The forest had quieted after the wolf's death, but the silence was not a comfort. Every step Ethan took seemed to echo too loudly in the stillness, crunching twigs and dry leaves like gunshots in the night. The blood on his hands had dried into a sticky crust, and no matter how he rubbed his palms against his pants, he could still feel it there, like a brand of guilt.
He should have been relieved to be alive. Instead, his skin prickled with unease, as if the shadows themselves leaned closer with every breath. The forest was watching.
Ethan stopped to catch his breath against a moss-covered tree. The air was sharp and cold, but sweat still slicked his neck. His body felt heavier than it should, every muscle aching from the fight, yet something deeper tugged at him. A weight not physical but inside him, in the very bones of who he was.
That broken screen. The word corruption. Glitched.
It all replayed in his mind like a song stuck on loop.
He closed his eyes and whispered, "What the hell am I?"
The answer came not in words but in movement. A ripple through the undergrowth. The soft crackle of leaves disturbed by something far lighter than a wolf.
Ethan's head snapped up. His heart stuttered.
The air had changed. It was colder now, almost unnaturally so, and the silver light of the moon seemed to bend strangely, as though the world itself was holding its breath.
Then he saw it.
A figure at the edge of the clearing, half-shadow and half-light. Long hair pale as the moon spilled down her back, catching in the faint glow. Her eyes gleamed in the darkness—not like a predator's, but something otherworldly, too bright, too sharp. She was draped in a cloak that shimmered faintly, the fabric shifting with iridescent hues like the surface of water.
For a heartbeat, Ethan thought she was another monster. His grip tightened on the broken branch still sticky with blood. But when she stepped forward, her movements were fluid, graceful, human in a way the wolf never had been.
Her voice broke the silence, low and steady. "You should not be here."
Ethan flinched at the sound. There was no malice in it, but it carried a weight, like a truth laid bare.
"I didn't exactly plan a vacation," he shot back, though his voice came out hoarser than he intended. "Trust me, if I could find the way out of this nightmare, I'd be gone already."
The girl tilted her head, studying him like one might study an unusual insect caught in glass. "Nightmare," she repeated softly, tasting the word. Then her eyes narrowed. "No… you are not of this world."
His stomach dropped. She saw it. She knew.
Before Ethan could answer, the air split open behind him. A shriek pierced the clearing, so sharp and high it rattled his skull. He spun, heart leaping to his throat, and saw a shape materialize from the shadows.
It was translucent, a warped figure of pale light and broken edges, like smoke given form. A twisted face stretched across it, eyes hollow voids, its mouth a pit of endless screaming.
Ethan stumbled back, bile rising. "What the—"
The thing lunged.
Instinct screamed at him to use the shadows, but his body felt drained, unstable. He braced for impact, for teeth or claws or whatever horrors it carried.
But the strike never landed.
The girl moved faster than his eyes could follow. One moment she stood still, the next she was between him and the specter, her hand raised. A pulse of silver light erupted from her palm, slamming into the creature. It shrieked again, writhing as its form warped, then burst apart like smoke scattered by a storm wind.
The clearing fell silent.
Ethan's knees nearly gave out. His heart hammered against his ribs like it wanted to break free.
He stared at her, wide-eyed. "You… what was that thing?"
Her gaze lingered on the fading wisps of the creature before cutting back to him. "A spirit wraith. Drawn to corruption. It should not have been able to cross into this grove. The only reason it came here…" Her eyes sharpened, glowing faintly as they locked onto him. "...is you."
Ethan's mouth went dry. "Me? I didn't—"
She cut him off with a step closer. "Your aura is broken. Twisted. It tears at the weave of this world like claws on silk. They will come for you. More of them. Stronger than this one."
Her words sank into him like ice water. He tried to laugh, but the sound was brittle. "So what, I'm cursed now? Is that what you're saying?"
Her expression didn't change. "Worse. You are infected."
The word hit harder than any wolf's bite. Infected.
He swallowed hard, suddenly aware of how close she was. He could see her eyes more clearly now—silver, but threaded with faint veins of light that shifted like rivers beneath the surface. She didn't look like anyone he had ever seen. Too luminous. Too unreal.
"Who… who are you?" he managed.
Her gaze softened for the first time. "My name is Lyra." She hesitated, then added, "My blood is not human. I am kin to the spirits you fear, though I am bound by flesh."
He stared at her, trying to process the words. Spirit blood. That explained the way she shimmered, the power she had wielded so effortlessly.
"Ethan," he said finally, his voice barely steady. "I'm Ethan."
Lyra inclined her head, acknowledging the name. Then her expression hardened again. "Ethan… whatever you carry, it does not belong in this world. The system around you, the corruption in your aura—it will destroy you if it does not destroy everything else first."
Ethan wanted to argue, to deny it, but he remembered the screen flickering, the words glitching into broken fragments, the feeling of his body tearing when he used the shadow step. He remembered the wolf's stolen ability becoming his own.
She was right. Something inside him was wrong.
He rubbed a hand over his face, exhaustion crashing down on him. "I didn't ask for this. I don't even know how I got here. One second I was… I was dying, then I woke up in some void, and now I'm fighting monsters in the dark. None of this makes sense."
Lyra's eyes softened again, though her voice stayed firm. "The void you speak of… perhaps that is where the corruption was born. Whatever the truth, you cannot run from it. It will grow until it consumes you."
Ethan let out a shaky laugh. "Great. Exactly what I needed. A death sentence, all wrapped up in glowing words."
For a moment, silence stretched between them. The moon hung above, casting her in silver light, her cloak whispering against the grass. She looked untouchable, like she belonged to another realm entirely. And yet, she had saved him.
"Then what do I do?" Ethan asked finally, his voice raw. "If I'm this… infected thing. How do I stop it?"
Lyra studied him for a long moment, her expression unreadable. Then she turned, her gaze sweeping toward the depths of the forest. "You survive. You grow stronger. And you pray the corruption does not outpace your will to control it."
Her words chilled him, but there was no room for protest. She had said it as fact, not suggestion.
She began to walk away, her cloak shimmering like liquid moonlight.
"Wait," Ethan called, stumbling after her. "You can't just drop that on me and leave."
Lyra paused, her profile etched sharp against the glow of the moon. She did not look back, but her words carried clearly.
"If you wish to live, Ethan Cross, do not let the shadows claim you. They will try. Again and again. Until nothing remains."
And then, as silently as she had appeared, she was gone—slipping into the forest until the silver shimmer of her cloak faded into darkness.
Ethan stood alone in the clearing, the night pressing down heavy around him. His pulse still thundered, his mind spinning with questions he couldn't answer.
The wolf's blood was still on his hands. The wraith's scream still echoed in his ears. And Lyra's warning burned in his chest like fire.
His system was broken. His soul infected. And now the world knew it.
For the first time since waking in this place, Ethan truly wondered if he was meant to survive at all.