From the folds of Draven's cloak, a small shadow slipped free.
A sleek black cat—its purple eyes glinting in the dim light—stepped onto the fractured stone. Its tail flicked lazily, but its gaze remained locked on the crystal in Draven's hand.
Draven didn't flinch. His crimson eyes stayed fixed on the core. Slowly, he tilted his head, acknowledging the creature at his side.
"…So you want it too," he murmured. "That's the only damned thing you ever do. Eat."
The cat's ears twitched. Its pupils narrowed to thin slits. It crouched, claws flexing against the stone floor, anticipation radiating from its small body like heat shimmering off iron.
Draven tightened his grip.
With a sharp crack, a fracture split across the crystal's dense surface. Jagged pulses of raw, unstable mana burst outward. Threads of folded crimson energy within him surged forward, probing the fissures, tasting the violent current spilling free.
The cat leapt.
Its tiny jaws latched onto a shard of released mana. Crimson threads coiled around its small form, merging with its unnatural aura. It purred—or something like a purr—but the sound vibrated wrong, a hum of pure consumption, a storm of hunger condensed into a fragile body.
Draven exhaled slowly.
He could feel it—every layer of the crystal's energy clawing back at him. The pressure of raw Abyssal alignment—dense, chaotic, jagged—hammered against the internal folds of his mana structure.
Pain flared.
Sharp. Immediate. Unforgiving.
It cut through his focus like a blade. Every nerve, every carefully compressed layer of energy inside him screamed in protest.
He didn't falter.
The cat's consumption synchronized with his own. Crimson and black threads intertwined, channeling the crystal's mana into parallel streams. The flow was violent and uneven, shredding at the delicate boundaries of his internal folds.
Draven's teeth clenched.
The crystal resisted. Abyssal energy lashed back, pulsing in furious rejection. Pain radiated from his chest, shot down his arms, burned along his spine, clawed at the core within him.
And still—he absorbed.
He couldn't stop.
Not when that power—thick, unstable, intoxicating—was within reach.
Crimson threads drove deeper into the widening fractures, dragging mana into him with ruthless precision. Beside him, the cat shivered faintly as it drew energy in tandem, eyes wide and intent, its small body thrumming with feral satisfaction.
The crystal cracked further. Jagged lines splintered across its core as chunks of dense Abyssal energy tore free. Some flowed into Draven's internal channels; others dissolved into the cat's waiting jaws.
Pain spiked again—hotter now, sharper, like molten metal sliding through his veins. His arms trembled. Muscles burned. The edges of his vision flickered crimson.
A low growl escaped him, restrained but raw.
The cat hissed in harmony, tail lashing, energy coiling faintly around its paws as it fed.
Every backlash from the Abyssal core struck him from within. Every pulse of rejection tried to crush him, to expel him, to overwrite him.
He forced it down.
Compressed it.
Layer by layer.
The crystal's pulse began to weaken. The fissures widened, mana pouring out faster, feeding the folding core he controlled.
Pain became pressure.
Pressure became burning.
Burning became rhythm.
And Draven—calm, relentless, crimson-eyed—did not stop.
He would not stop.
Not until every shard, every fragment, every trace of that Abyssal crystal had been consumed—by him and by the small, ravenous creature at his side.
Crimson threads tightened around the remaining shards, siphoning mana into Draven's internal structure with brutal precision.
The cat crouched beside him, eerily composed. Its eyes glowed faintly purple as it licked at the splintering currents of energy. Not a twitch of discomfort. Not a single tremor.
Draven was another matter entirely.
Each shard he drew in sent violent shocks through his chest and arms. His skin felt stretched over molten pressure, his bones straining to contain what surged within. The Abyssal mana clawed at him from the inside, seeking to root itself, to overwrite his structure.
Blood seeped from the corner of his mouth, trailing down his chin. A thin line split open along his forearm where unstable energy burst through weakened containment.
Still—he did not stop.
"Pain," he muttered through clenched teeth, voice low and steady, "is just resistance."
The cat remained serene. It clamped its jaws around another ribbon of fractured mana and swallowed it with casual ease. Its black fur shimmered faintly in the crimson glow, untouched by the chaos tearing through Draven's body.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the crystal, glowing red along every fault line. The flow intensified, thrashing wildly. Draven's legs trembled, threatening to buckle under the feedback of absorbing such unrefined density.
He adjusted.
Every fold within him tightened. Spiraled. Reinforced. He forced the crystal's resistance to fracture under his will, even as it shredded him from the inside.
His clothes were torn now, stained dark with blood and scorched where energy flared out of control. Burns marked his skin. Veins along his neck and arms darkened faintly before stabilizing beneath a crimson glow.
His breathing came in harsh, ragged pulls.
The cat simply sat beside him, gold eyes flicking from shard to shard, composed and unbothered.
Draven's lips twitched—almost a smile through blood and strain.
"…Lucky little bastard," he rasped. "You don't feel a damn thing."
Still, he consumed.
Every pulse. Every surge. Every scream of resistant mana.
The crystal shuddered under their combined assault, unable to withstand both Draven's deliberate brutality and the cat's effortless hunger.
Slowly—fragment by fragment—it began to surrender.
Final fractures raced across its surface like lightning trapped in glass. Crimson light bled through every crack, pulsing faster, weaker, unstable.
Draven's grip tightened. Blood dripped from his fingertips onto shattered stone.
Inside him, the Abyssal mana churned violently—trying to root itself, trying to rewrite him.
He crushed it down.
Compressed it again.
Across from him, the cat calmly bit into another splinter of energy. No pain. No trembling. Just quiet appetite.
The crystal pulsed once more.
Then—
It collapsed inward.
The remaining mana surged out in a final, desperate wave.
Draven took it head-on.
The force drove him to one knee. Stone fractured beneath him.
Blood poured from his mouth in a heavier stream, splashing against the ground. His veins blackened briefly before crimson light forced them back into alignment.
Beside him, the cat absorbed its portion smoothly, swallowing the last threads like mist dissolving into shadow.
No reaction.
No transformation.
It merely licked its paw.
The final fragment dissolved in Draven's grip.
Silence settled over the clearing.
Where a massive Abyssal core had once pulsed—
There was nothing.
Only drifting crimson embers fading into the air.
Draven remained kneeling for a long moment. His shoulders rose and fell slowly.
Inside him, the newly absorbed mana churned, smashing against containment folds. Fractures threatened to form along his internal pathways.
Too much. Too fast.
He coughed again—darker blood staining the stone.
Aldric stepped forward instinctively. "Hey, you good—"
"I'm fine."
His voice was rough.
But steady.
Draven pushed himself to his feet. For a brief second, his vision doubled. The world tilted.
Then it steadied.
The crimson in his eyes deepened—not wild, not unstable.
Denser.
He rolled one shoulder. Pain spiked internally—but held.
Contained.
The cat padded over and leapt lightly onto his shoulder, curling there as though nothing extraordinary had occurred.
Draven glanced at it from the corner of his eye.
"…Glutton."
The cat blinked lazily.
Inside him, the Abyssal mana slowly settled—compressing, aligning under his will. Rough. Untamed.
But his.
The air around him grew heavier.
Not chaotic.
Not unstable.
Just deeper.