Chapter 320: The Seal Must Have Broken

Place: Agency Headquarters

The officer's eyes filled with tears.

"Captain Raven..."

Her voice broke before she could finish. She swallowed hard, trying to maintain the discipline expected inside the command center, but the words that followed still came out trembling.

"Captain Raven is dead."

For several seconds, the entire command center fell silent.

Dozens of officers had been speaking only moments earlier. Communications from different cities had overlapped across the room, keyboards clicked continuously, and massive screens displayed battle reports from throughout the country. Now, however, it felt as though someone had suddenly cut the sound from the entire room.

Sara's eyes widened.

"What...?"

She stared at the Shadow Corps officer, almost certain she had heard incorrectly. Raven wasn't some ordinary field captain who could easily be overwhelmed during an invasion. Sara knew exactly how capable she was, especially when equipped with the Shadow Corps' combat resources.

"How can Raven be dead?" Sara demanded, stepping toward the officer. "Are you serious?"

The woman nodded, tears slipping down her cheeks.

"Yes, Chief."

She hurried toward one of the monitoring stations and brought the Shadow Corps tracking system onto the central screen. A series of names appeared alongside biometric readings gathered from the soldiers' equipment.

Sara's expression slowly changed.

Most of the readings were gone.

Several names were already marked with no detectable heartbeat, while the few remaining signals showed critically unstable conditions. Some heart rates were dangerously low, others fluctuated erratically, and only four active readings remained around the last known battlefield.

Then Sara saw Raven's name.

No heartbeat.

No movement.

Nothing.

Sara's fist slowly tightened.

"How...?"

She stared at the screen, struggling to make sense of what she was seeing.

"How is that possible?"

No one answered.

Sara turned sharply toward the officer.

"Raven is far stronger than an ordinary demon. She should be capable of fighting threats around the Upper Blood level, especially with her equipment." Her expression hardened. "So how the hell did an entire Shadow Corps unit get wiped out?"

The officer lowered her head.

"Chief, we...."

"Tell me who she fought," Sara interrupted. "I want everything. What demon attacked them? When did the battle begin? What happened to the unit before communications were lost?"

Before the officer could answer, someone else reacted.

"No..."

Sister Mary had been standing nearby, but the moment she heard Raven's condition, all the color disappeared from her face.

Her thoughts immediately went somewhere else.

Yuuta.

She rushed toward the monitoring station.

"What happened to Yuuta?"

The officer looked at her.

"Tell me about Yuuta first," Sister Mary demanded, her voice beginning to shake. "Is he alive? What about Elena?"

The Shadow Corps officer's expression became even more painful.

"We don't know."

Sister Mary froze.

"What do you mean you don't know?"

"Communication with Captain Raven's unit was completely cut off during the battle. We still receive limited biometric data from some Shadow Corps equipment, but we don't have direct visual confirmation of the Supreme Commander's family." She looked toward the screen. "At the moment, only four signals at the scene are still showing life. Everyone else from the deployed Shadow Corps unit is either confirmed dead or no longer transmitting."

Sister Mary's lips parted.

"No..."

Her hands began trembling.

"No, that can't be right. Check again."

"Saint...."

"Tell me he's alive!"

Her voice echoed across the command center.

The officer couldn't answer.

Sara's eyes widened as the full situation finally struck her.

Shit.

Only minutes earlier, she had believed the invasion was finally approaching containment. More than a thousand demons had been killed, most major attack zones were coming under control, and Erza was dealing with Leviathan. The Agency could finally begin shifting its attention toward the larger question of the ritual Erika had reported.

And now Raven was dead.

Her Shadow Corps unit had been nearly annihilated.

Yuuta and Elena's conditions were unknown.

Sara felt a chill run through her.

If something happened to Yuuta...

She didn't even want to imagine what would happen when Erza found out.

"No."

Sara immediately turned toward the central command floor.

"This takes priority over everything else."

Several officers looked toward her.

Sara slammed one hand against the command console.

"Send every available unit toward Captain Raven's last known location in Yuno City. Secure the Supreme Commander's family first. Yuuta Konuari and Elena are now priority rescue targets."

The command center immediately came back to life.

"Yes, Chief!"

"I don't care whether they're combat units, evacuation units or support personnel," Sara continued. "If they are close enough to reach Yuno City and they're not currently protecting civilians from an immediate threat, redirect them. Contact every captain operating within range."

"Yes, Chief!"

Operators immediately returned to their stations. Fingers flew across keyboards as communication channels were opened across the Agency's surviving network.

One officer activated an emergency command frequency.

"This is Agency Headquarters. All command centers operating near Yuno City, acknowledge immediately."

Responses began arriving one after another.

"Eastern Command receiving."

"Southern Unit receiving."

"Third Regional Command receiving."

"Yuno perimeter units receiving."

The officer looked toward Sara.

Sara gave a single nod.

The emergency order went out.

"This is a Priority Command issued directly from Agency Headquarters. All available combat personnel within operational range of Yuno City are to redirect immediately toward the coordinates being transmitted now. This order applies to all available ranks and divisions, from local field units to captain-class personnel."

Across the country, radios carried the same message.

Soldiers still moving through damaged streets heard it through their earpieces. Captains overseeing evacuation zones received new coordinates on their displays. Agency vehicles that had been returning from completed battles suddenly changed routes, while nearby command centers began identifying every unit that could safely be redirected.

The message continued.

"Captain Raven of the Shadow Corps has fallen. Her unit has suffered catastrophic casualties, and communication with the protected targets has been lost."

Several soldiers listening to the transmission went silent at the mention of Raven's name.

Then came the order that mattered most.

"The Supreme Commander's husband and daughter remain inside the affected zone. Their current condition is unknown."

Back at headquarters, Sister Mary covered her mouth with one trembling hand.

Sara stared at the enormous map of Yuno City as more and more unit markers began changing direction toward a single location.

The officer's voice spread through the Agency network.

"Priority One: locate and secure Yuuta Konuari and Elena. Repeat—locate and secure the Supreme Commander's family immediately."

One after another, acknowledgments flooded the command center.

"Orders received."

"Redirecting now."

"Unit moving toward Yuno City."

"Coordinates confirmed."

Sara's fists remained clenched as she watched the response spread across the tactical map. Only minutes ago, the Agency had been fighting an invasion across the country, but now an entirely new emergency order was spreading through its ranks.

Find Yuuta.

Find Elena.

Reach them before it was too late.

"Chief!"

Another voice suddenly cut through the command center.

Sara turned sharply toward one of the headquarters monitoring officers. The woman was staring at her screen with an expression that immediately made Sara uneasy. Her hands moved rapidly across the controls as warning symbols began appearing across several monitors.

"What is it?"

"We've detected an unknown threat."

Sara's brow furrowed. "Unknown?"

"Yes, Chief. The system can't identify the energy signature." The officer swallowed before looking back at her. "But the estimated threat classification is... Calamity Level."

Sara's eyes widened.

"What?"

The people around the officer stopped what they were doing. Several heads turned toward her station as though they had misheard the classification.

Sara immediately approached.

"Where?"

"Yuno City."

That answer made the tension inside the room rise even further.

"Put it on the main screen."

"Yes, Chief."

The enormous central display changed immediately. The tactical map disappeared, replaced by a live energy analysis of Yuno City. At first Sara couldn't understand exactly what she was looking at. The system displayed countless readings from fires, damaged equipment, residual demonic energy and ongoing battles throughout the area.

But one reading completely overwhelmed everything else.

A massive concentration of unidentified energy had suddenly appeared within the city.

It was dense.

Far too dense.

The Agency's detection system attempted to analyze it repeatedly, yet every attempt returned the same result.

ENERGY SIGNATURE: UNREGISTERED

THREAT ESTIMATION: CALAMITY LEVEL

Sara's eyes widened.

Is this what wiped out Raven's unit?

Her gaze hardened as she stared at the enormous reading.

"Run it through the database. Match the frequency against every registered energy signature we have."

"Yes, Chief."

The officer's fingers moved rapidly across the controls.

Several seconds later, her expression changed.

"Chief..."

"What?"

"There are actually two major energy signatures concentrated at the location."

Sara frowned.

"Two?"

"Yes. One is demonic. Extremely powerful, but definitely demonic."

The officer pointed toward the second reading.

"But this one..."

ENERGY SIGNATURE: UNREGISTERED

"The system can't identify it at all."

Sara's expression hardened.

Another monster? Now?

Two monsters.

One demon.

And something else entirely.

Before she could issue another order, she heard a trembling voice beside her.

"Yuuta..."

Sara turned.

Sister Mary was staring at the screen.

Her face had gone pale.

"No..." she whispered.

Sara's eyes narrowed. "Sister Mary?"

The Saint didn't respond. She continued staring at the readings as though the numbers on the screen had confirmed something she had desperately hoped never to see.

"No, it can't be..."

"Sister Mary." Sara stepped toward her. "What is it?"

Sister Mary's hands began trembling.

"The seal..."

Sara froze. "What?"

Mary stared at the impossible reading.

"Could the seal have broken...?"

She took an unconscious step backward.

"No... that shouldn't be possible."

Sister Mary took an unconscious step backward. Her breathing had become noticeably uneven as she stared at the enormous concentration of energy covering the screen.

"No... no, we have to go there. We have to get there quickly."

Sara watched her carefully.

She had known Sister Mary for long enough to understand just how unusual this reaction was. The Saint had witnessed things that would leave ordinary people unable to sleep for the rest of their lives, yet Sara could barely remember seeing her genuinely frightened.

Right now, however, Sister Mary was afraid.

Not nervous.

Not worried.

Afraid.

Sara looked back at the screen.

"Are you telling me that Calamity-level reading is coming from Yuuta?"

"No, it can't be..." Sister Mary whispered again, almost as if she were trying to convince herself. "It shouldn't be possible."

"Saint."

Mary finally looked at her.

Sara's expression became serious. "Is that human causing this?"

For several seconds, Sister Mary said nothing.

That silence was enough to make Sara's stomach tighten.

"We need to reach him," Sister Mary finally said. "Now."

Sara had questions far too many of them but this wasn't the time to demand answers. Raven was dead, most of the Shadow Corps unit had been annihilated, Yuuta and Elena's conditions were unknown, and now an unidentified Calamity-level energy source had appeared at almost the exact same location.

Something had happened there.

Something catastrophic.

Sara turned toward the command floor.

"Prepare a combat unit immediately!"

"Yes, Chief!"

"I want every available piece of Calamity-class containment equipment prepared for deployment. Heavy combat equipment, suppression equipment, emergency barriers—everything we can move."

Operators immediately began issuing orders.

Sara continued, "Warn every lower-ranked unit already approaching the area. Nobody enters the immediate threat zone without authorization. Establish a perimeter first."

"Yes, Chief!"

"And prepare the memory-erasure teams," Sara added. "If civilians witnessed anything classified during this incident, we deal with that after we've secured the area."

"Understood!"

The headquarters erupted into movement once again. Orders were transmitted, equipment teams were mobilized, and the enormous screen continued flashing warnings as the unknown energy reading remained concentrated over Yuno City.

Sara turned back toward Sister Mary.

The Saint still hadn't moved.

Her eyes remained fixed on that single point on the map.

Inside her mind, an old warning had returned.

The Elf Queen.

Sister Mary remembered what she had been told, and with every passing second, those words became harder to dismiss. There had always been something inside Yuuta that could not simply be treated like ordinary power. Something that was never supposed to be pushed carelessly toward the surface.

Yet tonight, Yuuta had been pushed further and further.

The invasion.

The demons.

The deaths around him.

Raven.

And now Elena.

Sister Mary's breathing caught.

She didn't know exactly what had happened to Yuuta in Yuno City, but she understood one thing with terrifying clarity.

He had been pushed into grief.

Deep, unbearable grief.

And if that grief had truly broken the seal...

"We have to hurry," Sister Mary whispered.

Sara glanced toward her.

Mary's trembling hands slowly curled into fists as she stared at the Calamity-level reading.

"We have to reach Yuuta before it's too late."

To be Contiuned...