Anthrax awoke to a sensation completely different from before. His body no longer felt like it was being torn apart by a thousand needles—instead, there was a strange energy coursing through his veins, like a warm, living electricity.
He opened his eyes to find himself lying on the familiar concrete floor of Layer 9. The narrow alley where Brak and his friends had left him battered. But something was wrong. The place looked the same, yet it felt so different.
The colors were sharper, more vivid. Every little detail—a crack in the wall, a grease stain on the floor, even the dust floating in the air—was visible with a clarity he had never experienced before. And most astonishing of all, he could hear sounds that should have been impossible to hear from his current distance.
The faint conversation from the apartment upstairs, the industrial hum of machinery from the factory at the edge of the district, even the heartbeats of rats hiding in the walls. It all reached his ears with astonishing clarity.
"What happened to me?" Anthrax muttered as he sat up, surprised at how easy it was. His body moved with agility he had never had before, as if his weight had been cut in half.
As he stood, something strange caught his eye on his right arm. A dark pattern had begun to appear beneath his skin, like a tattoo formed from within. It moved slowly, flowing like tiny snakes that snaked their way up his arm.
Anthrax studied the pattern with a mixture of awe and fear. The longer he stared, the clearer it became. It wasn't just one snake—it was hundreds of tiny snakes intertwined, forming an intricate pattern that rose from his wrist to his shoulder.
Suddenly, the crystal in his memory flashed. The Legacy Core. The ancient temple. The giant red eye that stared at him hungrily.
"This is all real," he whispered in a trembling voice.
As if in response to his words, the pattern on his arm moved faster. The tiny snakes began to spread to other parts of his body—up his neck, down his chest, up his left arm. And with each movement, Anthrax felt more power flowing through his body.
The sensation wasn't painful, but it was intense. It was like something was waking up in his blood, something that had been dormant for so long that it was now beginning to stir.
Anthrax tried to walk, but his steps were too fast, too strong. His feet kicked up small pebbles that exploded into fine dust when they hit the wall. He froze, staring at the small crater that had just been created in the thick concrete.
"This can't be," he said, holding up his hands, seeing the power hiding beneath his seemingly normal skin.
The sound of approaching footsteps made him turn. From the end of the alley, he could see Brak and two of his men walking toward him. Their expressions were confused—they clearly hadn't expected to find Anthrax alive and standing.
"Hey, look at that," one of them said, pointing at Anthrax. "The kid's still alive."
Brak growled and quickened his pace. "Hold him. Looks like that wasn't enough to teach him a lesson."
Anthrax felt something shift in his chest. A familiar rage began to burn, but this time it was different. It felt more alive, more powerful, as if some dark force was feeding off his emotions.
The snake pattern on his skin began to glow with a faint light, and Anthrax felt something he had never felt before—absolute confidence.
"I will not run this time," he said in a loud, clear voice.
Brak chuckled. "Oh, now this piece of trash is going to fight back? Good. I like those who fight back."
As Brak approached, Anthrax could see every detail of the man's movements with incredible clarity. The way he raised his hand, the direction his punch was coming from, even the weak spots in his defense. It all seemed so slow, as if time had slowed down just for him.
Brak's punch came—a hard punch that would normally be enough to knock Anthrax out. But this time, Anthrax moved.
His hand moved with inhuman speed, catching Brak's wrist in midair. His grip was so tight that he could hear the tiny bones in Brak's hand begin to crack.
"Aargh!" Brak cried out in pain, his eyes wide in disbelief. "Let me go!"
Anthrax stared into his eyes with a cold stare. "You call me a piece of trash?"
He squeezed his grip harder, and the sound of bones breaking rang through the air. Brak screamed, his knees nearly touching the ground in pain.
Brak's other two men retreated, their faces pale. They had seen Brak beat up men much bigger and stronger than Anthrax. Seeing the skinny kid handle their boss like a toy was a shocking sight.
"M-monster," one of them whispered.
The word made something snap inside Anthrax. Monster. Was that what he had become?
He released his grip, and Brak fell to the ground, cradling his broken hand. The normally arrogant man now stared at Anthrax with fear in his eyes.
"Don't… don't kill me," Brak pleaded, his voice shaking.
Anthrax stared at him with mixed emotions. Part of him—the old, weak part—felt sorry for the man. But another part, the part that had just awakened with this power, whispered that Brak deserved more than a broken hand.
Before he could decide what to do, a loud electronic sound boomed through the alley.
"ATTENTION. ENERGY ANOMALY DETECTED AT COORDINATES 7G-45X. RAPID RESPONSE UNIT IS BEING DISPATCHED."
The announcement came from speakers scattered throughout Layer 9, part of the surveillance system installed by the Layered City government. Anthrax had never heard anything like it before.
"Energy anomaly?" he muttered, then realized that the coordinates were right where he was now.
The snake pattern on his skin suddenly moved very quickly, as if in panic. Anthrax felt a strange sensation, like something was trying to communicate with him from within his own body.
Images began to flash in his head—not his own memories, but memories of something else. He saw glimpses of special forces hunted by the government, people with supernatural powers who were captured and never seen again.
"They know," he whispered with a horrifying realization. "They can detect this power."
The sound of heavy machinery approaching could be heard from the other end of the alley. Military vehicles, moving quickly toward his location.
Brak and his men, though still in shock from what had just happened, were smart enough to realize that the situation had taken a dangerous turn. They began to retreat quickly, not wanting to get involved with whatever was coming.
Anthrax stood alone in the alley, feeling the new power coursing through his body clash with the fear that suddenly overwhelmed him. He was strong now—far stronger than he had ever been—but he didn't know how strong, or what this power could do.
The snake patterns on his skin moved faster, and suddenly he heard a familiar voice—the same whisper he had heard in the ancient temple.
"Run... they're not ready for your power... you're not ready..."
"Run where?" Anthrax whispered. "They can detect me."
"Down... back to where it came from... you'll be safe... while..."
The sound of the engines grew closer. Anthrax could hear the sound of heavy boots running across the asphalt, commands being given in military code.
He had little choice.
Anthrax ran in the opposite direction of the voices, and was surprised at how fast he could move. His feet barely touched the ground, his body moving with inhuman agility. In seconds, he was at the other end of the alley.
But when he reached the main road, he saw that military vehicles had surrounded the entire area. Small tanks, trucks filled with soldiers, and most alarming of all—a strange vehicle he had never seen before, white with intricate electronics on top.
"Anomaly Detector," a whisper in his head explained. "They use it to find people like you…"
"People like me?" Anthrax asked himself.
"Heirs… those who inherit the power of an ancient civilization… the government has been searching for you for decades…"
Anthrax felt his body begin to shake, but not from fear. Something in his blood began to react to the detector's presence. The snake patterns on his skin moved rapidly, and he felt a strange sensation in his throat.
Suddenly, he couldn't breathe normally. His breaths became heavy and deep, and with each exhale, the air around him vibrated. Something was changing inside him, something fundamental.
"The transformation has begun… you cannot stop it… the ancient serpent's legacy has chosen you as its vessel…"
"Transformation?" Anthrax tried to speak, but his voice sounded strange—lower, with a soft hiss at the end of each word.
His skin began to itch, and when he looked at his hands, he saw that his skin was changing in texture. No longer smooth like normal human skin, it was starting to look like tiny scales that glistened in the light.
"No, no, no," he said frantically, trying to rub at his skin to try and get rid of the changes. But the more he rubbed, the more obvious the changes became.
His eyes began to change as well. His vision became sharper, but he also began to see a different spectrum of colors. He could see the heat radiating from the bodies of the soldiers in the distance, could see the energy flowing through their machines.
"Don't fight it... accept it... this is your evolution..."
But Anthrax didn't want to evolve. He wanted to remain human, albeit a weak and helpless one. The changes felt too fast, too extreme.
The electronic speaker boomed again, louder and more urgent this time.
"SERPENT CLAN SUCCESSOR DETECTED. THREAT LEVEL: MAXIMUM. ALL UNITS PREPARE FOR S-CLASS ARREST PROTOCOL."
The words made Anthrax's blood run cold. Serpent Clan. He didn't know what they meant, but the way they said them—with a mixture of awe and fear—made him realize that he had become part of something far larger and more dangerous than he had ever imagined.
The Anomaly Detector atop the white vehicle began to whirr, and a loud electronic beeping sound began to repeat itself. All eyes of the soldiers turned toward him, even though he was still hidden behind a building.
"They know where you are... you can't hide from them... the only way is..."
"What?" Anthrax asked desperately.
"Kill them all."