My eyes open, greeted by a darkness that feels alive and thick as I look around. The shadows stretch further than they should, crawling into corners where they don’t belong.

I stay still for a moment, trying to grasp what’s happening, until I see something twitch—a shadow too large, moving across the floor.

Am I imagining things?

The corner by the window seems darker, as if the shadow there is breathing and growing, reaching out like fingers toward me.

I blink, and it’s gone. But the feeling lingers.

Renna moves beside me, whispering. “What happened, Zeph? Why is it so quiet?” Her tone is strained, as though she feels it too. “I feel uncomfortable.”

“I… don’t know. Maybe it’s an accident, and they are taking a break. The festival is too crowded, so mishaps could happen.” I say as I give her hands an assuring grip, though my own words don’t sound convincing to me.

“It’s not that… Something’s wrong,” she says. Now awake, she’s sitting up, looking around, trying to make sense of the same darkness that bothers me.

“Don’t worry, it’s nothing. I’m here, okay? Let me go check what’s going on from the porch.” I try to sound as calm as possible, but the knot in my chest only tightens.

Reluctantly, I get up, moving toward the porch, but as I take a step, I feel something underfoot. A coldness, sharp and almost electric, shoots up my spine. It just brushes against me; not entirely visible, yet tangible.

What was that?

I pause at the door, hand on the handle, and with a step outside, the porch looks nothing more than an abyss, swallowed by the blackness.

But then, a tiny light, far in the distance, flashes and vanishes, as if the city itself is trying to remind me of its existence, only to retreat into the shadows. That leaves more questions than answers.

After that, I hear a faint creak behind me, but when I glance back toward the bedroom, but nothing’s there.

What the hell is going on? Is it a thief.. or maybe a burglar? I feel like someone is watching us, but that can’t be. There is no sign of anyone breaking in.

“Zeph, what do you see out there?” Renna’s voice pulls me back to reality.

I shake my head, trying to clear the fog. “No, it’s just... quiet and dark. I can’t see anything,” I say.

“Are you sure? Did someone break in?” she asks.

“No. Probably just some accident.” My words feel hollow. “Festival ended early, that’s all.”

Now that I look at her, she’s holding a long stick. I’m sure she wasn’t holding it when she fell asleep.

“Renna... where did you get that?” The words leave my lips before I can stop them.

“I keep it under the bed, just in case.”

In what case?

…No need to pry any further. “Oh. Let’s go back to sleep. We’ll figure it out in the morning.”

“Zepp, I don’t… feel like sleeping anymore. How about we watch a movie?” Her voice is small, but there’s some concern in it, maybe hesitation.

“Right now?” I look at her, surprised by her sudden change in mood. Well, it’s only natural that she has lost her sleep with this spooky situation.

“Mm. I’m nervous,” she says. “And could you bring some grapes?”

“Grapes?” I blink, caught off guard again.

Now? At this time?

But I don’t push her. She’s shaken, and the idea of distracting herself with something is understandable.

“Alright, stay here. I’ll get them for you,” I say, giving her a smile.

***

As I make my way toward the kitchen, the silence feels louder than ever.

I flick the light switch, the flash of electricity bringing a momentary sense of comfort, and then I pull the grapes from the fridge and head to the sink to rinse them off.

The tap water flows over the grapes as I slowly forget about the eerie sensation from before, but after a while, the water doesn’t come clear. No. It turns dark, pitch-black, as if ink is leaking from the pipes.

What the hell is this?

It flows rapidly, pulsing and spinning as if it’s a living being. And I freeze, staring at the grotesque fluid pooling in the sink.

I yank my hands back, trying to pull away from the sink, but I feel the heat. A burning pain shoots through my palms, an intense sting as though I’ve pushed my hands into fire. My scream tears through my throat as the black liquid licks at my skin.

“Zeph?!” Renna’s feet pound against the floor as she rushes to my side and sees the black liquid spreading fast across the kitchen floor, oozing over the tiles. The fluid doesn’t just cover the floor; it consumes it. And it smells too; a rotten, metallic stench.

“Don’t come here, Renna. Step back!” I shout.

“Zeph... what is this?!” Her face pales as she steps back, eyes wide with terror. The liquid continues to spread, slipping under the kitchen door, toward the hallway.

Suddenly, the lights flicker, and everything goes dark as a quake hits.

At first, it’s a slight tremor, but soon, the house rocks violently. The walls quiver, the floor rattles beneath me, and I stumble, barely keeping my balance. The windows shudder as if the house is being torn apart, each rumble growing deeper and more powerful than the last.

And then the noises hit.

Starting with a brash and ferocious roar, it’s followed by a long and drawn-out hiss, harsh screeches like nails on a chalkboard. The sounds keep coming. A dull growl of a beast, an unsettling scream of something large moving in the air, and a skittering of claws of an insect too large to be real.

Every sound is wrong. Twisted.

I can feel my heart hammering in my chest as the quake worsens.

The floor splits beneath the dark liquid. Renna stumbles backward, clutching the doorframe as the black liquid gushes toward her. But it’s hesitant, unable to decide whether to devour her or retreat. I want to shout, to warn her, but my voice is muffled by the screams of the beasts outside.

The gooey liquid continues to grip me, pulling me slowly across the floor. It’s no longer just under my feet, but it’s around me, crawling up my legs, binding me with a suffocating force. Every inch I move, I feel the pressure grow stronger.

Renna’s soft cries reach me, but she, too, is being pulled in the same agonizing way.

And as we struggle to break free, calling for each other, it comes.

A presence, ancient and far older than anything I’ve known, sneaks in around us. It’s not a thing. It wants. It needs. I can’t see it, but I can feel it like a heartbeat. Closer and closer.

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“Zeph, can you hear me?! I can’t hear anything. Zeph?”

Renna’s screams of panic slash through me, but I can’t reach her. I want to scream too. I want to fight. But my body is trapped.

Eventually, out of the blackness, eight figures emerge. Shadows—no, not shadows, not entirely. They seem to twist and bend with blurry forms, ever-changing as if they don’t fully exist. Each one is a silhouette of blackness, unnaturally tall, their outlines rough and broken. Their limbs stretch disturbingly long, and the way they move… they’re glitching, slipping in and out of reality.

Their faces, or rather, the places where their faces should be, are empty. But I know they’re watching us. I feel it.

“Who… are you?”, I ask, my body and voice shuddering with fear. “Are you fiends?”

The shadows don’t answer. Instead, one of them steps forward, and opens its mouth, or perhaps it doesn’t; the darkness that fills its face sinks, becoming words instead.

“She looks weak,” it says, its voice cold and hollow, like a whisper from a nightmare. “We should hurry before she snaps.”

They are after her!

“Renna! Get away from them, run!”

I see her body beating against the dark liquid, but her eyes never leave mine, desperate and pleading. “Zeph, are you okay?! Why aren’t you saying anything?”

I feel a rush of adrenaline. “No!” I shout, struggling against the liquid. “Don’t touch her! Who the hell are you?! We have got nothing to do with fiends.”

But it’s no use.

In a moment of desperation, I manage to break free, just for a second, from the grip of the black liquid. My body staggers forward, but before I can move, a sharp, piercing pain drives through my side.

Holding a spear crafted from blood-red energy, a shadow jumps before me, and it doesn’t hesitate to thrust the spear forward with a brutal, practiced motion. The tip of the other-worldly spear digs into my side. I scream again, feeling a pain unlike before, after which my body slumps as strength leaves my limbs. I feel my organs flowing out of their place, out of my skin, into that spear. It’s sucking the life from my body.

With a kick from the shadow, I crash back onto the walls, vision clouded, and gasping for air. I can feel the force of the strike pulling my core, sapping the little strength I have left.

“Zeph!” Renna cries. “No! Please, you have to be okay!”

But I can barely hear her. The world is spinning, and everything is fading in and out of focus.

Still, my adrenaline hasn’t run out. Instead, it’s been boosted to its peak. I grit my teeth, my voice coming out hoarse. “Why Renna… Why us?”

The shadow that struck me steps forward again, tilts its head slightly, and for a moment, it almost seems... curious.

“Why her?!” I demand with a sudden burst in my tone, growing more desperate despite the searing pain. “What makes her so important?!”

There’s a pause, then it growls. “She belongs to us.”

I recoil at the simplicity of the statement. “Belongs to you? What does that even mean?” My heart races. “What are you trying to do? Who sent you?”

Another shadow says, “Sent? No one sends us. We are inevitable, and it was time we came here to get what we want.” The voice comes from all directions at once. “Also, you better not compare us to pests like fiends,” it warned. “You would not understand even if we told you. So, stay quiet and scoot away to the afterlife.”

I try to push against the liquid, to move toward Renna, but its weight grows heavier by the second. “You… can’t take her! I don’t care about your inevitability. It’s time? Yeah, the FASE will be here soon. Just wait to be arrested,” I say through clenched teeth, anger rising despite the pain. “Now tell me what’s all this about?”

There’s another pause, and one of them finally speaks. “Give up. You or even the FASE can’t fight what you can’t see, what you can’t comprehend.”

I feel a shock run through me, an uneasy shiver crawling down my spine. “What are you going to do with her?”

Standing far to my right, a shadow moves. It’s the one that’s been silent until now, the quietest, yet the most chilling. “We don’t need to answer your questions. What are you all looking at? Secure her quickly.”

I feel Renna’s eyes on me and look at her. Her voice trembles. “Zeph... Please, what’s going on? What are they saying?”

“Stay away from them, Renna! Don’t listen to them!”

But she’s terrified. “What do they want, Zeph? This liquid… in my ears. I can’t hear clearly.”

“I’m tired of this game. You aren’t even an obstacle to us. So, off you go.” Out of nowhere, a green orb hits my chest and pushes in. The black liquid stabs through me, ravaging my insides, turning what once was human into something unrecognizable, but I can’t even cry.

Somehow, though, I’m still alive.

“Zeph!” Renna’s voice cuts through the fog of pain, and her frantic footsteps echo, growing closer, but I can barely lift my head to see her.

Did she escape from the liquid?

“Renna… Don’t come here. Run… run away!”

All I can see is a blurry shape, her silhouette rushing toward me. She falls to her knees beside me, her hands trembling as she touches my face, my chest, my arms. Her touch is warm against my cold skin, but it feels so distant, like a dream I can’t grasp.

“Oh my god…” she whispers, gently pressing her fingers to the blood-soaked mess that was once my body. “Zeph… No… no, please, no…” Her voice shakes with each word, “Please, no, don’t leave me… I can’t… I can’t do this without you…”

Her sobs fill the room, and tears flow down her face as she clutches my hand, shaking me desperately.

I want to tell her. That I’m still here, that I’m still holding on, but no words come.

The shadows scoff with cold indifference.

“What a tragic waste! So easy to break.”

“End this drama already. It’s unpleasant.”

Their voices drip with disdain, their words laced with scorn.

“Reaching for something beyond his grasp, and look at him now. He’s little more than a broken thing. Pathetic fool!”

With those words, Renna’s eyes flare with rage, her head snapping toward them. “You…” She’s trembling, but the fury in tone starts to break through. “Monsters! You think you can just do this and walk away?!” She shakes me again, her voice rising in desperation. “Stop mocking him! What have we ever done to you? Why do we have to go through this?!”

Something in Renna changes.

It’s so subtle that I can’t be sure I’m even seeing it. Her soft, helpless face wrinkles, brows furrow, and her lips press into a thin line. Her breath, still ragged with sobs, becomes slow and sharper. Those kind eyes that had been filled with nothing but worry, glow with a fire I’ve never seen before.

Then, it erupts.

A golden light bursts from her, blinding and powerful, but not harsh. It wraps around us, around the house, and the air trembles in its presence, alongside red sparks like the sparks of embers. From her back, golden wings unfurl. At first, they are just a faint illusion, but they grow and spread wide, each feather buzzing with energy, with life, with purpose.

The shadows hiss and move back, but it’s too late. Her hand moves toward the air, her fingers curling as if she’s pulling something to herself. And then, from thin air, a stick materializes. The one from under the bed.

I watch in awe as it changes, stretching, and becoming a spear, shimmering like molten gold.

“How dare you… How dare you hurt him!” She grumbles.

The shadows stand still for a moment, until one of them says, “You don’t understand.”

Its voice is full of dark amusement. “You are the key. The key to making us powerful, to creating beings this world has never seen. And once we have you, we will reshape everything... everything. This is not about your or this vermin’s death, no.”

Renna’s face twists further at the words. Her glowing golden eyes narrow as her body stiffens with barely-contained rage. The warmth from her wings grows hotter and brighter with every word the shadows.

“You want to use me?” she growls once more. “You want to tear him apart, then use me like some tool?” Her voice rises with ferocity. “Let’s see!”

In an instant, she leaps at a shadow, her spear arcs through the air, cutting it into slices. The shadow raises its hand, but the spear strikes it along with a torrent, sending it flying back into the wall with a screech of pain. Still, it recovers immediately and lunges at her with a razor-sharp claw extended.

The fight breaks out like a storm, each strike of her spear sending shockwaves through the air, and as she clashes with another shadow, slamming her spear into its side, the floor beneath them caves in. But the shadow doesn’t flinch. It morphs like liquid and strikes her in return with dark-red tentacles. The pain only fuels her further, her eyes glowing brighter with each attack.

The remaining shadows join the attack, relentlessly circling her like wolves, wielding jagged blades of shadow, chains of darkness that reach out to bind her, and orbs of icy smoke that block her vision.

Also, as the fight drags on, I can see the change in her, her power dropping, her strikes losing precision, and her breaths becoming unstable. She’s being worn down.

A moment later, a shadow, faster than the rest, falls on her with a red-hot spear, catching her in the shoulder, and she stumbles back, as a painful grunt escapes her lips. Coming at her from all sides, they press in, making her movements grow slower, more desperate.

Don’t hurt her…

I watch in horror as one of them rips her wings with a thorny whip tearing through the feathers. She lets out a cry of pain. Although she doesn’t give up, I can see how much she’s suffering. Her power is fading, and the shadows are growing stronger.

The golden light is dimming, she’s breathing heavily, her spear faltering in her hand, but still, she swings it, again and again, striking out at the darkness that surrounds her.

But their assault is never-ending. When her spear shatters one of them, more rush in to take its place, overwhelming her.

I can only see a terrible end to this.

Please… If there is anyone, any god watching this, please help us! I am begging you.

Soon, the shadows surround her completely, and in a final, coordinated strike, they bind her with chains of dark energy. The chains wrap around her, pulling her to the ground. Her wings are torn and crushed by the weight of the shackles until nothing remains but a trace of gold.

“Let go!” Renna grumbles, but they stiffen their grip on her as their mocking laughter echoes in the house. Not only anger but also pain fills her eyes, and with a final, frantic cry, she falls forward.

Please tell me I am dreaming. This is just a nightmare… Renna!

My heart aches at the sight, my body too broken to help, too weak to even speak. I can’t bear to see her like this, defeated and trapped.

Then, turning to me, they say with an emotionless and triumphant tone, “Your resistance... or whatever it was. Amusing but pointless.”

With that, the world fades.

I hear Renna one last time, light and distant, as if she’s calling from a faraway place. “I’m sorry… Zeph.”

The shadows tighten their hold on me, and I feel myself slipping, sinking into a void. But her voice... that last trace of her, remains in my mind, playing repeatedly through the endless black.

My consciousness fades out like a memory I can’t hold on to.

And then... silence.

A crushing, smothering silence.

***