Daiyu had seen killers. She’d seen monsters. She’d even seen a leviathan once, high above an island. But nothing compared to this.

  Quasi drove Karthis down the hall like a storm of claws and fire, each exchange rattling the stone, each roar making her bones quake. Sparks and ash spilled into the air as the two figures vanished into a chamber at the far end.

  She leaned around the corner just in time to see the beast vanish inside. Then the world .

  The chamber walls didn’t crack—they disintegrated. Stone blew outward in a storm of dust and shards, the floor buckling under the force. Daiyu threw herself flat against the wall, arms raised as grit rained down in choking waves.

  And then the dust cleared.

  Her heart stopped.

  The creature that crouched amid the rubble was no longer the nightmare she had been watching—it was bigger, infinitely bigger. A wyvern, its form so massive it had no business fitting in the chamber, jet-black scales shimmering with a violet sheen. Its wings unfurled, smashing aside what remained of the ceiling, and its tail lashed behind it like a battering ram.

  In its jaws writhed Karthis.

  His sword fell from his grasp as the wyvern’s fangs sank deep, piercing through muscle and bone. He screamed, violet veins bulging and pulsing across his skin as he thrashed with both arms—but it didn’t matter. The wyvern’s bite only tightened, the sound of bones cracking beneath its jaws making Daiyu’s stomach heave.

  Karthis screamed again—high, ragged, desperate.

  Then the sound cut short.

  The wyvern shook its head once, violently, and Karthis’ body tore like cloth. Flesh and bone gave way with a sickening crunch. What dropped to the rubble moments later was no longer a man, just mangled ruin.

  The wyvern raised its head and roared.

  The sound was primal, deafening, a wall of fury that rattled the stones beneath Daiyu’s feet. Dust poured from the ceiling. The very foundation trembled, as if the city above might collapse under the sheer weight of its presence.

  Daiyu froze. She couldn’t breathe. Her hands shook against the stone wall. Every survival instinct screamed at her to run, but her body would not obey. She had never, not once in all her years, felt so utterly small in the shadow of an apex predator.

  Then—

  “Is he done?”

  The voice was calm, curious. Daiyu’s head snapped around to see Clay, peeking out from behind a door where she had been hiding with Dr. Veynar. The girl tilted her head, eyes curious, not a trace of fear in her expression. “Can I stop hiding now?”

  The wyvern blinked at her once. Then it dissolved into smoke, the massive form shrinking, folding inward. When the haze cleared, the only thing left standing was Quasi—small again, tail swishing lazily, as though he hadn’t just torn a man apart.

  “It’s fine,” he said casually, voice carrying that smug drawl. “Fight’s over.” He padded forward, not a speck of dust on his fur, as though he’d been nothing more than a spectator.

  Daiyu swallowed hard, forcing words past a dry throat. “What… what the hell was monster?”

  Quasi only flicked an ear, unconcerned. He looked at her pistols instead. “You reloaded yet?” he asked. “Because I’d very much like to keep moving up.”

  _______________________________

  Veynar had designed Karthis. Piece by piece, nerve by nerve, he had built the man into something more than human. The eyes, laced with violet threads, let him perceive the flow of time ahead of its natural course—mere seconds, but enough to make him untouchable. The spinal spike was his balance, his axis, granting him mastery over gravity itself, bending his body to move where no limb should reach. Together, they made Karthis efficient, precise, deadly.

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  And yet, in the wyvern’s jaws, all that genius meant nothing.

  Veynar didn’t flinch when bone cracked like dry wood, when Karthis’ scream turned wet and gurgling before silence claimed him. He only tilted his head, watching as the massive wyvern’s teeth punctured flesh and armor alike. He noted how the violet light in Karthis’ veins flickered violently before fading—a detail to remember..

  The wyvern roared, scales shimmering black-violet in the fractured light, wings snapping against stone as though the building itself could not contain its body. A royal breed, he realized at once—rare, formidable, and untameable except by the kingdom of Mors.

  Veynar’s pulse quickened, not from fear but possibility. His mind unraveled question after question. Could the veins of this beast be reinforced to channel more potent toxins? Could its wings be augmented with grafted membranes to push flight beyond natural limits? Would the jaw’s crushing force hold if reinforced with layered bone plating? Every detail was potential—every breath, every twitch, a line of inquiry waiting to be dissected.

  Then the smoke shifted. The colossal body unraveled, black scales dissolving into vapor, massive wings shrinking inward until nothing remained but a small gray cat, tail flicking lazily. The transformation was seamless, without residue, without collapse.

  Veynar’s breath caught.

  A [shifter].

  His spectacles gleamed as he studied the creature padding forward. If the wyvern was not the base form, then what was? Did the transformation retain modifications from one body to the next? If he implanted something into the base body, would it manifest in the wyvern’s form—or vanish? Could the shifter’s transformation finally allow for perfect survivability in procedures that would otherwise collapse a host?

  For the first time in years, Veynar felt something close to elation. Not fear, not reverence—discovery. He was looking at the perfect test subject.

  “It’s fine,” Quasi said, grooming his paw as if nothing had happened. “Fight’s over.”

  Daiyu’s voice cracked through the silence, thin with disbelief. “What the hell was that monster?”

  Veynar ignored her. His thoughts were already racing, diagrams sketching themselves across his mind. he thought with a flicker of hunger behind his eyes.

  ____________________________________________________

  The tunnels of Fumehold breathed violet. Pipes lined the ceilings like veins, hissing gas that bled into the runes carved into the stone. The light it gave was eerie—half alive, half sickly—and every passerby carried it in their body in some form.

  Some bore faint glows under the skin, delicate lines like tattoos. Others had grotesque ridges, bulging cords of violet energy that warped muscle and bone. A man with one glowing eye staggered past, and a woman whose fingers were seemingly fused into a single claw gestured them aside without a word.

  Nepenthes’ gaze followed them with sharp interest, her voice steady, thoughtful. “Voluntary modification. Enhanced through mutation. Crude, but functional. There’s much room for refinement,” she murmured, pincers flexing faintly. “Stability remains questionable.”

  Boriss spat on the floor, wrinkling his nose but stayed silent, his focus on the wolf's movement.

  Myers leaned heavier on his cane, though his eyes never stopped sweeping their surroundings. His face was calm, lined by age, but his grip on the cane’s head was too tight. The thought nagged at him with every step deeper.

  Mishka halted. The wolf’s nose twitched, hackles bristling as she gave a low growl, staring straight ahead.

  Boriss crouched, ears flicking as he listened. He frowned, then straightened. “Wolf say… comrade Quasi.” He jabbed a thumb toward the air before them. “She smell him. On people ahead.”

  The tunnel opened into a cavernous space, and there it stood—a fortress of stone and iron, its walls laced with runes, gas, pulleys, and lanterns humming faintly violet light.

  Outside it huddled a ragtag group of men and women. Their clothes were little more than scraps, their bodies gaunt and scarred. Shackles dangled from raw wrists and ankles, half broken but still clinging like ghosts. They looked hollow, frightened, the air around them thick with defeat.

  Surrounding them were armed men, nervous and twitchy. One wore a full gas mask, violet mist clinging around him like a shroud. His weapon trembled in his grip as he raised it toward the approaching newcomers.

  “Back off!” the masked man shouted, his voice warped through the filter. “This is our territory! You’ve got no business here!”

  Nepenthes’ eyes narrowed, her voice precise, direct. “You are saturated with the same hue as the poison we tracked.”

  Yuto stepped forward, shoulders broad, his wolven frame tense with disdain as he stares at the huddled masses. His hand grasps the hilt of his blade. “Why do I have this feeling that these people are neither criminals nor slaves?” He asks, voice deep and ready for violence. “I suggest you release them now.”

  Boriss cracks his neck loudly, attracting the masked man's attention. “Ugh, sorry. Neck stiff like bear spine.” Boriss steps forward, somehow cracking his neck again, even louder.

  The gas-masked man stiffened, raising his weapon higher. “I said ”

  Boriss stares at the shaky arm and rolls his eyes. He then unsheathes his own blade and grins towards the man. “Vhy?”

  The answer does not come from the masked man. No, the answer comes quaking from the building.