Vivienne moved low and fluidly across the steppe, her bare feet brushing against the earth without so much as a whisper of sound. Each step was deliberate, her movements practiced and predatory as she parted the tall grass ahead of her, keeping her silhouette hidden from any prying eyes. The chill night air ed around her, but it didn’t deter her focus. She fixed her gaze in the dire Renzia had pointed, her mind calg. If the creature was as rge as described, it wouldn’t take much effort to track it down.

  Her onyx-bck tongue slithered from her mouth, long and sinuous, tasting the air with an almost serpentine precision. She flicked it several times, the motion unnervingly smooth. To ag, it might have been a strange and uling sight, but for Vivie was sed nature. The aether around her was faint, a quiet hum in the backdrop of the world, but she wasn’t searg for the mundane. She was hunting for the irregur—the sharp, distinct fvor of something that didn’t belong.

  The ambieher tasted like distant static, a on fvor ieppes, but there were faint ripples of something else threading through it. She paused, her toill tasting, her brow furrowing as she honed in on the differehe presence was faint, nearly drowned out by the natural hum, but there—a sharper note, something alien and potent. It was close, and it didn’t belong.

  Vivienne’s bck eyes flicked across the horizon, narrowing as she crouched even lower. Her fingers pressed against the dry, packed soil, feeling for vibrations—any sign of her quarry’s movements. Her tail curled behind her in a slow, deliberate motion, like a serpent coiling in preparation to strike. Anticipation buzzed through her veins, sharpening her senses as the thrill of the hunt took hold.

  The stew from earlier lingered in her memory only as a polite pretense—a habit of blending in, more an idea of food than something that truly nourished her. It wasn’t suste was a venience. She could eat it, sure, but it was never enough. The true meal was before her now. This—this was sustehis was life densed into its purest form, something she could truly sieeth into, something that could satisfy her in eople food never could.

  She sed the steppe with an almost zy fidence, but her mind was calg, her hunger simmering just below the surface. Then, there it was. Her breath hitched for half a sed as she spotted the creature. The massive grecw moved through the grass with an unnatural grace for something of its size. Its cws glowed faintly, their light carving out menag streaks against the dark ndscape.

  “How creative,” she muttered under her breath, sarcasm dripping from her tone as her lips curled into a faint, sharp grin. The sight of the beast set her instincts afme, the primal hunger whispering suggestions in her ear. But she didn’t rush. She wasn’t just a beast driven by need; she redator with options.

  Her mind raced through the possibilities. Her colossal form would give her raw power, the sheer size to meet this beast head-on and pin it to the ground. Then there was her spider form—sleek, agile, and equipped with webs that could immobilize even the mightiest of creatures. A quick, solution.

  But perhaps her hydra form was the best choice. The heads would let her strike from multiple angles, overwhelming the grecw with relentless attacks while avoiding its glowing cws. It would be over quickly, a show of dominand precision.

  Vivienne licked her lips, her long toasting the air again as she made her decision. “Let’s see what you’re made of, big guy,” she murmured, her voice low and tinged with excitement. Her body began to shift, the ge rippling through her like a tide as she prepared to front the beast head-on.

  Her body ed and stretched as her hydra form emerged, muscles twisting and bones shifting with a grotesque grace. Her plump figure expanded, growing bulkier and more massive as six serpentine necks sprouted from her shoulders, eading in a sleek, predatory head. Scales as dark as midnight glistened uhe faint starlight, each head swaying with its own sinister i. Her tails thied, splitting into several smaller, whip-like appehat twitched with anticipation.

  She crouched low, her six pairs of eyes log onto the glowing cws of the grecw as it moved with a predatory rhythm. The beast hadn't noticed her yet, and Vivienne savored the moment, her heads exging silent gnces as if unig a shared strategy.

  With a sudden, explosive lunge, Vivienne closed the distance, her body surging forward like a tidal wave of fangs and scales. The grecw let out a guttural, ear-splitting shriek as one of her heads cmped down on its glowing forelimb, the creature's lumi cws fshiically as it thrashed. Another head struck its side, teeth sinking into chitin as a third ed around its tail, anch it in pce.

  The beast retaliated with a ferocious swing of its free arrowly missing one of Vivienne’s heads, which recoiled with a hiss. Its powerful legs buckled and strairying to throw her off, but Vivienne’s sheer size a bore down on it like an uing avanche.

  It thrashed violently, its segmented body writhing and coiling like a spring under pressure. The beast's glowing cws sparked with energy, sshing upward in wild arcs as it fought against Vivienne's hydra body. One of its strikes ected with the thick scales of her leftmost neck, sending a jolt of pain through her. The injured head reared back, hissing in fury, but another lunged forward, jaws snapping shut on the creature’s glowing forelimb, f it down.

  Vivienne’s grip on the grecw’s tail wavered as the beast twisted sharply, nearly dislodgihe creature's cws raked against the ground, leaving deep, sm gouges in the dirt as it scrambled to reposition itself. With a sudden surge of strength, it pushed upward, throwing off Vivienne’s bance just enough to slip partially free.

  The grecw pivoted on its hind legs, using its massive tail like a whip. The apperuck Vivienne’s side with a resounding crack, sending her sprawling momentarily. She recovered quickly, two of her heads snapping in unison at the offending tail, but the grecw’s nimbleness proved surprising for a beast of its size. It jerked its tail back just in time, the heads’ fangs grazing its chitinous surface.

  “You’re slippery,” Vivienne growled, her voices overpping as her six heads swayed in agitation, their movements almost hypnotic. Her cws dug into the earth, anch herself as she surged fain, her hydra form a relentless force of nature.

  The grecw didn’t retreat; instead, it lunged, its glowing cws striking in rapid, uable arcs. One cw raked across Vivienne’s shoulder, slig through her scales and drawing dark, steaming ichor. Another narrowly missed the tral neck, and the creature took advantage of her momentary recoil to strike at her fnk.

  Vivienne hissed, a cacophony of overpping voices as her six heads snapped and lurying to drive the grecw back. The beast, however, was relentless. It surged forward, its glowing cws carving through the air with terrifying speed and precision. One of its strikes ected with Vivienne's rightmost neck, the razor-sharp energy slig through flesh and sinew as if it were paper.

  A scream of pain ripped through the night as the severed head toppled to the ground, ichushing from the stump like a dark fountain. Vivieaggered, her remaining heads writhing in agony as she tried to steady herself. The grecw screeched triumphantly, its cws sparking as it pressed its advantage.

  Her tral head reared back, spitting a jet of bck, corrosive venom toward the beast’s face. The grecw twisted away, but the venom spttered against its side, hissing as it begaing through the thick, bark-like chitin. The beast howled in pain and rage, retaliating with a devastating strike from its massive tail. The blow smashed into Vivienne’s fnk, sending her crashing to the ground with enough force to shake the earth.

  Another cw came down, this time aimed at her sed neck. Viviewisted desperately, but the beast was too fast. The glowing bde carved through her flesh, severing a sed head. Blood sprayed in an arc, staining the ground as Vivienne roared in fury and pain.

  Despite the agony, Vivienne’s four remaining heads shed out in unison, their jaws g down on the grecw’s limbs and tail. The beast thrashed violently, trying to dislodge her, but Vivienne held on with unyielding ferocity. Her cws raked across its armored body, prying at the vulnerable joints between its segments.

  The grecw screeched, smming its tail repeatedly into the ground in a desperate attempt to break free. Each strike sent shockwaves through Vivienne’s body, but she refused to let go. Her tral head lunged forward, jaws log around the creature’s thorax. She bit down with all her strength, feeling the chitin crad give way beh her teeth.

  It shrieked, its movements growing more frantic as ichan to spill from its wounds. One of its glowing cws sshed at Vivienne’s tral neck, carving deep into the scales but failing to sever it. She snarled, her venom-soaked fangs sinking deeper into the grecw’s flesh.

  This was no longer a battle for domi was a savage fight for survival. The steppe echoed with the sounds of their struggle: roars, screeches, the ch of bone and chitin, and the wet, siing sounds of tearing flesh. Both batants were bleeding heavily, their bodies battered and broken, but her showed any sign of surrender.

  Vivienne’s remaining heads struck again, ripping into the grecw’s legs and underbelly, tearing ks of flesh away. The beast retaliated with a frenzied swing of its cws, raking across Vivieorso and drawing more dark ichor. They were locked in a deadly dance, each trying to outst the other, their lives hanging by a thread.

  Vivieeeth sank deeper into the beast’s thorax, the beast’s thrashing growing weaker as blood poured from its wounds in torrents. She tasted its ichor, foul and tangy, as she ripped and tore at the creature's insides, her heads moving with a vicious hunger. Her tral head withdrew, snapping at the creature’s upper limbs, her jaws ripping through the chitin with ease.

  The grecw’s remaining legs scraped uselessly against the ground, desperate to cw its way free, but Vivienne was relentless. Her cws dug into the earth, anch herself as her remaining heads tore at its flesh. The creature let out a final screech, its body jerking violently as its remaining energy drained away.

  With a primal roar, Vivienne wrehe beast’s abdomen open, her fangs carving through yers of armor and flesh, pulling out the soft, vulnerable innards beh. Blood poured from the wound, and the grecw's legs twitched o time befoing still.

  Vivienne’s jaws worked with savage precision, tearing through the grecw’s remaining flesh as her body was overe with a feverish hunger. Her four remaining heads were a blur of motion, their fangs sinking into the creature’s still-warm body with frantic urgency. As she devoured the torn flesh, something more than mere sustenance flooded her senses—a pulse of loam aether, thid heady, rising from the disiing creature.

  It coursed through her, intoxig, as though the very essence of the beast was transf into energy and power, feeding directly into her veins. The loam aether—dense, primal—pushed into her, her body vibrating with the force of it. The energy felt like something old and buried, something that had beeo the nd itself, a force long-fotten by those who lived above. It was raw, feral, and it ignited something deep inside her. She could feel the fragments of the beast's being—its memories—begin to bleed into her mind.

  As the first of the loam aether touched her tongue, her senses heightehe warmth of the body beh her began to fade, the fibers of its flesh unraveling like threads in the wind, dissipating into the air, like dust that might soon vanish from existence. Vivienne’s instincts fred, and her hunger grew more intense, more ravenous. She had to e it before it was lost—before the aether escaped her grasp. Her jaws tore into the beast with renewed force, g through solid bone and splitting the chitinous pting that had once shielded its vital ans.

  With every bite, the loam aether surged into her like a tidal wave. Memories flickered before her, sharp and fleeting, like disjointed fshes of the beings who had once made up the grecw. She saw—no, felt—a vision of war: the csh of swords and screams, soldiers bound by duty and oaths. A moment of stillness, a battlefield strewn with bodies, and the crushing loneliness of a single warrior standing amongst the age. The vision shifted again—this time, it was a fsh of grief: a family huddled together, weeping for someone lost to the passage of time, their faces hollowed by sorrow.

  A jarring paied in her chest, and her heart twisted with the sorrow of an a mother whose body had long since decayed, her spirit trapped in the bones of the grecw’s form. Vivienne’s tral head jerked back, a growl of fusion rumbling deep withihroat as she tried to process the flood of emotions and images. She shook her head, cws raking through the beast’s still form as she tore deeper, determio e every st shred of the creature before its essence could slip away entirely.

  Another fsh of memory—the hard, releraining of soldiers who had bound their fates to the grecw’s body, their faces sharp and i, their wills unyielding. But in the depths of that memory, there was an undercurrent of something darker—an a curse that bound their souls together in this grotesque symbiosis. They were no longer fully human, lekine, or any other deheir identities twisted and lost over time.

  Vivienne's fangs sank deeper into the creature’s belly, feeling its flesh and spirit break apart in her mouth. She could taste the anguish of the warriors, their sacrifices, their bonds. The memories began to overp in chaotic bursts, eaore vivid tha. The rage of battle, the desperation of a soldier on the edge of death, and the final moments of a creature that had been more than just flesh and bo had been a prison for the lost, a vessel for memories that no one had the power to save.

  The grecw's form was rapidly disiing, the very air thiing with the deg st of its body. Vivienne’s heads snapped from one limb to the , her hunger insatiable. The body’s remaining flesh, now little more than a deteriorating mass of getinous material, melted into the ground, dissolving uhe onsught of her ing fury. She tore into it with frenzied determination, sshing through what was left of its armored hide, pulling apart every st piece of the disiing creature.

  Another vision. A fsh ht, blinding light. The memory of a child, young and wide-eyed, standing before the grecw, an i but unknowingly entwined soul. They had been nothing more than a spark of potential, bound to the war mae by blood and fate. The child reached for something beyond the creature’s grasp—something they would never fully uand.

  Vivienne roared, shaking her heads violently, as the st vestiges of the grecw’s existence began to slip from her grasp. There was a final moment of crity—an image of a mother’s st embrace before fading into nothingness. The aether was leaving, vanishing into the atmosphere, but Vivienne had ed it all. The memories, the pain, the sacrifice—they were hers now.

  Her body was alive with the loam aether, a rush of power that pulsed within her, grounding her in a way she had never felt before. She felt ected to the earth, to the world itself, as though the very nd had just whispered its secrets into her ears. Vivienne’s form, still bathed in blood and ichor, stood above the remains of her prey, her breathing slow and steady now. She had ed not just the beast, but the essence of its long, tragic story.

  The battle was over. The beast was gos once-mighty form now reduced to little more than a fading stain on the earth. The memories it carried, however, g to her like a shadow, embedding themselves deep within her mind. They twisted and shaped her in ways she could not yet uand—more intricate, more plex than any creature she had devoured before. This was different. There was somethiy about it, a lingering presehat refused to be erased, even as its physical form melted away into the earth.

  The loam aether swirled within her veins, filling her with prounding her, but still, the hunger g her ihe memories she had ed—the grief, the rage, the fragmented lives that had been lived and lost—did not soothe it. They left an echo, a hunger deeper than anything she had experienced before.

  But above all, beyond the aether, the memories, and the broken trauma that had once been this beast, she was still hungry.

  SupernovaSymphony