If you've ever seen your nightmares get up, stretch, and ask for a latte, that's pretty much how my next few seconds felt. The bone-faced creep with the floating crown didn't look like someone you invited to a tea party unless you liked your tea spiked with pure existential dread.
Adrian stepped in front of me, gun raised, but I grabbed his arm.
"No," I said. "Bullets won't do squat against that."
"How do you know?"
I nodded toward the creature's feet. "Because it's standing on scorched stone and the fire's not even touching its robes. That's either a really good laundry spell or"
"Demon-class Hollow."
The thing grinned. "Clever boy."
It raised a hand, and the shadows around it writhed like snakes in oil. Before either of us could blink, they shot out like tendrils. Adrian dove left. I dove right. The spot where we'd been standing turned into a miniature sinkhole.
I landed hard and rolled, coming up with my dagger Hollow-forged, humming with latent heat. My skin prickled. The beast inside me stirred, restless.
"You're not ready," it whispered.
"Never stopped me before."
I hurled the dagger. It whistled through the air and passed straight through the creature like smoke. It turned its head slightly, mock-impressed.
"Oh, that's cute."
Then it vanished.
Not blinked. Not teleported. Just,gone. One second it was there, and the next the world was too quiet.
Adrian was already scanning the sky.
"Above!" I shouted.
Too late.
The creature reappeared mid-air and slammed into him with bone-breaking force. Adrian's body flipped twice before hitting a broken pillar. I screamed his name, but my voice didn't carry far enough.
Then it turned to me.
"You're the Hollowborn. The experiment. I expected... more."
My heart pounded.
I reached into myself, searching for the beast the part of me that had claws and fangs and the survival instinct of a rabid wolverine. It surged forward, half-willing, half-forced. My skin darkened, eyes glowing. I didn't shift fully I couldn't risk losing control again but I embraced the edge.
Just enough.
"Wanna see more?" I growled.
We collided.
Shadow met claw, fire met frost. Our powers clashed in bursts of pressure that cracked stone and sent fire plumes spiraling into the red sky. Every strike from him was precise like he knew my limits. Every strike from me was desperate because I didn't.
Still, I held him.
For all of five seconds.
Then he whispered something. A word I didn't understand. My body locked up, muscles freezing like they'd been doused in liquid nitrogen. He raised one bony hand and drove it toward my chest.
Adrian appeared out of nowhere and fired a full clip into its face.
The bullets didn't kill it but they distracted it long enough for my body to move again. I rolled and kicked upward, sending the creature staggering. Adrian grabbed my shoulder.
"Move!"
We ran.
Behind us, laughter echoed like wind through shattered glass.
We didn't stop until we reached the subterranean tunnel system beneath the city. Old sewer lines, some Resistance maintained, most forgotten. We collapsed against a pipe wall, panting.
"What what was that thing?" Adrian gasped.
"Something ancient," I muttered. "And it knows who I am."
"That makes one of us."
I didn't respond.
There were more pressing issues. The city was burning. Our team was scattered. The Resistance was hanging on by a thread. And now, we had demon-level Hollows that spoke in riddles and paralyzed people with words.
"Elias, Adrian said suddenly,"you ever wonder if... we're on the wrong side of this?"
I stared at him. "What?"
"I mean, look at the way they're evolving. Rejected mutations, self-destructing hosts, and now...that thing. What if this isn't just invasion? What if this is something bigger?"
"You think there's a purpose?"
I think, he said,"we're pawns on someone else's board."
I hated how much that made sense.
We moved again deeper into the tunnels. I activated my Hollow sense, a talent I rarely used because it tended to turn my head into a screaming match between instincts and rational thought.
But we needed direction.
A pulse echoed through the darkness.
North. Something powerful. Faint but familiar.
We followed it.
After thirty minutes of wading through muck, darkness, and the occasional mutated rat the size of a Pomeranian, we found it a hidden Resistance safe room. Reinforced walls. Medical supplies. Battery cells.
And a body.
I knelt beside it. A woman, early twenties. One of ours. Her ID read: Corporal Lira Hess. No wounds. Just... empty. Like the life had been drained.
"Same as the others," Adrian whispered. "They're feeding."
"On souls," I said.
"No wonder the Hollows are changing."
A holographic projector on the wall flickered to life. Static. Then a voice.
"...anyone receiving this, this is Commander Vale. The city's lost. Pull back to Outpost Theta. Repeat, pull back to"
Static again.
"Outpost Theta's across the valley," Adrian said. "We'll never make it in time on foot."
"We don't have to," I replied.
Adrian raised an eyebrow. "Unless you've got a hover-bike hidden in your sock, we're stuck."
I walked to the far wall and slammed my palm against a hidden panel. The room shifted. A grinding noise echoed as the wall slid aside to reveal a narrow lift.
"Secret tunnels. Built by the original city architects. Not on any Resistance maps."
He blinked. "How do you know this?"
"Because someone left me a memory," I said.
He didn't ask more.
We took the lift down. The air grew colder, tighter. The walls pressed inward like the tunnel didn't like being disturbed.
Halfway down, the lift stopped.
Lights flickered.
Then we heard it: whispering.
Not in our ears. In our minds.
Adrian clutched his head. I fell to my knees.
"You do not belong," the voice said.
The tunnel warped. Flesh-like tendrils slid down the walls. Faces blinked open along the metal.
The Hollow Realm.
It was bleeding into our world.
"Get us out!" Adrian shouted.
I forced the beast to the surface. My arm morphed half-man, half-Hollow. I slammed it into the panel. Sparks flew. The lift jolted and descended fast too fast.
We crashed into the bottom chamber.
I was conscious long enough to see the door slide open and a girl standing on the other side.
"Elias?" she asked, confused.
"Zara?" I croaked.
Then everything went black.
I awoke on a cot, wrapped in something warm. Clean air. Filtered light. Machines hummed quietly. I sat up slowly and saw Zara sitting nearby, clutching a datapad.
"You look like crap," she said.
"Glad some things never change."
Adrian was resting nearby, a patch on his shoulder.
"Where are we?" I asked.
"Outpost Theta. We dragged you the last hundred meters. You're welcome, by the way."
"Thanks."
Then she got serious.
"There's more, Elias. We've been intercepting Hollow transmissions. We cracked a portion of their code."
I leaned forward. "And?"
She turned the pad toward me.
"The Crown of Ruin. That's what it's called. The one you fought."
I shivered.
Zara tapped the screen. "It's not just a creature. It's a herald."
"For what?"
"A god."
My stomach turned to ice.
"They're trying to open a gate," she said. "A real one. Into our world. And they need one thing to complete the ritual."
I didn't want to ask.
She met my eyes.
"You."
The silence was so heavy it might as well have been a physical object. Adrian stirred but didn't wake. I stood, pacing.
"They think I'm a key?"
"You're not just a Hollowborn, Elias. You're a tether. Someone made you with intent. You're a bridge."
I stared at my hands. At the faint glow pulsing beneath the skin.
"They plan to use you to anchor the gate. Merge the realms."
"And if I die?"
"They'll find another way. But you alive makes it easier. Cleaner."
We needed to move. Now.
"Where's Commander Vale?" I asked.
Zara hesitated. "Dead. We're it, Elias. The resistance now runs through us."
The weight of that slammed into my gut like a sledgehammer.
Then a new voice cut through the quiet.
"I wouldn't say just you."
We turned.
A figure stepped into the light cloaked in shadow, his face hidden. But I knew that stance.
"Kai?"
My brother.
Who'd been presumed dead for a year.
He stepped forward, lowering his hood. Older. Hardened. Eyes like obsidian.
"There's a lot you don't know, Elias," he said. "And if we don't move fast, the Hollow god isn't the only thing coming."
My brain short-circuited.
"You died," I managed.
"No," Kai said. "I was taken. Trained. And now I'm here to stop what I once helped begin."
That...didn't make me feel better.
Adrian woke with perfect timing. "Did I miss a resurrection?"
Kai smiled. "Nice to see you, too."
Zara handed me a map. "They'll come here next. We have maybe hours."
"Then we fight," Adrian said.
"We can't win," Kai countered. "Not yet. But we can steal something first."
"What?" I asked.
Kai's eyes gleamed. "The Obsidian Shard. It's what anchors the Hollow god to our dimension."
"And where is it?"
Kai paused.
"In the heart of the Hollow Spire."
Of course it was.
We didn't have time to argue. We geared up. Readied weapons. I slid my dagger back into its sheath.
Then something shifted.
The sky outside turned black.
Literally.
Alarms blared. Zara ran to the monitor.
"It's not just clouds," she whispered. "It's them."
A storm of shadows. Descending fast.
Kai drew a sword.
Adrian chambered a round.
I reached into myself and felt the beast rise.
The Eye of the Storm had passed.
Now came the teeth.
And we were going straight into its maw.