My stomach cramped, a sudden, violent knot that doubled me over. It wasn't just hunger; it was a vacuum in my gut, demanding to be filled.
[Warning: Caloric Depletion at 85%. Jink Reserves Critical.]
[System Note: Biological fuel required to maintain Cold Fire output. Starvation imminent.]
"Great," I spat, wiping rain from my eyes. "So I don't just need to kill them to level up. I also need to kill them to keep from eating my own liver."
The adrenaline from the fight with Teresa was wearing off, leaving my hands shaking. I needed food, real food, or this "Essence" the screen kept blinking about. The wind howled through the Zui peaks, carrying the scent of ozone and wet fur.
I wasn't a soldier. I wasn't a survivalist. But I watched enough documentaries to know that in a storm, predators seek shelter or they hunt the things seeking shelter. If I stayed in the open, I was dead.
I moved toward a cluster of limestone formations, keeping my body low. The rain was torrential now, turning the dirt into a slick slurry of mud.
Perfect, I thought grimly. Mud hides heat signatures. If these things saw in infrared like vipers, the cold mud was my best camouflage. I plastered it over my neck and arms, the chill ran through my skin, but it helped focus my racing mind.
A snap of a twig echoed to my left.
I froze, pressing my back against the wet rock.
The blue screen flickered.
[Entity Detected: Class 2 – Stalker Variant.]
[Advice: Avoid Direct Engagement. Target is cloaked.]
"Cloaked?" I whispered.
I squinted into the grey downpour. There was nothing over there. Just trees, rocks, and... a shimmering distortion in the air, like heat rising off asphalt. It was moving along the tree line, placing its paws with Care. It might be a mindless zombie.
I looked down at my hands. A direct blast of Cold Fire would drain me completely if I missed. I needed an advantage.
I spotted a narrow gap between two boulders, a natural choke point. If I could lure it there, it wouldn't be able to flank me.
I grabbed a handful of loose stones.
"Hey, ugly!" I shouted, hurling a stone at the tree opposite the gap.
The air rippled, and for a split second, I saw the creature that looked like a man stretched over a spider's frame, limbs too long, too many joints. Its skin shifted colors to match the grey bark.
It ignored the stone. It turned its head slowly, right toward me.
"Smart," I muttered, my heart beating against my ribs. "It doesn't fall for distractions."
The speed was terrifying. It covered thirty feet in a second. I threw myself backward through the gap in the rocks just as a claw, a long, serrated, and dripping with clear slime, slammed into the stone where my head had been.
Sparks flew.
I scrambled back, slipping in the mud. The Stalker tried to squeeze through the gap, its elongated shoulders grinding against the rock.
"Aaaaaahh," I slammed my palm into the puddle beneath its feet and unleashed the Jink.
"Freeze!" I roared.
The blue fire didn't shoot out; it flashed inward, sucking the heat out of the water instantly. The puddle flash-froze into ice, trapping the creature's front claws.
It screeched a sound like metal tearing and thrashed, but the ice held it for the crucial two seconds I needed.
I grabbed a heavy, rock with my free hand and brought it down on the creature's exposed elbow joint.
Crunch.
Bone shattered. The creature howled, its camouflage flickering and failing, revealing pale, translucent skin and veins pulsing with black fluid.
[Weak Point Exposed.]
I didn't hesitate. I drove my knee into its chest, ignoring the slime that burned my skin like acid, and jammed my hand directly onto its neck.
"Burn," I yelled.
I dumped everything I had left into the strike. The Cold Fire surged, like a rapid crystallization. The frost spread from my hand, turning the creature's black veins into blue ice. It stiffened, choked, and then shattered into a pile of frozen gore.
I collapsed next to it, gasping for air. My vision swam.
[Essence Absorbed. +35 Jink.]
[Caloric Levels Stabilizing. Memory Fragment Decrypted.]
"Memory... what?" I wheezed.
Before I could process it, my head split with pain.
It was an image forcing its way into my brain. I wasn't seeing the forest anymore.
I was in a white room. I was looking up at a man in a hazmat suit. The man was holding a clipboard.
"Subject 44 is showing resistance to the parasite," the man said. His voice was muffled.
Another man stepped into view. He wasn't wearing a mask. It was Ginta.
"Inject the catalyst," Ginta said. "If he doesn't mutate, we harvest the antibodies. If he does... throw him in the pit with the others."
I tried to scream, but my mouth was gone. I was the Stalker. I was the monster.
The vision snapped off.
I vomited bile onto the muddy ground.
"Ginta," I whispered, wiping my mouth.
"He made them. He helped make these things."
The Stalker I just killed... it used to be a person. And Ginta was there when it happened.
I forced myself to stand. The hunger was gone, replaced by a sick, burning energy. I looked at the shattered remains of the Stalker. Something shiny was lodged in what used to be its stomach.
I reached down and pulled it out. It was a dog tag, half-melted by stomach acid, but the engraving was still legible.
PVT. K. MILLER - SECURITY UNIT 4.
"Security Unit," I mumbled, pocketing the tag. "This wasn't a random civilian. This was a soldier."
If the military was here, and they were turned into monsters, it meant the 'rescue' Ginta talked about never happened. There was no rescue. There was only a containment zone.
My eyes scanned the horizon. Through the rain, I saw a flashing red light atop the distant radio tower, the same place Ginta had been heading.
It was a jammer. That's why no one could call for help.
I cracked my knuckles, the blue frost lingering on my fingertips. " Those people are the real monsters,"
I started running toward the tower.
[New Skill Unlocked: Thermal Sight (Passive). Duration: 5m.]
The world shifted. The grey rain vanished, replaced by shifting hues of blue and purple. And in the distance, near the tower, I saw a cluster of bright, burning orange heat signatures.
Humans. Soldiers.
And in the middle of them, I sighted Ginta.
"Found you," I said.
I didn't waste a second. I pushed off the tree trunk, my boots digging into the sludge, and sprinted toward the cluster of heat signatures. My body felt light, dangerously light, like a car engine revving past the red line. The Jink energy wasn't just in my hands anymore; it was in my legs, pushing me faster than any human should be able to move.
[Skill Alert: Thermal Sight duration ending in 10 seconds.]
"Don't you dare," I gritted out.
I needed to see where they were going. The orange blobs in the distance were moving, clustering around the radio tower. But as I watched, the heat signatures didn't enter the tower. They... flickered.
One by one, the soldiers' heat signatures turned from bright orange to a dull, freezing blue. Then they vanished entirely.
"What?" I skidded to a halt, grabbing a sapling to stop myself from sliding down a ravine.
Only one heat signature remained. The cold one. The one that burned with a pale, icy white light amidst the grey rain.
He wasn't fighting the soldiers. He was walking past them. And as he passed them, their heat went out.
[Thermal Sight Deactivated.]
The world snapped back to grey and black. The rain slammed down harder, washing away the vision.
I was blind again.
"He killed them, or he did something worse."
I spent the rest of the night navigating the ravine, slipping and clawing my way through thorn bushes that tore at my clothes. By the time I reached the radio tower, the sun was trying to break through the storm clouds, casting a sickly yellow light over the forest.
I didn't find Ginta.
I found the soldiers.
Five of them. They weren't dead. They were... empty.
They stood in a circle, staring at the sky with mouths hanging open, drool mixing with the rain. Their eyes were rolled back, showing only the whites. They were breathing, but there was no one home.
"Hey!" I shook one of them by the tactical vest.
"Snap out of it! Where did he go?"
The soldier didn't blink. He just swayed like a tree in the wind.
I checked his neck. No bite marks. No blood. Just a clean, terrifying emptiness. Ginta hadn't used violence. He had used something else.
I looked at the muddy ground. A single set of boot prints led away from the tower, heading deeper into the wasteland. Toward the jagged peaks of the Zui range known as the "Dead Zone."
[Objective Updated: Pursuit. Target Distance: Unknown.]
I tightened my fists. "Run all you want, Ginta. I've got nothing but time."