The safehouse's only window looked over the rain-slicked roofs of the tannery district. The air outside carried the faint sting of old chemicals and rotting hides — a perfect place for the hive to root itself without notice.
Kael sat cross-legged on the floor, a bloodstained knife laid across his knees. The map he'd stolen from the Council lay open beside him, its red circle now etched into his mind.
Ryn paced near the wall, checking her crossbow string. "If we go tonight, we won't have backup."
"We've never had backup," Kael said, but his voice was distracted.
He wasn't looking at her. He was looking inward — not at the room, but at the swirl of alien heat and weight inside his own body.
The GP surges from the last fights hadn't fully settled. His bones ached with it. His skin felt too tight. The truth was simple: if he went into the tannery with only Stonehide, he'd be one predictable move away from losing.
Three abilities per rank. That was the safe threshold the old hunters had sworn by. Go beyond it, and you risked your own body tearing itself apart from the inside.
He had one. Two more slots.
Kael shut his eyes and sank into the pressure inside his chest. The Gene Vein — every hunter had one, but his was a labyrinth of stolen power.
He searched through it like feeling along weapon racks in the dark.
First was the bedrock presence of Stone — the Stonehide, as familiar as his own heartbeat.
Next, he felt something sharper, colder. Steel. The sensation wrapped around his muscles and the knife in his lap, whispering of edges that could bite through root and armor alike.
"Iron Fang," he muttered. The name felt right.
Then came the heat. Not the wild, consuming blaze of a beast's fire breath, but a compressed ember under the ribs, ready to explode outward. He remembered the drake in the docks, the way its movements had blurred when it struck.
"Ember Lunge," he said. Flame, but controlled. Speed and impact in a single breath.
He opened his eyes.
Current Abilities – C-Rank (High):
Stonehide (Stone) → Layered defensive plating over skin, absorbs and disperses kinetic impact.
Iron Fang (Steel) → Enhances melee strikes and blades for high penetration against hardened targets.
Ember Lunge (Flame) → Short explosive burst of speed; impact strike causes searing burn.
"You done meditating or whatever that was?" Ryn asked.
Kael rose, flexing his hand around the knife's hilt. "Done. Let's move."
The tannery district was a corpse even in daylight. At night, it felt worse — the kind of silence that swallowed footsteps. The buildings leaned over narrow alleys, their wood warped by years of damp and the stench of chemicals baked into the beams.
But Kael could smell something under that: the green-sweet rot of the hive.
They crossed three alleys before they found the first sign. A leather-drying rack, warped into a lattice of living roots. Chitinous shells clung to it like giant insect husks.
Hive Thrall — D-Rank (High), GP ~140.
It hissed, lunging from the shadows, but Kael didn't bother with Stonehide this time. He let Ember Lunge flare — a rush of heat filled his veins, and the world snapped closer. His knife punched through the Thrall's chest before it could even swipe.
[C-Rank (High) | GP: 875 + 5 = 880 ]
The deeper they went, the more the streets twisted. Corners doubled back on themselves. Doors opened into bricked walls. Roots curled along the eaves like veins under skin.
Kael stopped at an intersection, scanning the shadows. "They've shaped the district into a trap."
"Which means the heart's close," Ryn said.
Another sound reached them — the soft, rhythmic thump of something large moving ahead. They turned the corner and saw her.
Mara.
She stood at the far end of the street, flanked by two Hive Stalkers. Her bark plating had grown thicker, darker, and the root cluster in her eye socket pulsed in time with the walls.
Mara — B-Rank (Low), GP ~1,050 (Hive-Assimilated).
"You should have stayed away," she called, her voice an eerie blend of her own and the hive's chorus.
Kael tightened his grip. The fight was coming — but so was the choice.