The scream came from above, cutting through the tomb's unnatural silence like a blade through silk.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
All three hunters snapped their heads up, eyes searching the blood-red sky. There, falling fast through the crimson air, was a dark shape that looked suspiciously like a person. A very large, very hairy person.
"Get out of the way!" the falling figure yelled, its voice carrying a distinctly canine growl.
Sarah was the first to move.
"Werewolf!" the knight shouted, diving behind a chunk of broken glass.
"Incoming werewolf!"
Nox and the alchemist scattered in opposite directions just as the creature hit the ground. The impact was tremendous, sending shockwaves through the black glass that made their earlier crater look like a polite tap. The explosion of force caught the alchemist mid-sprint and launched him through the air like a rag doll.
Nox slammed his tentacles into the ground, the black appendages punching through glass and stone to anchor him in place. The shockwave washed over him, trying to tear him loose, but his grip held firm.
The brown-haired knight activated some kind of skill, her body glowing with silver light as she planted her feet and rode out the blast like a ship weathering a storm.
When the dust cleared, the alchemist was picking himself up from a pile of glass shards fifty feet away, groaning and checking for broken bones.
"Fuck," he wheezed.
"I thought I was going to die."
At the center of the new crater, the werewolf let out a low moan of pain. It was massive, easily three meter tall, with dark gray fur and claws that gleamed like polished steel. Blood trickled from several cuts where the glass had bitten deep.
Nox pulled his tentacles free and walked to the crater's edge, his hands already hold a gatling gun. The weapon hummed to life with mechanical precision, barrels spinning up to firing speed.
"Wait, wait, wait!" the werewolf called out, raising both clawed hands.
"Nox, it's me!"
The spinning barrels slowed. Nox tilted his head, studying the creature more carefully. "Henry?"
"Yes, it's me!" The werewolf's voice was rough but unmistakably familiar.
Before their eyes, the creature began to change. Fur receded into skin, claws shortened to normal fingernails, and the massive frame compressed down to human proportions. Within moments, Henry stood in the crater, naked and covered in glass dust but definitely human.
"Damn," he said, looking around at the alien landscape.
"Where are we?"
Nox lowered his weapon and shrugged.
"Well, if you asked me, who am I going to ask?"
Henry considered this logic and nodded.
"Fair point."
Both men let out identical sighs of exhaustion.
"Huh, why is there a red light?" Henry asked, noticing something glowing near Nox's position.
Nox looked down at his hand. Sure enough, a soft red glow was emanating from his palm, pulsing gently like a heartbeat.
"It is indeed red," he confirmed, though he had no idea what it meant.
As he stared at the strange light, movement in his peripheral vision caught his attention. He looked up and froze.
The sky had changed.
Where before there had been the blood-red atmosphere of the tomb, now there was something else entirely. It wasn't black like a normal night sky. It was black like someone had taken the darkest shade of black possible and painted over reality itself. This wasn't the absence of light—this was something that actively consumed light, swallowing photons like a hungry void.
"What?" Henry followed his gaze and immediately took a step backward.
And there, hanging in the center of that impossible darkness, was a red moon.
Not red like sunset or rust or blood. Red like a fresh wound, pulsing with its own inner fire. It dominated the sky, easily ten times larger than any moon had a right to be