The first step into darkness is often taken without knowing. But the second? That one, you choose.
The shadows pressed in tighter with every passing second, grotesque figures circling like vultures scenting blood. Asher's breath hitched in his throat, his pulse hammering as he stood frozen for a moment—long enough to feel like a lifetime. His eyes flicked between the monsters. Not creatures. Not even men. They were... wrong. Bent. Crooked like broken thoughts, their shapes flickering between substance and smoke.
He gripped his weapon tighter. The mask on his face was no longer just a conduit. It was something else now—its power a storm just under his skin. It surged through him, alien and unrelenting. But he clung to it. Because what other choice did he have?
I need to stay focused, he told himself, the words a mantra against the chaos.
The woman beside him was already a blur of motion—graceful, brutal, efficient. She sliced through shadow like it was paper, each strike calculated, a dancer in a dance meant for death. Her face, usually unreadable, held only focus. Not fear.
But there were too many.
Far, far too many.
Asher's limbs screamed at him, his legs heavy as stone. But still, he moved. He had to move. The creatures didn't wait.
"Fight, Asher!" the woman snapped, her voice slicing through the noise like a blade of its own. "You know how."
He didn't know. Not really. But his body did.
The first creature came at him with a shriek that bent the air. Claws like shards of night slashed for his throat. But Asher moved—his body obeyed instincts too deep to be his. He ducked, twisted, and brought his blade up in a clean arc.
The thing exploded into ash.
He barely had time to process it. Another one leapt, more vicious than the first. This one was faster. Stronger. Its limbs bent the wrong way, and its eyes glowed with cold, soulless light.
Asher swung again. Steel met shadow. Another one down.
And then—more. Dozens. Pouring in through tears in reality, seeping through cracks in the rooftop like spilled ink. He could feel them—each one a thread pulled tight across his nerves. Each one a whisper of something ancient.
And the mask kept pulsing.
Faster. Deeper. Like it was alive. Like it was feeding.
He stumbled back, nearly tripping over debris. His blade flicked out, catching another creature just in time. Black ichor sprayed into the air.
"They keep coming," he breathed.
"They will always keep coming," the woman replied, voice grim as she pivoted into a backflip, slicing clean through the jaw of a shadow-walker mid-air. "Unless we finish this."
Asher gritted his teeth. His muscles screamed. But he moved.
The mask's power shifted in him again—this time slowing time just enough for him to see. Not just fight, but predict. Each twitch of a shadow's claw, each angle of their attack—it was all there. Lines of probability written into the air like a battle map only he could read.
He dove through it all, blade flashing with calculated rage. One, two, three more gone. Each kill felt easier. Too easy.
And that terrified him.
"Don't rely on it too much," the woman warned, catching his eye as she ducked beneath a spear of blackened bone. "The mask wants something."
"Yeah?" Asher snapped back, panting. "So do I."
He cut down another figure with a brutal scream.
But then it happened.
The shadows parted.
And it stepped forward.
A figure unlike the others—taller, thicker, wearing what might have once been armor, now fused to its flesh like a cursed second skin. Its face was a bone mask, jagged and bleeding shadows. Its eyes glowed red like coals plucked from hell.
Even the woman froze.
"What the hell is that?" Asher hissed.
"Their commander," she said, finally. Her voice was lower now. Less certain. "A Wraith-Lord."
The Wraith-Lord didn't speak. It raised a clawed hand, and the shadows around it rippled like a storm.
And then it charged.
Asher barely dodged the first strike. The impact cracked the rooftop, stone shattering like glass. The woman darted in, blades flashing, but the creature knocked her aside with a snarl.
It turned back to Asher.
And the mask—oh, the mask—screamed.
Not aloud. But in his mind.
"You know this one," it whispered. "You killed it once."
Memories surged. A battlefield of fire. Screams. This Wraith-Lord kneeling in blood, his own sword buried in its throat.
"No," Asher choked. "That wasn't me."
"Not you now," the voice whispered. "But once. Long ago."
The Wraith-Lord swung again. Asher met it head-on.
Steel collided with corrupted bone.
Sparks flew.
He was faster. Stronger. The mask had pushed him to the edge of something monstrous, and now—
Now he leaned into it.
He roared and drove his blade into the creature's chest, right where memory told him to. It shrieked. The sound rattled the night.
And then—
It crumbled.
Ash. Smoke. Gone.
Silence.
Asher collapsed to his knees, chest heaving. The rooftop was littered with shadow corpses, the night eerily still.
"They're... retreating," the woman said, surprised.
But Asher didn't feel victory.
Only dread.
Because the mask was still humming.
Because this wasn't the end.
It was only the start.
[End of Chapter 20: Rising Shadows]
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The rooftop battle is over—for now. But the mask's whispers grow louder. Its hunger more demanding. And as Asher stares into the ashes of the Wraith-Lord, one truth becomes impossible to deny: his past is not just catching up with him. It's returning.
Preview for Next Chapter
:Chapter 21: The Masked Truth
The battle is over, but the war within begins. Asher delves deeper into the mask's origins and the fractured memories it awakens—but knowledge has a cost. When an old name is spoken, and an even older enemy takes interest, Asher must ask: can he survive what he used to be?