The air beneath the surface was different. It held weight, like time itself had pressed down and condensed the darkness into something solid.
Rey crouched in his underground cave, back pressed to the cool wall of stone and mud. This shelter was better than the last. Deeper, more secure. Hidden.
He had built it with sharpened bones and patience. The roots above acted as natural camouflage, and wet soil masked any scent trail leading in. He no longer trusted the surface after dusk. Night in the Abyss belonged to predators too ancient to name.
Today was different.
For the first time in months, Rey had returned to a place he'd previously avoided—a ridge marked by white stones and twisted trees. He'd passed it on his journey north once, and something about that place lingered in his thoughts like a thorn in flesh.
This time, he was prepared.
He approached from the east, cloaked in soil and ash, silent as a shadow. The area was quiet—too quiet. No monsters. No birds. No wind.
Then he saw it: a mound covered in vines, almost like a small hill. But as he looked closer, he noticed a strange symbol etched into a flat slab—half-buried beneath dust and time. A spiral with three dots inside it.
Rey's breath caught. That same symbol had been on one of the temple walls.
He brushed off the dirt with trembling fingers.
Suddenly, the ground rumbled beneath him. A low vibration, then silence.
And then… the howl.
It rose from beneath the ground. Not like a beast. No—it was deeper. Older. A sound that shook the marrow in his bones. It wasn't loud, but it felt like the very Abyss was growling.
He fell back, heart hammering, crawling away from the mound.
From behind him, a twig snapped.
Rey rolled instantly, pulling out his monster-tooth blade—but there was nothing.
He stayed still. Listening.
Then it came—a whisper. Faint. Almost not there.
"...human..."
He froze.
No monster he'd ever encountered spoke. No creature ever whispered.
He backed away, eyes scanning the area, but nothing followed.
Rey returned to his shelter just before nightfall, locking the entrance with bones and thick vines. Inside, in the silence, his mind churned.
What was that mound?
What was that whisper?
And who—what—was watching him?
That night, he didn't sleep.
He stared at the cave ceiling, reliving the howl. The spiral symbol.
Everything in this Abyss had some hidden meaning. A pattern. And he was starting to connect them.
The temple ruins.
The 9-tier wall structure.
The symbol on the mound.
And now… a voice calling him human.
Someone—something—knew who he was.
Maybe more than he did.
Rey gripped his blade tighter.
He was no longer just a lost soul trying to survive.
He was being watched.
Hunted.
Or... maybe tested.
Either way, he knew one thing:
Tomorrow, he would return to the mound.
And this time, he wouldn't just observe.
He would dig.
Even if it meant waking whatever slept beneath.
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