◇_ _
The masked protector didn't move.
But his mind spun like a blade under pressure.
Two beasts. Both enraged. Both grieving. Both far beyond manageable.
Not just in size, but in weight—presence. They carried power the way storms carried silence before the break. The kind of force that didn't shout when it entered the battlefield. It just arrived—and everything else adjusted.
The air around the Grizzlies vibrated, thick with ambient mana. Unrefined. Elemental. The forest itself seemed to breathe with them.
He measured their gait, their spacing, their line of sight.
Both eyes were on her.
She stirred weakly in his arms—just a shift of weight, a murmur beneath her breath—but it was enough. The younger Titan's gaze twitched, its nostrils flaring harder as it caught the scent.
And then it growled.
Low. Deep.
The sound didn't rise. It sank. Into the earth. Into bone.
He lowered her, slowly—placing her behind the jagged roots of a fallen tree, where its trunk still radiated the lingering magic from her last strike. A fragile barrier. But maybe enough to force the first hit toward him instead.
Then he stood. Alone.
One man, two blades, and a forest closing in.
He drew the shorter of the two weapons—curved, utilitarian. Not for show.
He wasn't here to perform.
"Class Four threats," he thought grimly, muscles coiled. "Smart. Synchronized. Emotionally driven. That's the worst kind."
The younger beast lowered its head, claws gouging soil as it began a slow, steady pace forward. Not a charge. A judgment.
The older one remained back—but didn't retreat. It circled, slow and precise, flanking.
They were hunting together.
"Of course you're coordinated," the protector murmured. "Why wouldn't you be?"
He inhaled once—calm, focused—and let his aura slip free.
The effect was immediate.
Ash froze midair. Leaves went still. Even the sound of distant creaking trees seemed to pause.
Mana wrapped around his frame like a second skin—dense, not showy. Controlled.
Still, the beasts didn't stop.
They didn't fear what was ahead.
They only cared about what lay behind him.
The younger Grizzly's eyes locked on the blood-smeared sword. Its breath hitched. Its upper lip twitched in silent fury.
The protector stepped forward, just enough to re-center their line of sight on him.
His voice was quiet. But steady.
"You want a target? Try one that's still standing."
A twitch of muscle.
And then it began.
The younger Giant Grizzly surged forward—faster than something its size should move. Earth shattered beneath its first step. Bark flew from nearby trunks. It was not charging blindly. It aimed for the gap. For the moment between blink and breath.
And at the same time, the elder moved.
A pincer. Not born of planning, but instinct honed through grief.
The masked protector reacted—weight shifted, knees bent, mana condensed into his blade.
Still, he knew—not enough.
One hit might be manageable.
Two? Fatal.
He turned toward the younger bear, prepared to intercept.
And then—
A sound.
Sharp. Tonal.
A single chime, not loud, but unignorable.
It rang through the clearing like a breath held too long finally released.
Not steel. Not spellcraft.
Something else.
The Grizzlies stopped—unsettled. Frozen by fear .
Both Grizzlies paused mid-stride, their heads twitching, ears flicking toward the north. Their claws still dug into the earth, but the charge halted.
The protector blinked. His grip tightened—but he didn't move.
Even the trees seemed to hesitate.
From deep within the forest, past shattered branches and fog-wrapped light, someone approached.
Not loud.
Not fast.
But they carried weight.
Whatever it was, the forest was letting it in.
And that meant only two things:
It belonged or it tamed it.
◇_ _
Far from the center of the clearing, where the trees thickened and the shadows grew longer, the assassin stirred.
Still bound, still broken.
But awake.
Barely.
His fingers twitched against the mana-threaded restraints, too drained to fight, too stubborn to rest. Blood crusted at his brow, dried at the corner of his mouth. Pain throbbed in every joint, but it wasn't pain that roused him.
It was that pressure hangingin the air.
Not physical. Not even magical.
Something older.
The forest shifted.
The mana around him curled back—recoiling in fear.
The assassin's breath caught.
His senses, dulled by battle, sharpened like blades all at once. A scent—cold metal and old earth. A rhythm—like the footfall of someone who shouldn't exist, walking toward something they didn't fear.
"…That's not one of them," he whispered hoarsely.
Not the protector. Not the girl.
Something else.
The pressure didn't rise in waves—it dropped like a hammer. Absolute. Measured. Inescapable.
And beneath it, a darker note.
Beastiality.
Feral. Deep. Untamed.
This wasn't control, like the masked man.
It wasn't uncontrolled fury, like the boy.
It was inevitable.
The assassin grit his teeth. Even his thoughts tried to recoil.
He looked to the north, where even the forest had grown silent.
"…Another one," he said, voice hollow. A bitter laugh slipped through cracked lips.
Then came the sigh of resignation:
"Another monster."
◇_ _
Somewhere deeper in the clearing—between the roots of scorched trees and the thin veil of ash-choked air—Lothar stirred.
A twitch. Then stillness.
A second spasm, more violent this time, rippling through his limbs like a misfired command from a body unsure it still belonged to him.
Then, silence.
And the burning began.
Not a dream.
Not a voice.
Just heat.
It didn't rise like fire. It carved through him—slow, invasive, deliberate.
It began beneath the surface of his skin, somewhere deeper than flesh or nerve. A single vein lit up—then another—then a chain reaction of pain. Something inside him snapped awake. Not with rage, not with power.
With need.
His back arched off the ground. His mouth opened in a soundless scream as his chest heaved in place of breath. But there was no air—just the choking grip of something molten coiling around his core.
The cursed blood—his curse, his burden—had felt something.
And it was answering.
Not Vauldrix.
Not yet.
But something older. More intimate. Like a brand being pressed into his soul.
Lothar screamed.
It tore from his throat—raw, animal, involuntary.
The pain was not external. It didn't break his bones or blister his skin.
It rewrote him.
Every heartbeat came like a hammer blow. Every second stretched, bent, shattered under the weight of heat that had no name. A liquid fire that wasn't fire at all. Memory? Rage? A call? He couldn't tell. He didn't need to.
His body twisted, muscles locking into spasms he couldn't control. Ash lifted from the ground beneath him, repelled by the pulsing energy his skin began to radiate. His shirt tore across the shoulder. Light flickered underneath—sickly orange veins, like cracks in porcelain bleeding fire.
Not fully Lothar.
Not fully Vauldrix.
Something between.
His eyes flew open.
He sucked in air like he'd never breathed before—sharp, broken gasps that burned his lungs more than soot ever had.
And then… his head turned north.
No thought behind the motion.
No logic.
Just instinct.
His heart galloped in his chest, trying to outrun the thing he felt approaching. Not footsteps. Not pressure.
A pull.
It wasn't vision that told him. It wasn't hearing.
His blood had turned to face something. Something massive. Something known.
Not by mind.
But by memory that wasn't his.
By lineage.
By curse.
Lothar sat there—drenched in sweat, hollow in breath, glowing like something barely containing itself—and whispered through cracked lips:
"...What are you?"
He didn't know if he was asking the thing coming through the trees.
Or asking himself.
The forest didn't answer.
But it heard.
And it was preparing to show him.
◇_ _
The forest stirred.
The air condensed—slowly, impossibly—as if reality itself was bracing for something it couldn't name. The trees didn't sway; they bent, not outward but inward, drawn toward the direction Lothar faced. Toward the presence.
A new pulse joined the forest's rhythm.
It didn't walk.
It advanced.
And its arrival was announced not by noise, but by instinct.
The first to feel it were the birds too far to fly. Then the beasts, already retreating. And then—everyone.
Even unconscious, the golden-eyed girl's brows twitched, as if her body recoiled from something her mind couldn't yet process.
The assassin gasped.
Then stiffened.
A shadow slipped across the clearing—not from light, but from weight. The kind of shadow that bent sound. That swallowed certainty. That had teeth.
And it came from between the trees.
Not fully seen.
Just glimpsed—where vision refused to focus.
A long silhouette.
Too broad for a man. Too narrow for a monster.
And behind it…
Aura.
Not the silent hum of mana.
This was madness given shape.
It rolled forward like thunder through stone. And buried inside it—buried deep—was something worse.
Joy.
A savage thrill. Not rage. Not malice. But exhilaration.
Battle-lust.
Primal and unashamed.
Whatever was coming wasn't looking for a fight.
It was delighted to have one.
Lothar's fingers twitched against the soil. His body shook.
And for the first time since waking—
He wasn't sure if the burning in his blood came from fear.
Or from recognition.