Even though she had a real treasure in her hand, the idea that the man was leading them into a trap still had weight.

However, his next words shattered that last layer of doubt.

Mad Scientist rose to his feet once more. This time he didn't try to gain his composure. He let the weariness sit plainly on his face, and when he spoke, his voice came out heavy. "Because only a God can stop a God."

Any sane and righteous man in the Midlands who heard that line would laugh and write him off as insane.

This cult did not. For them, those words rang like a simple statement of fact and naked intent.

Watching their God rise against the others, crushing them, and tearing apart the four main paths was the kind of future they would gladly die to see. It was carved into their purpose.

So seeing someone else share the very dream they lived for was enough to make them accept his resolve without another question.

With nothing left to doubt, the leader closed her fingers more firmly around the key, feeling both its weight and the faint pulse running through it. She turned away from the man and walked toward the blood pool.

The cultists parted at once, clearing a path while dropping to their knees again before the body rested on the surface of the blood.

She stopped at the edge of the pool. The key slipped from her fingers and fell into the blood with an unceremonious, almost casual motion.

Then she lowered herself to her knees as well. From this point on, all that remained was to pray in silence and wait for the blood to digest the Rank 4 treasure.

Mad Scientist remained where he was for a while, watching the ritual unfold, not daring to interrupt with even the smallest sound.

After some time, he finally turned away, stepped back into the waiting darkness, and walked until it closed around him and his figure vanished once more.

—

Far from the ritual grounds, a soft breeze drifted through the dense forest, carrying the warmth of a sun that was slowly brightening into a clearer yellow, stirring the leaves and branches into a gentle rustle.

A bird chirped into the air, soaking in the warm breeze, greeting the shifting color of the sky, and happily welcoming another cycle of the day with simple, content sounds.

It spread its small bluish wings and jumped from its nest on a high branch, leaving behind its newly hatched eggs to search for the breakfast they were chirping for without pause.

Gliding between neighboring trees, it scanned the forest floor below. Its two bead-like blue eyes searched for anything edible. Roots, shrubs, patches of earth—nothing escaped its attention.

But there was nothing to find.

No bug to catch, no fruit fit to eat, not even a single visible creature.

The whole forest, sometime during the mother bird's sleep, seemed to have been abandoned in one quiet sweep. Life had vanished, leaving only a lingering stillness in its place.

Its instincts screamed at it to turn around and leave this place like everything else already had. Yet its wings kept moving, driven by the need to bring back food for the small, hungry beaks waiting in the nest, as it climbed higher above the tall trees.

Soon after it cleared the canopy, something new caught its eye—something that hadn't existed the night before.

A giant clearing sliced through the forest where there had been only trees. It looked like something had simply pushed everything aside, leaving a wide, raw gap in the greenery.

At the center of that gap sat a single red shape, shining under the sunlight in a way that pulled at the mother bird's hunger.

The bird flapped its wings harder and rushed toward the strange thing. It resembled an egg—like her own—but larger and entirely red.

Sensing no threat, only the strong smell of something that promised a satisfying meal, it landed on the smooth, reflective surface and drove its beak down, intent on tasting this delicious-scented egg.

The first strike met solid resistance. Pain jolted through its skull from how hard it was, a dull ache blooming behind its eyes.

Still, it refused to give up. It pecked again. And again. And again.

At last, a sharp sound rang out.

Crack.

The egg, however, remained smooth and whole. It was the tip of the bird's beak that had shattered, worn down by too many impacts. The sharp point was gone, leaving only a broken stump.

Even so, the bird didn't stop. It continued to hammer its ruined beak against the shell, each blow more desperate than the last. The original goal of finding food for its hatchlings faded away, smothered by the singular need to taste whatever was inside this red shell.

Desire drove it, and greed became its death.

After pecking at the shell until its beak was entirely ruined and its head smashed and bleeding from the impact, the bird finally toppled to the ground. It lay still, with only a brief twitch of its wings showing the last trace of life leaving its body.

If the bird had possessed a bit more awareness, it would have seen what really lay around that egg that promised a feast but only dealt out death.

Dozens—no, hundreds—of other birds and small creatures formed a ring around the red shell, each one drawn in by the same hunger, each one having collapsed the same way, all of them lying dead at its side.

None of them were truly at fault. The egg itself was the hunter, its presence a lure that wrapped the forest's residents in a pull they simply had no power to resist.

As time crawled on, more animals and even insects arrived, only to join the growing mound of bodies. The pile of corpses rose higher and higher around the egg until, at last, something shifted from within.

The red shell that no beak, tooth, or claw had managed to crack began to tremble. Harsh, splitting sounds cut through the clearing as thin, red-tinged fractures spread across its surface.

When the cracks webbed over the entire egg, a force from inside surged outward in a single violent blow, blasting a large section of the shell apart.

An arm slid free of the opening.

It was pure white, the skin smooth and unblemished, with a soft, almost human fairness that still felt wrong to look at.

The blood-red nails running along the long, delicate fingers made the limb seem less like something that could ever grow from a living body and more like a sculpture carved by a master mind, every contour too deliberate, every proportion disturbingly perfect.

The arm didn't stop after shattering a single section. It drove outward, breaking the shell around it and carving a wide opening for the body inside to walk out freely.

The figure that stepped outside trod on the animal and insect corpses without a hint of concern and lifted his head toward the bright sky.

His dark red hair stirred under the soft breeze, and his eyes, deep like a restless crimson sea, lazily turned to the bright sun.

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