The camp slept under a wolf-dark sky.
Night in the forest was never gentle. The cold came first, creeping through the canvas. Then the silence followed, thick and suffocating, swallowing even the crackle of the dying fires. The tents shuddered under passing currents of wind that carried the scent of pine sap, wet stone, and old blood dragged through the dirt.
Above it all, the moon hung sharp and indifferent—like a polished blade waiting for a throat.
"Wake up, young one." Beelzebub whispered. "It's time to digest."
Rush's eyes snapped open. Digest?
He didn't get a chance to ask.
It started with a spike of agony in his spine.
Rush gasped, his back arching off the mattress. It felt like someone had poured liquid nitrogen into his nervous system. The tent blurred. The smell of antiseptic vanished, replaced instantly by the sharp, freezing scent of pine needles and old blood.
"Do not fight it," Beelzebub's voice thundered, no longer in his head, but surrounding him."To keep the power, you must remember the source."
Wh-what are you doing?
"Synesthesia Protocol: Engage."
The world flipped.
Rush wasn't in the bed anymore.
He was running.
He was low to the ground, moving on four limbs. The snow crunched beneath paws that were massive and lethal. He felt the wind whipping through thick white fur. He felt a hunger—deep, starving, and hollow—clawing at his stomach.
He looked down. He didn't see human hands. He saw claws.
I am the Lycan, Rush realized, panic rising. I'm seeing its memories.
He saw the cave. He saw the apprentice—the fear on the boy's face smelling like sweet copper. He felt the urge to kill, not out of malice, but out of simple, cold instinct.
Kill. Eat. Survive.
The alien instincts flooded Rush's human mind. It was drowning him.
Stop! Rush screamed internally. It's too much!
"Breathe,"Beelzebub commanded. "You are not the beast. You are the graveyard that holds it. Take what is useful. Discard the rest."
Rush gritted his teeth, forcing his own mind to surface. He grabbed onto the sensation of the Lycan's speed—the way it condensed mana into its muscles to burst forward. He grabbed onto the feeling of the cold—not as pain, but as armor.
Mine, Rush thought, wrestling the memory into submission. This... is mine.
"Good."
The hallucination shattered.
Rush slammed back into his body. He was soaking wet, shivering violently in the medical tent.
He gasped for air, clutching his chest. His heart was hammering a rhythm that was too fast, too wild.
He looked at his hand.
It looked normal. But when he clenched his fist, he didn't just feel muscle contraction. He felt a phantom snap—like the memory of a claw extending.
"Assimilation complete,"Beelzebub whispered.
Rush lay back, staring at the canvas ceiling, his body humming with a strange, cold energy.
What… what was that?
"That was a B-Rank soul being written into your DNA," the entity replied calmly."You have inherited its resistance to frost. You have inherited its burst speed. You did not learn these things, Rush. You remembered them. They are a part of you now."
He sat up, looking at his palms. He felt lighter. Faster. But something was missing. The Lycan had controlled the environment itself.
Can I use the frost? Rush asked, imagining the beam of ice that had nearly killed him. Can I freeze the air like it did?
"No." The answer was instant and flat.
Why not? You said you harvested it.
"Your Origin Core is fractured," Beelzebub replied brutally. "My Forced Override during the battle saved your life, but it destabilized your foundation. You are a cracked cup, Rush. If I poured the full ocean of a B-Rank beast's magic into you now, you would shatter."
Rush frowned, irritation spiking through his exhaustion.
You admitted you broke it, Rush countered sharply. You said the Forced Override destabilized me. So fix it. You just ate a B-Rank monster. Use that energy to repair the Core.
"Resource Allocation: Negative," Beelzebub replied, his voice devoid of sympathy.
What? Why not?
"I used the Lycan's biomass to knit your shredded muscles and broken ribs. I used its mana to restart your heart. The fuel is spent, boy. "
Beelzebub paused, and the vibration in Rush's bones felt almost like a shrug.
"If you want a stronger Core, you must cultivate it yourself. Or… provide me something with higher purity."
Rush swallowed the curse threatening to leave his throat. So I have to do the heavy lifting.
"That is the nature of existence," Beelzebub agreed. "Now stop whining. The rest of the power is Archived."
Rush lifted his hand again. He focused on the mana inside him. Before, it was just a fuel. Now, it felt sharp.
He moved his hand.
It wasn't a normal movement. It was a blur. A Flash Step.
It happened so fast the wind cracked.
Rush stared. He hadn't cast a spell. He had just… moved. Like it was instinct.
I'm faster, Rush whispered.
"You are evolved,"Beelzebub corrected. "Sleep now, little boy. The meal is finished. Tomorrow, the hunt begins anew."
The vibration in his bones faded to a low, steady thrum.
Rush closed his eyes. And for the first time in five years, he didn't dream of emptiness.
He dreamed of hunting in the snow.