Hunter Academy: Revenge of the Weakest novel Chapter 1027

"Perfect."

She launched herself into the pack again, spinning her blade in brutal, unrefined arcs—every strike born from muscle memory, aggression, and sheer refusal to yield. Her form was ugly, wild—but nothing got past her.

And behind her, Ethan danced. freewёbnoνel.com

Where Julia overwhelmed, Ethan controlled. Every enemy that broke through her radius was met with surgical bursts of lightning, his spear snapping out in short, precise jabs that targeted joints, cores, and exposed sigils. Where Julia cracked skulls, Ethan shut systems down.

They didn't speak.

They didn't need to.

This wasn't coordination.

This was instinct.

Marin covered their blind spots with mid-range strikes, his blade darting between Julia's kill zone and Ethan's fallback line like a stitching thread. Kaela ghosted between outcroppings, never staying in one place for more than a few seconds, every arrow making space before the others could feel pressure. Raine's hands never stopped glowing—shield, cleanse, mend, repeat.

Fifteen minutes.

That's all it took.

The dungeon's final chamber crumbled around them, the corrupted mana source at its heart still crackling faintly—until Julia smashed it open with one overhead strike that left a crater the size of a wagon.

The mist receded.

The mana stilled.

And just like that—it was over.

Ethan stood at her side, the crackle of his lightning fading with every breath. Julia wiped the blood from her blade with one swift swipe against a fallen beast's fur, then turned to the squad.

"Time?"

Raine glanced at her wrist-sigil. "Fourteen minutes, forty-seven seconds."

Julia whistled, low and amused. "Tch. Sloppy."

Marin choked. "Sloppy?"

"You almost missed one," Kaela added helpfully, nodding toward a half-melted beast Ethan had finished off mid-run.

Julia shrugged. "That was his job."

Ethan raised an eyebrow. "I do love being backup janitor."

"See?" she said cheerfully, slapping him on the back again. "That's why I keep you around."

And for a long moment, none of them moved. They just stood there, blood on their boots, sweat cooling in the dungeon air.

And for a long moment, none of them moved. They just stood there, blood on their boots, sweat cooling in the dungeon air.

But then—

Ethan's fingers twitched.

It was subtle at first. A flicker of something—not sight, not sound, not even psion detection. Just presence. A pressure that didn't belong. A ripple against the edges of his awareness, like a hand grazing the surface of still water from beneath.

He straightened, eyes narrowing.

The atmosphere hadn't changed. Not visibly. The corrupted mana source was gone, the dungeon collapsing inward in slow, harmless pulses of dissipation. No new enemies. No alarms. No strange readings on the glyph scanners.

But the feeling was there.

Cold. Thin. Sharp.

Like breath on the back of his neck.

His gaze swept the craggy cavern walls—the broken ceiling overhead, the tendrils of mist still thinning into silence. Nothing moved. Nothing shifted.

And yet…

Ethan's shoulders tensed.

The spear in his hand hummed faintly again, residual psions reactivating on reflex.

He didn't speak right away. Just took a slow, measured breath. Then another.

There it was again.

A flicker.

A presence just out of reach—something watching, not from the shadows, but beneath them. As if the walls themselves had eyes. As if the dungeon hadn't died—it had gone still. Waiting.

Julia noticed first.

Her voice dropped, low and wary. "What is it?"

Ethan didn't look at her. His eyes were still fixed on the far corner of the chamber—a spot where the darkness seemed a shade too thick. Not unnatural. Just… off.

"I don't know," he said quietly.

Kaela had already readied another arrow.

Raine, without needing instruction, pulled her healing wards into a tighter formation around them.

Even Marin stopped joking.

Ethan's grip on his spear tightened. "It's probably nothing."

He didn't believe it.

The chill crawling down his spine wasn't psionic. It wasn't magical. It was instinctual.

Like something had brushed against the threads of his fate, then slipped away before it could be named.

And that—that—was what unsettled him most.

He didn't sense a threat.

He sensed... awareness.

Not just of their location.

Of him.

Of his lightning. His psions. His breath.

As if something out there had just catalogued every strike he'd made—and was still deciding what to do about it.

Ethan stepped closer to Julia, voice low. "We need to move. Now."

She didn't argue.

None of them did.

Because though the dungeon had collapsed… Ethan still felt watched.

And that feeling wouldn't leave.

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