Chapter 20 – The Calm Before the Storm
Darkness.
Silence.
Then a single breath.
Vaibhav exhaled slowly, steam curling from his lips. The Black Room around him pulsed faintly — a hollow world made of swirling energy veins and fragments of stars. Two months had passed since Lin Xuan had left him here.
Two months of pain, silence, and discipline.
He sat cross-legged on the blackened surface, surrounded by rings of floating runes. Each rune pulsed once for every heartbeat he managed to steady. Sweat trickled down his spine, evaporating instantly into green motes of energy.
His mind was no longer chaos. It was clarity carved by suffering.
> "The fire burns. The body endures. The life flows."
He repeated the mantra like breathing — a rhythm that anchored him against the void's whispers.
Outside the Black Room, the world burned differently.
Shin's heel slammed into the ground, creating a shockwave of dust. His sweat-streaked hair clung to his forehead as he straightened, a grin stretching across his bruised face.
> "Come on, old man! You call that pressure?"
Lin Xuan, standing several meters away, didn't answer. He merely shifted his stance — calm, unreadable — before vanishing in a blur.
Shin's instincts screamed. He dropped low just in time to block a downward strike that nearly shattered the training platform beneath him.
Qi flared — red meeting silver. Sparks rippled across the air.
> "You're learning," Lin Xuan said, voice mild but approving. "Your control of Gene Flow is stable now. But you still hesitate before impact."
Shin spat blood, grinning. "I hesitate because you're a terrifying monster."
> "Then good. You'll live longer."
Shin exhaled, rolling his shoulders. For weeks, Lin Xuan had drilled into him the hybrid flow between Muay Thai's grounding and Taekkyeon's aerial rhythm — a balance between the earth and sky. Combined with Gene Flow, it created something brutally elegant.
He'd started calling it the Flowing Fist — though Lin Xuan simply called it "acceptable progress."
On another plateau nearby, Alicia stood in silence, eyes closed, as faint ripples of energy circled her form.
The air shimmered with heat, but the flame around her wasn't wild — it was rhythmic, pulsing in perfect intervals like a second heartbeat.
She exhaled, palms opening.
Threads of Qi rose from the ground — thin, translucent, dancing between her fingers. They bent and swayed, never stable, never still. Her focus was razor-sharp, yet gentle.
> "Don't force it," Lin Xuan's voice echoed from memory. "You command nothing. You invite."
The threads trembled, resisting, before slowly weaving into a spiraling pattern. A faint hum filled the air as they aligned — each strand flickering in and out of visibility.
Then, a spark — brief, soundless — erupted and faded.
The threads scattered like dust, vanishing.
Alicia opened her eyes slowly. "Three breaths… almost stable."
Her fingers twitched, faint scorch marks left across the plateau's black stone.
She smiled faintly despite the failure. For weeks, she'd been learning Resonant Flow — a technique that required Qi to echo one's heartbeat rather than external force. It was harmony, not control.
This time, the echoes had matched — if only for a few moments.
A warm gust swept past, carrying the faint smell of ozone and ash.
Alicia raised her hand again, flame gathering softer this time.
No anger. No rush.
Just rhythm.
Evenings in Lin Xuan's realm had a rhythm of their own.
After training, they would gather in the courtyard. Shin complained. Alicia mended torn fabric. Vaibhav… meditated quietly at the edge.
Lin Xuan would sometimes join them, silent, watching.
Two months later.
The Black Room door opened with a hiss.
Vaibhav stepped out — hair longer, expression sharper. His old clothes were torn, stained by time and Qi burns. The faint aura around him was no longer flame — it was distortion, a gentle shimmer that warped light around him.
Shin froze mid-bite from a ration bar. "Bro… you look like you came back from another dimension."
Vaibhav gave him a flat look. "Technically, I did."
> "Fair point."
Alicia approached silently, her eyes scanning his aura. "Your energy feels… quieter."
Vaibhav nodded.
Shin smirked, elbowing him. "So what's the trick? You meditate yourself into godhood? Or found the path of Immortality?"
> "I burned myself," Vaibhav replied simply. "Until there was nothing left but the flame."
The silence that followed was almost reverent.
Lin Xuan appeared at the balcony above, his black hair catching the dim light. "Good. At least you won't let your power take over yourself."
"Get ready yourselves."
> "Ready for what?" Vaibhav asked.
Lin Xuan smiled faintly. "For what's coming."
Scene Shift — Ignis Prime
The crimson sun of Ignis Prime hung low — vast, molten, heavy with stormlight. The trio stood on a ridge overlooking the volcanic plains. The wind carried the smell of sulfur and ash.
Their training had ended. Now, the world awaited their return.
Shin whistled low. "Home sweet hell."
Alicia's gaze lingered on the horizon. "Something's changed. The Qi density feels… wrong."
Vaibhav crouched, touching the ash-coated ground. The texture was uneven, vibrating faintly. "The flow beneath the crust — it's moving north."
Lin Xuan's voice crackled through the communicator embedded in their watches.
> "Confirmed. The radars show mass migration of beasts toward the Emberfold Ridge. Something is stirring. Stay alert."
Static cut the line. The comms went silent.
A gust of wind swept across the ridge. Alicia's hand hovered near her blade, Shin rolled his neck, grinning, masking unease with bravado.
> "So, we're gonna get f*cked again, huh?"
Vaibhav stood still, his gaze fixed on the dark horizon where crimson clouds churned like living things.
He smiled faintly.
> "This time," he said quietly, "This time we're the whose gonna f'Em."
[Status Screen: Vaibhav]
Name: Vaibhav
Age: 17
Height: 178 cm
Weight: 66 kg
Lifespan: 250 years
Ordinary: 0/100
Mutated Ordinary: 0/100
Exalted: 5 / 100
Mutated Exalted: 4 / 100
Mythic: 0/100
Mutated Mythic: 6 / 100
Transcendent: 2 / 100
Mutated Transcendent: 0/100
The trio descended from the ridge, their silhouettes outlined by the red glare of Ignis Prime's sun.
Behind them, the wind carried faint tremors — distant roars, the sound of something vast moving beneath the land.
As they marched north, the air grew heavier. Flames in the distance twisted unnaturally — drawn upward as if pulled by invisible gravity. Beasts roamed in herds, restless and confused, many bearing strange mutations glowing beneath their hides.
Each step felt closer to something vast, waiting.
Vaibhav's senses tingled.
Night came in bursts of orange lightning and volcanic fog.
The trio made camp beside a cracked obsidian ridge. Alicia conjured a small Nexus Flame to cook their rations, while Shin skewered something suspiciously insect-like over it.
> "Dinner à la Lava Wasp," he announced proudly.
"Taste the despair."
Alicia sighed. "I miss vegetables."
Vaibhav smirked faintly. "They probably miss you too."
Their laughter — brief, real — filled the silence of a dying world.
For a moment, the three of them weren't hunters, or soldiers, or weapons.
Just humans.
And somewhere far above, Lin Xuan stood within his observatory, staring at the live feed projection of the Crimson North. His fingers trembled slightly over the console.
"The camera pans high above Ignis Prime — showing the volcanic continent breathing like a living organism. Rivers of magma pulse like veins. Across the northern horizon, the clouds twist crimson and gold, forming spirals that stretch into the stratosphere."
"Within the storm, something moves — massive, unseen, yet felt by every creature on the surface."
> "Far beyond Ignis Lake, crimson clouds twisted — and the hunt truly began."
Scene shifts:
The muscles around Lin Xuan's jaw were clenched, hinting at anger and annoyance, yet his lips were pulled back in a deliberately wide, forced smile.
Lin Xuan says, "Dion God... can you keep your mouth shut?"