A week had passed since Ash returned from the ruins of his old home—and the message left behind by the flame avatar of his father. The embers of that memory hadn't died. If anything, they had fanned a new fire within him.
In the past week The Crimson Fangs had sharpened.
Ash had stabilized at mid Core Vein stage. Mira, Talin, Rook, and Veyra had all reached early Core Vein. The remaining ten support members of the team were now Vein Initiate Peak, and Arlen—quiet, steady—was on the verge of breakthrough to Core Vein. Their rapid growth had demanded a field test.
Ash had found the perfect target.
It was a moonless night, the perfect cover for a stealth mission.
"Target: Secondary Treasury of the Yin Clan. Coordinates confirmed by Marla's recovered map."
Ash crouched over a drawn-out terrain map. A series of crude tunnels beneath a quiet hill in the outer sector of the city in the cover of an abandoned essense stones mine.
"This is the location. Intel confirms it's an isolated vault—used decades ago to mine. It's largely unguarded, protected only by a kill-on-sight formation and presence sensitive arrays."
"Exactly our style," Mira said, tightening her gloves.
"We breach, extract essence stones, and ghost out," Ash continued. "No civilians. No alerts. Stealth is priority. Veyra, you'll sabotage the perimeter alarm runes. Talin, keep us informed of motion. Arlen watches our rear and secures extraction if things go sideways. The rest, follow me."
"Rules of engagement?" Mira asked quietly.
Ash's answer was cold. "No mercy. They would've butchered us in the street."
Veyra cracked her knuckles. "Good."
Rook grinned. "About time we hit back."
They moved like a shadow tide through the forgotten paths. Ash's military experience shaped the entire assault plan—short bursts of motion, hand signs instead of speech, constant positioning behind hard cover, coordinated sweep angles.
At the cave access point, Ash raised a fist.
Stop.
Mira moved up, planting temporary distortion runes. They shimmered faintly—then faded, cloaking their spiritual signatures.
Arlen knelt, fingers pressed to the floor. "Pressure plates. Old…but still live."
Ash placed a palm over the stone. His flame pulsed—a measured, cold flicker instead of heat. It siphoned through the runework like ink in water, deactivating it silently.
"New trick?" the serpent asked lazily from his soul domain.
Ash didn't answer.
But his experiments over the second mark during last week were not in vain.
They slipped through.
Inside the Vault
The vault was deeper than expected. Dozens of steps led into a subterranean chamber flanked with half-dead spirit lanterns. Rows of locked coffers lined the walls, and racks of essence stones glimmered like frozen stars in the dark.
Two Yin guards sat at the outer chamber, bored and half-asleep.
They never saw the knives coming.
Ash moved like a shadow between flames—his hand flared once, and their heads fell without a sound. The fire didn't burn flesh; it seared the soul directly.
Essence gathered.
The serpent stirred within. "You're siphoning it. With that cursed Soul Flame—it's refining their life force as you kill."
Ash felt it too—his flame core swelling not with chaos, but with refined purity. His second Soul Mark, once dull, now pulsed. It wasn't justhelping him see patterns —it also filtered energy, condensed it.
traps.
Talin clicked his tongue once. "Four presence sensitive arrays. Two silent kill formations."
"Mark them," Ash whispered.
Each movement was deliberate. Mira bent time perception slightly to let Arlen and Rook disarm a barrier while Ash slid past a rune wall to reach the vault core.
He placed a hand over the primary treasury seal.
It fought him.
The Soul Flame surged, and so did the Phoenix Mark. But this time… something different happened.
As the seal broke and the energy flared, Ash's fire reached into the structure—and siphoned a fraction of it.
It wasn't theft. It was assimilation.
The essence pulled from the array swirled through his veins, refined as it entered him. —his second Soul Mark acted like a purifier, converting raw ambient essence into clean energy.
As the stones were gathered and the team began packing the crates, the serpent stirred.
"Now I see," it murmured. "That mark of yours—Phoenix lineage. No wonder they want you dead. No wonder your flames defy normal limits."
Ash said nothing. The fire curled around his arm, sharper now, more focused.
"That Soul Flame—it ignores physical resistance and gathers a fraction of what it touches. The stronger the foe, the harder it is to pierce through, yes. But it still bypasses layers of defense. You'll kill kings with a touch, if you survive long enough.
And the heart flame may be you've kept it's refining properties too others can have only one and you're collecting everything"
The serpent's tone darkened with wonder.
"The second mark… mm. That's beyond even my knowing. Not spirit, not elemental. It purifies. No... it perfects. It seeks efficiency. Perhaps even the heavens will fear what it might become."
Ash didn't flinch.
The team exited the vault as silently as they entered. Each member carried a secured bundle of essence stones—more than enough to fuel their growth for weeks.
Outside, Ash cast one last glance back at the hill.
"Did we trigger anything?" Rook asked.
"No," Talin said, tapping a jade disc. "Arrays are silent. They'll never know we were here."
Ash exhaled.
But in his chest, the flames stirred.
His fire from pheonix mark wasn't the same anymore. Not since the merging of two flames. It remembered every flame it encountered—and now, it kept something from each one.
He looked at his hand, flexing slowly.
Fire that breaks through defenses.
A mark that purifies stolen essence.
A weapon with infinite fuel.
This was no longer just the path of survival.
It was evolution.
And war was the proving ground.
Ash smirked. "One step at a time."
The next stage loomed. Nathan Yin still ruled the city.
But now… Ash had the strength to steal from his vaults.
Soon, he'd be ready to take his head...