The Hollowed's body lay crumpled on the ashen ground, a broken marionette with its strings cut. Its black ichor, the very essence of its being, leaked into the Shroud like smoke dissolving in water, carrying with it a faint, cloying scent of ozone and old dust. The world was silent again.
Silent… except for the whisper.
Eat.
It was inside his skull, not a sound but a physical pull. An ache, deeper than bone, deeper than marrow, centered in the hollow space where his soul used to feel anchored. The shadows clinging to his fingertips writhed, twitching like starving serpents that had caught the scent of blood. They wanted it—the Hollowed's remains. They wanted it, and they were a part of him.
Kairon staggered back, a ragged gasp tearing from his throat. His lungs burned, his chest heaving with exertion and revulsion. "No…" His voice was a hoarse rasp. "Stay away from me."
But the hunger didn't belong to the shadows. It belonged to him.
His stomach was a void, empty yet impossibly heavy. His veins felt hollow, begging to be filled. His entire body throbbed with a single, primal command: consume. The ichor shimmered faintly on the ground, iridescent like oil under a dead moon. It was wrong, a toxic violation of nature. Every sane instinct he had left screamed at him to turn and run. Yet when he leaned closer, the scent that rose from it—acrid and sweet at the same time—made his mouth water with black, bitter saliva.
He clutched his head, his nails digging into his scalp as if he could physically claw the craving out. "Stop… I'm not… I won't…"
The Shroud itself seemed to laugh, the mist curling and tightening around him like a noose. A sudden, oppressive silence fell, and the very air grew cold. Then, the chains appeared.
They slithered up from beneath the ashen ground like metallic serpents, black iron links inscribed with runes that bled a faint, sickly crimson. Before he could react, they wrapped around his arms, his legs, his chest, slamming him to his knees and pinning him in place. An unnatural cold seeped through his skin where they touched, but it wasn't the cold of metal—it was the profound, soul-deep chill of judgment.
From the fog ahead, a figure coalesced. The same serene, mask-like face, the same flowing gray robes. The Warden of the Shroud. Its eyes, two points of faint blue light, fixed on him.
"You have defeated one of the Hollowed," the Warden's voice echoed, a chorus of dispassionate whispers. "But the trial is not yet ended."
The chains pulled tighter, forcing the air from Kairon's lungs. "What trial? I fought. I survived—"
"You resisted your nature," the Warden corrected, its tone flat and absolute. "You resisted the hunger. Now, you will face it."
As it spoke, the ichor of the Hollowed began to move. It pooled together, rising from the ground like smoke thickening into a black, oily liquid. It slithered toward him, drawn by the desperate writhing of the shadows on his skin.
"No—don't bring it near me!" Kairon thrashed, but the chains held him fast. His body convulsed, every muscle screaming. The tendril of ichor brushed against his skin, and where it touched, his veins ignited with a fire that was both agony and ecstasy. A raw, ragged scream tore from his throat.
The Warden leaned closer, its mask-like face betraying no emotion, its voice colder than the chains.
"Your shadows are not a power you wield. They are an appetite you serve. They devour all things—flesh, curse, memory, even soul. Deny them, and you will starve until you are nothing. Embrace them… and you may become something far worse than the Hollowed."
Kairon's vision blurred, tears of pain and desperation streaming down his face. His heart hammered in a frantic rhythm, a drumbeat for the shadows pulling at him, tearing at his restraint. Against his will, one of his hands lifted, the chains guiding it. His fingers dipped into the tendril of ichor.
The taste—oh gods, the taste. It wasn't bitter. It wasn't foul. It was pure, molten strength flooding through every nerve, a jolt of life so potent it felt like a thousand suns exploding behind his eyes. His wounds, both old and new, knitted shut in an instant. His weakness, his exhaustion—it all burned away like dross in a forge. The ache in his body vanished.
But so did something else. A quiet corner of his mind where he kept memories of sunlight, of laughter, of a life before this nightmare… went silent.
Inside him, something uncoiled. A cold, patient predator that had been sleeping in his soul was now awake. And it was not satisfied with just one Hollowed.
The chains loosened their grip, and Kairon dropped fully to the ground, trembling, the shadows writhing madly across his skin. His mind was his own—but barely. The memory of the ichor was an addictive fire, singing to him, promising him more.
The Warden's whisper pierced the haze. "Chains exist to bind. But chains also remind. You will wear them until you decide what you are: man… or monster."
The iron chains did not retreat. They slithered up his arms, shrinking and reforming until they locked into place as two heavy, rune-etched manacles around his wrists. A permanent brand. The Warden then dissolved, its form dissipating back into the Shroud as if it had never been.
Kairon gasped, coughing, and stared at his hands, now shackled by his own nature. His veins still pulsed with a faint, black light. His stomach… hungered for more.
He realized, with a wave of absolute horror, that he hadn't just killed the Hollowed.
He had devoured it. And in doing so, the Shroud had just taught him exactly what it wanted him to crave.