The stream Master Torin mentioned gurgles nearby, a mocking whisper in the predawn gloom. North, he'd said. But the world is a tangled cage of shadows, and the stars are strangers to me. The monks' walls were my entire world.
The pendant in my palm pulses, a single, sickening throb that echoes the frantic rhythm of my heart. The scrap of map glued to its surface ignites with a crimson light, a twin to the sigils snaking up my arms. A pinprick of brighter light glows on the parchment, shifting as I turn.
A compass. Of course it is. Nothing about my life is simple.
// SYSTEM ALERT //
ITEM IDENTIFIED: BLOOD COMPASS (UNIQUE).
ARTEFACT ATTUNEMENT: MATERNAL BLOODLINE.
FUNCTION: PATHFINDING. ADDITIONAL FUNCTIONS: [LOCKED].
WARNING: ARTEFACT FUELED BY HOST VITALITY.
"Just what I need," I mutter to the uncaring trees. "Another parasite." But it's the only guide I have. I clutch the cold metal until it bites into my palm, and I run.
Thin meditation robes whip around my legs, offering no protection against the clawing branches. My bare feet are shredded meat on the rocky stream bank, each step a fresh jolt of agony. But I don't slow. Can't slow. The memory of the masked man's voice is a ghost at my back: The blood calls to blood.
What does that mean? What am I that they would slaughter peaceful monks to reach me?
The answers lie with the Huntsman. The man who knew the woman named Mira.
Dawn bleeds across the sky when I stumble into the crossroads. A mere clearing where paths meet, marked by a skeletal wooden post. I collapse against it, my energy spent. The sigils on my skin have faded to dull red scars, but they are permanent. A brand.
The moment my body stills, a foreign energy jolts through me, cold and electric.
// QUEST UPDATE //
ESCAPE MONASTERY: COMPLETE.
REWARD: 100 XP. SYSTEM TUTORIAL UNLOCKED.
The energy solidifies inside me, a tangible weight. My senses sharpen, the world coming into a fleeting, terrifying focus.
LEVEL UP!
YOU HAVE REACHED LEVEL 2.
+5 ATTRIBUTE POINTS AVAILABLE.
+1 ABILITY POINT AVAILABLE.
A sound. A rustle in the undergrowth. I jerk upright, heart seizing. A deer? A Purifier?
"Interesting," a voice drawls, too close, from the shadows directly behind me. "Very interesting indeed."
I whirl, hands coming up—useless, empty. A man stands where there was only air moments before. He is tall, woven from leather and twilight, a hood shadowing his face. A close-cropped silver beard. Eyes like molten amber, catching the dawn light.
// OBSERVE ACTIVATED //
NAME: UNKNOWN.
TITLE: THE HUNTSMAN.
LEVEL: ??
THREAT LEVEL: EXTREME.
DISPOSITION: CALCULATING.
Calculating. Not curious. The distinction feels vital and terrifying.
"Don't come closer," I warn, trying to summon the fire that ravaged the monastery. There's nothing but a hollow, aching void.
"Or what?" He chuckles, a dry, rasping sound. "You'll bleed on me? You're empty, little ember. Lucky for you, I'm not a headhunter." He sniffs the air, a predator's gesture. "Yet. But others are coming. They're always coming."
My legs tremble, threatening to buckle. "Are you the Huntsman?"
Something shutters behind his eyes. A door slamming closed. "Who asks?"
With the last dregs of my strength, I thrust out the pendant. It glows faintly in my bloody palm. "My mother. She said you owed her a debt."
He moves faster than thought. One moment he's ten feet away; the next, the pendant is in his grasp, his calloused fingers tracing its twisted form. He goes utterly still.
"Impossible," he breathes, the word barely a whisper. "Mira is dust."
"Mira?" The name is a key, turning a lock in a door I never knew existed. "That was her name?"
His amber eyes drill into mine, searching for a ghost. "You have her eyes," he concedes, his voice gruff. "But the rest... the rest is all him."
Before I can demand who 'him' is, his head snaps up. His body tenses, every muscle coiling.
"They're here," he hisses, his hand closing like a manacle around my forearm. "And they didn't come alone. They've brought the Hounds of Atonement."
"The Purifiers? How?"
"Because you're a fool leaving a trail of demon-scented wine!" He snarls, pointing at my ruined feet, the blood soaking the earth. "Now move!"
// NEW QUEST: SURVIVAL //
FOLLOW THE HUNTSMAN.
OBJECTIVE: REACH A SAFE LOCATION.
REWARD: 150 XP. SYSTEM TUTORIAL ACCESS.
FAILURE: CAPTURE / DEATH / FATE WORSE THAN DEATH.
TIME LIMIT: 1 HOUR.
He yanks me off the path and into the deep, waiting woods, a specter leading a lamb. I stumble after him, my mind a riot of questions, but my body knows one truth: run or die.
As we are swallowed by the forest, a single raven launches from a branch. It circles once over the crossroads—over the blood I left behind—before winging south. Back toward the smoking ruin of my home. Back toward the first thread of an eighteen-year-old mystery.
// SYSTEM MESSAGE //
TUTORIAL SEQUENCE: STANDBY. ACTIVATION UPON REACHING SAFE HAVEN.
Safe haven. The words are a bitter joke. The only safety I ever knew is cinders and ash. Torin's fate is a phantom weight on my soul, a scream trapped in my throat. There is no going back. Only forward into the unknown, trailing smoke and blood.
The wind carries a new scent now, beneath the loam and the fear: something musky, foul, and hungry.
And as the Huntsman pulls me deeper into the shadows, his grip is neither gentle nor kind, a single, chilling question echoes in the silence he leaves in his wake:
Is he my salvation, or merely a different kind of predator?