Transmigrated as the Villainess Princess - Chapter 152

Chapter 152: Forbidden Knowledge (Special Chapter)
Magnus Bloodstone had always been drawn to knowledge, but after the eclipse and the loss of his brothers, that thirst became an obsession.

He needed answers. Answers that the instructors and scholars of the academy refused to give him. They told him to grieve, to let go, to move forward. But he couldn’t. He wouldn’t.

There was something wrong with the academy, something that had been hidden from students for centuries. And if no one else would uncover it, then he would do it himself.

That was how he found himself standing before the entrance of the Forbidden Library. The library was an old structure, buried deep within the academy’s underground levels.

It was off-limits to students, sealed by magic, guarded by ancient constructs that patrolled its halls.

Only the highest-ranking officials and select scholars were allowed to enter. But Magnus was not deterred.

He had spent days studying the library’s security measures, mapping out the guard rotations, observing the spell formations that sealed the doors.

He learned that the wards were based on the academy’s crest, an ancient sigil that resonated with the bloodline of Sirius’s old rulers.

A sigil that his family had carried for generations. With a deep breath, Magnus pressed his palm against the sigil engraved on the door.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then, the metal groaned. The runes etched into the door flickered with golden light before fading into darkness. A cold gust of air rushed past him as the doors slowly creaked open.

The Forbidden Library welcomed him.

Inside, towering bookshelves stretched endlessly into the darkness, filled with ancient tomes and scrolls that had been long forgotten.

Dust hung in the air, disturbed only by the faint flickering of blue flames that floated in midair, serving as the only source of illumination.

Magnus took a step forward, his heartbeat echoing in his ears. He didn’t know exactly what he was looking for, but he trusted his instincts.

He needed records, something that documented the past, the history of the academy, the deaths that had taken place over the centuries.

As he navigated through the rows of bookshelves, his fingers trailed over the spines of books, their titles barely visible beneath layers of dust.

Then, his eyes landed on a section labeled Student Archives.

His breath hitched.

Carefully, he pulled out a heavy leather-bound tome and flipped it open. The pages were brittle, the ink slightly faded, but the names were still legible.

He started with the most recent records, scanning through the list of students who had passed away.

He had expected to see a few names, after all, the academy was not free from danger. But as he kept reading, a cold sense of dread crawled up his spine.

Every year, students died. That in itself wasn’t surprising. Accidents happened. Missions went wrong. Some fell to illness, others to battle.

But then he noticed a pattern.

Every year, the number of deaths remained eerily consistent. Twenty to thirty students, every single year.

It was too precise. Too deliberate.

He flipped back through the records, going further into the past. The trend remained unchanged. Decades. Centuries. No matter how far back he looked, the pattern persisted.

Something was wrong.

His grip on the book tightened. His brothers’ deaths had not been an accident. They had been part of this cycle.

A sacrifice.

His breath quickened as he reached for another book. This one was older, the cover cracked and worn with age.

It was a collection of reports from instructors, detailing student disappearances and unexplained deaths.

Magnus’s eyes scanned the pages feverishly. The further back he went, the stranger the entries became.

Some students had died during routine training exercises, bodies found mutilated beyond recognition. Others had vanished entirely, as if they had never existed in the first place.

Then, he found something that made his blood run cold. An entry from over five hundred years ago.

“Another eclipse has come. Another cycle begins. The chosen students have been sent to the forest as per the agreement. The portal will consume them, and in return, the academy will prosper. Balance must be maintained.”

His hands shook.

The agreement?

He flipped the page, desperate for more information. But the next entries were vague, carefully worded to hide the truth.

Whoever had written these records had gone to great lengths to ensure that the full story was never revealed.

Magnus swallowed hard. The academy had been sacrificing students for centuries. And no one had ever spoken of it.

His brothers had not been sent to that forest on a failed mission. They had been offered. He staggered backward, the book slipping from his grasp.

It was all a lie. The academy, the instructors, the missions, the noble ideals they claimed to uphold, everything was built upon a foundation of blood and secrecy.

His fingers clenched into fists. He needed proof. He needed something he could show to the world, something undeniable. And so, he kept searching.

He moved deeper into the library, past the archives and into the restricted section. Here, the books were bound in thick chains, sealed with powerful enchantments.

But Magnus was not deterred.

With careful precision, he wove a spell to weaken the bindings. The chains rattled, resisting his efforts, but he poured more mana into the spell, pushing past the barriers.

One by one, the chains snapped.

He pulled the book free, the cover marked with a symbol he did not recognize. The title was written in an old dialect, but he understood enough to piece it together:

“The Covenant of Shadows.”

His breath caught in his throat.

Flipping through the pages, he found what he had been searching for. An ancient pact, one made between the academy and an unknown entity.

The details were vague, but the essence of the agreement was clear. In exchange for power, knowledge, and prosperity, the academy would offer lives.

Students.

Every eclipse.

For centuries.

Magnus felt his stomach twist.

He thought of the students who walked the halls above, oblivious to the truth. He thought of the instructors who had kept this secret buried.

He thought of the families who had never known what had truly happened to their children. And then, he thought of his brothers.

Their deaths had not been fate. They had been chosen. Rage burned through him, white-hot and all-consuming. He could not allow this to continue.

Clutching the book to his chest, he turned on his heel and fled the library. The truth had been hidden for centuries. But not anymore.

Magnus Bloodstone would make sure of it.