Krisena was wailing in tears. Her eight-year-old son, Cian, still hadn't come home.
An hour had passed since he was last seen outside their rented house. She approached the barangay watchmen on duty. They immediately began searching the area—knocking on doors, asking neighbors, especially the children who often played with Cian when there were no classes.
"Where is your husband, ma'am?" one watchman asked, shining his flashlight down a dark alley. "Has he still not returned?"
Krisena bent over for a long moment before answering."Cian was only three years old when my husband disappeared," she whispered.
Everyone fell silent.
"You just moved here last month, didn't you?" he asked again. "Does he always have someone to play with? A friend to ask?"
Krisena couldn't speak properly. Her lips trembled, and her words barely formed between sobs.
They went from house to house, checking Cian's classmates and friends. Almost everyone was asleep—lights off, doors closed.
Except one house.
Ben's.
According to some neighbors, Ben was the last person seen with Cian that afternoon, playing in the vacant lot.
When the door opened, Ben's swollen eyes greeted them. He was sitting in a corner near the door. Silent. Shaking.
"I spanked him earlier," Ben's mother explained. "He came home at ten. He wouldn't answer when we asked where he had been. We were worried."
"Ben, son," the father insisted, "where did you last see Cian?"
The child's crying grew louder.
But he said nothing.
The next day, before the search for Cian even ended, another scream shook the barangay.
At Ben's house, the child's bed was smeared with blood.Ripped, bloody shorts were hanging in his room's window.
But Ben was nowhere to be found.Not inside. Not outside.
His favorite slippers were still at the door.
In the following days, two more children disappeared—twin girls, classmates of Cian.Their uniforms were found behind the school's restroom.Covered in sticky fluid. Wet with saliva.
No one saw them leave the gate. Their fathers had been escorting them every day since the disappearances began.
The elementary school declared a one-month suspension. Teachers and parents worked together to search.
But there were no suspects.No traces.It was as if the wind had swallowed the children.
One night, at the Deynso house, the dogs in the yard suddenly went wild.
Deynso peeked through a small window crack. Shadows moved in the darkness—not normal movements, crawling like creatures.
He remembered to check on his sister Andrea, Grade 6. She was busy on her cellphone in the living room. Their parents were helping search for the missing children.
Then—A child's scream ripped through the silence.
Deynso peeked again. His eyes went wide.A child was walking in the middle of the street. Pale. Smiling.
One of the missing children.
In the blink of an eye—it was gone.
Neighbors rushed out. The Deynso family locked all the doors and windows. Deynso called 911.
"Oh my God! Are you okay?" shouted a neighbor, Aling Gina, outside."Yes!" Andrea answered from inside. "Kuya is here. Everything is locked."
As Andrea closed the last window—Something suddenly lunged at her face.
A long tongue wrapped around her mouth. Rancid. Slippery. Alive.
Four wrinkled hands grabbed her legs. She couldn't scream. She couldn't move.
She was still facing the door, but something was breathing behind her.
The creature slowly turned her body.
And she saw it.
A student.Missing for a long time.Smiling.And… its stomach was smiling too.
A huge mouth in the center of its belly, full of sharp teeth. From it emerged the enormous tongue and the four wrinkled hands.
It was the monster.
At the side, Andrea saw her older brother.Deynso was kneeling, stunned, seemingly being pulled by an invisible force. Slowly, he crawled toward the mouth in the child's stomach.
As if hypnotized.
Tears ran down Andrea's face.She was next.
When the neighbors finally broke down the door—It was too late.
The siblings were gone.
The back window was shattered. Blood led into the forest.
And on the other side of the barangay—A child walked home.Alone.
Cian.
His mother opened the door."My child," Krisena asked with a smile, "did you eat properly?"
The boy nodded.
"Tomorrow," his mother whispered as she closed the door, "we go to another town. There will be more food there."
"Yay!" Cian shouted happily. "Will I change form? I want to look like Ben!"
"No," Krisena said coldly.
On the table, she was slicing the remaining fingers of Andrea.
"No one must know your secret."
Cian smiled.
The fingers—His favorite souvenir for Mother.