The sky above Camp 12 cracked with ash-burnt orange as the pain-siren screamed.
Kaelren jolted awake in the pit barracks — a rectangular Tent by the hillside. The other low-rank trainees groaned and rose like half-starved corpses, bones popping, skin clinging tight to under fed frames. Bedding was a myth. Warmth was reserved for those ranked high enough to earn it.
Kaelren sat up slowly. Sleep was brief. Meals were brutal. But he was learning.
He dressed quickly, slipping on his beast jeans and tightening the straps on his bracers. His black tail flicked instinctively behind him — not in agitation, but readiness.
No one cared about his tail, many youths had beastial traits. It means they have traces of beast blood in their body's.
A crude bell tolled once. Camp 12's low ranked mess hall wasn't a building. It was a sunken yard, ringed by crude stone counters and bark-skinned soldiers handing out portions based strictly on rank.
Kaelren's line — the lowest rankers, were last.
The "meal" was a wooden bowl of grey slop and a single chunk of stringy meat, unless someone else punched you and took it.
Kaelren stood silently, eyeing the other starving recruits. Some looked feral. Others looked dead already.
Then someone nudged him. Not hard — just enough to break the air of isolation.
"Don't stare like that. You'll get noticed."
Kaelren turned.
The boy beside him looked about twelve, lanky with burned wrists and faded armor scraps that didn't match. Shaggy red hair, smart eyes.
"You're new," the boy said. "Name's Dren. Dren Talvak."
Kaelren blinked. "Kaelren."
Dren nodded toward the food counter. "Rule one: eat fast. If they see you taking your sweet time, someone'll punch your teeth out to take it for themselves."
Kaelren muttered thanks, collected his food, and sat beside Dren in the shadows of a broken pillar. The meat was cold. The slop was hot. Both were barely edible.
"You really don't know where you are or anything about this place, do you?" Dren said around a mouthful.
Kaelren shook his head. "No."
Dren sighed. "Alright. Quick version. You're on Vel'Drakka. The Whole continent runs on strength. No kings, no courts — just clans, warlords, and weapons. We're in Camp 12. Blood Fang territory."
"Blood Fang?"
"They run this place. Mostly Gene Refiners. Big into beast bloodlines and breaking bones to build strength. But they've got a tech faction here too — Gloomtide Syndicate. Makes for weird training."
"Trainning starts after feeding. Physical first — runs, climbs, body destruction. Then combat. You want to rise in rank, you fight someone and win."
Kaelren frowned. "Why fight?"
"Because the bottom 20 die in the winter cull. If you're weak, they don't waste food keeping you alive."
He said it casually. Like it was normal. Like death was just a schedule.
Kaelren asked about cultivation,he had learned it existed here but nothing more.
Dren nodded, lowering his voice. "We're all aiming for Gene Refinement Path here I'm blood fang. Most don't make it past level one. You ever heard of the realms?"
Kaelren shook his head.
" I Fang. know about all the realms. But we're only allowed to know the first two at our current stage." He held up his hand. "Realm One is the Body Tempering Realm. It's where you train your muscles, bones, blood — make your body stronger so you can survive gene infusion if your 100% human. Most never even touch it."
Gene Infusion is something you won't have to worry about.you already have beast blood.
Kaelren listened closely, memorizing every word.
"Realm Two is Gene Ascension. That's when your body's strong enough to merge with a beast trait. Claws, eyes, fur, venom, whatever. But that's dangerous. People mutate, lose control. You have to be stable before you can even try."
Kaelren's eyes narrowed. "How do you start?"
"You don't. Your body does. Once you push it far enough, something clicks. You'll know, when it happens."
Dren gave a tight smile, then finished his food.
"You've got something strange about you," he added. "I've seen plenty of recruits come in. Scared. Angry. But you? You're… off. Calm, but sharp."
Kaelren said nothing.
The physical drills began as soon as the sun burned high over the camp.
Dozens of recruits sprinted across gravel fields with heavy iron packs strapped to their backs. Kaelren's legs screamed. His arms shook. But he ran.
Next came the cliff climbs — bare-handed, slicked with blood.
Then the bone gauntlet — crawling through a trench of broken blades and bones while instructors shouted insults and shock-staffed anyone who hesitated.
Kaelren bled. He bruised. But he endured.
By midday, he was gasping, his black tank top soaked with sweat, dust and blood.
Dren stumbled beside him, panting. "You've got lungs, I'll give you that."
Kaelren didn't reply. His bones felt hot. His muscles tight — like something was pressing outward from within.
Then came the bell.
Combat hour.
The arena was nothing more than a shallow pit ringed by jagged rock. A dozen fights would happen at once — instructors watching for weakness, for potential, for death.
"Kaelren," barked a guard. "You're up. Rank 68. You'll be fighting Rank 48 — Vask, your his warm up."
Kaelren stepped into the pit.
Vask was older, broader, and covered in ritual scars. A failed beast-gene infusion had turned his eyes milky yellow. He smiled, revealing sharpened teeth.
"Fresh meat," he snarled. "Hope you like the taste of your own ribs."
Kaelren stood still. Heart pounding. Tail flicking.
Vask charged.
Fast. Too fast for a child his size. He was already at stage 1 of body Tempering.
Kaelren barely ducked the punch — it whistled past his head and cracked the ground.
Kaelren sidestepped, pivoted, and drove his foot into Vask's knee. The older boy grunted but didn't fall.
Vask slammed an elbow into Kaelren's back.
Pain exploded through his spine. He rolled. Coughed blood.
But he got up.
And then — it happened.
Time slowed. Kaelren felt his blood ignite. Muscles locked, then loosened, as if a seal had been torn open inside his body.
Gene Refinement Path — Body Tempering Realm, Stage 1.
His eyes burned.
His skin tensed.
He moved.
Faster then before — precise. Focused.
Vask lunged again, but Kaelren ducked, grabbed his arm, and flipped him onto the stone with a sound like cracking wood.
Before Vask could rise, Kaelren drove a knee into his face — once, twice — until blood spilled.
The instructor watched the fight with a slight smile.
The pit fell silent.
Kaelren stood panting, blood dripping from his knuckles.
"Rank 48 defeated. Kaelren rises to Rank 48."
Dren, standing at the edge, was wide-eyed.
Then he smiled.
"Alright," he muttered. "No way I'm letting you climb alone."
Dren entered the pit against Rank 49 — a lean brawler with claw-tipped gauntlets.
He didn't match Kaelren's raw strengeth.
But he fought smart.
He baited the older boy, dodged wide strikes, and used the environment — loose stone, blinding dust — to turn the fight.
In the end, he landed a perfect throat-strike that sent his opponent choking to the ground.
"Rank 49 defeated. Dren Talvak now Rank 49."
They didn't speak after — not yet. But the look they shared said enough.
Two shadows climbing from the gutter together.
That night, both Kaelren and Dren were assigned private tents — not the high-rank luxury tents, but durable hide-cloth ones near the eastern hill across from the low ranked tents.
Inside: a cot. A water basin. A dim glowstone. Nothing more.
Kaelren laid down. Muscles aching. Head throbbing.
But the heat in his blood hadn't left.
I broke through, he thought. That was power!
Then sleep took him.
And with it — a vision.
He stood in an empty black field — stars above, stone beneath.
A voice like grinding bone whispered:
"Day is for death.
Night is for rebirth.
Break the flesh…
And the gene will remember."
Before him, lines of red light burned into the void — diagrams, symbols, movements of bone and blood.
He understood them without reading them.
A Gene Refinement Sutra. Ancient. Brutal. Honest.
The method was simple:
Train until the body fails. At night, use the sutra to rebuild it stronger. Repeat.
Endless pain. Endless growth.
This is what I needed, Kaelren thought.
When he awoke, the pain in his limbs had eased. Not completely — but enough to notice.
And his muscles were tighter. Denser.
The sutra had worked.