Void Veins: The Forbidden Ascension

Chapter 3: First Predation

The roar drew closer, accompanied by the sickening crunch of snapping branches and the rumble of shifting earth. Lin Ye could sense the creature through the new awareness the black jade had granted him—a primal radar that picked up killing intent and life force with terrifying clarity. The beast was large, the size of a horse, four-legged, and radiating a thick, palpable aura of hatred.

 “Mutated Iron-Hide Boar,” Mo Yuan’s identification came instantly, a flood of concise knowledge flooding his mind. “Equivalent to Qi Condensation Stage Three. Hide as hard as low-grade steel. Fangs carry a neurotoxin. Weak points: eyes and underbelly. But you cannot defeat it with brute strength. You have none to speak of yet.”

 “Then how?” Lin Ye asked in his mind, backing slowly as he sought cover among the jagged rock formations at the ravine’s bottom.

 “You use the technique I just taught you. Breath of the Abyssal Maw. Not to strike the boar. To feed on its energy. It is brimming with wild qi and raw vitality—perfect nourishment for your meridians. You do not need to kill it. You need to wear it down, throw its qi into chaos, and drain its excess power when it weakens.”

 Lin Ye nodded, though no one was there to see. He closed his eyes and focused on the black jade burning in his palm. He felt the flow of cold yin energy coursing through his Void Leaking Veins, forming a strange, complex circuit throughout his body. This was nothing like the harmonious, balanced qi circulation of orthodox cultivation. It was parasitic. Aggressive. Designed to take, not to receive.

 The boar burst from the darkness, its eyes glowing with malevolent red light, its breath curling into clouds of toxic fumes. It stamped the earth, muscles coiling to charge.

 Lin Ye did not dodge fully. He shifted just enough to let the beast thunder past mere inches away, while his jade-clasped hand—hidden within his sleeve—brushed against its flank for a fleeting moment.

 Instantly, an explosion of energy surged into him. Not pure qi, but a chaotic storm: rage, pain, killing instinct, untamed wild vitality. His meridians blazed, but not with destruction—with transformation. His Void Leaking Veins adapted instantly, filtering the chaos, retaining its brutal essence, and venting the rest as heat that seeped from his pores like steam.

 The boar shrieked, its stride faltering. Its strength was draining away—not from physical wounds, but from a spiritual drain no low-level beast could comprehend. Confused and enraged, it grew wilder, more erratic.

 Lin Ye felt the shift within. His once-soft muscles grew dense and taut. His senses sharpened to a razor’s edge. Most of all, for the first time in his life, he felt real power. Not an illusion. Power taken through predation. Through dominance. Through seizing what was not his.

 “Continue!” Mo Yuan commanded, his voice bright with dark excitement. “Do not stop! It still has reserves! Drain it until it collapses!”

 Lin Ye moved again, this time with growing confidence. He evaded each charge with minimal motion, using the terrain—rocks, roots, hollows—as his shield. Every brush of contact, no matter how slight, was an opportunity to feed. He learned fast. The instincts of a predator awakened in him, born not of training, but of the absolute, desperate need to survive.

 After minutes that felt like hours, the boar fell. It gasped for air, its eyes dimming, its massive body trembling with utter exhaustion. Its qi was nearly spent; its vitality had plummeted to nothing.

 Lin Ye stood over it, breathing heavily but steadily. Sweat slicked his skin—not from exertion, but as a byproduct of the chaotic energy refining within him. He had reached the first sub-realm of the Demon Way: Abyssal Initiate Stage One. Not Qi Condensation. Not an orthodox foundation. Something darker. Truer. And entirely his own.

 “Well done,” Mo Yuan murmured, sounding genuinely pleased. “You learn fast. Faster than most of the demon sect disciples I trained in ages past. Now—take its fangs. The venom will be useful later. And its flesh… eat it raw. A mutated beast’s vitality is the finest fuel for a new Abyssal Initiate.”

 Lin Ye looked down at the helpless creature. Once, he would have felt disgust, fear, hesitation. Now? He saw only resources. He drew his dull kitchen knife and, with a steady hand, finished the task.

 As he chewed through the raw, gamey meat, it tasted foul—metallic and bitter. But inside him, it was turning into strength. And with that strength came a cold, clear realization: he was no longer the Lin Ye he had been. The boy who ate raw beast flesh at the bottom of a ravine just to survive was no longer a victim.

 He was a predator, newly born.

 And that Annual Assessment Ceremony tomorrow? It was no longer a death sentence.

 It was his first stage.