Chapter Ten – Hollow Mirth
The gates of Station Mirth sagged inward, rust flaking like scabs. No guards. No shouts. Only the whisper of wind through hollow streets. Shadows stretched long across cracked cobblestones, and every corner seemed to breathe with unseen life.
Leylin stepped inside. The stone towers he had glimpsed from afar now loomed like carcasses, their windows dark pits staring into nothing. His breath caught a trace of something more than rot .. Essence, acrid and sour, hanging in the air like fog, lingering thick in every hollow.
[Scanning…] [No living biomass detected. Residual Essence traces: recent. Highly concentrated.]
The chip's verdict coiled in his skull, cold and exact. Yet Leylin's instincts pricked louder. The stillness was staged ... too absolute, like a snare waiting to close. He could taste it in the air, a residue of fear and control left behind by those who had been here before. Not alive, but not entirely gone either.
He moved deeper. The scent trailed between leaning houses, past bones gnawed down to splinters, past scraps of cloth clinging to broken frames. A child's toy lay face down in the dirt, wooden eyes split by teeth. A warning? Or simply neglect? Either way, it was irrelevant. Only the Essence mattered.
A shadow slid across the far street.
It stepped into the open.
The thing might once have been human. Now it was a lattice of corded muscle, skin pulled tight over bulging veins, flesh puckered where regeneration had faltered. A warped spine jutted like a row of serrated knives. Its head lolled, lips cracked in something like a grin.
[Biometric anomaly detected. Genetic overlap: 78%. Incomplete regeneration. Predatory instability: high.]
It lunged.
Leylin slipped aside, claws opening its throat in a clean arc. Blood sprayed the street, hissing as it hit the stone. It thrashed, teeth snapping, but he pinned it long enough to feed. Essence spilled down his tongue, bitter and incomplete, but beneath it ... a flicker. Memory. Steel walls. Glass pods. Needles humming with light. Every shred of it threaded through his mind like a signal he had learned to read.
[Gluttony parameter: 6% → 9%]
He swallowed hard. The aftertaste clung like ash, but it fueled him further.
Then the street behind him boiled with motion.
Figures poured from an alley, spilling into the open like a tide. Their bodies were wrong ... too long, too twisted. One crawled on all fours, jaw unhinged far too wide. Another's limbs ended in hooked talons that screeched against stone. A third's torso split open with each breath, ribs blooming like teeth, unnatural and grotesque.
[Multiple signatures detected. Estimated count: nine. Combat potential: cumulative threat moderate-to-high.] [Engagement duration: 90 seconds. Survival probability: 62%.]
A low laugh slipped from his throat. "Wrong again."
They came fast.
The first crashed toward him. He met it with a twist of his body, hand spearing through its chest. He ripped free, blood slick to the elbow, and fed before the body hit the ground.
[Gluttony parameter: 9% → 15%]
Another swept low with talons. He vaulted over its strike, landing behind it, claws scissoring through the spine. Essence rushed him like fire, but thinned before it could satisfy.
[Gluttony parameter: 15% → 18%]
The air grew heavy with steam and copper. Three more rushed him together. The chip bled data into his mind ...attack arcs, muscle twitches, weak points ... and his instincts wove through them like threads in a loom. He became inevitability, each step already chosen.
One neck wrenched sideways. One jaw crushed in his grip. One split from groin to chest. He tore into each kill, devouring in violent rhythm. Each pulse of Essence strengthened his senses, sharpened his reflexes, tuned his mind to the chaos of predator and prey entwined.
[Gluttony parameter: 18% → 27%]
Still, they did not relent. A hunchbacked figure slammed into him, knocking him against a wall. Stone cracked, dust spilling. Teeth gnashed for his face ... he drove his claws up through its chin, splitting bone until its skull burst. Every movement was precise, premeditated, and predatory.
[Gluttony parameter: 27% → 31%]
But it wasn't enough. Hunger clawed at him, gnawing, a familiar ache he had learned to embrace. The Essence faltered, patchy and incomplete, forcing him to fight harder. He bent, twisted, lashed with precision sharpened to madness. He wasn't just feeding ... he was consuming everything they were, piece by piece, memory by memory.
Another fell. Then another. Until only steam rose from the ruin of their bodies.
[Gluttony parameter: 31% → 45%]
Silence returned, wet and ragged. Only the whisper of wind through broken streets remained.
Leylin stood in the blood-washed street, chest heaving, body humming with a rhythm that was neither fully human nor fully beast, but something sharpened between. Limbs felt lighter, faster, as though the air itself bent to his will. The cobblestones beneath him seemed to hum, each vibration echoing with the memory of Essence he had consumed.
Then — the ground shook.
Dust rained from the roofs. Stones groaned underfoot. From deep below the station's bones came a guttural roar, low and resonant, vibrating the marrow in his bones. The AI chip shuddered in his skull, sending frantic updates that blurred across his vision.
[Warning: Unknown entity detected. Biomass and Essence levels exceed scan capacity. Immediate recalibration recommended.]
Leylin turned toward the sound, blood dripping from his hands, a grin splitting his face ... sharp, hungry, and unyielding.
The hunt wasn't over. Not even close.