*THUD.*
Something heavy hit the ground in the dark. The sound came with warmth and wet — and a spray of blood that vanished into the black before anyone could track it.
Everyone snapped to attention.
Rustling behind the carriage. The horses shrieked and threw themselves against their harnesses. Jack was an experienced guard, but this silence had been stretching his nerves for too long. The moment he heard movement in the dark, his fingers moved without him.
*TWANG.*
The bolt split through the trees. A wet thud followed — but the rustling didn't stop. It multiplied.
Then another sound came from somewhere deeper in the forest. The kind that turned the stomach.
Arthur moved.
One leap carried him onto the carriage roof. His sword came down twice in rapid succession, blue light tearing through the dark.
*SLASH. SLASH.*
Something fell apart in the shadows.
He steadied himself on the roof and spun.
*SLASH. THUD.*
Leo's sword was already drenched. A deep red aura rippled along the blade, and at his feet lay something that had once been moving. Arthur looked at him across the chaos — and for just a moment, something like pride crossed his hard face.
---
The noise tore the boy from sleep.
The merchant was on his feet instantly, pulling him back and putting himself between the boy and the dark.
"Clad!" Arthur called from the roof.
"Got it."
Clad snapped his fingers. The small light on his fingertip split into three fireballs. He hurled them into the trees with everything he had.
*BOOM. BOOM.*
The detonations lit the forest white for a moment. The sounds that followed — burning, tearing — were not pleasant. The stench of rot and scorched flesh rolled through the camp like a wave.
But it wasn't over.
Clad grabbed the unconscious child and pulled him back under the canopy. Arthur dropped from the roof, sword raised, stepping into a defensive position.
"Father..." The boy's voice trembled. He was staring at the shapes on the ground — the smell, the blood. His whole body had gone rigid. "What's happening?"
The merchant didn't look at him. He looked at Jack and Leo. "Get him inside the tent. Now."
"But you—" Leo started.
"Don't worry about me. Guard the entrance."
Jack took the boy and moved. Leo planted himself at the tent flap like he had grown there, red blade raised between the darkness and everyone inside.
---
Clad dropped to his knees beside the child.
The energy leaking from the boy's body had grown visible — bleeding outward in pulses, uncontrolled.
"His energy is calling everything in this forest, Arthur!" Clad's voice was tight. Sweat ran down his face. "The seal is breaking. If I don't suppress it, we're finished!"
Then the rain stopped.
All at once. Like something had switched it off.
A crack of lightning split the sky — and in that half-second of white light, a shape filled the gap between the trees. Enormous. Wrong in the way it stood. The air dropped several degrees in an instant, as if the forest itself had pulled back from it.
In the dark, two red eyes opened.
The shadow lunged.
"GET BACK!"
Clad grabbed the child and threw himself into the tent.
Arthur stepped into the creature's path and braced his sword horizontally in both hands.
*CLANG.*
Metal met bone. Sparks tore through the air on impact. The creature's weight drove Arthur backward — boots carving gouges through the mud, chest compressing under the pressure. He locked his jaw. Held.
Warm blood rose in his throat and spilled from his mouth.
The creature raised its other claw.
Then something moved through the air.
Not blue. Not red.
Dark.
A blade made of shadow drove straight into the creature's chest and tore it in half in a single motion — clean, complete, without hesitation.
*CRACK.*
Flesh split. But the creature made no sound. Whatever that black energy was, it had swallowed the dying cry whole. The two halves of that enormous body collapsed into the mud without a word.
A thunderclap shook the forest to its roots.
---
Arthur slid in the mud and caught himself.
His chest heaved. He forced his eyes open.
In the flickering light, a man stood ahead of him.
In his hand was a sword that seemed to be made of absence rather than metal. No light came from it — instead, the light nearby bent toward it, pulled inward, swallowed. It was nothing like Arthur's blue or Leo's red. It was still. Deep. The kind of thing that didn't announce itself.
Arthur's eyes moved from the blade to the man holding it.
Slowly, he lowered his sword. Wiped the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. And dipped his head — just slightly.
"...Forgive me."
---
**[Chapter 2 — End]**