Fredozy
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Chapter 66: Unassuming traps
🕑 Added 2025-08-21 19:35:35 +0000 UTCA low chuckle rolled across the room. Dean Fogg emerged from the far doorway, his immaculate white suit untouched by dust and the wound on his back now healed up. "How did you know?"
Kai smirked. "Tricking the trickster."
Fogg paced slowly across the ruined classroom, " Is that so boy, you think you can trick me…" his voice weaving like smoke. He reached the center then froze mid-stride.
Kai looked up. Alice took a second before she exhaled in relief. "It worked… it actually worked Kai"
Above them, faint runes shimmered into view on the ceiling showing the intricate bindings of the Clavicula Vinculis Arcana spell.
Alice let out a nervous laugh of triumph, but Kai didn't waste time. Moving forward to the frozen ex professor. He circled the immobilized Fogg, his eyes sharp as he looked for anything out of the ordinary… this felt too easy. Then, without hesitation, he plunged his hand into the man's chest. Alice gasped at the brutal act, horror written across her face.
Kai's expression was grim. "Not taking any chances while he's bound."
Magic bled into him and it felt dense, but the flow was sluggish, wrong. His brow furrowed. "That's… odd…"
Before he could finish, a sudden force slammed into him, sending him flying. He crashed across benches, the jagged wood impaling him near the kidney.
Kai groaned, blood dripping down his side. 'What the hell hit me…?' His gaze snapped up. 'Alice…'
She was choking, lifted effortlessly by the throat. Fogg held her, smirking.
Kai's eyes darted to the frozen Fogg still caught in the spellwork, then back. "What did you do?"
"I outsmarted you," Fogg sneered. He snapped his fingers.
The ceiling cracked and collapsed inward, shattering the Arcana bindings. The frozen Fogg melted into mud, dripping across the tiles.
"A fucking golem?"
"How disappointing," Fogg taunted, tightening his grip on Alice. "You didn't even power your spell with divine energy. What, no stomach to summon a god. Did you truly believe that would hold me?"
Rage surged through Kai. He ripped splinters from his side and fired a blast of shards with wood and metal whirling toward Fogg.
Fogg only chuckled as he looked back at Kai. "My dear boy…" He exhaled gently. Half the shrapnel turned to dust; the other half reversed course, embedding viciously into Kai's body.
Kai hissed in pain, blood seeping through his shirt. Forcing himself to his feet, he looked back. Fogg and Alice were gone.
"Tch." He yanked a shard from his arm. "Well… that didn't work." Then, with a grim tone "Now then."
He blurred out of the classroom.
---
Outside, Fogg dragged Alice across the grass by the throat. Her nails clawed uselessly at his grip.
"Foolish girl," he said coldly before he started laughing. "To think you could outsmart me. Trap me. Your plan was doomed from the start."
She struggled, kicking, but his laughter drowned her cries. Then suddenly they hit something with a thud.
Fogg stumbled, his stride halting. His hand loosened, Alice dropped to the ground and gasped for air. Fogg ignored her as and looked In front of him at what shimmered like an invisible wall of a sort.
"What?" He struck it, only to be thrown back by its resistance. He tried to teleport but he was still standing in the same spot without the change in position.
His eyes narrowed. "What did you do?"
Alice coughed violently, gasping. "I… I didn't—"
Fogg seized her again, voice like a knife. "You're done playing. I'll dismember you and spread your innards across the school just for the sport of...grrarck”
Before he could finish, a steel rod speared clean through his neck. Blood sprayed as he gagged.
Behind him, Kai appeared, cloak of invisibility peeling away. His eyes burned cold.
"Disgusting," Kai said, voice sharp as a blade. "Talking to a lady like that."
He shoved the rod deeper. "Where did you think you were going?"
Fogg tried to scream as Kai pushed further in. With a twist of will, he unleashed the Aneurysm Spell and blood vessels in Fogg's head rupturing in rapid pops. The Beast dropped Alice, stumbling from the shock and pain.
Kai blurred forward, catching her before she struck the dirt. He crouched low. "Alice hey look at me are you alright?"
She was too terrified to answer, eyes wide and hollow but she gave a nod. Kai's gaze hardened as he turned back.
Fogg stood, yanking the rod from his throat, blood soaking his once-pristine suit. He chuckled, even as crimson dripped down his chest.
Kai smirked coldly. "Expected that. That wouldn't kill you."
Fogg tried to step forward but smacked into another invisible barrier. His eyes widened. He struck harder. The wall held.
Alice stared, trembling. "What… what is that?"
Kai kept his gaze on Fogg. "A Boundary spell."
"A what, when did you… when did you cast it?"
"Yesterday," Kai said smoothly. "When you were narrating the school's downfall."
Fogg traced a hand along the shimmering surface, intrigued. "Well played. Such peculiar magic. Where did you learn this?"
Kai looked at him like he was an idiot. "Now why the fuck would I tell you that?"
Fogg smirked. "A trapped man likes to know how he's trapped."
"So your Shades gone and common sense gone with it too I see," Kai shot back.
That made Fogg laugh.
Alice found her voice. "Your feet… you were dragging your feet"
Kai glanced at her. "Dragging my feet?" His grin turned sly. "Was I?"
"And the bursts I felt from you," she said.
He nodded. "Activation pulses. Every step stitched the spell into place."
His smirk deepened. "Unassuming traps are the best kind after all."
"Why didn't you tell me?" Alice asked.
"Because he was watching and listening." Kai turned his smirk toward Fogg. "Isn't that right, peeping Tom?"
Alice blinked. "What do you—"
Kai pointed upward. "I felt him spying yesterday when you were talking. In the library too. That's how he knew to plant the decoy. The Arcana spell was doomed before it began because he already knew we would use it."
Her eyes widened. "How did he…?"
Kai pointed directly at her. "You."
Fogg's frown deepened.
Kai leaned close to Alice, eyes serious now. "Do you trust me?"
Alice's gaze flickered between Fogg and Kai then she nodded, fear trembling in her chest.
"Good," Kai whispered. "Relax. Don't fight me."
He placed his palm gently against her head. His hand glowed red, symbols burning faintly into the air.
"Revelare Corruptionem."
Alice screamed as her skin shimmered translucent on the left side of her skull veins spider-webbing red, pulsing like an infestation. A writhing parasite revealed itself in her brain's hemisphere.
Kai held her steady and siphoned out the parasitic organism with the spell as her body shook violently. "Relax, Alice. I've got you."
