Kamcy

  I lowered my trembling arms and finally stopped running.

  The moment I looked up, I understood how pointless the st few minutes had been.

  They were everywhere.

  The forest had gone completely dark, as if night itself had sunk its teeth into the nd. The moon hung above like a pale, indifferent eye, barely strong enough to cut through the shadows. Its light mixed with the eerie red glow leaking from the forest itself—fungi pulsing faintly like exposed organs, swollen eyeballs embedded in tree trunks, blinking slowly as they watched me. Every stare carried pressure, a sickening awareness that crawled across my skin and refused to let go.

  I was surrounded.

  The creatures I’d been fleeing stood at varying distances, forming a loose but unbreakable ring. Wolf-caste beasts paced low to the ground, elongated jaws dripping saliva between rows of too many teeth. Their cws scraped against bark and soil, slow and deliberate. Behind them loomed rger shapes—four-armed behemoths with torsos of knotted muscle, skin stretched tight over warped bone, their shadows swallowing the light around them.

  I gnced down at the bde in my hand.

  It felt useless.

  Cut them wrong and they split, duplicated, multiplied like some sick biological joke. My energy reservoir was nearly dry, my breathing shallow and uneven. Every desperate step I’d taken trying to escape had been a waste. There was no breaking through this ring. Not now.

  I exhaled slowly and let the bde lower before deciding to sheath it.

  Then my hand moved to my waist.

  I unclipped the whip. It unfurled as it dropped, coiling across the ground and revealing its full length. The handle hummed faintly as it synced with what little energy I had left. My other hand followed instinct, pulling free my bone dagger.

  I raised my head and spoke, my voice steadier than I felt.

  “I don’t know if you’re intelligent enough to understand me,” I said, my eyes moving from one creature to the next, “but I was honestly just running for my mental health.”

  A low growl rippled through the circle, vibrating through the trees, but they didn’t attack yet.

  “You know… dying this many times really isn’t great for the human mind.” A dry ugh slipped out before I could stop it. “I’ve started talking in my head like I’m expining things to someone else.”

  I ughed again, sharper this time, mocking.

  It was true. Lately every thought came with narration, like someone was listening, like silence itself would finish breaking me if I let it settle. Maybe it was loneliness. Maybe desperation. All I knew was that this simution—this endless loop of death—was tearing pieces out of my psyche and leaving nothing behind to fill the gaps.

  “But that’s on me,” I continued. “I promised myself I’d do anything to get back home. To see my family again.”

  The creatures crept closer, cws digging into the earth, breath steaming in the cold air.

  “Running like this?” I shook my head. “That just insults that promise.”

  My grip tightened around the whip.

  “So let me hold myself to it. Let me show you my resolve.”

  The forest exploded into motion.

  They charged.

  I snapped my wrist and the whip cracked through the air like thunder. Its energy-reinforced tip smashed into the skull of the nearest wolf-caste. Bone colpsed inward on impact. Its eyes burst, gore spraying outward in a wet arc as the body stumbled forward before colpsing into a twitching heap.

  I didn’t stop.

  The whip moved around me like a living thing, a serpent with my intent burned into its spine. I spun, ducked, shed again. Another crack echoed through the trees as the strike tore a creature’s jaw clean off, snapping its head back so violently its neck twisted the wrong way.

  Cws raked across my side.

  Pain fred hot and immediate, but I forced myself through it.

  The whip wrapped around another wolf-caste’s throat. I looped my arm around the line, braced my feet, and yanked. The creature was dragged toward me, choking, cws filing uselessly. As it reached me, I drove the bone dagger straight down through the top of its skull.

  The bde punched through bone and brain with a sickening crunch.

  I ripped it free and kicked the corpse aside.

  Something massive roared.

  I twisted just as a four-armed behemoth swung. The blow passed inches from my face, the force of it staggering me. I flipped backward, boots skidding through blood-soaked soil, and hurled the whip upward. It wrapped around a thick tree branch. I pulled hard, using the momentum to yank myself backward as another massive fist smashed into the space I’d just occupied.

  The tree behind me exploded into splinters.

  I nded hard, rolled, and snapped the whip again.

  This strike hit a creature square in the chest. The energy discharge bsted straight through it, liquefying organs and spraying steaming gore across the ground behind. The body folded in half, ribs spying outward like shattered cages.

  More came.

  I swung, leapt, and shed, using the whip to pull myself out of reach, to pivot mid-air, to turn their numbers against them. I vaulted off tree trunks, wrapped the line around limbs, and tore joints apart with raw force. Every crack of the whip was followed by ruptured flesh, shattered bone, or bodies colpsing in impossible shapes.

  But every movement burned energy.

  My breathing grew ragged. My limbs felt heavier with each passing second. Injuries stacked up—deep gashes, crushed ribs, torn muscle. Blood soaked my clothes and slicked my hands. I could feel my energy trying to recover, but it was nothing compared to what I was spending just to stay alive.

  And then I realized the truth.

  Their numbers weren’t dropping.

  They weren’t increasing anymore—thank the whip for that—but it didn’t matter. I was a candle burning at both ends, and they were a storm that didn’t care how bright I burned.

  A blow caught my left arm.

  I didn’t even hear myself scream.

  The force tore it free at the shoulder, flesh ripping apart as blood sprayed violently across the ground. My bone dagger vanished with it, lost somewhere in the chaos. I staggered, vision swimming, pain so intense it felt cold.

  I kept fighting.

  I don’t know how long it went on. Time blurred into movement and impact. At some point cws tore across my face. My left eye went dark as warmth poured down, swelling shut beneath the flood of blood.

  Finally, my energy ran out.

  My legs gave way.

  I dropped to one knee, the whip slipping from my grasp as my body finally refused to move. Blood pooled beneath me, my heartbeat loud and uneven in my ears.

  The forest closed in.

  I barely managed to lift my head as one of the four-armed behemoths stepped forward. It raised all four arms at once.

  And then—

  The world went bck.