The Sleepless March

Far from the comfort of the Academy's enchanted walls, the land twisted. The Gravefront stretched like a scar across the continent's eastern edge—where even mana recoiled, and the dead murmured beneath every stone.

There, they emerged.

The Sleepless.

Seven figures, each taller than a man, yet thinner than hunger itself. Cloaked in dark tatters that writhed without wind, their heads were bare skulls with burning runes carved into bone. Where eyes should be, nothing but pulsing black voids.

And they moved in silence.

No words. No breath. No soul.

The lead Sleepless raised one skeletal hand, and the ground parted. Out spilled a tide of half-formed ghouls, crawling things, and corrupted birds with silver bones and shattered faces. These were the Fallowborn—failures from a thousand incomplete necromantic rituals.

They followed their masters toward one destination: the Academy.

Within the Academy, Riven stood before the Librarian, deep in the sublevels beneath the Grand Archive. Tomes levitated in a slow, swirling dance above a pool of memory-infused water.

"She's… changing," Riven said, breaking the silence. "Lira doesn't remember what she did. But something remembers her."

The Librarian didn't turn. Her cane tapped against the stone once, and the swirling tomes stilled. "Some memories are not stored in the mind, but the soul. And some souls are older than the worlds that birthed them."

"You knew about the Sleepless, didn't you?"

"I suspected." Her voice held sorrow, not surprise. "Their kind only move when the balance breaks. When something too ancient is made new again."

"Then what do we do?"

The Librarian turned, her eyes dim with age but sharp as ever. "You protect her. The way you swore to."

[System Notification: Secondary Quest Unlocked – "Nightfall Approaches"]Objective: Prepare the Academy for invasion. Defend Lira at all costs.Rewards: ??? | Failure Consequences: CatastrophicTime Remaining: 48 Hours

Riven's jaw clenched. "Two days. That's all we have."

Up in the student barracks, the atmosphere had shifted.

Kael and Sera were sparring again—this time without holding back. Every blow cracked the courtyard tiles. Every spell left runes flickering on the air like fireflies. Around them, other students gathered, watching, waiting.

"Everyone can feel it," Sera said between breaths, sword glowing with inner flame. "Something's coming. It's in the wind."

Kael nodded. "Riven will tell us when it's time. Until then… we train."

Even those who once sneered at Riven's sister now hesitated to speak her name. Something in their eyes had changed—respect, maybe. Or fear.

Inside her quarters, Lira stared out the window.

The moonlight caught the streak of pale violet now running through her hair. Her reflection no longer matched what she remembered. Her skin shimmered faintly, as if a second form flickered beneath.

In her hands, she held a shard of crystal—left behind by the Reaver's remains. It pulsed when she touched it.

"Why does this feel like… home?" she whispered.

A whisper answered—not from the room, but from the crystal.

"You are the last echo. The breath they failed to silence."

She dropped it, heart pounding.

And then—

[System Message: Soul Synchronization at 3%… Awakening Path Stabilized]

Elsewhere, in the Tower of Bellros—a fortress of ancient design built deep within the Rift—the demon-king peered into a mirror of blood and smoke.

Beside him stood a man not quite living. His form flickered with static. His eyes were blank.

"Has the Sleepless swarm reached the outer forest?" the king asked.

The figure nodded once.

"And the girl?"

"Protected. But unstable. She is beginning to… remember."

The demon-king's smile was thin, cruel. "Then she will either break… or become divine."

Lightning crackled in the skies above the Rift as he raised a clawed hand.

"Let chaos reclaim what order could not bind."

The next morning, alarm bells rang across the Academy.

Wards flared to life—light blue and golden domes rising from the spires like blooming lotuses. Professors barked orders. Students scrambled to their assigned quadrants.

Riven stood at the center, blade sheathed, eyes scanning the horizon.

The eastern treeline shifted. Birds burst from the canopy.

And then they came.

At first, it looked like mist. Then shadows. Then teeth.

The Sleepless didn't charge. They simply arrived, like a nightmare made real.

Behind them came the horde—twisted wolves, crawling bone-chimeras, flesh-knitters with a thousand limbs. Some still bore academy uniforms—students who had gone missing in the past few years.

"Hold the line!" one professor yelled.

Barrier spells arched through the sky, connecting like spiderwebs. Towers fired bursts of divine lightning. Enchanted cannons mounted on flying platforms released mana-charged bolts that tore through the first few ranks.

Still, the horde didn't falter.

[System Alert: Defensive Line Compromised – Western Wing Breach at 4%][Warning: Sleepless Entity Detected – Rank: Sovereign Threat]

And then, the lead Sleepless stepped into the courtyard.

It raised its hand.

Dozens of corpses rose—twisting, merging, screaming.

A single monstrous amalgam formed—twenty meters tall, plated in bone and screaming with fifty mouths.

Riven unsheathed his blade.

He looked to Kael. "Cover the south wall. No matter what happens… don't let them get to her."

Kael nodded, already racing off with Sera and a team of elite students.

Riven stepped forward.

[System Update: Skill Unlocked – "Soulflare: Heaven Piercer" (Prototype)]

He took a deep breath. The blade in his hand shimmered, runes igniting one by one.

"I'll be your light," he whispered, "even if the night swallows everything else."

And with a single leap, he launched himself into the fray.