The woman's lips parted.
And her voice came. Not through the air, but through the water, the trees, the silence itself. It curled into our minds without ever crossing the space between us.
"You have come deep," she said. "Deeper than most. Past root and rot. Past fear."
Her eyes glinted, catching a shard of half-light as her head tilted in the smallest, smoothest motion.
"Few walk this far. Fewer still are seen."
She turned slightly, gaze shifting toward Jackal. Her voice remained calm, but something beneath it began to thrum. Like pressure. Like something unseen opening its eyes.
"You are fear-wrapped," she murmured. "Torn from sleep. A scarecrow stitched from nightmare and need. You have no soul left to bargain."
Jackal stiffened.
He didn't move, but his expression blanked. His body locked in place.
"Jackal?" I said.
Nothing.
He stood as if frozen, eyes wide but vacant, breath caught halfway to a word.
"Jackal."
Still no response.
Then I felt it.
The pressure at the back of my skull, coiling, slithering. Something foreign brushing across the rim of consciousness. A ripple. A whisper. A hand trying to open a door it didn't understand.
And then she entered me.
She didn't utter a word, just wandered through me, through my mind.
Through memories. Through echoes. Through scars.
Her presence dragged like silk across my thoughts, delicate, invasive, impossibly old.
She saw the Seraph. The Trial. Kaldrith's end. My blade.
She saw a father and a brother. A quiet home. A silent choice.
She pushed deeper. Toward the part of me I hadn't named. And found it.
The Primordial.
It didn't roar. It didn't resist. It simply was.
Endless. Vast. Older than her river, older than her bones. A storm of form and unbeing wrapped around a single unlit spark.
She touched it.
And recoiled.
Like frostbitten flesh torn from metal.
She screamed.
Not aloud. Not with breath. But inside both our minds at once. A howl like stone splitting under pressure, like mountains cracking apart.
Jackal fell to the ground with a ragged gasp, coughing hard, eyes wild.
The woman staggered, physically staggered, on the water. Her form shivered.
Then her smile broke.
Her body buckled, twisted, shifted, shoulders cracking, skin darkening. The river exploded outward as her form unraveled into scale and coil.
The woman became a thing.
Black serpent flesh rippled across the river's surface, swallowing her humanoid shape in a blur of limbs and teeth and ancient hate. Her eyes burned golden now, vast and vertical, slit down the middle like blades.
The Serpent rose.
Massive. I was not a good analyzer of Verdicts, but she was strong, if it even was a she.
The air bent around her. The water churned beneath her without moving. The jungle shrank under her weight.
Jackal staggered to his feet. "What the hell did you do?"
"She looked too deep."
I drew the Blade of Kaldrith.
Hellflame licked the edge before I even spoke.
The serpent bared her fangs.
And attacked.
Her massive body slammed into me like a collapsing mountain.
I blocked with my blade, barely.
The impact nearly folded me in half. My boots tore up the earth behind me as I skidded backward, the Blade of Kaldrith howling against scale and force. Her mouth opened wide, trying to swallow me whole.
Jackal was already on her, slashing at her spine from above, movements sharp and unnatural. His blade bit deep, purple mist blooming around each strike like fog catching fire.
I triggered Brand.
The sigil blazed to life, the mark appearing on the serpent, and was about to burst. But...
She sensed it.
In an instant, the serpent vanished.
She became the woman again. And struck.
Her palm hit my abdomen like a falling star. I didn't even feel it at first. Just light.
Then I flew.
Through branches. Bark. Bone. I crashed into the forest, dragging a trench across the earth.
This was going to be dangerous.
Jackal was still airborne, blade raised, closing in fast. He reached her neck just as she shifted again, her body twisting, elongating, scales ripping across skin.
She tried to bite him in half.
He blinked out of the way a breath before her jaws clamped down.
"Fear's starting to affect her," he called, blade flicking back into his grip. "But she's resistant. Got to drag it out."
No panic. No change in tone. Just the same twisted calm.
I climbed to my feet, coughing blood. "Then keep flanking her. Strip her down. I'll take point."
He nodded once.
"Ember Step."
Flame sparked beneath my feet and I vanished.
I reappeared mid-air, above her lunging form. Reached out, grabbed one of her massive fangs, and drove the Blade of Kaldrith straight into the roof of her mouth.
Hellflame surged.
She shrieked, a real, angry shriek, and launched me away again like I weighed nothing.
I flipped mid-air, twisted to land, but she was faster.
She became the woman again, right behind me.
Then the serpent, again, striking me across the ribs with her tail.
My back slammed into stone hard enough to crack it.
"You are not of this thread," the Serpent hissed, voice a thunder that curled into thought. "Why are you here, in this realm?"
I spat blood, stood.
And raised my blade.
"You entered my head," I said. "You tell me."
Her body coiled again, rising, obsidian glinting under dim light. Rain began to fall—soft and slow, like the jungle itself was holding its breath.
Jackal appeared at my side, chest rising and falling.
"I will end you," the Serpent hissed, golden eyes narrowing, "before you are able to manifest into something beyond me. Beyond this world. Beyond everything."
Her voice was conviction and wrath, thunder made intimate.
Then—
ding
A pop-up flared in the corner of my vision, translucent gold edged in violet.
[Trial Initiated]
Objective: Humble this unintelligent beast.
Reward: A Trait in the path of Ascended.
I knew Traits could evolve. That they had structures, branches, families. Some were forged through battle, others through quests, mutation, sacrifice. But...
For the Trait Ascended to have a path?
That meant this wasn't just rare.
It was singular.
And considering the last time the reward reshaped everything… I had to tread carefully.
The System didn't hand these out lightly.
And last time, when I reached too deep, when I used that partial transformation, I got scolded, like a child who couldn't behave.
By the thing beneath it all. The part of me I hadn't fully woken yet.
The Primordial.
I exhaled slowly, leveling the Blade of Kaldrith toward the Serpent as she loomed, still coiled in the air, tasting the silence with her forked tongue.
"Very well, System," I murmured. "I will end this beast."