The night had no stars that evening—only a slow, pulsing haze that breathed across the sky, like lungs made of mist. The air clung to the skin, heavy and wet, carrying the faint smell of rust and something far older—something that didn't belong to this age.
The group had built their camp beside the broken ridge where the last distortion had occurred. The fire refused to burn normally; every flicker turned the shadows into elongated shapes that bent against the flames rather than retreating from them.
Nofan sat a few paces away from the others, staring at the ground. The earth beneath him was no longer still—it swelled, ever so slightly, as though a heartbeat throbbed somewhere beneath the crust.
Syran watched him from the distance, arms folded.
He didn't speak, but everyone could feel his unease. The last incident—the distortion that nearly swallowed them—had left its echo in their nerves. Even the insects avoided this stretch of land.
Marin, sitting near the fire, sharpened her blade with motions too mechanical to be natural. Her eyes kept glancing at Nofan. Every scrape of steel sounded like the cutting of fabric in a silent room.
No one spoke for a long time.
Then came the sound.
A low hum, distant but alive, like wind moving through hollow bones. It rose and fell in rhythmic waves, the same rhythm as a heartbeat. The same rhythm as Nofan's breath.
"Do you hear that?" Kyle whispered.
Marin froze. "It's not the wind."
Syran looked at Nofan. "When did it start?"
Nofan didn't answer immediately. His eyes were unfocused, reflecting nothing of the fire's light. "It never stopped," he said at last. "You just started to notice."
The words landed like stones in water, rippling through the camp.
The humming deepened.
From the darkness beyond the ridge, the fog began to move—not drift, but crawl. It rolled forward in deliberate tendrils, dragging itself across the cracked stones. The air grew colder, and even the fire seemed to shrink, curling into itself as if afraid.
Faris muttered, "It's too early for another distortion. We sealed the last one."
Syran shook his head. "Distortions don't wait for our approval."
He turned toward Nofan again. "What are you feeling?"
Nofan's voice came low, hollow. "It's like… the air remembers something. Like this place is replaying an old scream."
He stood. The firelight caught on his features, outlining the faint veins of black beneath his skin—marks that pulsed with their own rhythm, out of sync with his heart.
"Don't move closer," Marin ordered.
But Nofan had already taken a step.
The ground trembled—not violently, but rhythmically, as if answering him.
---
Hours passed. The fog never left.
No one slept.
Kyle sat by the remains of the fire, staring into the embers. "He's been standing there for too long," he whispered.
Marin didn't answer. She was tracing symbols into the dirt—protection glyphs, old military habits. But the lines wouldn't stay. The dust kept rearranging itself, erasing her marks.
"It's rewriting itself," she murmured.
Then, suddenly, Nofan spoke. His voice didn't sound like his own anymore.
"They're close."
Syran rose immediately. "Who's close?"
Nofan turned. His eyes gleamed like mirrors—reflecting not their faces, but something else. Shapes. Movements.
"The ones who came before the distortions. The ones who fed them."
Marin took a step back. "You're not making sense."
He smiled faintly—an expression too calm for his words. "Neither are they."
The ground convulsed.
This time, the tremor was real—violent, angry. Cracks split through the ridge, coughing up steam that reeked of blood and iron. From the fissures, voices leaked—not coherent, but layered whispers overlapping until they formed a single, terrifying unity.
Faris stumbled backward. "This isn't just an echo—this is alive!"
The fog thickened, pressing close, forcing the air from their lungs. Marin's ears rang as she drew her blade, the sound swallowed by the pressure around them.
In the distance, figures began to form inside the fog.
Human shapes—bent, twisted, half-seen, moving as if underwater. Their faces flickered like broken projections.
One of them spoke.
Or perhaps all of them did.
> "Return what was taken."
The voice tore through the air like a blade through silk.
Syran pulled the trigger on his rifle—three shots, each dissolving into nothing before reaching the fog.
"Marin, hold formation!" he barked.
She tried, but her limbs were trembling. "It's… not real," she whispered to herself. "It's a projection."
But then one of the shapes stepped closer—its feet leaving wet imprints of blood on the ground.
Not projection.
Nofan watched, unmoving. The shapes looked at him, and in their distorted eyes there was recognition.
He felt it again—the pulse, not from his chest but from the air itself. A thousand heartbeats aligning into one.
His head ached. His vision twisted. The fog wasn't fog anymore—it was memory.
He saw flashes—cities made of bone, seas that breathed, towers built from eyes that never closed. The source was not outside; it was inside everything.
He fell to his knees, gripping his head. "Stop… it's too loud."
Marin rushed to him. "Nofan!"
Her touch snapped him back, but something else snapped with it. A line, unseen, between worlds.
The ground screamed.
Light—black and silver—burst upward like a geyser, engulfing them in a spiral. The distorted figures lunged, disintegrating as they entered the vortex. The sound was unbearable: the roar of a thousand reversed screams.
Syran tried to reach them, but the shockwave threw him backward, crushing the air from his lungs.
The explosion was silent.
Then, nothing.
Only dust, rising like ghosts.
When the smoke cleared, the ridge was gone—flattened.
The air was cold, calm. Too calm.
Marin opened her eyes first. Her ears rang, her hands bleeding from the impact. She turned—Nofan was standing again, at the center of a shallow crater, untouched.
His eyes were dim now, no longer glowing. But beneath the surface of his skin, something shifted—like a second heartbeat trying to synchronize.
Syran staggered closer. "What happened?"
Nofan's voice was faint, almost human.
"They weren't attacking."
Marin frowned. "Then what were they?"
He looked toward the horizon, where the fog still lingered in threads.
"Fragments," he whispered. "Pieces of something waking up."
Then, softly, almost like a promise—
> "The real curse isn't in the distortions. It's in us."
And from deep within the earth, far beneath their feet, came a single, slow pulse—
one that answered him.
---
End of Chapter Ten — "Shadows Between the Echo"