Felicity dismounted and stood over Kira, eyes gleaming. She didn't gloat. She simply said, "Mine." Then turned away. I was waiting outside the ring. She offered her fist, and I bumped it. Vein born had arrived.
[REWARDS CLAIMED]
Red Claw Way Territory!
Beast Net Rank Up!
Clan eyes were watching.
The Fang dome roared behind us. I picked up our territory keys from the bowl. The arena's lights dimmed, glyph-screens fading as officials cleared the bodies and steam. The twins of Blood brine were already being pulled off the field—Kira dazed, Lana deathly quiet. We didn't speak as we exited the ring. Felicity leaned against my shoulder as we walked, she helped steady me as I limped along, but her grin was still sharp. I had blood in my mouth that wasn't mine. My tail ached like it had grown new bone.
Herja stirred behind my eyes, satisfied. Not gloating. Not raging. Just... full. Like a lioness after the kill. The locker room was dim-lit and quiet. Veinstone benches. Cold water from bone-piped taps. A mirror so cracked it barely worked. We dropped our gear. Let the sweat steam off. Felicity peeled off her sports-wrapped jacket, winced at a bruised rib. "Ugh. Kira's suplex almost compressed my soul."
"You suplexed her face into the floor." I said Felicity slowly exhaled, "Yeah, and you drained Lana of her Orgone, that really turned me on. Fair trade." She tossed me a drink, it was cold tart and citrusy. I sipped. It stung. Perfect. For a few long minutes, we said nothing. Just breathing. Letting the war-storm settle.
Then—
Felicity looked over, her voice quiet now. "We won." I nodded, "well duh, obviously." Like it mattered. She leaned her head back against the wall, eyes closed. "We're on every screen now," she said. "Clans are watching. Everyone's watching."
"And?"
"And I don't care," she whispered. "As long as I get to fight next to you." I turned toward her. Still not used to Herja's face staring back in the mirror.
But Felicity? She was looking at me.
"Ash."
Not Herja.
Me.
I didn't smile. But I felt it. Deep in the ribs. I raised my drink. "To the next fight." Felicity clinked hers against mine. "To the next claim." And the room went quiet again. Not empty. Just earned. We started walking back to the Gutter Nest. We now controlled the territory key to Red Claw Way, the Key was a gleaming crimson beast claw.
We would receive Digi Coin payments from all beast vein merchants who wished to travel the route for the next three years/cycles. We we're Still bandaged up. Still pulsing with the heat of the Fang dome. But now different. We weren't entering it as trespassers. We were coming home as dominants. The entrance—half-buried in cracked resin bones—recognized our presence before we reached it. Glyphs on the gate pulsed. Doors unsealed.
Felicity pulled the Territory Key from her hip pouch—a polished gleaming spike, still humming faintly with the echo of Zerask's death.
"You ready?" she asked. I nodded. She slammed it into the stone altar just inside the gate.
[TERRITORY CLAIM INITIATED]
DOMAIN: HOLLOW GUTTER NEST
OWNERS: VEINBORN (Herja / Felicity)
STATUS: LOCKED
ACCESS: RESTRICTED TO NON KEY-HOLDERS
FEATURES UNLOCKED:
Hive-Forge access granted!
Territory beast ring unlocked!
Recipe Vault Tier II, Unlocked!
The floor shuddered. Lights blinked on, one by one. The walls hissed open to reveal chambers we hadn't seen before. It was… breathing again. Alive. Ours. We entered through a throat-shaped corridor and found the forge room. Part lab. Part ritual altar. Part armory. A vein-fed crucible pulsed molten material in one corner A living anvil chittered softly, waiting for commands. Bone-tool racks hung on tension wire
A suspended AI-organ hummed above a console, its many glyph-eyes blinking to life. I approached the console. The glyphs flared and opened.
[RECIPE VAULT ACCESS GRANTED]
Tier II Forge Permissions Active
RECIPES AVAILABLE:
Hive-Forge Craftables: Swarm skin Cloak. Requires: Hive Amber x2, Brood Shell Chitin. Grant's stealth, pheromone masking, light armor Can be keyed to specific enemy types Spine burst Chakrams
Requires: Carapace Fragments x2, Bonewire
Mid-range plasma-reactive throwing discs
Returns on successful hit, synergizes with Herja's booster band
Feral Mind Charm:
Requires: Brood mother Core + Scent Gland + Neural Fiber
Very risky. Implants low-level swarm empathy. Increases evasion and reflexes… possibly at cost of mental stability
Tail-Core Engraving Kit
Requires: Orgone x3, Memory Slag
Unlocks Tail Signature mods: custom burn trails, tracer energy effects, kinetic flavor
Felicity scanned the recipes and let out a long, low whistle. "We can make gear nobody else has," she said. "No need for clan forges. No need for permission." I nodded slowly. This wasn't a prize anymore. This was a base. A power node. A kingdom waiting to be built. We found the access door behind a hanging curtain of fang beads.
The key glyph unlocked the gate with a hiss. Inside was our own private crucible arena, it sported a low ceiling, shaped for close combat and high strategy. There were floating auto-adjusting platforms, plasma feeds and an observation balcony. A screen on the wall flickered to life:
[VEINBORN RING STATUS: OPERATIONAL]
Mode: Private / Invite Only / Spectator Feed Available
Logged Fighters: 2
Training Protocols: Active
Clan Scrim Requests: 0
Beast Net Visibility: Moderate
Potential Sponsors: 3 Pending...
Felicity turned to me. "Coach?" I cracked my neck. Flexed my tail. "We build here," I said. "Train here. Rule from here." She smiled like a storm. Vein born now controls a Territory. The Hive-Forge still pulsed with residual heat. Felicity busied herself at the anvil wall, inspecting blade templates and kinetic harness mounts. But I stepped toward the console altar, drawn by the low, rhythmic hum above it.
Suspended by vein glass cords and nerve-strands, the AI-organ floated like a bloated gland—its surface covered in dozens of blinking glyph-eyes, each one glowing softly in different spectral hues. It pulsed like a heart. But it watched like a machine.
[NEURAL-FORGE AEGIS NODE 7-A]
Status: Dormant. Core AI Sleep Cycle Disrupted.
Waiting for: Claimant Imprint.
One glyph-eye turned violet and scanned me. I didn't move. I felt Herja stir behind my eyes. "Touch it," she whispered. "You're the dominant now." I raised a hand and placed two fingers on the console below the organ.
The AI-organ shuddered.
A hiss. A pulse. The scent of ozone and wet stone.
[CONNECTION ESTABLISHED]
The glyphs flickered, rippled, then projected a voice—not in my ears, but directly into my skull. Cold. Genderless. Old. "Claimant recognized: Uncatalogued Hybrid, Disrupted Template." I winced. My spine lit up. The organ was tasting my beast-code. "Current Territory: Hollow Gutter Nest. Previous Alpha: ZERASK. Status: Deceased. Neural Crown Cleaved. You hold the rite."
"Do you seek to forge?"
"I want access," I said. "Schematics. Black-prints. What this place used to make."
"Access permitted."
The console blinked once, then bled a stream of info-glyphs down the wall. Dozens. No—hundreds. Some recipes were encrypted. Some were banned. One just blinked with a red warning:
[BONEKIND ENGINE – RESTRICTED / CORRUPTED]
Another showed a shifting image of a tail mod with modular chambers—flesh-reactive, linked to neural memory threads. Felicity walked over, drink in hand.
"Making friends with the brain-jelly?"
"It's a forge-AI," I said. "But also a psychic archive." One glyph-eye blinked three times. Then whispered directly to me: "I can help you evolve. If you help me remember."
I pulled my hand away. The organ went still—but not dormant. It was waiting. System Unlocked: Forge-AI "Aegis Node 7-A"
"Welcome user I Can assist in: Recipe optimization. Memory-coded crafting tail mods, hive mods, organic tech. Unlocking restricted designs-with risk."
Felicity grinned. "If that thing offers you a free lobotomy, say no." I didn't answer. I was still watching the glyph that read, this H-Q wasn't just a base.
It was evolution.