The mountain air was thin, sharp enough to cut the lungs. Kael descended the sect's winding paths with a group of eight other initiates, each carrying the faint glow of freshly carved veins beneath their skin. At their head walked Master Daran, whose silent presence pressed heavier than the stone cliffs surrounding them.
"This is no trial chamber," Daran said as they marched. His voice was flat, but it carried across the cliffs with unnatural weight. "The mountain beyond the sect is tainted. Shards fell here long ago, and their poison has seeped into root, flesh, and bone. What lives there is no longer mortal. It will test you without restraint."
One of the initiates a tall youth with sharp features snorted softly. "Then we kill beasts. What difference is that from training?"
Daran stopped. Slowly, he turned until his burning eyes locked on the boy. "Beasts?" he repeated, voice almost gentle. "You will see soon enough."
They resumed their march in silence.
By dusk, the group reached the treeline. The Hollow Forest stretched endlessly, trees with twisted trunks that spiraled unnaturally toward the sky. Leaves bled faint colors violet, crimson, pale silver. The air stank faintly of ozone and rot, as though the forest exhaled sickness.
Kael felt his scar burn faintly, the same way it had at the sect's gates. His veins pulsed faster, as though the residue inside him recognized its kin.
"The forest feeds on what the gods left behind," Daran said, his hand brushing a tree whose bark pulsed faintly with inner light. "Creatures within are born of this poison. Kill them, and the residue may fuse with your veins. Fail, and you will become one of them."
A ripple of unease moved through the group. No one spoke.
"Spread out," Daran ordered. "Return by moonrise with proof of a kill. If you do not return, the forest has claimed you."
Then he was gone, vanishing into the shadows like smoke.
Kael tightened the bandages around his arms and stepped forward. The forest greeted him with silence not the silence of peace, but the silence before a storm. His every step crunched leaves that glowed faintly underfoot, releasing wisps of pale light that clung to his boots.
The deeper he went, the stronger the pressure grew. His silver veins thrummed painfully, and his scar felt alive. Whispers coiled faintly at the edge of his hearing no words, just echoes of hunger.
Then he saw it.
A deer stood in a clearing ahead. Or what had once been a deer. Its body was swollen unnaturally, veins glowing across its hide. Its antlers had twisted into jagged spears of crystal, and its eyes burned with hollow light. Each breath it took was ragged, gurgling, as if life itself resisted remaining within it.
The creature turned its head, and the moment its gaze locked on Kael, it screamed. The sound was no animal cry but a chorus of broken voices, shrieking in unison.
It charged.
Kael braced himself. The deer's mutated antlers swung like blades, gouging deep furrows into the earth as it lunged. Kael dodged sideways, feeling the wind of its charge scrape his skin. He struck at its flank with a palm strike, channeling the residue in his veins.
Light burst from his strike, silver and violent. The deer staggered, its flesh burning where the conduit-guided energy struck. But instead of falling, the beast convulsed, the wound splitting open to reveal writhing strands of glowing flesh.
The whispers surged louder in Kael's head. Consume. Join. Break.
He clenched his teeth, forcing the residue into order. Another strike this time a fist to the creature's throat. The deer reeled back, thrashing wildly, its antlers slicing through trees like paper. One grazed Kael's side, cutting through cloth and flesh. Pain seared his ribs, but he pushed forward.
He leapt onto its back, driving his fist into the base of its skull. The silver veins in his arms blazed, residue surging violently. With a roar, he poured the energy into the beast.
The deer convulsed once more, then collapsed with a thunderous crash, its glowing veins flickering before going still.
Kael rolled off its corpse, gasping for air. His wound burned, but worse was the sensation crawling beneath his skin the residue of the beast trying to seep into him. His conduits buckled, his scar seared. For a moment, he thought he would split apart.
Then the whisper came again soft, cold, inside his skull.
Endure.
The invading energy bent, twisted, then merged with his own. His silver veins pulsed brighter, steadier. The pain dulled, though the corruption's echo lingered like a shadow.
Kael staggered to his feet. The deer's body was already dissolving into ash, leaving behind a single fragment of glowing crystal. He picked it up carefully, feeling the thrum resonate with his veins. Proof of his kill.
He returned to the edge of the forest by moonrise, body weary but alive. One by one, the other initiates emerged as well. Some carried trophies claws, fangs, bones that glowed faintly. Others carried nothing but trembling bodies and hollow eyes.
Three never returned.
Master Daran waited at the treeline, arms folded. His gaze swept across the survivors, lingering briefly on Kael's glowing veins before moving on.
"You have tasted the forest," he said. "Now you understand. Power is not given. It is stolen. Wrested from poison. Every breath you take along this path brings you closer to corruption. Only those who walk further than death itself will rise as vessels."
Kael met his gaze, silent.
The whisper in his mind had not faded. If anything, it had grown clearer. And though he despised it, he knew one truth:
This path would not end with survival. It would end with answers or with him becoming the very thing he fought.