The volunteer transports arrived just as dawn should have broken—
But the sun never rose properly.
Instead, the sky above New Haven's slums bled crimson.
Rift haze spread like infected fog, staining clouds a sick, arterial red. Even the light that filtered through carried a diseased tint—as though reality itself had caught fever.
Below it sprawled the city's underbelly.
Hab-blocks crumbled into one another like stacked graves. Rusted balconies sagged. Windows gaped hollow like missing teeth. Alleys were choked with refuse… and people who had nowhere else to go.
At the center of it all—
Reality had torn open.
The Rift pulsed from an abandoned warehouse district—a jagged wound suspended in midair, edges flickering like broken glass grinding against existence.
Briefings had labeled it clinically:
**Low-Realm — Swarm Horror Classification.**
Spawn origin: collective nightmares of infestation… hunger… violation.
Accurate.
But incomplete.
Because briefings never captured smell.
The air reeked of ozone, rot, and fresh blood.
Sirens wailed uselessly—thin human cries swallowed beneath a far worse sound.
Chittering.
Endless.
Layered.
Like a billion mandibles grinding in anticipation.
Then they came into view.
Nightmare vermin.
Fist-sized hybrids of insect and shadow, their segmented bodies glistening wetly as if coated in oil. Mandibles clicked and dripped mutagenic essence that hissed when it struck pavement.
Where it touched flesh—
Skin warped.
Victims twisted.
Some collapsed into writhing nests, bodies hollowed and repurposed as spawning sacs.
Chaos ruled the streets.
Civilians stampeded in blind panic.
Mothers clutched screaming children.
Elderly were trampled beneath desperate feet.
Perimeter wardens fired essence rifles in controlled bursts—but the shots vanished into swarms that simply re-knit.
Legion forces were delayed.
Bureaucracy.
Overload.
Or both.
The volunteer squad deployed into hell.
Twelve branded volunteers.
Plus three veteran handlers.
Garrick's voice cut through comms—calm, iron, unshaken.
> "Hold the perimeter. Evacuate civilians. Buy time."
Xia Ying stepped off the transport.
Calm.
Uniform immaculate despite the carnage.
Pack light.
Lin Mei landed beside him, healing glow already flickering with anxious instability.
Wei Jun's eyes were scanning before his boots even touched ground.
The public mask slid into place instantly.
"This way!" Xia Ying's voice rang out, amplified with controlled authority. "Form lines—children first!"
Panic-stricken civilians turned instinctively toward command.
Hope—fragile, desperate—ignited in their eyes.
Inside him—
Something else ignited.
Terror essence hung thick in the air.
Almost visible.
His aura sipped passively—warm trickles flowing into him from every scream, every racing heartbeat.
A banquet… laid bare.
His Flaw stirred in bliss.
Starvation ended.
The trio moved like a trained organism.
Wei Jun vaulted debris, marking safe corridors.
"East alley clear! Move them there!"
Lin Mei dropped to her knees beside the wounded, her glow stabilizing bite victims. Mutating flesh reversed partially under her trembling hands.
Xia Ying stood at the center axis—command and control.
"Barricade this lane!"
Shadow tendrils uncoiled publicly—precise, surgical.
They lifted collapsed beams.
Held falling walls.
Bound swarms long enough for civilians to flee.
To onlookers—
He was salvation incarnate.
Children were snatched from vermin floods.
Families escorted to warded zones.
Cries of gratitude followed him like hymns.
But beneath the heroics—
His aura pulsed subtly.
Amplifying ambient dread.
Illusion whispers crept faintly through the fog:
*They're inside the walls…*
*They're crawling closer…*
*You won't make it…*
Panic deepened.
Stampedes worsened.
Terror ripened.
And the harvest—
Flooded in.
Warm.
Addictive.
Essence coursed his veins like molten nectar.
His Flaw drank deeply, purring into silence that would last weeks.
Power surged in response.
Shadows grew denser.
Aura radius expanded another invisible margin.
One rescue burned brighter than the rest—
A collapsing hab-block.
He tore through debris, dragging out a trapped family.
The mother's eyes locked onto the encroaching swarm behind him—
Pure oblivion terror.
He took a trace harvest from that instant.
Guilt.
Fear of losing her child.
Then he saved them.
Adoration replaced terror.
A perfect emotional arc.
A richer yield.
Nearby, Lin Mei faltered.
"There's too many… I can't—"
He stepped beside her instantly.
Tendrils shielded her from an incoming swarm.
A hidden pulse of Phantom aura rippled outward, deterring vermin from closing.
Her eyes lifted—shaken but shining.
"You're always there…"
Devotion deepened another degree.
Wei Jun slid in moments later.
"Core's inside the warehouse. Queen-type spawning waves."
Delay reports crackled through comms:
> "Legion reinforcements en route. Hold positions."
Xia Ying stepped forward.
"I'll buy time. I'll scout the core."
One veteran grabbed his arm.
"Solo? That's a death dive."
"Efficient," Xia Ying replied calmly.
Inside—
Anticipation roared.
Unlimited terror.
Alone.
Unobserved.
The squad relented reluctantly.
Lin Mei and Wei Jun exchanged anxious glances as he departed.
---
## **Rift Interior**
Crossing the breach felt like plunging into infected water.
The interior mirrored the slums—
But warped.
Alleys stretched infinitely.
Walls pulsed like breathing flesh.
Chittering echoed from impossible angles.
The swarm attacked instantly.
Vermin flooded from shadows, ceilings, burrow tunnels.
Claws raked.
Mandibles snapped.
Tendrils erupted from Xia Ying's back—
Now extended to nearly ten meters.
Hardened.
Blade-tipped.
They carved through swarms in whirling arcs, severed bodies dissolving into essence mist.
"Summon."
The **Adolescent Phantom** manifested fully.
The orphan child appeared amid the carnage—
Ink tears streaming.
Aura detonating outward in a freezing dread wave.
Entire packs froze instinctively.
Then possession triggered—
Vermin turned on each other in frenzied self-mutilation.
Combat became art.
A choke alley collapsed under bound walls.
Burrow ambushers were dragged out mid-phase.
Illusion shadows lured packs into kill zones.
Mid-battle harvesting continued.
Swarm terror tasted different—
Primal.
Hive-linked.
Fear of isolation from the collective.
Blended with civilian panic echoes still clinging to his aura.
Richer.
Denser.
Deeper inside, nests lined the corridors.
Pulsing egg clusters.
Spawning sacs.
Phantom aura cleared approach paths while tendrils skewered incubation masses.
The swarm adapted.
Waves coordinated.
Mutations accelerated.
So he escalated.
Feedback pulses struck hive echoes—injecting oblivion fear directly into the network.
Confusion spread through the swarm link.
Then—
He reached the core chamber.
---
## **Hive Queen**
She filled the warehouse interior.
A grotesque matriarch fused to a pulsating nest-throne.
Building-sized.
Spawn orifices opening and closing rhythmically.
Each pulse released new vermin.
Her dread field radiated outward—paralysis laced with insatiable hunger.
She struck first.
Essence tendrils lashed, warping air.
Xia Ying vanished into shadow glide.
The Phantom phased forward.
Possession triggered—
For one fractured instant…
He seized the queen's mind.
Her spawning orifices twisted inward.
She began devouring her own brood.
Primal betrayal terror detonated through the hive link.
That was the opening.
Tendrils hardened to their peak density—
Blades of compressed abyssal shadow.
They pierced through layered chitin defenses.
Aura and Feedback surged together.
He forced oblivion dread into her psyche—
Endless hunger.
Endless emptiness.
No swarm.
No feeding.
Just void.
She convulsed violently.
Spawning ceased.
Her body ruptured under psychic overload.
With one final thrust—
His tendrils pierced her core heart.
The Rift screamed.
Reality fractured.
The queen shattered into dissolving essence.
And the Rift began collapsing.
He harvested the core essence personally—
A tidal flood of power cresting through him.
---
## **Aftermath**
He emerged from the breach as it sealed behind him.
Legion transports arrived seconds later—too late for battle, just in time for witness.
Wardens stared at the cleared kill zone.
Dissolving vermin.
Silenced chittering.
One volunteer whispered over comms:
> "One branded… cleared a Rank 3 solo?"
Combat captures were already spreading.
Viral feeds igniting.
**Volunteer Branded Neutralizes Slum Rift Core Alone.**
Lin Mei and Wei Jun rushed him—relief flooding their faces.
Distant civilians cheered from evacuation lines.
Xia Ying simply adjusted his cloak.
"Luck," he said modestly. "The team bought me time."
Inside—
His Flaw purred in exquisite satisfaction.
The feast had been vast.
The mask remained flawless.
And now—
His reputation had begun to kindle.
A hero to the public.
A sovereign predator beneath.
Ascension… continued.