The return of the monster
Chapter -12
Eidolon didn't know how long he had been in the cell anymore.
Days.
Months.
Years.
Time meant nothing in this place. Only darkness... and the sound of people dying slowly around him.
His body had grown-taller, stronger, sharper. His hair now brushed his shoulders. His hands were no longer the small, trembling fingers of a child.
He was becoming something else.
Something he did not recognize.
At first, there had been maybe twenty of them locked in this dungeon together. Twenty voices crying, begging, whispering hopeless prayers in the dark.
Then those voices became fifteen.
Then ten.
Then eight.
Then five.
Now... only five remained alive.
The silence terrified him more than the screams ever did.
Eidolon grew restless. Every day, he pressed his ear to the cold metal door, hoping-dreading-what might be on the other side. Every day, he tried to escape, scratching, pushing, kicking, even trying to melt the hinges with the strange heat that sometimes crawled under his skin.
But it was useless.
The door didn't budge.
Not even once.
Sometimes he felt like even the darkness had eyes.
Sometimes he felt watched... by something that didn't breathe.
Now he was certain of it.
Even his shadow felt like it wasn't his anymore.
Then, one day-
BANG!
A loud crash shook the entire dungeon. Dust fell from the ceiling. The remaining prisoners gasped, scrambling away from the door.
Eidolon didn't move.
He just stared.
Because he could feel it-
that aura.
That evil, suffocating, fume-like darkness that made the air taste like metal.
Footsteps echoed in the silence.
Slow.
Heavy.
Familiar.
No.
Not familiar. Worse.
Recognizable.
The figure stepped into the cell block, the black hood hiding their face, but Eidolon didn't need to see it.
He knew.
He could never mistake it.
This was the person who put him here.
The one who sold him.
The one who condemned him to fifteen years of living hell.
Eidolon's nails dug into the stone floor as a cold, burning rage curled inside him.
The hooded figure stopped in front of his cell, head turning slightly to look through the bars. For a moment, there was silence.
Then-
a whisper.
A voice that froze Eidolon's blood.
"So... you survived."
Eidolon's heartbeat roared in his ears, but his voice came out steady.
"You."
The hooded figure didn't respond. Just stared, studying the grown boy who should have died long ago.
Something moved behind the hooded figure.
A shape.
A shadow that was not a shadow.
Eidolon felt his breath stop.
That presence... it wasn't human.
It was watching him-closely, hungrily.
The figure's voice cut through the darkness again.
"It's time."
Eidolon didn't understand.
"Time for what?"
A slow smile spread beneath the hood-cold, cruel, hungry.
"For you to meet the one waiting outside."
The door of the dungeon creaked open.
Light flooded in.
And everything Eidolon knew was about to end.
---
The one who returned