Anna's urgent call made them rush into the hut, their footsteps hurried on the sand. Zego ran at the front, his small heart filled with terrifying worry, only able to hope that his uncle was alright. As they entered the hut, the sight that greeted them was horrifying. On the mat, Anna, with blood-stained gloves, was holding a writhing black mass. The mass was filled with slimy, worm-like creatures, emitting a pungent, fishy odor that corrupted the air in the room.
"Good heavens... are those sea worms?" Gran said, his voice trembling, his fingers unconsciously brushing a star-shaped scar on his neck. The scar throbbed whenever dark energy was near.
"What are they, Master?" Zego asked, his fear giving way to a surge of curiosity.
Gran swallowed hard, his expression turning grave. "Sea worms are deadly parasites. They can drain a person's energy core completely. Their habitat is supposed to be the Black Zone, the deepest and darkest region of the ocean. I thought they were just fairy tales, but it seems creatures like that really do exist." Gran's eyes narrowed, looking at Zego with suspicion. "Where did you two come from?"
"We came from the south, Master. We took the trade route to the west, so we didn't pass through the Black Zone," Zego replied, confused by Gran's sudden shift in attitude.
"Hmm..." Gran fell silent, his brows furrowed in deep thought. "This is strange. If you didn't pass through the Black Zone, how did these sea worms get into your uncle's body?" Gran was both curious and suspicious.
Zego suddenly remembered. "Argh! On our journey, we met a huge, terrifying monster. It seemed like it was waiting for us in the ocean," Zego explained, speaking in a rush.
"A huge monster? What were its characteristics? Was it a sea beast?" Gran's curiosity exploded, momentarily forgetting his suspicion.
"The monster had a very large shell on its back. Its entire body was covered in extremely hard, dense, and spiky skin. It had only one large, glowing red eye, and in its eye, there was a strange constellation pattern. The patterns seemed to move, as if they were alive. It also had ten long tails, all of which were spiky," Zego described in detail. "Uncle fought the monster while protecting me. Some of Uncle's attacks couldn't wound it, but when he unleashed a strong enough attack, the monster immediately lashed out with its tail. The attack caused Uncle to suffer very severe injuries and he was thrown very far. Uncle decided to flee from the monster, and that's how we ended up here."
Gran and Anna exchanged a look. Their faces were pale. "A strange monster... and its eye has a moving constellation pattern? This can't be happening?!" Gran gasped in shock.
Anna immediately chimed in, her voice trembling, "What kind of creature did you two fight?!"
"I don't know, but I heard Uncle say that the creature was one of the 10 Ancient Sacred Beings," Zego said innocently.
Gran and Anna heard that and fell completely silent. They were deeply shocked, unable to believe what Zego had just revealed. Cold sweat streamed down Gran and Anna's foreheads. A great sense of dread and fear gripped them. Zego, seeing them, tried to calm them down, but he was also curious about what an Ancient Sacred Being was.
"Calm down, Master, calm down, Grandma. Why are you so shaken?" Zego asked.
"Son, do you really not understand what you're talking about?" Gran said, his voice trembling heavily.
"What is it, Master?" Zego asked with genuine curiosity.
Anna immediately cut their conversation short. "Enough! You two better help me deal with these sea worms right now!" Anna took out a small crystal that emitted a soft glow. "You just need to gather all the sea worms into one pile. I will destroy them using Vatican holy magic. That should be powerful enough to destroy them."
Gran and Zego immediately gathered all the parasitic worms into a single writhing mass in the middle of the room. But as Zego touched one of the largest sea worms, he noticed something strange. The parasite's eye had the same pattern as the sea monster's eye—a constellation pattern. The sea worm stared into Zego's eyes.
The worm's eye pulsed. Suddenly, Zego's vision swam—saltwater stung his nostrils, though he was still standing in the hut. The wooden walls around him melted like wax, revealing an endless ocean that stretched beneath him.
Before him, a blue eye, wider than a mountain, glared at him. Its voice vibrated in Zego's very bones, not in his ears. "MORTAL... WHY DO YOU REEK OF THE SHATTERED STAR? ITS CORPSE BIRTHED YOUR EYES... YET YOU WALK AMONG WORMS?"
Zego choked. "Whose corpse? I don't—"
The eye narrowed. "LIES TASTE SWEET... BUT BLOOD BETRAYS YOU."
A tidal wave of teeth swallowed him—
—Zego gasped awake, coughing, his breath ragged. The hut was gone. Only ruins remained, reeking of ozone and iron. Sand glittered with frost where no ice should form, and the air hummed with a residual energy that made his teeth ache. Zego looked around, surrounded by debris and scorched sand. He couldn't understand what had happened.
"UNCLE... MASTER... GRANDMA..." Zego yelled, his voice hoarse. "UNCLE... MASTER... GRANDMA... Where are you..." Zego was utterly confused and couldn't comprehend what had happened during his "unconsciousness."
From a distance, he heard a very loud shout that sounded just like his uncle's voice. "ZEGO... ZEGO... ZEGOOO..."
"Ah, that's Uncle's voice!" Zego immediately ran towards the sound, hoping that it was really his uncle. The voice grew closer. As Zego neared the source of the sound, the sight that greeted him made him stop dead in his tracks. Zego wished it were a lie or just a dream. It left him completely in shock. He fell to his knees, a scream tearing through the silence—not human, but the raw cry of a wounded animal. He crawled towards his uncle's body, his hands scraping bloody trails in the sand.
The sight in front of Zego was his Uncle Zeos's body lying helpless. His ribs were shattered. His face was unrecognizable. Next to him, Gran's staff lay snapped in two, and in Anna's hair, the shattered shards of her crystal glittered.
Zego looked around, his tear-filled eyes sweeping over the remnants of destruction. He wished this scene was a dream, but the profound pain he felt in his heart told him otherwise. He looked towards the sea, the very ocean he had crossed, the ocean that had taken everything from him.
"This can't be real," Zego whispered.
In the midst of the wreckage, he looked up at the sky and asked, "Why? Why did this have to happen? What did I do wrong? Why me?"
No answer came from the heavens. Only the sound of the waves responded. Zego wept, hugging his uncle's cold body, as he stared at the remaining debris of his peaceful life. He felt alone, completely alone in a cruel world.
"This is all my fault," Zego whispered. "If only I were stronger."
Suddenly, he felt an indescribable energy surge within him. It flowed throughout his entire body, making him feel more alive than ever before. He looked at his hands, the hands he had just used to hug his uncle. They were glowing with a soft blue light. He looked up at the sky, and there, he saw a star shining incredibly brightly. It was the same star he had seen in the monster's eye, in the sea worm's eye, and in the mysterious eye he had seen in his vision.
Zego knew, this was the beginning of his true journey. A journey to find out who he really was, and to seek revenge for everything he had lost.