After stepping through the fourth door.
The world twisted. Then he stood on a wide stone floor. The ground stretched far into the dark. It was broken into slabs and every slab was cracked. Some were small cracks. Some were wide and deep. He could not see the bottom.
The air was heavy. Cold. It tasted of iron.
He took one step forward and the floor groaned. The cracks spread further. He stopped.
One more wrong step and he would fall. That much was clear.
He crouched low and touched the ground. It was trembling like something alive.
He saw marks. Scratches. Fingers maybe. They did not matter. What mattered was this. If the ground kept moving then brute strength would not save him. Running would not save him.
He stayed still. He watched.
The stones moved. Not quickly. Not wildly. But they moved. Some slid back into place. Some sank. Some tilted then returned.
It looked random at first. The kind of movement that makes you panic. That was the trap.
Aren breathed slow. He counted. One two three. The slab in front of him sank. Five more heartbeats. It rose again.
He nodded to himself. It was not random. It was rhythm.
But then he saw the other danger.
From the cracks below the shadows stretched. Long black fingers. They reached when he leaned too far forward. They pulled back when he froze.
So that was it. The trial had two traps. If he moved without thought the floor collapsed. If he waited too long the shadows caught him.
We cannot measure which danger was greater. This was the kind of place where any wrong thought could kill you.
Aren thought. If I run I die. If I wait I die. If I fight the shadows I waste time. Then what remains.
He closed his eyes and placed his palm on the floor. The cracks quivered under his skin. They were breathing. The whole floor was like a chest that rose and fell.
His eyes opened. He whispered to himself. "It is alive."
If it was alive then it had rhythm. If it had rhythm then it had safety too.
The others would avoid the cracks. They would step on the stones that looked solid. But Aren saw the trick. The cracks were not only danger. The cracks were guides. They showed the beat. They showed where to step.
He smiled faintly. "So that is how it is."
He rose and waited. The slab in front of him tilted. He did not move. It steadied again. He stepped lightly on the crack itself. The shadow reached too late.
He stepped again. He matched his breath with the movement. The floor inhaled. He stepped. The floor exhaled. He stopped.
One stone. Two stones. Ten stones. His heart pounded but his steps never faltered.
The shadows hissed. The slabs groaned. But he kept moving with the rhythm of the living floor.
Finally his foot touched solid ground on the far side. The floor went quiet.
Aren opened his eyes and looked behind him. The world around him was still now. The stones were no longer shaking. The shadows that had been alive a moment ago were gone.
For a second he thought it was over. He thought the trial had ended.
But then a voice came.
"Aren…"
At first he could not even tell if it was a voice. It was not male and it was not female. It was not the kind of sound that came from a mouth. It was something different. Heavy, deep and cold.
It filled the space around him as if the air itself had started speaking. It sank into his chest and into his bones until he felt too small to stand in its presence.
Aren's body locked up. His skin broke out in chills and the hairs on his neck stood straight. He turned in circles trying to find the source. There was nothing. No figure. No shadow. Only the voice.
His voice shook when he forced out the words.
"Who… who are you."
The answer came without pause. The tone was calm and steady, as if it had always been waiting. "Eclipse."
Aren froze. The word struck through him like ice. He was shocked to be standing here, speaking with Eclipse itself. Questions rushed through his mind but none left his mouth. He could not speak.
The voice spoke again.
"I see you, Aren. You have carried a hard life for many years. Shall I send you back? Back to the time when life was easy?"
Aren froze. The words hit him harder than the trials before.
Back.
For a moment he saw it again. The small home. The smell of food his mother used to cook. The way his father laughed. The days when his parents were still alive. The days before everything broke apart. Life had been warm then. Simple. Safe.
The voice pressed again. "Or do you want to gain a dominion and become a hunter in this cruel world?"
This question was not like the others before. This one was heavy. Aren stood still and thought.
If he said yes, if he chose to go back, would that really happen? Or was it only a trick? He did not know. But he knew this. If going back was truly possible, if the Eclipse really allowed such a thing, then every single person would have chosen it.
Hunters would not exist.
The Eclipse spoke again. "Well, child? What is your answer?"
Aren lifted his head. His voice was quiet but steady.
"The past is a grave that will never open. I will not cling to what is not real."
"Give me the dominion. That is my answer."
The Eclipse did not answer at once. Then, at last, it said, "Interesting."
The presence leaned closer, though it had no form. Its voice echoed like a deep current. "I see you have a strong will to return."
"Yes. I cannot die here."
It paused again. Then, heavy and final, it said, "I have chosen a dominion for you. It is not one you expect. Let us see if you are worthy."
And then the presence vanished. The voice was gone. Only silence remained.
The dark shook. For a moment he thought the forest was returning, that the voices would come again. But instead, something new happened.
The ground beneath him split. Not real ground. Not real earth. It was something deeper, something inside him.
Aren staggered. He grabbed his chest. His heart pounded so fast it felt like it might break open.
Then the awakening began.
The pain came first. Not the kind you could grit your teeth through. It was deeper. It was like claws digging from inside his chest trying to tear their way out.
Aren fell to his knees. His hands scraped the dirt. His vision went white and then black and then nothing at all. His lungs refused to pull in air. For a moment he thought this was death.
But it was not death.
The pain twisted into heat. Not fire on his skin but something burning in his veins.
His bones felt hollow. His eyes stung like something behind them was waking up. He tried to scream but no sound came out. It was not heat from outside. It was something cold filling him. Cold and endless.
And then it happened.
Something shifted at the side of his neck. His skin split with light and a mark formed there. Not ink. Not scar. Something alive. A Hollow Star.
Six points sharp and bright red with the center black and empty. It did not sit still. It pulsed like it had a heartbeat of its own. If you looked at it too long you felt like you were falling into it.
Aren gasped and clutched at his neck. The mark was cold against his fingers. Cold like metal left in snow.
That was the mark of the Eclipsed.
Every hunter had one.
This was how Hunters were born. In the trial, when a person passed the breaking point, something opened. It was not learned. It was not trained. It was awakened.
Each person came out different. Some carried fire. Some carried lightning. Some carried shadows or beasts. It was called Dominion, the mark of power that separated Hunters from the rest.
And Aren, in that moment, awakened his Dominion.
The Hollow.