[BETA-READ / Side Project] RoU | B1 | Chapter 6 (Patreon)

(Be advised that this book contains a dark setting, strong romance, and explicit scenes. I do not recommend it for anyone under 18.)

Rise of the Unbound / Book 1: The Blade and The Pawn

• Cover / synopsis: https://www.patreon.com/posts/141212971

• Prologue - > https://www.patreon.com/posts/141378684

IMPORTANT:

• This is the draft of a fiction I plan to release on either amazon or KU one day. Feel free to rip me apart in the comment section!

• If you like it, you're also welcomed to leave a like or a comment!

• I'll try to post 1 or 2 chapters per week, but can't make any promises. Ascension of the Primalist is my priority!

Chapter 6: Astral Gear

Seven leaned back against the cold metal of the table, and his eyes drifted to the small, curled form of the dead astra beast. 

If this thing was as rare as that noble believed, then the one coiled behind his own sternum had to be  also quite valuable.

Seven's thoughts suddenly moved back to the alleyway. The searing heat. The giant, scaled lizard that had tried to burn him alive, obeying the commands of its master. That beast had been a weapon, an extension of the man’s will, just as a dagger. 

Seven looked down at his own chest. Could he do that? Could he pull the creature from inside him, leash it, and make it his weapon?

As if reading his thoughts, the thing next to his heart stirred. 

It wasn’t a violent movement this time. It was a low, vibrating hum against Seven's ribs. He couldn’t tell if it was an approval, a warning, or if the creature had simply sensed the intent in his mind. 

Perhaps it was just lucky timing.

Seven closed his eyes, pushing his consciousness inward, past the bone and flesh, seeking the source of the stir. 

And he found it. Deep in some kind of void behind his sternum. 

It was awake. And it was hungry.

Seven had never been able to sense his body that way before. Probably a perk of being a Weaver. He could discern the flow of astra inside himself—and more importantly, he could feel a leak. 

The creature was latching onto his newly formed core, sipping its energy like a tick. It was a subtle and slow, rhythmic drain.

It’s feeding itself.

Seven analyzed the flow. The creature's pulling rate was barely below his core's natural replenishment. A chill ran down his spine. If the beast got bigger, it would need more food. And it would drag Seven inch by inch into elemental decay  by draining his astra.

Until there was nothing left. Until he died.

But he still couldn’t tell that noble. 

If the man learned there was a second, priceless monster inside him, he would tear it out without hesitation to sell it. If Seven somehow extracted it himself—and trained it—it could become a secret weapon.

He would have to pull it out soon, or grow his astra pool faster than that thing's hunger increased. If he succeeded, it could help him retrieve his freedom.

That was a gamble. 

The room's heavy door creaked open once again. 

Seven's body tensed, though he didn’t reach for a weapon this time. He recognized the man immediately. Strong build, down-to-earth posture, blond cropped hair, eyes that tracked everything. It was the Skyrider—the one who had knocked him unconscious at the Iron Claws’ headquarters.

The man walked in, carrying a bundle of fabric, and tossed it onto the counter next to Seven.

“Put those on,” he said with a flat voice. “We need to get you geared up.”

Seven picked up the clothes. A simple tunic, sturdy trousers, and leather boots. Better than the rags he was used to when younger. He began to dress in silence when the Skyrider's gaze drifted to the floor behind him, landing on the corpse of the Soulwarden. 

The man let out a long sigh.

“Great,” he muttered before rubbing the side of his neck. He looked back at Seven. “You should stop killing everyone you see. Or try to, at least. It will make everything a pain in the ass.”

Seven pulled the tunic over his head, his voice muffled. “The person before you already gave me the lecture.”

The man’s eyes narrowed slightly. “The person before me? His name is Baron Valdos. You should at least refer to him as ‘The Baron’.”

Seven stopped himself from shrugging and instead adjusted the collar. Titles meant nothing to him. Only strength did. “And you?”

“Corporal Thorne.”

Corporal. Seven repeated the word inwardly. Cities and nations used ranks like that for their militaries, but he couldn’t recall if a corporal was high on the food chain or just another grunt. 

He looked at Thorne’s hands. 

They were relaxed, hanging loosely by his sides. But Seven remembered the speed. That terrifying, blurring velocity. Without a perfect ambush no way he couldn’t kill that man. He was outmatched.

Seven's eyes moved once more at the dead Soulwarden. “It’s hard not to strike back when someone is about to cut you open.” 

The words had slipped out before he realized it. His brow furrowed, unsure why he was even explaining himself. It wasn’t like he owed this man—or anyone—a justification for defending himself.

Thorne didn’t look concerned. “He wasn’t going to cut you open,” he answered. “When the beast fights the extraction, harvesters make a small incision to be closer to the pocket-realm. It helps them control the astra.” 

The corporal then shrugged and jerked his head toward the door. “Anyway, let’s go.”

Seven followed him out of the room and into a long stone corridor, his thoughts lagging a step behind. Pocket-realm. 

So that was the name of the empty pressure behind his sternum. The void he’d felt since his awakening. He’d have to figure out what that was—and what beast lived in it—on his own later.

Sunlight greeted them at the corridor’s end. 

The transition was jarring. The quiet of the inside was instantly replaced by the chaotic symphony of a working transport hub. Seven squinted against the sun. He recognized the architecture in the distance—the spires of Seraklieus—though he had never been in this specific sector. It seemed like a private, walled-off section of the main caravan station.

Around them, men and women in uniform were hauling heavy wooden crates, shouting orders over the grinding of wheels.

At the front of the heavy wagons stood beasts—massive, quadrupedal creatures with builds reminiscent of horses, but far denser and more powerful. Their hides were a dull, armored gray, and their eyes glowed with a faint, docile blue like the two horns on their head. 

Valk-Striders. 

That was what people called them—astra beasts bred for endurance and hauling power. One of the few known even to the people of the slums, thanks to their incredible usefulness. Once tamed, the creatures made travel between cities possible in hours and days rather than weeks.

Sven scanned the wagons, his eyes locking onto a symbol painted on the side of the lead canvas: a green snake eating its own tail.

He had never seen that emblem in Seraklieus before yesterday. Just as Six had mentioned at the awakening ceremony, these people weren’t locals. They were an external noble House, operating with a level of organization that the gangs in the slums, like the Iron Claws, could only dream of.

Thorne didn’t stop for sightseeing. He cut a path through the workers, leading Seven toward a makeshift supply depot set up against the perimeter wall. 

There, standing next to a stack of open crates, was a mountain of a man—bald, with a beard like steel wool—bellowing at a subordinate who clutched a clipboard and tried not to shrink.

 “I said standard issue, not the recruits’ trash!”

Thorne stopped and cleared his throat. “Quartermaster Hrogar.”

The large man turned, his annoyance vanishing. “Corporal.”

“Equip him,” Thorne said, gesturing to Seven with a thumb. “Baron’s orders. I’ll be back in a few minutes,” he added before glancing at him. “Don’t wander off.”

The next instant, the corporal vanished into the crowd of workers and left Seven alone with the bearded giant. 

The large man turned, wiping grease from his hands onto a rag. “Quartermaster Hrogar. Head Pyrosmith of House Valdos. And you are?”

Seven looked at him, his expression flat. “Seven.”

“Right.” Hrogar tossed the rag aside. “The other one.”

He turned to a reinforced crate, then rummaged through it with heavy hands until he pulled out a set of black leather armor. He threw it to Seven. “Try that.”

Seven caught it. The armor was surprisingly lighter than it looked. The instant his fingers touched it, a crawling chill slid up his skin. The shadows inside the piece of equipment stirred, stretching subtly toward him, answering a pull that resonated deep in his chest. 

It was calling to him.

Seven stripped off the tunic he had just put on and slipped into the leather armor. He was halfway through securing the chest piece when Hrogar stepped closer, his large hand reaching out to tug the leather strap, pulling Seven's shirt up in the process.

Seven froze, and his breath hitched, held tight in his lungs. 

In that fraction of a second, his eyes locked onto the man’s exposed jugular. If he had a blade—a shard of glass, a rusty nail, anything—he would have slit the man's throat before the fabric settled. The invasion of his personal space had triggered all his killing instinct. As if awakening the Hound in him.

“That's a ton of scars,” Hrogar growled, unaware of how close he was to getting attacked. “Way more than that girl. And the others from this shithole.” He shook his head. “You must have been hard to tame.”

Seven forced his muscles to relax, pulling the armor down. The others from this shit hole. 

So the Iron Claws hadn’t been the only ones selling their best killers to the nobility. Many of them were like him—the latest product on the assembly line.

“You should thank Silas when you see him,” Hrogar added, pointing a thick finger toward a man in white robes conversing with a woman in the distance. “That’s the Sun Priest. He’s probably the one who patched you up.”

Seven nodded. Even if he seemed annoyed, the quartermaster had a big mouth. That was good. Useful. A loose tongue often spilled secrets by accident.

“It's the first time I've seen the Baron invest like this in a fresh contracted weaver,” Hrogar continued, turning back to the crates to search for something else. “You must have impressed him somehow.”

Contracted weaver. It sounded prestigious. Better than what it actually was: a fancy name for a slave.

“Ahh, where is it...” Hrogar muttered as he shifted a pile of belts. “I don’t have access to the recruitment reports, but you certainly did something special.”

Seven stopped his eyes from narrowing. So they had been observing him. Assessing his value before the purchase. 

Hrogar glanced back over his shoulder and ceased rummaging, his gaze expectant. He was waiting for a story. Seven let the silence stretch, and only when the man’s curiosity began to sour into impatience did he finally speak.

“I probably killed someone that the person who wrote the report didn’t think I could kill.”

“I don’t think Mar—um, this person is easily impressed,” Hrogar answered, quickly correcting himself. “What’s the hardest target you took down?”

Seven leaned against the table. There was no advantage in revealing his true strength. If this man thought Seven was barely competent, he would be less cautious around him. 

“Some noble,” Seven lied smoothly. “Or a wealthy merchant. Hard to tell with the robes.”

“In which astral stage?”

Seven frowned. “Like… gas and all that?”

“Yes,” Hrogar retorted, annoyance creeping into his voice. “Like at the beginning or near the peak?”

“And how am I supposed to know that?”

Hrogar looked at Seven like he was an idiot. “You sense his core. You check whether the astral gas inside is thin, dense, pure—” Hrogar paused, then pinched his nose. “Right. You couldn’t do that. You weren’t a Weaver.” The large man sighed. “Then what's the strongest spell he used?”

Lying was obviously the right choice again. Seven visualized the one used by the noble lackey who had tried to kill Jorun. It had been weak. “He made a blade out of wind.”

“Hmph.” Hrogar waved a hand dismissively. “He probably was at the beginning of the gas stage. Astra is easier to control up close. Projecting it is the hard part.”

Seven pressed his lips together. It was all knowledge he would need. 

Part of him regretted having overlooked it in the past—back then, it had all seemed useless. Weavers hadn’t been much harder to kill. But watching a blade fail to cut the Baron’s skin only minutes ago had been eye-opening.

If Seven wanted to escape all of this, he would have to learn—and climb the food chain of this new world.

“Still,” the boisterous man conceded, “killing a Weaver when you aren’t one isn't nothing. Most gutter-rats' instinct makes them run the second they see one.”

Seven kept his face blank, and for a moment, he thought about asking what stage the Baron or Thorne were in. But that would make it evident that he was already planning to kill them.

“Here,” Hrogar said as he finally pulled a weapon from a velvet-lined box. It was a dagger with a dark, matte grey blade and a handle wrapped in shadow-black leather. “It’s an astral weapon, forged from the core of a beast at the peak of the gas stage,” he explained as he handed it over. “It’s something you should be able to handle. Don't lose it, though. It’s worth more than your life right now.”

Seven took it and spun it in his hand, feeling the balance. The moment his skin touched the hilt, a circuit closed. The same cold energy he had felt from the armor seemed to flow out of the blade into his arm. It merged with him better than any steel he had ever held, as an extension of his limb.

“It matches your dark element,” Hrogar said, watching him. “Like the armor. It makes them fit you. Makes them more potent. Especially when you’ll learn to use them well.”

Seven gripped the hilt tighter.

The quartermaster went on as he closed the velvet box. “It’ll conduct your astra with ease. And there’s a replenishing reserve inside the hilt. It will allow you to avoid running your core dry and reaching elemental decay.”

This kind of equipment was certainly not something one could find in a street market. It was a substantial investment. Asking for half a dozen of these would be ridiculous, but a second one could certainly be helpful. 

“Is there another?” Seven asked. “I fight with two blades.”

Hrogar shook his head. “Dark weavers usually don't rely on melee combat, let alone dual-wielding. They hide and let the shadows do the work. I don’t have another one in stock here. Maybe I'll be able to craft you one during the next month if you don't get yourself killed by then.”

Seven nodded once again. His gaze then drifted from the quartermaster and prowled over the open crates around them. His eyes then snagged on a weapon to the left. It was another dagger, but this one was different. 

The metal was pale, almost milky, with a slight, predatory curve. As Seven reached out, he didn’t feel the oily, cold slide of the shadows. Instead, he felt a draft. A subtle, high-pitched vibration in the air around the hilt, like a vacuum demanding to be filled. 

He grabbed it. It was light—unnervingly so. Air parted around it with a soft, whistling hiss. “What about this one?” he asked.

Hrogar frowned as he glanced at the pale blade. “That’s a wind weapon. It doesn't fit you."

"I like the balance."

"It doesn't matter," the man retorted with a grunt. "You won’t be able to access its astra reserve, and your dark astra will clash with the affinity. If you try to push energy through that, the blade will shatter.”

“Then I won’t do it.” Seven felt the edge. It was sharper than anything he’d ever owned. It would be perfect for his wind affinity, but he didn’t say that, of course. That was to remain a secret for as long as he could. “I need a backup. A simple knife.”

Hrogar stared at him for a long moment, seemingly debating whether it was worth the argument. Finally, he let out a sharp exhale. “Fine. Take it.”

Seven immediately moved to sheath it, but Hrogar’s heavy hand slammed onto the crate next to him. “But listen to me closely, gutter-rat,” he growled, leaning in, his voice dropping to a dangerous rumble. “That blade isn’t assigned to your loadout. If you break it, I will take the cost of it out of your hide. Understood?”

Seven met the giant’s gaze evenly. “Understood.”

“Good.”

Seven found a sheath for the pale blade and strapped it to his back hip, positioning it horizontally. Hidden. Accessible.

“I’d need a cloak.”

Hrogar turned to a pile of fabrics and tossed a heavy, charcoal-colored cloak at Seven. “Your first task isn’t really about... stealth. But sure. It might help you look intimidating. Hide some of the scars, let her imagine the rest.”

Seven caught the heavy fabric and swung it over his shoulders, fastening the iron clasp.

Let her imagine the rest?

If the quartermaster knew about his mission, it meant it was significant—perhaps not a simple kill.

“Follow me,” a voice cut through Seven's thoughts.

He glanced over his shoulder. Corporal Thorne had returned, appearing as silently as he had left. Standing a few paces away, the man spun on his heels and began to stride away, forcing Seven to fall into step immediately.

______

Next --> Chapter 7: https://www.patreon.com/posts/150276688