Chapter 25 – Worship of the Crimson Veins
The air deep inside the northern valley felt wrong — too dense, too thick, as if every breath carried the taste of molten metal. The further they went, the more the world itself seemed to breathe around them. The rhythmic pulse under their boots never stopped — steady, patient, alive.
Every few steps, Alicia adjusted her scanner, the device flickering uselessly. The readings spiked so high that the digits blurred into static.
"Qi density—" she muttered, voice strained, "—off the scale. It's not even measurable anymore."
Vaibhav's gaze swept the valley ahead. The fog wasn't natural; it shimmered faintly, glowing in shades of crimson and violet, rising from fissures that cut across the terrain like open veins.
Every inhale burned his throat. His lungs felt heavier. Yet something in that air called to him — faint, almost familiar. The pulse thrummed again, deep, sonorous.
Thud... Thud...
Shin exhaled sharply, sweat trailing down his neck. "I can feel that in my bones. It's like the planet's heartbeat just synced with mine."
Alicia didn't respond. Her face had gone pale beneath her visor. "No… not the planet."
They walked in silence after that.
Even Shin — normally the loudest — said nothing. His usual grin had faded, replaced by wary focus. The valley narrowed as they descended, walls of dark stone rising like jagged ribs around them. Cracks glowed faint red, pulsing faintly with each beat beneath the earth.
The deeper they went, the more the world warped. Gravity thickened; even lifting a hand felt like dragging it through liquid iron. The air shimmered with distorted mirages — heat and Qi colliding until space itself twisted in faint ripples.
Alicia stumbled once, catching herself on a rock. "This pressure… it's compressing the ambient Qi. No — it's condensing it."
Shin gave a short, shaky laugh. "So we're basically walking into the lungs of a god."
Vaibhav said nothing, eyes fixed forward. His heartbeat was still synchronized with the pulse. Every throb of the ground tugged at his chest, like invisible strings connecting him to whatever lay beneath.
And then… the silence broke.
It wasn't a sound, not exactly — more like a vibration.
Something vast moved below, sending waves of pressure through the valley floor. Stones cracked. Dust fell like slow rain.
Alicia froze mid-step. "Did you feel that?"
Vaibhav's voice was low. "Yeah. It's awake."
They crested a low ridge — and stopped dead.
The sight before them was nothing short of unreal.
Hundreds — maybe thousands — of beasts stood across the valley floor. Wolves, serpents, insectoid monsters, and creatures with too many limbs. Their bodies glowed faintly red from within, Qi veins pulsing like molten threads under their skin. But none were fighting. None even moved.
Every single one was kneeling.
Their heads were bowed low toward the crater's core, forelimbs pressed to the ground in silent reverence. Even the air was still — no snarling, no roars, no chaos. Just the rhythmic, unified pulse that shook the ground.
Thud... Thud... Thud...
Shin's eyes widened. His voice came out barely a whisper. "They're… not hunting…"
Vaibhav's expression darkened. "…They're worshiping."
Alicia looked from one beast to another, her scientific calm cracking. "That's impossible. Beasts don't exhibit coordinated behavioral—"
Her words died.
Because even as she spoke, one of the beasts raised its head — a colossal, mutated stag-like creature — and bellowed not in rage, but in a low, harmonic tone.
The others answered in kind, hundreds of voices merging into a single vibrating hum that made the valley tremble.
It wasn't a roar.
It was a chant.
The fog thinned, revealing the crater's heart.
It wasn't empty anymore.
The center glowed — a vast network of veins, crimson and gold, spiderwebbing across the land like an open circulatory system. Rivers of molten Qi flowed through them, pulsing rhythmically. Each beat sent ripples of red light crawling up the valley walls, painting everything in a bleeding hue.
Alicia stared, her voice trembling. "Those… aren't veins. They're Qi conduits. The land is channeling energy toward one point."
Vaibhav's hand tightened around his weapon. The pulse inside him matched perfectly with the veins' rhythm. His chest burned faintly — not from pain, but resonance.
"It's feeding something."
Shin exhaled shakily, voice barely audible. "Tell me that's not what I think it is…"
The ground shuddered again — harder this time. The beasts all lowered their heads deeper, pressing their faces into the dirt.
The light intensified.
And then came the sound.
A long, guttural exhale that echoed across the crater — not from the wind, but from below.
The molten veins flared, flooding the valley in scarlet light.
Thunder cracked overhead, lightning tearing through the mist. The bolts didn't fall from the clouds — they rose up from the ground, drawn by the veins' energy.
Shin stumbled back, shielding his face. "That's not normal lightning!"
Alicia raised her scanner, though her hands were shaking. "It's Qi discharge! The air's saturated past threshold— it's ionizing on its own!"
The pulse quickened again.
Once every six seconds became once every four.
Then three.
Then two.
The light from the crater's heart blazed white-hot for an instant.
And for that instant, they saw it.
A silhouette moving beneath the molten crust — vast, serpentine, and coiled like a sleeping god beneath the world.
Its sheer size dwarfed mountains; each shift of its body sent tremors rolling across the land. The crimson veins above glowed brighter in response, like arteries feeding a colossal heart.
Shin's breath hitched. "You've gotta be kidding me…"
The sound came again — deeper, louder, resonating through bone and soul alike.
Thud... Thud... Thud...
Alicia whispered, barely audible, "It's not the crater that's breathing."
Vaibhav's gaze never left the glowing heart of the valley.
He could feel it now — the pull, the ancient hunger stirring below.
The ground beneath their feet cracked, light spilling through the fractures like blood.
And in the silence that followed, a single whisper escaped Vaibhav's lips.
> "Beneath the ashes… something awakens."