The Fiend Egg, sensing the attempted attack, reacted instantly. The swirling black energy intensified, thickening into a dense fog that filled the room. The aura of corruption grew even stronger, so potent that Cross felt his body start to rebel against it. He could see the energy seeping into the floor, warping and twisting the tiles into rust, the metal of his knife corroding in his hand before shattering into pieces.

It’s speeding up.

Cross’s pulse quickened. The egg was hatching faster now, and he had no way to stop it. He’d triggered the process, and now it was too late.

Two problems now stared him in the face: one, the egg was about to hatch, and two, he didn’t know how to manipulate Source. He had no way to stop this thing.

His eyes darted around the bathroom, searching for something, anything, that could help him. But the bathroom was small, bare, and the air was thick with the corrupt energy of the Fiend. There was no escaping it now.

Cross’s mind raced, searching for answers. How did Rankers use Source? He’d barely had any time to figure that out. His eyes fell back on the egg, watching the black miasma pulse faster, like a heart ready to burst. His thoughts scrambled through the bits of information he had gathered. Rankers manipulated Source energy, but how? Was it something instinctual? Something you had to learn?

His Heavenly Eyes flared, pulling his focus back to the particles of Source swirling around him. Red particles—Body—floated nearby, drawn to him like magnets.

Could I absorb them?

With his Clairvoyance ability engaged, Cross’s mind operated at an unnaturally heightened speed, calculating every detail in the space around him. Time seemed to stretch, and despite the terror that should have consumed him, a forced sense of calm overtook his body. His Heavenly Eyes granted him clarity in the madness, showing him that he had only ten seconds before the Fiend Egg would hatch. And ten seconds wasn’t much time when facing down a potential death sentence.

He gripped the knife tighter, knowing that it wouldn’t do him any good. The information from his eyes flooded his brain, offering details he wouldn’t have otherwise noticed—the black miasma was not only corrupting the area around the egg, but it was pulsating, eager to release whatever lay within. If the egg hatched, Cross had no doubt that he’d be dead in seconds.

His mind scrambled for anything useful. Think, think! There had to be a way to manipulate Source energy, the key to Rankers’ power. He cursed himself for not having learned how to channel it yet, but then, in the back of his mind, a memory sparked.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

It was a video, something he’d watched when he was six years old. An interview with a Ranker who had specialized in Mind, bragging about how he could manipulate Source to kill Fiends by the dozens. Cross had skimmed past most of the interview, bored by the Ranker’s ego, but there had been one useful part at the end, when the interviewer had asked how the Ranker controlled Source.

Cross fast-forwarded the memory in his mind, skipping past the boasting, until he found the part he needed.

The Ranker had explained that to manipulate Source, you first had to establish a connection with the world’s Source energy around you. For a Mind Ranker, the trick was to imagine a link between your own Source and the world’s, using your thoughts as the bridge. Once you summoned the Source particles within yourself, you’d connect them with the outside world’s Source and channel that energy through your body.

It was a simple explanation, but the process itself wasn’t exactly straightforward. Cross cursed under his breath. He didn’t have time to figure out the intricacies—he had five seconds before the egg hatched, and he didn’t have a mind for Mind energy. His affinity was for Body.

But the concept was the same, right? Body Source would follow the same principle. He just had to summon the energy within him and link it with the red Source particles—the Body class—that surrounded him. And thanks to his Heavenly Eyes, he could literally see the Source energy floating in the air like a swarm of colored particles. The white Source particles were everywhere, but the red ones—Body—stayed close to him, like they were waiting to be called.

Cross closed his eyes for a moment, trying to focus. He didn’t have time for trial and error. He imagined a connection with the Body Source particles in the world around him, reaching out to touch them. When he opened his eyes, the particles swarmed toward him, gathering at his command. They floated around him, almost like he was a magnet drawing them in.

But there was one problem—he didn’t have enough Body Source stored inside him yet. He was too inexperienced, too new to this world to have accumulated much. He could feel the minuscule amount of energy in his body, barely enough to spark a match, let alone combat a Fiend.

Three seconds left.

Cross cursed again and decided to throw caution to the wind. He summoned what little Body Source energy he had and willed it to connect with the red particles around him. It was weak, but it was all he had.

For a moment, nothing happened. His heart sank, and panic threatened to overwhelm him. The particles swirled around him lazily, almost as if they were disappointed.

But then, just as he was about to give up, the connection snapped into place. The red Source particles surged toward him, drawn into his body like a torrent of power. He gasped, his muscles tensing as a wave of energy flooded through him.

Too much.

He had pulled in more Source than his body could handle. Heat surged through his veins, his skin tingling with the overwhelming force. His vision blurred, and for a moment, he felt like he was going to pass out. But there was no time for that.

One second left.