Kai finished tightening his belt when his wristband blinked sharply. Marin's hologram flickered into existence above his arm, her voice cutting through the silence like a blade. "Kai, listen up." Behind her, Sylvie leaned forward, eyes glued to something offscreen, tension radiating off her. "We've located the final Gemstone."
"Where?" Kai asked, voice low but sharp.
Marin tapped the interface. A bright marker popped onto his HUD, far northwest, deep inside a rift-corrupted sector tangled with thick infection roots. "It's heavily guarded," she warned. "Five Knights and the Heloxian Queen herself."
Grin whistled, smirking. "Oh great. Just what we needed."
Marin's fingers danced over the display, zooming into a narrow ridge valley etched between jagged cliffs. "We'll rendezvous here," she said, pinpointing the spot, "then push in from that angle."
Sylvie gave a casual wave, but her eyes were serious. "Also, don't die!"
Kai winced. Grin snorted.
The call ended. Kai glanced around—Akari wasn't nearby.
Where is she..?
---
Out by the lake, she stood waist-deep in steaming water, alone. The chill of the Rift didn't seem to touch her bare skin—either because she'd grown used to discomfort or because whatever had once made her flinch was already long dead.
Her gaze locked onto the trembling mirror of her reflection, but she wasn't really seeing it. Not her face, not the steam swirling around her shoulders, not the faint glow of distant spores drifting across the lake surface.
She was seeing something else. A moment sealed in memory. The kind that didn't fade with time, only got sharper.
You don't hold the blade. You become it. Her father's voice—stern, gentle, final. His calloused hands resting over hers, correcting the grip on a katana worn smooth from years of use.
The smell of old wood, a fireplace crackling and her younger self nodding, eager to please, unaware how fragile peace really was.
Then—fire. The kind that devours homes. The kind that licks screaming faces and makes steel shriek. She remembered the smoke, the bodies and the wall of blood, her hand shaking as she dragged that same katana from her father's fallen grasp.
That night never left her. Not during the silence of sleep, not during the chaos of combat. It clung to her skin like ash.
Now, in the Rift's waters, she stood still, as if waiting for something—an answer, maybe.
But it never came.
Only the sound of rippling water as she moved to the shore, dried off with movements, and began dressing again.
Her face was unreadable as Kai called out without turning, "You don't have to come. Just say the word if you want to or not."
She paused, the weight of that world settling on her shoulders.
"…I'll go." Her voice was steady, hollow but resolute. "There's no one left to return to."
---
Kai flicked open his wristband. A prompt hovered in the corner—Gene Fragments Analyzed.
The system showed two new entries.
Fertile Sac (F+ Rank) – Heloxian Reproductive Node.
Vorabone Carapace (E- Rank) – Layered bio-chitin.
So that's what I pulled off that bastard…
Each fragment had a strange new tag attached—an icon of coins and numbers beside them.
"Wait, I can sell these?" Kai blinked. He tapped it. Market Price: €128 for F+, €205 for E-.
His eyes narrowed. They've monetized gene loot? What the hell kind of future are we living in?
Sekh's voice echoed through his mind.
"There is always a market for evolution, Host. Even if it means selling your future piece by piece."
Kai closed that window and looked at another tab—Evolution Paths.
A dark tree branched across the screen, pulsing faintly. His current track glowed blue—Spinal Leech – Neural Symbiote. But below it, three grayed-out icons shimmered like locked doors.
He hovered over them.
Path of the Buried Sun – A route focused on stealth, mimicry, and viral infiltration. Prioritizes hiding in plain sight, biological disguise, and subversion-based combat.
Path of the Bone Maw – Heavy mutation focus. Graftable limbs, dense armor, and direct offense. Slow but unstoppable.
Path of the Mind Nest – Mental domination, parasite projection, swarm control. Dangerous to user stability.
Kai leaned closer. This is huge. If I can pick a path… But then the bar underneath each icon snapped into focus.
Gene Fragments Required: 30 Normal Fragments.
"What the hell's a normal fragment?"
Another tab opened. The system answered quickly.
[Convert Unique Gene Fragments → Normalized Fragments
Conversion rate depends on rarity:
F = 1 Fragment
E = 2 Fragments
D = 4 Fragments
C = 8 Fragments
B = 16 Fragments
A = 30 Fragments
S = ?]
Kai's eyes twitched. "I'd have to grind this like a goddamn MMO."
Grin, Kai and Akari moved through the twisted roots and cracked stones toward Marin's meeting point.
Akari broke the silence first, her voice low but steady, "So, what about your clan? Were they like, hunters, warriors, or just constantly picking fights?"
Kai didn't hesitate. "Mostly battles, rival clans all around, but there was always one guy, especially him." He left the rest hanging, his eyes shadowed.
Akari nodded as if she understood more than she let on. "Yeah, I get that. I'm from Japan—my clan's from the old ways, but my father insisted I learn German early, said languages are weapons too, and you never know when you'll need them." She smirked.
"I guess he was preparing me for a world that doesn't make any sense. Like, in Japan, we have this tradition of sumo wrestling—giant guys trying not to fall over—and then there's tea ceremony, which is basically staring at leaves for an hour while pretending it's the most serious thing ever. Our clan had some weird mix of that, all honor and bizarre rituals, and yeah, occasionally throwing each other into the river to prove who's toughest, which is dumb but effective."
Damn... That's a lot of cultures. Is Japan really like that? Kai laughed, the tension easing for a moment. "Sounds like my kind of weird."
Akari grinned, eyes glinting with something fierce. "We survived because we adapted, or maybe because we just refused to die quietly. You ever have a ritual that involved throwing your enemies in water?"
"Only metaphorically," Kai said, "but I get it, fighting for survival means doing whatever works, no matter how strange."
As Kai and Akari talked, Grin slipped up behind them, her footsteps soft but deliberate. "Talking clans and rituals, huh? You're missing the urban legend here." She smirked, folding her arms. "I'm Grin, born and raised in Berlin—city girl through and through. No ancient clans or fancy tea ceremonies for me. Just concrete, neon lights, and the constant hum of the city that never really sleeps."
Kai glanced back, curious. "So what's your story then? No family drama, no secret clan bloodline?"
Grin laughed, a short, sharp sound. "Nah, my biggest family drama was surviving Berlin traffic and dodging assholes in crowded subway cars. My parents were regular folks—office jobs, weekend barbecues, that kind of boring normal."
Kai smirked, shaking his head. "Life's still pretty good even if you're stuck in the city—fast-paced, messy, but you learn to appreciate the little things that keep you sane." Then he glanced at Grin, eyebrows raised. "But wait, Grin? That can't be your real name, right? So what's your real name?"
Grin just shrugged, a sly grin playing on her lips. "Maybe. But some things are better left a mystery."
Kai shrugged and let it go. They kept walking. Kai pulled up the HUD and checked the distance—still two kilometers from the meeting point. An hour at least, he thought. Then he frowned. "By the way, how does time work here? It feels... off."
Grin flicked her eyes toward him, voice casual. "Time here runs faster, way faster. Like, a whole week here could be just an hour back on Earth. And it gets crazier—the higher the Rift tier, the more time speeds up. If we're dealing with an A+ Rift, a day here might be like a year on Earth." She shrugged. "That's why all the pros rush through these things—they don't want to get stuck living a lifetime in a few hours."
Kai blinked, trying to let that sink in. "Makes sense why no one lingers."
As they moved forward, the tunnel began to open up—walls of jagged stone softened by thick green moss, bright mushrooms glowing faintly in clusters, patches of light filtering down from cracks above, and small pools of clear water reflecting the strange, warped sky on the Rift.
Kai looked around, This place feels less like a prison and more like a wild garden twisted into some alien shape.
Kai's HUD pinged—a small pulsing red dot blinked on the upper-left corner. He tapped it, bringing up the scan overlay, and narrowed his eyes.
Two Riftborn signatures, forty meters off to their left, partially shielded by fungal overgrowth and organic pillars. Movement was rhythmic.
Kai tilted his head, expression flat. They're mating? Seriously? Right in that hut made of... whatever that slime-fused bone is? He squinted. Good for them. Probably the only peaceful thing in this whole hellhole.
Except peace didn't mean mercy.
Kai grunted and turned to Grin and Akari, pointing to the nearby outcropping of calcified roots shaped like jagged claws. "Stay here. Don't make noise. That's another pair ahead, and we've had enough close calls already. Let me handle this one."
Grin rolled her eyes but crouched down without complaint. Akari didn't argue either.
This had become their rhythm—advance in short bursts, stick to cover, eliminate threats before they spotted them. Hiding behind rocks had basically become a tactical lifestyle at this point.
Kai crept forward, keeping low, mutating his right arm mid-step. Flesh peeled, veins writhed, and muscle coiled into a sharpened claw-blade that hummed quietly with Sekh's latent humoral energy.
He skirted the edge of the overgrown tunnel, stepping silently over twisted roots and phosphorescent patches of grass. The Heloxian hut came into view—organic, pulsing slightly with life, like it was grown rather than built.
The two inside hadn't noticed him. They were… busy.
Kai sighed. "Sorry, aliens." One lunge. Two precise slashes.
The deed was done before they even realized someone else was there. Blood hissed against the fungal moss. He flicked the claw clean and exhaled through his nose.
When did I start getting this casual about it? he thought, flexing his fingers as the arm morphed back into human flesh. I was literally harassed by Heloxians a day ago and now I'm the one doing the ambushing.
Sekh's voice coiled in his mind like smoke.
"It's a pattern in many hosts. Guilt turns to numbness. Numbness to clarity. And clarity to acceptance. It is not sadism. It is the price of adaptation."
Kai didn't respond. He just turned and walked back to the others.
They moved again. The terrain was changing. The deeper they went, the more the Rift felt like a hybrid ecosystem rather than a battlefield—like some twisted parody of nature.
Kai moved in front, scanning as they went, and in every short break, he'd mutter something, stretch his hand over a carcass, and devour another Heloxian piece by piece.
He wasn't proud of it, but it was survival, and he was starting to understand Sekh's words.
He was human. And humans, when pushed to the edge, did whatever they had to.
---
Kai sat beneath the twisted canopy of alien foliage, back pressed to a half-hollowed mushroom trunk, watching light drip like syrup through the leaves above. They'd found a temporary haven—lush, quiet, even peaceful. It almost felt like a pocket of real nature. Grin had scouted the strange fruit clumps, checked their gene composition twice before giving the green light. Akari munched on hers like an actual human being again, the fatigue easing from her shoulders. Even Grin looked halfway relaxed.
But Kai... Kai wasn't eating.
He stared at his hand. At the faint shimmer in his veins. At the part of his skin that still hadn't fully un-mutated after absorbing those Heloxians.
Kai, what are you doing?!
You told yourself this was just a truce. You're not a real GeneDevourer.
He clenched his fist and opened it again. There was no pain. Only silence from Sekh, who watched like a shadow behind glass.
Why am I even acting like one?
Why am I treating devouring like breathing? Just because the parasite's not trying to kill me right now doesn't mean I'm one of them.It's just a truce, just a truce, just a—
A memory stabbed through him.
Water, a bathtub, and he was twelve. His knees were curled to his chest, and the steam couldn't hide the way his ribs showed through his skin. There was a man across from him—not his father. Someone else. He couldn't remember the man's name, just the warmth of his voice.
"If you have power," the man had said, kneeling by the tub, "a great power, but it meant sacrificing your humanity to use it for others—would you still do it?"
Kai didn't answer. He remembered staring at the water.
The man gave a sad smile. "The world isn't sunshine and rainbows, Kai. You've probably seen those animes, yeah? With the cool main characters who save people and win? You wished you could be like them. So did I. But this… this isn't fiction."
The man placed a hand on his shoulder. "If you want my advice—live normal, get a job, find someone, raise kids, and be boring. Boring is beautiful."
Kai snapped back, chest tight.
He looked at the pile of Riftborn corpses still burned into his memory, Heloxian blood on his conscience like a second skin.
He wouldn't do it again.
No more killing the innocent.
From now on, only those who struck first would fall. If the Heloxians came for him, he'd fight. But if they didn't?
Then they'd live, because he wasn't just a GeneDevourer. He was still Kai Alaric Vogel.
The HUD pinged—sharp and insistent.
Kai blinked, vision adjusting to the flicker in the corner of his interface. Three human bio-signatures and forty-nine meters north. Heat signatures showed erratic pulses, movement erratic, staggered. Running.
"Three humans?" he muttered, narrowing his eyes.
Then the call hit.
Marin's hologram buzzed to life over his wrist, fuzzed for half a second, then snapped into focus. Her voice was tense, fast, clipped like she was already halfway through running triage in her mind.
"Kai—listen carefully. Ash and Sylvie are close to your position, but they're both severely injured. They ran into one of the Queen's knights. They're alive, but barely. ETA to your location: one minute. Prepare support and intercept if possible."
As Kai sprinted toward the north ping, boots slamming against the fungal soil, he tapped his wristband again. "What about you, Marin!? You said they're close—but where the hell are you!?"
Her voice came back fast, but there was a pause, like she hadn't wanted to answer.
"I'm safe," Marin said, but her voice was low, frustrated. "Sylvie and Ash told me to split off. Said they'd lure the knight while I found backup and sent the call. I didn't like it either, Kai, but I trusted them."
Kai gritted his teeth. They did that just to get Marin out...
"I'll stay on overwatch," she added, and her voice steadied. "Keep your channel open. I'll scan for movement and check if any other Knights are converging on your position."
"Right," Kai muttered. "Just don't die, got it?"
"I'm not planning to," she shot back. "Remember, alright? Stay alive. Help them. I'll handle the rest from my side."