A Psychopath Reborn as a Third-rate Villain

The next enclosure was smaller than the others.

Thick iron bars replaced the reinforced glass, and the air around it carried a faint smell of ash.

Professor Everhart stopped in front of it and rapped her knuckles once against the railing.

A shape stirred within the shadows.

It emerged slowly — a compact, four-legged creature roughly the size of a large hound, its scales a deep obsidian black veined with threads of dull orange that pulsed faintly, like embers cooling beneath ash. Its wings were folded tight against its ribs. Its eyes, when they opened, glowed the same dull orange as the veins beneath its scales. A low growl rattled up from somewhere deep in its chest — more vibration than sound — and the students nearest the railing instinctively stepped back.

”A Cinderfang Drake,” Everhart said. ”Young. Barely past its first molt.”

She turned to face the class.

”This time, I’m not going to tell you its weakness.”

A few students exchanged glances.

”You watch it. You think. And when I ask, you answer — even if you’re wrong.”

She crossed her arms.

”Guesses.”

A boy near the front spoke first. ”The eyes? They look sensitive to light.”

”Reasonable. Wrong.”

A girl beside Seraphina raised her hand. ”The joints, like the lizard?”

”Also reasonable. Also wrong. Its plating extends past the joints on a drake this age. Try again.”

Seraphina studied the drake for a long moment before speaking.

”The wing membrane. It’s thinner than the rest of the hide — if it’s forced to fly under stress, that’s where it would tear first.”

Everhart tilted her head, considering it.

”Closer. Not what I’m looking for, but closer than anyone else has come. Keep thinking.”

The class fell quiet.

Andras said nothing.

He kept his attention on the drake, ignoring the temptation to reach toward the system. He could have the answer in a heartbeat if he wanted it — a single thought, a status window, weaknesses laid out for him like a menu.

He didn’t.

Everhart’s earlier words came back to him.

”If you don’t understand what you’re fighting, your strength may not matter.”

The system could hand him information. It couldn’t hand him the instinct to use it in time. That instinct only came from watching — from training the part of his mind that noticed things before he consciously decided to look for them.

So he watched.

The drake shifted its weight, restless under the sudden attention. Everhart nodded to a handler standing near the enclosure’s edge, who extended a long pole with a strip of raw meat fixed to the end through the bars.

The drake’s head snapped toward it.

Its body coiled.

For half a second — no more — its jaw parted, and a thin line of orange light kindled at the back of its throat. In that same instant, its folded wings flared outward, no more than a hand’s width, the thin membrane stretching taut along its ribs.

Then it lunged, fire roaring from its throat and scorching the meat to ash before the pole could be withdrawn.

Several students flinched back from the railing.

Andras didn’t move.

He had seen it. The half-second glow. The wings flaring open at the exact same moment.

Everhart’s gaze swept the class.

”Anyone?”

Silence.

Her eyes settled on Andras.

”You’ve been quiet.”

”I have an answer.”

”Let’s hear it.”

Andras kept his eyes on the drake as he spoke.

”It can’t breathe fire without drawing air first. The wings open because it needs the intake — the membrane pulls air toward the fire sac beneath its throat. That’s the same moment its throat glows.”

He paused.

”Its scales are thickest everywhere else. But for that half-second, its throat and the base of its wings are exposed, because it can’t armor itself and breathe fire at the same time.”

The classroom went quiet.

Everhart studied him for a long moment.

”That’s correct.”

Something in her voice had shifted — not suspicion, not the sharp attention Valeria had given him. Simple, professional interest.

”Most students take years to learn to read a tell that fast. Where did you learn to watch for one?”

Andras met her eyes calmly.

”I’ve hunted before, Professor.”

It wasn’t a lie.

It also wasn’t the whole truth.

Everhart held his gaze a moment longer, then nodded, apparently satisfied, and turned back to the enclosure.

”He’s right. The half-second before a Cinderfang breathes fire is the only window you’ll get. Miss it, and you’re fighting fully armored scales for the rest of the exchange.”

She waved the class closer.

”This is what I mean when understanding a monster matters more than overpowering it. Strength buys you the fight. Understanding tells you when to end it.”

The lesson continued through two more enclosures before the sun began sinking toward the western wall. By the third — a broad-shelled creature marked with faint luminous blue veins — most of the class had learned enough to venture guesses before Everhart said a word. Most were still wrong. A few, this time, were close.

Andras found his thoughts returning to that half-second window long after they’d moved on.

Beside him, Seraphina spoke quietly.

”That was fast,” she said. ”Even for someone who’s ’hunted before.’”

One eyebrow arched, just slightly.

Andras glanced at her.

”Are you calling me a liar?”

”I’m saying you’re very good at answering questions without actually answering them.”

A faint smile touched his lips.

”I’ve had practice.”

Seraphina huffed a quiet laugh and let the matter drop — for now — but Andras filed the exchange away all the same.

She was paying closer attention to him than she let on.

He found himself wondering, briefly, how many other things about him she had already noticed and simply chosen not to ask about.

That, too, was worth remembering.

---

Professor Everhart clapped her hands once, drawing every eye back to her.

”That’s all for today.”

She gestured toward the iron gate behind them.

”Return to Class A. In the next lesson we’ll cover feeding behavior, and how it changes a monster’s aggression — useful, if you’re ever unfortunate enough to meet one on an empty stomach.”

A few students laughed quietly.

The class filed back through the gate. The defensive formations along the wall hummed faintly as it sealed shut behind them.

The walk back stretched longer than the walk out had felt, though the distance was the same. Conversation filled the corridor almost immediately — the Frosthorn Wolf’s horns, the Stonehide Lizard’s joints, the half-second of orange light before the Cinderfang Drake breathed fire.

”I still can’t believe it torched that meat that fast,” one boy said, shaking his head.

”I can’t believe someone actually spotted the tell,” another added, glancing sideways toward Andras before quickly looking away.

Andras said nothing, letting the comment pass.

Beside him, Seraphina walked in comfortable silence, occasionally offering a short answer whenever a classmate asked for her opinion on something.

They reached the familiar corridor leading to Class A within a few minutes, the chatter still trailing behind them.

Garran Holt reached the door first.

He pushed it open without slowing down, still mid-sentence about the drake’s wingspan—

And stopped.

The word died in his throat.

The rest of the group crowded up behind him, the conversation faltering one voice at a time until the corridor had gone completely silent.

Someone was already inside.

They stood near the front of the room, framed by the pale afternoon light spilling through the tall windows, utterly still — as though they had been waiting exactly this long, and not a moment more.

Andras stepped forward through the frozen crowd of students.

His eyes settled on the figure.