Chapter 18 – The Serpent Breakthrough
Night cloaked the Flintclaw tribe, but the sky above the Patriarch's courtyard glowed crimson — a storm of heat and smoke rising from the heart of the forges.
At the center stood a cauldron the size of a small hut, its bronze walls cracked from overuse.
Warriors and elders circled it nervously, their faces drenched in sweat, eyes gleaming with both fear and greed.
The Desolate Cores had been laid out like treasures — white, crystalline remnants taken from a slain beast. Even inert, they radiated a power that made men's hearts tremble.
Ren Flintclaw sat nearby, cross-legged on a raised platform, eyes half closed, expression proud and hungry.
Beside him, the Patriarch wiped his brow. "We are ready, Young Master. The flames have reached their peak."
Ren nodded once. "Begin the refinement."
The elders lifted the Desolate Cores into the cauldron with iron tongs.
The instant the cores touched the fire, the air exploded with light — brilliant, pale, and cold.
The flames hissed as though frozen, twisting between crimson and ghostly white.
"Maintain the heat!" shouted the Patriarch. "Add more coal!"
Men rushed to obey. The bellows roared, and sparks sprayed into the night like falling stars.
But even as the fire grew hotter, the temperature in the courtyard plummeted. Frost crept across the bronze cauldron, webbing the surface in veins of ice.
Ren's eyes gleamed with fascination. "So this is true Desolate energy… even fire can't tame it."
The Patriarch forced a smile. "Without an alchemist, this is the best our tribe can manage. We can only heat and hammer the essence free. In the Dominion, they say true alchemists can refine these cores into essence pills—each the size of a thumb, brimming with power and not a drop of essence lost."
He sighed, shaking his head. "We… are far from that level."
Ren snorted. "Then we'll do it the crude way. I'll take the essence by force."
The cauldron shuddered as the cores began to crack. Light spilled out in frozen beams, and the faint, keening sound of something ancient echoed through the air.
Every warrior in the courtyard felt it — a chill that pierced the soul.
Far from the fire and noise, deep in the back mountains where few ever tread, Zac trained alone beneath the whispering pines.
For five days, he had done nothing but practice the Stone Serpent Flow — morning to dusk, from dusk to dawn.
Each repetition had polished his control. Each stance had dug deeper into the earth's rhythm.
Now, beneath a half-moon, his bare feet pressed into the soil. His breathing slowed, becoming impossibly long and gentle.
In…
Out…
Even the wind seemed to move in time with him.
The Yellow Amethyst pulsed faintly beneath his chest, resonating with each measured breath.
The flow of blood in his body changed, moving faster and stronger, as though his veins had found a new pulse.
Then, as he sank into the final stance — the serpent coil — his arms traced the air in a smooth, spiraling motion.
Crack—!
The ground split open before him. A jagged fissure raced outward in a straight line, stone and dust spraying into the air.
For a moment, it looked like a serpent of stone bursting through the earth — exactly as the technique's name described.
Zac's eyes widened in awe.
"I… did it."
The faint hum of energy flowed through his body like molten sunlight, and a pulse of light flashed under his skin — a second glowing vein, bright and golden, running along his forearm.
A warm, powerful current rushed through his muscles and bones.
He had broken through.
A rush of information and instinct filled his mind, as if his body itself understood the transformation.
The Second Vein, known as Tempering.
The blood now fused with essence; the muscles hardened, bones strengthened, and recovery soared beyond human limits.
Zac flexed his fingers and felt the earth's weight lighten around him. Every motion carried force, precision, and flow.
It wasn't brute power — it was harmony.
"This feeling…" he whispered. "Like my body itself is alive."
He exhaled slowly, grounding the surge of excitement.
The Stone Serpent Flow had become more than a movement — it was now a breathing art, a bridge between his spirit and the earth's pulse.
As Zac gathered his things to return to the village, he caught sight of something strange in the distance — a red glow flickering against the horizon.
The wind carried with it a faint, biting cold that didn't belong to night.
He frowned. "That direction… the tribe?"
He climbed a rocky ridge and looked down at the valley below. From afar, he could see the great cauldron blazing in the Patriarch's courtyard. Firelight painted the clouds orange — but beneath it, something was wrong.
Even from miles away, Zac could sense it: a chill spreading outward, fighting the heat.
His heart clenched.
That energy…
It was the same as the Desolate Cores he'd seen that day in the square — the same cold radiance that had fed his Yellow Amethyst.
The cauldron blazed with fire, yet the essence that leaked from it felt freezing.
Zac's veins pulsed, the amethyst resonating faintly in his chest. It drank in a trace of the energy even from this distance, responding like a beast stirring in its sleep.
He steadied his breath. "They're refining the cores…"
A mix of dread and curiosity rippled through him.
The tribe's crude methods would never tame power like that — and if they lost control, the backlash could destroy them all.
He turned toward the flickering horizon, the yellow light in his veins glowing faintly through his sleeve.
"I need to see what happens," he murmured.
Far below, in the Patriarch's courtyard, the cauldron groaned and the Desolate Cores pulsed violently — as if something inside them had begun to wake.
And in the mountains, the earth beneath Zac's feet trembled… answering in kind.