The first real battle did not begin with a roar.
It began with hesitation.
The village was small—too small to matter to anyone important. A cluster of wooden houses clinging to the edge of a forest that swallowed light even during the day. The kind of place history forgets unless something terrible happens there.
Something terrible already had.
Smoke curled faintly from the treeline, thin and lazy, as if whatever caused it was in no hurry to leave. The ground told the rest of the story. Broken tracks. Blood dragged rather than spilled. Claw marks deep enough to gouge stone.
I followed them in silence.
Fear lingered in the air long after the screams faded. Humans always leave it behind, like a scent. It grows weaker with time, but never truly disappears. Monsters notice it. So do men like me.
When I reached the clearing, I saw the creature immediately.
It was larger than most beasts but smaller than the stories people liked to tell. That was always the case. Reality never bothered to meet expectations. Its hide was dark and ridged, muscles coiled tightly beneath skin scarred by old fights. Curved horns framed a face twisted more by instinct than malice.
It was feeding.
A body lay torn at its feet, barely recognizable as human. I counted the breaths without thinking. One. Two. Three.
The creature lifted its head.
Our eyes met.
There is a moment in every fight—brief, fragile—where both sides understand what will happen next. Where the world balances on a single decision.
Attack.
Wait.
Run.
The beast growled. Low. Warning, not challenge.
It was wounded. I saw that immediately. One of its legs dragged slightly. Fresh blood stained the dirt behind it. Someone had fought it already.
And lost.
My hand tightened around the spear.
I could leave.
That thought surprised me with its clarity. I had completed the Order's task simply by finding the threat. Report its location. Let a squad handle it. Let efficiency replace risk.
But then I looked at the corpse again.
I imagined a second one. A third.
The spear felt heavier.
The thing inside me stirred—not urgently, not violently. Patient.
It trusted me to decide.
I stepped forward.
The beast roared then, sound tearing through the clearing like a physical force. It charged with no hesitation, pain forgotten beneath instinct. The ground shook beneath its weight.
I moved.
Training took over first. Footwork precise, angle calculated, spear thrust low to exploit the injury. The tip bit into flesh, drawing a scream from the creature—not of fear, but rage.
It swung wildly. I ducked, rolled, felt air tear past where my head had been a heartbeat earlier. Pain grazed my shoulder as claws clipped armor.
Good.
Pain anchored me.
The fight should have ended quickly. It didn't.
The beast was stronger than expected, fueled by desperation and survival. Every strike I made was answered with reckless force. It did not fight to win. It fought because it refused to die.
That refusal resonated with something inside me.
A mistake.
The creature caught the spear mid-thrust, claws digging into the shaft. With a violent wrench, it yanked me forward. The world lurched. I felt ribs strain as momentum betrayed me.
For the first time, fear cut through discipline.
Not fear of death.
Fear of losing control.
The mark burned.
Heat flooded my veins, sharp and intoxicating. Time slowed—not magically, but perceptively. I saw the muscles tense, saw the moment before the beast would strike.
I could end it.
Easily.
The power was there, humming beneath my skin, eager and precise. No chaos. No frenzy.
Just certainty.
I hesitated.
That pause nearly killed me.
The beast's claw tore across my chest, shredding armor, ripping flesh. Pain exploded bright and blinding. I staggered back, breath knocked from my lungs, vision swimming.
Blood soaked into the dirt.
Mine.
The thing inside me surged—not angrily, but decisively.
It did not ask.
It assumed consent.
The next movement was not technique.
It was instinct refined by violence.
I stepped in before the beast could recover, hands steady despite the blood loss. The spear spun once, twice—then drove forward with force no human training alone could explain.
The tip punched through hide, muscle, bone.
Silence followed.
The beast's roar cut short, replaced by a wet gasp as its body convulsed once, then went still. My hands did not shake as I withdrew the spear.
I stood there, chest heaving, staring at what remained.
The power receded slowly, like a tide pulling back from the shore. Warmth faded. Time returned to its normal pace.
What replaced it was worse.
Clarity.
I had not lost control.
I had chosen.
The realization settled heavy in my chest.
I looked down at my hands—steady, capable, stained red. They had not acted on their own. I had guided them. Allowed the thing inside me to merge with intent rather than override it.
That frightened me more than rage ever had.
The villagers arrived minutes later, drawn by noise, by smoke, by hope thin enough to break. They stopped at the edge of the clearing, staring.
At the corpse.
At me.
Some cried. Some whispered prayers. One woman fell to her knees, sobbing thanks to any god that would listen.
No one approached me.
I wanted to tell them it was finished. That they were safe.
The words lodged in my throat.
What would safety mean, spoken by someone like me?
I left before they gathered the courage to speak.
By the time night fell, my wound had closed enough to stop bleeding, but pain lingered. Pain is honest. It does not pretend to be earned or deserved. It simply exists.
I made camp beneath a crooked tree, far from the village lights. As I cleaned the spear, images replayed unbidden—the creature's eyes, the moment of decision, the ease of the final strike.
That ease haunted me.
I had always feared losing control.
I had not prepared for the possibility that control would come naturally.
The thing inside me was quiet now, satisfied in a way that felt disturbingly neutral. Not pleased. Not bloodthirsty.
Aligned.
I leaned back against the tree, staring at the dark sky.
What did it mean if I was strongest when I accepted what they feared?
What did it mean if violence felt… right?
I remembered the hesitation before the fight. The option to walk away. The brief, fragile moment where I could have chosen differently.
And I wondered—if given that moment again, would I decide the same?
The answer came too quickly.
Yes.
Not because I enjoyed killing.
Because I understood it.
That understanding frightened me—but it also brought a strange sense of relief. Doubt is exhausting. Certainty is simple.
Dangerously so.
I closed my eyes, listening to the forest breathe around me. Somewhere, something moved through the dark. I felt it—not through sound, but awareness sharpened by experience.
More would come.
They always do.
The world does not leave weapons unused for long.
If this is what survival demands of me, then I will pay the price consciously. Not as a beast. Not as a puppet.
As a man who knows exactly what he is becoming—and walks forward anyway.