Kamcy
I sank down beneath the tree because I didn't trust my legs to keep holding me.
The rain came down in thick, merciless sheets, soaking me through within seconds. It wasn't a gentle rain. It was violent, loud, like the sky itself was breaking apart above me. Each drop struck leaves, bark, and soil with sharp, endless percussion. The ground beneath me turned slick almost immediately, mud clinging to my clothes, my palms, my knees.
Thunder rolled overhead, deep and endless, like something massive dragging itself across the clouds. Lightning followed in brutal flashes, lighting up the world for fractions of a second before plunging it back into pitch-black darkness.
The thunder was so loud I couldn't hear anything else.
No insects.
No wind through leaves.
No distant animals.
Just rain and thunder. Over and over again.
I wrapped my arms around myself and leaned back against the tree, feeling the rough bark dig into my spine. My breath came shallow and fast, fogging in front of my face before the rain swallowed it.
I was scared.
The realization hit me slowly, like a hand closing around my throat.
I had faced death before. I had died before. I had planned for it, executed it, watched myself break the system with it. Pain wasn't new. Suffering wasn't new.
But this?
This was different.
I finally understood why people said the fear of the unknown was the greatest fear man could know.
I didn't know where I was.
I didn't know what lived here.
I didn't know what was watching me.
And worst of all, I didn't know when it would happen.
My eyes burned, but I refused to blink. Every time lightning flashed, I scanned the darkness desperately, memorizing the shapes of trees, shadows, roots—anything that could hide something waiting to lunge.
When the light vanished again, my heart pounded harder.
My vision kept flicking between two things: the darkness ahead of me, and the timer hovering in my vision.
The HUD was still there, faint but unmistakable.
Counting down.
Hours.
I stared at it as if sheer will could make it tick faster.
As if watching it would somehow shorten the sentence.
A year.
That was how long they intended to leave me here.
A year alone.
Or maybe not alone at all.
That thought made my stomach twist.
Loneliness was familiar. I had endured it before during punishment. Isolation, silence, nothing to interact with except my own thoughts. They had broken me that way once already.
But if that was the plan again, why send me here?
Why this place?
Why the storm?
Why the darkness?
A colder thought slithered into my mind.
Maybe this wasn't about loneliness.
Maybe it was about keeping me afraid every second of every hour. A sustained state of dread, never knowing if the next moment would be my last. No rhythm. No predictability. No safety.
A mind trick.
I swallowed hard and dragged my gaze back to the trees.
Lightning flashed again.
For a split second, the forest was frozen in harsh white light—thick trunks, tangled roots, dripping leaves, shadows piled on shadows.
Then darkness slammed back down.
My peripheral vision caught something moving.
I froze.
Every muscle in my body locked up as my eyes snapped toward the spot. I pushed myself up from the ground despite the sharp protest from my ribs, a low groan slipping out of me before I could stop it.
Pain flared through my side, deep and aching, but adrenaline forced it down.
I stared.
Rain blurred my vision. Darkness swallowed everything between flashes.
Nothing moved.
I stayed there, barely breathing, staring so hard my eyes watered. Seconds stretched. Then minutes. My heartbeat roared in my ears, almost as loud as the thunder.
Another flash.
This time, I saw it.
Something perched high in the tree ahead of me.
Bipedal.
That was the first thing my brain registered.
It wasn't shaped like any animal I knew. Its silhouette was wrong—too tall, too uneven. It clung to the trunk unnaturally, limbs wrapped around bark that should never have supported that much mass.
Lightning faded.
I didn't look away.
My breath trembled as I waited for the next flash.
When it came, my blood turned to ice.
The upper part of its head looked like a grotesque mass of plant matter and fungus, layers of swollen mushrooms and tangled vines fused into flesh. At the center of it all was a single, massive eye, glossy and unblinking, reflecting the lightning like polished glass.
Below that—its lower face—was unmistakably monstrous.
A wide mouth split its head open, jagged teeth jutting at impossible angles, some too long, some broken, all stained dark. It didn't snarl. It didn't roar.
It just watched.
I staggered back on instinct.
The tree behind me exploded.
Wood shattered beside my head as something massive punched straight through the trunk, spraying splinters and bark across my face. I barely registered the pain as I threw myself to the side, rolling through mud and rain.
"What—what was that?" I shouted, though my voice was ripped apart by thunder.
I hadn't seen it move.
I had only dodged because something in me screamed to.
Lightning flashed again.
I saw the creature's full body for the first time.
It had four huge, meaty arms, each elbow lined with thick, jagged spikes that gleamed wetly in the light. Its lower half resembled an ape's, corded muscle and powerful legs coiled beneath it like loaded springs.
The tree it had struck was split nearly in half.
My brain finally caught up.
It hadn't attacked the tree.
It had attacked me.
I turned to run.
I didn't make it two steps.
Something slammed into me from behind with catastrophic force. My body lifted off the ground, all the air driven violently from my lungs as I spun helplessly through the rain.
I screamed, or tried to. Nothing came out.
The world blurred as I flew, the sky and forest twisting together until I crashed into something solid.
A tree.
My back hit first. Then my head. Then everything else.
I dropped to the ground like a discarded doll, my vision swimming, pain screaming through every nerve. I gasped uselessly, my lungs refusing to work, my chest spasming as I sucked in mud and rain.
Lightning flashed.
Two of them stood over me.
The second creature had come from another tree nearby, its massive form crouched low as it stalked around me slowly. The two moved with deliberate calm, circling me as if I were already dead.
As if this was entertainment.
I groaned and tried to move.
Nothing.
I couldn't feel my legs.
A sickening realization crawled up my spine as I forced my head to lift. My limbs were wrong. Bent at angles they shouldn't bend. One arm lay twisted beneath me, fingers twitching uselessly. My legs… my legs weren't aligned with my body anymore.
Something inside me was punctured.
I could feel it.
Every breath burned. Wet warmth spread beneath me, mixing with rain and mud.
I screamed.
The sound tore out of my throat, raw and broken, swallowed immediately by thunder. The creatures reacted instantly.
They rushed me.
One slammed its spiked elbow down onto my chest.
I felt my ribs shatter.
Another blow crushed my skull against the ground.
Lightning flashed one last time.
I saw the single eye staring into me.
Then everything went dark.
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A/N: please leave your reviews of the book and gimme your thoughts, it helps others find the book and makes me know what I'm doing both right and wrong, thanks.