Silas moved like a shadow through the hollowed remains of what once might have been a marketplace. Cracked stone arches loomed overhead, draped in strips of moss-like growth that pulsed faintly with the same eerie breath as the Shroud. His group followed in staggered formation — not sloppy, but not disciplined either. They were too new to fear working against them. That, Silas could use.
Bessia walked just behind him, her boots crunching quietly over broken tiles. She held a jagged longsword scavenged from a fallen patrolman, and unlike most, she carried herself like someone who'd already bled for survival. Behind her came Vance, Kellan, and Haru — each eager, but untested. Each useful, until they weren't.
"We're entering its zone," Haru whispered, clutching the crude spear she'd carved that morning. "The ones Rogan mentioned — silent crawlers. They don't scream, don't roar. They slip behind you and—"
"Don't speak unless you must," Silas said without turning. His voice was smooth, calm, almost bored. "Noise won't scare it. It will interest it."
Bessie glanced at him. "And that's the plan?"
Silas didn't answer. He lifted a hand, signaling them to spread out. The buildings around them leaned inward, forming a crooked alley choked with debris and ash-dark vines. Fog pooled low, thick near the ground, making their steps sound distant.
They hunted the way predators did — with caution, but intent to claim, not survive.
Silas' goal wasn't a mere normal core. He wanted an ability. Something rare. Something perfect for him. He had spent every night imagining it — a crystal core that could dull his existence, make eyes slide off him, breaths ignore him. Not invisibility, but erasure. A gift that would turn ambition into certainty.
They passed what looked like a shattered bell tower. Bones were scattered in a fan shape near the entrance — human by shape, but not recent.
Kellan cursed under his breath. "This… this is wrong. Even tier-ones don't stack bones like—"
Bessie silenced him with a look. "We've seen worse in the last week."
Silas crouched, running his gloved fingers over the stone. Claw etched grooves curved like the path of a dancing blade, precise, repeated. He smiled faintly.
"It nests here."
Vance swallowed. "The silent kind?"
"The kind that watches before it lunges," Silas said. "Form up."
They fanned out around the ruined tower, backs to debris walls, weapons drawn. The fog barely moved, as though listening.
A soft scrape sounded above them.
Haru jerked her head up, eyes wide. She saw nothing through the cracks in the ceiling beams, but her breath quickened.
Then — a flicker.
Something slid from the shadows like wet ink — a lithe shape, sleek and low, limbs elongated like an assassin's silhouette. Its skin looked like smoke pressed to muscle, and its head was smooth except for a slitted mouth that didn't open.
No screech. No warning. It dropped behind Kellan without a sound.
Silas was already moving.
"Bessie — left!"
Bessie pivoted, her blade flashing in a practiced arc. The creature darted aside, preternaturally fast, but Vance lunged with a broken halberd, catching its flank with a glancing cut. The crawler twisted rather than recoiled — using the hit to spin and carve its claws across Vance's arm.
He fell back with a choked cry.
"Keep its focus forward!" Silas snapped, eyes tracking every shift of shadow around it. "Haru — right angle!"
Haru charged in, hesitant but desperate. Her spear jabbed low, forcing the creature to adjust its stance — and that opened the moment Silas waited for.
He lunged in silence, curved dagger reversed in his grip. The blade sank into the crawler's side with a wet crunch. Not a killing blow — but a wound it hadn't anticipated.
The creature reacted without fury, without sound, trying to slide away — but Bessia was there.
Her sword cleaved down, cutting deep across its neck and shoulder. The crawler spasmed, turning its body liquid-smooth even as it fell, claws still reaching for someone's ankle, someone's throat—
Silas stepped on its wrist and drove his dagger through its skull.
Silence reclaimed the space.
Vance groaned on the ground, clutching his bleeding arm. Kellan breathed hard, staring at the twitching corpse. Haru looked one breath from bolting.
Bessie exhaled, blade dripping. "It didn't scream."
"They don't," Silas said, wiping his dagger on the creature's back. His eyes lingered on the faint pulse beneath its ribs, already fading.
Everyone knew what came next — the extraction. A shard of chance, a sliver of power.
They gathered around it. Even injured, Vance crawled closer. No one spoke of sharing — not yet. Not before they knew if it held what they wanted.
A faint bulge glimmered just under its sternum — dark, not bright. A crystal core.
Bessie whispered, "It has one…"
Silas' heartbeat didn't change, but his fingers curled with intent. This was it. This could be the one.
But he didn't rush.
He knelt beside the corpse, running his hand across its chest as though gauging the perfect cut. The others waited, watching him with a mix of expectation and unease.
Then — he stopped.
"Not yet," Silas said, surprising them all.
Kellan frowned. "What? Why? It's right there!"
"We're exposed," Silas replied calmly. "Noise draws things like it. And if this one had a mate, we'd be caught with our hands in its chest."
Bessie scanned their surroundings. She didn't argue. "We carry it?"
Silas nodded once. "Vance and Haru flank me. Kellan, take rear. We'll extract it back at shelter."
"And if someone tries to take it?" Kellan muttered.
Silas smiled slightly without looking back. "They won't."
They lifted the crawler's body—still warm—onto a broken sheet of stone like a stretcher. As they moved, Silas walked at the head, his mind already reaching ahead to the moment he would claim the core.
Not share it.
Not trade it.
Claim it.
Behind them, the fog curled around the trail of dark blood they left behind, erasing footprints, swallowing sound, as though the Shroud itself watched the hunters return with their prize—unaware that the true predator walked among them.