THNK-
The rock cracked against Aren's skull again like thunder caged in a stone.
The sigil etched into its surface pulsed once, a dim blood-red glow before vanishing beneath the smear of his own blood.
For a moment, the area was still. Rock reminisce floated through broken beams of light like snow caught in fire.
Then the pain began.
SKRRRCH-SSHHHHT-FWUMP
It wasn't just the wound. It was something deeper, like the mark had dug into more than skin. Like it was searching for something inside him
Aren gasped. His hands twitched. The world spun sideways.
His blood pooled around the rock. The sigil flared again.
A burn.
A brand.
A beginning.
"Ugh Kael what ha-have you done"
"My head is pounding"
By the time Kael was ready to reply Aren was out. Passed out like a hunted deer.
Darkness folded in.
No sound. No pain. No time.
Then - a whisper.
"You bled for it"
A voice like embers cracking in the snow. Aren's vision flickered. He was no longer by the training hall. He was standing alone in a cavern of burning symbols, walls etched in glowing rubes that shifted like living scars.
Each sigil pulsed like a heartbeat - slow, alive, watching him.
Aren staggered forward. His hand grazed one of the symbols.
It screamed.
"YOU TOOK THE MARK. NOW IT TAKES SOMETHING BACK."
The walls twisted. Faces formed in the sigils - twisted echo's of other wielders, their eyes hollow, mouths stitched with flame. One reached out - their hand bone-thin and burning, pressed against Aren's chest.
FWUMP
He felt it.
A brand searing through his ribs, into marrow, into memory. A sigil burning its way into his soul.
He opened his mouth to scream-
And a second voice, deeper, ancient, murmured:
"Burn well... or burn out"
Aren's body convulsed.
The hallucination cracked like glass - and the world returned with a surge of fire and coughing blood.
He wasn't the same.
The sigil was inside him now.
And it was awake.