Chapter 12 Hostile takeover
“Oh no!”
Vandal instantly tried to put distance between them.
Alarik’s open palm was already descending, cutting off his path of retreat.
Raw, unfiltered force slammed into Vandal like a tidal wave. The blast lifted him off his feet and flung him backward. Blood sprayed from his lips as the air exploded from his lungs.
“Urgh!”
The raw power tore through his chest and gut like a thunderbolt. His knees buckled. Every nerve ignited at once.
Inside him, the Mawrot essence shrieked, a high, jagged sound that wasn’t quite sound. It thrashed wildly, coils whipping against his ribs as if trying to claw its way into his heart. Then it lunged at everything full of resonance energy.
It drank.
The giant’s energy poured in, thick and molten. The Mawrot gulped it down with greedy, pulsing surges, growing heavier, darker, hotter with every heartbeat. A low, bone-deep hum rose from Vandal’s core, vibrating through his teeth and skull, ominous and alive.
He gasped, claws digging into his own thighs, as the essence ballooned inside him, fat, satisfied, and far too strong.
“Arrrggggh!!” Vandal’s eyes rolled back, foam frothed at his mouth as violent convulsions wracked him.
A searing white-hot pain exploded behind his sternum, like molten iron being hammered straight into his heart. His back arched hard as something sharp and foreign twisted inside his chest, pulsing, growing, forcing itself into shape.
Every beat of his heart sent fresh waves of agony through his veins while a new core, raw, violent, and humming with destructive power , crystallized deep within him.
“What… what did you do to me?” Vandal struggled to stand, but his knees buckled and gave out.
“I healed you. You should be thanking me, no?” Alarik said with an innocent smile.
“You… bastard… get away from me!” Vandal staggered back, every muscle still shaking with leftover pain.
“Is that any way to show gratitude… huh?” Alarik took one lazy step and instantly closed the distance Vandal had tried to create.
His eyes widened in delight. “Yes! Can you feel it? Your Berserker Core?” He leaned in, his breath hot against Vandal’s face. “Time to repay my kindness.”
“Go to hell!”
Vandal yanked power from his bone-mouthed bear mark, but it was useless. Alarik pinned his shoulder with two fingers and flicked his forehead with a single pinky. The world went black.
“Now… let’s see what’s going on inside you.”
Alarik’s pupils turned cloudy white. A white mist flowed out of his body and sank into Vandal’s. The right eye snapped open on its own. The abyssal pupil, crimson as fresh blood, stared at the giant hungrily.
Food… How… dare… you…
Alarik stared into the black hole’s gaping maw. Infinite darkness swirled around it, pulling at the edges of his vision like living hunger. An ancient, suffocating pressure rolled off the void, heavy enough to crush bones.
His smile died instantly. The playful glint in his eyes vanished, replaced by cold, razor-sharp focus.
“No,” he said quickly, hands raised. “I’m not food. Before you try to swallow me whole, hear me out. I have a deal for you.”
The void waited, silent and ravenous.
“I can feed you whatever you crave,” Alarik continued, his voice dropping into something smoother, almost intimate. “Anything you desire.”
Food…
Freedom…
The words echoed inside Alarik’s skull, not his own.
A low pulse rippled through the black hole. Its spinning slowed, deliberate and thoughtful.
I… want… his… soul.
Alarik’s lips curved into a calm, confident smile, all trace of his earlier panic gone.
“Done,” he said, voice steady and velvet-smooth. “You get the boy’s soul. In exchange, I take this body. We’ll share it for now, both of us using it to get what we want. When we’re finished, you can keep the shell if you like… or I’ll leave and you can have it all. Your choice.”
He spread his arms slightly, eyes gleaming.
“What do you say?”
Vandal suddenly thrashed wildly as his own consciousness surged back to the surface.
“Get out of my head!”
“I take your silence as my cue. Thank you,” Alarik said to the black hole, completely ignoring Vandal’s voice.
“Boy, you are done.”
His hand grew massive then crashed down on Vandal inside the mind space.
The world folded.
Vandal was no longer in the ruin. He stood on an incomparably vast plateau.
“What is this place? It stinks,” Vandal said, wrinkling his nose.
The masculine odor of blood and foul sweat from smoky figures bombarded his nostrils. Towering weapons and bronze statues pierced the clouds in every direction. Far below, black waves churned across a massive sea.
Surrounding him were several thousand muscular giants with well-developed limbs, bursting muscles, and fierce faces. They smashed huge hammers against weapons on their anvils, causing the base of the entire floating mountain to tremble.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
“What the hell…? I… I’m a giant!” He discovered he had become one of these nine-foot-tall burly giants. Even his appearance had changed entirely. He touched his chin and felt beard stubble like iron needles.
“I’m holding a hammer?” Vandal noticed he was gripping the same type of iron hammer, the size of a small tree. Its coiled rope grip had rubbed his palm raw and soaked it with his blood.
“Is this some kind of military training ground?” Vandal muttered, puzzled.
His eyes widened as an even larger giant approached. This one was twice the size of the others. It was some kind of humanoid Echo beast.
It glared with large teal-colored eyes and shouted like a thunderstorm:
“You useless pieces of shit! You have already been officially admitted into the Anakim Guild and have become the lowest level blacksmiths here. We, the Anakim Guild, are the greatest and most powerful blacksmithing guild in this world. You must become experts in forging powerful weapons or die trying!”
“Get stronger! Stronger than our enemies! Alarik Yaegeroth, what are you standing around for? Why aren’t you training with your hammer?”
Vandal still had not processed what was happening when he noticed the entire group of humanoid giants looking at him with pity. His heart immediately froze.
“If I am in this body… does that mean anything that happens to this body happens to me? So if I die here, would I die in the real world?” Vandal pondered, unaware of the whirlwind of malice honing in on his head.
In the blink of an eye, the humanoid Echo beast, built like a walking tank, appeared right in front of him.
Vandal had to look upward to meet its ferocious stare.
He felt his palms sweating as a tight knot formed in his stomach.
“I feel so small… so beneath him,” Vandal thought.
“Alarik Yaegeroth, you were boasting about becoming the guild leader one day. What is wrong? You feel our beginner techniques are too weak for you, the ‘Future Guild Leader,’ to learn?”
Vandal opened his mouth to reply, but the humanoid beast roared directly into his face with so much force that he staggered backward several steps.
“What the hell?” Vandal was still processing when the beast suddenly bellowed:
“Alright then! Today I will let you experience how powerful our Two Hundred Hands Wind Hammer Technique can be! DIE!”
Boom!
A giant hammer larger than Vandal’s skull smashed straight into his head.