The blood surged into them.
It was not water, not blood, not any liquid known to the waking world. It was a river of marrow, a tide of living essence that forced its way into every pore, every vein, every bone. The Hollowborn screamed as one, their voices rising like a broken hymn.
Their frail bodies convulsed, then stretched. Bones cracked, not in breaking but in remaking. Their limbs lengthened, their frames filled. Gaunt cheeks swelled with flesh, hollow eyes kindled with a strange red gleam.
Children no longer.
Something else.
Sané felt his ribs expand, his spine creak and straighten. His fists clenched with strength that had never been his. He had grown taller, his body broader, his muscles wiry with power. For the first time, he looked down at his hands and believed they could hold weight — his weight, and more.
The pool released them. They rose from its embrace dripping crimson, their new bodies steaming as though forged from heat. Their rags clung wet to them, but their postures were different now. No longer bowed in shame, but upright.
And at the edge of the chamber, the beasts bowed lower still.
11 and 12 did not speak further. They simply gestured, and the children followed, their steps uncertain but their blood singing with newfound vigor.
They were led through a labyrinth of obsidian tunnels, the walls etched with symbols that pulsed faintly, like veins in flesh. Along the way, shadows moved — not beasts, but men and women in masks, their numbers higher: 13, 14, 15… Some stood silent, some sharpened strange weapons, some merely watched. Their presence was suffocating.
Sané could feel it — raw power radiating from them, the kind of power he had once only glimpsed when cultivators fought in Dravenloch's streets. But here, that strength wore Hollowborn faces, bore Hollowborn numbers.
And so the lie of the world cracked further.
At last, they were brought before 10.
She was a woman draped in robes of shadow, her mask white instead of black, the number carved deep and crimson upon it. The aura she carried pressed down like a mountain, yet her voice was a whisper.
"You survived the Pool. Good."
Her gaze swept over them, weighing not flesh but essence. Sané felt it linger on him longer than the rest, though he did not know why.
"You will now face the Vestiges."
With a wave of her hand, the air itself split. A wormhole tore open, but unlike the chaotic rifts Sané had known, this one was deliberate, precise. Its edges glowed faintly, bound by symbols that crawled like living script.
"Enter."
They obeyed.
---
The world on the other side was ruin.
Not ruin of stone alone, but of something older. The ground was fractured obsidian, veins of faint light coursing beneath as though the earth still bled. Towers lay broken, their tips piercing the horizon like jagged teeth. A sky of shifting gray loomed above, heavy with silence.
And the aura… it was everywhere. Thick, suffocating, it felt alive. Each breath burned Sané's lungs, each step made his veins sing. It was not the aura of cultivators, not the polished refinement of pills and techniques. This was raw, primal, feral.
In the center of the ruin lay the weapons.
They were scattered across the field, yet none of them seemed… ordinary. Some were blades, but their steel rippled like liquid flame. Some were spears, but their shafts writhed with scales like serpents. One took the form of a child, eyes closed, chest rising and falling as though asleep. Another slithered as a snake of black glass, coiled yet unmoving. Others were shapes Sané could not name — masks, shards, orbs that pulsed faintly, bones etched with spirals.
They were not weapons.
They were Vestiges.
Fragments of something vast and forgotten, given form that mortals might grasp.
Number 10 raised her hand.
"These are the remnants of the First War. They are what remains of those who came before us, those who bled before worlds were named. They are not to be wielded. They are to be endured. They do not serve — they choose. If one claims you, you will cease to be Hollow. You will become what the world fears."
Her words fell like stone into silence. The Hollowborn shifted, unease and awe battling in their new hearts.
"Step forward," she commanded. "One by one. The Vestiges will decide."
The first child moved, trembling. He reached toward a blade of jagged bone — and it screamed. Not sound, but resonance that shook the ruin. The boy collapsed, convulsing, his body remade in an instant as the bone blade melted into his flesh, his arm elongating into a weapon half-organic, half-steel. He rose gasping, transformed, his eyes burning with crimson fire.
Another stepped forward. She was taken by the serpent, its glassy coils dissolving into her veins. She screamed as scales burst along her skin, her hair twisting into tendrils, her eyes slitting like the serpent's own.
And so it went. One by one, the Hollowborn were chosen. Their bodies cracked, twisted, reformed. No two alike. Some bore claws, some new voices, some masks that grew into their faces. None resisted. None could.
Until Sané's turn came.
He stepped forward on trembling legs, the ruin thrumming beneath his feet. The Vestiges pulsed in unison, as though waiting.
He felt them before he saw them — whispers crawling into his hollow chest. Not words, but urges. Hunger. Violence. Yearning.
But none reached for him.
None claimed him.
He stood in silence, heart pounding, the eyes of his brethren on him. Some smirked, some pitied, some whispered: perhaps he was too empty even for the Vestiges.
And then the ground itself split.
From the cracks in the obsidian floor rose not a weapon, not a beast, not a form he could name. It was shadow, but denser than steel, liquid but heavier than stone. It surged upward in tendrils, spiraling toward him, pulling itself into shape.
And in its center burned an eye.
It felt Cold...it was vast. It stood there..Unblinking.
The ruin shuddered. The other Vestiges dimmed, their pulses faltering, as though yielding to what had risen.
Sané's hollow screamed. Not in pain, but in resonance. The emptiness inside him was no longer void — it was echo. It belonged to this.
The shadow lunged, tendrils piercing his chest, his arms, his throat. He did not resist. He could not. His body convulsed, his vision blurred white, his heart split open.
And the eye spoke.
Not in words, not in voice, but in truth.
You were never Hollow. You were Mine.
Sané collapsed, screaming — and was remade.
---