The sudden, unsettling silence was the alarm clock of the Wastes. The rhythmic, organic vibration pulsing up through the dry earth beneath Aurelius Marakā's feet confirmed the immediate danger. The Strata Beast was not a distant rumor; it was a rapidly approaching, physical reality, drawn by the pulsing beacon of the black aura he carried like a drumbeat. The air itself seemed to crackle with anticipation.
"Go! Now!" Aurelius shouted, the urgency in his voice sharp as broken glass, shoving Aoi toward the deeper scrubland and breaking his years of emotional and physical reservation. He couldn't spare a glance to ensure her safety; every ounce of his focus was required to assess the imminent threat and prepare his body for the coming ordeal.
He was pinned between the Water Tower, a tall, exposed structure, and the open ground leading back to the farm. He chose the open ground, needing space for his wire and momentum, already calculating his escape vectors. The moment he moved, the Beast registered his action.
The first sign of the Beast wasn't visual; it was structural. A wave of heavy and unnatural force, preceding the creature itself, slammed into the Old Water Tower. The rusted metal shrieked in protest, a sound of agony against the deep silence, and a hundred gallons of stagnant water burst from a ruptured seam, pooling uselessly on the dust. Aurelius felt the shockwave in his teeth. The Beast's approach was a localized dimensional stress field, twisting space around its massive frame.
Aurelius didn't wait for the visual confirmation. He snapped the coiled long wire from his forearm, the metallic flick a disciplined prayer to his father's teaching: control, precision, force. The wire was suddenly alive, not with mystic energy, but with pure kinetic truth, awaiting direction.
First Minute: Engagement and Retreat
The creature erupted from the ground near the Northern Fault line, not rising but emerging with horrifying speed. It was a monstrosity of jagged, chitinous armor and segmented limbs, its body radiating the sickening, unstable Muddied Green Strata Aura. It wasn't huge by GHC standards, but it was fast, powerful, and utterly alien. Its eyes, hundreds of reflective facets that caught the weak sunlight, immediately locked onto Aurelius, sensing the potent, forbidden darkness he carried.
The Beast didn't move; it slammed a thick, reinforced limb into the earth, sending a tremor that threw Aurelius off balance, churning the dust. He rolled, recovering his footing instantly, his eyes never leaving the monster's core.
A single, crucial thought flashed through Aurelius's mind, echoing Aoi's warning: The aura is a key. The Beast wasn't just attacking him; it was attempting to extract the chaos it sought, attempting to unlock the power coiled within his chest.
Aurelius focused on his feet and his center of gravity. He didn't run away; he ran sideways, maintaining optimal striking distance. He executed his signature low snap, aiming the coiled wire at the Beast's nearest knee joint, a point of pure kinematic weakness designed to absorb massive mechanical stress.
SNAP!
The wire struck with the precise force of a bullet. The Beast's chitin didn't break, but the kinetic energy, channeled with absolute perfection, was undeniable. The joint popped, momentarily locking the massive limb in place.
The Beast shrieked, a high, dimensional sound that caused the bones in Aurelius's ears to ache with vibrating force, and swiped blindly with its massive arm. Aurelius ducked under the massive limb, the air current from the swing nearly tearing the skin from his face. He recoiled the wire instantly, retreating ten meters, forcing the creature to reorient its attack.
Second Minute: Kinetic Defense
Aurelius was a blur of motion and calculation, his mind working faster than the monster's slow, deliberate malice. He used the coiled wire not for piercing, but for kinetic disruption. He targeted small, vulnerable surfaces, using his velocity to create impact geometry. He struck the base of the creature's antennae, its sensory organs, forcing it to focus on defense rather than its objective.
The creature responded by spitting a jet of viscous, corrosive green liquid, raw, unstable Strata aura that hissed and boiled. Aurelius evaded the stream with a sharp, sideways pivot, but the spray that hit the ground dissolved the dust into smoking sludge, leaving small, circular scars on the earth. The heat from the acidic cloud was intense.
He saw the pattern clearly: the Beast was slow to turn but devastatingly fast in a straight line. Its aggression peaked every time it felt the physical truth of the wire, every time pure physics counteracted its raw power.
As he pushed his body to evade the toxic spray, running faster than he ever had, the familiar pressure of the black aura surged again. It was a cold, demanding hunger, threatening to release the raw, draining power of Life Essence Reduction that he was not yet ready to use, urging him to simply burn the creature away.
He fought the impulse, forcing his mind back to the chain's law: Discipline over chaos. He suppressed the aura, forcing the volatile power back down, channeling every ounce of his focus into the next kinetic strike.
He saw an opportunity: the Beast was preparing a large scale strike, drawing its center of mass back for maximum momentum. Aurelius didn't attack the limbs; he attacked the center of tension.
He flung the wire in a perfect, horizontal rotation, catching the point where the Beast's central plates met. It was a flawless kinetic shot. The plates groaned with the force but held. The Beast was enraged, its energy signature flaring brighter.
Third Minute: The Test of Discipline
The Beast charged, its momentum a devastating force that shook the ground with every step. Aurelius abandoned his skirmishing and ran toward a nearby cluster of ruined concrete pillars, the remnants of the old settlement, knowing his space was running out.
He used the debris as anchor points. He flipped, wrapping the coiled wire around a pillar and using the sudden, violent tension to slingshot his body into an impossible maneuver. The move maximized his velocity by trading stability for speed, a trick Jin had warned him against as "over ambition" and foolish risk.
The pillar shattered behind him, exploding into clouds of gray concrete dust. Aurelius knew his father would have seen the move as reckless, a violation of fundamental principles, but the Beast was closer to the farm now. He was drawing it away, successfully acting as bait.
He was hit; a glancing blow from the Beast's shoulder caught his side, sending him skidding across the dry ground for several meters. The impact was purely physical, and it was brutal. Pain flared, momentarily blinding him and stealing his breath, but he kept his grip on the wire, the familiar texture grounding him.
As he recovered, gasping, he saw the Beast raise its primary limb, the massive appendage shadowing the sky, preparing for the finishing blow.
Fourth Minute: Revelation
Aurelius stared at the descending limb, its green aura dripping toxic sludge onto the dust. He was out of kinetic options. He had exhausted pure physics. His body was failing, screaming from the impact.
In that moment of absolute desperation, his father's voice, demanding discipline, faded. He made a conscious choice. He stopped fighting the black aura. He let the cold, oil-like energy surge from the scar in his chest, abandoning the tenets of pure geometry and allowing raw chaos to pour into his arm and down the coiled wire. The feeling was intoxicating and terrifying.
The energy was a shock, vast, and silent. He felt his veins burn with a power that wasn't muscle, the nascent power of Life Essence Reduction flooding his nervous system.
He didn't aim for the limb. He aimed for the core of the Strata Aura radiating from the Beast's shoulder joint, the source of its destructive energy.
He struck.
The wire hit the joint, and the black aura made contact with the green. There was no explosion, no flash of light. Instead, the area around the strike point turned absolute black, an immediate, concentrated patch of pure absence, consuming all light and color.
The Beast didn't shriek: its sound was cut off entirely, replaced by a soundless, desperate gurgle. It felt the profound, chilling nothingness of the essence drain, a negative force consuming its very structure. The joint cracked, not from impact force, but from immediate essence drain. The creature stumbled back, retracting its limb, confused and severely wounded.
Aurelius, panting violently, snapped the wire back. He looked at his hand; the skin was intact, but the overwhelming surge of power had left him nauseous, weak, and dizzy. The attack had been successful, but the power had consumed him almost as much as it had consumed the Beast.
The Strata Beast, wounded and confused, turned its attention away from the farm and lumbered back toward the Northern Fault, disappearing beneath the desolate horizon. It was a retreat, not a defeat.
Aurelius had won his first battle, but he realized the chilling truth: the black aura was not a flaw to be controlled; it was a devastating weapon that consumed its user. He had tasted the Stigma's Zenith, and it demanded payment in his own life force. He struggled to his feet, ignoring the searing pain in his side, and began the long walk back to the farm, realizing his father's warning was not philosophical. It was literal.