Chapter 57: Thomas’s anger

Cedric let out a low, chilling chuckle, his calm expression never wavering as his golden eyes bored straight into Thomas’s face.

"Oh, I see what this is," Cedric murmured softly, his elegant voice carrying a suffocating, passive mana pressure that made the dark sand around their boots vibrate. "You must think that you are exceptionally special now, don’t you, child? Well, news flash, boy, you are still scum. And you just managed to thoroughly infuriate someone with the absolute power to destroy you and your whole family."

The thousands of High-blood spectators leaned forward in a breathless, suffocating silence, waiting for the administrative lord to crack the freshman’s skull open.

Thomas slowly shook his head, his mask returning to its absolute, unshakeable calm as his dark eyes locked onto the president’s pale features. He stood perfectly rigid under the crushing weight of the man’s dennsse mana output, his flat voice cutting cleanly through the whistling gale.

"Who said you are superior to us?" Thomas asked, his voice carrying an unyielding, razor-sharp grit. "What is the true standard of that? Is it the simple fact that you all have last names and we do not? Is it because your houses hoard all the good things for yourselves and deliberately limit our capacity for growth?"

He took a slow, firm step forward into the grit, completely ignoring the collective gasps echoing from the front noble rows.

"If we were fundamentally lesser as you all choose to believe, then the Awakening crystal was supposed to reject our souls or not work for us at all," Thomas stated smoothly, pointing his calloused finger back toward the giant stone spire in the center of the ring. "But it seems like in front of the crystal, we are all exactly the same. We have those you call lessers who awaken Grade S talents, and we have High-bloods born with low-grade talents. I have personally fought some of you High-bloods on this sand, and you do not bleed golden. So in my eyes, you are all just a bunch of arrogant pricks that rule Samra with complete tyranny."

"Die," President Cedric whispered coldly.

With a sudden, explosive motion that completely bypassed human reaction thresholds, Cedric lashed out, his palm striking Thomas flat across the face. The sheer, unyielding force of the slap didn’t just break his guard, it launched his entire body across the black sand like a bullet, slamming him violently into the jagged stone walls of the arena.

CRACK!

The impact was sickening. Thomas’s chest cavity violently buckled, multiple bones fracturing instantly as a fountain of blood erupted from his mouth. He slid down the rock wall, dragging against the wet grit as he collapsed onto his knees, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps.

The entire Arena fell into a absolute, suffocating quiet. Thousands of High-blood students gaped from their stone benches.

Julian let out a low, condescending scoff from his tier, adjusting his silver-rimmed glasses with absolute, cold indifference. Without a single word, he stood up from his seat alongside Rei, the two slowly walking toward the exit tunnels, seemingly unbothered by the lesser’s imminent demise.

Cedric slowly began to approach him, his dark crimson robes floating lazily around his ankles as his body levitated three feet off the ground.

"The weak should know their absolute place," Cedric stated calmly, his golden eyes locking onto the broken freshman with supreme, absolute disgust. "You brought this ill fate upon yourself, child. "

With a sharp, fluid rise of his right hand, Cedric yanked Thomas off the ground without physically touching him. Thomas was now suspended in the air. Thomas was bleeding profusely from his mouth, his nose, and his ears, the dark crimson fluid dripping rhythmically onto the black grains below.

Yet, through the white-hot haze of pure physical agony, Thomas slowly forced his jaw to widen into a dangerous, dark grin. His eyes locked onto the platinum-haired lord with an unyielding, predatory focus.

"You better... make sure I am dead, old man," Thomas rasped out, his voice carrying a razor-sharp grit despite the dark blood bubbling from his split lips. "Or else... you will live to regret every single second of this day."

Cedric let out a cold, irritated scoff, his golden gaze flashing with an absolute finality. "Were those your last words?"

He manipulated the vacuum to pull Thomas’s floating vessel closer, until their faces were mere inches apart. Leaning in, Cedric lowered his voice into a chilling octave, whispering a private declaration intended for only Thomas to hear.

"I am going to slaughter your entire family," Cedric whispered with a cruel, satisfied grin. "And I am going to do it exceptionally slowly, making sure your parents and siblings crawl before they burn."

Thomas’s dark eyes violently widened into circles of pure, unadulterated anger, his muscles thrashing against the invisible restriction lines as a catastrophic spike of adrenaline flooded his system. ℴ

Cedric laughed loudly, his face twisting into a cold, terrifying mask of absolute authority as he reached his bare hand forward, gripping Thomas’s skull with a crushing grip. "Goodbye."

He began to squeeze as he prepared to rush Thomas’s head into a fine paste.

"Kneel!"

A deep, commanding, yet intensely familiar voice violently shattered the silence of the tower summit.

The single spoken word carried a catastrophic, law-defying weight that instantly plummeted the air pressure across the entire stadium to absolute zero. Before President Cedric could even process the sound, a mountain of dense, suffocating mana befell directly upon his shoulders. The immense spiritual pressure was so absolute that his defensive shields flatlined instantly, the council lord failing to even resist as his body was violently crushed flat onto his stomach against the black sand.

With Cedric driven face-first into the dirt, the invisible vacuum constraint dissolved entirely. Thomas fell heavily back onto the black sand, coughing up a spatter of dark fluid as his lungs greedily pulled in the freezing wind.

High above the field, the deep, ancient voice continued to echo off the vaulted stone pillars, its tone dripping with an absolute, terrifying weight as it now addressed the remaining administrative staff.

"I am deeply disappointed in you two," the voice stated coldly.

Down on the elevated marble platform, Director Seraphina of House Pint and Dean Talia of House Erengale instantly went perfectly pale. Without a single microsecond of hesitation, the two powerful council members violently fell to their knees, bowing their heads low against the marble railing as their bodies trembled in pure, unadulterated terror.

"Apologies... Headmaster," they whispered unanimously, their voices cracking as the supreme ruler of Blackspear Academy finally appeared.

President Cedric lay pinned flat on his stomach against the cracked bedrock of the arena floor, his nose pressed directly into the loose black grains as the mountain of suffocating mana continued to grind his spine. He couldn’t lift his fingers. He couldn’t muster a single spark from his year five core to resist the supreme pressure. Every single student in the vaulted stone benches sat frozen like statues, their breath completely caught in their throats as they looked down at the absolute domination of a council lord.

Thomas lay a few paces away on his side, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps as the dark crimson fluid continuously leaked from his ear canals onto the sand. Beneath his eyelids, his translucent blue system lines were flickering erratically, fighting to stabilize his internal tissue damage while his dark eyes remained wide open, staring unblinkingly into the empty air above.

[ INITIALIZING SYSTEM DIAGNOSTIC OVERRIDE ]

* Physical Host Vitals: 9% (Severe Multi-Bone Fractures / Internal Trauma)

* System Priority: Stabilizing Core Circuits

The deep, commanding voice of the Headmaster rolled across the tower apex once more, its ancient resonance carrying an icy, terrifying authority that cleanly silenced the howling high altitude gale.

"There will be an entirely new set of rules starting from now on," the Headmaster stated, his words dripping with a heavy, law defying weight that made the stone pillars hum. "Tomorrow morning, your homeroom instructors will fill you in on the complete parameters of the new rules. The old doctrines of this institution have run their course, and the balance has flatlined."

Down on the elevated marble platform, Director Seraphina and Dean Talia kept their heads bowed low against the stone railing, their bodies shaking violently as they waited for the ultimate judgment.

"It is about time I permanently purge the bad seeds from this academy," the Headmaster’s voice dropped into a lethal octave that gave the entire stadium actual chills. "And that decree applies directly to all of you who participated in the unrefined cruelty upon the students you choose to call lessers. The shield of your status is officially revoked within these walls."

A cold, primal terror visibly washed across the thousands of gold trimmed High blood rows. The nobles looked at each other with pale, trembling faces, realizing that the sovereign hand holding the absolute power of Blackspear Academy had just completely embarrassed them.