The air was still thick with the lingering scent of gunpowder and a faint trace of blood—that was the remnant power of the Succubus dissipating.
Ange swiftly holstered the White Gun at her thigh. The heel of her boot tapped the ground with a crisp sound, shattering the brief silence.
Ingrid finally understood: just now, the teacher had instantly bent her knee and drawn the gun from her heel to shoot at the Succubus.
She walked to the motionless corpse of the Succubus, glanced down, then turned to the still-dazed Ingrid, a teasing curve lifting the corner of her lips.
“All right, Ingrid, stop just staring. Next up is the Practical Lesson,” Ange said, tapping the Succubus’s body with her toe.
“I bet you’ve never handled one of these things yourself, have you?”
Ingrid snapped back to herself, the blush on her face from Ange’s earlier battle not yet fully faded. She straightened her back, striving to make her voice sound calm and professional.
“Yes, Teacher. There are a lot of Theoretical Courses and Simulation Training at the Academy, but… I’ve never actually handled a Demon Remains myself before.”
As soon as she spoke, a thought flashed through her mind like lightning: if Teacher Ange said this, did that mean that, even as a student, she had already… started personally hunting and handling Demons?
The idea made her heart pound. She looked at Ange with even deeper admiration in her gaze.
As expected of the First Demon Hunter. Her experience was truly beyond comparison.
“Knew it. No matter how well you memorize the theory, if you haven’t seen the real thing, it’s all just talk on paper.”
Ange’s tone was flat, as if stating something utterly ordinary. “Today, you’ll start from the simplest. Watch carefully—I’ll only demonstrate once.”
As she spoke, she pulled out a uniquely shaped dagger from somewhere—perhaps a hidden pocket in that fitted but mysterious top.
The dagger’s blade was short, glimmering with a cold metallic luster, and seemed to be etched with faint runes.
Ange squatted beside the Succubus corpse, her movements completely devoid of hesitation or disgust, as calm as a surgeon about to perform a dissection.
She first used the dagger to cut open the thin, semi-transparent black-silken garment and the skin on the Succubus’s chest. Her motions were precise and steady.
Ingrid instinctively held her breath, but the bloody spray she had anticipated didn’t appear.
Ange’s dagger seemed almost magical. As it sliced through the tissue, the edges of the wound turned slightly pale, with almost no blood flowing out.
Her wrist was incredibly agile; the angle and depth of her cuts were so perfectly controlled, it was as if she could “see” every inch of the structure beneath the skin.
In less than ten seconds, Ange’s hand slipped and hooked, and a heart—still faintly beating, an uncanny peach-pink hue—was extracted whole and rested in her palm.
The heart was hardly stained with blood, only a few vessels at the base cut cleanly.
Ingrid stared in shock. Was this a Demon Hunter handling a trophy, or a master surgeon giving a demonstration of a precision operation?
She even forgot to feel disgusted, lost in pure awe. With skills like these, if Teacher didn’t hunt demons, she could probably be a chief surgeon at any hospital.
She sneaked a look at Ange’s hands, gloved in black tactical gloves. Those hands had just performed such precision, yet now were utterly steady, not the slightest tremble.
What amazed Ingrid even more was that from start to finish, not a single drop of blood or stain landed on Ange—whether her black top and shorts, her silver hair, gloves, stockings, or boots.
The entire process was clean, efficient, even carrying a kind of professional beauty.
“Demons—especially high-level ones—their bodily tissues are often precious materials, or dangerous sources of contamination.”
Ange explained calmly, placing the peach-pink heart into a prepared sealed bag.
“If you carelessly destroy it, you’ll cause energy to dissipate, or… dirty your clothes. Maintaining cleanliness is a basic quality for a Demon Hunter,” she said, even glancing pointedly at her own spotless fingertips.
Ange would never admit she was showing off a little, heh.
Next, she stood up, took some powder from another pouch, and sprinkled it evenly over the Succubus’s corpse.
With a snap of her fingers, a flicker of blue flame sprang up from the powder, swiftly spreading over the entire body.
The flame burned silently—no thick smoke, no foul smell—simply consuming flesh and bone to ash.
Watching the blue fire on the ground and the small puddle of blood that couldn’t be fully avoided during cutting, now being burned away, Ingrid finally couldn’t hold back her question.
“Teacher, are we just… handling it here? Won’t these bloodstains and burn marks attract attention and cause trouble with ordinary people?”
Ange turned, giving her a look that barely concealed her exasperation, as if looking at an idiot.
“Heh.”
Ange sighed, grinding the last ember out with her boot heel.
“This is just the initial handling, to erase most of the energy traces and biological information. Did you think Demon Hunters also moonlight as sanitation workers, digging pits and scrubbing floors?”
She pulled out her phone and tapped rapidly. The screen’s pale light glimmered on her unreadable face.
“I’ve already notified the Logistics Department. The Academy has a dedicated Clean-Up Squad. They’ll be here soon to make sure this place looks untouched, clear away all traces, perform Memory Obfuscation, cleaning… They’re the professionals.”
As if to prove her words, the distant rumble of an engine could be faintly heard, approaching from far away.
Or perhaps it was just a passing car—the Academy’s Clean-Up Squad had probably just set out.
Of course, that didn’t stop Ange from maintaining her sense of authority in front of her student.
“Understood?”
Ange put away her phone and dusted off her hands, though there was no dust to speak of.
“Let’s go. Leave the rest to the professionals. Our work here is done.”
On the way back to the Academy, night had fallen deep.
Ingrid quietly kept half a step behind Ange, gazing at the tall, composed figure ahead, her emotions in turmoil.
During the day, Teacher Ange could oversleep and be late, joke around with her, haggle over money, even sometimes reveal a casualness and roguishness out of character for her elegant appearance—a relic, perhaps, of her past as a man.
She seemed nothing like a traditional teacher.
Yet, once in Demon Hunter mode—from devising uncanny yet effective plans, to coldly and efficiently eliminating the target, to the final, practiced, precise, almost heartless handling of the corpse—Teacher Ange revealed a professional polish and strength forged over countless battles, ingrained to her very bones.
That effortless composure, that ability to turn danger and gore into a clean “operation,” made Ingrid realize: this seemingly “casual” teacher was a true veteran on the Demon Hunting path.
In fact, one at the very pinnacle.
The night wind stirred Ange’s silver hair. Sensing Ingrid’s long stare, she turned her head slightly, violet eyes flashing with silent inquiry in the darkness.
“It’s nothing, Teacher.”
Ingrid quickly shook her head, yet a smile of yearning spread uncontrollably on her face.
“I just feel… it’s really wonderful to be your student.”
She was determined to work even harder, just to catch up with Teacher’s footsteps, even if only a little.
Ange raised an eyebrow, giving no comment on her student’s sudden sentimentality. She just turned her head back and tossed out a line:
“Less flattery. Remember to get up early and buy me Breakfast tomorrow.”
“What would you like?”
“Get me some Chocolate Buns. I’m a bit curious about their flavor.”
“By the way, Teacher, your Pole Dance moves earlier were so smooth! Do I need to learn that too?”
“No need. I just happened to pick it up for certain reasons back when I was male. You don’t have to.”
“Understood…”