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Chapter 3 - The Shadow in the Soul

The air inside The Gauntlet was cold and smelled of ozone and old stone.

The first floor was a massive, circular arena.

In the center, a creature of gleaming black metal stood motionless.

It had the shape of a wolf, but it was larger than a horse, with claws like daggers and eyes that glowed a malevolent red.

An inscription on the wall read:

First Trial: The Adamant Wolf.

NICO (from the Hall of Echoes): "Whoa, kid. That thing looks nasty. You sure about this? It's not too late to go back to making mud pies."

KAEL: "Shut up, Nico. It's just a puppet."

He strode forward, drawing on the Aether in his Core. His confidence, bolstered by two months of rapid progress, was a blazing fire.

He was an Aether Weaver. He was the Inheritor. This metal dog was nothing.

He lunged, channeling his power into the Unification Move, a simple but powerful sword thrust he'd practiced a thousand times.

The Adamant Wolf didn't even flinch. It moved.

Not a lunge, not a pounce. It simply vanished.

BOOM!

A thunderous crack echoed through the arena. Kael felt a cataclysmic impact on his chest.

The world spun, stone, sky, darkness and then slammed into him as he hit the far wall.

The air rushed out of his lungs in a pained gasp. His ribs screamed in protest. He slid to the floor, the metallic taste of blood filling his mouth.

KAEL: "Hah… hah…"

He looked up, dazed. The Adamant Wolf was back in the center of the arena, motionless, as if it had never moved. Its red eyes stared, devoid of emotion.

Defeated. In a single blow. Humiliated.

He dragged his battered body out of The Gauntlet, the silence of the arena mocking him.

The walk back to his small, magically-conjured house felt like a mile of shame. He slammed the door, the sound echoing the shattering of his pride.

KAEL: "USELESS!" he roared, hurling a wooden cup against the wall. It shattered.

"WEAK!" He kicked a chair, sending it splintering.

He was panting, his body shaking with a rage so profound it felt like poison.

He stared at his reflection in a shard of a broken plate on the floor. A boy with wild eyes and a bloody lip.

His father's disappointed face flashed in his mind. "That path only leads to death, Kael."

KAEL: "You wanted me to be weak!" he screamed at the empty room. "Is this what you wanted?! For me to be pathetic?!"

A voice, smooth as silk and cold as the grave, answered him. It wasn't Elder Morn or Nico. It was inside his head. And it sounded exactly like him.

VOICE: Isn't it infuriating? To be given a taste of power, only to find you're still in a cage?

Kael froze, spinning around. "Who's there?!"

VOICE: I'm always here. I'm the part of you they tried to bury. The part your father feared. He locked me away, and in doing so, he locked away our true potential.

A cold dread mixed with a strange sense of vindication washed over Kael. This was it. The source of the anger. The hunger for strength.

KAEL: "What do you want?"

VOICE: I want what you want. To be strong. To be free. They shackled us, Kael. But a shackle can be a weapon, if you know how to use it.

Your despair... your rage... it's the perfect key. Let me give you a gift. A taste of what we could be. Just accept it.

He was so tired of being weak. So tired of failing. "...Yes," Kael whispered, collapsing onto his bed. "I accept."

He fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

When he awoke, the world felt... different. The rage was gone, replaced by a chilling clarity.

The bottleneck in his cultivation, that immovable wall, had vanished. He sat up and instinctively began to meditate.

This time, it wasn't a trickle or a river of Aether. It was a maelstrom.

A colossal vortex of Primordial Aether formed around him, roaring like a hurricane.

The ground beneath his house trembled. The air crackled with raw power, so immense that Elder Morn's eye snapped wide open in the distance.

ELDER MORN: "What in the cosmos is that boy"

The Aether surged into Kael, not just filling his Core, but overflowing, reshaping him.

His power skyrocketed past the Early stage, through the Middle stage, and finally settled at the very peak of the Late Aether Weaving stage.

He opened his eyes, gasping. He felt... whole. He examined his inner self, his Divine Sense now sharp enough to see the landscape of his own soul.

He saw the brightly glowing Aetherium Core. But next to it, nestled in his Sea of Lo, was something new. A small, black crystal, pulsing with a cold, dark energy. An Umbral Core.

And in his Sea of Consciousness, where his very soul resided, he saw it. A faint, golden sphere, wrapped around his soul like a cage. On it, shimmering letters spelled out a single word: SEAL.

NICO: "Whoa! Kid! What did you do?! That's an Umbral Core! That's Devil Clan tech! And that golden cage around your soul... that thing is nasty. It's suppressing you!"

Kael touched the sword, which he'd brought back from the Hall. Nico's voice was buzzing with a mix of fear and manic excitement.

KAEL: "The voice... it said my father did this."

NICO: "Your dad? Seriously? Kid, your family drama is way above my pay grade.

But this... this is interesting! A regular kid with a regular core is boring. But a kid with a regular core, a creepy shadow core, and a divine curse? N

ow we're talking! The latent power... the potential! Okay, I'm in. For real this time.

Let's make a contract, partner. I'll be your blade. My name is the Feiling Sword, and I will help you cut down anyone who stands in your way."

A surge of energy flowed from the sword into Kael, sealing a bond between them. He felt the sword's power become an extension of his own.

The mysterious voice whispered one last thing in his mind before fading into the background.

VOICE: Answers lie to the south. In the forbidden ground. Go there... and learn the truth of who you are.

Kael stood up, his eyes burning with a new, cold fire. He now had the power. He had a weapon. And he had a destination.

"Elder Morn!" he called out, his voice sharp and clear.

"You said the south was forbidden. I'm going there. Try and stop me."

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