"Power is not given by gods. It is stolen—from beneath their fangs."
The pit reeked of old blood and sacred venom.
Kael Vire stood barefoot on the cracked stone ring, heart thundering against the silence of hundreds. High above, the amphitheater of Vasskar roared with faces—noble-blooded warriors, fang-masters, serpent clerics—all waiting to see which snake would choose him. Or if he would die.
Behind him, the boy before him still convulsed on the ground, his skin purple, mouth foaming from a venom rejection. They were already dragging his limp body away.
Kael didn't blink.
Not when blood sprayed onto his toes.
Not when his name was called.
"Kael Vire, of no house. Step forward."
He walked.
The circle of serpents hissed from silver cages arranged in ritual order—twenty-three breeds, each aligned to an art of power: healing, war, poison, illusion, memory, and more. They slithered slowly inside their glass prisons, watching.
Waiting.
He could hear his pulse in his throat. He wore nothing but binding wraps and a thin ceremonial sash—offering his body, his blood, his fate.
A hiss.
Then another.
One by one, the snakes emerged. Some coiled lazily, disinterested. Others flicked tongues at him. But none moved toward him.
Seconds dragged. The elders began to murmur.
Another failure. Another orphan. Another waste.
Kael clenched his fists behind his back.
He refused to walk away unbitten. To return to the gutters of Vasskar, to be spat on, shamed, passed over for patrol rations and whipped for bread crumbs. No. If none of these temple-bred worms would take him—
Then something shifted.
From the shadow beyond the ritual circle, a low growl-hiss crawled across the pit.
The elders jolted.
A seventh, unseen cage—long sealed, rust-covered, forgotten behind incense smoke—shuddered open.
A serpent slithered out.
It was nothing like the others. No glimmering gold, no priestly white, no jeweled azure. This one was obsidian black, its scales cracked like volcanic stone, eyes glowing green like jungle fire.
Gasps rippled through the elders.
"That cage was sealed a hundred years ago—"
"Kill it before it—"
"It's forbidden—extinct—!"
Kael didn't move. His entire body had gone cold.
The black snake ignored the other serpents. It slithered directly to him, rising on its coils, nearly reaching his face.
He met its gaze.
The snake tilted its head. Then lunged.
Fangs pierced his chest—straight through the heart.
Kael didn't scream.
He couldn't.
His body locked, his vision exploded. Colors bled into sound. Light into pain. He fell to his knees as the venom burned through his veins—not like fire, but like memory.
Whispers erupted behind his eyes.
> "I remember gods."
"I remember fire eating sky."
"I remember a voice… like yours."
He gasped.
And the snake spoke.
> "You are mine, Kael Vire."
"You will uncoil the buried truths."
"You are Venombound."
---
He collapsed.
Somewhere above, the elders shouted. Chaos exploded in the arena. Clerics screamed about sacred laws. A noble woman fainted. Soldiers ran toward the pit.
But Kael lay still, blood mixing with venom on his chest.
The black snake curled protectively around him, hissing low—a warning to all.
The choosing was done.
The forbidden serpent had claimed its warrior.
---
Hours later, Kael awoke in a dark cell beneath the temple.
His breath came shallow. The wound in his chest was sealed with burn salve and silkroot paste. But the pain still echoed—not from injury, but from the knowledge embedded in his blood.
Images flickered behind his eyes.
A temple overgrown with vines, buried in jungle stone.
A woman with snakes for hair whispering a child's name.
A voice—his voice—chanting in a language long dead.
The door opened.
A woman entered. Pale robes, violet eyes, a silver fang pendant.
"You should not be alive," she said flatly. "That serpent should not exist."
Kael didn't answer.
She stepped closer.
"I am Cleric Selyra. You have broken every law of selection. The Obsidian Coil has not chosen since the Serpent War. You are to be tested. Examined. Perhaps executed."
Kael lifted his head. "I didn't choose the serpent. It chose me."
She stared at him a long moment. "So it did."
Silence.
Then the snake uncurled from the shadows of the room—silent, smooth, regal. It wrapped once around Kael's arm and rested its head on his shoulder.
Selyra stepped back, shaken for the first time.
"Do you know what it means to be Venombound?"
Kael shook his head.
She knelt, suddenly reverent. "It means the gods remember you."
Kael is now bonded to a serpent long thought extinct—one connected to ancient divine wars. This makes him both a threat to the ruling order and a possible key to an ancient prophecy. The elders are panicking. His destiny is no longer his own.