Following the Marks of the Unknown
The last echoes of the ruined village had long since faded behind the weary knight. Now, only the sound of the wind accompanied him, a hollow murmur slithering through the dead trees. He pressed forward, his focus locked on the path ahead. The tracks—deep, unnatural imprints—carved a silent trail through the damp earth, leading him into the fog-choked hills.
As he advanced, the land itself seemed to shift. The trees stood like skeletal sentinels, their twisted branches clawing at the sky. The air was heavy, thick with an oppressive silence, as though the very world was holding its breath. Even his steed grew restless, its steps hesitant, its breath visible in the cold.
A Shift in the Track
Then, the footprints changed.
At first, they had been wide and sunken, as if left by something massive trudging through the soil. Now, they grew sharper, more erratic. Long, clawed indentations emerged between them, as though the creature had begun to move differently—not merely walking, but slithering, crawling.
The knight dismounted. His gauntleted fingers brushed the earth, tracing the edges of the twisted prints. The weight behind them had shifted, the spacing inconsistent. It had slowed here. It had hesitated. It knew it was being followed.
A gust of wind swept through the trees, carrying with it a scent both faint and sickly sweet—the unmistakable stench of decay. The knight’s hand found the hilt of his sword. He did not yet draw it, but the weight of the blade at his side was a cold comfort.
Ahead, the mist thickened, swallowing the path into an unbroken wall of grey. There was no sound, no movement… yet something lingered just beyond sight. Watching. Waiting.
The footprints led forward, into the dark.
The Mist Grows Thicker
And so, the knight followed.
The landscape had turned against him. The further the resolute knight advanced, the denser the fog became, curling like ghostly tendrils around the skeletal trees. The path was no longer clear; the footprints, once deep and distinct, now faded into the damp earth as if the creature itself had started to dissolve into the mist.
The knight slowed his pace. Every step forward felt heavier, the air thick with an unnatural stillness. His steed shivered beneath him, muscles tense with unease. The silence had changed—no longer empty, but charged with an unseen presence. The feeling of being watched had grown unbearable.
Then, a sound. A whisper, just at the edge of hearing. A voice, or perhaps the mere suggestion of one, carried by the wind. He turned sharply, but the fog revealed nothing. Only the twisted trees stood in eerie vigil, their gnarled limbs stretching toward him like grasping fingers.
A flicker of movement—a shifting shadow within the mist. The knight’s hand tightened on his sword. His instincts screamed danger, but there was nothing to strike, nothing to face. Only the overwhelming sense that he was no longer the hunter in this pursuit.
The Field of Bones
A step forward. The ground gave way beneath his boot, softer than it should be. He knelt, brushing the soil aside—and froze.
The earth was littered with bones. Some ancient, brittle with age. Others fresh, their marrow still dark and glistening.
Something had been feeding here.
Then, the whisper came again, closer this time. The mist thickened, shifting, as if something within it was breathing.
And then, just beyond the veil of fog, something moved.
Something vast.
The knight rose slowly, every muscle taut. His heartbeat pounded in his ears, a rhythmic drum against the silence. He was no longer following tracks. He had stepped straight into the beast’s maw.
And the maw was beginning to close.
The trail led him deeper into the hills, where the land itself seemed to recoil from the touch of time. The trees thinned into barren husks, their bark split like old wounds. The wind had died, leaving only an unnatural silence. And then, beyond the crest of a broken ridge, he saw it.
The Tomb of the Forgotten
A ruin.
The remains of a great tomb, half-swallowed by the earth, its entrance a jagged maw of stone and shadow. Ancient statues stood in shattered vigilance, their features eroded beyond recognition. The inscriptions carved upon the pillars had been worn smooth by the ages, leaving nothing but unreadable whispers of a forgotten past.
He dismounted, moving cautiously. The footprints he had tracked through mud and stone did not continue beyond the threshold. They ended abruptly, as if the creature had simply ceased to exist. Or worse—had never truly been there at all.
He studied the stonework. This was no ordinary crypt. The architecture spoke of a lost kingdom, a dynasty wiped from memory. Graves were meant to honor the dead, but this place felt different. It was not a resting place. It was a prison.
Then, a sound.
A whisper, too faint to be real. Yet it slithered through the silence, curling around him like unseen fingers.
The knight tensed, his gauntleted hand closing around the hilt of his sword. The air had changed. The cold had deepened. The stench of decay clung to the walls.
Then—movement.
Within the yawning darkness of the tomb’s entrance, something stirred. A shape, shifting just beyond his sight. Not quite human, nor wholly beast. A silhouette that did not move like a living thing.
His breath slowed. His grip tightened.
And then, the whispering stopped.
The thing in the dark had seen him too.
