UNBOUND: THE DEVOURING TAMER

Beast Taming

# Chapter 3: 

The catalyst stone sat in the middle of his cracked concrete rooftop, humming faintly under the dark morning sky. Ethan had come up here before sunrise so nobody would see this if it went wrong.

He'd read everything he could find last night—half a dozen dog-eared library books on Beast Taming fundamentals, most written for kids with C-rank talent or better, all of them vague about what F-rank summoning even looked like in practice. The theory, at least, seemed simple enough. Channel a thread of your own life-force, your Aether, into the catalyst. Let it resonate. Let it call something from the space between worlds that matched your soul's frequency.

"Okay," Ethan muttered, cracking his knuckles. "Let's see what garbage tier gets me."

He knelt, pressed both palms to the stone, and pushed.

Nothing.

He pushed harder, straining until sweat beaded on his forehead, until his arms shook. The stone's blue veins flickered weakly, stuttered, then died. He sat back on his heels, breathing hard, humiliated in front of an audience of absolutely nobody, which somehow still stung.

"Come on."

He tried again. And again. Forty minutes in, his hands were trembling and his head throbbed from whatever internal muscle he was supposed to be flexing but clearly wasn't flexing right. The books talked about Aether like it was obvious, like everyone just *knew* how to find it inside themselves. Maybe C-rank kids did. Maybe it came easier the higher your talent sat.

Or maybe he was just doing it wrong.

He closed his eyes and stopped trying to force it. Instead he thought about the crystal at the Awakening Hall—the black symbol flickering underneath the gold F, gone before anyone else even noticed. He thought about that instead of the ache in his arms, instead of Marcus's laugh, instead of anything except *that.* Something in his chest shifted, subtle, like a key finally finding the right lock.

The catalyst lit up all at once, blinding blue, and cracked down the middle with a sound like a knuckle popping.

Smoke curled out of the crack. Something small and wet-furred stumbled onto the rooftop, hissing, blinking against the dawn light.

A fox. Barely bigger than a house cat, scrawny, one ear torn, fur patchy in a way that looked less like a design choice and more like a bad decade. It bared its teeth at him, tiny and unthreatening, and let out a squeaky snarl that would've been almost cute if it weren't clearly furious.

"...Right," Ethan said slowly. "Hi."

The fox lunged and bit his ankle.

"OW—hey!" He shook his leg. The fox held on with the stubborn commitment of something that had nothing left to lose. "Let go, you little—"

It let go on its own, spat like it had bitten into something disgusting, and slunk to the far edge of the rooftop where it curled up with its back to him, tail flicking in obvious disdain.

Ethan sat down heavily, rubbing his bitten ankle, and stared at his new companion.

*This* was his soul-bonded beast. A mangy, undersized fox that had bitten him within ten seconds of meeting him and now refused to look at him.

"Great," he muttered. "Off to a fantastic start."

He spent the next hour trying every command the library books listed. *Sit. Heel. Attack the target.* (He'd propped up an old broom as a stand-in.) The fox ignored every single one, occasionally shooting him a look that Ethan could only describe as *contempt,* before going back to grooming itself with theatrical indifference.

By midmorning, exhausted and bruised in pride more than body, Ethan understood something the books had glossed over completely: talent wasn't the whole equation. Even a garbage F-rank beast still had to be *earned.* Bonded, in more than name. The soul-contract might have linked them, but respect—loyalty, obedience—clearly had to be built the hard, slow way. No shortcuts. No talent high enough to skip the work.

He looked at the fox. The fox looked at him, unimpressed, and yawned.

"You and me," Ethan said, "we've got a long way to go."

The fox's ears flattened. It turned its back on him again.

He almost laughed. Almost. Instead he pulled a strip of dried meat from his bag—cheap jerky he'd bought on the way home, thinking he might need to bribe his way into a beast's good graces—and tossed it near the fox's paws.

It sniffed. Hesitated. Ate.

Small progress. He'd take it.

Below him, the district was waking up—shutters rattling open, vendors calling out morning prices, the ordinary noise of a world that had already decided who mattered and who didn't. Ethan sat on the rooftop with his bitten ankle and his sulking fox and found, despite everything, a strange thread of stubborn hope threading through the exhaustion.

He was building something from nothing. Slower than everyone else. Weaker than everyone else. But building.

That's when his phone buzzed with a message from an old classmate, someone he barely talked to anymore—Dez, always chasing quick coin, always half a step outside the law.

**Dez:** heard about your rank. rough. hey—you still need cash? I got a job. pays stupid well for one night's work. no guild registration needed either which is the best part 😏

Ethan's thumb hovered over the reply. He glanced at the fox, at the bruises forming on his ankle, at the twelve silver he'd already burned through and the rent that was due in nine days.

**Ethan:** What kind of job?

**Dez:** retrieval job. some old ruins out past the eastern checkpoint. easy stuff, low-level monsters, in and out. money's good because of where it is though.

**Ethan:** Where is it?

**Dez:** ...

**Dez:** technically it's a Dead Zone. but a low-threat one! practically abandoned lol

Ethan stared at the message for a long time. Dead Zones were where Awakened talents went to die when their egos outran their power—corrupted land, twisted monsters, no guild patrol because no guild wanted the liability. Illegal to enter without a C-rank license or higher. Which he absolutely did not have.

He thought about the gray pamphlet. *Insufficient combat utility.* He thought about his mother's raw hands and forced smile. He thought about nine days and a rent due date that didn't care about ranks or Dead Zones or fairness.

**Ethan:** I'm in.

The fox lifted its head at that exact moment, ears perked, gold eyes fixed on him like it somehow understood, and let out a long, unhappy growl.

"Yeah," Ethan muttered, pocketing the phone. "I know."

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