It was the year 20XX when everything changed. The world as we knew it crumbled under an onslaught of chaos. Towering creatures of nightmare—monstrous, twisted, and merciless—emerged from nowhere, leaving nothing but devastation in their wake. Cities fell. Humanity's screams became the new soundtrack of life.
I was seventeen when it began, an ordinary teenager in an ordinary town. Or so I thought.
The day started like any other. My mother had sent me to the market to pick up supplies. Our town, though tense with news of distant destruction, remained untouched—at least for the moment. People whispered about monsters, about cities falling, but no one wanted to believe it could reach us.
But it did.
The first sign was the screams. Piercing, frantic, like nothing I'd ever heard before. I turned just in time to see the crowd scatter, their faces twisted in terror. A creature stepped into view—a towering beast with glowing red eyes, claws like scythes, and a body that radiated pure malice.
I froze. My instincts screamed at me to run, but my legs wouldn't move. The beast locked eyes with me, and a guttural snarl ripped through the air, shaking me to my core.
Then, something deep inside me stirred.
It was as if a switch had been flipped. My chest burned, and an unfamiliar energy coursed through me, sharpening my senses in an instant. I could hear every sound with startling clarity—the distant screams, the pounding of my own heart, the scrape of the creature's claws against the pavement. My vision sharpened, every detail unnervingly clear. Colors were brighter, sounds louder, smells more vivid.
I had awakened. My spiritual root—something I had only read about in dusty, forgotten books—had come alive.
But it was nothing like the stories. The awakening wasn't a grand surge of power, no miraculous strength or lightning summoned to strike down the beast. All it did was enhance my senses, making the world sharper and more terrifying. And against the hulking creature before me, it wasn't nearly enough.
The beast lunged, its claws slicing through the air with deadly precision. I barely dodged, my sharpened hearing picking up the whistle of its claws brushing past my ear. My body moved instinctively, but my steps were clumsy. Fear gripped me as I stumbled over a broken stall.
I had to run.
My sharpened senses helped me navigate the chaos—the screams, the stampede of panicked people, the crumbling of buildings as more creatures joined the carnage. But they also overwhelmed me. The stench of blood, the deafening roar of destruction, the sheer terror all around me—it was almost too much to bear.
Somehow, I found myself in an alley, panting and clutching my chest as the burning sensation faded. My limbs trembled, my newfound senses flickering in and out. I knew the beast was close; I could hear its growls echoing as it searched for me.
I needed a way out.
As I pressed my back against the wall, gasping for air, a memory surfaced—a fragment from a book I'd read years ago. It was one of the countless texts I'd devoured in my curiosity about old legends and forgotten practices. Most people dismissed them as myths, but one passage now stood out in my mind:
"The spiritual root is the foundation, not the power itself. It is a seed, and only through cultivation can it grow. To nurture it, one must begin with the breath. The breath is the key, the rhythm of life itself. Without it, the root withers."
I'd thought little of it at the time, but now it seemed like a lifeline.
With the beast closing in, I forced myself to focus. My senses, though heightened, were still disoriented. I shut my eyes, trying to recall the breathing technique described in the book. Inhale deeply, slowly. Hold. Exhale. The rhythm came back to me, and I began to follow it.
At first, nothing happened. My breaths were shaky, uneven. But with each inhale and exhale, my mind began to steady. The chaos around me dulled, and the burning in my chest reignited, warmer this time, more controlled. My senses stopped flickering and grew sharper, more precise.
The beast's shadow loomed as it rounded the corner, its glowing eyes locking onto mine. I could feel its hunger, its malice.
I couldn't fight it—not yet.
When it lunged, I moved—not with strength or speed, but with precision. My sharpened senses allowed me to predict its movements, and I slipped past its claws by the narrowest margin. The rhythm of my breath kept me calm as I darted into the open street, weaving through the chaos.
My escape was pure desperation. I ran until my lungs burned, until my legs felt like they would give out. But the creatures didn't pursue. As the first rays of dawn broke over the horizon, they retreated, their growls fading into the distance.
Collapsing among the ruins of my town, I stared at the sky, my body trembling with exhaustion. I was alive—but barely.
The spiritual root was not a gift. It was a challenge, a potential waiting to be unlocked. Awakening it was only the first step. If I wanted to survive, I had to cultivate it, to nurture it with breathing and meditation, to strengthen my body and spirit.
I remembered the words from the book, a warning buried within its wisdom: "The path of cultivation is long and arduous. Each step forward is fraught with pain, each advancement hard-won. But those who endure will rise above the limits of flesh and mortality."
For now, all I had was a flicker of hope and a path that stretched endlessly before me. But as I lay there, battered and broken, I vowed to begin.