Supreme Hunter of Beautiful Souls-Chapter 378: It’s okay. Everything will be alright.

Irelia stopped walking immediately—so abruptly that even the snow seemed to protest beneath her boots.

Amelia opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again, unable to formulate anything for a few seconds.

Sylphie simply stared at Kael as if he had just announced that he had decided to become a dragon in his spare time.

"…N-necromancy?" Amelia finally managed to utter, her voice caught between shock and indignation. "Like… NECROMANCY necromancy? The forbidden kind? The kind that takes your soul, cooks it, seasons it, and serves it on a silver plate to the wrong entity?! THAT NECROMANCY?"

Kael shrugged, as if he had been asked what flavor of tea he had for breakfast.

"Yes. That's the one."

Sylphie's eyes widened, the green mana escaping in an involuntary spasm around her, like leaves being blown by a sudden wind.

"Kael… necromancy isn't just forbidden. It's dangerous. It's unstable. It's—"

"—controlled, in my case." Kael finished, with the utmost calm. "I said it was fine."

Irelia, however, didn't seem inclined to accept vague answers. She took two steps closer, crossing her arms and narrowing her eyes.

"How did you learn necromancy? It's not something that just… appears. It's pact magic, blood magic, ancient magic. Who taught you?"

Kael looked away.

Just for a moment.

Long enough for Irelia to notice.

"Kael."

"It was just a contract." He finally answered, pushing a piece of ice with the tip of his boot as if it were the most common conversation in the world. "A spirit made an offer. I accepted."

Amelia almost tripped over her own staff.

"A SPIRIT?! WHAT SPIRIT?!"

Kael smiled—that smile that was half charm, half trouble.

"I can't say."

Sylphie stepped forward now, her face serious, her concern much more evident.

"Kael… if it's an ancient spirit, or a fragment spirit, or worse… a spirit of the Veil…" She touched her chest, as if trying to contain her own heart. "They don't give power for free. They always demand something."

Kael raised his hand to reassure her.

"It's alright."

"KAEL—"

"It's. Alright." He repeated, this time firmly, almost affectionately, but still with the familiar stubbornness that had been a part of him for so long. "I'm not alone in this. And I haven't done anything to put you at risk. This deal is mine."

Irelia opened her mouth, but Kael raised a finger before she could finish.

"And before you start asking: no, there's no shady price waiting to kill me. I've got that sorted."

Amelia snorted.

"Yeah. You've got it. With NECROMANCY."

Sylphie tightened her cloak around herself, taking a deep breath.

"Kael… I trust you." She said honestly, even though fear still lingered in her voice. "But necromancy… living necromancy… manipulating shadows… it's all—"

"Necessary." He cut in, turning back to the frozen castle on the horizon. The shadows around him shifted as if reacting to his focus, converging, pulsing, widening for a brief moment. "We don't have time. We don't have an advantage. We don't have reinforcements. And that palace over there—" He pointed to the distant white hill, where towers of ice pulsed like malevolent hearts. "—won't wait."

He breathed, letting the hot smoke escape from his mouth like a restrained dragon.

"I have something that can turn the tide. I'm going to use it."

Silence fell again.

Cold.

Heavy.

Full of fear… but also reluctant confidence.

Kael turned to them, smiling—not in an arrogant or provocative way.

It was a slight smile.

Calm.

Tired of carrying other people's worries, but willing to continue doing so.

"Let's go. Really."

He gestured with his head, starting to walk.

"Keep going."

Crossing Lake Helvorn was like walking over the corpse of a world. The ice cracked underfoot, but not with the natural sound of something frozen—it was more like bones breaking at the touch. Each step echoed too far, reverberating as if the lake had transformed into a single, enormous instrument of mourning.

The ice palace, still distant, seemed to pulse in a slow, almost respiratory rhythm. The grey light of the sky reflected off its walls, outlining a structure so sharp and irregular it seemed capable of cutting through the very air.

The expanse of the lake seemed endless. With each step, the wind grew stronger, acquiring a mournful tone that made the air feel heavier. The ice palace loomed large in view, but never fast enough—as if the landscape itself were manipulating distances.

After nearly half an hour of silent marching, Irelia raised her hand in warning.

"Stop."

Kael immediately stopped, his group of shadows freezing with him, as if they had received a telepathic command.

"What?" he asked.

Irelia knelt on the ice and ran her hand over a whitish layer.

"The lake was too deep to freeze so quickly… but here…" She touched the ice, which responded with a hollow, almost metallic sound. "There's an empty layer just below. As if something displaced the water."

"Or as if it's been drained," Amelia suggested, moving closer.

"Which means…" Sylphie took a deep breath. "That the lake level has risen."

Kael turned to her, frowning.

"What exactly does that mean?"

Sylphie pointed to the horizon, beyond the frozen palace.

"The tunnel entrance was in a small cave at the edge of the lake. Near the rocks where the water met the Skaldi wall. If the level has risen…" She knelt down, examining the layers of ice. "Then the entrance might be completely submerged and frozen along with the lake."

Amelia's eyes widened.

"This isn't just complicated. It's suicide. Nobody here is an expert at swimming in… solidified ice."

Irelia rested a hand on the hilt of her sword.

"And even if we managed to break the ice… we don't know how long we could breathe down there."

Kael observed the horizon, his eyes following the gentle curve of the lake to where the surface seemed to change texture—as if something were compressed at the bottom.

"Maybe…" he murmured. "Or maybe the tunnel isn't completely blocked."

Sylphie shook her head.

"The lake is frozen to the bottom, Kael. I can feel it. There's no flow at all. No current. It's as if it's been frozen from the inside out by immense, continuous magic."

Kael ran a hand over his chin.

"Then let's find out where this freezing started."

Irelia blinked.

"You want to trace the origin?"

"Yes."

"Kael…" Amelia crossed her arms. "We're walking across a plain of ice for miles. You're going to look for the source… by looking at the ground?"

He smiled.

"Not by looking at the ground."

And then he snapped his fingers.

The shadows around reacted instantly.

A dozen rose up. Then two dozen. Then four.

Black silhouettes, slender, shallow as blades, piercing the ice on contact—but without breaking it, spreading like liquid ink beneath the surface.

Sylphie recoiled instinctively.

"Kael… what are you doing now?"

"Asking."

"Asking what?"

"If the ice has internal cracks."

Irelia frowned.

"…Your specters can move beneath the ice?"

"They can move wherever there is shadow."

"But down there there's no sound—"

Kael glanced at her over his shoulder.

"There's darkness."

Irelia opened her mouth to argue… but closed it immediately.

Because it made sense.

In a terrible way.

In a way only Kael could make sense of.

The shadows vanished completely as they sank into the ice, like snakes diving into dark water.

Seconds passed.

Five.

Ten.

One minute.

Sylphie gnawed at the corner of her glove, tense. Amelia tapped her foot nervously. Irelia maintained a firm posture, but her fingers drummed subtly on the hilt of her sword.

Kael stood completely still.

As if listening.

And then…

"There."

He pointed northwest, toward an area where the ice took on a slightly more opaque tone.

Irelia narrowed her eyes. "What's down there?"

"A pocket." Kael took a deep breath. "A part of the ice where the water hasn't completely solidified. And… something below."

Amelia swallowed hard.

"Something? What kind of something?"

Kael raised his face and explained with the calm of someone unfazed even by gigantic disasters.

"A chamber. Part of the ancient structure. Maybe the tunnels."

"Maybe?" Sylphie insisted.

Kael gave a slight smile.

"Unless there's a giant monster waiting down there."

"KAEL!"

Amelia's cry echoed throughout the lake.

He shrugged, chuckling softly.

"Just kidding."

Pause. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

"…I think."

Irelia ran a hand over her face.

"Let's go before you make it worse."

The wind intensified as they advanced along the edge of Helvorn. With each step, the ice seemed to change hue—from translucent white to deep blue, and from blue to black, like an immense shadowed scar stretching beneath their feet. The silence was almost absolute, broken only by the muffled sound of footsteps on the snow and the distant crackling of ice shifting somewhere beneath the surface.

Kael and his shadows were the only thing that didn't seem frozen in that place.

Even if the group didn't openly comment, it was impossible to ignore that the further they advanced, the more shadows appeared around him. As if the place—or the tension itself—nourished them. Small, shapeless creatures crawled, melted, reappeared… always behind him, always watchful.

Irelia looked away every time one of them appeared too close.

Amelia tried to ignore them, but without success.

Sylphie… Sylphie just watched, silent, but her expression betrayed a certain concern—not about the energy itself, but about what it could mean for Kael.

"Keep going," he repeated once more, as if guiding a group that insisted on hesitating. "The entrance must be nearby."

"It must be," Amelia repeated, unconvinced. "The princess said it was near the shore, not miles away…"

"It's a cursed lake now," Irelia corrected. "Nothing here is as it once was. The ice may have advanced. The structures may have changed."

A few steps later, Sylphie stopped abruptly.

The three followed her gaze.

And immediately realized what she had noticed.

The edge of the lake… was no longer the edge.

The ice had risen to where the dry land had once been, swallowing half the fallen trees and burying moss-covered stones. The natural contours of the land were altered, raised by a layer of ice almost three meters thick.

It was as if the lake had grown.

Or worse… as if it had swallowed everything around it.

"This is bad," Irelia murmured.

"This is terrible," Amelia corrected. "If the lake has advanced like this, then—"

"The entrance might be submerged," Kael finished, crossing his arms as he analyzed the icy surface. "And frozen."

Sylphie approached the advancing ice. She touched the surface with her fingertips, and a faint green glow ran down her arm, but upon reaching the ice, it simply… died. As if the energy were suffocated.

This made her recoil immediately.

"It's not just ordinary ice," she explained. "It's solidified mana. Dense. Compressed. And extremely… hostile."

Amelia approached and lightly tapped with the tip of her staff. The ice didn't even scratch. Didn't vibrate.

"This is too bad. If the entrance is down there, how are we going to get to it?"

Kael remained thoughtful for a few moments. Their shadows seemed restless, as if something in the ice repelled—or attracted—them.

"Kael?" Irelia called. "Are you thinking of… breaking this?"

"I could try," he said. "But if I release too much mana, this thing might react. And I don't want to test what happens when living energy meets this ice."

Amelia agreed, earnestly. "Yes, please don't blow up the whole lake. And the castle too. And us too."

Kael didn't even smile this time.

Sylphie seemed to absorb every detail before giving her verdict.

"The princess said the entrance was on the northwest slope of the lake. Not exactly on the shore, but on a sloping part, near a rocky outcrop. If that area was swallowed by the ice… then the entrance is down there, yes."

Irelia took a deep breath. "How many meters?"

Sylphie answered without hesitation: "Five. Maybe six."

Amelia's eyes widened. "Six meters of mana condensed into demonic ice. Great. We're doing great."

Kael knelt beside the frozen edge. He ran his hand over the ice and felt the echo—not an ordinary cold, but something that pulsed. As if the ice had a heart. As if it were alive.

And… observing.

He sighed.

"It's okay. Everything will be alright."