Steve stood still, his hands clenched tightly around the hilt of his sword, his chest rising and falling with labored breath. Blood dripped from his lip, staining his chin, but he didn't wipe it. His eyes were locked on the beast in front of him—the towering, ash-skinned goblin with eyes like burning coal.
He had spoken the words. The summoning command from the Author's Notebook. The phrase that was supposed to bring the ghost forth.
But nothing happened.
The air was still. Too still.
Only the heavy thuds of the ash goblin's boots echoed through the trees, growing louder with every step. The other goblins had stopped—uncertain, even hesitant. But this one? This one walked with purpose. The forest seemed to part for him as he advanced, every stride deliberate, every stomp like the tolling of a death bell.
He stopped a few meters from Steve.
So close now.
