Wulei

In a world where power comes from what you kill and eat, everything has a price. Eat an animal's heart — gain its ability. Eat a second different one — you die. Unless you know the sequence. Unless you're on a path. The exam opens once a year. Hunters, criminals, desperate people — all converging on Edra, the last town with a name, at the edge of zones that get progressively more dangerous the deeper you go. Amadeus is nineteen. His father died on a hunt — or so he was told. His mother sits by a window and hasn't moved in months. He has a torn note in his pocket he doesn't understand yet. He's here to pass the exam. Everything else comes after.