The forest was too quiet. Not the peaceful kind of quiet, but the other kind, the kind that makes your nerves pull tight like wire. Every branch, every leaf, even the wind itself felt as if it were holding its breath.
"Why does it feel like the trees are watching us?" Luis whispered.
"Stop talking," Rodriguez snapped. He wanted it to sound firm, confident, but his voice wavered anyway. His grip tightened around the rifle, fingers aching. Fog clung low to the ground, creeping and curling like something alive, something aware.
"We shouldn't be out here," Enzo whispered behind them. "Command said the creature moves at night."
Creature.
The word always made Rodriguez's stomach twist.
"Just keep your eyes open," he muttered.
A sharp crack split the air behind them.
Rodriguez spun, pulse spiking.
"Enzo? Seriously, stop wandering off."
"Enzo?"
Silence answered him.
Then the rain started, soft at first, a gentle patter that felt too delicate for a night like this. Drops tapped against the canopy in a slow, eerie rhythm, like restless fingers drumming on a table.
Rodriguez raised his flashlight.
The beam sliced through the fog and caught on something dark smeared across the dirt.
Blood.
"Luis…" he breathed, the name barely more than air.
Luis cursed softly. "It killed the others like they were—"
A branch snapped.
"Did you hear that?" Rodriguez's voice cracked, the fear finally surfacing.
Another snap.
Another.
It was circling them.
"…Sir?" Luis barely breathed the word.
A cold gust slid across the back of Rodriguez's neck, too deliberate to be just wind.
He spun around.
Nothing.
The flashlight flickered once. Twice.
"…W-what are you?" Rodriguez called into the dark, trying to sound brave and failing. "Come out and face us!"
That was when he saw them.
Two blue lights.
No, not lights.
Eyes.
Glowing.
Ice-blue.
Inhuman.
"Luis," he whispered, "run."
Before Luis could respond, something dropped behind him. Swift, silent, impossible. A blur. A shadow. A shape that moved too fast to be human.
Luis managed one sharp gasp.
Then he was gone, dragged into the fog with a sound that didn't even reach a full scream.
"Luis!" Rodriguez shouted, his voice cracking apart.
Nothing answered.
Then breathing.
Slow. Controlled. Not his. Not human.
Rodriguez backed up until a tree stopped him cold. His heartbeat hammered so loud he thought it might echo through the forest. He lifted the flashlight again, hand trembling.
The figure stepped into the moonlight at last.
Tall. Rain-soaked. His coat clung to him, heavy and darkened with blood. Blood that clearly wasn't his. A deeper shadow wrapped around him, something that seemed to devour light as it moved.
But Rodriguez saw the eyes first.
Like lightning trapped in ice.
Ice-pale. Empty.
Too cold to belong to anything human.
"Wh… what are you?" Rodriguez whispered.
The figure tilted his head, a movement too smooth, too deliberate. Water traced down his jaw. His voice, when he spoke, was low and shockingly calm.
"Your last mistake."
Rodriguez fired, but the figure wasn't there anymore.
A hand clamped over his mouth from behind. Another pressed a blade to his throat, impossibly steady and freezing cold.
The voice murmured near his ear, not rushed or angry, just steady in its certainty.
"Who sent you?"
Rodriguez stammered, his voice trembling as fear crawled up his spine.
"No… no one sent—"
The blade shifted, a silent warning.
"Lie again."
He broke instantly.
"T-there's a command unit. They said something's out here. Something dangerous. We were told to track it before… before it reaches—"
He cut himself off, eyes widening as if he'd already said too much.
"So your command is hunting me."
Rodriguez nearly collapsed under the weight of those words.
"T-They want you eliminated as soon as possible."
The reply came as a whisper, soft and almost bored, yet carrying the certainty of a death sentence.
"They'll be dead before sunrise."
Rodriguez froze.
"Please," he whispered, tears mixing with rain, "don't—"
A tendril of darkness snapped forward like a striking serpent.
Rodriguez didn't even feel the ground when his body hit it.
And the forest fell quiet again.
Too quiet.
As if it had swallowed the night whole.
⸻
VALEN POV
Valen stood over the bodies, bored more than anything.
Blood slid down his jaw in a slow line. He wiped it away with two fingers, shadows swirling lazily around him, pulling back as though satisfied with their hunt.
Humans.
How did they manage to cross into this realm? Humans aren't meant to survive the passage.
He turned to leave.
Then something vibrated in his palm, faint but impossible to ignore.
He paused and opened his hand.
The clan emblem embedded in his glove glowed with cold silver light, something it hadn't done in years.
A distorted voice spilled from the relic, warped and distant.
"Valen… the Mark has awakened."
He raised an eyebrow, the slightest flick of interest breaking his boredom.
"After twenty-four years?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
Static crackled.
Then:
"In the human world."
Interesting.
The forest darkened. His shadows stirred like wolves sensing blood.
Valen tilted his head, a small smile forming.
"I'm listening."