood.'
Zeke fancied dungeons as a child, leading him to learn a lot about them. Blueblood was one of the S-rank dungeons that was released to the world, more specifically on Red Land. It contained more than a hundred thousand humanoid blue monsters that specialized in the water element, they weren't fishmen, but a completely different kind of entity.
Once they were released to Earth, humanity fought with them for multiple years, and only won by a slight margin. But by that time, it was already too late. Once a dungeon was released to the world, its own special environment would integrate with the place it was released on, turning that place into a terrifying domain with special rules.
S-rank dungeons like Blueblood created Forbidden Domains, the most dangerous kind of domain. One of such examples was the Blueblood Domain. The author of the book wrote a detailed description of the Blueblood Domain, as though they had visited it themselves, which surprised him greatly.
'All life was blue, it was a seabed, a land of azure. The Blue Crawlers spawned continuously, and if not for the barrier set by the Sealing King, Red Land might be a different color entirely…'
Zeke was engrossed in reading for an hour. When his Herta ID rang, he realized that there was only half an hour left before his first class began. He pursed his lips and looked at the book, seeing that he wasn't even halfway close to finishing it. But against his heart, he stood up and returned the book.
'Next time, maybe…'
Zeke thought as he stepped out of the grand library. His eyes were calm as he started walking towards the main building.
Soon, no longer than five minutes, he arrived on the fourth floor and stopped in front of Class 1-D's classroom. Unlike yesterday, the class was filled with noise, leaking out in the hallway.
Zeke glanced at the doorknob, hesitating slightly. He didn't know why he was hesitating, but he thought back over the past few days and knew he was completely different from before. He took a deep breath and opened the door.
Click!
When the door opened, everyone immediately turned their gaze. Their eyes widened in shock as a brief silence fell over the room, everyone's expression mixed with surprise and disappointment.