The spatial distortion unravelled in an instant, the light snapping back into focus.
The fragrant scent of the academy office was replaced by the scorched, suffocating reek of sulfur, dried blood, and intense heat. I blinked, looking down at the desolate floor beneath my boots.
’Did we just teleport? That was instantaneous.’
"There is the target you will fight," Headmaster Myrra spoke softly from behind me, her voice echoing against the towering canyon walls.
I looked ahead. Thirty yards ahead, patrolling the entrance of a lava carved cavern, was a creature the size of an armored carriage, a Tier 3 Giant Scorpion. Its thick chitinous carapace gleamed with an oily, iridescent sheen, an outer shell hardened to deflect physical strikes and elemental blasts alike. Two massive, serrated pedipalps snapped rhythmically with force enough to shatter iron, while its segmented tail coiled overhead like a poised spear, dripping viscous green venom that hissed into white steam wherever it hit the stone.
"Go," Myrra instructed calmly. "I will step in if things become truly dire."
"Understood," I replied flatly.
I unsheathed my spirit steel shortblade, dropped my posture, and intentionally released a pulse of cold, sharp intent straight toward the beast.
The Giant Scorpion’s burning red eyes snapped toward me instantly, letting out a deafening, metallic screech that shook the gravel beneath my feet.
Stealth.
My spirit energy enveloped my frame, warping the surrounding light and muffling the sound of my pulse. I became a ghost in the shadows of the canyon floor.
Crouching low, my twelve year old body, lean and forged through months of brutal conditioning moved with terrifying efficiency. My breathing was so shallow it barely stirred my tunic.
’Near death... that is the key.’
I closed my eyes for a fraction of a second, drawing a single deep breath. When I opened them, all hesitation vanished.
I launched myself forward, a localized burst of fire detonating behind my heel to propel me across the obsidian floor in a crimson streaked blur. As I closed the distance, I channeled corrosive fire mana into the blade, igniting the edge until it glowed white hot, dripping with acid like heat. I targeted the soft joint behind the beast’s rear left leg, lunging in to sever the tendon.
SPARKS ERUPTED!
Sparks sprayed violently, but the blade penetrated barely an inch into the thick hide before stopping dead against the inner shell.
The scorpion’s seismic sensing had caught my footfalls the microsecond my weight struck the rock floor. Before I could pull my blade back, the beast spun its massive bulk with terrifying speed, sweeping a huge left claw sideways like a battering ram.
I brought my arms up to block, but the raw kinetic force of a Tier 3 creature was overwhelming.
BOOM!
The impact shattered the air, throwing me thirty feet through the air until I slammed heavily against the canyon wall. I hit the stone hard, knocking the wind from my lungs, and dropped to one knee, spitting a mouthful of dark crimson into the dirt.
The giant scorpion screeched, a sharp, scraping noise of metal against glass and skittered forward, its eight heavy legs beating a rhythmic war drum against the stone.
Stone Skin!
Grey, stone like scales rippled rapidly across my arms, shoulders, and chest.
The scorpion closed the gap in a heartbeat. Its right claw snapped down like a guillotine, but I ducked beneath the pincer, thrusting my white hot blade upward into the creature’s softer underbelly. The heat scorched the joint, making the beast roar in agony, but its left claw whipped around and caught me around the waist in a vice like grip.
The pincer squeezed mercilessly. My Stone Skin groaned under the pressure as deep hairline cracks formed across my grey scales. I couldn’t breathe; my ribs felt on the verge of splintering into pieces.
With the last of my strength, I raised my left hand and pressed my palm straight into the scorpion’s primary eye cluster. This chapter is updated first at novelping.com.
Fire Release!
A blinding jet of white hot fire erupted from my palm, scorching the monster’s face. The scorpion thrashed wildly as blinding heat burned its sight away, hurling my body high into the air.
As I plummeted back toward the ground, a massive shadow fell over me. The scorpion’s tail lashed out like an iron whip, driving its toxic stinger straight through my stonified shoulder, piercing deep into muscle and bone.
STAB!
A raw shriek escaped my throat as I was slammed brutally into the scorched dirt. The stinger pulled away, leaving a jagged wound dripping dark, smoking poison.
The Tier 3 venom was catastrophic. It coursed through my blood vessels like liquid fire, blackening my skin and eating away at my spirit pathways. My passive self recovery fought furiously, sending green ripples of healing energy to seal the wound, but the Tier 3 poison overwhelmed my Tier 2 body in seconds.
My limbs grew heavy as lead. My vision swirled into darkness, the golden sky fading into black as my heart slowed to an agonizing drag.
The giant scorpion loomed over me, its burned eyes twitching, both claws raised high to crush my small body into powder.
I laid in the dirt, unable to move a single finger as the cold touch of death settled over my chest.
’Is this where it ends? Am I dying?’
Myrra’s words echoed softly through the fading darkness, ’Stop commanding your spirit animal like a tool... think of it as yourself.’
Suddenly, the reek of sulfur, the crushing weight of the venom, and the roar of the scorpion vanished into complete stillness.
I opened my eyes, finding myself standing in an endless, white tinted expanse. Floating in front of me was a towering, transparent door, glistening like liquid glass.
And on the other side of that transparent veil stood my spirit animal, the Crimson Basilisk in its true form, its scales gleaming like magma, its slit pupil eyes staring back at me.
’Did I die? What is this place?’
Confused, I reached up with my right hand to touch my head in shock.
Across the transparent veil, the Crimson Basilisk raised its claw to its head at the exact same moment, matching my motion down to the microsecond.
I froze. I blinked, then slowly lowered my arm.
The Basilisk lowered its claw simultaneously.
My breath caught in my throat as understanding struck like a bolt of lightning.
’Why is it repeating every action I do?’
Is this what she meant?
Myrra’s voice resonated in my mind once more: ’A body and a soul... you were always meant to be forged into one single completion.’
A quiet realization settled over my spirit. Ah... I see. It isn’t a tool I command from the outside. It is me.
I stepped forward and reached my right hand straight toward the transparent door, pressing my palm against the glass like barrier. On the other side, the Crimson Basilisk extended its claw, pressing it directly against mine. Enjoying the story? Read on at novelping dot com.
FLASH!
A blinding, ethereal light exploded from the point of contact, shattering the transparent door into millions of glowing fragments. The white space dissolved as the Basilisk’s soul merged directly into my own, flooding my entire core with absolute harmony.
THOOOOOM!
Back in the canyon, a sound like thunder echoing inside a sealed vault shattered the quiet air.
A roaring pillar of crimson and gold light shot straight up into the sky from my chest, blowing away the surrounding dust and shattering the basalt rocks within twenty yards. The sheer pressure wave knocked the scorpion back a full step.
The poison in my veins was incinerated in a single, roaring surge of Tier 3 spirit energy. My skin restored itself, my broken bones snapping back into perfect alignment.
Behind me, the gigantic phantom outline of the Crimson Basilisk materialized, its scales glowing with molten energy, its eyes burning like twin suns.
I stood up slowly, surrounded by a swirling aura of golden fire and dense stone mana. I lifted my head, revealing eyes that were no longer human, my irises had transformed into glowing golden slits.
The giant scorpion raised its claw, driving it down to crush me, but I locked my gaze directly onto the monster’s face.
"Halt."
A wave of golden, visible energy exploded from my eyes and swept across the battlefield. The moment the light touched the giant scorpion, the creature froze mid motion.
From its eyes down to its pedipalps, grey, lifeless stone spread across its body at terrifying speed. The petrification raced over its carapace, down its eight jointed legs, and up the coiled length of its dangerous tail. In under three seconds, the entire Tier 3 beast was converted into a silent, solid granite statue.
The air in the canyon fell dead silent.
The gigantic basilisk aura coiling above me faded back into my spine. I walked slowly toward the petrified monster, raising my spirit blade. Coating the edge in a delicate, high frequency vibration of Tier 3 spirit energy, I tapped the center of the stone chest once.
Clink.
A single hairline crack appeared at the tip of my blade. In a heartbeat, a web of glowing light rushed across the entire stone statue.
CRACK SHATTER!
The giant Tier 3 scorpion collapsed outward, exploding into hundreds of thousands of tiny stone fragments and gray dust that cascaded down the canyon floor like a falling landslide.
I stood amidst the shower of falling gravel, breathing deeply as the warm, abundant spirit energy of Tier 3 filled my chest and core. I wiped a streak of dried blood from my cheek, looked up at the ash choked sky, and let out a soft breath.
My knees buckled as the immense physical backlash of the breakthrough caught up to me.
Before my body hit the ground, a pair of gentle arms caught me mid fall.
Headmaster Myrra held my small frame securely, looking down at my unconscious face with a proud, warm smile.
"Congratulations on your breakthrough... little Iver," she whispered softly into the quiet canyon air as darkness finally took me.
...
i was just testing if iver’s pov would work but i’ll stick to the original