Chapter 73: Eight Months Ago

Eight months ago, life still felt ordinary enough to believe in.

Kassia lived with Daemon in a small rented place on the quieter side of Ashford. The rooms were not luxurious, but they were warm.

In the mornings, sunlight came through thin curtains. In the evenings, the smell of simple cooking filled the kitchen. It was not a rich life, but it was theirs.

She wanted to marry him.

She wanted a child with him.

She wanted a future that did not depend on constant worry about rent, cores, and whether the next dungeon assignment would be enough to survive another month.

Daemon was still an E-Rank Hunter then. Every day, he struggled just to get regular dungeon entry. Gates preferred higher ranks.

Parties preferred proven names. He worked hard, came home tired, and still smiled at her like the world had not pressed its full weight on his shoulders yet.

Kassia was a C-Rank healer.

She had not awakened any bloodline at that time. Her value came from steady hands, clean recovery work, and the simple fact that people trusted her in the field.

She took jobs with different hunter parties whenever she could. Some teams were polite. Some were rough. Most only cared that she kept them alive long enough to finish the run.

Still, their days moved forward in a fragile kind of peace.

They spoke about dreams the way ordinary people did.

A better home.

Stable income.

A place in a top guild.

A life where money stopped being the first problem every morning.

Kassia believed if one of them broke through first, the other would not be left behind.

The day everything changed began like any other dungeon assignment.

It was only a C-Rank gate. Nothing glamorous. A mid-level team. Manageable monsters. Standard formation.

Kassia stayed near the rear line, watching vital signs, closing wounds, pulling exhausted hunters back from the edge of collapse.

Then one of their front-liners took a heavy hit.

Blood spread too fast.

His breathing turned shallow.

Kassia dropped to her knees beside him and pressed both hands over the wound. Healing energy flowed from her palms as always — controlled, familiar, limited.

Then something inside her broke open.

Heat flooded her veins.

Not ordinary mana.

Something deeper.

Her vision sharpened. Her pulse thundered. For one terrifying second, she felt as if her body was no longer only human, as if something ancient had turned over beneath her skin and decided to breathe.

The wound under her hands closed far faster than it should have.

The hunter gasped back to full consciousness.

The whole party stared at her.

Kassia stared at her own hands.

She had awakened.

A bloodline.

In the middle of a C-Rank dungeon, with blood still on her sleeves, her entire future shifted.

Her first thought was Daemon.

She wanted to run home and tell him everything.

She wanted to see his face when he heard it.

Then another thought followed quickly behind the first.

What if she secured a real future first?

What if she entered a top guild, gained status, gained money, and then told him?

Would that not make the happiness even greater?

Would that not finally give them the life they kept talking about?

So she stayed quiet.

Not because she did not trust him.

Because she wanted the surprise to matter.

In the days that followed, Kassia applied to every major guild she could reach.

Including WHA.

Some replied slowly.

Some offered cautious interest.

Apex Guild answered fastest and with the heaviest offer.

More money than she expected.

Better medical support.

A formal healer track.

And one clause that made her heart tighten with hope:

if she signed, she would be allowed to recommend another hunter for recruitment consideration.

Daemon.

That one line decided everything.

If she entered Apex, she could pull him in after her. No more begging for low-rank gates. No more watching him come home exhausted from scraps of opportunity. They could rise together.

She told herself it was practical.

She told herself it was love.

She told herself she would explain everything on their third anniversary, when the surprise would be complete.

So she signed the documents without telling Daemon the full truth yet.

Not out of cruelty.

Out of hope.

Then came the second condition.

Before official placement, Apex wanted her verified by their chief researcher.

Dr. Adrian.

They said he led a confidential medical project connected to newly awakened healers. They said her bloodline reading was unusual. They said the verification was only physical qualification nothing more.

Kassia hesitated.

She had not even officially started yet.

Something about the request felt too quick, too smooth, too carefully wrapped in friendly language.

But Apex’s offer still glowed in her mind like a door out of poverty.

If she refused now, would the opportunity disappear?

If she accepted, could she finally change both their lives?

In the end, she agreed to meet him.

Dr. Adrian worked in an underground building near Apex Guild’s main tower.

The entrance looked ordinary from outside. Inside, the air grew colder with every level down. White lights. Clean corridors. Silent doors. It did not feel like a public medical wing. It felt sealed.

Adrian himself looked to be in his fifties. Calm eyes. Controlled posture. A friendly smile that made the room feel less dangerous than it was.

"You must be Kassia," he said. "Thank you for coming."

He spoke gently while he worked.

Blood samples.

Awakening readings.

Pulse response.

Mana circulation tests.

Physical compatibility scans.

None of it was openly painful. That almost made it worse. Everything happened with professional politeness, as if the process itself had nothing sharp hidden underneath.

After a few hours, Adrian set his instruments aside and smiled again.

"We will send the results by email," he said. "For now, continue your regular dungeon clearances. Once everything is confirmed, we will contact you regarding the project."

Kassia nodded, relieved more than she wanted to admit.

"That’s all?"

"For today," Adrian replied. "Yes."

She left the underground building believing she had taken one careful step toward a better life.

She did not know she had already stepped into a trap.

The moment the outer door sealed behind her, Adrian’s friendly expression faded.

He activated a private line.

Leonard Valen answered quickly.

"Well?" the Apex Guild Master asked.

Adrian looked down at the fresh reports glowing across his screen awakening data, bloodline markers, cellular regeneration patterns that should not have existed in any ordinary C-Rank healer.

A slow breath left him.

"She is the one," he said.

"Are you certain?"

Adrian’s eyes remained fixed on Kassia’s sample readings.

"Yes. Her awakening and blood structure match what you have been waiting for."

On the other end of the line, Leonard Valen smiled.

And somewhere above ground, Kassia walked back into the city still thinking about anniversaries, marriage, and the man she wanted to surprise.