Chapter 146 : Chapter 146

The trees were still there. The flecks of light were still there. The same murky, unreadable gray light still hung over everything.

He had no idea how long he had been walking when he saw another corpse.

This time there were two.

One was large, one small. The smaller one had only half a body left. The larger one had been ripped open from throat to belly, its entrails entirely gone. The blood had dried into a dark reddish-brown crust, drawing a swarm of black beetles that crawled over the remains without pause.

Ryan did not approach.

He watched the beetles from a distance, watched them slip into the gaps in the corpses, crawl back out, then burrow in again. They were as big as thumbs, their shells slick and glossy, flashing a dark green sheen under the dappled light.

He circled around the two bodies and kept moving.

The air grew wetter, heavier, and the sweet-fishy scent deepened. The moss beneath his feet thickened as well. Now, when he stepped on it, dark water seeped out and soaked into his boots.

Ryan stopped and looked down.

Something dark clung to the leather of his boots. It was not mud.

He crouched, lifted a bit of it with the tip of his knife, and brought it to his nose.

The stench of blood hit him at once, sharp and thick.

Bloody water.

Ryan rose and looked around.

The trees were still the same. The flecks of light were still the same. But at some point, the trunks had become covered in claw marks.

Deep ones. Shallow ones. Fresh ones. Old ones. So many that on some trunks they nearly covered the bark.

He stood where he was and slowly turned in a circle.

Every single tree bore claw marks.

They ran from the base of the trunks all the way up, and some even reached the branches. Some overlapped and crossed each other, as though the same claws had raked over them again and again, or as though many claws had torn into them all at once.

Ryan’s hand tightened around his knife hilt until his knuckles turned white.

It was too quiet.

The wind had stopped. The whispering high in the canopy had vanished. All that remained was a dead silence so complete that even his own breathing sounded harsh to his ears.

He backed away slowly until his spine pressed against a tree. The trunk was cold, so cold he could feel it even through his clothes.

His gaze swept over every tree, every shrub, every patch of shadow.

Nothing.

No living thing. No movement. Nothing at all.

But the claw marks were fresh. At the base of some of them, clear sap was still oozing out. It had not dried yet.

That thing had been here not long ago.

Ryan drew in a slow breath and forced himself to calm down. He closed his eyes and listened for several breaths.

Nothing.

When he opened them again, the world was unchanged. Trees. Flecks of light. Claw marks everywhere.

Then he started walking.

This time he moved fast, no longer bothering to soften his footsteps. The claw marks were too close. That thing was too close. If he kept wandering at a leisurely pace, he might die here.

He passed one tree after another, skirted patches of brush, and splashed through one pool after another. His boots were soaked through now, each step making a faint wet squelch. The dark water splashed onto his trouser legs and the hem of his coat.

He did not know how long he kept at it, but eventually the trees began to thin out, just a little. More light filtered down from overhead, though the sky was still nowhere in sight. The claw marks on the silver-gray trunks grew fewer and fewer, until at last they vanished entirely.

Ryan stopped, bent over, and braced his hands on his knees as he caught his breath.

His heart was pounding. His temples throbbed. After a few breaths, he straightened and glanced back.

Behind him, the trees stood in dense ranks, gray and indistinct, their depths unreadable. The claw marks, the corpses, the dark bloody water—they were all hidden in there.

He had never seen the thing itself.

From beginning to end, he had not once laid eyes on it.

Ryan turned back around and continued walking.

This time, his pace was measured and steady. One hand still rested on his knife hilt. His eyes still swept the surroundings without pause.

But at last, the forest felt a little more normal.

There were no claw marks on the trunks. The sweet-fishy scent in the air had faded. The moss underfoot had thinned, and now when he stepped on it, there was a soft rustling sound again.

He looked up overhead.

Still no sky.

The canopies layered over one another so densely that they sealed off the heavens completely. He still had no idea whether it was day or evening, how much time had passed, or which direction would lead him out.

Ryan took a slow breath and kept going.

The soft rustle beneath his feet was the sound of his own steps on the moss. Behind him, there was only emptiness. Nothing had followed him.

There were only trees, only the scattered flecks of light, only the endless forest.

After several dozen steps, he stopped and crouched down.

His short blade slid from its sheath, the edge flashing once under the mottled light. He carved a mark into the moss at his feet—one horizontal line, one vertical line, then another horizontal line.

When he finished, he rose and walked on.

After another few dozen steps, he crouched again and cut another mark.

Horizontal. Vertical. Horizontal.

Horizontal. Vertical. Horizontal.

The marks formed a wavering line, stretching behind him and forward before him. Every so often, Ryan looked back. The marks were still there, shallow scars cut into the moss, like a thin thread tying him to the way he had come.

At least now he would not walk in circles.

He continued onward.

The trees were still those same trees, and the flecks of light were still those same flecks of light. But after he had walked for some unknown stretch of time, Ryan gradually noticed something wrong.

The light was dimming.

Not suddenly. Little by little.

The broken pools of sunlight overhead were becoming fewer and fewer, while the gray around him thickened and deepened. He looked up. The canopies were still layered overhead, but they seemed higher than before, denser, blotting out the sky even more completely.

The moss beneath his feet had changed as well. It was thicker, softer, like stepping on waterlogged cotton. With every step, water seeped up and soaked over the tops of his boots.

The air grew wetter and heavier, pressing against his chest until breathing felt faintly labored.

Ryan slowed and tightened his grip on the knife.

It was too quiet.

Even the wind was gone now. The rustle of leaves had vanished. Only a dead silence remained.

His breathing, his heartbeat, the faint wet sound of his boots on the moss—all of it sounded unnaturally loud in that silence.

He stopped and held his breath, listening for several moments.

Nothing.

Nothing at all.

He moved on.

After some unknowable span of time—perhaps half a stick of incense, perhaps longer—Ryan stopped short.

There was something ahead.

He narrowed his eyes.

Far off among the trees, something lay on the ground. It was dark red, shockingly vivid against the murky gray light.

Ryan did not move immediately. He stood where he was and listened first.

No sound.

Then he looked again.

The thing did not move.

He advanced a few cautious steps, rounded a tree that blocked his view, and finally saw clearly.

Two corpses.

Fresh ones.

Ryan’s breathing stopped for a single instant.

He knew them.

He had seen them yesterday in the camp, standing by the fire, speaking with the accent of the western provinces.

One was taller. One was shorter. Both had worn battered old leather armor and carried oversized packs, their eyes bright with curiosity, as though everything around them was new and wondrous.

The taller one had practically drooled over the swords in front of the supply tent. The shorter one had shoved him and laughed at how shameless he was.

Now they lay on the ground, reduced to corpses.