Night in the outer zones always smelled like rust and wet stone—like something old and wounded refused to die. My footsteps were quiet, careful. The moonlight barely reached the alley where I moved. This was the edge of Valeria's slums, a place most forgot existed. Here, even rats walked in silence.
I didn't come here to be seen. I came for the shadows.
Ten years ago, I would've feared this place. Now? It felt familiar. Honest, in its own twisted way.
Beyond the alleys, past rows of rusted metal and rotting boards, the outskirts gave way to the forbidden zone: Deadroot Hollow. A ravine surrounded by whispering trees and silence so thick it choked the lungs. The zone had been sealed off years ago by the academy and the hunter guilds. They said it was unstable, cursed. No one came here anymore. Or at least, no one who followed the rules.
But the weak didn't have the luxury of rules.
I paused near the edge, crouching low behind a collapsed wall. In the distance, flickers of blue fire lit the forest's underbelly. A group of licensed hunters moved through the brush, dragging steel spears, their armor marked with the golden crest of the Valor Guild—the fourth-ranked guild in the human territories. Their leader's voice was sharp.
"Move quick. If another wave of beasts comes through, we hold them at the choke point and call the scouts. We're here to cleanse and collect cores. Anyone sees anything strange, report immediately. We're not here for heroics."
Another replied, "What if we run into an anomaly?"
"Then we run the other way."
Their laughter was bitter, forced. Even guild elites didn't like this place.
I waited until they passed, hiding behind twisted roots and charred stone. Once they were gone, I stepped deeper into the forest, past the boundary line scorched into the ground by magic wards. I crossed the line without hesitation.
Ten years ago, I died trying to survive.
Now, I was walking into a place that kills men twice as strong as I ever was.
I needed power. And the kind I was looking for didn't exist in clean places.
---
I'd heard the rumors before—Demonic Wells, sealed places from the last Beast War. Places the Guilds buried and pretended no longer existed. They were remnants of the battlefield, marked by cursed ground and spiritual decay. Most people didn't believe in them anymore. Too inconvenient. Too terrifying.
But I remembered.
A man once whispered about it in a prison cell two days before he was executed. Said he saw a demon gnawing its own bones beneath the roots of an ancient tree. Said he heard it speak—offering gifts in exchange for names.
The memory gave me chills.
I found the tree at midnight.
It was split in half, like something from a nightmare. Black bark. No leaves. Its roots curled into the earth like claws. The air smelled like ash and cold iron. A faint humming filled my ears, like breathing that didn't belong to anything living.
I dropped to one knee and touched the ground. The soil pulsed beneath my fingers.
It was real.
I pulled the small bone talisman I had taken from a corpse back in the slums. It was old, wrapped in faded cloth and inked with demonic scripture. A gateway key, if the rumors were true. I pressed it to the roots.
Nothing happened.
Then everything did.
The tree pulsed. The roots split. Darkness spilled out like smoke, cold and wet and ancient. My vision blurred, and for a second, I felt like my skin was burning from the inside.
And then I saw it.
A crack beneath the tree. Not large—just wide enough to crawl through.
The entrance to the well.
My heart pounded.
I could still turn back.
But if I did, I would never be anything more than a D-rank support. A healer without talent. A boy destined to fail again. A brother who would lose her all over again.
No.
I climbed inside.
---
The descent was silent. Just me and the sound of my own breath. The tunnel was narrow, pulsing with something ancient. Every footstep echoed too loud, like I was disturbing something asleep.
At the bottom was a chamber.
Circles were etched into the floor—glowing faint red, carved into stone. Bones littered the edges. Some human. Some not.
And in the center: a faint flicker of light hovering above a pedestal. It was a crystal, jagged and dark, bleeding red light. It pulsed with life.
The Demonic Core.
I approached slowly. I could feel it trying to push me back. Not physically—but something deeper. Something inside me resisting.
"You shouldn't be here," something whispered in my mind.
But I was.
I stood before the core. My fingers twitched.
"What do you want?" I whispered aloud.
A rush of images filled my head—flashes of pain, war, power. Screams. Laughter. Blood.
Then a single sentence burned across my thoughts:
Prove you can endure.
The trial had begun.
---
Pain exploded across my skin. Not from outside—but inside. My veins lit up like fire. My breath caught. My knees hit the floor.
It was like drowning in smoke, choking on memories I didn't recognize. My vision blurred. My heartbeat stuttered.
"Survive this," I whispered. "Just survive."
I saw Mira's face.
I heard her scream.
I screamed back.
Then everything went dark.
---
When I woke, I was lying beside the altar.
The core was dim now. The trial was over.
Something burned on my chest—a mark, black and deep. A sigil I didn't recognize.
I didn't feel stronger. Not yet.
But I was still alive.
And in this world, that meant something.
I stood slowly.
There would be a price.
But power always costs something.
And I was done living powerless
End of ChChapteCha