I

Ngen. The machi had explained it to him on the very first day of his mystical journey: “They are the spirits that maintain the balance of our world. Water, fire, earth, wind, animals… Everything that surrounds us, visible and invisible, has its own protective ngen.” It was one of the fundamental concepts of the Mapuche religion, so deeply rooted in everyday life that repeating it seemed redundant.

Yaco always met with Rayen, his grandmother and above all his mentor, in the open air. Connection with nature was essential for the machi, the shaman who channels the power of the elements to communicate with them and, consequently, use them for the good of the village.

They lived on the southern shore of Lake Ranco, in what would become central Chile. It was located just west of the Andes and fifty kilometers from the Pacific Ocean—a distance more than sufficient to render the sea a negligible element in their stationary existence. The Mapuche were a peaceful people of herders and farmers, their lives deeply rooted in respect for the world around them.

However, their teacher-student relationship was more strained than it should have been. Male machi were exceedingly rare and often considered inferior to their female counterparts. Tradition dictated that the role be passed down from grandmother to granddaughter, who would eventually leave the family home to live alone near the village, offering her assistance to the community. But since that fateful day when Yaco had lost both his mother and sister, he was the only viable descendant to inherit the role. Neither he nor his father had fully come to terms with this, but Rayen’s love had helped them accept reality, build a future for the boy, and ensure the continuity of the tradition.

In recent months, their lessons had focused on the properties of stones, herbs, and water: how the color of a container or the temperature of the liquid it held could alter its beneficial effects, for example. The teachings followed a steady, peaceful rhythm, as they sat by the lake listening to the breeze descending from the mountains, attuning themselves even to the faintest of scents—from the resin of the pines to the crisp, exotic tang of sea salt, sometimes carried inland by the waiwén wind.

But destiny cannot be forced. Perhaps Yaco was not truly determined to become a machi. Or perhaps the impulsiveness of his seventeen years was too difficult to temper. Or maybe his impatience outweighed his discipline. Whatever the reason, he was tired of learning how to give energy to others. He wanted to harness it for himself. While this did not preclude using it altruistically, his yearning was driven by the basest of virtues: vengeance.

He wanted to become a kalku—a shaman who wielded their abilities for… more questionable purposes. Kalku could inflict harm, cast spells, unleash illness, or even bind the power of an ngen to exploit it at will. Yaco, however, was only marginally interested in the power of these spirits. His intent was far more specific: he wanted to kill one.

II

Twenty lunar cycles earlier, Yaco’s mother and his ten-years-old sister had taken a canoe to the island called Leiva, three hundred meters from their settlement, where a small altar stood. That morning, a low mist stubbornly refused to lift despite the late hour. The water had taken on a brownish hue, as if the lakebed—or something dwelling within it—had been particularly disturbed. The woman was well aware of these ominous signs, but the purpose of their journey was to pray and appease the spirits of the lake, so she paid them little mind. Never, however, could she have expected a cunning demon to ambush them.

The guirivilo, the water fox, loved to lurk beneath the surface, ensnaring victims with its long, hook-like tail. Its body resembled that of a canine, but it was as slender and sinuous as a serpent. Once it harpooned its prey, it would coil around them and drag them into the depths to suffocate.

That day, the woman and her daughter fell prey to the beast before they even reached the island. Their screams carried clearly to the village, where Yaco and his father were washing wool shorn from their animals.

The father immediately leapt into another boat to reach the unfortunate pair, but it was too late. Yaco remained behind, powerless, his fists clenched around the wet fibers, as the cold water slowly lost its cloudiness and turned crystal clear. That day, still so vivid in his mind, something inside him darkened, and he swore vengeance against the demon.

That afternoon, his grandmother dismissed him from their lesson with a reminder of the rules of the admapu—the fundamental principles of nature, inviolable for those who wished to avoid incurring the wrath of the divine pillánes. These were simple laws that underpinned their way of life: always act respectfully toward all beings, living and nonliving. Additionally, never forget to honor the gods with the appropriate rituals, such as seeking the blessing of the ngen of the animal or resource one intended to consume.

But it was Yaco who felt consumed. The anger within him grew increasingly difficult to suppress. Walking, fishing, and merely existing near the vast expanse of the lake caused him almost physical pain. Though the valley where they lived, nestled in the shadow of the mountains, was a feast for the eyes and soul, Yaco was more restless than ever before. As he returned to the ruka he shared with his father, he made a decision: that night, he would hunt the monster and put an end to it once and for all.

For weeks, he had spent sleepless nights crafting a ceremonial spear wrapped in leather and feathers, with a double-bladed tip—serrated on one side and sharper than the stone they used for shearing on the other. He had even carved into the wooden shaft the incantations his grandmother had taught him to ward off negative influences.

It was through these very incantations that he intended to find the beast. Spirits always responded to certain prayers. His grandmother had taught him that these prayers were not so much spoken as listened to: every ngen had its own voice—or something akin to it—that a machi must learn to recognize.

That evening, after sharing dinner with his father and waiting for him to go to bed, Yaco silently slipped out of the hut, retrieved his weapon, and made his way toward the lake.

The habits of the guirivilo were well-known to the Mapuche. Humans are keen observers, always seeking to attribute meaning to the world around them. In the case of the water fox, it was most often sighted at night near the western shore of the lake, where it was said to have a den. Yaco walked along the moonlit bank, not even considering taking a boat—he would have been far too visible and exposed. Besides, he planned to exploit the creature’s supposed weakness: according to rumors, this canine-reptilian hybrid was almost entirely defenseless and vulnerable if forced out of its aquatic habitat onto dry land.

With this plan in mind, the boy continued silently for more than an hour, staying well clear of the water and alert to the slightest movement in the lake or nearby. His patience paid off. Hidden among bamboo reeds at the foot of a promontory that concealed it from the path encircling the basin, there was the mouth of a small underground cave. It was barely half a meter wide but more than sufficient for an animal to pass through.

The novice hunter wasn’t certain it was the right cave, but he desperately hoped it was. He crept toward the opening as silently as possible, placing his bare feet on the ground as lightly as falling leaves, and straddled the entrance.

He mentally reviewed the hunting techniques his father and the villagers had taught him: staying downwind, controlled breathing, balanced weight. He was just thinking he should ask for a break from machi training to practice hunting when the water beneath him rippled. Something was moving toward the exit of the hiding place.

He gripped the spear tightly, held his breath, and tensed every muscle in his body. A pointed head of a fox emerged first, with ears flattened, followed by an elongated, reptilian body with a brown fur tinged with greenish hues. Without hesitation, Yaco drove the spear’s tip into the base of its skull with all his might. The creature let out an unholy yelp, silenced as the boy violently twisted the shaft, forcing it to contort in agony. The beast’s hook-like tail flailed wildly, but the attack had been too swift, and the blows missed their mark. Without a moment’s pause, Yaco leveraged his weight to fling the beast over his shoulder onto the dry ground, where it landed with a dull thud more than ten meters away. Quickly glancing into the den to ensure no other creature was lurking inside, he lunged toward his prey.

The rumors were true: the beast was trembling, not convulsively but with an unsteady breath that caused its entire form to blur, as if it were struggling to maintain its shape. The fox’s eyes were filled with terror, but there was something else—something beyond fear. They seemed to reproach its assailant or issue a warning.

This was the final spark that ignited Yaco’s fury. Overwhelmed by rage, he pounced on the wounded fox, finishing it off and mercilessly mauling it with his weapon.

III

When he had finished venting his fury, Yaco paused to observe the creature’s body, which had long since stopped trembling. Only then did he notice, with horror, that it was completely drenched in blood. What frightened him, however, was its color: it wasn’t a vivid red but an unnatural purple, streaked with indigo. He had never seen such a hue before, but then again, he had never seen the remains of a creature like this.

His vengeance was only half complete. He still needed to kill the creature’s ngen spirit. In that moment, as he sat atop the warm corpse, it struck him as an unnecessary exaggeration. Yet, the thought of the monster having taken not one but two of his loved ones spurred him on. Without hesitation, he slit its chest open with the serrated edge of the spear. Gagging, he plunged his hand into the viscous, warm innards, steeling himself as he grasped what he believed to be the heart, and tore it free with the help of the blade.

The organ was large, forcing him to use both hands to hold it as it slipped from his fingers. With tears streaming down his face—whether from the memory of his brutally slain mother and sister or the sacrilegious, accursed act he was committing—he sank his teeth into the flesh. His mouth filled with blood, and he fought back retches as he swallowed the anomalous liquid.

He tried to rip off a piece, but his vision began to blur and double. His body, like the creature’s mere minutes before, started to vibrate. It wasn’t an uncontrolled muscle spasm; rather, it felt as if every molecule of his body was oscillating rapidly, moving first to the left and then to the right, making his figure seem hazy.

Confused and unable to comprehend what was happening, a clear vision of the metal bell his grandmother always rang at the end of the guillatún ritual appeared in his mind. He had always hated that sound—or rather, the vibration of the metal that traveled from his ears to his teeth, his skull, and down to his fingertips. Now, after ingesting the abnormal blood, he felt a resonance eerily similar to that bell.

Yet, his ears had nothing to do with it. He sensed the vibration spreading throughout his entire body, growing and shifting. It was impossible to describe: his whole being—not any particular organ—moved in a direction he couldn’t define. He felt himself slipping outside his own body. The trembling worsened, and he collapsed onto the fox’s corpse, its unblinking eye staring back at him. In its glassy pupil, his own grotesque reflection was the last thing he saw before losing consciousness.

Yaco had no understanding of the consequences of his actions; had he known, reason and fear would have surely overridden even his overpowering thirst for vengeance. His unconscious body began to move, driven by an external force. It slowly rotated in place, lifting a few centimeters off the ground, before starting to deform like a drop of fluid suspended in another, denser liquid. His consciousness ceased to exist—at least, in this world. His remains, which no longer resembled anything human, emitted a purple hue that clashed violently with the blue of the night. It seemed ill-suited to this reality.

From his village, a faint glowing dot would have been visible to the west, but no one was awake at that late hour. For several hours, the shapeless mass slowly rose from the ground. Like a distant star, its brightness was not constant; the strange trembling had gripped it since the fateful bite into the creature’s ngen.

By dawn, as the first villagers rose with the sun, they noticed the celestial body levitating in the distance, dozens of meters above the ground. At first, they weren’t frightened, there was no reason. In fact, they spent hours venerating it and praying peacefully for its benevolence. Meanwhile, a search for the missing boy began, though only Rayen seemed truly concerned, sensing a connection between his disappearance and the strange phenomenon.

At sunset, as the sky turned crimson, the violet anomaly revealed its true nature: it was nothing good. Later, the machi would name it minchenmapu—the “spirit of imbalance.”

IV

Jellyfish—or at least that’s what they seemed to be. Hovering hundreds of meters away from the village, too far to be seen clearly, they floated in the air with the characteristic grace of their aquatic counterparts. Dozens of them had appeared suddenly in front of the towering purple mass, as though they had been born from it. They swam sinuously through the air, trailing tentacles that seemed to burn like fire. Some moved toward the lake, while others drifted across the sky, scattering in all directions.

When about ten of them passed over the cluster of houses, they did not stop but circled curiously above, studying the humans who stared back in open-mouthed wonder.

To the Mapuche, these beings were entirely new. They seemed to be made of rock rather than flesh or wood, gleaming like metal in the reddish light of the setting sun. Their fiery tendrils occasionally disappeared, allowing them to move nimbly with the wind’s current. Yet, the most striking feature to the villagers was the entire vision’s dreamlike quality: these strange objects sometimes seemed to vanish abruptly, only to stabilize again for several seconds.

The same was true of the sounds they made as they flew at low altitude. A rhythmic humming, sweet and almost soothing, emanated from the floating creatures. But when their forms began to tremble, the humming ceased. It was a confusing dream. The flickering images and vibrating sounds caused nausea among many villagers, who retreated to their homes, unaccustomed to the strobe-like effect.

In the minutes that followed, more jellyfish continued to emerge from the violet star—which itself trembled intermittently—and dispersed across the sky, heading toward the sea and the mountains as though eager to explore a new world. A group of four settled on the lake’s surface, just a few dozen meters from the Mapuche dwellings. Many villagers, struck with severe headaches, had sought shelter indoors, but others, including Rayen, were more resilient and observed the scene with fascination. The creatures did not appear hostile, only curious.

One of the entities broke away from the group and, hovering motionlessly, drifted slowly toward the humans to study them more closely. Despite the villagers’ discomfort, the atmosphere remained peaceful. Suddenly, the soft hum that marked the sound of these beings stopped, and for a moment, all of them seemed to freeze, as though listening.

An ear-splitting roar filled the air, and a massive, radiant figure streaked across the sky, spanning its entire length. Against the deep blue hues of twilight, the perfect whiteness of the immense, amorphous creature stood out as it darted from one side of the heavens to the other. It resembled a fish—perhaps a moray eel—but appeared to have large wings (or were they heads?) folded at its sides. Its dazzling brightness made its exact features difficult to discern, but unlike the three-meter-tall jellyfish, this creature was over fifty meters in length.

As the winged fish soared over the lake, an earthquake began to shake the ground beneath the villagers, who rushed to their ruka made of straw and earth. Accustomed to seismic activity, the Mapuche’s homes were well-suited to withstand the tremors due to the pliability of their dried grass stems. But this earthquake was different. Its epicenter seemed to be inside one of the eastern mountains.

The atmosphere was surreal. The daylight had nearly faded, but a brilliant light darted across the sky, reflected on hundreds of small, floating stones. Suddenly, the trembling ground stilled, and the light in the sky grew even more intense. Another enormous luminous being appeared to the east, atop Choshuenco, the most imposing volcano in the mountain range. It shone as brightly as a second sun.

This being stood on two legs and was perhaps more than a hundred meters tall. It had more than two arms—possibly four—but its movement and inherent brightness made it difficult to count. Its head was indiscernible, almost as though it lacked one atop its massive torso. Most striking, however, was the disproportionate length of its limbs.

It descended the hills with immense strides, reaching the lake in less than a minute. Impossible—an ordinary man would have needed an entire day to cover that distance! It did not touch the water but levitated toward the violet shape that had emerged from Yaco’s body. Once before it, the giant extended its arms, encircling the star, and with a single swift motion, crushed it out of existence.

The jellyfish, which until then had maintained their tranquil demeanor, panicked at the disappearance of their portal into this alien world. They began flying erratically, seemingly in disarray, but within seconds formed a perfect spiral in the sky. The formation began to rotate around the figure that had emerged from the mountain. It was a strange dance, beautiful and hypnotic.

Starting from the spiral’s outer edge, the stone-jellyfish launched flaming arrows from invisible bows, all aimed at the giant’s torso. The fiery projectiles struck—or so it seemed—but disappeared into the immense being’s light, leaving it entirely unscathed.

The winged fish flew to its aid, weaving through the stone creatures and breaking their spiral formation with a sweep of its tail. The impact sent the defenseless targets hurtling kilometers away, likely smashing into the mountains.

Two distinct scenes followed. The surviving jellyfish—still numbering in the hundreds—scattered in every direction, pelting the two luminous giants with fiery arrows. Many missed their mark, landing on the ground and exploding on impact, destroying rocks, trees, and, in a few cases, even straw huts. Fires erupted around Lake Ranco as the hills filled with massive craters.

The two radiant beings, however, seemed entirely indifferent to the chaos. When the dragon-like creature struck its targets with its appendage, the other giant appeared to scold it, seemingly to avoid violence. It gestured wildly in all directions, its arms rotating around its body as the fiery projectiles struck it harmlessly. Stretching its limbs outward, it appeared to touch invisible points around itself, moving faster and faster, as though tracing unseen shapes in the air.

V

After an indeterminate period of chaos, during which the Mapuche were desperately fighting the fires consuming their village, the giant finally stilled its long arms, bringing their ends together above its chest—where one would expect its head to be.

Time seemed to stop for a moment. An electric charge rippled through the air, making the villagers’ hair stand on end. Then, suddenly, all the jellyfish, which had been flying in a frenzy, froze in place. They hovered motionless for the briefest of moments before their incessant trembling, which had persisted throughout their visit to this world, intensified to a frenzy. In the blink of an eye, they vanished.

At that instant, Rayen felt something go silent inside her. Dozens, hundreds of voices disappeared all at once. They were the ngen she had communed with over the years, their songs interwoven with her daily life. In her mind, so accustomed to the constant hum of these spirits, an oppressive silence now rang out.

Left alone in the night’s darkness, the two pale giants grew calm and separated. The moray-like figure flew westward toward the ocean, disappearing beyond the horizon. The bipedal titan, meanwhile, began its march floating toward the eastern mountains. As its colossal form ascended the volcano, the earth began to quake once more. The tremors ceased abruptly as the titan vanished behind the peak from which it had emerged.

Fearing another appearance, the villagers stayed vigilant until dawn. Desperate to find meaning in what they had witnessed, they gathered to discuss its significance. There was little doubt in their minds: this had to have been an apparition of the divine, a pillanés. The jellyfish-like entities were alien to the Mapuche world, nameless and inexplicable. But the white, radiant beings… Without much thought, they identified the multi-armed colossus as Antu; its overwhelming majesty had to belong to the supreme deity of their pantheon.

They called for the machi to confirm their hypothesis, but they found her consumed with attempts to reconnect with the vanished spirits. She was shaken and distraught, grieving both the loss of Yaco and the absence of the voices. Anguish gripped her as she spent hours attempting to reestablish contact with the ngen of water, fire, and the animal guardians—but no response came.

As months and years passed, it became clear to her that these spirits and their earthly hosts, like the water fox, had not only ceased listening to the prayers directed at them, but seemed to have disappeared entirely. Only the pillanés could have enacted such a radical act—the eradication of a fundamental element of culture and the world itself. But why?

Inside her, Rayen knew. The admapu, the simple yet inviolable doctrine, had been broken. Could that mysterious purple star have been the cause of the calamity? The machi grew increasingly convinced that its appearance was connected to her grandson. Yet, as often happens, humans fail to realize how close their perceptions are to the answers they seek. Above all, they do not understand how far beyond their comprehension those answers lie—and perhaps it is better that way.