The cavern pulsed with life.
Kael stood motionless beneath the ancient tree, its bark veined with a pale, shifting light that hummed with memory. This was no ordinary root network—it was a relic of a civilization that had once cultivated entire planets, guiding them like seedlings through the void. The tendrils of the tree extended outward, brushing Kael's skin like cold breath. They wanted something.
Or someone.
"You feel it?" Marei asked, her voice barely above a whisper. She knelt beside the closest root, brushing her hand gently across it. "It's trying to connect to your essence."
He nodded stiffly. "It's like it knows I'm not... just Earth-born anymore."
"You aren't," she said. "You carry something ancient inside you now. The Seed you awakened isn't just a fragment of power—it's a memory bank, a consciousness fragment... maybe even a living will."
Kael's brow furrowed. "Then what does it want from me?"
Marei stepped forward and pointed to the center of the cavern. "That."
A pod hovered midair, suspended by glowing vines. Its surface was smooth, metallic, and marked by a constellation pattern Kael had seen in a dream—seven stars orbiting a shattered sun. His vision blurred the moment he looked too long at it, as if the pod existed in overlapping realities.
"This is the Heartroot," Marei explained. "The Federation thinks it's just an ancient artifact—but it's the cradle of the first cultivators. It's been locked down for centuries."
"Why show me this now?"
"Because the Seed inside you is resonating with it," she replied. "And because the Federation sent a retrieval unit this morning. They're already on their way. You have one shot to form the bond before they extract it by force."
Kael didn't move. The thought of becoming something more than human… it should have excited him. But all he felt was weight. The burden of legacy. Of expectation. Of war.
Marei must have seen it in his face. "I can shield you," she said softly. "I know the ritual. But only you can accept it."
He inhaled deeply, stepping into the ring of roots. The air crackled as the vines opened, revealing a shimmering stair of energy leading up toward the pod.
Every step closer twisted time around him. He saw flashes of battles long lost to history, of cities suspended in orbit, of cultivators whose veins burned like galaxies. Then, the visions changed—Kael saw himself, not as he was, but as he could become.
A general. A savior. A tyrant.
Then darkness.
The pod opened.
Inside was no device. No weapon. Just light—pure, overwhelming, and warm. It rushed into him like a flood, burrowing through muscle and bone, tearing away fear, rewriting instinct.
Kael screamed.
Not in pain, but in transformation.
His body collapsed to the floor, smoking slightly. His eyes glowed faintly with the same hue as the tree. The Seed had grown roots.
When he stood again, something in the cavern bowed. Not Marei. Not the pod.
The tree.
It had accepted him.
Kael wasn't just cultivating through the stars anymore.
He had just been accepted by the stars' original cultivators.
And that changed everything.