Chapter 10: The Pulse Awakens

The shrine fell into a trembling silence—every flame frozen mid-flicker, every speck of dust suspended as if time itself held its breath.

Ren slowly lifted his head.

His eyes glowed with a pale, otherworldly white. Not bright, not blinding—just wrong, like light coming from a place that had never known sunlight.

Astra took one step back.

Yoruha didn’t move. She was too terrified even to breathe.

Kagetsu’s cracked mask tilted as he observed Ren, his stance shifting from cold confidence to genuine caution.

“So… it finally answers you,” Kagetsu muttered. “The Pulse has made a mistake.”

Ren didn’t hear him.

All he heard was the heartbeat echoing inside his skull—

BOOM

BOOM

BOOM

It pulsed through his veins like molten metal, every beat tightening his muscles and sharpening his senses. His right arm blazed with white cracks that spread to his shoulder and chest, glowing beneath his skin.

Yoruha knelt beside him, trembling. “Ren… can you hear me? Ren, please—say something.”

His breath came in shallow bursts. He tried to speak, but the voice that slipped out was layered—his own mixed with a deeper, resonant hum:

“Y…oru…ha.”

Astra snapped her hands into a seal, blue energy flaring.

“Ren, listen to me! You need to stop channeling it or your body will—”

Ren’s gaze flicked to her. The moment their eyes met, Astra’s energy shattered with a crack.

She staggered back, trembling. “The Pulse is overriding him.”

Kagetsu raised his bone-plated hand.

“Then we end him now.”

With a fluid motion, he summoned a massive bone blade and hurled it straight at Ren.

Yoruha screamed—and moved.

She threw herself in front of Ren, fully ready to take the strike.

But the blade never touched her.

Halfway through the air, it froze, twisted in on itself, and shattered to dust.

Ren had raised his trembling arm without even realizing it.

A shockwave rippled through the shrine.

Kagetsu braced himself. “So the Pulse grants you power… but not control.”

Ren forced himself to stand. Each breath clawed at his lungs. His bones felt like they were vibrating under his skin. But he faced Kagetsu anyway.

The light in his eyes intensified.

Kagetsu slid into a battle stance. “Come then, Chosen Mistake.”

Ren vanished.

One moment he stood five feet away; the next he was inches from Kagetsu—faster than his own mind could follow. His strike landed square in Kagetsu’s chest, sending the Warden flying into a stone pillar.

The impact cracked the mask further.

Astra’s eyes widened. “That speed… humans can’t move like that.”

Ren took one step toward Kagetsu—

—and suddenly fell to his knees, clutching his chest.

The pain hit like a hammer. His glowing veins throbbed violently. A strand of light flickered out, and Ren choked on a scream.

Yoruha grabbed him, desperate. “Ren—stop! You’re tearing yourself apart!”

For a moment, the glow faded from his eyes.

He saw her clearly.

Really saw her.

“Yo…ruha…” he whispered, voice shaking. “I… I can’t hold it…”

She held his face gently. “Then let it go. You don’t have to fight like this.”

Astra stood ready behind them, weaving a sealing sigil in the air.

“Yoruha, pull him back from it! I’ll lock the energy down.”

But Kagetsu wasn’t done.

He rose from the rubble, mask fractured enough to reveal a glimpse of the hollow black void underneath.

“You don’t understand,” Kagetsu rasped. “If he loses control, the Pulse will break its roots—its prison. The island will wake.”

Astra froze mid-seal.

“He can’t be allowed to reach that state.”

Kagetsu spread his arms, bone armor swirling around him like living shards.

“This ends now.”

He thrust both hands forward—

—and countless bone lances shot toward Ren with killing intent.

Yoruha braced herself to shield him—

But Ren moved first.

He stood, shaking, barely conscious. But he opened his eyes, and the world dimmed around him.

A single white pulse rippled outward from his body.

Every bone lance disintegrated instantly.

Kagetsu staggered. “Impossible…”

Ren raised his hand again, but this time, the glow dimmed, scattered, and flickered like a candle in the wind. His body was done fighting.

The power shut off—

—and he collapsed.

Yoruha caught him before he hit the ground. “Ren! Wake up—please!”

Astra rushed to them, placing a glowing hand on Ren’s chest, checking his pulse. Her eyes widened.

“He’s alive… but his connection has deepened. The Pulse marked him.”

Kagetsu lowered his arm slowly, voice trembling with a mixture of awe and anger.

“The island will start hunting him now. Even I cannot stop it.”

A heavy silence filled the shrine.

Astra lifted Ren carefully.

“Then we move. Now. Before Crimson Eden awakens fully.”

Yoruha wiped the tears from her eyes and nodded.

But before they could leave, the ground beneath the shrine rumbled—deep, ancient, hungry.

Something beneath the island had stirred.

And it knew Ren’s name.

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