Kaelan had retreated to the rooftop to breathe.

  The backlash effect was still pounding in his head—but this time, it wasn’t the core of the problem.

  He had felt something else.

  A чуж чуж чуж.

  An external pulse.

  Brief. Poorly contained.

  As if someone had pushed against the territory from the inside without knowing how to do it properly.

  His Resonance vibrated without overflowing—uneasy, like a strained ear trying to identify a distant sound.

  Kaelan leaned against the railing and let the cold wind hit his face. It didn’t calm him. It didn’t fade. It stayed there, alert, as if something were rehearsing a call it didn’t yet know how to complete.

  He sighed.

  “…Why can’t you just be normal for one day?” he muttered.

  “You’re being too loud.”

  Kaelan startled and nearly lost his balance.

  He turned.

  Koneko was standing behind him, leaning against the wall, eating a pack of chocolate cookies. She looked like she’d been there long before he arrived.

  As always.

  “K-Koneko…” He swallowed. “How long have you been there?”

  “Long enough,” she replied flatly, chewing.

  Kaelan scratched the back of his neck.

  “Sorry if I was… bothering you.”

  Koneko watched him with those golden eyes that always seemed to see through layers.

  “You’re not the problem.”

  Kaelan stiffened.

  “Then…?”

  Koneko lifted a cookie and pointed it at his chest.

  “Your aura.”

  A brief hollow sensation opened in his stomach.

  “It’s vibrating,” she continued. “But not like at the temple. It’s not exploding.”

  Kaelan leaned his back against the wall, exhausted.

  “Yeah… I noticed. But I don’t know why.”

  Koneko took a few steps forward. She didn’t invade his space—just close enough that he didn’t feel alone.

  “There’s something strange in the air at the school,” she said.

  Kaelan looked at her.

  “You feel it too?”

  Koneko nodded slowly.

  “It’s not just magic,” she added. “It’s like… accumulated pressure. Emotions that don’t go away. That just keep circulating.”

  Kaelan swallowed.

  That fit too well.

  Koneko lifted her gaze to the orange sky over Kuoh.

  “Rias isn’t okay. Akeno is restless. Kiba is tense. Issei is holding himself back too much.”

  Kaelan clenched his teeth.

  “And me… I make noise.”

  Koneko looked straight at him.

  “You’re not a problem.”

  The words hit harder than he expected.

  “You just react,” she added, “when something isn’t balanced.”

  Kaelan let out a short, bitter laugh.

  “Sona looks at me like I’m a walking bomb.”

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “You could explode,” Koneko said bluntly. “But you don’t want to.”

  Kaelan raised his head.

  “How are you so sure?”

  She tilted her head slightly, as if it were obvious.

  “Because you worry about who you’d hurt.”

  He opened his mouth—but no words came.

  Koneko kept eating. Then, without ceremony, she held out another cookie.

  “Here.”

  Kaelan took it. It was the first time she’d ever offered him something like that.

  “Thanks.”

  “If you pass out,” she said, “it’d be annoying.”

  Kaelan smiled—this time, genuinely.

  “Thanks anyway.”

  Koneko walked toward the door. Before leaving, she stopped.

  “Arverth.”

  “Yes?”

  “If the noise gets worse… tell me.”

  Not if it explodes.

  Not if you lose control.

  If it gets worse.

  Kaelan nodded.

  “I will.”

  She left.

  Kaelan stayed alone on the rooftop.

  But he didn’t feel alone.

  “I’d tell you,” he murmured, “but you’re going to the Underworld soon for the Rating Game. You won’t be here.”

  For the first time in days, his Resonance vibrated softly.

  Not alert.

  Not tense.

  As if something had stopped pushing… for now.

  Lunchtime passed normally for almost everyone.

  For Kaelan, it didn’t.

  The moment he stepped into the main building, a pulse crossed his chest.

  Not pain.

  Not fear.

  Presence.

  Thm.

  Kaelan froze.

  Saji bumped into him from behind.

  “Hey! Watch where you stop, glowstick!”

  Kaelan pressed a hand to his sternum.

  “Didn’t you feel that?”

  “Feel what?” Saji grumbled.

  Kaelan hesitated.

  “Nothing. Must be… my aura again.”

  Saji rolled his eyes.

  “Great. Another excuse for the president to inspect you like a defective appliance.”

  Kaelan didn’t reply.

  Because that pulse wasn’t his.

  It was the same tone as before.

  The same kind of vibration that appears when someone pushes at something they don’t understand.

  Like a clumsy attempt.

  Like a call made wrong.

  Something inside the territory had pulsed again.

  And his Resonance had recognized it before he had.

  Twenty minutes later, Tsubaki was waiting for them, her magical tablet already active.

  Sona stood in front of the three-dimensional map of the Sitri territory, arms crossed, expression still.

  “Sorry to interrupt your lunch,” Tsubaki said in her usual tone, “but there’s been another anomaly.”

  Saji raised both hands skyward.

  “Another one? It’s been what—five hours since the last one?”

  Sona didn’t look at him.

  “This time,” she said, “it wasn’t a backlash effect.”

  Kaelan felt the air tighten.

  “It was a momentary drop.”

  “A drop in what?” Kaelan asked.

  Tsubaki expanded the hologram.

  One section of the territory was dark. Not unstable. Not damaged.

  Shut down.

  “Dimensional flow,” she explained. “It’s as if a section of the territory… ceased to exist for an instant.”

  A chill ran up Kaelan’s spine.

  “What does that mean…?”

  Sona looked directly at him.

  “That something interrupted the continuity between this plane and ours.”

  Saji frowned.

  “But that doesn’t happen. Connections are stable. Natural. Monitored.”

  “Exactly,” Sona replied. “They don’t fail on their own.”

  Tsubaki added, without drama:

  “The interruption lasted 0.3 seconds.”

  Saji scoffed.

  “And that’s bad?”

  Tsubaki didn’t blink.

  “It’s enough to dismantle a portal.”

  She paused.

  “…Or for something to try to form—and fail.”

  Silence fell.

  Kaelan felt a pulse in his chest.

  Thm.

  Thm.

  Sona narrowed her eyes, watching him.

  “Arverth.”

  He stiffened.

  “Yes, Sona-sama?”

  “Your aura reacted before we received the report.”

  Tsubaki was already taking notes.

  Kaelan lowered his gaze.

  “I don’t know what’s happening to me. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize,” Sona said. “You’re not causing this.”

  Kaelan looked up.

  “Then…?”

  “Your Resonance is detecting an early alteration,” she continued. “Not the event. The intent behind the event.”

  Saji tilted his head.

  “Intent?”

  Sona nodded slightly.

  “This doesn’t feel like an attack. Or an invasion.”

  She looked at the map.

  “It feels like an attempt.”

  Kaelan swallowed.

  “An attempt at what?”

  Sona didn’t answer immediately.

  The portal opened with a dry snap.

  Cold struck them as they crossed.

  There were no visible cracks.

  No magical residue.

  Nothing out of place.

  And yet…

  The air was dead.

  Kaelan took a step and stopped.

  “This…” he murmured. “It doesn’t respond.”

  “What doesn’t?” Saji asked.

  Kaelan frowned.

  “My aura. It’s like… there’s no echo.”

  Tsubaki checked her device.

  “This is where the drop occurred. All flow was interrupted for 0.3 seconds.”

  Saji crossed his arms.

  “I still don’t see the problem.”

  “Because you’re thinking in terms of force,” Sona replied. “Not precision.”

  Kaelan closed his eyes briefly.

  “It feels like…” He searched for words. “Like someone shouting underwater. It doesn’t reach—but it moves everything.”

  Sona watched him with genuine attention—not clinical.

  “Is your Resonance being pushed?”

  “No,” Kaelan said. “It’s being… contained.”

  Tsubaki looked up.

  “That matches the pattern.”

  “What pattern?” Saji asked.

  Tsubaki turned the tablet.

  A sequence of blue points appeared in the air—the anomalies of the last twenty-four hours.

  Not scattered.

  Not chaotic.

  Aligned.

  “They aren’t isolated events,” she said. “They’re imperfect repetitions.”

  Kaelan felt a knot form in his stomach.

  “Like… rehearsals?”

  Sona didn’t deny it.

  “Like attempts to reproduce something they don’t fully understand.”

  Saji’s eyes widened.

  “Reproduce what?”

  Sona closed the map.

  “A forced connection.”

  The air seemed to tighten.

  “Not a full portal,” she added. “Not yet.”

  She looked at Kaelan.

  “Something is probing the limit. Testing where the fabric gives.”

  Another internal pulse struck him—stronger.

  Not fear.

  Recognition.

  “And you,” Sona continued, “are reacting because your Resonance doesn’t amplify. It perceives.”

  Saji frowned.

  “So… he’s not the problem?”

  “No,” Sona said. “But if this continues, he could become part of the phenomenon.”

  Kaelan swallowed.

  “How?”

  Sona was honest.

  “If someone learns to use what he senses before we do… they could use him as a reference.”

  Silence fell again.

  Finally, Tsubaki spoke.

  “President. The pattern has an endpoint.”

  Sona looked at the tablet.

  “Where?”

  “At the edge of the territory,” Tsubaki replied. “Right before the portal network to the Underworld.”

  Kaelan felt cold.

  “It’s a route…”

  “No,” Sona corrected. “It’s an error repeating in the same direction.”

  Saji muttered,

  “Like something is learning…”

  Sona nodded.

  “Exactly.”

  She looked at Kaelan one last time.

  “And your Resonance is detecting the error before it stabilizes.”

  Another pulse.

  More urgent.

  Not a call.

  A warning.

  Something imperfect. Something learning.

  The breach doesn’t come without warnings.