Elena's fists were bruised.
Not from fighting anyone — but from the floor.
The old man, who finally introduced himself as Thorne, had her striking a cracked punching bag for the past hour. But not with muscle. With Flux.
"Again," he barked from the shadows of the gym.
Elena gritted her teeth. Her arms ached, her pulse thudded in her ears. She took a breath.
In through your nose… out through your mouth.
She focused on the hum beneath her skin. The warmth in her chest. Let it rise down her arms, into her knuckles. She pictured her fists like river stones — smoothed by current, but strong enough to break bones.
She struck.
A faint flicker of blue light trailed her punch — just for a second.
The bag barely moved.
She sighed. "That's like… 5% improvement."
Thorne cracked a rare smile. "More like 7%. Don't be greedy."
________________________________________
For the next hour, she practiced movement drills — boosting her speed with short bursts of flux, timing her breathing with her strikes. Flux surged best when intention, motion, and emotion aligned.
But she kept overthinking it. Hesitating.
"Flux isn't a technique," Thorne snapped. "It's a truth. And you're still lying to yourself."
Elena blinked. "What does that mean?"
"You don't believe you're strong. So your Flux doesn't either."
She clenched her fists. "I'm trying."
"Then stop trying. Start choosing. Choose who you are when it matters. That's what draws your energy into form."
She turned back to the bag.
This time, she didn't overthink.
She didn't hesitate.
She threw a punch — not to impress him, not to improve, but because she wanted to hit something that couldn't hit back.
Her fist lit up in blue fire.
The bag flew across the room.
Her mouth dropped open.
Thorne laughed — deep, sharp, satisfied.
"Welcome to basic enhancement. You just Flux-forged your first strike."
________________________________________
✦✦✦
Later that night, Elena walked home through alleys she normally avoided.
Her body buzzed from the breakthrough. Her first real control. The glow had lasted only a second — but it was hers.
She passed a shuttered warehouse two blocks from the restaurant when she heard it.
A soundless scream.
A pressure in the air.
Like the sky was holding its breath.
She stopped.
A figure stumbled from the alley ahead — pale, staggering, eyes wide with terror.
Behind him… something moved.
Wrongly.
It wasn't a man.
It wasn't an animal.
It was a Wraithborn — and even though she didn't know the word yet, her whole body screamed it.
Its form flickered like corrupted static — long-limbed, faceless, humanoid but not human. It pulsed with violet-black energy, seething, starved.
And it saw her.
________________________________________
Elena backed up, heart hammering. "What the hell—"
The Wraithborn lunged.
Instinct took over. She dove to the side, rolled, scrambled to her feet. The air around it rippled — distorted like heat waves.
It wasn't just chasing her.
It was drawn to her flux.
Her power was awake now. And it wanted to feed.
Elena raised her fists — flux already flaring weakly in her knuckles. Her hands trembled.
"I'm not ready for this," she whispered.
The Wraithborn shrieked — an echoing, hollow sound that shouldn't exist.
She took a deep breath.
No one ever is.
She lunged.
________________________________________
The fight was chaos.
She landed one enhanced punch — it staggered the Wraithborn but didn't slow it much. It moved like smoke wrapped in muscle — fast, unnatural, always shifting. Every second burned more energy from her core.
She couldn't keep this up.
The Wraithborn pinned her against a wall. Its claws scraped concrete beside her face.
Her legs kicked free, shoving it back — but she was losing ground fast.
That's when a second figure dropped from the rooftop behind it.
Blue flux flared like lightning as a kick smashed into the Wraithborn's spine, launching it back.
Elena stared, panting, stunned.
The stranger landed in a crouch.
Short black jacket. Combat boots. Calm eyes that shimmered silver in the dark.
"You handled yourself pretty well," he said.
Elena blinked. "Who—?"
"No time. It's coming back."
The Wraithborn shrieked again, re-forming in mid-air.
Together, they moved.
________________________________________
It took both of them — a dozen blows, several bursts of coordinated flux strikes, and one risky joint maneuver to knock the Wraithborn into a metal beam and pin it long enough for the stranger to use a glowing wireblade to disrupt its core.
With a pulse of light, it disintegrated — vanishing into cold dust.
Elena dropped to her knees, breath ragged.
She had never fought for her life like that.
The stranger stood over her, offering a hand.
She took it.
"Elena," she managed.
He nodded. "Rico. I've seen you training with Thorne."
She stared. "You've been watching me?"
"Not just you," Rico said. "There are more waking up now. The current's shifting."
"What was that thing?"
"A Wraithborn. Echo-tier. Weak one."
"Weak?!"
"Yeah," he said, grim. "They're getting stronger. And someone's making them."
Elena froze. "Someone?"
Rico looked toward the rooftops.
"They call themselves the Eclipsed Circle."