Beast Devourer: I Grow Stronger by Eating Monsters

Valeria looked at the Pulse Core again.

”When was the first time you shot someone?”

The question came without warning, and Raven stopped moving his hand.

She kept her eyes on him.

”You don’t have to answer.”

That made answering easier.

”Before Black Hound.”

”In combat?”

”Yes.”

”Do you remember it?”

”Yes.”

Valeria waited, but Raven didn’t give her details. A name, a place, blood—none of it mattered now.

”It wasn’t particularly heroic,” he said eventually. ”He was trying to kill me. I was faster.”

Valeria nodded.

She didn’t ask whether he had felt guilty.

He appreciated that too.

”And after that, did it become easy?”

Raven thought about it.

”Familiar.”

”That isn’t the same thing.”

”No.”

The room remained quiet for several seconds before Valeria pointed toward the Pulse Core.

”So after years of using weapons made by people who knew what they were doing, your first personal attempt depends on an organ ripped out of a monster horse during a thunderstorm.”

Raven looked at her.

”When you say it like that, it sounds irresponsible.”

”It is.”

”Then the description is accurate.”

She laughed.

Raven slept for eight hours.

Valeria considered that enough of a victory to have the courtesy not to mention it until breakfast.

”You didn’t say you were staying another day.”

”Because I’m not.”

”But you slept.”

”I do that occasionally.”

”Eight hours.”

Raven cut off a piece of bread.

”I don’t need a ceremony.”

Roland sat across the table.

”I’d vote for a plaque.”

Raven looked up.

”We can still leave you here.”

Roland picked up his cup.

”And he’s back to normal.”

Valeria smiled.

The pain in Raven’s ribs had diminished considerably. Predatory Regeneration had done its work through the night without Raven interfering with the process.

He wasn’t completely healed, but he was healed enough to travel.

They left an hour later.

Kharad came into view by midafternoon the following day.

Raven had expected a mining town.

That wasn’t quite what he found.

The settlement had been built inside an irregular depression between formations of reddish stone. Most of the houses were low, many of them partially excavated into the rock itself, with almost flat roofs and walls that looked unnecessarily thick.

There were very few wooden structures.

That made sense.

The bells didn’t.

Raven noticed the first before they crossed into the settlement: a small piece of dark metal hanging above the doorway of a house. Then another. And another.

A larger one hung from a stable. Two were mounted outside a shop, while three more were suspended from a metal frame above the central square.

Even several carts had small bells attached underneath them.

They weren’t decorative. They were too plain, too uniform, and placed with too much consistency.

Raven counted more than thirty before Roland spoke.

”Is there some kind of festival?”

Valeria looked around.

”Not one I know of.”

Raven kept watching.

The bells hung at different heights. Some nearly touched the walls beside them, while others were suspended freely. One outside a smithy even had a thin metal rod connected directly to the ground.

Not celebration.

Detection.

”They aren’t decorative,” Raven said.

Roland looked at one.

”How do you know?”

Raven pointed toward the rod.

”Because that one is connected to the stone.”

A boy of perhaps nine sat outside a shop eating something that looked like dried fruit.

Raven dismounted nearby.

The child watched him with the same curiosity any child might show an armed, scarred stranger.

Raven pointed toward the small bell above the doorway.

”What are those for?”

The boy frowned as though the question itself were strange.

”To listen.”

”That is generally what bells are for.”

The boy stared at him for a second.

Valeria had to hide a smile.

Raven tried again.

”What are they listening for?”

The boy pointed at the ground with his piece of fruit.

”When it starts breathing.”

Raven looked down at the stone beneath his boots.

”The ground?”

”Yes.”

He said it as though explaining that water was wet.

Roland stepped closer.

”Does the ground breathe often?”

”Sometimes.”

”And what do you do when it happens?”

The boy took another bite.

”Depends how it sounds.”

Raven looked back at the bells.

Different sizes.

Different frequencies.

”Who knows how to interpret them?”

The boy pointed toward the center of town.

”Everyone.”

That wasn’t a reassuring answer.

Valeria placed a few coins on the shop’s outside counter, took another piece of the same fruit, and handed it to the boy.

”Thank you.”

The child looked at the coins.

”That’s too much.”

”Then buy another fruit.”

”I already have one.”

Valeria smiled.

”A tragedy.”

They continued toward the square.

Raven kept noticing bells, not only on buildings but near sealed mine entrances, wells, and crossroads. Some had been marked with red paint, others with white.

A pair of miners passed them without even glancing toward the nearest one.

Normal.

That was what made it unsettling.

When an entire population lived with an emergency measure long enough, it stopped looking like an emergency.

It became architecture.

They found an inn near the eastern edge of town.

It had four bells: one over the entrance, two near the windows, and another suspended from a metal frame driven into the ground beside the stable.

Raven pointed toward the last one while the owner registered their rooms.

”What does it mean when that one rings?”

The gray-bearded innkeeper followed Raven’s finger.

”Depends.”

The same answer again.

”On what?”

”How much.”

Raven waited.

The innkeeper seemed to realize he wasn’t speaking to a local.

”The small ones react to surface movement. Heavy carts, nearby mining work, things like that. That one”—he pointed toward the bell connected to the ground—”picks up deeper pressure.”

”Burrowers.”

The man stopped writing.

”You came for them?”

Raven had no reason to lie.

”One.”

The innkeeper exhaled through his nose.

”Outsiders always want one.”

Valeria rested a hand on the counter.

”And the locals?”

”The locals prefer they stay where they are.”

”Been having trouble lately?”

The man looked toward the square before answering.

”More than last year.”

That caught Raven’s attention.

”Why?”

”If we knew, we’d probably have fewer problems.”

”How many attacks?”

”Direct attacks? Not many. Collapses, more. Two tunnels lost in the last three months. One house sank. One warehouse ended up with a wall out of place.”

Roland frowned.

”Out of place?”

”Twenty meters away.”

Raven looked at him.

The innkeeper shrugged.

”Pressure did the rest.”

That explained the name.

Blastback.

Valeria glanced toward Raven.

”I think you found your component.”

”Not yet.”

”Why?”

Raven pointed toward the bells.

”Because if it were as simple as walking into a cave and killing one, they wouldn’t need these.”

The innkeeper smiled without humor.

”Maybe you’ll survive long enough to get it.”

Raven took the key.

”That’s the plan.”

Kharad had rules.

Raven discovered that over the next hour.

Don’t enter abandoned tunnels without a local marker. Don’t use explosives without permission. Don’t dig after dark. Never ignore a red bell.

If one of the large bells in the square rang three times, evacuate buildings constructed over older chambers.

If it rang continuously...

No one finished that explanation.

That didn’t help.

Raven bought a partial map of the surrounding region, although most of the deeper cave networks were left blank.

When he asked about mature Blastback Burrowers, the map seller looked at him as though Raven had requested directions to a convenient execution.

”The juveniles come closer to the surface.”

”I don’t need a juvenile.”

”Then you need a bad day.”

”FORGE tends to be specific.”

The man didn’t understand the reference.

Valeria did.

”Any local hunters?”

”Ask for Maelor tomorrow. If he’s sober.”

”And if he isn’t?”

”Ask anyway. Sometimes he explains things better drunk.”

Raven put the map away.

A guide tomorrow.

Information first.

Hunt afterward.

That was enough.

For once, he had no reason to enter a cave the same afternoon he arrived.

They ate early.

The meal was simple: roasted meat, root vegetables, hard bread, and a spicy sauce Roland declared excessive until he noticed Raven eating it without reaction.

”Doesn’t that burn your mouth?”

Raven kept eating.

”I’ve deliberately consumed poisonous organs.”

Roland looked down at his plate.

”That didn’t answer the question.”

”Then yes.”

Valeria drank some wine.

”The disturbing part is that the comparison probably made perfect sense to him.”

Raven lowered his fork.

”The sauce is good.”

Roland went still.

So did Valeria.

Raven looked between them.

”What?”

Valeria smiled slowly.

”Nothing.”

”Don’t do that.”

”I’m simply appreciating the moment.”

”I said the sauce was good.”

”I know.”

”It wasn’t an emotional revelation.”

”I never said it was.”

Roland wisely decided to keep eating.

Raven did the same.

The first bell rang shortly after midnight.

Raven opened his eyes before the second movement.

It wasn’t a full ring, only a small metallic note.

Tin.

Then silence.

A moment later, another soft tin came from the bell near the window.

The room was dark, and there was no strong wind outside. The movement was too small and too regular to be caused by a gust.

Raven sat up and put on his boots.

His ribs protested less than before.

A door opened in the hallway almost immediately.

Valeria appeared with her hair loose and a small blade already in her hand.

”Is that normal?”

”I don’t know.”

Another bell sounded from downstairs, followed by one across the street.

Tin.

Tin.

Roland stepped out of his room while fastening his bow belt.

”What’s happening?”

Raven raised one hand for silence.

He listened.

Nothing.

Then he felt it.

Not a tremor, but a faint pressure beneath the soles of his boots, almost as though the stone itself had changed tension.

The large bell connected to the ground outside the inn moved once.

The clapper struck metal.

CLONG.

Voices started downstairs immediately.

Not screams.

That was worse.

The people of Kharad knew what it meant.

Raven descended with Valeria and Roland behind him.

The innkeeper was already awake, a lamp placed on the counter beside a small bowl of water.

Its surface trembled in intervals rather than continuously.

A pause.

Ripples.

Another pause.

More ripples.

Raven watched.

”Is that what you call breathing?”

The innkeeper didn’t smile.

”Yes.”

”What kind?”

”I don’t know yet.”

A more distant bell rang, then another.

The pattern began spreading down the street.

The innkeeper went outside.

Raven followed.

The square was beginning to fill with people opening doors, miners staring at the ground, and a woman bringing two children down from an upper floor.

No one was running.

Not yet.

Another pulse traveled through Raven’s boots.

Stronger this time.

An interface reacted.

Not FORGE.

Predation didn’t have enough biological information either.

This was a different reading.

[Environmental Pressure Fluctuation Detected.]

Raven frowned.

The pressure wasn’t coming from the air.

It was coming from below.

Another pulse moved through the stone, making the large bell tremble.

CLONG.

Several smaller bells answered at once.

Raven looked down the street.

”Where are the tunnels?”

The innkeeper pointed north.

”Under almost everything.”

That was information Raven would have preferred to receive earlier.

Valeria moved closer.

”Burrowers?”

”Probably.”

The innkeeper shook his head.

”Not necessarily.”

Raven looked at him.

”What else does this?”

The man took too long to answer.

The next pulse interrupted him.

It was stronger.

A thin crack appeared between two stones in the street. It didn’t widen or split further; it simply appeared.

Water inside a nearby barrel jumped several centimeters, and every bell attached to the inn vibrated at once.

CLANG.

CLANG.

CLANG.

Then they stopped.

Silence fell over the entire square.

Raven felt the change before he understood it.

Something beneath Kharad had stopped moving.

Not because it had left.

Because it had stopped.

Waiting.

The interface appeared.

[Subterranean Pressure Anomaly Detected.]

[Source Depth: UNKNOWN.]

[Pattern: BIOLOGICAL POSSIBILITY — UNCONFIRMED.]

Raven stared at the ground.

Valeria saw his expression.

”What does it say?”

”There’s pressure beneath us.”

”We already knew that.”

Raven kept watching the crack.

”It doesn’t know what’s causing it.”

The innkeeper went pale.

For the first time since the bells began ringing, one of the locals looked genuinely afraid.

Raven noticed immediately.

”What?”

The man stared toward the large bell.

”Normally, you can feel the direction.”

Another bell rang far away.

Then one sounded to Raven’s left.

Another followed behind him.

The innkeeper slowly turned in place, and Raven understood before the man spoke.

There was no direction.

The pressure was coming from several points beneath the settlement.

The innkeeper swallowed.

”That shouldn’t happen.”

Raven looked at the stone houses, the invisible tunnels beneath his feet, and the dozens of bells waiting for the next movement.

They had come to Kharad for one organ.

Apparently, Kharad had other plans.