Chapter 54 – The Shattered Veins
The summit no longer felt like stone.
It felt like flesh.
Every step Kratos took beneath his heavy boots caused the fractured ground to tremble, as if the mountain itself were breathing—slow, strained, wounded. The veins of green light that ran through the broken rock pulsed unevenly now, brightening… dimming… then brightening again, in rhythm with Atreus' heartbeat.
The boy stood once more at the very center of the chaos.
His feet hovered a few inches above the ground, suspended within a rising spiral of luminous energy. His eyes glowed faintly, not the gentle light of magic—but the harsh, burning brilliance of something ancient forcing its way into the present.
Above him, the Ninth Breath watched.
Chains still rattled.
Crown still fractured.
But the entity's presence had changed.
No longer only observing.
Now… it was waiting.
"Father…" Atreus whispered without turning. His voice echoed in more than just the air. It rippled through the stone, the shadows, even the silence itself. "The Hollow Reaches… it's not just a place anymore. It's a mind. And it knows me."
Kratos tightened his grip on the Leviathan Axe.
"It will know your blade before this ends," he said. "Focus. What do you feel?"
Atreus' hands slowly clenched into fists.
"Pain…"
"…And memory."
"…And something that doesn't belong to this world."
The veins in the mountain flared violently in response to his words.
Then the mountain opened.
Not splitting like stone.
But tearing like fabric.
A massive rupture formed behind the Ninth Breath, stretching vertically from the sky to the abyss below. Inside it was no rock, no earth, no void.
Only darkness twisted into motion.
Shapes moved within that darkness. Slow. Massive. Conscious.
The true heart of the Hollow Reaches had been revealed.
The Ninth Breath's voice thundered across the shattered summit.
"WITNESS THE SHATTERED VEINS… THE BLOOD OF A DEAD REALM STILL FLOWING."
From the tear in reality, tendrils of fractured energy emerged—long, serpent-like, covered in jagged fragments of broken runes and ancient symbols. They did not move randomly. They moved toward Atreus.
Each pulse of his power drew them closer.
Kratos stepped forward immediately.
"Do not let it touch you, boy!"
The first tendril struck the ground just inches from Atreus, splitting the stone like lightning without sound. A second one came from the side, sweeping wide—
Kratos hurled his axe.
The Leviathan buried itself into the dark limb. Frost flared. The tendril stiffened, then shattered into black dust that dissolved in the air.
But for every one destroyed, two more pushed through the rip in the world.
The summit became a forest of writhing shadows and broken light.
Atreus cried out, not in pain but in concentration, as a massive wave of emerald energy burst from his body, repelling the nearest tendrils. The shockwave caught Kratos as well, forcing him to plant his feet deep into the broken stone to stay upright.
The boy was no longer just channeling power.
He was becoming a source of it.
"A… Argh—!" Atreus groaned, gripping his chest. "It's trying to read me… my mind… my past…"
Kratos looked up.
Within the swirling darkness around Atreus, fragments of illusion had begun to form. Ghosts of memories. Flickers from other realms. Images of the past and futures not yet shaped.
He saw a younger Atreus, laughing in sunlight that no longer existed.
He saw blood-red skies.
Worlds burning.
A throne made of bones — and Atreus standing before it, older, eyes empty.
Even Kratos staggered at the visions now leaking into reality.
The Ninth Breath moved closer, slow and deliberate.
"YES… LET THE CHILD SEE WHAT HE IS… AND WHAT HE WILL BECOME…"
"Stop!" Kratos roared. His voice cracked like thunder. "You will not poison his mind!"
The entity laughed — a sound made of thousands of distant echoes.
"It is not poison. It is TRUTH."
Atreus screamed as another surge of energy tore out of him. The illusions shattered into fragments of light. The ground began to break apart again, massive pieces falling into the abyss as gravity grew unstable.
Kratos ran forward, leaping across a widening gap and grabbing Atreus' arm.
"Look at me, boy!" he shouted. "Not the past! Not the future! Only the present!"
Atreus's glowing eyes flickered. For one trembling moment, he looked like a lost child again.
Then the power within him surged violently.
The ground beneath them rose upward like a wave frozen in stone. Darkness and energy collided with such force that a deafening silence swallowed everything.
Time felt… broken.
And in that frozen moment between destruction and control…
Atreus spoke — but not with his own voice.
"THE VEINS ARE OPENED… THE SEALS ARE BROKEN…"
Kratos' eyes widened.
"That is not your voice…"
A towering shape began to rise through the rift behind the Ninth Breath. Not fully formed. Not physical. But vast beyond reason.
A shadow of a forgotten god.
A being that had once ruled the Hollow Reaches.
The First Silence.
The Ninth Breath turned as if in reverence.
"AWAKEN, ANCIENT ONE."
The presence alone crushed the air. Kratos felt pressure weigh down on his chest, on his thoughts, on his very spirit. This was not a creature to be fought with axes or arrows.
It was a concept. A memory. A will that survived extinction.
Atreus' body started to rise again, drawn toward the entity like a star captured by a collapsing galaxy.
"No!" Kratos roared. He wrapped his arms around Atreus, anchoring him with sheer strength. "You will not take him!"
Energy burned against his skin, cracking the ground beneath his knees, but he held on.
For the first time… the shadow hesitated.
And in that hesitation, Atreus found himself.
He let out a defiant scream — a scream of identity, of resistance, of choice — and slammed both hands into the air.
A blinding pillar of green light shot upward, piercing the rising darkness, tearing the shape of the First Silence apart before it could fully emerge.
The rift in reality screamed as it began to collapse.
The Ninth Breath recoiled, chains snapping violently as the energy backlash struck it.
"IMPOSSIBLE… THE CHILD DENIES THE VOID—"
The mountain collapsed inward.
Kratos threw his arms around Atreus, shielding him as the world around them shattered.
Stone fell.
Light fractured.
Darkness screamed.
Then everything went…
…still.
When Kratos opened his eyes, the summit was gone.
The abyss was sealed.
The sky had returned—dark, but whole.
Atreus lay on the ground beside him, unconscious, breathing… alive.
And in the air, fading like mist, the final echo of the Ninth Breath whispered:
"THIS IS NOT OVER, BOY OF WAR… THE VEINS HAVE BEEN TOUCHED… AND THE NINE HAVE FELT YOU…"
Silence returned.
But not peace.
Only the tension of what now knew his son.
Kratos slowly pulled Atreus closer, eyes scanning the broken horizon.
"The war has heard your name now, boy…" he muttered.
"…and it will come for you."