The bass was a physical entity. It thumped through the reinforced concrete and marble framework of the Thorne mansion, traveled up the walls of the west wing, and settled directly into the springs of Lucian's mattress.
Tonight was the succession banquet. The Marquis had officially named Silas as the sole heir to the Thorne family legacy, and the estate was currently hosting half the capital's elite to celebrate.
High-ranking Guild Masters, corporate sponsors, and Hunter Association officials were downstairs drinking expensive champagne, brokering dungeon rights, and generating a volume of noise that bordered on a localized seismic event.
Earlier in the evening, Hans had unlocked Lucian's door just long enough to deliver a strict, uncompromising directive from the Marquis: 'Under no circumstances are you to leave the room tonight'. The family wanted absolute perfection.
They did not want the "insane" eldest son wandering through the ballroom in cheap clothes to embarrass them in front of the press.
Lucian had given the butler a single, slow nod. He had absolutely zero intention of going anywhere near the loud, exhausting politics of the first floor.
But as the night wore on, the situation in his room became untenable. His heavy, matte-black headphones completely blocked the auditory assault of the music, but they couldn't stop the vibration of the floorboards.
Every time the DJ dropped the beat, Lucian's teeth rattled. He had waited for Lily to come by, hoping the youngest Thorne would sit on the rug and provide a quiet distraction, but a passing maid had mentioned that the little girl had exhausted herself at the dinner service and was already fast asleep in her own wing.
Lucian lay in the dark for another twenty minutes, feeling the bed frame hum against his spine, before he finally reached his limit.
He swung his legs over the edge of the mattress. He put on his usual attire, a plain black jacket and loose black trousers.
He walked to the storage closet at the back of his suite, rummaging past the discarded silk tunics until he found what he needed: a thick, heavy coil of durable hunter-grade climbing rope and a dark woolen blanket.
He looped the rope over his shoulder, tucked the blanket under his arm, and slipped out the back servant's exit.
He didn't care about the Marquis's orders. He just needed a place to sleep that wasn't vibrating.
***
Three stories above the gardens, on a secluded marble balcony, two people were actively hiding from the exact same party.
"If that corporate lapdog from the Scavenger Guild asks me to endorse his new line of mana-potions one more time, I am going to melt his shoes to the floor,"
Kaelen muttered, leaning his elbows against the stone balustrade.
Kaelen was the Guild Master of the Inferno Guild. An S-Rank hunter with a fire attribute, he radiated a faint, natural heat, his sharp features illuminated by the glow of the ballroom behind them.
"You'd be doing the fashion world a favor," Sera replied coolly, swirling a glass of sparkling water. "Though with your temper, I'm surprised you haven't burned the buffet table down yet."
Sera was the Guild Master of the Glacier Guild. She was the absolute antithesis of Kaelen, an ice-attribute S-Rank with a demeanor as sharp and unforgiving as a winter storm.
They were the two most famous, powerful hunters in the capital, and they despised each other on a deeply moral level.
Kaelen thought Sera was a heartless ice queen; Sera thought Kaelen was a reckless brute. But the stifling boredom of high-society banquets made for strange bedfellows, and they had mutually agreed to a temporary truce just to escape the crowds.
"At least Silas Thorne knows how to throw a party," Kaelen conceded, looking over the vast, manicured estate. "Kid earned it. Cleared an A-Rank Gate solo last week. He's the real deal."
Sera took a sip of her water, her icy blue eyes scanning the dark treeline at the edge of the property.
"He is. Though I hear his promotion is built on a rather tragic foundation. Have you heard the rumors about the eldest brother?"
Kaelen scoffed softly. "Lucian? The 'Trash'? Hard to miss the rumors. The whole city knows he lost his mind after a training drone nearly took his head off. My vice-master said Lady Seraphina broke off the engagement, went to visit him, and ran out of the house crying because he had gone completely catatonic. Just sits in the dark all day. The Marquis locked him away."
"It's a pity," Sera murmured, though there wasn't much warmth in her voice. "To fall so far, so quickly. A broken mind in a family that only values strength. He must be in agony-"
"...?"
As she spoke, her sharp, magically enhanced vision caught a flicker of movement in the shadows below.
She paused, her glass stopping halfway to her lips. Down in the darkest, most secluded corner of the estate gardens, near the edge of the ancient oak trees, a figure was walking across the grass.
"Kaelen," Sera said, her voice dropping its usual condescension. "Look."
Kaelen followed her gaze. Through the gloom, they saw a gaunt, pale man with stark white hair, dressed entirely in black. He was walking with a slow, heavy, dragging gait, heading straight for the oldest, tallest tree on the property.
Over his shoulder, he carried a thick coil of rope.
Kaelen's posture stiffened immediately. "Is that...?"
"The eldest son," Sera confirmed, her heart rate spiking. She watched as Lucian reached the base of the massive oak. He uncoiled the heavy rope, his movements sluggish but deliberate. He looked up at a thick, sturdy branch about ten feet off the ground, then tossed one end of the rope over it.
The two S-Rank Guild Masters felt the blood drain from their faces simultaneously. The context painted a horrific, undeniable picture. The broken, disgraced heir. The absolute isolation.
The loud party celebrating his replacement inside. And now, sneaking out into the dark with a rope.
"...Gods, he's going to do it," Kaelen breathed, his fire-attribute mana flaring to life in an instant, warming the air around the balcony.
"We have to stop him," Sera said, slamming her glass down on the stone rail, her own ice mana surging in a panic.
They didn't hesitate. Putting their bitter rivalry entirely aside, the two S ranks of the hunter world vaulted over the second-story balustrade.
They plummeted toward the ground, using their respective mana to cushion the fall, landing on the grass with a muted, heavy thud. Without a word, they sprinted across the massive lawn. Their S-Rank speed blurred their movements, closing the distance of the football-field-sized garden in mere seconds.
"Lucian! Stop!" Kaelen roared, his voice booming over the distant thumping bass of the mansion.
"Step away from the tree!" Sera yelled, her hands glowing with a soft, blue frost, ready to freeze the rope if she had to.
Lucian, however, didn't even flinch.
Beneath the thick canopy of the oak tree, enveloped in the absolute, silent void of his noise-canceling headphones, Lucian was completely oblivious to the two human missiles hurling toward him.
He didn't hear Kaelen's shout. He didn't hear Sera's warning. He was entirely focused on threading the end of the rope back through the loop he had just created.
He had already spent five minutes weaving the thick cords back and forth, creating a wide, flat net. He was just reaching up to pull the final knot tight against the trunk, looking forward to lying down and escaping the vibrations of the house.
Kaelen and Sera saw him ignoring their shouts. They saw him reach up to tighten the knot. In their panicked, adrenaline-fueled minds, it meant he was fully committed. He was going to end it right now.
"I've got him!" Kaelen shouted.
Lucian finally felt the displacement of air. He turned his head, his dull golden eyes registering two blurry shapes lunging out of the darkness.
Before he could even process who they were, a wall of pure, physical force slammed into his waist.
*WHAM!
Lucian hit the grass hard. The breath was knocked out of his lungs in a sharp rush. He felt a heavy weight pin his legs, and another weight crash onto his chest, securing his shoulders to the dirt.
The impact jarred his skull against the soft turf, and his right headphone was violently knocked off his ear, suddenly flooding his right side with the distant, thumping bass of the party and the frantic, heavy panting of the two people on top of him.
"We've got you! Don't move!" Kaelen yelled, pinning Lucian's left arm, his face flushed, glowing with embers of residual mana. "It's not worth it, kid! Look at me! Don't do it!"
"You're safe now," Sera gasped, her icy hands firmly holding down his right shoulder, her pristine dress stained with dirt.
"Whatever pain you are in, taking your own life is not the answer! You have to fight it!"
Lucian lay flat on his back. His left ear was still perfectly silent, covered by the remaining headphone pad.
His right ear was ringing. He felt the crushing, dense auras of two S-Rank hunters pressing down on him, a localized pressure of extreme heat and biting cold that would have made a normal civilian pass out.
He didn't panic. He didn't struggle against their grips. He didn't even blink.
He simply moved his eyes from Kaelen's sweaty, heroic face to Sera's desperate, panicked expression. Then, slowly, he tilted his head to look past them.
Dangling from the sturdy oak branch, clearly illuminated by the moonlight, was not a noose. It was a wide, expertly woven, flat rectangle of rope, anchored at two ends. It was a hammock. A blanket lay neatly folded on the grass directly beneath it.
Lucian looked back at the two most powerful, famous Guild Masters in the country. He felt a profound, bone-deep exhaustion settle over him.
"Are you done?" Lucian asked.
His voice wasn't grateful. It wasn't angry. It was a flat, gravelly rasp of absolute, unadulterated annoyance.
Kaelen froze. Sera stopped breathing.
The two S-Ranks slowly turned their heads, following the trajectory of Lucian's earlier gaze. They looked at the rope. They looked at the flat, comfortable-looking weave. They looked at the folded blanket.
"..."
"..."
The adrenaline evaporated from Kaelen's veins so fast he felt dizzy. The frost on Sera's hands completely fizzled out, replaced by a sudden, intense flush of embarrassment that turned the tips of her ears bright red.
They were pinning a man to the ground who was just trying to build a bed.
The silence that followed was agonizing. The distant, thumping bass of the mansion seemed to mock them.
Lucian didn't wait for an apology. He didn't demand an explanation. Using his free right hand, he calmly reached over, picked his displaced headphone off the grass, and secured it back over his ear.
The world went blessedly silent again. He closed his eyes, completely ignoring the two incredibly stupid, very heavy S-Ranks currently sitting on his chest, and waited for them to get off of him.