I had no time to linger. The thought gnawed at me like a whisper carried on the wind—
What if the monster that slaughtered them all returns?
Yet, strangely… I felt nothing.
No fear. No urgency. No tremor in my heart.
It was as if my soul had grown numb to the idea of death, as though it had already accepted it once before.
Only one thought lingered, echoing through the hollow of my mind—
Should I go to the Fortress of Ascalin?
The name pressed upon my chest like a weight, both foreign and familiar. Something inside me—some instinct buried deep—urged me forward.
Still, I knew one thing for certain: I could not remain here.
The battlefield was a graveyard now, and I was its only living ghost.
I took the bloodstained map and stepped out of the commander's tent. The cold wind met me like an old acquaintance—silent, unfeeling. The vast field stretched endlessly, painted with the pale red of a dying sun. The silence was suffocating, but there was something oddly comforting in it.
Familiar, I thought.
Why does this loneliness feel familiar?
I searched the horizon for a path leading toward Ascalin, but there was none. Only the dark outline of the forest, dense and ancient, waiting like a slumbering beast.
If I wanted to reach the fortress, I would have to go through it.
Before that, I needed to prepare—if such a thing was even possible. I wandered through the ruins of the camp, stepping over shattered shields and forgotten blades, searching for anything that could aid me.
After an hour beneath the blood-red dusk, I gathered what little remained of the world's mercy:
a piece of rotten bread,
two stones to spark a fire,
and a pair of swords, dulled but sturdy.
It wasn't much.
But in this forsaken land, it was enough to feel almost alive.
I stood once more at the edge of the forest, the map in my trembling hand. The trees loomed ahead—black, silent, endless. Somewhere beyond them lay the Fortress of Ascalin…
and perhaps, the beginning of whatever I truly was.
I started walking toward the forest—its shadow swallowing the last light of the dying day.
Each step carried me farther from the silence of the dead and closer to something unknown.
After a while, I stopped.
Something made me turn back.
The battlefield stretched behind me, endless and still—an ocean of corpses bathed in fading red light. The wind whispered through torn banners, carrying the faint scent of ash and blood.
I stood there for a moment, my heart quiet.
"May these souls rest in peace," I murmured, though I wasn't sure who I was speaking to—the fallen, or myself.
Then, without another glance, I stepped into the forest.
The moment my foot crossed its threshold, I felt it—an energy, ancient and cold, wrapping itself around me like unseen fog. It pulsed faintly, neither welcoming nor hostile, merely watching.
It reminded me of the little girl's magic—familiar, yet not the same. Hers had been divine, radiant; this was darker, heavy with the scent of decay and the whisper of forgotten names.
The trees towered above me like pillars of another world. Their trunks were immense, their bark dark as old iron, twisted and gnarled. The leaves shimmered in strange hues of green and gold, their veins catching the crimson light that bled through the unmoving sky.
The moon still hung above, motionless, frozen in its crimson phase—as though time itself refused to flow here. The air was thick, humming faintly with unseen life, and the ground was blanketed by tall grass and overgrown shrubs that hid the soil beneath.
As I walked deeper, the forest breathed around me—its silence alive, its shadows watching.
Above the treetops, small creatures flitted through the air.
Their shapes were strange—winged things with glowing eyes, half insect, half phantom. They moved in swarms, their faint screeches echoing like shards of broken music.
The deeper I went, the more the world changed.
The air grew colder, the light dimmer. The forest seemed to hum with secrets—some waiting to be found, others praying to remain hidden.
And as the last trace of the battlefield vanished behind the trees, I realized something quietly terrifying:
the forest did not feel like a place I was entering.
It felt like a place that had been waiting for me.
The deeper I walked into the forest, the darker it became.
The air grew thick, heavy — each breath tasted of moss and rust. The wind no longer sang; it whispered, cautious, as though afraid to disturb something ancient that slept beneath the roots.
I pushed forward, one careful step after another, until a faint sound reached my ears — a wet, tearing noise, followed by a low, guttural growl.
My blood froze.
Through the dense veil of trees, I saw it.
A creature — crouched low upon the earth — feeding.
Its back arched grotesquely, its limbs far too long for its frame. Its skin hung in ragged folds, grey and mottled, and its face… gods, its face was melting, as if its flesh refused to stay still. Where its eyes should have been, there were only dark hollows, leaking a slow, black fluid that steamed in the cold air.
It was enormous — easily seven feet tall — yet it moved with a kind of dreadful grace, each motion deliberate, almost reverent, as it tore into what remained of its prey.
The smaller creature beneath it was beyond recognition.
Its body was mangled, shredded — nothing more than a crimson heap of muscle and bone. Each bite made a sound that crawled beneath my skin, the sound of something alive being unmade.
For a heartbeat, I could not move.
The world around me blurred — the forest, the sky, even the distant hum of unseen life — all drowned beneath the grotesque rhythm of its feeding.
Then instinct seized me.
I darted behind the nearest tree, pressing my back to the rough bark. My breathing quickened, shallow and trembling, as I peered through a narrow slit between the branches.
The creature did not notice me.
It was too consumed by its hunger, devouring the last remnants of the smaller being with a kind of animal ecstasy. The sound of tearing flesh mixed with the faint rustle of leaves — a symphony of horror and silence.
I gripped the hilt of my sword, though I knew it was useless.
The steel trembled in my hand, reflecting the faint crimson glow of the moon filtering through the canopy.
My heart pounded — not from fear, but from something stranger, something buried deep inside me — a flicker of recognition.
I had seen monsters before.
But never one that felt so… familiar.