The tunnel didn't end at a door. It ended at a precipice.

  We stopped at the edge of an obsidian platform, staring into the vastness of Zero Point.

  It wasn't just an underground cave. It was a colossal geode, miles in diameter, lined with crystals pulsing with a warm, blinding amber light.

  The temperature here was high, but it wasn't the humid heat of the jungle. It was a dry, sterilizing heat, like the inside of a nuclear reactor.

  "My armor's Geiger counter froze," Valéria tapped her wrist. "Either it's broken, or the radiation here is spiritual."

  "It's both," I replied, adjusting the sunglasses I grabbed from my pack. "We are in the womb of the world."

  In the center of the geode, floating above a lake of liquid silver metal, was the Entity.

  It had no fixed shape. It was a serpent made of plasma, fire, and eyes. Hundreds of eyes, scattered across a body that writhed in an infinite loop, eating its own tail and being reborn.

  "M'boitatá," Luna whispered, her voice full of reverence and fear. "The Fire Snake. Legend says whoever looks into its eyes goes mad."

  "It's not a legend," I looked away, focusing on the base of the structure. "It's neurobiology. The light pattern of its eyes causes overload in the visual cortex. It burns your synapses with excess information."

  Arthur (the Parasite) was absolutely silent. It shrank into the deepest part of my body, covering itself with layers of dead cells.

  [THREAT: APEX PREDATOR. CLASS: BIOLOGICAL STAR.]

  [THIS BEING DOES NOT CONSUME MANA. IT GENERATES MANA. IT IS THE OPPOSITE OF THE DEVOURER KING.]

  "Exactly," I said aloud, understanding the Gardener's (and my father's) plan.

  I descended the spiral ramp leading to the mercury lake.

  "Arthur! Where are you going?" Gristle tried to grab me. "That's pure fire! It'll vaporize you!"

  "The Devourer King is a black hole of hunger," I explained, continuing to descend. "He eats matter, mana, and concepts. The only thing that can kill a black hole is forcing it to swallow something bigger than its capacity to digest.

  "We need to give him indigestion of infinity."

  I pointed to the Boitatá.

  "That thing is a perpetual fusion reactor. Infinite mana. If we can inject its essence into the King... he explodes."

  I reached the edge of the metal lake. The heat was unbearable. My skin started reddening instantly.

  The Fire Serpent stopped spinning.

  Hundreds of eyes of fire turned to me.

  I felt my mind start to fry. I saw the birth of galaxies. I saw the death of the universe. I saw the day I was born and the day I died.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  I screamed, falling to my knees, covering my face.

  "Little parasite..." The voice didn't come from outside. It came from the heat in my blood. "You smell of Void. You carry the mark of the Enemy."

  "I carry... the cure..." I choked out, forcing my body not to spontaneously combust.

  "Cure?" The serpent laughed, and the mercury lake rippled. "You humans broke the seal. You called the Hunger. Now, you want the Fire to clean up the mess."

  "I don't want you to clean," I raised my head, keeping my eyes closed, guiding myself by the symbiote's thermal vision. "I want you to use me."

  The serpent descended, hovering inches from me. The heat was so intense the fibers of my synthetic clothes melted, fusing to my skin.

  "Use you? You are a cracked glass vial. If I enter you, your soul will evaporate."

  "I don't have a soul," I smiled, a smile that tore my cracked lips. "I have a Parasite. And it's very good at adaptation.

  "My father, Hélio Veras, designed me to be the bridge. I am compatible with Darkness (the Parasite) and Light (you). I am the gray."

  I ripped open my tattered shirt. In my chest, the Parasite manifested, creating an open cavity protected by black ribs of reinforced chitin.

  "Enter. Become the bullet for my gun."

  The Entity hesitated. It looked into the abyss of my twisted biology.

  It saw the potential.

  I was an anomaly. A being existing between life and death, between science and magic.

  "Very well." The serpent began to shrink, condensing its mile-long body into a sphere of concentrated liquid fire. "But know this, hybrid: Fire asks no permission. It burns. You will live in constant agony until the moment you fire me."

  "I've lived in agony since I was 10," I replied. "A little more won't make a difference."

  The sphere of fire, the Boitatá's core, shot into my chest.

  There was no physical impact.

  There was fusion.

  AAAAAAARRRRRGH!

  The scream that tore from my throat wasn't human.

  I felt my blood literally boil. My veins glowed orange through my skin. The Parasite tried to flee my body, but the fire trapped it, fusing alien biology with stellar magic.

  I fell to the ground, convulsing.

  The mercury lake evaporated. The geode went dark, for all the light was now inside me.

  Valéria, Luna, and Gristle ran to the platform.

  "Arthur!" Luna tried to touch me but recoiled, hand burned. "He's at 800 degrees!"

  I stood up slowly.

  The pain was absolute. Every breath was like inhaling crushed glowing glass.

  But I was alive.

  My skin was gray, like coal ash. My eyes, when I opened them, had no iris or pupil anymore. They were two furnaces of golden flame.

  And in my chest, shining through the flesh, was the spinning core of the Serpent.

  Arthur (the Parasite) was silent. It had been subjugated. Now, it served only as thermal insulation to keep me from melting.

  "Doctor?" Gristle asked, clutching her cleaver in fear. "Is that you in there?"

  I looked at my hands. Sparks flew from my fingertips.

  "Partly," my voice sounded double, like crackling fire. "The rest is... fuel."

  I looked up at the cave ceiling. I could feel the Devourer King. He was close. His hunger was a black hole in the north, coming toward us.

  But now, I felt no fear.

  I felt I was the antidote.

  "We have the weapon," I said. "Now we need to deliver the package."

  "How?" asked Valéria. "The truck is upstairs. And you can't touch anything without melting it."

  "I don't need a truck." The energy built up in my legs was insane. Gravity felt like a suggestion, not a law. "I am the rocket."

  "Luna," I turned to her. "I need your help. My mind is burning. The Serpent's consciousness is chaotic. I need you to use your voice.

  "Sing a stabilization frequency. Keep my mind focused. If I lose control, I explode and take the Amazon with me."

  Luna swallowed hard. She nodded, gripping her baton.

  "I'm going to sing the most hardcore lullaby in history."

  "Valéria, Gristle," I pointed to the exit. "Get out of the jungle. Run as far as possible. The blast radius when I meet the King will be continental."

  "No way," Gristle stomped her foot. "We started this together. We finish it together."

  "Besides," Valéria smiled, showing a remote control. "I called the cavalry."

  "Cavalry?"

  A rumble came from the tunnel above.

  Not roots. Engines.

  Captain Jurema and her aerial fleet (barges suspended by swamp gas balloons and levitation magic) were descending through the bunker hole.

  "We heard there was a barbecue!" Jurema's voice echoed. "And we brought the sauce!"

  I smiled, and smoke drifted from my mouth.

  "Good. Let's go to war."

  I began to float, propelled by jets of thermal mana shooting from my back.

  The fusion was complete.

  I was the Concept Incinerator. And the Devourer King was about to find out that not everything that shines is edible.