Shattered Innocence: Transmigrated Into a Novel as an Extra

Chapter 767: Ethereal

The moment Lucavion stepped past the threshold, the shift in pressure wasn’t just physical—it was mnemonic. Like air carrying the scent of a long-buried battlefield, faint yet unmistakable.

The banquet hall of the Arcanis Imperial Academy unfolded in ceremonial splendor—arched ceilings hung with spell-laced chandeliers, walls lined with banners from every major faction, and polished marble floors reflecting a grandeur far too clean, far too controlled. Every line, every shimmer, every curve in this place screamed power wrapped in pretense.

And yet—

All he could hear was silence.

Not the hall’s. Not the nobles’. His own.

That awful, echoing kind.

’Last time I walked into a banquet like this…’

A breath. Slow. Hollow.

’…I didn’t walk out the same.’

A part of him had been waiting for this. For the step onto marbled stone. For the shift of light across his coat. For the scent of too-fine wine and spiced arrogance. And yet now, standing within it, surrounded by gleam and gaze and ambition cloaked in silk—

He felt… unmoored.

’Strange.’

He didn’t slow, of course. His feet carried him in perfect rhythm with the others, each step measured but unhesitant. His posture? Impeccable. His expression? Cool, composed, mildly amused—exactly what they expected from the infamous Sword Demon. The outsider. The unaligned weapon.

But inside?

His thoughts spun like shards.

Faces blurred across his vision, not because of magic, but memory. Nobles with too-curious smiles. Professors whose gazes dipped to his blade before daring to meet his eyes. Courtiers in laughter that didn’t quite reach their chins. All of them different—yet somehow the same.

The last banquet…

The last trap.

’No. Not now.’

The thought cut through the haze like the edge of his estoc—sharp, absolute, necessary.

This wasn’t the time. Not for slipping. Not for unraveling.

Not after everything.

’You didn’t crawl this far to break at the door.’

He felt the flicker of heat in his chest—not rage, not pride, but mana. That quiet hum at the core of him, where starlight twisted through bone and breath like a reminder of what he had become. It pulsed once, steadying.

All those years—every wound, every exile, every lie carved into the marrow of his name—he hadn’t endured them to falter now.

This banquet was not a battlefield.

But it wasn’t safe either.

And he would not be caught with his guard down.

He exhaled once, low and even, the motion hidden beneath the fold of his coat.

’Lucavion.’

He called himself by the name, grounding it with intent. Not just a name. A tether.

[Lucavion.]

The voice that answered wasn’t his own.

It slid through his thoughts like silk pulled across the edge of a blade—soft, but never harmless.

Vitaliara’s voice.

He didn’t need to look. She was still perched across his shoulders, tail curled with calculated grace, but her tone—

This time, it held something else.

Support.

That subtle, familiar push he’d come to recognize only in hindsight.

And then—

He saw her.

Pink hair.

Flowing past her waist like a banner caught in the right kind of wind, a touch too vibrant for courtly halls. Violet eyes—still fierce, still clear—cutting across the crowd and landing right on him.

And he knew.

She had seen him.

’Ah…’

The sound slipped inwardly, not voiced, just an inward exhale twisted with irony.

’Of course. I should’ve known she’d be here.’

He scoffed to himself, and just like that, the edge of his memory turned. Not the cruel banquet of betrayal—but a different one. Warmer. Dumber.

A night of dancing shadows and half-said insults.

Of her standing beneath an overhanging moon, blade on her back, pride in her spine, and that one time he’d called her—

“Lady Knight…”

He remembered her glare. That glint of restrained fury masking the barest hint of amusement.

’Valeria.’

[It is that girl.]

Vitaliara’s voice again. But this time, her tone shifted—low, dry, unmistakably annoyed.

He didn’t reply.

Her gaze pierced through the room—not with the finesse of a courtly glance, but with something far more dangerous.

Intent.

It wasn’t just that she was looking at him.

It was how.

As if her eyes were trying to unravel the space between them, piece by piece. Like the air itself had offended her by daring to exist in the gap that separated their steps.

Lucavion felt the echo of it—not just in his chest, but down to the marrow of his bones. Her presence, that force of familiarity wrapped in stiff posture and sharpened silence, was like mana pressed to his spine.

And her face—normally so controlled, so impeccably arranged—wasn’t stiff tonight.

No.

It was alive.

Behind that glare, there were too many things. Questions unspoken. Curiosity barely leashed. Recognition that didn’t belong in a stranger’s eyes. And beneath it all—expectancy.

She expected something from him.

Something only he could give.

And in that instant, Lucavion felt it—his breath settled. His step regained its weight. The balance in his shoulders reasserted itself, not forced, but remembered.

Like strength returning to its rightful place.

’Tch. You never did glare like a normal person.’

His mood lifted.

Slightly.

Subtly.

But undeniably.

Then—another face drifted through the corners of his mind. Like the flick of a candle lighting a room too cold to forget.

Amber eyes.

Black hair.

That relentless girl with the voice too honest, the steps too bold, the presence too close. The one who pushed through his armor not with magic or force—but with the unbearable audacity of care.

’Aeliana…’

That name rose without warning, and he didn’t shove it back down.

She, too, had become part of the shifting pieces. Part of the tangled fate he had touched. Changed. Twisted.

’Yeah…’

He remembered now.

All of them.

Those whose lives had intersected with his like blades crossing in the dark. Those whose stories weren’t written until he entered the scene.

’Indeed.’

And his mouth moved, the smirk returning.

That familiar, infuriating one that Valeria always claimed to hate.

But never once looked away from.

“Hello, Pink Knight.”

No sound.

Just words shaped with deliberate grace, sent across the banquet hall like a whispered dare.

A greeting.

’And you, peeping cat.’

The thought rippled beneath the surface of his smirk, directed not at the crowd, not at Valeria, but to the familiar weight perched across his shoulders.

As expected—

[I am not!]

Vitaliara’s voice came sharp, immediate, bristling with the same offended dignity that she wielded like a blade when pressed. But he didn’t even try to contain the low hum of amusement that stirred in his chest.

’Hehe…’

He didn’t laugh aloud.

He didn’t need to.

Because she felt it. And for all her indignation, he could sense her mood shifting. Her tail flicked once—slow, measured, but undeniably pleased.

He was returning.

Not all the way. Not yet.

But enough to remind her—and himself—who he was.

Lucavion.

The man who survived.

The man who chose his name not to reclaim it, but to reshape it.

His stride remained smooth, effortless as he resumed his walk down the hall. But his senses stretched far beyond the measured footfalls and noble whispers.

They were watching.

Of course they were. Everyone watched the outsider with the unyielding blade and the cat who glared like a queen.

But not all gazes were made equal.

After all there were those that were looking at him differently.

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