Kaiser's gaze sharpened, crimson irises flaring like suns igniting within the void.
Kaiser: "You survived the first flow. Good. Now let's see if your soul is as durable as your flesh."
Before Shojiro could respond, the Primordial raised his hand. The crimson aura around him flared — not like flame, but pressure, gravity, existence itself twisting.
Then the cradle roared.
Every vine, every shard of amber, every pulse of Yggdrasil's sap vibrated with primal intensity. Streams of scarlet energy lashed through the air, wrapping Shojiro in a web of divine tension.
Kaiser: "Tenfold."
The word alone was a command to the cosmos.
Vythra surged.
Shojiro's body arched violently — the floor beneath him cracked as a shockwave burst outward. His veins glowed beneath his skin, burning lines of crimson spiraling upward like living lightning. His breath hitched; his muscles screamed; his vision fractured into streaks of red light.
Shojiro (struggling): "K-Kaiser…! I can't—this is—!"
Kaiser: "Endure it!"
The other Primordials took a cautious step back, their eyes reflecting the violent torrent swirling around him.
Vythra was no longer flowing — it was flooding. His body trembled violently, bones creaking under the pressure of godly current. The crimson light pouring from his veins began to drift upward, forming shimmering fragments that broke free and floated — like stars torn from his flesh.
Each one pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat, orbiting him in slow, graceful arcs.
Thanamira (quietly, to Artemis): "He's reaching the threshold…"
Artemis: "No. He's opening it."
Then — beneath his sternum — the light gathered.
Right where his mortal heart had once been pierced through.
A small, circular glow formed there — faint at first, like an ember. But then it pulsed. Once. Twice. Then a third, thunderous beat that echoed through the cradle like the birth of a star.
Shojiro gasped, his back arching as the glow burst open — not outward, but inward. The energy didn't explode; it breathed. It expanded through every vessel, every nerve, every strand of his reborn flesh.
Poseidara: "By the roots… his Life Point."
From the core of his chest, crimson Vythra began to spiral outward, filling every inch of his body. His muscles no longer strained — they synchronized. His heartbeat no longer fought against the flow — it became the flow.
The pain transformed into heat, the heat into rhythm, the rhythm into power.
Shojiro's hair lifted, strands drifting weightlessly in the Vythra field. His eyes burned with twin red flares, glowing so brightly that they cast their own shadows.
The floating stars around him pulsed once more — then reabsorbed into his skin.
The cradle fell silent.
Steam rolled from Shojiro's shoulders. He stood, trembling — not from exhaustion, but from the sudden, terrifying awareness of his own strength.
He looked down at his chest, where the faint crimson sigil still shimmered beneath the skin — a spiraling mark shaped like a rotating helix of flame.
Shojiro (panting): "What… what did you do to me…?"
Kaiser's lips curled into a satisfied smirk.
Kaiser: "Nothing you weren't born for. Your Life Point has awakened — the core from which your Vythra will flow. Every Chosen carries one, but few ever open it. You did it on instinct."
Savitar: "And without dying. That's new."
Hephaestus: "Means the forge held. The vessel's stable."
Thanamira: "He's no longer just reborn — he's aligned."
Shojiro steadied his breathing, feeling the rhythmic surge of warmth under his chest — not just a heartbeat anymore, but the pulse of something greater.
Shojiro: "So this is… my power?"
Kaiser's crimson aura flickered once more, steady and deliberate.
Kaiser: "No. This is the beginning of it. You've merely opened the door. Now, mortal… learn to walk through it before it consumes you."
The chamber dimmed, the Primordials watching silently as Shojiro's eyes glowed faintly in the dark — his breathing slow, steady, and utterly alive.
For the first time, Vythra was not burning him from within.
It was listening.
The air shifted.
The calm hum of Vythra within Shojiro's chest was abruptly swallowed by tension.
A stillness — deep and sudden — spread through the chamber. The Primordials' auras, once harmonious, flickered like candlelight in a storm.
Savitar's expression turned grave, his usual grin gone.
His electric-blue eyes crackled once — not in excitement, but in alarm.
Savitar: "My Chosen… he's in No Man's Land."
His voice was sharp, guttural — a tone that silenced even the Primordials.
The atmosphere fractured like glass under the weight of his words.The others turned toward him immediately.
Aegriya: "What?"
Savitar: "He was scouting near the boundary— but something pulled him in. He won't get out alone. If I don't reach him now, he'll be erased before the Cycle even begins."
The cradle pulsed with rising energy — the vines along the walls tightening as though the world itself shared Savitar's urgency.
Hephaestus: "Damn it, not now…"
Voltraeus: "We don't have enough time to finish Shojiro's training."
Thanamira: "If we delay, we'll lose one of the Ten before they even awaken."
Artemis: "Then there's no choice. The plan accelerates."
A tremor ran through the chamber as the Primordials exchanged knowing looks — a silent understanding passing among them.
Poseidara: "We scatter, then. Each to their own Chosen."
Aegriya: "Agreed. We can't risk losing any fragments this early."
The cradle trembled as divine energy surged through the room. Every Primordial radiated their full essence — coalescing in a single breath of power.
Without another word, their forms blurred — divine silhouettes unraveling into streaks of light, vanishing one by one into rifts of color and sound. The chamber erupted with movement:
Savitar's form blurred into lightning.
Poseidara dissolved into mist.
Voltraeus vanished in a crack of thunder.
Hephaestus folded into embers.
Nocturne faded into pure absence.
Aegriya became a streak of gold.
Thanamira turned to drifting souls of light.
Moara's form dissolved into swirling smoke and bone. all dissolving into nothing in the span of a heartbeat.
Artemis remained only long enough to meet Shojiro's eyes.
Artemis: "Do not falter, Shojiro Momo. The moment you hesitate… is the moment a world dies."
And with that, she too was gone — her silver glow scattering like starlight.
Only two remained.
Kaiser… and Shojiro.
The cradle was suddenly silent.The silence that followed was crushing. Shojiro could feel his pulse pounding against his ribs, the glow of his Life Point still faintly burning beneath his skin.
Kaiser stood unmoving for a heartbeat — then turned to Shojiro, his face grim.
Kaiser turned toward him, his crimson eyes softer now — but only slightly.
Kaiser (quietly): "I wanted to prepare you properly, child. To teach you to wield your Vythra before it consumed you."
He paused — a faint, regretful sigh breaking his composure.
Kaiser: "But we don't have that luxury."
He placed a massive hand on Shojiro's shoulder — heavy, grounding, but not cruel.the air around them collapsed inward — space folding, pressure spiking, reality snapping.
Shojiro: "W–wait, what's happening—!?"
Kaiser: "You're being tested."
With a single step, Kaiser moved.
Before Shojiro could ask more questions, the Primordial's aura ignited — a crimson inferno swirling around them both. The ground shattered beneath their feet as Kaiser clenched his fist, and the world itself seemed to buckle under his command.
Kaiser: "Hold your breath, mortal. You're about to meet the heart of strength itself."
The cradle split open.
Reality inverted.
In a single motion, Kaiser dragged Shojiro through the fold — the air around them screaming as space warped and twisted into a spiral of crimson light.
Then — impact.
The two reappeared in a massive chamber that pulsed with living stone and molten veins.
The air burned with heat, the ground split into platforms floating over a void of shifting light. The very walls hummed with ancient power — the resonance of Kaiser's domain.
And at the center of the chamber…
floated a massive, burning crystal — jagged and alive,glowing deep red, bleeding streaks of energy that hissed like burning blood, pulsing like a colossal heart.
Shojiro (gasping): "What… is that…?"
Kaiser's voice echoed through the cavern like thunder under restraint.
Kaiser: "That… is my Shard. The fragment of Strength that will become yours to bear — if you can survive touching it."
Its glow was the same as Shojiro's — the same crimson that burned beneath his skin.
The crimson crystal pulsed once, sending a shockwave that rippled through Shojiro's chest. His Life Point flared in response, syncing with the shard's rhythm.
Shojiro's breath caught in his throat as the shard pulsed once, sending a tremor through the air that rattled his bones.
Shojiro: "That thing… it's alive."
Kaiser: "Alive — and hungry."
The Primordial turned toward him, his eyes sharp as blades.
Kaiser: "Listen well. Once it senses your Life Point, it will not stop until it claims you. Either you master it…"
He paused, the chamber vibrating under his aura.
Kaiser: "…or it tears you apart trying."
Shojiro stared at the shard — his reflection flickering across its molten surface, distorted by the pulsing crimson light.
Kaiser: "Every Chosen is bound to their Primordial's Offshoots essence. But you— you'll carry mine. Not borrowed. Not diluted. A piece of my true domain."
The sound of his heartbeat echoed again, deep and slow — answering the shard's rhythm.
Two heartbeats, one divine and one human, aligning by fate.
He turned his gaze toward the shard, his voice lowering to a growl.
Kaiser: "Now prove that your body, your soul, and your will can withstand it. Or die again trying."
The shard's glow intensified — beams of crimson energy arcing toward Shojiro like seeking tendrils, each one humming with impossible power.
Shojiro's pulse raced.
The air burned.
The trial had begun.