Silence didn't exist in the forge.
Not real silence.
Not here.
Even with the Warden lying in pieces and its weapons scattered across the floor, the air still vibrated—low, deep, constant. Like the forge didn't approve of a guardian dying and wanted to remind me it was still watching.
My body wasn't listening to anything anymore.
Pain crushed my limbs. Heat tore through my chest. Shadows under my skin thrashed like they were trying to escape.
I dropped to one knee.
Or maybe both. Hard to feel anything now.
Something cracked inside me—bone? Essence?
Didn't matter.
The evolution had already started.
Too late to stop.
Too late to think.
The Warden's core essence didn't blend smoothly like the Ravagers or Gnashbeast. It slammed into me like molten metal poured into cold water—violent, expanding, reshaping.
The air around me bent inward.
Shadows whipped outward.
The floor trembled.
Predation Level: Threshold Exceeded.
A whisper crawled along my spine.
"Reforge."
Or maybe I imagined it. Couldn't tell.
My vision folded inward, collapsing into streaks of red and black.
I fell forward.
The ground… disappeared.
---
The first thing I felt was my claws.
They weren't claws anymore.
Too long. Too sharp. Too flexible.
They scrapped across stone and cut furrows just by twitching.
I pulled them back instinctively—
—and the joints folded in a way they shouldn't have before. Smooth. Liquid. Almost silent.
My breath hitched.
A new sensation flooded the edges of my body.
Like… edges had moved.
Shifted.
Changed.
My limbs pulsed—bones stretching, condensing, re-aligning. The shadows around them hardened like armor. Then softened. Then hardened again, settling into layered plates.
The forge heat hit my skin—
And my skin didn't flinch.
Didn't recoil.
Didn't melt.
It absorbed.
A hiss slipped out. Not a word. Not a growl. Something between instinct and disbelief.
"—khh…"
My back arched abruptly as something extended from my spine.
Two sharp protrusions—no, blades—grew along the back of my arms, curving slightly like hooked scythes.
Adaptive Morph wasn't subtle anymore.
My tail lashed behind me. It wasn't a tail now.
It split halfway along its length, forming two blade-like extensions that hummed faintly as if sensing air currents.
Everything felt sharper.
Edges. Instincts. Thoughts.
Blink twitched in my head, calling to be used—no, demanding.
I tried it on instinct.
The world warped—
—but not like before.
No drag. No unwanted shift.
I reappeared cleanly behind a cracked pillar, barely aware of the movement.
My heart—if I still had one—thudded once, heavy.
Again.
Blink.
Perfect.
No distortion.
I blinked three more times in rapid bursts—each one snapping me to a different corner of the chamber.
Faster. Cleaner. No drag.
A laugh almost escaped me.
Weird.
Hadn't laughed in… well, since dying.
The Nightbound Reaver form greeted the forge with hunger.
Not for food.
For movement.
For impact.
For evolution.
But it wasn't done.
My chest tightened again—
Hard.
I staggered forward as another wave of essence slammed through me.
The world dimmed and brightened in pulses.
My senses exploded outward. Echo Sense fired like lightning through stone. Every crack. Every vibration. Every distant pressure. Every shift of heat. Every faint movement.
It was overwhelming.
Too much.
I dropped down, claws scoring deep into stone just to anchor myself.
The forge responded—
A deep thrum—
Heat pulsing outward like a heartbeat.
My body reacted instantly.
Heat absorbed into my limbs.
Shadow hardened over my frame.
Muscle fibers twisted tighter.
My outline sharpened.
Everything sharpened.
The chamber blurred around me for a second as my senses re-synced.
A low growl echoed—
my voice, but not quite.
New vocal cords.
New resonance.
Deeper. Sharper. Wrong in the right ways.
I rose.
Slow at first.
Then steady.
My new body balanced naturally, like it had been waiting for this shape.
Legs bent differently—taller stance, more digitigrade.
Arms longer—claws reaching past my knees.
Shoulders layered with folded shadow armor.
Back lined with those curved scythe-blades.
Tail bladed and flexible.
And my eyes—
They weren't singular now.
Two vertical slits formed.
Then two more above them, faint but glowing.
The forge light reflected in them.
Sharply. Too sharply.
I blinked, and the glow cut through the haze like knives.
Nightbound Reaver.
Yeah.
This was right.
The name fit like instinct.
I stepped forward, expecting the usual weight shift—
But my foot landed without sound.
No scrape.
No echo.
Silent movement.
Very silent.
A new message burned into my thoughts:
[Nightbound Reaver — Tier 3 Form Stabilized]
[Abilities Unlocked:]
• Reaver Step (Blink-Integrated Dash)
• Shadow Cleave (High-Velocity Limb Strike)
• Predatory Insight (Instinct-Based Reflex Boost)
Each one pulsed faintly in my skull like something knocking from the inside.
Testing…
Maybe.
I lifted my arm and dragged a claw across a nearby stone.
The stone didn't break.
It split.
Clean.
Instant.
The top half slid off a second later and crashed beside my feet.
My breath caught again—habit more than need.
"…Alright," I muttered lightly. "This is… yeah. This is good."
The forge hum deepened, almost responding.
But the feeling changed.
A shift.
A whisper of movement.
The pillars around the chamber pulsed faintly—sigils lighting up in small flickers, running like veins. Not alive, but aware.
The Warden's defeat had triggered something.
A door in the far wall cracked open.
Not physically.
Not with sound.
Just… opened.
A faint glow leaked out—soft blue, nothing like the forge's red heat.
A new passage.
Deeper.
Cleaner.
Different.
My claws twitched.
My instincts prowled forward before I did.
Something waited beyond that door.
Someone.
Shadeborn maybe.
Or something older.
But I didn't walk through yet.
I turned back toward the center of the chamber, to the Warden's broken head. A faint glow still lingered in the core-slit—dying, but not gone.
I crouched down and touched the metal.
It pulsed once.
A final message.
"Worthy."
Then the light went out.
For a moment, I didn't move.
Didn't breathe.
Worthy.
Not praise.
Not approval.
Recognition.
The forge wasn't testing monsters.
It was forging rulers.
And I had passed.
The chamber hummed again—low, heavy, almost respectful.
I rose, claws hanging loose at my sides.
Nightbound Reaver form settled deeper into my muscles with each second. Familiar. Comfortable. Hungry.
Yeah.
This was me now.
I stepped toward the open passage.
The forge heat stayed behind me, replaced by a cool drift of air as I entered the threshold.