A visceral chaos erupted in the frozen streets.
Screams pierced the biting air, mingling with the clatter of wind whipping against pale faces. Voices clashed in disarray, a cacophony of fear and panic.
Frenzied figures ran in every direction, crashing into everything in their path, desperately searching for refuge—some escape from the night that had turned into a nightmare.
— "Help!"
— "Where are the Awakened? Someone has to intervene!"
— "Run! Run before it's too late!"
The din echoed like a brutal storm inside a frozen ribcage, vibrating deep into the bone.
Suddenly, in the heavy, low-hanging sky, a body was torn from the darkness. It split in two, as if cleaved by an invisible blade.
Chunks of flesh and bone spun through the air, suspended in a grotesque dance, before collapsing onto the frozen asphalt—just meters from Jinra.
She sat there, huddled under her blanket, holding a half-eaten shawarma, unmoved by the macabre scene.
A shredded piece of leg rolled gently to a stop at her feet.
Jinra slowly raised her eyes, her gray gaze narrowing beneath a veil of frost.
In a voice weary, almost detached:
— "Disgusting."
She chewed her bite with disarming nonchalance, as if the world's violence were no more than background noise.
— "You should've run when the alerts went off. But no… you stayed. Waiting for the Awakened to come save you."
She clicked her tongue, irritated.
— "What a bunch of dreamers… Betting your survival on a miracle."
The sky darkened further. Amid the agony and despair, a new figure emerged.
A child, barely larger than a cat, fled through the street, his cries piercing the night. Behind him slithered a deformed shape—an animated shadow, twisted by a waking nightmare.
The Echo was hunting him.
Its contorted limbs flowed with terrifying grace, like black ink poured over reality.
The child stumbled, collapsed into the snow, sobbing, his face buried in trembling arms.
His shrill cries sliced through the night, cutting even through the surrounding turmoil.
The Echo crept forward, slowly, with implacable patience. Its skin resembled shifting ink and fog; its hollow, tormented eyes locked on the child like a predator sizing up its prey.
— "Where's my daddy?"
The whisper emerged from the creature's warped mouth as it tilted its head, as if straining to catch the faintest vibration.
Then, panting, a man burst into view, his features hollowed by anguish. He ran toward Jinra, arms outstretched in desperation.
— "Miss, please—help my son! I can't save him… I won't make it in time. Please, do something!"
Jinra turned slowly, her pupils reflecting the child's raw terror.
She saw the Echo raise its dark club, heavy as a shard of the abyss, poised to strike.
In that child's gaze, she read the weight of the world.
Her voice rose, calm, glacial:
— "What a pitiful end for a ruined world."
A sigh escaped her, almost human. A terrible truth:
— "Humans aren't eternal. If I step in, it'll kill us both."
The club came down.
The child's scream shattered into a red spray, splattering the night in a brutal burst—a grotesque firework of blood and flesh.
The father froze, eyes hollow, then crumpled to his knees, powerless before the disintegration of his son.
Then a voiceless scream tore from his throat—a cry of surrender, a silent grief so piercing it sent a flock of frightened birds fleeing into the night sky.
Tears spilled down his cheeks as his trembling hands reached, in vain, for something that no longer existed.
— "No… No… No…"
Paralyzed by grief, he remained there—broken, breath crushed under the weight of loss.
Jinra watched in silence.
She slowly set her shawarma on the sidewalk and brushed the cold snow with her fingertips, chasing away a painful thought.
— "I'm sorry. It shouldn't be my scent that finishes you off."
She inhaled deeply, swallowing the entire night.
— "But at least take comfort in this: your son won't suffer in this world any longer."
She finished her meal unhurriedly, then, with a fluid motion, pulled off her blanket and rose.
She walked toward the broken man, took out her phone, and checked the time: 11:57 PM.
— "To make it up to you… I'm going to die too, in three minutes."
But no answer came. The father remained imprisoned in his pain.
Jinra spoke softly, almost in a whisper, as if to herself:
— "This world is rotten. It never gave me a chance. Took everything from me, though I did nothing to deserve it."
She narrowed her eyes, fixing them on the Echo, now approaching again—its bloodstained club ready for the next blow.
— "This world rejects me. Why should I fight to prove my worth?"
— "I'll let myself fall… become an Echo too."
— "And that one—I'll make him pay."
The Echo raised its weapon once more.
Jinra stared at the father, a cold breath sweeping through the night.
— "He left too soon."
A heavy silence settled in, broken only by the wind's whisper and the crackling of snowflakes on the city's frozen skin.
⸻
The Echoes
Night's silence had been the only anchor—until they appeared.
Beneath flickering streetlamps, in the damp cold, the Echoes drifted, defying all logic of flesh and form.
Their bodies were aberrations—limbs twisted and shifting, gliding on a frequency only the dead could hear.
They seemed made of liquid ink and black mist, dissolving and reforming endlessly.
Around them floated fragments of emaciated faces: silent mouths, extinguished eyes, erased features.
They were the negation of life itself, absorbing light, warping space and time around them.
When one stopped beneath a broken sign, its maw opened like a mute carnivorous flower—while the neighborhood dogs howled in unison.
Then, in a chaotic and terrifying rush, they surged forward—tearing through the night, devouring life.