Ashen slowly opened his eyes, only to find himself trapped inside suffocating darkness. But it was not only the darkness pressing down on his chest… it was the cage.
A cage not made of iron or bone, but alive, pulsing with blood and savagery. Its walls were nothing but stretched thorns, twisted, writhing like starving snakes. They moved with a deadly slowness, as if savoring the act of piercing his veins. Each thorn stabbed into his flesh, tearing, drilling, settling deep within his body. With every breath he tried to take, with every desperate attempt to swallow air, the thorns stretched further and dug deeper, punishing him for daring to cling to life.
He felt his ribs crack, his skin rip, his muscles crushed between the fangs of this cursed cage.
Every movement was a scream, and every scream became new fuel for the insatiable creature surrounding him.
Ashen tried to gather his strength, to summon the Rune of the Blood Panther, to turn liquid and escape through the gaps. But the moment he tried, the cage's thorns exploded like arrows, ripping his body apart once more, drowning him in pain that went beyond all reason.
The pain was not only physical… it scorched his awareness, dug claws into his mind, planting inside him the desire to give up, to end this farce by dissolving into nothingness.
Breathing felt like drinking glass, and every heartbeat like a hammer of fire.
The cage was not only a prison, but a being feeding on him. He could feel his blood flowing toward the thorns, every drop seeping out of his wounds sharpening them, making them hungrier. The thorns grew longer, fiercer, like monsters celebrating a feast of his living flesh.
Then suddenly… the walls shivered.
The eye.
From above the cage, the giant eyelid opened. The blood-red eye glared at him directly. Its fire was not light… but hell itself. A flame from forgotten ages, burning with savage intent. As it blazed, the thorns began to move again, not only tearing his flesh this time… but turning into whips. Spiked whips that lashed him from every direction, suspending him in the air, stretching his limbs like a broken puppet, before stabbing deep again.
Ashen's scream tore out, but shook only his own heart.
His blood dripped from his shredded body, falling, splattering, scattering on the ground—if it could be called ground—flesh that absorbed every drop with hunger.
Then he heard them… the voices.
Savage voices, neither human nor beast. A mix of screams and whispers, laughter and weeping, primal instincts surrounding his consciousness.
Whispers slipped into his mind, planting a poisonous seed:
"Surrender… let us devour you… let us end your pain… death is your salvation, savagery is your only hope… surrender, and rest…"
Ashen was about to sink into that swamp, about to believe that death could be an escape. But… something else flared inside him. Something ancient, something black that knew no mercy.
He lifted his head with effort, his eyes bleeding more blood than tears. His voice came out broken, ragged, like a sword soaked in rust:
"As long as my heart beats… as long as my blood drips… my path of vengeance will remain a burning flame, fueled by regret and hatred… Death… is only the plea of the weak in this wretched world. But me… my existence is nothing but the trial and the curse destined for this world."
The giant eye trembled slightly, as if mocking his resistance with a smile.
Suddenly… the thorns did not just tear him this time.
From his open wounds, wild flowers began to grow. Flowers with black, bloody petals blooming from his torn flesh, releasing a poisonous nectar into the air.
The nectar slipped into his nose, his mouth, his pores. Every breath, every drop entering his body carried the same savage intent trying to seize his soul.
The flowers were the most beautiful curse, a trap mixing beauty with ruin.
The savage voices returned, clearer now, sharper, more cruel:
"Do you still refuse? Do you still cling to your defiance? Surrender, and let us melt you into nothingness…"
Ashen laughed. A broken laugh, soaked in madness and blood.
"You think I fight because I believe in life? No… since the day I survived, vengeance was carved with blood and tears."
The thorns went insane. They pierced him again, but this time bound his body into the cage itself. Every rib, every tendon, every nerve fused with the spikes, making him a part of the prison.
He was torn apart, then healed in brutal fashion, only to be torn apart again.
An endless cycle of torment:
Flowers sprouting. Poisonous nectar sinking into his soul. Voices asking again. His refusal.
Then the tearing.
Then the healing.
Then the tearing again.
Until pain became infinite, time itself stopped, and he could no longer tell one second from another.
His suffering passed beyond the body. It reached his very being. His soul stood on the edge, every heartbeat announcing a new death.
Then suddenly… the cage vanished.
Ashen crashed to the ground, drowning in his own blood, breathing with great effort, as if each breath might be his last.
He lifted his head weakly to see the giant eye staring at his body… its fire dimming, weakening little by little. Then, slowly, it closed.
Everything disappeared.
He found himself floating in the void, suspended between darkness and silence. Absolute solitude. No voices, no thorns, no blood. Just emptiness swallowing him.
But the peace did not last.
Another eyelid opened.
Before Ashen, the giant eye appeared again… but this time, it was not looking at his body.
It was looking at his soul.
An eye burning with savage, bloody fire. Brighter, hungrier, more insane.
Ashen smiled. A twisted, crazed smile, the same spark lighting up in his own eyes.
He understood.
The trial had not ended.
It had not even begun.