At the exact moment the field horn sounded, the door burst open.

“Arada!”

Arada looked up from her sketchbook, momentarily distracted from the various faces she was trying to draw. In the doorway stood Irgos, breathless and gripping one of the doorposts. He showed fear, and sweat trickled down his face.

“Your father wants to see us. Now.”

Irgos’s voice was tense, fearful, and serious, coming out in short, panting phrases. Something was clearly wrong.

“He says the village is under attack. We don’t have time to waste. Cura has something important to tell you.”

Arada was initially confused. Whenever an alarm was raised, the people of Overmore were supposed to follow procedure: stay indoors with windows and doors shut, waiting for the horn to sound again when the danger had passed. Going out to visit someone was a dangerous move in such situations. Why would Cura want to see them so urgently?

Arada stood up and opened her mouth to say something, but Irgos had already turned, left the room, and ran into the street. Arada quickly followed, leaving her sketchbook behind, saving her questions for later. Outside, Irgos pointed wordlessly to the left. Arada followed his finger and saw clouds of dust rising above the distant sandy path. In those clouds, she made out figures moving on horseback, though it wasn’t clear how many there were. She trailed after her brother toward her father’s house.

The sand, warmed by the evening sun, kicked up as they ran through the dusty paths of Overmore. A soft breeze provided slight relief, hinting at a thunderstorm set to break within hours. The swirling sand drew the attention of those peering out their windows, curious to know what was happening. A few, disregarding protocol, opened their windows and shouted warnings about the danger of staying outside after the horn had sounded.

After some running, Arada and Irgos arrived at Cura’s cabin. The front door was open, and a middle-aged, balding man waited for them on the covered wooden porch. He was missing the lower half of his left shin, replaced by a steel plate and leg. To compensate, he leaned heavily on a wooden cane whenever he stood or walked. He wore wide, gray-blue denim pants and a frayed black t-shirt.

His flat face was grave but calm, his brown eyes behind small round glasses sharply alert. He spoke in a low, grounded voice.

“Arada. Irgos. Come in quickly. We don’t have much time.”

He let them in and closed the door behind them.

Immediately, a loud bang sounded outside, followed by a high pitched scream.

Arada jumped. “What was that?”

Cura cursed as he moved further into the hallway: “The attackers have already arrived. They’re wielding hammers and tearing down houses. It won’t be long before he’s here.”

“He?”

Without elaborating, her father entered a doorway to the left of the hall. Arada and Irgos followed, and Irgos shut the door behind them.

The room was about three by four meters, similar in size to the rooms Arada and Irgos had. On the left stood a wooden table with a few chairs, and on the right, a bed that took up nearly half the space. Behind the table was a large wardrobe where her father kept his clothes. The only light in the room came from a window across from the door.

More loud bangs and screams echoed.

Without inviting them to sit, Cura began speaking right away.

“They’re going to raze the village. You both need to get out of here as soon as possible.”

“Where to?” asked Irgos.

Outside, they could hear hurried footsteps on the sandy paths. The number of houses being demolished and people being killed was rising rapidly.

“Aquinox.”

Without pausing, Cura walked to the opposite wall. “You need to get to Aquinox.” He pried a slightly loose stone from the wall with his fingernails. Behind it, Irgos saw two hidden items. Cura took them out and turned to face Arada and Irgos again.

“There are still people in Aquinox.” Now Irgos could see what his father had retrieved. In his right hand, he held a glass vial containing a reddish-pink liquid. In his left, he held something that looked like half of a small silver coin. He handed it to Irgos.

“Find the person with the other half of this amulet. They can help you; we don’t have time to discuss more.” Then Cura handed the vial to Arada. “This is the only thing that can stop him, and it must not fall into the wrong hands.”

Irgos pocketed the ‘amulet,’ just as Arada did with the vial. She was struggling to process all the information.

“Him? Dad, who are you talking about?”

The door to the house burst open. “Shit, he’s here. You two, quickly, through the window.” He opened the window, and Irgos climbed out immediately. Arada was about to do the same, but it was already too late. The door to the room slowly opened.

“My deepest apologies for interrupting your little gathering...”

A tall, thin man appeared in the open doorway. He wore a long, black robe and walked in socks and slippers. Long,black curls cascaded to his shoulders, a stark contrast to his vampire-pale skin. His face was wrinkle-free and consisted of an oversized nose, absurdly high cheekbones, and a grimace somewhere between a sneer and a straight line. But the most striking thing about this man was his eyes. They were the first thing that caught Arada’s attention. Even a child a few weeks old would recognize that glint.

Pure evil.

In the hallway behind him stood two other people. The left one was a bald, burly man, whose face was a mess of wrinkles. He was dressed in an eroded black suit, with a strange, pink piece of cloth with a pointed tip hanging from his collarbone. The right person was bald as well, but clearly resembled the slim figure of a woman. Her clothes seemed as if she’d worn them her whole life, and some sort of metal bracelet was tied around her left wrist. Remarkable was that they both kept their eyes closed.

The man continued speaking, his voice embodying all the coldness and sadistic pleasure the world had to offer.

“...but we have some unfinished business, Cura.”

Hearing his name, Cura froze as the man’s mouth twisted into a grin that stretched from ear to ear. He dropped his cane, which clattered to the floor, causing him to lose his balance and fall backward onto the bed. He wanted to say something but couldn’t, either from lack of words or fear.

Arada couldn’t hold back. “What the hell is going on?” she shouted.

Without answering, the man broadened his grin. He approached the bed where Cura lay, pushing him back onto the mattress. He fished around in one of the robe’s pockets and pulled out a long, sharp knife.

“Get away from him!” Arada yelled. She tried to come to Cura’s aid, but the two people with closed eyes in the doorway sprang into action. They rushed forward, grabbed her, and tried to pin her against the wall.

Due to her position, only her lower back pressed against the wall, with her upper body partially through the window. Despite the awkward angle, they held her firmly. They did all of this without opening their eyes.

“Let me go, you bastards.” She struggled to break free by twisting and kicking, but to no avail. Their grip was iron-strong.

Cura tried to resist, but the man with the knife held him down. He pressed the blade against his throat, relishing his control.

“The past always catches up with you, my sweet Cura,” he said. “Honestly, I must admit, I didn’t expect it would take this long for us to cross paths again.”

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“How did you cross the Ebros?” Cura asked. “It was destroyed nineteen years ago.” A small droplet of blood appeared on his throat.

“Eighteen,” the man corrected him. “We rebuilt it. Using wooden poles. I wanted a permanent bridge to the eastern part of this land.”

“And that took you eighteen years?”

“Does that seem long to you? I’m in no rush. Isn’t it nice to enjoy yourself before everything goes down?”

The man’s grin broadened even more. “I’ve waited a long time for this day, Cura. Overmore was the last place where people remained. And finally,we’re here.” He threw his hands up in a celebratory gesture. “While my men deal with the village, I can savor one last glimpse of my—”

“Shut up!” Arada shouted, struggling against the force of four strong hands. “Do you even know what’s coming out of your mouth, you idiot? You should—”

“Don’t worry, girl,” the man interrupted her. “I know exactly what I’m doing.”

And then, everything happened at once.

The man pulled the knife away from her father’s throat and plunged it deep into one of his arms. He shouted with such a powerful voice that it must have echoed through the entire village. Arada watched helplessly as it happened, but she didn’t have long to process it. She noticed the grip of her two captors had suddenly weakened. She was yanked by her upper body and pulled backward out the window.

* * *

Irgos sat below the window, listening to everything being said. He saw his sister pressed up against the window above him.

I have to help her, but how?

He looked at his palm, where the half-coin still lay. He pocketed it and felt something else inside. Pulling out the sharpener blade, he remembered he’d forgotten to return it to Arada yesterday. She’d need it to sharpen her pencils. Irgos thought over his options. Looking up, he could make out three, no, four hands gripping the open window frame. He gathered his courage as he started to devise a plan—

Cura’s scream was deafening.

Without hesitation, Irgos stood up. He saw his sister being held by two—strangely dressed—bald individuals with their eyes closed. He snapped the sharpener blade in half, driving each piece deep into one of the hands gripping her. It worked and their grip lessened. Irgos wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her out of the window.Her legs swung through the air, and they tumbled to the ground, landing atop one another.

* * *

As Arada fell out of the window and saw the sharpener blades sticking in the hands of her captors, she realized what her brother had done. She rolled off him, stood up immediately, and helped him to his feet.

“We have to get out of here. Now.”

She couldn’t believe what she had just witnessed. Right before being pulled out of the window, she’d had to watch as that horrible man had stabbed his father while his screams were getting louder. There was nothing they could do. These people were crazy, and they couldn’t stay another minute.

“And your father?” Irgos asked. “We can’t just leave him—”

“Master,” called the voice of the bald female attacker from inside. “She’s escaping.”

The man inside had heard it and ended Cura’s torture.He withdrew the knife from his arm and slit his throat. A gurgling sound came as blood spilled from his mouth, and seconds later his body lay lifeless on the bed.

For a second Arada’s world stopped completely.

“Go after them,” ordered the ‘Master.’ “Once the rest are done dismantling the village, we’ll send reinforcements.”

The other assailant—the one in the big black suit—looked up in surprise. “Them?”

“I could sense another presence,” said the Master. “There are two of them.”

Arada looked at her brother with a panicked expression, then glanced back at the window. The bald man and woman began climbing out.

“Run!” she shouted.

“Don’t let them escape!” came the Master’s shout from behind.

Like lightning, they bolted down the street. Their bald pursuers were close on their heels. Arada glanced back.

Please, let them not be as fast as we are.

* * *

Arada and Irgos weaved through the chaos. Arada looked around. Overmore was in ruins. The Master’s minions were everywhere. Houses were being leveled with gigantic hammers over a meter long. Screams filled the evening air. Skulls were crushed, leaving blood splatters on walls and paths. It was a nightmare.

Most of the attackers were more focused on destroying homes than pursuing two fugitives. Their footsteps were drowned out by the many screams and hammer blows. No one paid them any mind.

But Arada noticed something: all the followers she saw were bald and had their eyes closed. How could they carry out such acts if they couldn’t see?

They turned down a left street, heading back toward Arada’s cabin. For a moment, their pursuers were out of sight.

Arada was struggling to think clearly. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she recalled what the Master had done to her father.

Hold it together. Emotions can come later.

They ran down the path and reached another T-junction in the village. They turned right. Immediately on the left was Arada’s cabin, or at least what was left of it.

They stopped to catch their breath, staring at the wreckage.

Her cabin had been completely leveled. Stones and pieces of wood were strewn everywhere. Among the debris stood a small, stocky figure holding a hammer, who was as bald and blind as all the others. They looked disappointed that there wasn’t a victim inside. Then the figure looked up and saw them standing there.

Arada swallowed hard. That backpack is out of the question now.

With wide eyes, the stocky person raised the hammer and charged at them with a scream. From the sound of it, she was a woman.

Arada and Irgos bolted away, and Arada flinched as something whizzed just past the back of her head. The stout woman had thrown the hammer, crushing the stones of a house to their right. If she’d been even a second slower, the same would’ve happened to her skull.

They sped down the short road, out of the village. Fortunately, the stout woman didn’t have the stamina of the two siblings; she gave up the chase halfway. But to their horror, Arada glanced back to see their two original pursuers—the ones who were with the Master just minutes ago—rounding the corner. The stout woman looked surprised as the bald man and woman raced past her.

For Arada and Irgos, there was only one option: run. Once they were out of the village, they continued over the fields that surrounded Overmore. They were in good shape,better than the Master’s followers. But that was no reason to stop.

After a while, the rural landscape gave way to a forested area, which offered some relief from the blood-warm evening sun. The residents of Overmore rarely ventured here, only in summer to pick fruits, cool off, or gather wood for campfires. Occasionally, they’d find a fallen, dead tree, which they reused as building material for more homes. But no one went further north than this forest—it was simply too dangerous.

Irgos realized this too and came to a halt.

“Stop!” he called.

“What?” His sister stopped and turned around.

“We can’t go further. The forest marks the boundary of the danger zone.”

“We have to. The danger behind us is greater.” She pointed back toward their village.

They looked at each other. There wasn’t much choice.

And so, Arada and Irgos were forced to cross through the forest.

* * *

After another half-hour of running, they reached the edge and emerged into a more open area. They stopped, panting, and hid behind a tree at the forest’s edge, listening for footsteps. After five minutes without hearing anyone following, they started to calm down a little and took in the surroundings beyond the forest.

In front of them lay a long, wide gray strip, which clearly resembled a road. The road, divided in two by a white line in the middle, came from the west and veered northward. Weeds had overgrown many sections—some lightly, others so densely that the surface was barely visible. The setting sun cast a glimmering layer over the road, and the faint, hot wind grew stronger, as if giving a sinister tint to what had just happened in Overmore. In the distance, dark clouds gathered above the landscape.

During their frantic escape, they hadn’t said a word to each other, saving their breath for running. It created a terrible, pressing silence, an uncomfortable feeling they’d never experienced before.

Arada was the first to break the silence.

“We’ll have to keep moving. On foot.”

“Wait,” Irgos responded. “Cura told us not to go into the Old World. It’s too dangerous there. Besides, there are the jelly monsters, which—”

“That was before that deranged gang attacked our village,” Arada interrupted him. “We don’t have a choice.”

“But—”

Arada walked over to her brother and put her hands on his shoulders.

“I don’t want this either. But look, if I had to choose between a murderous madman chasing us with his gang, or a few jelly monsters wandering through the remnants of the Old World, I’d still prefer the latter.” She lowered her head. “We’ll have to take the risk and follow this road on foot to get as far away from here as possible. Along the way, we’ll see if we can find food and supplies. With any luck, we might find horses.”

Irgos was still in shock from everything that had just happened. It was clear he couldn’t understand how his sister could think so practically and quickly. “H-how can you think like this after everything that’s happened?” he stammered.

There was a pause. After a moment, she said, “If I don’t...” She raised her head again, a tear rolling down her cheek.

“...we won’t survive this.”