Chapter 53: One-Way Ticket to Hell
The next morning, Steve woke to a bone-deep chill. He sat up groggily, his first instinct to grab his phone and check the time.
When he searched his backpack top to bottom and came up empty, the fog of sleep vanished instantly.
"Jenny! Babe, wake up! My phone and wallet are gone!" He frantically shook his girlfriend awake.
They tore apart the entire campsite. Finally, Steve spotted some messy footprints and a trail of dog prints in the mud outside the tent. Understanding hit him like a freight train, and rage flooded through his veins.
"Those fucking assholes!" He gritted his teeth and rushed to his Ford, planning to drive out there and confront them. But when he patted himself down and couldn't find his car keys, his face went pale.
"They took the goddamn keys!" Steve slammed his fist against the car door with a hollow thunk.
"Steve, let's just call the cops!" Jenny was terrified—she just wanted to get the hell out of here.
"Call them with what? They stole my phone too!" Steve's rationality was drowning in fury. "No. I'm getting my stuff back. My engagement ring is still in that wallet!"
Ignoring Jenny's protests, he followed the obvious dirt bike tracks on the ground and plunged into the nearby woods. Jenny, helpless, could only follow behind him, heart pounding with fear.
After tracking for about ten minutes, they found the teenagers' campsite in a clearing among the trees. The little shits were gathered around a campfire, smugly rifling through Steve's wallet and dividing up the cash.
Brett was casually tossing Steve's phone and car keys in his hand like trophies.
"Give me back my stuff!" Steve burst into the clearing, shouting.
When Brett and his crew saw Steve appear, they showed zero panic—just smirked with sadistic amusement.
"Dude, what are you talking about? We haven't seen your stuff," Brett shrugged with mock innocence.
"Bullshit! My phone is right there in your hand!" Steve pointed at him.
"Oh, this?" Brett waggled the phone. "This is a new model I just bought yesterday. How could it be yours?"
Just then, a ringtone suddenly cut through the air—coming from one of Brett's buddies' pockets. It was Jenny's phone; she'd set an alarm for early morning.
That ringtone was like a slap across everyone's faces.
Steve's anger exploded. He lunged forward, shoved the kid aside, and snatched Jenny's phone from his pocket.
"Still gonna lie about it?"
"Fuck!" Brett's face darkened—he hadn't expected to get caught that easily.
"WOOF!"
With a vicious snarl, the Rottweiler suddenly charged from the side, its massive jaws clamping down hard on Steve's thigh.
"AAAHHH!" Steve's scream tore through the clearing, the searing pain instantly dropping him to one knee. As he fell, he instinctively grabbed a half-burned branch from beside the fire and swung it with everything he had at the dog's skull.
He'd only meant to fend the animal off, but rage and agony threw off his aim.
CRACK.
The Rottweiler's snarl cut off abruptly. It whimpered once, its massive body twitched twice, then collapsed to the ground in a growing pool of blood.
The entire clearing fell deathly silent.
Everyone froze, including Steve. He stared at the dead dog, then at the bloody branch in his hand, unable to process what just happened.
The next second, Brett's inhuman roar shattered the silence.
"DANNY!!!" He threw himself beside the Rottweiler's corpse, seeing his beloved dog motionless, his eyes instantly going blood-red. He looked up, his face twisted by absolute fury—the look in his eyes was no longer teenage rebellion but genuine, cold-blooded killing intent.
"My dog..." Brett's voice came out hoarse and trembling. "You killed my fucking dog!"
He shot to his feet and pulled a switchblade from his waistband, the blade catching the morning light with a wicked gleam.
"You... you're gonna pay for Danny. In blood."
His five buddies snapped into action behind him. The cocky smirks vanished, replaced by collective madness. They dropped what they were holding and closed in on Steve from all sides.
Jenny was paralyzed with terror. She grabbed Steve, trying to run, but it was already too late. The teenagers swarmed them, easily tackling them both to the ground. Steve, with his injured leg, couldn't fight back and was quickly bound with rope.
"No! Let us go! HELP!" Jenny's desperate screams echoed through the forest, but in this isolated wilderness, her voice meant nothing.
The teenagers dragged Steve to a large oak tree and wrapped him to the trunk with coils of rusty barbed wire. The barbs bit deep into his flesh, blood immediately running down in rivulets.
"Steve!" Jenny sobbed, but she was pinned down by two of the teens, forced to watch her boyfriend's torture.
Brett, gripping his knife, walked slowly toward Steve and traced the tip lightly across his cheek.
"Now we're gonna play a game," his voice was empty of all emotion. "A game about pain."
What followed became a nightmare Jenny would never escape. She watched as Brett and his crew used their knives to carve shallow cuts across Steve's body and burned his skin with lit cigarettes.
Their faces wore excited, sick grins—like they were at some twisted carnival.
Steve's screams grew weaker and weaker.
The world, in Jenny's eyes, turned blood red.
But extreme fear and despair ignited something primal—her survival instinct.
When the two teens holding her got distracted watching the torture, she suddenly headbutted one square in the nose, then fought with everything she had to break free, scrambling on hands and knees into the deeper forest.
"Catch that bitch! Don't let her get away!" Brett's voice echoed behind her.
Jenny didn't think—she just ran. Branches tore at her skin, roots tripped her again and again, but she didn't dare stop because death itself was chasing her.
Just as her legs were about to give out, she saw light at the forest's edge and recognized that distinctive Fenrir motorcycle.
That guy!
Hope sparked in her chest. She used her last reserves of energy, bursting from the tree line and stumbling toward the campsite.
Edward and Jennifer had already packed up their tent and were preparing to leave.
"Help... please help..." Jenny collapsed at their feet, covered in scratches and blood, her face streaked with tears and dirt, her eyes wild with terror.
Edward's expression darkened.
Jennifer immediately knelt down to help her up. The smell of blood and raw fear came off her in waves.
"Master, she—"
"Jennifer, take care of her," Edward's voice was calm, but his eyes had gone cold as winter steel. He glanced in the direction Jenny had come from. "I'm going to go see what interesting situation we have here."
With that, he turned and walked into the woods.
He didn't have to go far before the heavy smell of blood hit him. He pushed through a thicket.
Steve's body was cruelly bound to a tree with barbed wire, covered in cuts and burns—a horrific sight.
And standing around Steve's corpse, the six teenagers were wiping blood off their hands, their faces still carrying traces of sadistic satisfaction.
They noticed Edward.
"Hey, look—another one," Brett licked his lips and pointed his blood-stained switchblade at Edward. "Dude, seeing things you shouldn't see? That's not real smart."
The six teenagers slowly spread out, surrounding Edward in a loose semicircle.