The Weeping Citadel earned its name.
I understood that the moment we crossed the final bridge and saw the fortress up close. The walls were not just covered in flesh corruption—they were crying. Black tears streamed from cracks in the stone, pooling at the base in thick puddles that smelled like copper and rot.
My boots splashed through the liquid as we approached the entrance. The smell hit me first—not just blood, but something older. Decay mixed with salt water mixed with that sweet-sick odor of infection. I could taste it on my tongue, metallic and wrong.
"This place is alive," Lucy whispered beside me. Her voice was tight. Scared.
She was right. The entire citadel pulsed with a heartbeat I could feel through the soles of my feet. Steady. Powerful. Like we were walking into something's chest cavity.
The entrance was a massive archway, easily twenty feet tall. No door. No barrier. Just darkness beyond, waiting.
We stepped inside.
The interior was not what I expected.
We entered a circular chamber—an arena, really—maybe a hundred feet across. The floor was smooth stone, wet with that same black liquid that wept from the walls. The ceiling rose into shadow, too high to see clearly.
And ringing the arena, carved into the walls at regular intervals, were alcoves. Ten of them. Each one dark. Each one occupied by something that I could sense but not see.
My Essence Detection was screaming warnings. Ten signatures. All Tier 6. All hostile.
"Combat trial," Somi stated, her tactical mask already glowing. "Arena-style. Estimated opponent count: ten. Difficulty: extreme."
"Ten Tier 6 enemies against five of us?" Gery's hand tightened on his katana hilt. "Those are bad odds."
"They are test odds," I said. My voice came out cold, clinical. The corruption had stripped most inflection from my speech. "The Mother wants to see if we can handle sustained combat. Endurance. Coordination under pressure."
Darius cracked his knuckles. "Then let's show her."
A voice echoed through the chamber. Not the Mother's singing. This was different. Masculine. Multiple voices speaking in unison, like a crowd all saying the same words simultaneously.
"FIVE ENTER. TEN DEFEND. ONLY BLOOD OPENS THE PATH. ONLY VICTORY GRANTS PASSAGE. BEGIN."
The alcoves erupted.
The first four creatures that emerged were quadrupeds. Dog-shaped, but wrong. Their bodies were muscle and bone with no skin, raw flesh glistening in the dim light. Their skulls were elongated, jaws full of serrated teeth. No eyes—just empty sockets.
They moved fast. Faster than anything we had fought before.
The lead hound leaped at Lucy.
She barely got her Lightning Wand up in time. Electricity exploded outward, catching the creature mid-air. It convulsed but did not stop. Momentum carried it forward even as lightning burned through its muscles.
Gery intercepted it. His Azure Fang sliced clean through the hound's neck. The head separated from the body. Both pieces hit the ground, twitching.
The other three hounds spread out, circling us.
"Formation!" I commanded. "Back to back! Don't let them isolate us!"
We pressed together, five people facing outward in a tight cluster. The hounds circled, testing, looking for weakness.
One darted in at Darius. He transformed partially—claws extending, spine bending—and caught it by the throat. The hound's teeth sank into his forearm. Blood sprayed, his blood, bright red against the dark floor.
He did not let go. Just squeezed harder. The hound's windpipe crushed. Its jaw went slack. He threw the corpse aside.
"They bite hard," Darius said through gritted teeth. His forearm was torn open, muscle visible through the wound. But already his regeneration was working, flesh knitting back together.
The remaining two hounds attacked simultaneously.
Somi raised her hand. Her Essence Drain activated, connecting to both creatures at once. I felt the technique—like invisible threads extending from her fingers to their bodies. Their essence flowed out, siphoned away.
The hounds slowed. Weakened. Stumbled.
Lucy did not waste the opening. Lightning arced from her wand in a chain, jumping from one hound to the other. The smell of burning meat filled the arena as the electricity cooked them from the inside.
They collapsed, smoking.
Four down.
"Six left," Somi stated. "Essence reserves: eighty-three percent. Status: sustainable."
"Good," I said. "Because here comes wave two."
Two more alcoves opened.
What emerged were humanoid. Tall, graceful, covered in that black-red corruption. Each one wielded weapons that grew from their arms—bone blades, curved and sharp, extending three feet from each wrist.
They moved like water. Like wind. Like nothing I had ever seen.
The first one reached me before I could react.
Its blade slashed at my throat. I jerked back, feeling the edge whisper past my neck close enough to shave the white hairs there. The second blade came low, aimed at my legs. I jumped, barely clearing it.
The creature pressed its attack. Both blades moving in a pattern too complex to follow. All I had was my Truth-Seer vision showing me where the strikes would land half a second before they arrived.
Not enough time to dodge. Only enough to minimize damage.
A blade caught my shoulder. Pain exploded through me, white-hot and immediate. The bone weapon cut deep, scraping against my clavicle. Blood soaked through my shirt, warm and slick.
My regeneration kicked in. The wound closed partially, but not fast enough. Not completely.
"Sidd!" Lucy's voice, distant through the pain.
I activated my Essence Dominion. Reached out with my Transcendent ability and grabbed the creature's essence. Did not try to control it—no time. Just squeezed.
The Blade Dancer's essence compressed. Its weapons retracted. Its body seized.
I consumed it.
The essence flooded into me, familiar now. Power. Temporary abilities. Permanent stat increase. And corruption.
[CORRUPTION LEVEL: 64%]
One percent. Acceptable.
The second Blade Dancer engaged Gery. His katana met its bone blades in a series of impacts that rang through the arena like bells. Metal against bone. Water against corruption.
Gery was faster than the creature. His new fighting style—fluid, adaptive—matched its grace and exceeded it. He parried high. Spun low. His blade found the creature's torso, cutting deep.
The Blade Dancer split in half. Top and bottom separating. Black ichor sprayed across Gery's face.
He spat, wiping his eyes. "These things bleed more than they should."
"Everything in this world bleeds," I replied.
The next alcove opened, and what came out made the hounds and dancers look small.
This thing was massive. Eight feet tall, four feet wide, pure muscle wrapped in corrupted flesh. Its arms were tree trunks. Its hands were sledgehammers. Its head was tiny in comparison to its body, almost comically small.
But there was nothing funny about the way it moved.
It charged Darius. Not fast. Not graceful. Just inevitable. Like a collapsing building.
Darius tried to dodge. Too slow. The Brute's fist caught him in the chest.
The impact sounded like a car crash. Darius flew backward, hit the wall, and left a crater in the stone. He slid down, gasping, blood trickling from his mouth.
"Darius!" Lucy ran toward him.
"STAY IN FORMATION!" I yelled.
Too late. She broke position. The Brute turned toward her, seeing weakness, seeing prey.
It charged.
Gery intercepted. His katana struck the Brute's arm. The blade bit deep but stuck, caught in the dense muscle. The Brute swung its other arm, catching Gery in the side.
Ribs cracked. Gery went down.
Now Lucy was alone with the Brute bearing down on her.
She did the only thing she could. She went full power.
Lightning exploded from her body, from her wand, from the very air around her. The entire arena lit up blue-white. Thunder cracked, deafening in the enclosed space.
The Brute walked through it.
The electricity burned its flesh, charred its muscle, made it smoke. But it kept coming. Step by step. Inexorable.
It raised its fist.
I hit it from behind.
My flesh manipulation activated. I reached into the Brute's body with my power and twisted. Reshaped its spine. Compressed its vertebrae. Forced the bones to collapse inward.
The creature fell, paralyzed from the neck down.
Somi finished it. Her Essence Drain connecting to the helpless Brute, pulling its essence out in a steady stream. It took thirty seconds. Thirty seconds of the creature lying there, unable to move, while we drained its life away.
It died silently.
"Status," I demanded.
"Darius: three broken ribs, internal bleeding," Somi reported. "Gery: fractured ribs, possible punctured lung. Lucy: exhausted, essence reserves forty percent. Sidd: shoulder wound, healing. Me: functional."
"Three more alcoves remain," I said, looking at the unopened chambers. "We are not ready for them. Not at this condition."
"Do we have a choice?" Gery asked, standing despite his injuries. Blood leaked from the corner of his mouth.
"No. We fight or we die."
The three final alcoves opened simultaneously.
What emerged was worse than everything before.
The first was a swarm. Not one creature but dozens—small, bat-like things with needle teeth and hooked claws. They filled the air, screeching.
The second was another humanoid, but this one wielded actual weapons. Twin swords, forged from corrupted bone, each blade as long as my arm.
The third was the worst. It was us. Not literally. But it was shaped like us. Humanoid. Awakened. Covered in the same corruption veins we carried. It was what we would become if we lost ourselves completely.
The swarm hit first.
Tiny bodies slammed into us from all directions. Claws raked my face. Teeth sank into my neck. The pain was sharp, immediate, constant. Dozens of small wounds that individually meant nothing but together were devastating.
Lucy screamed. The swarm covered her, blocking out her body completely. Just a mass of writhing flesh and claws.
Gery cut through them with wide sweeps of his katana, but for every one he killed, two more took its place.
Darius went full berserker. His transformation completed. His body became something between human and beast, all claws and teeth and rage. He tore through the swarm with his hands, ripping them apart.
But there were too many.
I activated Essence Dominion. Reached out to every signature in the swarm simultaneously. Felt their essence. Felt their connection to each other. They were not individuals. They were a hive mind.
I found the core. One creature, larger than the others, hiding at the back of the swarm.
I crushed its essence.
The entire swarm dropped. Dead instantly. Their bodies hit the floor like rain.
Lucy collapsed, bleeding from a hundred small wounds.
No time to help her. The sword-wielder was already moving.
It engaged Gery. Twin blades against katana. The exchange was too fast to follow. Metal rang against metal. Sparks flew. Both fighters moved at inhuman speed.
Gery was better. His water-blade style flowed around the creature's attacks. Found openings. Cut deep.
But the sword-wielder did not die easily. It fought through wounds that should have been fatal. Fought until Gery severed both its arms. Fought until its head left its shoulders.
Only then did it fall.
Two down. One remained.
The corrupted Awakened.
It looked at us with eyes like mine—void black, empty. Its veins glowed just like ours. Its white hair matched mine. It could have been my reflection.
It opened its mouth and spoke with my voice.
"You cannot win. You are already lost. All of you."
Then it attacked.
THE MIRROR
Fighting yourself is horror.
But fighting what you will become is something worse.
The corrupted Awakened moved like I moved. Thought like I thought. Used abilities similar to mine—essence manipulation, consumption, control.
We clashed in the center of the arena.
My hand met its hand. My Essence Dominion against its essence control. Two opposing forces trying to crush each other.
The pressure was immense. My hand ached. My bones creaked. Blood vessels burst in my eyes, flooding my vision with red.
The others tried to help. Gery's katana struck the creature's back. It ignored the wound. Somi's Essence Drain connected, trying to weaken it. It shrugged off her technique. Lucy's lightning washed over it. It did not flinch.
It was fully corrupted. One hundred percent transformed. Beyond pain. Beyond fear. Beyond everything that made us weak.
And it was winning.
My strength failed. My essence control slipped. The creature's hand closed around my throat.
It lifted me off the ground. Squeezed.
I could not breathe. Could not speak. Could only watch as it smiled with my smile.
"This is your future," it said with my voice. "Embrace it."
Then Darius hit it from behind.
His claws sank into the creature's spine. Ripped out vertebrae. The grip on my throat loosened. I fell, gasping.
The corrupted Awakened turned on Darius. Grabbed him. Started to consume his essence just like I would have.
Darius screamed.
But he held on. Did not let go. Kept his claws buried in the creature's back even as his life drained away.
"DO IT NOW!" he roared at me.
I understood.
I reached out with Essence Dominion. Not at the creature. At Darius. Connected to his essence and pulled. Pulled everything he had, everything he was, and channeled it through me into the creature.
Feedback loop. Essence flowing in a circle. Building. Amplifying. Becoming too much for any body to contain.
The corrupted Awakened exploded.
So did Darius.
Both bodies burst simultaneously, torn apart by essence overload.
Silence.
Darius was gone. Just pieces. Just meat and bone scattered across the floor.
[TRIAL COMPLETE]
[THE WEEPING CITADEL: CONQUERED]
[REWARD PENDING]
I knelt in the blood and the water and the pieces of my ally. Felt nothing. The corruption had taken my grief too.
Lucy was crying. Gery was staring. Somi was analyzing.
We had won.
But we had lost one of our five.
The trial said five must enter and five must succeed. But only four remained.
"What happens now?" Lucy asked through tears.
The answer came as a door opened in the far wall. Beyond it, not the exit we expected.
Beyond it was another arena. Larger. Darker. Worse.
And standing in the center, waiting, was not the Mother.
It was something else. Something we had not prepared for.
Something that made the corrupted Awakened look weak.
[CITADEL GUARDIAN DETECTED]
[RANK: TIER 5]
[CLASSIFICATION: SAINT-LEVEL THREAT]
[YOU HAVE NOT COMPLETED THE TRIAL]
[YOU HAVE ONLY PASSED THE ENTRANCE EXAM]