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Tick… Tick… Tick…
Night settled over the lower domain like a lid being pressed onto a boiling pot. The wind cooled. The rocks released the day's heat in slow, grudging breaths. Insects began their endless clicking in the crevices, and far away something large and hungry called out to the darkness as if announcing it had woken up.
Awoooooo…
Sekhmet sat beneath the overhang with his back against stone, knees drawn slightly up, arms folded tight enough to keep his body from shaking. The thin shelter did little to block the night air, but it hid the campfire's glow and kept the scent from drifting too far. He did not light a large fire. Large fires were invitations. In purgatory, invitations were answered with teeth.
The bat slept in his coat pocket, warm and annoyingly peaceful.
Renn sat a few steps away, pretending to rest while pretending not to watch Sekhmet. His eyes kept flicking toward the place where Sekhmet had stored the shadow beast residue. Toward Sekhmet's hands. Toward the air around Sekhmet, like he was waiting for the invisible storage to open again so he could count treasure with his gaze.
Sekhmet noticed it.
He pretended not to.
Because he was tired.
Because he was weak.
Because he was not in the mood to babysit another living creature.
Because he was still trying to swallow the fact that he had been chained in that orc dungeon for three weeks.
Three weeks.
The number had hit him earlier like a fist when Renn mentioned it casually, as if it was nothing.
Three weeks of darkness. Three weeks of dripping water. Three weeks of chains cutting into his wrists. Three weeks of not knowing whether time had moved or stopped. Three weeks of thinking escape was a myth and his life had become a single room with no night and no day.
Sekhmet's body still carried it. His shoulders ached when he moved. His muscles felt like rope left out in rain. His joints cracked with every stretch, and his skin still itched where the chains had bitten. Worse than the pain was the memory of helplessness. It lived behind his ribs like a small animal scratching at the inside of his bones.
He breathed in slowly.
Cold air.
Stone dust.
Smoke.
The faint metallic tang that never fully left his mouth.
He had drunk water. He had swallowed until his stomach felt heavy, until his throat stopped burning.
And still…
Thirst remained.
Not normal thirst.
Not the kind you solved with a skin of water and a few deep gulps.
This thirst sat deeper, gnawing under his tongue, tightening his throat, making his mouth feel dry no matter how much he drank. It was like his body was thirsty for something that water could not understand.
He shifted against the stone and winced.
The rings on his fingers felt heavier at night. Or maybe he was more aware of them when he was still. The weight tool did not let him forget. It pressed him down, reminding him of the promise again and again that he had made to his father without speaking a word.
Survive five years.
Come back at twenty.
Learn the truth about your mother.
Now the city was three months away, not three days, not a short march. Three months across purgatory land where jungles took years to cross and beasts hunted travelers like sport. Three months was a sentence.
Sekhmet's jaw tightened.
I cannot stay weak.
I cannot stay confused.
I cannot stay soft.
Then the system chimed.
Ding!
The sound sliced clean through the night like a blade.
Sekhmet's eyes snapped open fully, and his body tensed, ready for an attack that was not physical but still felt dangerous. A window unfolded in his vision, pale and steady.
[System Alert- Host hydration level: critically low. Immediate action required.]
Sekhmet stared at the words.
His throat tightened in anger.
"What," he whispered.
He grabbed the water skin beside him and drank again, long and deep. The water was cold now, and it ran down his throat in a clean stream.
Gulp… Gulp… Gulp…
He drank until his stomach pulled tight.
He lowered the skin, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and waited for relief.
It did not come.
The thirst remained, stubborn and cruel, sitting in his mouth like sand.
Sekhmet's eyes narrowed.
"I drank so much water," he muttered, voice low. "Why am I still thirsty?"
The system answered immediately, calm as ever, as if it had been waiting for him to ask the obvious question.
[System notification: Host thirst is not water-based. Host thirst is blood-based. Recommendation: consume blood.]
Sekhmet froze.
The night seemed to get colder.
His stomach lurched slightly, not from nausea but from shock that turned into nausea a heartbeat later.
"Blood," he repeated.
He stared at the system window as if the word might change if he looked at it long enough.
His mind tried to reject it instinctively.
"No.
I am not—"
He stopped.
He did not know what he was anymore.
He had swallowed the blood god essence.
He had awakened a blood system.
He had controlled blood like it was a toy.
He had formed a sword out of it.
He had summoned a blood bat.
He had fed that bat flesh and blood like it was normal.
He had done all of this while pretending he was still the same person.
Sekhmet's throat worked.
"Are you telling me," he whispered, "that I need to drink blood."
[System: Confirmed. Blood System activation altered host requirements. Water will not resolve host thirst. Blood consumption will stabilize the host state and recover fatigue.]
Sekhmet's chest tightened.
A cold memory flashed through him.
Chains.
Darkness.
Dripping water.
The feeling of being powerless while something else controlled his fate.
Now the system wanted to control him in a different way.
Drink blood.
He clenched his fists.
The rings pressed into his skin.
The bat in his pocket shifted and made a tiny, sleepy sound.
"Batbat…"