The sky had started to shift.
No longer blue, not yet black—just a twisted smear of dull red bleeding through low clouds. The kind of sky that warned something unnatural was stirring below.
Their footsteps echoed against the cracked pavement as they sprinted toward the eastern end of the broken highway. Trees flanked both sides now, shadows weaving between their legs. Breathless, aching, unsure—but not stopping.
Then they saw it.
"There! A vehicle!" Nathan shouted, his voice cracking as he pointed ahead.
The group's pace doubled, hope flaring like a dying match.
It was real. Half-covered in leaves and dirt, but unmistakably a van—beaten, rusted, paint peeled down its sides, but intact.
They rushed toward it.
Ivy slowed just before reaching the vehicle, her mind spinning. She held the crumpled map in one hand, eyes flicking down to it and back to the world around her.
"Hold up—just a second," she panted, raising a hand.
The others paused, breath heavy in their chests. The ground behind them groaned—the squelch of earth and the low, stomach-turning slither of something enormous.
They didn't have long.
"Okay... listen," Ivy began, spreading the map over the van's hood as fast as she could. Her voice was strained but clear. "This is the full layout of the phase. I got it now."
She pointed to the middle. "We entered from the west side—here. That's the place where we entered this Phase on the main road. That whole middle stretch where we just ran through? That's the main road. Cottages lined both sides—south side on the left, north side on the right. Both Spes's house and that Old bitch's house were on the right side, meaning North."
Her finger tapped the right edge.
"We're here now. Eastern Edge of the main road, meaning we are at the end of the main road. And this..." she nodded toward the van, "...isn't marked. Which means it's either a trap—or our way out."
"We don't have time to guess!" Harper snapped, glancing over her shoulder.
"We make time," Ivy snapped back. She locked eyes with each of them.
"This thing... the monster... it's traveling on its tentacles. Like an octopus. It's fast, but it moves heavy. Which means it won't be stealthy. If it's not on us yet, we might still have a minute."
Alice, still gripping the bag, stepped closer.
"So we check it—fast. Keys, fuel, whatever. If it doesn't work, we run."
Nathan opened the driver's side door. It creaked violently. Dust scattered from inside.
"No key," he muttered, checking the dash, the glove box, under the seat.
"Hotwire?"
"Can you?" Ivy asked.
He hesitated.
"Maybe. I've... seen people do it. Just give me a second."
Behind them, the earth shook again. Not loud—but deep. Like something breathing through the dirt.
Alice slowly turned.
And saw it.
The creature had risen.
Not just the tentacles now. The full, grotesque body had emerged—massive, swollen, covered in hundreds of rotating eyes. It stood still for a moment, high above the rooftops, head twitching as it searched. Its limbs slithered, anchoring to trees, to cottages, to the road itself.
Harper gasped. "It's scanning. Looking for us."
"Then we better not let it find us," Ivy said.
Nathan twisted a pair of wires together, sparks spitting out against the van's metal frame.
One cough.
Then another.
The engine wheezed—
And came alive.
"IT'S ON!" he yelled, a mix of disbelief and adrenaline surging through his voice.
The roar of the old engine shattered the silence of the road, echoing down the cracked pavement like a war cry. No time to process. No time to celebrate.
"GET IN—NOW!"
Ivy, Alice, and Harper broke into a sprint toward the back of the van.
"Move—move!" Harper shouted, practically dragging Alice behind her.
The clouds above had gone black. No transition, no warning. The last traces of sunset had been swallowed whole. The sky now looked like ink spilled across a page.
It was night. And it wasn't natural.
Ivy looked up, just for a moment. The monster wasn't visible from this angle, but the weight of it could be felt—as if the sky itself were being pulled downward.
"The Hunt has begun," she whispered, eyes still locked on the darkness before she climbed in.
She turned to Alice and Harper as they scrambled inside with her.
"Keep the rear open," Ivy ordered.
They nodded, pulling the rear doors wide and bracing them against the frame. Nathan flung the supply bag into the back, the heavy thump echoing in the van's hollow interior.
Ivy, Alice, and Harper gripped their weapons tighter now. Ivy held the map against her chest like a lifeline. Alice wrapped her fingers around the axe handle, knuckles white. Harper kept her eyes on the open road behind them, her breath shallow, machete across her lap.
Nathan looked over his shoulder from the driver's seat.
"Should I start?" His voice was low, serious now—no more questions after this. Just movement.
All three women looked at him. Ivy gave a single nod.
"Drive."
Nathan's fingers hovered over the wheel. His foot pressed lightly on the pedal.
Then—
A sound split the world in two.
A deep, guttural roar erupted from behind them—no, not just a roar. It was a concussion, a howl that shook the air and rattled through the metal of the van like an earthquake wrapped in sound.
The monster had seen them.
Spotted.
Hunted.
"Fuck," Ivy muttered, her voice tight and cold.
Before anyone else could react, Harper's scream cut through the van like a blade:
"DRIVE!!"
Nathan slammed his foot down. The tires squealed against the cracked road as the van lunged forward, the rear doors still wide open, wind tearing through the cabin.
Behind them—chaos.
Tentacles slammed into the pavement, trees were uprooted like weeds, debris was hurled into the sky. The creature surged forward, faster than anything its size should have been allowed to move.
The eyes across its swollen head locked on the van—blinking, twitching, fixated.
It began to chase.
With a harsh shriek of rubber, the van's rear tires spun in place—kicking up dirt, broken glass, and dry leaves in every direction. For one terrifying second, it felt like it might stall out.
Then—traction.
The van jerked forward, and they were off.
Nathan gripped the steering wheel tight, white-knuckled. His hands shook violently, the road vibrating beneath them as they barreled east. His eyes flicked from the road to the mirrors, to nothing, to everything, panic clouding his judgment. The engine roared louder than it should have.
Too loud.
Too wild.
In the back, Harper, Alice, and Ivy stood near the open rear frame, the wind howling past them as they stared behind.
And they saw it.
The monster was chasing them.
Its tentacles stretched unnaturally long, pulling its massive body through the shattered cottage row. Each movement was followed by a crash, a splinter, a scream—not human, but something deeper. Something that vibrated in the gut.
Every cottage it passed through exploded into wood and dust, its body slicing through them like paper. The creature didn't stop. It didn't hesitate. It just screamed—again and again—with a voice like steel being dragged across bone.
"Holy shit—it's destroying everything in its way!" Harper yelled, her voice nearly drowned out by the wind and chaos. She stumbled back from the edge, her hands trembling as she held her machete closer.
Alice stood frozen for a second, eyes wide, then finally managed a breath.
"We're not far ahead—don't panic. It hasn't gained on us yet. We've still got some space!"Her voice cracked as she tried to reassure them, but the fear was plain in her tone. She gripped the metal frame tighter, as if bracing for something to rip her out of the vehicle.
Ivy didn't speak. She moved.
She yanked the map from the bag and quickly turned, rushing to the front of the van, her boots slamming against the metal floor. Her fingers unfolded the map as she sprinted—creased paper snapping in the wind.
Nathan was still struggling to keep the van straight—his jaw clenched, sweat dripping down the side of his face, his eyes darting to the rearview where those black tendrils came closer, closer, closer.
He muttered to himself, low and hoarse. "C'mon… just drive straight, dammit…"
Ivy didn't ask.
She climbed up, crouching behind him, then leaned over the driver's seat and pressed the side of her head against his neck—grounding herself, grounding him.
Her voice was steady. Firm.
"Nathan, directions. I'll guide you."
He didn't say a word.
But his hands, just for a second, stopped shaking.
Alice and Harper remained near the back, bracing against the van's shaking frame as the creature thundered in pursuit. They watched it closely, eyes narrowed, tracking its speed, its movement. It was relentless—smashing everything in its path with blind fury.
"Still back there," Alice muttered. "It's fast… but not too fast."
"It's keeping distance on purpose…" Harper replied. "Like it knows we're heading somewhere."
Meanwhile, Ivy scanned the map, her eyes racing across the scribbled lines and symbols. Her pulse pounded in her ears. Every bump in the road nearly threw her off balance, but she held the paper tight, reading fast.
They had moved past the central road. The cottages were gone now. They were deep in the eastern part of the phase.
A labeled region: "Eastosis."
Her finger traced the northern east direction—a symbol stood there. A towering tree. It wasn't just any tree—it was marked as a landmark.
A note beneath it:
"Cliff ahead. Visibility opens at tree point."
"There's a cliff in the front…?" she muttered aloud.
Nathan flinched, eyes flicking toward her.
"What? What'd you say?" His tone was anxious, like he'd heard the word cliff and immediately pictured their deaths.
Without looking, Ivy lifted a hand and smacked the back of his head—not hard, but enough.
"Focus on driving, idiot!!" she snapped.
He grunted, gripped the wheel tighter, and forced his eyes back on the road.
Ivy inhaled sharply, pulling the map closer to her chest as her mind clicked into place.
They couldn't just head to the exit.
If they made a beeline for it, the monster would close in—its tentacles would catch the van or cut them off. They'd be cornered. Slaughtered.
But if the cliff was near the massive tree… and the road bent just before it…
Her eyes narrowed.
There was a turn—a sharp one—to the right, just before the cliff. And that road led toward the exit, about 500 meters off the cliff's right ridge.
"We can't outrun it..." she realized. "But we can trick it. We'll let it think we're going off the cliff—then cut right at the last second."
She looked up.
Still no sign of the tree.
But the road was starting to open up. The forest was thinning. The terrain was widening—and that meant it was coming.
"Nathan," she said, voice calm and sharp, "When I say cut right, I need you to trust me and do it. No questions."
Nathan didn't look back. But his voice came through.
"You planning to drive us off a cliff?"
"Just trust me."
"That's not a no."
Nathan exhaled, his grip tightening around the wheel. The veins in his arms were stiff, his shoulders tense—but his voice stayed steady.
"Alright… don't fuck us up."
He pressed his foot down, and the van groaned forward, the engine screaming louder as they accelerated. The speed surged. Trees and torn-up road blurred into motion on either side. Wind howled through the open rear like a banshee.
For a moment—just a brief one—the monster's noise had seemed to fall behind. Distant. Muted.
But then—
Boom.
BOOM.
SKRRRRK-THRUM.
The sounds came again. And louder.
The rhythmic crashing returned—only this time it wasn't fading. It was rising.
Ivy's brow furrowed. She could feel it in the floor of the van—through her knees. The subtle tremble of something massive gaining ground.
The sound of the tentacles slamming into the dirt, the trees, the remnants of shattered cottages. Getting faster. Louder. Closer.
Then, from behind them—
"IVY!!"
The scream tore through the van like lightning.
She whipped around instantly, the map crinkling in her hand. Her gaze landed on Alice, who was clutching the metal edge of the rear doors, panic radiating from her face.
Then her eyes shifted.
And she saw it.
The monster.
So much closer now.
And now—its full body was clearly visible.
Ivy's breath caught in her throat.
She stared, frozen for just a second.
The creature had officially reached the highway—the same road the van sped across now—and it was chasing them.
Crawling wouldn't be the right word.
It was running.
Dozens—no, hundreds—of slick, twitching tentacles slammed against the cracked earth in rhythm, propelling the creature forward with terrifying momentum. With each step, the ground split beneath it, forming deep ruptures in the road—loud, bone-jarring cracks. It wasn't just fast—it was heavy. Heavy enough to collapse roads by simply existing.
Above its bulbous, glistening body, more tentacles flared outward and upward—spreading wide like a monstrous peacock in full display. But this display wasn't for beauty. It was for the kill.
And Ivy understood that instantly.
This was a predator preparing to strike.
Her eyes widened as she calculated—quickly.
The body: approximately 10 meters tall.
The tentacles: easily 17 meters long, if not more.
Meaning… they needed to maintain at least 20 meters of distance just to avoid being skewered or ripped out of the van.
And that center—the core of the thing—was a massive sphere, pulsating and shifting with each movement. A living mass of tissue and sinew. Covered in eyes. Dozens, maybe hundreds, like a spider's cluster—but each one was shaped like a human eye. No lashes. Just cold, wet, watching things, scanning hungrily in every direction.
And the worst part?
It was getting faster.
The crashing behind them grew more intense. The rhythm of pursuit was changing. Closing in.
Ivy measured it fast—200 meters between them at best.
Not enough.
But just enough time for her.
Just enough time to calculate, plan, and decrease the chance of death by as much as she could.
Nathan's voice cut through the chaos from the front.
"WHAT'S HAPPENING BACK THERE, IVY?!"
He looked up at the rearview—caught a glimpse of writhing black tentacles, but nothing more. The mirror didn't show the full form. Just movement. Violent movement. That made it worse.
He began to panic. But he didn't lose control—not yet.
Still driving. Still trying.
"JUST FOCUS ON DRIVING!" Ivy screamed over the wind and engine.
"Accelerate—and don't you fucking look back!"
"Don't lose focus or it's gonna catch us!"
"Our lives DEPEND on you, Nathan!"
Nathan grit his teeth, jaw tightening."Got it!" he yelled back, pressing harder on the pedal.
Ivy didn't wait. She turned, dropped to a knee near the gear crates, and yanked open the supply bag. She pulled out the Kar98k—cold, heavy, classic—and clicked it open. Her fingers trembled slightly as she checked the bolt.
No time for hesitation.
She grabbed the small ammunition box next to it, popped it open, and began loading bullets into the magazine, one by one.
Just in case.
Because if that creature did catch up—
They needed something to fight back.