The alley offered little cover, just damp concrete and the smell of rotting garbage. We pressed ourselves against the wall, hearts hammering, listening for any sign that the wretched little creature had followed us.
"What was that thing?" Niran finally gasped, peering back toward the festival's cheerful noise.
"A bottom-feeder,
i remember it from some stories..."
I repeated, the name feeling foul on my tongue.
"It feeds on sadness. It showed me… hell." The memory of the vision made me shudder.
"It targeted you specifically," Preecha observed quietly. "Drawn to your energy."
Before we could spiral further, a faint scuffling sound came from the mouth of the alley. We froze. A figure stepped into view, silhouetted against the bright festival lights. It wasn't the bottom-feeder.
It was a girl from our class. Julia. Her eyes were wide, not with fear, but with a burning, unnerving curiosity. She'd been watching us. She'd seen everything.
"I knew it," she whispered, her voice trembling with excitement. "I knew something was going on with you guys after school that day. You all got so weird. And now this… What are you? What did you see?"
Kephriel materialized beside me with a sound like rustling chains, his form coalescing from the shadows. He looked bored.
"Another one?" he sighed, examining his flawless hands. "Does your entire generation lack the sense to look away from things that will damn them?"
He glanced at us.
"Is this one with you? Another friend to add to your collection of doomed mortals?"
"No!" Dao and I said in unison.
"She's just a classmate," Niran added, stepping slightly in front of her, a protective instinct even now.
"Ah," Kephriel said, a slow, terrible smile spreading across his face.
"An uninvited guest. A witness. Well. We can't have that."
Kephriel flicked his wrist.
A single, whisper-thin chain shot out and touched her forehead. It didn't pierce her; it sank into her, like a drop of ink in water. She convulsed once, a silent gasp locking in her throat. Her eyes became red for a second, and when they focused, they were different. Wider. Seeing everything.
She stumbled back, her hands flying to her mouth. She was no longer normal. She was seeing the truth of the world. The faint, shifting auras of people passing the alley, the minor spirits clinging to the rooftops, the lingering stain of the bottom-feeder's misery. The world had just become a crowded, terrifying nightmare.
"There," Kephriel said, sounding immensely pleased with himself. "No longer a witness. A participant. Your problem now." He dismissed her with a wave, turning his attention to the more pressing issue. "Now, about that pest."
"We can't fight that thing," I said, my voice tight. "It doesn't fight. It just… makes you despair."
"Precisely why a direct confrontation is beneath me,"
Kephriel sniffed.
"I am a god, not an exterminator. We will subcontract."
He closed his eyes. The chains around his wrists glowed with a faint blue light, rattling softly. He was communing with something. A moment later, the air in front of us split open with a sound like tearing silk.
A creature crawled out of the rift. It was sleek and low to the ground, built like a hairless jaguar made of polished obsidian and shadow. Its face was a featureless plate except for a wide, vertical maw that now split open, revealing rows of needle-like teeth. It let out a silent, psychic shiver that made my teeth ache.
"A Devileater," Kephriel announced. "They work on contract. Payment is rendered upon completion of the task. This one costs… two souls." He said it with the casualness of someone ordering lunch.
The Devileater's featureless face turned toward the festival, sensing its prey. It shot out of the alley with blinding speed.
We waited, holding our breath. A minute passed. Then, a wave of psychic agony washed over us, followed by a soundless snarl of fury. The Devileater came flying back into the alley, crashing into a dumpster with a deafening clang. Its obsidian form was covered in a sickly, grey goo that sizzled and smoked. It scrambled to its feet, shook itself, and let out a frustrated psychic screech before turning and bolting back through its rift, which snapped shut behind it.
It had failed. The bottom-feeder's illusions had turned the hunter's own mind against it.
"Well,"
Kephriel said, looking mildly annoyed.
"That was a waste of two souls. It seems the creature is more potent than I thought when it has a strong source to feed from." His eyes lingered on me.
"We need to go. Somewhere it won't find us," Dao urged.
"My place,"
I said immediately.
"It's… empty." The old loneliness I'd worn for years was now a practical advantage. No parents to worry about, no one to explain things to.
We ran again, a now-expanded group of five. Julia followed us in a daze, tears streaming down her face as she flinched at every spirit we passed, her new sight a relentless assault.
My apartment was as I'd left it: cold, quiet, and impersonal. It didn't look lived in. We collapsed inside, locking the door behind us.
Julia sank to the floor against a wall, hugging her knees. She stared at nothing, trembling. "I see them… I see them everywhere," she whispered over and over.
Then her eyes focused on me, and a strange shift occurred. Amid the terror, a flicker of something else emerged. Awe. "You… you live with that? With him?" she asked, her gaze drifting to where Kephriel lounged on my kitchen counter. "You're so… strong."
I looked away, uncomfortable. She wasn't seeing strength. She was seeing a survivor, a hollow thing that had simply endured. But in her traumatized state, she was rewriting the narrative, making me into something I wasn't.
Niran was peering through the window blinds, checking the street. "I don't see it. I think we lost it."
Preecha joined him, looking out. He froze. "What is that?"
We all crowded around the window. Across the street, in a small playground, a young boy was building a sandcastle, completely absorbed in his work. And standing guard over him was an entity that made us all catch our breath.
It was immense, easily three meters tall, but it had a soft, rounded, almost plush appearance. Its form was a patchwork of bright, primary colors, like a child's drawing come to life. It had large, kind eyes and a gentle smile. It radiated an aura of immense, unwavering protection and pure, innocent safety. It was the absolute antithesis of Kephriel's terrifying grandeur.
Kephriel made a sound of disgust from the counter.
"A Dekbi. The most sentimental of the lot. They attach themselves to every child under the age of eight. Consumes a truly sickening amount of energy to maintain that form. Absolutely revolting."
We watched, transfixed, as the Dekbi gently placed a shimmering, invisible ward around the sandbox, its movements tender and careful. It was defending the soul of the child, a guardian of pure innocence.
In the darkness of my empty apartment, with a terrified new witness and a failed demonic contract behind us, the sight was both comforting and deeply isolating. We were caught between bottom-feeders that harvested despair and guardians that protected innocence. And we, with our hollowed-out souls and cursed sight, belonged to neither world. We were something else entirely.
Keph sighed, turning his head to Julia,
"Yo, give some food to Thomas."
He comanded, referring to the Devileater.
---