There was only silence in the room; Selene and the others just stood there frozen, staring at the screen. They couldn't comprehend what they had just seen.

"Did he just solo that thing?" Valena mumbled, her mouth agape. "But that's an S+-ranked calamity." When it appeared, the whole world was in turmoil. Back then we barely managed to defeat it with multiple S-rankers."

Selene also stood there nailed to the ground, staring at the screen. "How does he have 10 familiars? Isn't the highest number recorded only five, and that is for royal vampires? Then what the hell is he?" Standing there, she mumbled to herself.

She shook her head sharply, forcing herself out of her stupor. Now wasn't the time to stand gawking around. Her voice, firm and commanding, cut through the heavy silence.

"Enough standing around," she said, her tone regaining its edge. "Valena, come with me; we will check on Teo. Corvus, you close the dungeon; Ashura, you stay with Corvus and make sure everything goes smoothly."

Valena blinked, her shock dissipating as Selene's words registered. "Y-Yes, coming!" she stammered, jumping out of her chair and following Selene.

Selene hurried to Teo's side, her piercing gaze looking around to find him as fast as possible. "This is going to get messy. If the council finds out about this, they will probably try and control him by any means," she muttered.

Valena silently nodded along. 'Indeed, if people find out that he's that capable, it might also cause unrest because of how he is.' Shaking her head, to rid herself of any unnecessary thoughts, she focused on the task at hand: finding and healing Teo.

"That was intense, huh? What do you think, Corvus?" Ashura asked while stopping all the running programs to deactivate the dungeon.

"Yeah, but how did that thing even appear?" Corvus said, then paused mid-thought. His eyes widened, and his hand froze over the console, as if struck by a sudden revelation.

"It can't be... did Selene really put that thing as the hidden boss?" Ashura looked at him in shock. "She must have been really pissed, but she probably thought Teo would try fighting it. See how strong it is and just leave it?"

The two nodded in unison as they efficiently shut down the dungeon, and then, exiting the room, they went to the entrance where Selene and Valena entered the dungeon.

***

The faint hum of the dungeon's mechanisms faded, replaced by an unnatural stillness. Teo sat on the cold metal floor, his chest rising and falling as he tried to steady his breathing.

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He wiped the blood trickling down from the corner of his mouth, his gaze fixed on the dissipating remnants of the calamity he'd just defeated. "Tsk, finally a battle I could go all out in. And then they had to shut it down right after." He mumbled, "I'll just wait here till she arrives then."

As the door creaked open, light spilled into the room, and two figures emerged from the shadows, Selene, her expression worried, and Valena, clutching some healing potions with evident urgency.

"There you are!" Selene's voice was a mix of relief and exasperation as her gaze locked onto him. Her steps quickened, and Valena followed close behind.

*Smack*

"What were you thinking! Why didn't you run? I only put it in there to teach you a lesson!" Selene demanded as she looked seriously pissed.

"Selene," Valena said softly. "He might still be injured; you know it's better to keep this for another time."

Selene's eyes widened. "Sorry, Teo. I don't know what overcame me," she mumbled apologetically.

Teo shrugged. "It's fine; my injuries are mostly healed; I'm just very hungry right now." he said, trying to ease the tension in the room. Valena, however, looked at him suspiciously.

"You're saying you already healed from all that, and you're only hungry right now, no discomfort or anything?" she inquired, as she inspected his whole body.

"Yep, perfectly fine. I'm not a vampire for nothing. I'm confident in my healing abilities," he said as he walked toward the exit.

Exiting the corridor, he saw Corvus and Ashura waiting there. Sighing, he couldn't help but wonder why they were here. "Why are you two here, oh, and Valena as well?"

"You don't know? For a reassessment you need multiple judges, and because you are part of our team, we're the ones that had to do it."

"Teo, to my office now! And you three stay on standby. Selene hurried after him out of the corridor and pulled him along by the arm.

"She looks pretty mad. You think he's gonna survive that?" said Ashura as he looked at the door that just slammed shut after Selene and Teo exited the room.

"He'll be fine; she has a soft spot for him after all. If it was anyone else, though, that would be a different story." stated Corvus, with shivers running down his spine; if he was the one in trouble, he would suffer a lot.

"Well, don't we all have a soft spot for him?" mentioned Valena with a tender look in her eyes. And they all nodded in unison. Hoping Selene would go easy on him as it was technically partially her fault.

Teo barely had time to process Selene's grip on his arm before the door slammed shut behind them. Her pace was brisk, her expression a mix of frustration and something he couldn't quite place, concern maybe? The silence between them was heavy, broken only by the echo of their footsteps in the corridor.

"You're unusually quiet," Teo remarked, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye. "Technically I didn't do anything wrong as you put that colossus in the dungeon."

Selene kept walking forward, not sparing him a glance, as she muttered, "You don't get it, do you? What you accomplished in there is going to cause problems, big ones."

Teo arched an eyebrow, his stoic expression shifting slightly. "Problems for who? You or me?"