The forest swallowed Esu whole, vines closing behind him like a grave's jaws.
He moved without sound, barefoot on damp earth, dagger tucked into his waistband. The poison berries three black orbs mashed into a paste coated the blade's edge. Enough to fell a bull in minutes. Enough to make a man hallucinate his own death.
Hours bled away. The sun climbed, indifferent. Esu's mind mapped the raiders' path: broken twigs here, a boot print there, the faint ozone of Òya wind lingering like a curse. Jide's clan was predictable arrogant with their thick blood, sloppy in victory. They camped at the Storm Cliffs, believing distance equaled safety.
Esu believed in angles.
He crested the final ridge as dusk painted the sky bruise-purple. Below, the Cliffs plunged into oblivion, wind howling through stone teeth. The raiders' cave glowed with firelight twelve men, laughter rough as gravel, the Fear Shard pulsing on a central rock like a captive star.
Jide stood tallest, shirtless, blue wind scars glowing across his chest. Fear Realm, Echo stage. He could ride gusts like blades, survive wounds that felled mortals. His men were lesser: thin affinities, blades sharpened on envy.
Esu counted.
Four archers on the upper ledge.
Six around the fire.
Two scouts patrolling the rim.
He started with the scouts.
First one pissed against a boulder, back turned. Esu rose from the shadows, dagger flashing once throat opened, blood hot on his knuckles. The man gurgled, eyes wide in the moonlight. Esu caught him before he fell, easing the body down. One.
The second scout rounded the bend moments later. He saw his partner's corpse, mouth opening to scream.
Esu was faster. Hand over mouth, blade up through the jaw into the brain. Twist. Silence. Two.
Ten left.
He scaled the cliff face like a spider, fingers finding cracks the wind had carved over millennia. The archers diced on the ledge, oblivious.
Third: throat slit from behind, bowstring cut.
Fourth: dagger in the eye before he turned.
Fifth and sixth argued over shares died mid-sentence, arrows snapped, bodies rolled into the void.
Four archers down. Six blades plus Jide.
The camp stirred now, voices low. "Scouts late?"
Esu dropped to the lower path, circling. He poisoned the water skin by the fire's edge paste dissolved in seconds. Then he waited.
Thirst came quickly in the dry wind.
Three men drank first. Foam at the lips in minutes, convulsing as hallucinations claimed them: ghosts of old gods, perhaps, or their own sins. They screamed, clawing at eyes that saw nothing.
Panic exploded.
Jide barked orders, wind coiling around him like serpents. "Ambush! Form up!"
The remaining three blades charged into the dark, swords raised.
Esu met them in the open.
He had no Ase. No realm. Just a dagger and a lifetime of reading rooms full of predators.
First blade swung high Esu ducked, hamstring sliced. The man dropped screaming. Second lunged; Esu sidestepped, blade buried in the throat. Third hesitated fatal. Dagger thrown, buried in the eye.
Three down. Jide alone.
The leader's eyes found him across the fire. Wind howled louder, whipping flames into frenzy.
"You," Jide snarled. "The sacrifice. Gutted trash."
Esu stepped into the light, hands empty. "Trash crawls back. You took something that wasn't yours."
Jide laughed, wind blades forming around his fists razor gusts that could flay skin from bone. "Come claim it, rat."
He attacked.
Ten meters closed in a blink. Fist slammed toward Esu's chest, wind screaming.
Esu didn't dodge.
He stepped in, arms wrapping Jide's waist as the punch landed. Ribs shattered. Blood flooded his mouth. Pain white-hot.
But his dagger was already plunging under the ribs, up into the heart. Once. Twice. Seven times.
Jide staggered, wind faltering. "Impossible… Echo stage… I survive…"
"You do," Esu whispered, twisting the blade. "Long enough to feel this."
He shoved Jide back, yanking the dagger free. Blood sprayed.
The leader dropped to his knees, hands clutching the wound. Healing flickered Echo stage defiance but poison from the berries coursed through his veins now, hallucinations blooming.
Jide saw gods dying. Saw Esu as a void.
Esu knelt, pressing the Fear Shard to his own chest. Then he grabbed Jide's hair, forcing eye contact.
"Your terror," Esu said softly. "All of it. Mine."
The baptism ignited.
Pain beyond flesh. The shard burned cold, burrowing into his heart like a parasite. Terror flooded not Esu's, but Jide's. The leader's life flashed: childhood beatings, first kill, the arrogance of power. Amplified. Inverted. Forced into Esu's soul.
His body convulsed. Veins black with stormlight. Skin split and resealed.
Jide's eyes widened one last time. "Monster…"
Then he died, heart finally stilling.
The shard shattered into Esu's chest, light exploding outward. Wind bowed. The Cliffs trembled.
Power answered.
Flesh knit. Bones reset with thunderous cracks. Eyes snapped open amber threaded with grey storm.
Fear Realm: Layer 1. Early Stage. Whisper sub-stage.
He could sense it now divine remnants pulsing faintly across the continent, calling like distant drums.
Killing intent rolled out, thick as fog. If any raider still breathed, they'd have died from sheer dread.
Esu stood amid the corpses, blood-soaked, reborn.
[Esu's Status]
Realm: Fear (Layer 1 Early Stage)
Lifespan: 180 years, 4 months, 22 days
He carved Jide's heart free, crushing it in his fist. Wind essence flooded his veins temporary, fading in minutes. But enough.
Parasitic Union: Òya Wind (8 minutes remaining).
Esu rose on a gust, hovering above the massacre.
The Oyo Enclave's disciple selection opened in three days.
He had a face to steal Jide's would do nicely.
And a village to forget he ever existed.
The God-Eater smiled, wind carrying him into the night.
Twelve corpses. One shard. Zero regrets.
The Divine Path had its first true devourer.