Every desire demands sacrifice. And the most sinister desires often lead to pacts with the devil.
Such is the fate of Adanu Raksa. At the tender age of six, he was offered to the Carrion Flower Devil, a shadowed name, lost in the whispers of the few who dare remember.
Though it did not take his life, the devil's shadow never truly leaves him. Every night, it calls for him. With it, demons and the malevolent spirits come.
And tonight is no different.
"There they come again…"
Adanu stands at the threshold of his small hut, the weight of his sword familiar in his grip. His cloak, tattered and worn, billows with the night wind. His unkempt hair shifts as the breeze rakes through it.
A thick fog coils through the trees. The wind slips through the hollow boughs, its passage reduced to a low, eerie whisper. The moon, pale and distant, casts its cold light over the clearing, revealing the figures slithering in the dark.
"…the same wretched faces."
It's a horde of forest demons and the restless dead. The wretched things creep closer, drawn to him like moths to a dying flame. They move as one, creeping forward with sickening ease.
Adanu tightens his grip on his sword as the first of them lunges within reach. His blade moves without hesitation, slicing clean through its torso and spilling blackened bile across the undergrowth.
Another crawls forward, only to have its head taken in a single motion, its body collapsing into the dirt in a twitching heap. The severed head lands a short distance away, and for a moment, the body drags itself toward it, fingers clawing blindly through the soil.
Adanu snorts under his breath and nudges the head farther away with the side of his boot.
"Not helping your case."
He doesn't wait to see what happens next, his blade already moving again as he cuts down the next one, leaving the thing to writhe uselessly behind him.
Rotting flesh and splintered bone begin to litter the ground around him as more shapes emerge from the fog, pressing closer with each passing second.
"…damn it," he mutters. "If I stay here for too long, that old man will throw a fit."
He is not really alone in this stretch of wilderness. Deeper within the forest, hidden among uneven ground and old trees, stands a modest hermitage built of weathered wood.
Inside, a dim light spills across the interior, where oil lamps sway gently from overhead beams, their flames bending with the passing wind. Shadows stretch across the floor, tracing the outlines of thirteen figures seated in a loose circle.
Most of them are still young, their posture held with effort rather than ease, their voices rising together in a low chant that wavers at the edges but holds through repetition.
Know your Tattwa, lest you forget what holds you whole.
Guard your Sukma, lest it be torn and scattered.
Carry your Raga, for it is the vessel of your passing.
Their voices settle into a fragile rhythm, filling the room with a steady cadence.
For a time, nothing disturbs it, until a faint sound drifts in from the forest beyond. At first it is distant, almost indistinct. But it grows clearer: the crack of wood, the shifting of something heavy, a brief metallic note that does not belong to the night.
One of the younger boys falters, and the chant begins to unravel as uncertainty spreads.
"Did you hear that?" someone murmurs.
"It came from outside…"
"That couldn't be the wind, right?"
A boy near the center swallows hard. "Is something out there…?"
At the edge of the circle, Dharma exhales quietly, as though he has seen this happen far too many times.
"…It's him again," he mutters.
Indra, the oldest amongst them, shifts slightly. "He never changes."
The younger ones turn toward them, confusion and unease written plainly across their faces.
Before the silence in the room could stretch any further, an old figure appeared at the entrance. Ki Bayanaka stands just beyond the threshold. His hair, streaked with age, is tied loosely at the back, and his all-white robe hangs plainly over his frame without ornament.
The space itself seems to settle around his presence as his gaze moves across the room, taking in the halted chant and the tension that has quietly taken hold of the air.
"Why did you stop?" he asks.
Dharma tilts his head, an easy smile forming as if the answer is already obvious.
"First night for them, Ki."
A few of the younger disciples shift at the casual tone, but the old man does not react. His attention has already moved elsewhere, past the walls of the hermitage and into the forest beyond.
He lets out a quiet breath, with the faint weariness of someone who has seen this pattern repeat too many times. Then his voice comes, not carried by the air, but impressed directly upon the mind.
"You damned brat… How many times have I told you…"
The younger disciples do not hear the old man's voice. But they feel a slight pressure in the air, as though something unseen presses down upon the night itself.
"Don't bring those vile things anywhere near my dwelling!"
The same pressure spreads through the trees and settles over the things that move within the darkness, forcing them into stillness.
The waneforms and restless undead freeze where they are, their distorted shapes suspended mid-crawl, as if the very night has tightened its grip around them.
At the center of it, Adanu clicks his tongue in annoyance.
"Yeah, yeah… heard you."
With a practiced motion, he wraps his blade in a long strip of cloth, binding it tight before securing it at his waist.
Then he raises his voice. "Sorry, gramp! I'll deal with it!"
The moment the words leave him, the pressure begins to lift. Adanu lets out a slow breath and rolls his shoulders once, already turning away from the direction of the hermitage.
"Oi… flat-faced freaks," he calls out. "Still hungry for this rotten Sukma of mine?"
The nearest figures jerk toward him.
"Then come get it."
What begins as a scattered crawl quickly turns into a pursuit. The forest stirs as more of them emerge from the dark, drawn not by sight, but by instinct, by the foul lure embedded deep within his being.
They come from between the trees, from hollow ground, from shadows that should have remained empty, their numbers swelling with every stretch of distance he covers.
Bounding northward, he leads the demons away. The chase stretches through hills and valleys, the wind whipping against his skin. What would take an ordinary traveler an entire day passes beneath his feet before dawn threatens the horizon.
Then, as the mist begins to lift, a village emerges in the distance. Adanu slows, his frown deepening. If the demons follow him there, it will be a massacre.
"…Damn it!"
No choice now but turns to face his pursuers.
"Can't let you lot go any farther than this."
The waneforms waver, their whispers rising to a fever pitch. Their translucent forms ripple like water disturbed by an unseen force.
Adanu doesn't hesitate. He unwinds the cloth from his black blade and wraps it tightly around his left arm.
As the spirits screech and lunge, he simply cuts through them with a single, merciless stroke.
Kyyaaaaa!!!
Their agonized cries shatter the silence, dissolving into the night.
"Tch. Your screams are worse than a crow's at dawn," Adanu mutters, rubbing his ear.
Suddenly, a chill spreads down his spine as one of the waneforms slips past his guard.
A cold hand brushes against the back of his head, leeching the warmth from his body.
A voice, ancient and insidious, slithers into his mind.
<< Stop resisting, branded child. >>
<< Are you not tired of running? >>
<< Embrace your fate. Let us take you to the Carrion Flower Devil. >>
<< We shall release you from your suffering. >>
For a moment, Adanu's vision blurs, and his breath hitches.
Then slowly, a grin splits his face, twisted and maddened.
"Do I look tired to you?"
With a vicious swing, his sword carves through the spirit, silencing its whisper.
"I left my weakness behind a long time ago."
His voice is steady, but his eyes gleam with something far more dangerous. He turns to the remaining demons, raising the blade.
"Come. Taste the sweetness of my steel."
They hesitate, just for a moment. And then, the battle begins again.
Rotten bodies lunge across the forest floor in staggering waves, limbs snapping and dragging, while waneforms spill through the air between the trees like torn veils given hunger.
Adanu meets them head-on, his blade carving through flesh, splintering bone, and scattering shrieking forms into nothing as he cuts his way through the swarm.
This is his life.
This is his every night.
And this will not be his last.