It was morning again when Gan stopped his march at a small river and kneeled to rest and drink. The forest here was beginning to thin and the earth here was rocky and hard. The river stretched wide between him and the piler, and the other side gave way to boulders and gulches where the stones jutted out from the earth like sharp spearheads giants had left behind. Gan's body was numb and tired, his nerves were frayed from the endless walk in dangerous darkness. The rain had poured for hours and he was drenched and cold, every part of his body felt like a stone sunken to the bottom of a cold puddle. The rushing sound of the flowing River was a welcome retreat from the noises of the spreading which were growing heavier the further and further Gan headed. A few swallows of the cold stream quenched the dryness in his throat and he refilled his waterskins as well. Then crawling grogily and shivering to a nearby tree with branches twisted and empty of leaves, he laid his head against its roots and fell asleep. He didn't put out his trip alarms in case danger approached, or any bedding from his now overstuffed pack, and he didn't care that he was visible in this open area by the rocky river. He had walked day and night into the apocalypse that followed all men to the edge of the world, even now the monsters that float at the edges of the tower's influence were beginning to eat and murder and consume the world at their pleasure. He would not be safe no matter what he did, or what he prepared. Eventually, He would be found by something he could never prepare for, something he could never fight. And his story would end. He was cold and laid in the sun like a dead fish, his will drained of potency, there wasn't even enough of him left to pull a blanket out of his bag before he passed out.

When Gan woke he was partly amazed he hadn't been found by an Eater or something worse, the sun was hovering in the middle of the sky and the sounds of monsters in the distance were still calling out from time to time over the low hum of flowing water. But he supposed the edges of the spreading were always like this, the monsters were terrifying but scarce at first. They spread out wide from each other and most seemed unwilling to compete with the others. It wasn't odd to see one Eater alone for dozens of miles. grabbing his Bag and his spear he stepped into the shallow river and began to wade over to the other side, not yet entirely dry from the night's rains he was yet again resolved to get soaked. Gan clenched his teeth at the cold that made his legs feel heavy and stiff like blocks of ice. At the deepest part of the river, the water was up to his chest and he was back to shivering, only thankful that the weather of the day was warm and he would dry again soon if he kept marching.

Water dripped off him and poured out of his bag as Gan arose from the other side of the river, teeth clattering and body shivering as if it could simply shake the cold off. The rocks of the river shore crunched under his feet as he marched ahead. Hours later he was finally dry and surrounded by cliffs and rocky hills. When He and his sister had come from this area they had gone around this mountainous area all together because the gravel and loose stone, as well as the hills and sharp inclines, were hard for his sister to walk. They had also found a much more shallow area of the river to cross so that Roanna didn't drown or catch hypothermia in the cold water. Gan remembered clearly making those decisions to make the travel easier on his little sister, though oddly enough he didn't remember telling Roanna those reasons. "I should have spoken to her more often." Gan blurted out to himself as he carefully descended a hillside with loose mud and rocks that almost caused him to slip and tumble more than a few times. Their father and mother had always kept Roanna busy and happy by talking to her on their travel, Gan himself used to chat with her from time to time in amusement at her young attitude, before...

For a long while now Gan had been quiet, too quiet. He hadn't felt like talking and so he simply didn't. And ironically he was only now realizing what that must have been like for his little sister. At a certain point, he didn't remember when, but she had stopped asking him questions. "ARWWWWOOOOOO!!!" The call of something awful pulled Gan's thoughts to the sky, where something flew high above him with evil in its eyes. "Trouble." was Gan's only curt reply to the flying thing's obnoxious howl. Gan lept to the bottom of the muddy hill he was on and took off in a run towards a large rock jutting out of the ground at an angle, it was at least twice his height and would provide some modicum of cover. The creature in the sky let out another loud noise as it dove down toward him.

Gan turned his back towards the thick pointed overhanging rock that looked like the finger of a stone hand and was glad it overhung over him, keeping the monster from just dropping down on top of him, instead it would have to swoop under the rock to claw at him, which from its angled approach was exactly what it intended to do. As it glided lower and lower Gan could make out the blue feathers and blood-red beak of the bird, its wingspan at least teen feet across as it swam through the air towards him. The sleek and elegant curves of its body and wings reminded Gan of a longbow pulled tight and then firing an arrow with each flap of its powerful wings. Gan wasn't sure what kind of beast this creature was until he saw its feet. Where the eye expected strong sharp talons of a bird of prey, instead were long red tentacles, dozens of snake-like appendages twirling and twisting together, reaching out with malice their ends tipped with stingers that invariably contained a venom no man could survive.

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Gan cursed his luck, this was a Hawksore. Given the name by men who had not been poisoned by the beast but just splattered by drops of its venom on tier cloaths and skin. Just a droplet of the venom would cause the skin to fester and rot making sores on the body that would last for months and sometimes cause death if they became infected. The Hawksore screeched as it dove down and at Gan, its tentacles as long as a full-grown man reaching out to sting him at the same time its wide red beak opened to bite him. The mouth of the bird was large enough for Gan's head to fit into and he knew that if given the chance the Hawksore would crush his skull like a melon in that blood-colored maw, so as it neared instead of stabbing at the creature he pulled his spear beside him like a club and using it's long reach swung hard, striking the beast's head as it's tentacles struck out at him blindly. The length of the wooden spear vibrated with the hit but did not break. The swooping bird slammed to the left toward the angled stone cover and crashed beak-first into the rock. Gan narrowly avoided two tentacles and their stings, one tearing his pant leg and the other brushing through his hair as he sidestepped the dangerous arms while the bird fell to the ground.

But one brutal crash would not kill the monster, so Gan struck again with his spear as the dazed kamikaze slithered back up to face him. Most of its tentacles were now needed as legs to ply its shaking body off the ground so Gan only had to bat away a few stray stingers as he plunged his spear into the chest of the bird. It let out a shrill scream as he withdrew quickly before he lost track of where all the tentless were. But in protest of his hasty retreat and to punish him for the gaping bleeding hole now in its upper half under its right wing the monster lunged beak first and caught Gan's arm its closing force enough to crush bone if it wasn't dazed from the crash and weakened from the bleeding wound. As it was, Gan still heard a painful pop from his arm as the monster clenched onto him. Gan grit his teeth from the pain and letting go of his spear with his free hand straghtened his fingers and clawed them deeply into the left eye of the bird tearing it into bloody pulp. His arm was immediately released as the creature reared back in agony. Still holding his spear with his now injured arm Gan also pulled back and stared angry death into the monster from ten feet away. The bird was a mess now, its head was malformed from the crash into the stone and the strike from Gan's spear, its right wing looked broken and some of its tentacles were limp. Not to mention it was bleeding out from the spear wound Gan had inflicted.

it was also blind and one eye and from the way it started to droop and move sluggishly it was beginning to die. Gan didn't let his guard down, he backed away even further and watched the thing come toward him slowly on its tangle of dangerous appendages. but it couldn't fly anymore and it was too slow on the ground. it crawled in his direction even as it bled out and slowly died the hate and violence in its heart shown clear. This was no animal or being of nature, its only will was to kill and destroy the life it found. It didn't care about surviving, it only wanted Gan to die. it crawled on its weakening tentacles its head turned to the side so its good eye could watch him. No emotion or life was in that black pupil, and no reason was good enough for the bird to stop chasing its prey. Gan watched until its body gave in and fell, then its eyes shut and its breath stilled, and at last, the beast lay in a puddle of its own blood stiff and lifeless. Then and only then did Gan turn his back and depart the brutal scene. His arm was fractured, and his mind was filled with memories of the death he had seen at the hands of both men and monsters. Gan looked up at the setting sun and felt like he couldn't breathe, it wasn't fear but something else, it felt like this world was not worth living in. Not a world where monsters like the Hawksore and the Eaters lived solely to destroy innocence and life. Gan found a patch of muddy earth some distance away from the dead bird and prepared to sleep the night through, too numb to worry about what might find him sleeping out in the open again he just lay down with only a blanket and slept. The day was coming to an end, in more ways than one. He could hear the callings and howlings of beasts and monsters closer than before. This far into the spreading, there would soon be the sound of creatures Gan had only ever heard about from his father and other travelers.

If he made it through the night, He would count it a miracle.