The blood was still fresh on the ground when everything began to change. The sky, once glowing with a faint red light, had grown heavier and darker, as if it were watching him without blinking. In that endless arena where Ashen had walked for so long, death was no longer a strange event. It had become part of the daily rhythm, like a heartbeat that never stopped.
But something new was moving now. Something unseen, with no scent, felt only within the blood itself. The savage intent that filled the air like a mad wind began to creep closer, seeping through the pores, sinking into the nerves, until it touched the core of awareness itself.
At first, Ashen felt only a faint vibration in his chest, as if his heart beat twice instead of once. But with every battle, with every body that fell, that vibration turned into another pulse — a strange rhythm that followed his breaths, watched his movements, breathed with him... and sometimes laughed with him.
He fought as usual, surrounded by a river of corpses that evaporated after death, and by soil that absorbed blood to grow new beasts again. But something about that daily slaughter was different today. Every time his weapon struck an enemy, he heard a strange echo inside his head — not a human voice, but a deep hum, like a well that swallowed screams without returning them.
"Kill him..."
The voice didn't just command; it tempted, as if promising something beyond death. And with each strike, the feeling grew stronger — every time his weapon tore through flesh, he felt a pleasure he couldn't explain. It was as if his body was producing a new substance, one that made killing a primal delight he could never get enough of.
In one of those fights, when dozens of black-bodied beasts surrounded him, Ashen activated the Rune of the Sky Leopard. From his legs burst a bloody aura shaped like the feet of a furious leopard. Energy surged through his limbs like a current of cold fire, doubling his speed until he became a phantom moving within the storm. But he didn't stop there. In a moment of madness, he let the savage intent around him enter his body freely.
What happened next defied imagination. The aura of the "Sky Leopard Rune" changed color and form; instead of pure red, it darkened, almost black, and gray sparks moved along its edges like living smoke. Every step he took left behind marks that pulsed with life, marks that hummed faintly, as if the earth itself groaned beneath him.
Ashen moved faster than ever before. He struck, and the air shattered before his blow even landed. He spun, leaving behind spirals of blood that formed thin blades, piercing everything nearby. Beasts that once took ten strikes to fall were now sliced in half with a single touch.
The savage intent didn't just grant him speed — it gave him something far worse: pleasure. The pleasure of killing. The pleasure of tearing. The pleasure of the explosion when bones shattered.
That pleasure flowed through his blood like sacred poison, and he accepted it with a smile, like a man drinking from a cup he knew was tainted but couldn't stop.
In the corners of the arena, where the bodies of beasts piled up, the air grew thicker. The savage intent multiplied, interacted, and reproduced itself from the corpses. The entire arena was slowly turning into one conscious being — a being that knew his name, his number, and how many years he had left.
When Ashen stopped for a moment, panting as blood dripped from his fingers, the voice in his head laughed. A faint laugh — not human, emotionless, yet full of meaning.
"See? Killing isn't a sin. It's a path. The more you kill, the closer you get. Kill to understand. Kill to live. Kill to become."
Ashen didn't reply. But he didn't resist either. He closed his eyes for a moment, breathing in the scent of coagulated blood. A part of him whispered that this was wrong, that something inside was decaying, but another part — the part that pulsed with each beat of savage intent — laughed.
During that battle, Ashen tried something else. When a massive beast crawled toward him — as large as a tree, its scales as hard as steel — he activated the Blood Bear Fist. A dense aura formed around his arms, turning them into the limbs of a colossal bear. But this time, he didn't use it as before. He fused it with the savage intent.
It wasn't just a fusion of energy; it was the birth of a new monster. His arms were no longer made of blood but of solid shadows. When he raised his fists, the entire arena shook. When he brought them down, the ground exploded beneath, and the surrounding beasts turned to ash in the wind.
Each time he used this power, the voice grew clearer. He began to hear distinct words, short sentences that sounded both tempting and threatening.
"Don't fight it, Ashen... You were born to consume. Killing is the only way to refine yourself. Every spilled soul brings you closer to the origin."
He couldn't tell if the words came from the savage intent or from a hidden part of himself he had never known. But the truth no longer mattered. What mattered was that he was stronger, faster, and closer to something he couldn't yet name.
Days passed — or maybe months. In this place, time had lost its meaning. He didn't know if the sky ever changed between day and night, for all he saw were shades of blood and screams.
The beasts he fought began to evolve — thicker intent, tougher hides, more aware eyes. It was as if they were growing with him, or rather, mimicking him. Some even took his facial features when they died — a mix of human and beast, laughing with sharp teeth.
One long night, Ashen sat in unusual silence. There were no battles then, only mist rising from the ground and the distant groan of the hourglass. He looked up at the sky. Crimson cracks stretched across the horizon like veins. He felt that the sky itself was bleeding, and those drops of blood were descending toward him as thin threads.
When the first drop touched his face, he heard the voice again.
"You have accepted the intent. Now let it eat you."
And it did. The sensation crept from his skin to his bones. With every breath, he felt the air itself invading his lungs. With every heartbeat, he heard two beats — one his own, the other belonging to something else living inside him.
Moments later, his body began to tremble. The blood in his veins no longer flowed calmly but slammed against the walls like waves seeking escape. His face reddened, his eyes widened, and something new appeared in his gaze — not the mind of a man or the will of a warrior, but the madness of a creature that knows only to devour.
The savage intent was no longer an external force attacking him. It had become a partner living within. Between them was a fragile balance: either he controlled it... or it would control him.
As the days passed, that balance began to shift. He no longer felt guilt when he killed, but emptiness when he didn't. Blood became like air to him, and when he stopped fighting, he felt suffocated.
He started smiling in battle — sometimes laughing — a cold laugh that didn't come from his heart but from something deeper, from the void that had learned to devour without thought. Even the beasts born from intent hesitated to attack him, as if they sensed that what stood before them was no longer human.
In the tenth month, the battles suddenly stopped. The arena that once blazed every moment grew quiet, as if the world itself had decided to give him a short rest. But rest in this place was no blessing — it was a delayed curse.
Ashen sat on a rock covered with dried blood. He looked at his hands — they were no longer the same. His veins bulged, his skin had turned crimson, and in his reflection on a pool of blood, his eyes were not entirely human. One remained red, while the other darkened, with something crawling behind the lens.
He didn't feel tired despite endless fighting, but something inside was quietly breaking. His memories began to fade; the faces of his clan, their voices, their details — all turned into a shapeless fog. The savage intent wasn't satisfied with his body; it had started eating his past too.
When he finally slept that night, he saw a different nightmare. He saw himself standing in a sea of blood, black arms growing from his skin, his face splitting in two — one half human, the other an unfeeling creature. And in that dream, the old voice whispered again:
"Everything you kill... returns within you. You become what you consume, Ashen. Intent does not die — it multiplies."
He woke up gasping, clutching his chest as if trying to rip something out. But what he felt was worse than any wound: the realization that the savage intent was no longer a disease to cure — it had become a part of him.
The symbolism needed no explanation anymore. In this world, intent wasn't a weapon. It was an infection. And those who caught it... never came back the same.
As Ashen rose to face the next battle, his eyes showed no hesitation. But deep within that gaze, something was smiling — the smile of a being that had begun to forget it was ever human.