Chapter 58

At the bottom of the deep pit. Absolute dead silence and absolute madness intertwined here. The shadow cast by the Mutant’s massive, bone-winged structure—which bore the weight of its rebirth—expanded and contracted like the lips of the abyss itself, every pulsation drinking in the drifting bloody embers of the void and the radiation of death. A cold, devouring will throbbed within its body like a heart, replacing the once-pure directive of cutting. Every ripple carried a ravenous hunger for more energy, like a bottomless pit forged of ice. The process by which the wreckage of the prow was forcibly torn apart, chewed, and swallowed was not only a battle of the jungle governed by the distorted wills of the Ancient Relic of Deep Space, but also its own "delivery" ritual of transforming from a tool into a predator. Yet, right at the peak of this carnival of plunder and rebirth—just when that devouring, silver-blue radiance grew so intense that it seemed about to ignite it from the inside out...