Chapter 124
The investigation eventually ended the way many such investigations did.
Not with answers.
Not with justice.
But with silence.
The official reports were filed. The area was marked as hazardous. Patrol routes were altered. Villagers were advised not to travel alone after sunset. A few specialists continued searching for the source of the attacks, but as weeks turned into months, the trail grew colder.
No arrests were made.
No bodies of the perpetrators were recovered.
No definitive conclusions were ever announced to the public.
Life simply moved on.
The fields were replanted.
Children returned to school.
Market vendors reopened their stalls.
The empty house was eventually torn down.
And little by little, people stopped talking about what had happened there.
But Nille never forgot.
He remembered the smell.
The unnatural silence.
The way even experienced officers struggled to keep their composure.
Most of all, he remembered the realization that had settled into his mind that night while watching the darkness beyond the tree line.
Monsters did not always look like monsters.
Sometimes they smiled.
Sometimes they laughed.
Sometimes they looked exactly like the people they intended to eat.
It was a lesson that had remained with him long after Bulacan faded into memory.
A lesson that had saved his life more than once.
And it was the reason he felt absolutely no fear as he sat bound inside the hut.
The memory dissolved.
The present returned.
The flickering firelight cast shifting shadows across the wooden walls.
The woman stood only a few steps away.
The child watched him with eyes that were far too intelligent.
The scent of cooking food lingered in the air, but beneath it Nille could detect something else now.
The faint metallic odor of old blood.
The smell was carefully hidden.
Masked.
But not completely.
A normal traveler might never notice it.
Nille did.
The years had taught him what to look for.
The years had taught him what these creatures were.
The woman continued studying him, clearly convinced she was dealing with nothing more than a lost student.
To her senses, his spiritual signature remained weak and unimpressive. The Celestial Cloth concealed everything that would normally trigger caution.
No overwhelming aura.
No legendary bloodline.
No signs of danger.
Just a tired young man who had wandered too far into the wilderness.
Exactly the kind of prey an Aswang preferred.
Nille almost found the situation amusing.
Almost.
Because beneath the disguise, beneath the false hospitality and the carefully maintained illusion of normalcy, he could already see the cracks.
The child moved wrong.
The woman blinked too infrequently.
The hut felt too empty for a family supposedly living here.
Every detail reinforced what he already knew.
This was a feeding ground.
A trap repeated countless times.
One that had probably succeeded against many unfortunate travelers.
The woman smiled again.
"You're very calm."
Nille met her gaze.
"I've met your kind before."
For the briefest moment, her expression changed.
Not much.
Just enough.
Surprise.
Then curiosity.
The child stopped moving entirely.
Silence settled over the hut.
Outside, the wind rustled through the dry grass.
Far away, somewhere beyond the darkness, Sector Twelve stretched toward the distant mountain range.
The ruins.
The buried city.
The World Tree vision.
The dimensional gateway.
The mysteries he had set out to investigate tonight.
They were all still waiting.
But for now, another mystery sat directly in front of him.
Because Aswangs rarely established hunting grounds near something unimportant.
They preferred isolated places.
Forgotten places.
Places where people rarely visited.
Places where secrets remained hidden.
And that fact interested Nille far more than the bindings around his wrists.
The woman slowly tilted her head.
"You've met our kind before?"
Nille nodded.
A small smile appeared on his face.
Not fearful.
Not nervous.
Interested.
The same expression he often wore when discovering a new clue.
And somehow, that smile seemed to make the woman more uncomfortable than any display of strength could have.
For the first time since entering the hut, Nille noticed something subtle.
Something the Aswang woman hadn't intended to reveal.
Every few moments, her gaze drifted toward a particular section of the floor.
Only for an instant.
Then away again.
But it happened repeatedly.
Enough for him to notice.
Enough for him to wonder.
And as the conversation continued, Nille quietly filed the observation away.
Because after everything he had learned tonight, he was beginning to suspect that the real reason this hut existed here had very little to do with hunting travelers.
The more Nille observed the woman and child, the less their presence made sense.
That alone was enough to hold his attention.
The bindings wrapped around his wrists and ankles were little more than an inconvenience. He could have removed them at any time if he chose to. The spiritual threads woven into the hut were crude by his standards, designed to restrain ordinary travelers, low-level awakened individuals, or unlucky hunters who wandered too far from civilization.
Yet Nille made no attempt to break free.
Because curiosity had already replaced caution.
The situation simply didn't add up.
Very few people could even reach this part of Sector Twelve. The journey alone discouraged most travelers. Between the swamps, the ruins, the distance from established settlements, and the increasingly dangerous terrain, there was little reason for ordinary people to venture this far into the wilderness.
Which raised an obvious question.
What exactly were these two feeding on?
An Aswang's appetite wasn't occasional.
It was constant.
A creature that fed on human flesh required a steady source of prey.
But there weren't enough people passing through this region to sustain them.
At least not naturally.
Nille studied the woman again.
Then the child.
Neither appeared concerned about scarcity.
Neither appeared malnourished.
If anything, they looked comfortable.
Established.
As though they had been here for some time.
That only made the mystery deeper.
Because as far as Nille knew, this wasn't their habitat.
Not even close.
Aswangs preferred places where people lived.
Villages.
Remote settlements.
Rural communities.
Areas where disappearances could be explained away and victims could be isolated.
This region offered none of those advantages.
It was too empty.
Too exposed.
Too dangerous.
His gaze drifted toward the distant darkness beyond the hut.
Toward the mountain range.
Even from here, he could feel it.
The subtle pressure lingering in the environment.
The feeling that stronger things existed further ahead.
Far stronger.
The mountains had a reputation for a reason.
Among explorers, adventurers, and awakened organizations, the region was known to host powerful Malignants and Encantos that claimed entire territories for themselves. Creatures capable of driving away competitors simply through their presence.
The sort of beings that lesser predators wisely avoided.
Which made the woman's presence here even stranger.
A lone Aswang and her offspring establishing a hunting ground this close to such territory felt almost suicidal.
Unless...
They weren't here by choice.
Or they weren't here for hunting.
Nille's eyes narrowed slightly.
The possibility intrigued him.
Perhaps they had been displaced.
Driven out of another region.
Perhaps they were hiding.
Perhaps they were serving someone.
Or perhaps there was something in this area valuable enough to justify the risk.
The woman noticed his gaze drifting toward the mountains.
A subtle reaction crossed her face.
Gone almost immediately.
But not before Nille caught it.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
He filed the observation away.
Years of dealing with spirits, excavations, ancient ruins, and dangerous creatures had taught him that information often appeared in the smallest details.
A glance.
A hesitation.
A subject someone deliberately avoided.
The woman recovered quickly.
"You're awfully calm for someone tied up."
Nille shrugged lightly.
"Aswangs aren't usually found this far out."
The words slipped from him casually.
As if making idle conversation.
But the reaction was immediate.
The child stopped moving.
The woman became still.
Not hostile.
Not yet.
But attentive.
Nille smiled inwardly.
He had touched something important.
Outside, the wind swept across the dry hills surrounding the hut. The swamp was far behind him now. The terrain here was rocky and sparse, with only scattered vegetation clinging to the earth. Their hill stood isolated from the surrounding landscape, overlooking a vast stretch of wilderness that eventually rose toward the distant mountains.
And those mountains remained far away.
Much farther than they appeared.
Meaning these two weren't even close to the territories of the strongest Malignants and Encantos.
They were in the buffer zone.
The empty land between civilization and true danger.
A strange place to settle.
A stranger place to hide.
Nille slowly leaned back against the wooden wall, appearing relaxed despite his restraints.
The woman watched him carefully now.
No longer viewing him entirely as prey.
And that suited him perfectly.
Because every passing minute reinforced the same suspicion.
This hut wasn't here because of travelers.
The Aswang woman and child weren't here because of food.
And whatever had drawn them to this desolate hill was probably connected to something much larger than either of them realized.
The question was whether they knew it.
Or whether they were merely another piece of the puzzle.
The silence inside the hut lingered for several moments.
Then the child suddenly spoke.
Its voice was wrong.
Too clear.
Too articulate for something that appeared barely two years old.
"Can't we eat this human?" the Tiyanak asked, staring directly at Nille. "I'm hungry."
Nille remained motionless.
But inwardly, his expression darkened.
The voice.
The mannerisms.
And then the name that followed.
"The Dimas twins haven't returned," the child complained. "They promised us more human meat. It's been days."
For the first time since entering the hut, genuine irritation surfaced within Nille.
Imto Dimas.
A name he would have preferred never hearing again.
The Pilandok twins had a habit of appearing wherever trouble was brewing. They were clever, opportunistic, and somehow always involved in matters that should have remained buried. Worse, they possessed an uncanny talent for surviving situations that should have killed them years ago.
The Aswang woman sighed.
Apparently convinced her prisoner was harmless enough that secrecy no longer mattered.
"They'll return."
The Tiyanak frowned.
"You always say that."
"The Drake hasn't returned either," the woman replied.
That immediately caught Nille's attention.
The Drake.
Not a title one used lightly.
The woman's expression became more serious.
"We were told to remain here and watch for its return."
The child kicked at the floor.
"But Master wounded it."
"Severely wounded it," the woman corrected.
"We saw the blood ourselves."
A brief silence followed.
The Aswang's gaze drifted toward the shuttered window.
"Until one of the Pilandok twins returns with the remnant of the Buntala, we stay here."
The word immediately sent a chill through the room.
Not because of fear.
Because of recognition.
Nille's eyes narrowed slightly.
Buntala.
Now that was a name he hadn't expected to hear.
The child made a disgusted face.
"I hate that metal."
"So does every Malignant," the woman replied.
Her hand unconsciously touched a pale scar running along her forearm.
A scar Nille had not noticed before.
"It burns."
"It cuts."
"And unlike ordinary weapons..."
Her voice lowered.
"It can kill us."
The Tiyanak hissed.
"I hate it."
The woman nodded.
"Of course you do."
She stared into the fire.
"There are only a handful of Buntala relics left."
"Most were lost long ago."
"Destroyed."
"Hidden."
"Buried."
Her eyes became distant.
"The last known pieces were in the island nation once called the Philippines."
Nille remained perfectly still.
Inside, however, his thoughts accelerated.
Buntala.
The legendary silver-white metal.
Not truly silver.
Not truly steel.
Something older.
Something stranger.
Ancient records described it as one of the few substances capable of harming creatures whose bodies could regenerate through spiritual means.
It wasn't merely sharp.
It disrupted.
It interfered with the unnatural processes that allowed powerful Malignants to survive wounds that should have killed them.
Which explained why the Aswang feared it.
Why the Tiyanak hated it.
And why something powerful enough to be called a Drake had apparently been wounded by it.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
The woman continued speaking.
"Master said the wound should have killed it."
"It didn't."
The child frowned.
"Then why not hunt it?"
The woman's expression hardened.
"Because even wounded, it would tear us apart."
The Tiyanak immediately fell silent.
That answer alone told Nille everything he needed to know about the creature's strength.
The Aswang woman wasn't weak.
Neither was the Tiyanak.
Yet both were terrified of pursuing an injured Drake.
Whatever had happened in the mountains had clearly involved forces beyond their level.
The child eventually looked back toward Nille.
Its eyes gleamed in the firelight.
"Can we eat him if the twins don't come back?"
The question was asked with the casual tone of a child asking about dessert.
The woman chuckled.
"Maybe."
The Tiyanak brightened immediately.
Nille almost sighed.
Some things never changed.
Monsters remained monsters.
No matter how intelligent they became.
Yet despite the unpleasant conversation, Nille had obtained something valuable.
Several things, in fact.
The Dimas twins.
A wounded Drake.
A mysterious Master.
A remnant of Buntala.
And a reason these creatures were hiding on this isolated hill.
The pieces didn't fit together yet.
But they were pieces.
And that was enough.
Outside, the wind swept across the dry landscape.
Far beyond the hut, the mountains loomed against the night sky.
Dark.
Silent.
Ancient.
Nille's gaze drifted briefly toward them.
The World Tree.
The dimensional gateway.
The buried city.
Now a wounded Drake and fragments of Buntala had entered the picture as well.
Somehow, he doubted any of it was a coincidence.
And if the Dimas twins truly were involved...
Then things were probably about to become much more complicated.
Nille remained outwardly calm, but inwardly he was beginning to see a pattern.
A dangerous one.
The mention of the Buntala remnant, the Dimas twins, the wounded Drake, and the mysterious Master should have been separate concerns. Instead, they all seemed to converge toward a single point.
A single person.
Granny Amparo.
The realization made him slowly lean back against the wall as he organized the information in his mind.
The more he thought about it, the more uncomfortable the conclusion became.
Almost every item powerful Malignants and Encantos appeared interested in somehow traced back to her possession.
The old barkcloth records.
The ancient heirlooms.
The forgotten relics.
The unusual artifacts she kept as casually as another grandmother might keep old family photographs.
At the time, Nille had assumed they were simply historical curiosities preserved through generations.
Now he wasn't so sure.
Because powerful creatures rarely searched for things without reason.
And these were not ordinary creatures.
The Aswang and Tiyanak sitting only a few feet away clearly understood what Buntala was.
They knew enough to fear it.
Enough to wait for it.
Enough to risk remaining in dangerous territory because of it.
That implied knowledge.
Organization.
Purpose.
And if Malignants knew the value of these ancient remnants, then surely others did as well.
Which raised an unsettling question.
Was Granny Amparo aware of what she possessed?
Nille genuinely didn't know.
Part of him could easily imagine her being completely oblivious.
The old woman had always treated many of her belongings as ordinary family keepsakes. She stored ancient objects beside cooking utensils. Priceless records sat near jars of preserved food. Items that scholars would have fought wars to examine were often wrapped in cloth and tucked away in wooden cabinets.
To her, they were simply things inherited from previous generations.
Pieces of family history.
Nothing more.
Yet another part of him found that explanation difficult to believe.
Granny Amparo was far from foolish.
People often underestimated her because of her age and her simple lifestyle.
Nille knew better.
The old woman possessed a quiet intelligence that rarely revealed itself unless necessary.
She noticed things.
Remembered things.
Connected details others overlooked.
There had been many occasions when she seemed to know more than she should.
Moments when she answered questions Nille hadn't spoken aloud.
Moments when she casually referenced knowledge that should have been forgotten centuries ago.
The memory made him frown slightly.
Was she truly unaware?
Or was she choosing not to speak?
The possibility lingered.
Because there was another explanation.
One Nille found increasingly plausible.
Perhaps Granny Amparo knew exactly what those relics were.
Exactly how valuable they were.
Exactly why certain creatures sought them.
And had simply spent decades pretending otherwise.
The thought almost made him laugh.
It would certainly explain a great many things.
Including why so many dangerous individuals seemed unable to acquire what they wanted despite apparently searching for years.
After all, nobody expects the elderly woman tending a garden and offering snacks to visitors to be the guardian of ancient relics connected to forgotten civilizations.
The disguise was almost perfect.
Which was exactly why it would work.
Nille glanced toward the Aswang woman.
She was still speaking casually with the Tiyanak, completely unaware of where his thoughts had gone.
Neither of them realized that nearly every object they were discussing had already passed through Granny Amparo's hands at one point or another.
And that realization alone made the situation far more complicated.
Because if powerful Malignants, Encantos, and perhaps even ancient entities were searching for the same artifacts...
Then Granny Amparo was either the luckiest old woman in the Philippines.
Or one of the most dangerous people Nille had ever met.
And somehow, based on everything he had experienced so far, he suspected the truth was much closer to the second option.
Nille allowed his shoulders to sag and his breathing to become shallow.
The performance wasn't difficult.
Years of dealing with spirits, Malignants, and suspicious individuals had taught him that appearing weak often revealed more than appearing strong.
He lowered his head slightly.
"If that metal is so important..." he asked weakly, "why are you looking for it?"
The Tiyanak rolled its eyes.
The Aswang woman laughed.
Not kindly.
Mockingly.
"Our Master intends to break the seal of Lord Arimaonga."
The name alone caused a faint stirring in Nille's memory.
Ancient.
Dangerous.
The sort of name that appeared in fragmented records and stories people preferred not to repeat.
The woman continued.
"And those Buntala fragments are the only thing that can—"
She stopped.
Instantly.
The change was so abrupt that even the Tiyanak froze.
A moment earlier, both creatures had appeared relaxed.
Now they looked terrified.
Not cautious.
Not alert.
Terrified.
The hairs on Nille's neck rose.
A pressure swept across the hill.
Not a gust of wind.
Not spiritual energy.
Something else.
Something vast.
Something old.
The fire outside extinguished itself.
The night became unnaturally silent.
The woman slowly turned toward the door.
The Tiyanak's face had become pale.
"What is that?" it whispered.
The Aswang didn't answer.
She already knew.
And judging from her expression...
she wished she didn't.
The pressure intensified.
Every instinct Nille possessed immediately screamed the same warning.
Leave.
Now.
The woman grabbed the Tiyanak.
"We have to go."
The child didn't argue.
That alone told Nille everything he needed to know.
Both Malignants rushed outside.
Neither bothered looking at him.
Neither cared about the prisoner anymore.
For the first time since entering the hut, they were afraid of something more than they feared losing a meal.
The door slammed open.
Then closed again.
Leaving Nille alone.
Silence filled the hut.
For exactly one second.
Then Nille moved.
"Nyx."
Darkness rippled around him.
Immediately, three layers of concealment activated.
Perception Distortion.
Residual Echo Projection.
Conceptual Interference.
The bindings around his wrists became meaningless.
By the time they slipped from his arms, the illusion of Nille remained sitting exactly where he had been moments before.
A perfect decoy.
Even direct observation would struggle to distinguish the difference.
He was already moving toward the rear of the hut.
Nyx's voice emerged inside his thoughts.
Warning.
Threat level exceeds recommended engagement parameters.
Nille didn't need the warning.
He could feel it himself.
The pressure washing over the hill wasn't merely powerful.
It was wrong.
The way a hurricane was wrong.
The way standing beneath a collapsing mountain was wrong.
Something was approaching.
And whatever it was had terrified two experienced Malignants into immediate flight.
Nille had no intention of remaining long enough to identify it.
A single possibility surfaced in his thoughts.
Apo Lakkay Masalanta.
The name carried weight.
A High Elven Dalaketnon.
One of the ancient servants directly tied to powers far older and more dangerous than modern awakened society understood.
Even if it wasn't Masalanta specifically...
Anything capable of generating this level of pressure belonged in the same category.
And Nille wasn't foolish enough to gamble.
Not tonight.
Not without preparation.
Not while standing alone on a hill in the middle of nowhere.
"Teleport."
Space distorted.
A burst of light folded around him.
His destination wasn't another part of Sector Twelve.
It wasn't even another sector.
He chose somewhere much farther.
Somewhere safe.
His warehouse home in the Philippines.
The location anchored instantly.
For the briefest moment, Nille felt hesitation.
A tiny voice questioning whether he should stay.
Whether he should investigate.
Whether he might learn something valuable.
Then his instincts answered for him.
Leave.
Now.
Nille trusted those instincts.
They had kept him alive this long.
The world vanished.
Space folded.
And he disappeared.
The teleportation completed.
The familiar interior of the warehouse appeared around him.
Concrete.
Steel.
Shelves.
The scent of home.
For a moment, everything was quiet.
Then Nyx spoke.
Good decision.
Nille frowned.
"That bad?"
Nyx was silent for nearly two seconds.
Which was answer enough.
Then—
The connection to his observation echoes shattered.
Every remaining projection he had left behind on the hill vanished simultaneously.
Not destroyed individually.
Erased.
As though something had swept across the area and removed everything at once.
Nille's eyes narrowed.
A moment later, the distant observation feed captured one final image before collapsing.
The hill.
The hut.
The surrounding terrain.
All of it erupted.
The earth split apart.
A column of fire, stone, and pressure exploded upward like a volcanic eruption.
The entire hillside vanished beneath the blast.
Trees disintegrated.
Rock melted.
The shockwave rolled across the landscape with enough force to flatten everything nearby.
Then the feed ended.
Silence returned.
Nille stared at the empty space where the projection had been.
Slowly.
Very slowly.
He exhaled.
His instincts had been right.
If he had delayed even a few more seconds...
If he had chosen curiosity over caution...
He might have been standing at the center of that explosion.
And for perhaps the first time since arriving in Sector Twelve, Nille felt genuinely relieved that he had chosen to run.