THE DEVIL'S FRUIT

Chapter 3: Burning Resolve

Aric Blackthorn’s eyes snapped open, the faint light of dawn flickering across the ceiling above him like red embers caught in ash. For a few moments, he couldn’t breathe. His chest rose and fell too quickly, his fingers digging into his scalp as if he could claw away the fragments of a dream that refused to die.

His heartbeat thundered in his chest, wild and uneven. Then, unexpectedly, a single tear slipped down his cheek. He froze. Tears. He hadn’t cried in years.

He forced himself to breathe, slow and steady, repeating the words of the Blackthorn Creed in his mind. Each line was like cold water washing through his thoughts, clearing the haze, tightening his focus. The trembling in his hands faded, his pulse slowed, and his body began to calm.

Not again.

His fists clenched until the knuckles turned white. The nightmare was gone, but the ache it left behind still pulsed like a scar that never healed. It didn’t come every night, but when it did, it always dragged him back to the same moment, the one that broke everything. His parents. His home. His soul.

He hated that dream. It showed him the version of himself he despised most: small, helpless, drowning in darkness.

And yet, he couldn’t bring himself to let it go.

He needed that pain. The fire of it. The reminder of what he had lost and what he still had to do. That agony was the only thing that kept the flames inside him alive.

He swung his legs off the bed, sitting upright in one smooth motion, his eyes sharp and alert. The room around him was elegant but restrained, fine craftsmanship, muted luxury, a quiet mark of the Blackthorn lineage.

He rolled his shoulders, muscles rippling under the scars that webbed across his skin. The strength was back. The pain was gone.

I’m healed.

Memories of the last battle flickered behind his eyes, the monstrous creature of darkness, the crushing blow that should have broken him. By all rights, he shouldn’t have survived. Yet here he was. Breathing. Whole.

His gaze dropped to the slim device around his wrist. The metal band shimmered faintly with green light, sigils pulsing in rhythm with his heartbeat.

Lifeguard.

Every life within the dome carried one, a guardian of flesh and pulse, silently tracking every breath, every drop of blood.

Aric turned to the mirror and stared at himself. Lean frame. Scarred skin. Crimson eyes burning with the same fury that haunted his dreams.

A sharp knock cut through the quiet.

Before he could answer, the door opened and a woman stepped inside, bowing low.

“Ninth Vein,” she said softly.

His attendant.

She bore the unmistakable traits of the Blackthorn bloodline, hair the color of blood in sunlight, skin pale as frost, eyes lowered in perfect discipline. A tray rested in her hands.

“How long was I out?” Aric asked, his tone steady, detached.

“Eight hours and two minutes, Ninth Vein,” she replied without hesitation. Her voice was clear, unshaken.

Ninth Vein, the title reserved for the newest heir in the Blackthorn line, a name heavy with expectation and history.

“Eight hours…” he murmured, almost to himself. He’d expected longer. His recovery was faster than it should’ve been.

“And the captain?” he asked next, voice sharp again. “Has he left?”

“He’s been waiting for you to wake,” she said. “Shall I tell him you’re ready to receive him?”

That gave Aric pause. He hadn’t expected the captain to wait. If anything, he thought the man would’ve used this as an excuse to disappear, to distance himself from the clan’s outcast.

A failure. A stain on the name Blackthorn. The only descendant who had never ascended.

He pushed that thought aside.

“Tell him I’ll be ready in ten minutes,” he said.

She bowed again. “As you command.”

Before leaving, she set the tray before him. He nodded curtly and glanced down at the contents, dark, gleaming fruit, their skins pulsing faintly with unnatural light.

The Devil’s Fruit.

He picked one up and bit into it. The taste was metallic and bitter, like ash and iron. A sudden surge of raw energy burst through his veins, then vanished, leaving nothing but emptiness in its wake.

He set the fruit back on the tray.

Still nothing.

The Devil’s Fruit was supposed to change a person’s very essence. Born from the life energy of fallen darkness beasts, it carried the power to awaken evolution in those who consumed it.

For others, one bite was enough to spark transformation.

For him, it was just another reminder. Another failure.

Years of swallowing that bitterness, of chasing a change that never came.

He knew why.

His mother’s sacrifice the night she died, the secret she took with her, the curse she left on his blood.

But he never blamed her. Not once.

He looked back at his reflection, the scars on his body glinting faintly under the light. Each mark was a story, a lesson, a survival etched in flesh.

He couldn’t evolve, but he could endure.

And that endurance had forged him into something else, something stronger than those who were blessed.

Because pain, betrayal, and loss had become the fire that fueled him.

And that fire had a name.

Revenge.

Someone had betrayed the Blackthorn family. Sold them out. Delivered his parents to the darkness.

He would find them. Every last one.

And he would erase them from existence.

The rage burned bright in his chest, fierce and alive. His heart pounded like thunder, echoing through the silence.

He closed his eyes and repeated the Creed under his breath, a childhood whisper, a song of blood and survival.

Slowly, his breathing steadied. The fury turned sharp, focused.

He stood, reached for his clothes, and fastened each clasp with mechanical precision.

It was time.

Time to return to the Blackthorn clan.