An overwhelming stench jolted him upright. Memories of the fight replayed in his groggy mind.
The two corpses that had once been fresh were now corroded — the meat crawling with maggots.
He didn't know how long he'd been asleep, but the maggots made it clear: it hadn't been a short time.
As he stood, his mind felt oddly refreshed, but his body was anything but. The ordeal he'd endured was written plainly across his skin — every bite and claw mark a reminder of the night before.
He dragged the rotting carcasses toward the cave's mouth, gagging from the stench. The air felt thicker now, humid in a way that didn't belong in a mountain vale.
Each step sent a pulse through his leg — not of pain, but of something else. The branch embedded in his thigh twitched.
He froze.
It wasn't his imagination. The wood was pulsing, faintly, like it had a heartbeat of its own.
He gritted his teeth and yanked at it, but the bark clung to him as though it had taken root. Blood ran down his calf in sluggish streams — darker than before, thicker.
For a moment, the sight didn't disturb him. In fact, the smell made his stomach growl.
His eyes darted away trying to forget about the fact he had eaten raw flesh just prior.
Looking outside, the forest had changed. The mist that once blanketed the vale now hung heavier, almost luminous. The trees were breathing — not literally, but their branches swayed in a rhythm too steady to be mere wind.
a low hum rolled through the air. Somewhere distant, It sounded like the growl of one of those creatures — but deeper, resonating through the ground beneath his feet.
He pressed his palms to his face, trying to steady his breathing. The hum still vibrated faintly beneath his skin, like a second pulse echoing in his bones.
He told himself it was just exhaustion. Hunger. Blood loss.
But the thought didn't settle.
When he lowered his hands, his palms left faint impressions on his cheeks — dark, almost bruised, though they hadn't been there a moment ago. He rubbed at them. They didn't fade.
The air inside the crevasse had grown warmer, almost comforting. The smell of decay no longer stung his nose; it was… tolerable. Familiar, even.
He shook his head hard, forcing a breath through clenched teeth. "No," he muttered to no one. "That's not—"
Something rustled outside. The vines at the entrance shivered though no wind touched them.
He crouched, clutching a jagged rock. His heart hammered.
A shadow shifted beyond the veil of vines — human-shaped this time.
He blinked, and it was gone.
His breath came shallow and fast. The warmth that had filled the cave turned oppressive, pressing against his chest, filling his head with whispers that weren't quite words.
He stumbled back to the wall and slid down, clutching his leg. The branch still pulsed beneath the skin — or maybe it was just his heartbeat again. He couldn't tell anymore.
He tried to count the beats to calm himself, but they didn't stay in rhythm.
The sound of his heartbeat grew louder in his ears.
Bump-Bump.Bump-Bump.
He pressed his ear against the cave wall, desperate for something steady — a sound that wasn't his own pulse. For a moment, he thought he heard running water beneath the stone. Then it changed. The trickle became whispering.
He jerked back, breathing hard.
"Just the blood in your ears," he muttered, trying to laugh.
The light filtering through the vines dimmed, though the fog outside hadn't moved. Shadows stretched long across the floor, curving, bending toward him like fingers.
He shut his eyes. When he opened them again, the shadows had snapped back to normal.
A dry laugh escaped him — relief, or hysteria, he couldn't tell. "Lack of blood," he whispered. "That's all."
He reached for the branch in his leg. It still pulsed faintly, a reminder of the night before. The bark felt warm now — too warm. He pressed his thumb against it, and for an instant, swore he felt it pulse back.
He yanked his hand away, trembling.
The smell of rot filled the space again, thick and cloying. He turned toward the corpses to make sure they hadn't moved — but the pile of decayed flesh was gone.
He blinked.
It was gone, empty stone.
A moment later, he caught the faint sound of chewing from somewhere deep within the cave.
He froze. The chewing stopped the moment he moved.
"Who's there?" His voice cracked in the silence. It felt strange in his own throat, as though he hadn't spoken in days.
No answer. Just the slow drip of moisture from the cave ceiling.
He forced himself to stand, pressing a hand to the wall for balance. His leg throbbed. His fingers brushed the damp stone — and then the stone breathed.
He staggered back, staring. The surface rippled like skin under shallow water.
"Stop it," he hissed. "You're not real."
A laugh — low, gurgling, almost familiar — echoed through the crevasse.
"Are you sure about that?" it whispered. The voice came from everywhere and nowhere.
His stomach turned. He swallowed hard. "You're not real," he repeated, louder this time.
The air thickened. The scent of blood — metallic, sweet — filled his nostrils again.
"You wanted this," the voice said, closer now.
He backed toward the entrance, eyes darting wildly, searching for movement — for anything to anchor to.
Then, between the vines, he saw a human.
Pale, hunched, bleeding — his own face staring back from the mist outside.
He clenched his eyes shut, counting to three.
"One.""Two.""Three."
When he opened them, the tree stood empty. No figure in sight.
He sighed in relief.
Throughout the days he'd been here He had noticed that the sun never seemed to move, yet the thick branches and heavy fog smothered any light from passing through.
There was nothing to do for now. He tore pieces of his clothes and used them to bandage his wounds.
Thoughts of everything he had endured churned in his mind. Despite it all, he was grateful to have made it this far.
An occasional laugh echoed in the distance — almost human, yet carrying an animalistic undertone.
He felt himself slipping — eyes darting across the cave, heart pounding. The thought of something watching him left a sour taste in his mouth.
There were three steps to recovery: sustenance, safety, and rest.
"The only problem," he muttered, "is I don't have food, and this cold floor isn't helping me sleep any faster."
"At least this crevasse has a natural cloak." said a voice in the distance, With the same plain monotonous voice.
It was exactly the words that played in his mind.
His mind anchored on different thought's.
He had an idea of how to find water — but food was another matter.
What he had faced before was unlike anything he'd ever seen. More ferocious than anything he could have imagined.
"Yet we survived such an encounter." The voice said.
"only barely." He replied.
The mist hadn't lifted. It pressed against the cave mouth like a living thing, breathing slow and shallow. He hesitated there for a long time, watching how the fog seemed to recoil whenever he exhaled — like it didn't want his breath mixing with it.
He told himself he was imagining it. He had to be.
With a makeshift bandage tied tight around his thigh, he limped into the gray. The forest greeted him with silence — no birds, no pandemonium, just the wet sound of his boots in the moss.
He followed the faint downward slope, trusting the instinct that water always found the lowest ground. But the air grew colder as he descended, not warmer as he expected.
Then he heard it — a faint trickle, almost like a whisper. Water.
He pushed toward the sound, branches snagging at his clothes, until the trees opened into a small clearing. A shallow pool sat there, perfectly still. No ripples. No movement.
He crouched, his reflection staring back — and blinked. The reflection didn't.