The forest swallowed sound long before the hunters reached the ruins.
Rowan Vale walked at the front of the formation, bow in hand, eyes scanning the shadows between the pines. Evening light bled through the branches in thin red streaks, as if the sun itself was warning them to turn back.
"Tracks lead this way," Lethan whispered from behind Rowan, prodding a gouge in the earth. "But whatever made them… didn't walk like any wolf."
Rowan crouched.
Deep claw marks pierced the mud, spaced unevenly—like something loped on limbs that weren't the same length.
"Corrupted," Rowan murmured.
Caren, spear in hand, tightened her jaw. "Then we're heading right where it sleeps."
Not far ahead, the trees opened into a sunken clearing where ancient stone jutted from the earth like broken teeth. Weathered pillars leaned against twisted roots, half-buried arches crumbled beneath moss and time.
The ruins of Black Hollow.
Rowan had heard stories—old, vague tales about an age before kingdoms, before the Hunter Guild, when things older than men carved their dreams into stone.
He never believed them.
Until now.
"Why would a beast nest here?" Tomas muttered nervously behind him.
Elwen responded quietly. "Maybe it didn't choose this place. Maybe it was called here."
Rowan felt it too:
A vibration in the air.
A low hum beneath the earth.
A pressure behind his temples.
These ruins weren't dead.
They were dreaming.
The wind shifted. The smell hit them—
a thick, metallic odor that made Rowan's stomach clench.
"Blood," Caren whispered.
They stepped deeper into the ruin, torches flickering against cracked pillars engraved with symbols Rowan didn't recognize—circles, spirals, twisted shapes that hurt to look at.
Then they found it.
A stone disc, half-buried in the center of the ruin, was recently exposed by a landslide. Roots curled around it like fingers trying to pull it back underground. The surface was engraved with a faint, eye-shaped sigil.
The lines glowed softly, as if remembering their purpose.
Lethan knelt beside it. "This wasn't carved by humans. Look at the detail."
"It's not natural either," Rowan said.
Caren touched Rowan's arm. "Do you hear that?"
Rowan frowned. "Hear what?"
He listened.
There—beneath the sound of wind and breath—
A heartbeat.
Slow.
Distant.
Wrong.
A growl rolled through the ruins, deep enough to shake old stone.
The Black Maw stepped from the shadows.
It wasn't a wolf.
It wasn't a bear.
It wasn't anything with a name.
Eyes like burning cinders.
Fur matted with old blood.
Limbs too long, ending in bone-tipped claws.
Its chest pulsed with the same faint glow as the buried stone.
"It's feeding on the artifact's corruption," Rowan whispered.
They barely had time to ready their weapons.
The Maw lunged.
Tomas screamed as the creature tore him apart.
Elwen loosed an arrow that shattered on bone.
Derrin charged with a war cry and died in seconds.
Caren stabbed her spear into its shoulder—but the beast didn't stop. It slammed her into a fallen pillar, pinning her with one massive claw.
"Rowan!" she cried, struggling beneath the weight.
Rowan sprinted forward, slicing at the Maw's flank. The blade scraped bone, barely cutting skin. The Maw turned toward him, lips peeling back to reveal rows of jagged teeth.
It struck.
Rowan crashed into a stone pillar, the wind knocked from his lungs. Pain shot through every rib.
He crawled backward, vision blurring, until his hand hit the stone disc.
The sigil beneath his palm pulsed.
A low whisper seeped from the cracks:
"…awake…"
Red light seeped through Rowan's fingers, crawling up his arm. His skin burned. His blood boiled.
"Rowan, get away from that!" Caren shouted—
Too late.
Something ancient, something hungry, stirred beneath the ruin.
The sigil ignited.
Rowan's scream didn't escape his throat—it was swallowed by the red glow that burst from the artifact, wrapping around him like living flame.
The Maw recoiled, snarling, eyes widening in recognition or fear.
The whisper deepened:
"You will not die here. Not yet."
Pain ripped through Rowan's chest. His bones twisted. His heart hammered as if trying to escape his ribs.
The world drowned in crimson.
The ruins trembled.
And Rowan Vale's life ended—
So something else could begin.