The old sensation wrapped around me again, that silent pressure that precedes the rupture of a spatial rift. The body feels ripped from itself, the entire world reduced to a single line of light. Yet, in that suspended microsecond, something flickered in my mind… a spark of recognition, or perhaps a warning.
When the flash dissipated, my feet sank slightly into warm, damp soil. The air carried the dense perfume of vegetation, mingled with the insistent hum of insects and the distant calls of birds I knew were far from harmless. A wave of heat embraced me like an old enemy. And I couldn't help the crooked smile that formed.
"No way…" I muttered.
I was back in a territory that had been my forced home in recent days: a tropical forest. The canopy of trees rose like living walls, filtering the golden sunlight into irregular patches that danced across the ground. The sound of running water nearby competed with the snapping of branches and something, large, moving through the undergrowth.
'Did the old man know?' The question lodged itself in my mind like a splinter, but there was no time to pull it out now.
I inhaled deeply, letting the heavy air fill my lungs, and began organizing the information. It was truly a Tournament of Protection, protecting a beast egg until it hatched. To do that, I would have to find something called an incubator, probably well hidden somewhere in this suffocating jungle.
But there was the prerequisite that turned the contest into a programmed bloodbath: to awaken the egg, I would have to feed it with the core of other eggs. One per day. That meant inevitably hunting at least one competitor per cycle.
And, lastly, perhaps the most treacherous of all… based on the last few weeks I'd spent in places like this, I seriously doubted that the only threats here would be the competitors. The beasts that roamed this kind of territory weren't the type to back down from armed prey. On the contrary, they would hunt us like succulent meals until the end.
I looked around, assessing the shadows in motion, the rustle of leaves that didn't come from the wind. One doubt surfaced: had all the competitors been dropped in the same region… or were there others like this?
"Phew…" I exhaled, the weight of priorities already piling up in my mind. There was much to do, and the forest would not wait.
I closed my eyes, trying to surrender completely to the dizzying sensation of crossing the dimensional rift created by the artifact. The beast egg rested firmly in my hand, almost pulsing in sync with my heart. Gradually, my senses began filtering out everything irrelevant, muffling the hum of gravitational and electrical affinities around me, until only a dense silence remained, as if my ears were submerged. There was an invisible anchor, a subtle call, and I focused on it as if it were the only fixed point in a world about to shatter.
Slowly, I noticed a place not far away vibrating with a singular frequency. It was a soft, almost shy resonance, yet unlike anything alive.
Electric arcs ran across my skin, crawling like blue serpents, and I moved forward with every ounce of speed my body could muster. Yet even before reaching the point, heavy sounds began to echo through the forest, trees being shredded, trunks crashing with violent snaps.
"It's begun."
The site of the anomaly lay just ahead, marked by a colossal tree rising like a slumbering titan. Its trunk was wide enough to swallow an entire house, and its canopy disappeared into the sky, filtering sunlight into golden beams that danced in the humidity-laden air. I circled the trunk completely, alert to any sign, until my fingers felt a subtle change in the bark's texture.
When I touched the irregular spot, what had seemed solid wood disintegrated like old paper, releasing a damp, acidic scent.
Before me, a hole opened nearly two meters in diameter, darkness within pulsing as if watching me. I stepped inside, electric arcs illuminating the space around my body.
The path descended into a narrow, damp tunnel before opening into a small underground cavern. The air there had an ancient weight, as if guarding a secret for millennia. At the center, a black stone pillar supported a copper tray filled with a liquid so clear it seemed nonexistent. Above it, floating and slowly rotating on its own axis, was a glass prism. Its surface reflected colors that didn't exist in the ordinary world, an impossible spectrum that hypnotized the eyes. And it made no sense, as there was no light to separate the visible spectrum.
The egg in my hand began to tremble, as if recognizing the artifact, until it simply slipped from my fingers and flew toward the prism. When it touched the structure, it was swallowed as if entering a gelatinous mass. The bluish film that enveloped it dissolved into the air like smoke in the wind, revealing the egg in its full form: irregular shell, almost metallic, with veins of light flowing like rivers across its surface.
"First objective: Check! — incubator found."
I ran a hand over my chin, evaluating every detail of my situation. Finding the incubator might have been luck… but it was luck guided by my spatial affinity. Still, only a fool would believe I was the only one to stumble upon a place like this.
'In ten days, this forest will turn into a bloody hunting ground, and each egg will be a spark for personal wars. The first day… that will be calm. Everyone focused on finding an incubator, hunting a single opponent, playing it safe. But me? I can't see myself following that playbook,' I analyzed carefully.
The real problem wasn't a lone hunter… it was when they teamed up.
Sooner or later, it would happen — improvised alliances — and I'd be a fool to think their objective would be anything other than taking me down. After all, I have a target on my back: a newly ascended youth, the queen's pawn, with three affinities. Moreover, I've won duels against a large portion of the competitors in this tournament.
I am absolutely certain there will be competitors who will forget the central objective and the idea of winning the tournament just to defeat me.
Many possibilities ran through my mind. Wait for them to hunt each other and strike stealthily, but honestly, I'm not very good at being stealthy. And the idea of hiding like a cornered rat, waiting for everyone to come for me? Hah… no. That's asking to be crushed. If I'm to survive, it will be by hunting.
My thoughts aligned with the cruel logic of the jungle: survival is not for the fastest or the cleverest; it's for the most ruthless. I'll use this cavern, yes, and set the traps Old Silas taught me, but not to be trapped here.
'I'll draw attention elsewhere, plant bait, create chaos. If they want to find me, they'll have to get lost first.'
I took a deep breath, a crooked smile forming at the corner of my mouth.
"So, this is it… if I'm going to shock everyone, I'm going all in. I'll go out today and steal as many eggs as I can. Actually, I'll try what no one else will dare attempt on the first day."
I still had no idea how much this strategy would turn the tournament upside down. Nor the storm that would hit once the first rumors started spreading… but honestly, I could barely wait to see it happen.
With my plan set, I turned my attention back to the altar and the prism in front of me. The structure itself held nothing particularly special — carved stones, a circular design that seemed more ornamental than functional.
But the liquid in the tray… that caught my attention. I approached cautiously. At first, it looked like crystal-clear water, but as I got closer, chills ran across my skin. I felt that familiar unease, like when I faced the abyssal crocodile in the dungeon. The black fluid, the pool of blood, that disgusting thing crawling in the depths… it all echoed in my memory.
Only here, the difference was brutal: the liquid was transparent, translucent, yet somehow even more threatening. I inhaled deeply and decided not to touch it. The risk wasn't worth it.
I focused on the prism. At first glance, it seemed like nothing more than glass — transparent, harmless. But when I touched it with my fingertips, I realized it was soft, even spongy, almost organic. What intrigued me even more was its ability to refract light even in the near-total darkness of the cavern. My sparks of electricity crackled across my body, illuminating the space in short pulses, and with each flash, the prism seemed to respond, revealing hidden cosmic effects within it.
Miniature stars, glimmers reminiscent of spatial rifts.
"Interesting… I feel gravitational magic here too."
I was almost certain that this was definitely not just an egg incubator.
I spent more time studying the environment, connecting pieces, storing impressions in my memory. When I felt I had enough, I left the underground cavern and returned to the surface.
The tree camouflaging the entrance was ancient, robust, and it served me well. I tore off branches full of leaves and covered the passage, arranging them naturally, as if time and the forest itself had done it. Nothing could draw attention here.
My eyes burned with a different light, wild.
I felt my own presence grow more aggressive, more predatory — as if I were assuming the role of the beast. I inhaled deeply, savoring the sensation.
"Let's do what needs to be done."
A second later, I surged forward at full speed, this time without caution, vanishing from the cave entrance, moving toward the sounds of trees crashing. The forest guided me, and with every step, I drew closer to the first blood of this tournament.