Jason had made steady progress through the volcanic realm. The lesser creatures no longer charged him blindly. The ones that remained kept their distance, intelligent enough to recognize the disparity in power. He was not the only force capable of reshaping this place, but that fact only sharpened his focus. He needed answers. Specifically, he needed to know why they had targeted his child.
It could not have been random. The barrier around the settlement had been linked directly to him. Nothing from outside should have been able to perceive what lay within, let alone lock onto an infant who had only just begun to display unconscious power.
This was the first time Jason had even known he had a daughter. The realization still sat strangely in his chest. Tauriel was strong in her own right, yet something about the infant’s protective magic had drawn attention from across realms.
A quiet concern lingered at the edge of his thoughts. Exiting a tear the first time had dumped him into an unpredictable location. He had no guarantee that forcing his way out now would return him cleanly to the settlement. Still, the signatures of the stronger entities burned clearly in his senses. A dozen of them. The smaller lifeforms stayed back, disciplined, almost certainly under the direct command of those twelve.
Jason knew he had to be careful. There was a strong chance that the moment he committed fully, the real powers of this realm would respond in kind.
In the next breath he triggered one of the traits assimilated from Namtar. Dark, leathery wings burst from his back with a wet, organic sound. He launched skyward, climbing rapidly above the lava fields and ash clouds. From this height he intended to map the environment, mark the positions of the twelve, and plan his next sequence of strikes.
He never got the chance.
A lance of pure, condensed force tore upward from below and impaled him cleanly through the chest. There was no time to dodge. The weapon moved with a speed and certainty that bypassed every defensive layer he possessed. Jason’s wings locked. His body arched in midair as the lance punched straight through flesh, bone, and the space where his heart should have been. He fell like a fallen angel, trailing black-red mist, and struck the volcanic ground with a heavy, bone-jarring thud.
"What the fuck was that?" Jason muttered, voice strained.
The lance should never have bypassed his barrier. That should not have been possible. Worse, he could feel it actively negating every form of magic and supernatural reinforcement he carried. His healing factor, normally instantaneous, had slowed to a crawl. Pain flooded his torso in sharp, grinding waves. Breathing became a deliberate, agonizing effort.
"Fuck! It hurts!"
He had no idea whether pulling the weapon free would kill him outright. The System remained silent on adaptation. For the first time in a long while, it offered no progress bar, no percentage climb, no reassurance. Jason smirked through the blood in his mouth. It had been ages since he felt this exposed, this close to genuine mortality. For some twisted reason, he relished it.
The lance had struck the exact location of his heart. The fact that he was still conscious, still thinking, meant the weapon was not absolute or rather, had missed its mark.
At the last possible instant his heart had shifted to the opposite side of his chest cavity. Another gift from Namtar. The ability to voluntarily rearrange internal organs explained a great deal about her grotesque resilience and survival. Jason filed the information away without further emotion.
A female figure approached through the haze of heat and ash.
Her skin was a deep, luminous red that seemed composed of living fire rather than flesh. Horns curved back from her temples. Demonic features sharpened an otherwise striking face. Despite the inhuman traits, her chest was full and heavy, the curves pronounced even beneath the minimal armor of hardened magma plates she wore. She stopped a short distance away and studied the lance protruding from Jason’s body.
"How are you alive?" she asked.
Jason opened his mouth to answer, then realized she was not speaking to him. Her gaze was fixed on something deeper—on the Marrow itself.
She extended one hand. The lance shuddered, then withdrew in a smooth reverse motion, leaving a gaping, smoking hole through Jason’s chest. The moment the weapon left his body, his healing resumed, slower than usual but steady. Tissue began to knit. Ribs realigned. The System finally stirred.
[Ding!]
[Notification: Current adaptation limit reached.]
[Further environmental and conceptual adaptations locked.]
[Assimilation of abilities through carnal knowledge remains available.]
Jason registered the message with cold clarity. The weapon had been unique enough to push him against a hard ceiling.
Ordinary threats would no longer expand his resistances. But the door to taking power directly from others through intimacy remained open.
He looked at the fire-skinned woman again. She still had not acknowledged him as an independent being. Her attention remained locked on the Marrow she believed was wearing him like a coat.
"Why are you doing this?" Jason asked, voice rough but steady as the hole in his chest continued to close. "What do you want with my child?"
She ignored the question completely. Lava ropes erupted from the ground without warning, coiling around his limbs and torso with crushing heat. The bindings were meant to immobilize and cook him alive at the same time. Jason flexed once. The ropes shattered into cooling fragments of black glass. In the same motion he closed the distance, appearing directly in front of her.
She reacted instantly, one clawed hand shooting toward his throat. Jason caught the wrist, twisted, and drove a knee toward her midsection. She blocked with her free forearm, the impact producing a sharp crack of force that scattered ash in a wide circle. The two of them broke apart, then closed again.
She struck first with a rapid series of open-palm blows aimed at his center line. Each impact carried the heat of a forge. Jason slipped the first two, absorbed the third against a raised elbow, and answered with a straight right that snapped her head sideways. She recovered with unnatural speed, spinning into a reverse kick that forced him to lean back. The heel of her foot passed close enough to scorch the air in front of his face.
Jason stepped in rather than retreat. He caught her extended leg, attempted to sweep the supporting one, and found her already shifting weight. She dropped, planted both hands, and drove both feet upward toward his chest. He crossed his arms in time, but the double impact still drove him back several meters across the cracked stone. Heat radiated from the points of contact, lingering on his skin like a brand.
He advanced again. This time he mixed low kicks with sharp elbow strikes, forcing her to defend on multiple levels. She met him blow for blow. A rising knee from her nearly caught his chin. He turned with the motion, let the force pass, and delivered a short, vicious hook into her floating ribs. The sound was solid and satisfying. She hissed, eyes narrowing, and answered by coating her next punch in liquid fire. Jason took the hit on the shoulder rather than the face, feeling the unnatural heat try to burrow into muscle. He grabbed the extended arm, rotated his hips, and threw her over his shoulder in a heavy slam.
She rolled with the impact and came up in a low crouch, one hand pressed to the ground. Lava surged upward in a narrow spike aimed at his midsection. Jason sidestepped, caught the spike with both hands while it was still semi-molten, and redirected it into the ground beside her. The near miss bought him half a second. He used it to close distance once more.
The fight settled into a grinding, close-quarters rhythm. Fists, knees, elbows, and forehead strikes. She was strong—stronger than most of the entities he had faced in this realm. Jason matched her power directly, relying on refined technique and the sheer durability the Marrow provided. They traded dominance in short bursts. One exchange left her with a split lip that leaked molten fluid instead of blood. Another left Jason with a deep bruise across the ribs that healed even as they continued to move.
Minutes stretched. Neither gained a decisive advantage. Sweat and ash mixed on Jason’s skin. Her breathing remained controlled, but the intensity of her attacks had increased. She was beginning to treat him as a genuine threat rather than a vessel to be claimed.
Jason finally saw the opening he needed. She overcommitted on a wide, fire-wreathed haymaker. He ducked under it, stepped inside her guard, and drove his shoulder into her center mass. At the same time his lead leg hooked behind hers. The combined force took her off her feet. He followed her down, using his weight and positioning to pin both of her wrists against the volcanic stone above her head. His knees bracketed her hips, locking her in place.
She thrashed once, testing the hold, then went still. Heat continued to radiate from her skin, intense enough that the stone beneath her began to glow. Jason held firm, looking down into her furious eyes.
In that moment of enforced stillness she displayed something new.
The fire along her arms and torso did not simply burn—it reorganized. Patterns of living flame shifted across her skin like a second circulatory system, redirecting heat and force with conscious precision. When she tensed, the fire concentrated along her forearms and attempted to melt through his grip. When she relaxed, it spread outward in a defensive lattice that hardened the air itself. The control was granular, almost cellular. It was not raw elemental projection. It was an internal architecture of flame that she could reshape at will.
Jason’s eyes narrowed with genuine interest.
That ability was worth taking.
He kept her pinned, weight settled, and studied the living fire moving beneath her skin. The System’s earlier notification echoed in his mind. Adaptation limits had been reached. Assimilation through carnal knowledge remained open.
Jason had an idea in that moment.