The Prince had left. That fact alone should have brought relief, and yet, the silence he left behind felt heavier than his presence ever had. The Avery estate had returned to its usual rhythm: servants moving like shadows through the halls, the distant, muffled laughter of Niva and Alden somewhere in the gardens, and the low hum of an old house settling into the night.
Normal. Peaceful. Boring.
But Ray couldn’t shake the tension. Dinner had been... awkward. Not explosive, not openly hostile, but polite. It was the kind of politeness that wrapped sharp things in silk and smiled while doing it.
Cassian Draegor had sat at that table like the world had already bent itself around him long ago and simply hadn't realized it yet. And Elaine—Ray exhaled slowly—Elaine had been a masterpiece of composure. She’d navigated the conversation effortlessly, deflecting the Prince’s barbs with an elegance that made Ray feel like a bull in a china shop.
Watching her was impressive. It was also unsettling.
Ray had noticed something tonight, clearer than ever: Elaine never reacted emotionally first. Everything was measured. Every word was a move on a board. Even her warmth felt curated. Not fake, just... precise.
Ray rolled onto his side, staring at the darkened window. Being near Elaine was dangerous. Not because she was malicious, but because she was the epicenter of the world’s attention. Rowen, Lucien, the Prince—they all gravitated toward her like moths to a flame.
And Ray? Ray was just the guy standing in the blast zone, trying to survive Academy training without dying in a ditch.
He laughed quietly to himself. “So this is what being a protagonist’s fiancé feels like,”
He pushed himself up and sat on the edge of the bed, rubbing his face.
The Fingers.
That revelation still sat in his gut like a cold stone. In every RPG he’d ever played, seeing end-game content this early was a sign that the difficulty curve was broken. Or worse—it meant the world was speedrunning toward a disaster he wasn't leveled for yet.
Ray glanced down, summoning his status screen. It flickered into existence, glowing softly in the dark room.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
STATUS — USER: RAY MELBORNE
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NAME: Takahara Kenji (Ray Melborne)
AGE: 15
LEVEL: 8
EXP: 12 / 100
HP: 25 / 115
STM: 10 / 70
ATTRIBUTES:
? STR: 17 (+8)
? AGI: 14 (+4)
? VIT: 20 (+6)
? DEX: 12 (+4)
? INT: 13 (+2)
? WIS: 11
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NEW TRAIT UNLOCKED:
ASH CIRCUIT — VEIN II: FOUNDATION
A corrupted/altered Fire Vein.
Type: Unknown
Effect: ???
Stability: UNSTABLE
Resonance: EXTREME
Synchronization: 12.00
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Progress. Real, measurable progress. He had been stuck at Level 4 for such a long time, and now he was Level 8. Academy training and sparring had given him minimal EXP; the leveling had been a agonizingly slow crawl. For a gamer like Ray, that was pure poison.
It was clear now: fighting monsters was the only way to move the needle. When he got the chance, he would have to find Kaelen, the Guild Master, his brother-in-law and figure out how to become an adventurer. He needed to speed-run his growth and catch up.
Compared to the "Fingers"—monsters in human shape who deleted entire border regions—he was still grinding slimes while the raid bosses were already being deployed.
He let the screen fade.
The Prince was gone, the estate was safe, and the Festival was coming. A whole month of “rest”—or whatever passed for rest in a world determined to keep throwing plot hooks at his face. Elaine had essentially ordered him to accompany her.
Ray sighed, falling back onto his pillow. The "Festival Arc" was officially looking like a "Power-Leveling Arc."
Still, despite the danger and the looming sense that the world was accelerating toward something awful, there was a stubborn spark in his chest. He had survived the Crucible. He had forced Rowen to work with him. He had protected his friends.
Ray leaned back and stared at the ceiling, exhaustion finally winning.
“Festival arc,” he murmured. “Please be light-hearted. Please have mini-games and street food. No more lava bears.”.
Ray squeezed his eyes shut, desperate for the darkness to pull him under. It was useless. Every time he drifted close to sleep, his mind yanked him back, forcing him to toss and turn against a mattress that suddenly felt like stone.
Too much had happened. Too much was resting on his shoulders.
Between the Prince being a total pain in the ass and his own powers refusing to click, Ray was at his breaking point. To make matters worse, the end-game content was already shifting—moving faster than he could keep up with.
And then there was Lucien. God, Lucien. What was his deal, anyway?
Ray opened his eyes. Worrying about princes, the Fingers, and end-game monsters wouldn’t help him sleep—and sleep clearly wasn’t happening anyway. Ray swung his legs off the bed, the cool floorboards grounding him, and slipped out into the silent halls of the Duke’s estate.
No matter how many times he walked these corridors, the place still felt absurd. Vaulted ceilings were etched with living sigils that thrummed with ancient power. Walls of pale stone were inlaid with gold thread that caught the flickering torchlight like flowing fire. Statues of long-dead heroes stood frozen mid-stride, each one radiating a history of violence held politely at rest.
Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.
His home back in Melborne territory was beautiful—noble and refined. But this place? This was beauty taken to an unreasonable extreme. It felt less like a residence and more like a musuem of war.
Ray walked without urgency, his mind drifting while his feet carried him forward through the stillness. The estate was quiet at this hour; the servants had long since retreated to their quarters, and the nobles were tucked away behind layers of security and silk.
Yet, despite the silence, there was movement here. Purpose. Before long, Ray realized exactly where he was headed.
This was the forge of House Avery, the place where knights honed themselves day and night for wars that might never come and enemies that almost certainly would. The massive oak doors were thrown wide.
Inside, torchlight spilled across stone floors scarred by centuries of steel on stone. The air was thick with the scent of ozone, sweat, and cold discipline. Ray paused at the threshold, the sheer intensity of the room hitting him like a physical weight.
Dozens of knights moved within—muscled, scarred, intimidating figures clad in leather training gear or half-plate. Blades rang in rhythmic succession. Fists struck padded targets with the sound of small explosions. Bodies collided with a controlled, professional brutality.
This wasn’t a class. This was maintenance. These weren’t soldiers learning to fight; they were weapons ensuring they hadn’t dulled.
And then, Ray saw her.
Sera.
She stood near the center of the hall, clad in simple training clothes—dark fabric fitted for lethality rather than display. Most of her usual finery was absent, but a few rings still glinted on her fingers, and a thin silver chain rested at her throat. Even stripped down for combat, she looked unmistakably like herself.
She moved with a fluid, lethal grace, trading blows with a knight twice her size. Every strike was precise; every step was a calculated move on a chessboard. There was no wasted motion, no hesitation. She ended the exchange with a lightning-fast throw that slammed her opponent to the stone floor with a bone-jarring thud.
Ray swallowed hard.
Sera noticed him then. Just a glance—sharp, assessing, and colder than the winter wind. And then, she dismissed him entirely, turning back to her training as if he weren’t worth the air he was breathing.
Ray winced. He wasn't exactly offended, but the message was loud and clear: You don't belong here.
He took a long, steadying breath. Sera was right. This was her world. And if he wanted to survive in Elaine’s orbit—if he wanted to survive the "Fingers" or the Prince or this world’s broken difficulty curve—then wandering halls and overthinking politics wasn't going to be enough.
He stepped fully into the light of the training hall, his jaw set. If he couldn’t sleep, he might as well get stronger. He couldn't afford to be the only blunt blade in a house of razors.
Ray knew how to activate his power now. It wasn’t a matter of logic, calculation, or even perfect technique. It was excitement.
It was that split-second rush—the same thrill he used to get back on Earth when a finisher landed, when the boss’s HP bar finally flickered into the red, and the music swelled for the final phase. When he called out his moves, committing to them with every fiber of his being, the Ash Circuit answered.
He already had his "Loadout":
- 煙拳?バリアントストライク！！ ENKEN: BARIANTO SUTORAIKU!! (Smoke Fist Valiant Strike)
- 煙拳?ロケットパンチ！！ ENKEN: ROKETTO PANCHI!! (Smoke Fist Rocket Punch!!)
They hit hard. They felt right. But Ray grimaced, rubbing the back of his neck as he stood in the flickering torchlight of the Avery training hall.
I can’t keep yelling forever.
Actually, he could. And, honestly, he probably would. It was Anime Law, Article One: Violation punishable by revocation of protagonist status. But the tactical problem remained. Rian didn’t shout at the earth to harden his skin; Harel didn’t chant water into existence. They just... flexed. Their power was a muscle, while Ray’s was a performance.
If he was ever silenced, or if he needed to be a ninja instead of a walking explosion, he’d be stuck.
Ray leaned against the cool stone wall, staring at the ceiling. He forced himself to think like a gamer. His mind drifted to the "Non-Verbal Casting" trope. In every manga, the protagonist eventually skips the chant, and the side characters lose their minds.
Wait, Ray thought, his eyes widening. The chant isn't the battery. It’s the trigger.
The shout was just a crutch to force his emotion and intent into alignment. If he could recreate that "Boss Fight" thrill without the vocal cords, he could unlock the silent patch.
Ray clenched his fist. No names. No theatrics. Just the raw intent of the moment before impact. The Ash Circuit stirred—a whisper of heat, a curl of phantom smoke at his knuckles—but it didn't ignite. He was stumped.
“Time for a status check,” he muttered.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
STATUS — USER: RAY MELBORNE
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NAME: Takahara Kenji (Ray Melborne)
AGE: 15
LEVEL: 8
EXP: 12 / 100
HP: 25 / 115
STM: 10 / 70
ATTRIBUTES:
? STR: 17 (+8)
? AGI: 14 (+4)
? VIT: 20 (+6)
? DEX: 12 (+4)
? INT: 13 (+2)
? WIS: 11
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
NEW TRAIT UNLOCKED:
ASH CIRCUIT — VEIN II: FOUNDATION
A corrupted/altered Fire Vein.
Type: Unknown
Effect: ???
Stability: UNSTABLE
Resonance: EXTREME
Synchronization: 12.00
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Skills:
[Analyze]
[AMATERION SURGE — Lv.1 (Passive)]
+20% to all stats for 60 seconds when triggered. Cooldown:12hr
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
QUEST: Unknown Origin — Investigate
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Looking at the screen, Ray realized something. He never had to shout to use Analyze. It was natural, like opening a familiar menu. If Analyze worked on pure will, why didn't his combat moves?
“Scientific method time,” Ray rolled his shoulders. “Establish a baseline.”
He jogged to a reinforced wooden dummy. It was scarred by generations of Avery knights—a silent witness to centuries of violence. Ray inhaled, then punched. Thud. Solid. He followed with a flurry: jab, cross, pivot, kick.
He felt good. Stronger than any button-mashing nerd on Earth had a right to be. His body responded cleanly. Then, he focused inward. He didn't think of a move name. He focused on the Surge.
[AMATERION SURGE — Lv.1 Activated]
The change wasn’t an explosion of smoke; it was a shift in reality. Power flooded his limbs like a switch had been flipped. His heartbeat became a sharp, clean drumbeat. Heat spread through his spine.
He lunged. CRACK.
The dummy groaned under the impact. The difference was night and day. He was lighter, sharper, and his balance was uncannily precise.
“Do I feel smarter? Or is that a placebo?” Ray wondered as his mind processed the dummy's movements faster. No, the INT boost is real.
He chained his strikes together, moving with a fluidity he’d never possessed. It felt like he was playing on a high-refresh-rate monitor after a lifetime of lag.
“I’ve been doped with an end-game consumable,” he panted, a grin breaking across his face as the glow faded. “It’s not an attack. It’s a multiplier.”
Ray wiped the sweat from his brow, looking at his shaking hands. The smoke moves were his "Specials," but the Surge was his "Engine."
“If this is only Level One...” Ray whispered into the empty hall, “I can definitely work with this.”