The city was quieter at night, but never silent.
Even in the poorest quarter, the streets whispered with the shuffle of boots, the creak of wagon wheels, the murmur of hushed deals in shadowed corners. In the Scavenger's Lane, the air carried a thick stew of smoke, rotting fruit, cheap ale, and the faint metallic tang of blood that clung to every hunter's skin.
Kael kept his hood low as he slipped between shuttered stalls, boots splashing in puddles of foul rainwater. The vial inside his coat felt heavier than it had an hour ago, as though it were dragging him down into the cobblestones.
It wasn't the weight of glass.
It was the weight of change.
By the time he reached his shack, the moon had broken through the clouds, painting the warped boards in silver light. Kael slid inside, bolting the door behind him.
The vial came out first — glowing faintly in the dimness, the blood within swirling as if alive.
He sat cross-legged, setting the vial before him. His breath slowed. His body wanted the power, his blood almost vibrating in anticipation.
In the guild's clean, regulated absorption halls, there would be ritual chants, talismanic bindings, healers on standby. Here, Kael had nothing but four walls, a locked door, and the knowledge that no one else could do what he was about to do.
He pulled the stopper.
The scent hit him first — hot and sharp, like breathing in a forge. He tipped the vial to his lips.
The moment the first drop touched his tongue, the world narrowed to fire and stone.
The heat was unbearable, searing through every vein, pounding in rhythm with his heartbeat. His muscles locked, then spasmed, as though the rhino itself had driven its horn straight through his chest.
His vision blurred. Images surged — the rhino's endless patience as it grazed, the sudden violence of its charge, the unyielding strength of its stance when challenged. He could feel the Earth under his feet, could taste the molten heart of the mountain it carried in its blood.
[D-Rank Gene Integration Possible: Choose One Ability Slot.]
The whisper in his mind was colder than the blood was hot, steady, waiting.
Kael's pulse quickened. Most hunters fought tooth and nail to earn one-third of what he was feeling now — and then had to waste years waiting for the right element match.
He had no such chains.
Options flashed before his eyes:
Molten Charge — A burst of unstoppable forward force, horned or not, that could smash through walls.
Stonehide — Skin as tough as worked granite, able to turn aside blades and arrows.
Earth Pulse — A seismic shockwave channeled through the ground, destabilizing enemies' footing.
Kael clenched his fists. He could take any of them — or save the slot entirely for something rarer, stronger. That was his edge: he didn't have to fill every breakthrough with the best option available. He could stockpile.
But… the wild was changing. The panthers proved that. The next time something came for him, he might not get the chance to decide later.
His gut chose before his mind caught up.
Stonehide.
The heat slammed inward, condensing into his skin until it felt like his entire body had been dipped in molten rock and left to cool. The burn dulled into a slow, powerful thrum beneath the surface.
[C-Rank – Low Stage Achieved. GP: 110/300. Ability Integrated: Stonehide (Earth)]
Kael exhaled shakily. His hands no longer trembled. The ache in his ribs from the rhino's kick was gone.
When he flexed his fingers, the skin across his knuckles felt denser, heavier, as though every bone and tendon had been reinforced.
He sat there for a while, letting the sensation settle, listening to the rain pattering on the shack's warped roof. The breakthrough hadn't just strengthened his body — it had quieted something inside him, a restless edge that had gnawed at him since he'd first discovered his gift.
But the quiet didn't last.
A faint thunk at the door snapped him upright.
Kael crossed the room in three strides, pressing an ear to the wood. No footsteps. No voices.
Slowly, he slid back the bolt and eased the door open.
A folded scrap of parchment lay on the step, held down by a small stone.
No seal. No name.
He unwrapped it inside, unrolling the damp paper. The handwriting was jagged, hurried:
You're not the only one taking blood.
The Guild will think it's you. Meet me at the east wall, midnight. Come alone.
Kael read it twice, jaw tightening.
Either it was a trap, or someone knew his secret. Neither option was good.
He glanced at the wall where his satchel hung. Inside were the remaining vials of lesser beast blood — his fallback supply. If the Guild had begun connecting the thefts, those would damn him as much as the rhino's blood would.
He shoved the note into his coat and stepped back out into the wet night.
The east wall was a half-hour walk through streets where lantern light barely reached, past shuttered warehouses and the occasional drunk sprawled in the gutter.
The wall itself was a jagged spine of black stone that marked the city's edge. Beyond it stretched the inner hunting zones, the real hunting grounds, where beasts of D-Rank and above roamed freely. Only licensed teams went there.
And only fools met strangers here after midnight.
A shadow peeled itself from the base of the wall as Kael approached.
"You came." The voice was low, female, and sharp with tension.
The speaker stepped into a stray shaft of moonlight. She was young — not much older than Kael — but her leather armor bore fresh claw marks, and the crossbow slung over her shoulder was loaded. Her dark hair was tied back in a hunter's braid.
Kael's eyes flicked to the faint glow of a vial strapped to her belt. Blood.
"You wrote the note," he said flatly.
She nodded. "Name's Ryn. And before you start thinking this is some Guild sting — trust me, I'm not with them. I'm like you."
Kael didn't move closer. "Like me?"
She held up the vial, shaking it so the dark liquid caught the moonlight. "Full absorption. No cubes. No attunement limits. I take it straight from the source."
Kael's heartbeat thudded once, hard. "That's not possible."
Ryn's smirk was humorless. "You thought you were the only freak in the world? No. There's more of us. And right now, someone's making sure the Guild thinks we're all the same person."
She stepped closer, lowering her voice. "Those panthers at Red Vale Gorge? They didn't wander in by accident. Someone's driving beasts into the wrong zones — herding them — and then hitting both the beasts and the hunters. Taking blood from both."
Kael's skin crawled. "Why?"
"Because," she said, eyes narrowing, "if the Guild thinks one rogue blood-thief is behind the chaos, they'll hunt them down with everything they've got. And while they're busy, whoever's really doing this will take what they want."
Silence stretched between them. The wall loomed above, black against the clouded sky.
Finally, Kael said, "Why tell me?"
"Because you're sloppy," Ryn said bluntly. "The Guild's already watching you. If you go down, they'll lump me in with you. And I'm not planning to die in some Guild interrogation cell."
Her gaze was sharp, assessing. "We work together, we find who's doing this, we stay alive. Or we stay separate, and we both burn."
Kael studied her for a long moment. Trust was a currency he didn't spend — but the thought of another like him, with the same impossible gift, was a crack in the wall he'd built around himself.
Finally, he said, "Fine. But we do this my way."
Ryn's smirk returned, thin as a knife's edge. "Good. My way usually ends with more corpses than answers."
She turned toward the wall, vaulting onto the lower stones with practiced ease. "We start now. Before the Guild realizes the rhino wasn't the only thing bleeding in Red Vale."
Kael followed, the new weight of Stonehide in his muscles promising he'd be ready for whatever waited beyond the wall.
But in the back of his mind, one thought dug in like a thorn:If there were two of them… how many more could there be?