The teenager's footsteps felt lighter that afternoon.
Beneath his dirty clothes, he hid a bundle of smoked meat and several pieces of fresh bread, the result of a risky grab from a market on the outskirts of the city.
He had already imagined the Old Man's flat expression. Even without praise, at least there would be a small nod, a silent sign that they wouldn't go hungry for the next two days.
But as he stepped into the shack, the silence that greeted him felt… wrong.
There was no sound of a blade being sharpened. No harsh scent of cheap tobacco. No cynical muttering that usually welcomed his return.
"Old Man? Look what I brought," he called out, trying to break the strange stillness.
Silence. Only the faint dripping of water from the leaking tin roof answered him.
He stepped deeper into the darkness of the shack.
His heart began to pound as his eyes caught the silhouette of a body lying on the dirt floor. The bundle of food slipped from his hand, scattering across the dust.
"Old Man!"
He rushed forward, dropping to his knees beside the man who had raised him for over a decade.
The Old Man's body trembled violently. His breathing was ragged, short, and heavy, as if an invisible weight was crushing his lungs.
The teenager frantically examined him.
No bullet wounds. No stab marks. Not a single drop of blood stained the ground. Yet the Old Man's face was deathly pale, and the veins in his neck bulged like roots ready to burst. This death felt sudden… unnatural.
"Old Man! Hold on! What happened? Who did this?!" His voice broke, filling the narrow space. He pulled the rigid body into his arms.
The Old Man's eyes were wide open, staring directly at him.
There was something different in them. No longer cold and harsh, but filled with a deep guilt… a regret that had long been locked behind his cracked lips.
Those lips trembled violently, trying to form words.
He wanted to shout a name, a secret, or perhaps a warning.
But his throat seemed bound by some dark force. Only a hoarse hiss escaped, before his eyes dimmed, losing the light of life forever.
The rough hands that once saved him now grew cold in his grasp.
The teenager fell silent. He didn't cry.
His sorrow was swallowed by confusion and an overwhelming emptiness. At such a young age, he became what he should have been twelve years ago: alone.
Without family. Without protection. Without an identity tying him to the human world.
He stared at the Old Man's corpse with hollow eyes.
Inside his chest, something began to shift.
The pain he felt slowly transformed into a bottomless void. An absolute emptiness that devoured every trace of his humanity.
Unaware of it, in the suffocating silence of the shack, the darkness in the corner of the room seemed to breathe, merging with the void in his heart.
An entity that should not exist in this world… had heard his call.
The call of a soul that had never had a name.