Three hours.
Three hours of non-stop running, with the mist biting at their heels and exhaustion weighing more than any armor.
The ten survivors advanced as best they could, some faster, others slower, but all driven by the same primal instinct: survive.
Ash felt each step like a small death. His ribs protested, his legs burned, his lungs begged for air that the mist seemed to deny him. But he didn't stop. He couldn't stop. Stopping meant dying.
Dren ran beside him, axe in one hand, breathing labored but steady. The veteran had a resilience Ash envied. He seemed made of something harder than flesh and bone.
Ahead, the veteran knight led the group, his armor clanking with each step. The prematurely gray woman followed close behind, her axe also at the ready. The other mercenaries —three of them, plus Dren and Ash— brought up the rear.
Ten souls lost in the mist.
And then, the mist responded.
"Halt!" the knight shouted, raising a fist. "They're surrounding us!"
Ash didn't ask how he knew. He simply accepted the truth as the forms began to emerge from the haze.
Spawn. Dozens of them. More than he had seen in the previous two attacks combined.
They weren't just latent creatures; Ash could distinguish several of larger size, more solid, more real. Awakened beasts. Perhaps even one of a higher rank.
"Form a circle!" the knight ordered. "Cover each other's backs!"
The ten positioned themselves back to back, a small island of humanity in a sea of mist and monsters.
Ash drew his sword. But then he remembered something.
The Memory.
He summoned Mist Fang. The grayish sword appeared in his left hand, its weight almost nonexistent. A short sword in one hand, and in the other. It wasn't a style he had ever practiced, but at that moment, any advantage was welcome.
The Spawn attacked.
Chaos erupted.
Ash barely had time to process what was happening. His body moved on instinct, one sword tracing defensive arcs while the other sought openings.
And it worked. Mist Fang pierced through the creatures as if they were made of... well, mist. Its ethereal edge cut through their natural defenses with astonishing ease.
A latent Spawn fell to his sword. Then another. An awakened beast lunged at him, and Ash raised his sword instinctively.
The gray blade sank into the creature's chest, and it dissolved with a shriek.
[You have killed an awakened beast: Mist Spawn]
The spell's voice echoed in his mind, but Ash had no time to celebrate. Already another creature took its place.
Beside him, Dren fought like a demon. His axe reaped Spawn with deadly efficiency, his face a mask of absolute concentration. The veteran seemed born for this.
The knights also held their own. The leader and his younger companion formed a wall of steel and determination, their swords dancing in the mist. The veteran woman, despite her age, fought with a blood-chilling ferocity.
But the other mercenaries...
One fell. Then another. Their screams were cut short abruptly as the mist claimed them.
Ash couldn't look. He couldn't afford that distraction. Every second he looked away from his own fight was a second that could cost him his life.
Minutes passed. Or hours. Time meant nothing in the mist.
When the last Spawn fell, when the battle finally ended, Ash found himself gasping, barely able to stay on his feet. Blood —if that gray liquid could be called blood— covered his clothes, his swords. And the blood of those creatures dripped from his chin, from his arms, from every part of his body.
Around him, the landscape had changed.
The bodies of the Spawn slowly vanished, returned to the mist from which they were born. But there were also other bodies. Human bodies.
Of the ten, only five remained.
Ash counted, again and again, hoping to be wrong. But the number didn't change.
There were him and Dren. The veteran knight, wounded but alive. The gray-haired woman, leaning on her axe, gasping. And the younger knight, sitting on the ground, with an empty expression on his face.
Five.
"Damn it," Dren muttered, falling to his knees. "Damn it."
No one said anything. There were no words for that moment.
The veteran knight was the first to move. He approached the fallen, one by one, looking for any sign of life. He found none.
"We have to keep going," he said, his voice hoarse. "We can't stay here. We'll attract more."
"Let us rest," the veteran woman said. "Just a moment. Please."
The knight looked at her for a moment, then slowly nodded.
"Five minutes. Not one more."
The five sat where they were, too exhausted to move. Someone passed a canteen. Someone else shared a piece of hard bread. Small gestures of humanity in a place that seemed to have forgotten it.
Ash closed his eyes for a moment, letting his breathing calm. The pain in his ribs was unbearable, but he no longer cared. He just wanted to rest. He just wanted to...
No, he thought, forcing himself to open his eyes. I can't fall asleep. Not here.
He looked around. The mist was still there, dense, implacable. But something had changed. The sensation of being watched was more intense than ever. As if all the eyes of the mist were fixed on him.
"We have to move," he said, standing up with effort. "Something isn't right."
The others looked at him, confused.
"What do you mean?" Dren asked.
"I don't know. But we have to go. Now."
The veteran knight studied him for a moment, then nodded.
"The kid's right. Get up. We're leaving."
The five set off, leaving behind the bodies of their companions. Ash didn't look back. He couldn't.
---
They walked for hours. Or maybe it was minutes. In the mist, time still made no sense.
And then, they attacked again.
But this time it was different.
The Spawn emerged from the mist as before, but their attack was... strange. Uncoordinated. As if they weren't really interested in fighting.
Ash killed two with his sword before realizing something was wrong. The other four survivors also fought, but the Spawn retreated as soon as they received a blow, falling back into the mist instead of pressing the attack.
"What... what's happening?" the young knight asked, his voice trembling.
No one answered.
The Spawn withdrew completely. A moment later, the mist began to dissipate.
Ash blinked, incredulous. For the first time since arriving in this place, he could see beyond a few meters. The gray sky was still gray, but now he could make out the horizon. The mountains. The road stretching ahead.
And at the end of that road, in the distance, he saw lights.
"The camp," the veteran woman said, her voice barely a whisper. "It's the camp."
The five stared at the lights for a moment, not daring to believe it.
"Why did they retreat?" Dren asked, voicing what everyone was thinking. "They had the advantage. They could have killed us."
The veteran knight slowly shook his head.
"I don't know. But I'm not going to question it. Go! Run!"
The five began to run towards the lights, towards safety, towards life.
Ash ran, but he couldn't stop thinking about what had just happened.
The Spawn had retreated. The mist had dissipated. It was as if something... or someone... had decided to let them go.
And as he ran, he felt that gaze once more. That invisible presence that had followed him from the beginning.
But now, for the first time, he felt something else.
He felt truly uncomfortable, as if something wasn't right but he couldn't exactly tell what.
'What the hell?' Ash thought, as his feet carried him toward the camp.
He didn't know.
But he was beginning to suspect something unpleasant was about to happen. He could feel it. His intuition guided him toward the camp, but that gaze became more intense with each passing second.