THE AETHERBORN

Thorne came to hours later, blinking against the groggy haze that clung to him. Darkness had settled thickly over the forest, and the nocturnal symphony of rustling leaves and distant animal calls filled the cool night air.

For a moment, a pang of panic flared—Sid would scold him for being late! But as the memories filtered back, he remembered that the rogue was still bedridden, recovering from his own brutal battle. The thought calmed him, but a wave of soreness quickly replaced any comfort.

With a groan, Thorne sat up, a piercing ache radiating from the side where the boar’s tusks had gored him. Worse than the wound, however, was the weakness that lingered like a weight in his bones, thanks to the aetheric storm he’d unleashed. He’d slept for hours, yet the exhaustion felt bone-deep, beyond what rest alone could mend.

Glancing around, he stiffened as a new realization hit him: he’d been foolish to fall asleep here, out in the open with the scent of blood heavy in the air. He was lucky he hadn’t been picked off by one of the forest’s predators while he lay vulnerable. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled, and he scanned his surroundings, noting the shadows shifting in the dark, just beyond the edges of his vision.

Several notifications crowded his peripheral view, but Thorne forced himself to ignore them for now, focusing instead on his new skill, Hunter’s Insight. He activated it, honing in on the mother boar’s body lying nearby. His vision sharpened, and he wasn’t disappointed. Her tusks, each one longer than his arm, pulsed with faint aetheric light, practically brimming with power.

Only once he’d examined the bodies did he let his attention drift back to the notifications waiting in his view.

Skill Level Up: Daggers!

Skill Level Up: Daggers!

Skill Level Up: Running!

Skill Level Up: Acrobatics!

Skill Level Up: Escape Artist!

Skill Level Up: Thick Skin!

Skill Level Up: Combat Reflexes!

Skill Level Up: Stealth!

Skill Level Up: Shadow Meld!

Skill Level Up: Primal Aether Manipulation!

Skill Level Up: Aether Burst!

Each notification sent a small spark of satisfaction through him, but he quickly focused on the most significant gain: three levels’ worth of points to distribute. He didn’t hesitate, knowing exactly where he needed the most reinforcement. Without question, he funneled fifteen points into Endurance, frustrated with his ongoing limitations.

Lately, every fight, every intense training session with Sid had left him gasping for breath, each lost stamina point dragging him closer to the edge of failure. Boosting his endurance felt like an anchor—a promise that he’d last longer next time.

Ten points went straight into Agility and Dexterity. His training and fighting style had made one thing clear: speed and quick reflexes were essential to his survival, and these points were just as critical to building his advantage as any weapon.

Finally, he spared the last ten points, distributing them between Vitality and Spirit, bolstering both his health and his aether reserves—a prudent choice, given his recent experience with how quickly aether could run dry at the worst possible moment.

Satisfied, he opened his character sheet, inspecting the day’s gains, feeling a sense of readiness despite the ache in his body. Today had tested him, worn him down, but he could feel his growth.

And that felt... Amazing!

Name: Thorne

Level: 17

Race: Human

Age: 9

Special Trait: Elder Race

Health Points: 342/510

Aether: 156/290

Stamina: 110/520

Attributes:

Strength: 30

Agility: 36 → 46

Dexterity: 33 → 43

Endurance: 37 → 52

Vitality: 46 → 51

Spirit: 50 → 55

Wisdom: 29

Intelligence: 30

Skills:

Tracking: 11

Foraging: 3

Archery: 1

Running: 17 → 18

Stealth: 13 → 14

Reading: 7

Arithmetic: 6

Herbalism: 2

Acting: 13

Haggling: 6

Deception: 4 → 9

Sleight of Hand: 5

Pickpocketing: 3

Lockpicking: 2

Resilience: 6

Thick Skin: 18 → 20

Acrobatics: 10 → 12

Daggers: 11 → 14

Escape Artist: 10 → 12

Shadow Meld: 2 → 3

Mindguard: 1

Echoes of Truth: 3

Unarmed Combat: 3

Combat Reflexes: 1 → 3

Stealth Strike: 1

Aether Skills:

Primal Aether Manipulation: 7 → 8

Aether Burst: 2 → 3

Aether Surge: 1

Thorne marveled at his progress, his eyes lingering on the new skills he’d unlocked. Hunter's Insight and Stealth Strike sparked a thrill in his chest, opening up exciting possibilities for his future hunts and battles. Despite his exhaustion, he felt a surge of pride; this battle had forged him in ways he hadn’t imagined.

The forest night had settled in, bringing an eerie quiet that only the occasional distant howl or rustle disrupted. Thorne’s new skill, Hunter’s Insight, was guiding him, highlighting the pockets of aether-rich parts within the boars’ bodies, each glowing faintly in his vision. He took a steadying breath and refocused, his hands moving with calculated precision as he started the harvesting process.

But the effort proved far from easy. Every movement was a struggle, his limbs heavy and aching from the battle, and each shift sent fresh waves of pain through his side where the boar had gutted him. Yet he pushed through, knowing the importance of the task.

He began with the piglets, their smaller size making them more manageable. The insight skill highlighted specific organs, the tusks, and a few bones that still pulsed with faint aetheric energy. Extracting them was another matter. He struggled with their tough hide, his knives barely cutting through at first. He reminded himself to focus only on the most valuable parts. The hides, durable as they were, didn’t carry any particular magic or aetheric properties; they’d only waste his precious time and dwindling energy. Instead, he turned his attention to their tusks and bones—each rich with concentrated aether.

Working carefully, he began sawing off the tusks, each one gleaming with faint aetheric light. The mother boar’s tusks were particularly impressive, massive and curved like scimitars, far larger than his own forearm, and he knew they’d fetch a handsome price in any market.

The piglets’ tusks, though smaller, were still valuable, each holding faint pulses of energy. As he worked, his hands trembled from fatigue, yet he moved with care, keeping his grip steady to avoid wasting a single part of these precious resources.

Next, he turned to the bones. Accessing the larger ones was a challenge, especially in his weakened state, and he managed to extract only a single thigh bone from the most damaged piglet. The process was slow, labor-intensive, and every tug of the knife felt like a weight pressing against his muscles. The smell of blood clung to him, and the wet squelching sounds turned his stomach, but he pushed through. The bones, he knew, were infused with aether and could be powerful components for crafting or trade.

A distant howl echoed through the trees, drawing his attention momentarily to the deeper forest. He quickened his pace. Each second spent here increased the chance of attracting a predator, drawn by the scent of fresh blood.

Finally, he turned his attention to the mother boar. Her hide was almost impenetrable, and each attempt he made with his knives barely scratched the surface. After a few futile efforts, he abandoned the hide, instead focusing on the areas that Hunter’s Insight had marked as valuable. His attention was drawn to a particular organ in her neck, pulsing faintly in his vision. With painstaking precision, he managed to reach it, extracting a dark, hardened organ that seemed to pulse with its own aetheric energy.

The organ looked like a lump of coal, dark and dense, yet it was the source of her ability to breathe smoke and embers. As he held it, he felt the power within, an aetheric potency that was almost palpable.

The piglets’ versions of this organ, smaller and underdeveloped, lacked the strength of their mother’s but would still fetch value. He wrapped them all carefully in his makeshift shirt-bag, ensuring they were secure.

When he finally stood back, Thorne sighed in relief, wiping a thin layer of sweat from his brow. His muscles ached, and his body felt as if it had been drained entirely. The mother boar’s remains lay before him, still impressive even in death, and he felt a faint pang of defeat at leaving so much behind. But his body was nearing its limit, and the cries of creatures prowling through the forest were growing louder, closer.

Satisfied with his haul, Thorne pushed himself upright, though his body protested every movement. His side throbbed from the boar’s wound, and a lingering heaviness clung to him, the price of his reckless use of Aether Surge. But resting here, deep in the forest, was out of the question. He needed to keep moving.

As he made his way out of the elven forest, Thorne’s senses remained on high alert. Every rustle in the shadows felt too close, and the wild calls of unseen creatures followed his every step, echoing off the trees like ghostly warnings.

An unsettling feeling of being watched prickled at his skin, reminding him that, weakened and slowed by his loot, he’d be an easy target. His grip tightened around the tusks and bones, prepared to use them as crude weapons if necessary. But mercifully, the treeline broke open, and at last, the familiar, flickering lights of the city came into view, twinkling like distant stars through the trees.

As he trudged through the city streets, he drew curious and sometimes horrified glances. His clothes were torn, dirty, and spattered with blood, and the odd array of boar tusks and strange, fleshy organs in his arms made him a sight to behold. Even the working women on the corners fell silent, their calls to prospective clients forgotten as they stared, wide-eyed, at the bloodied figure cutting through the night.

But Thorne paid them no mind. All he wanted was a hot meal and his bed. With his hands full, he had to bash the door open, startling Jonah and Ben, who jumped with a pair of high-pitched yelps and huddled together as if they’d seen a ghost.

Thorne frowned, rolling his eyes at their overreaction. "It’s just me,” he muttered, setting his haul down on the small table with a heavy thud.

The boys let out audible sighs of relief, though Jonah’s face held a lingering mix of confusion and awe as he eyed the bloody collection. Thorne allowed himself a sigh of satisfaction as he noticed a bowl of soup waiting for him on the table, the fragrant aroma rising with hints of carrot and savory herbs.

Jonah’s gaze never left the haul, his eyes wide with calculation. He leaned in hesitantly, almost as if he didn’t trust himself to get too close to the strange organs and jagged tusks. Thorne ignored him and sank into a chair, sighing with relief as he dug eagerly into the soup, savoring each mouthful as warmth spread through his exhausted body.

“How did you manage all this?” Jonah demanded, his voice somewhere between astonishment and suspicion. "What the hell, Thorne? How many beasts did you kill? How? How?" His mouth hung open, at a rare loss for words. "Not even hunters dare enter the elven forest, afraid of the aether beasts, and you just casually stroll in and kill a bunch of them?"

Thorne, taking another bite of soup to buy himself a moment, feigned indifference, shrugging as if it were no big deal. He wasn’t about to reveal the truth about his core or skills, so he activated Echoes of Truth, infusing his lie with a hint of aether to make it sound natural and convincing. “What can I say? I was lucky,” he replied with a carefully melancholic tone. “My father taught me everything he knew about hunting back when I was little.”

Jonah looked skeptical but said nothing, studying him with an almost admiring frown. Thorne took the opportunity to tilt his bowl back for a long, satisfying sip, then gestured at his torn side. “Not like I came back unscathed, as you can see.”

From behind, he heard Ben’s signature grunt, and Thorne glanced over to see the blond boy crushing herbs into a small bowl, his expression grim. Jonah, now leaning eagerly over the pile, seemed to be calculating the profit of each piece, though his hands hovered with a certain wariness, as though he half-expected one of the fleshy organs to come alive.

“Sell everything but the weird, fleshy balls,” Thorne told him between bites.

Jonah’s curiosity got the better of him, and he immediately reached for the glistening, mysterious organs, his finger hovering in fascination. Thorne smirked, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he warned, barely looking up.

Jonah’s hand froze. “Why not?” he asked, his tone half-defiant.

“They’re full of poison,” Thorne replied casually, relishing the way Jonah’s face shifted from curiosity to horror as he quickly withdrew his hand.

Jonah nodded solemnly. “Right,” he muttered, clearing his throat. “Guess I won’t be having those for dinner, then.”

Thorne barely hid a grin as he finished the last of his soup, feeling the warmth dull his aches. But just as he set down his bowl, Ben approached, holding a bowl of medicinal paste and sporting a pointedly disapproving expression. Without a word, he began to rub the ointment onto Thorne’s wounds with deliberate, brusque movements.

Jonah snickered, folding his arms with an exaggeratedly satisfied expression. “Looks like you’ve made Ben angry,” he remarked with a grin.

Thorne winced under the sting of the paste, looking up at Ben with a guilty smile. “Sorry, Ben. Didn’t mean to make you worry.”

Ben narrowed his eyes, holding the gaze for a long moment before finally stopping his angry grunting.

“You know, Thorne,” Jonah said, gingerly poking at the fleshy organs with a stick, “we might actually make a decent haul from this. Just… try not to die next time, okay? Hard to make sales when the supplier’s dead.”

Thorne chuckled, though the laughter sent a painful pang through his side. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Jonah settled beside him, casting another greedy, calculating look at the haul. “Seriously, Thorne, you ever think about making this a regular thing? Forget the small-time pickpocketing. We could make a real fortune.” His eyes gleamed, as if already counting out the coins in his head.

Finishing the last of his soup, Thorne shook his head. “It’s not that simple, Jonah. The forest is dangerous.” But Jonah only shrugged, too caught up in the possibilities of profit to worry about the risks.

Thorne leaned back, his gaze shifting to Ben, who was still watching him with a quiet, unspoken worry. “Thanks, Ben,” he said, genuinely grateful. Ben nodded again, his eyes bright with both determination and a lingering concern, the sort that didn’t go away just because Thorne was back.

They sat in companionable silence for a while, the warmth of the room a welcome balm after the chill of the forest night. But gradually, the mood shifted, turning heavy and somber.

Thorne noticed it in the way Jonah’s shoulders drooped and in the distant, haunted look in Ben’s eyes. It dawned on him that on most nights, the two boys would be out at the docks by now, working as lookouts. Their absence now felt like a silent admission that something was wrong.

“Why aren’t you guys at the docks?” Thorne asked, breaking the thickening silence.

Jonah’s face darkened, and Ben’s lower lip began to tremble, his eyes shining with unshed tears. Thorne’s heart sank. He had no idea what could’ve happened, but he knew enough to brace himself. It took Jonah several moments to respond, and when he did, the words chilled Thorne to the bone.

“Two more cousins went missing today,” Jonah murmured, his voice barely more than a whisper.

Thorne’s stomach twisted. “Who?” he asked, a sick feeling spreading through him.

“Timur was one of them,” Jonah replied, his expression softening with a flicker of sadness. “He was… different from the rest of us. Too kind. Always the first to help anyone, always had a smile for Ben.” Jonah glanced over at Ben, who nodded, tears welling up as he clamped his trembling lips shut.

Thorne took a steadying breath, trying to think. Sure, it wasn’t unheard of for an orphan to go missing now and then, but three cousins disappearing in just two days was disturbing. That kind of thing usually only happened during turf wars, when gangs fought openly in the streets. But they hadn’t heard any rumors of conflict, no warnings of a brewing storm between factions. So who would target the cousins—and why?

“Are you certain they disappeared?” Thorne asked, trying to sound rational. “Maybe they just… went somewhere together.”

But Jonah shook his head grimly. “They barely knew each other, Thorne. Timur and the other kid hardly even talked.” He paused, casting a hesitant glance toward Ben, then leaned closer, his voice dropping to a barely audible whisper. “Jenny said she saw something… She swore she saw a man in black grab Timur off the street and slit his throat. Right there. Didn’t even hide it.”

Thorne felt a chill shoot through him, icy and sharp. It wasn’t just a disappearance, then—it was cold-blooded murder, bold and public, as if meant to send a message. The thought was terrifying, and as he looked over, he noticed Ben had gone pale, his eyes wide and horrified. Ben made a small, choked sound, and before either of them could react, he bolted, darting down the narrow stairs and out into the night.

“Ben!” Thorne called, his voice tight with alarm, but the boy was already gone.

Jonah cursed, tugging his hair in frustration. “Dammit, Ben!” he muttered under his breath before rushing after him.

Thorne sat frozen, his mind reeling. Two cousins gone. Three in two days, if the rumors were true. His thoughts raced through every possible explanation, every terrifying possibility. Was someone targeting them? Was this a rival gang’s attempt at a takeover, a brutal power play to push the cousins out? Or was this something more sinister, a trap aimed at Uncle or at someone higher up? And if so, why target orphans?

A dark realization settled over him: whoever was behind this wasn’t stopping. The cousins were easy prey, scattered across the streets and bound by little more than loyalty and survival.

He couldn’t shake the feeling that they were being hunted, picked off like animals. It was open season, and every cousin could be the next target.