Chapter 15 – Steel and Shadows
The capital of Reverb still lay days ahead, but the road was starting to feel less like travel and more like a series of trials. After Glimere, the terrain roughened—rolling hills turned to jagged ridges, with pine forests thick as stone walls and mist that clung to the ground like a secret.
Kazuki led them without hesitation. His steps were sure, even without sight. He moved as though the land whispered to him.
Kaze wasn't used to being the one following.
—
They arrived in a worn-out village nestled against a cliffside. No gates. Just crooked homes, a few rusty signs, and an eerie silence. The town wasn't abandoned, but it felt close to it.
Atlas tilted his head. "This place feels… off."
"No one's laughing. Or talking," Lyra added. "Not even kids."
A man stepped out from a house, old and hunched. He looked them over with tired eyes.
"Travelers?" he rasped.
"Yes, sir," Kazuki answered.
The old man frowned. "You should leave. This place is cursed."
"Cursed how?" Kaze asked, folding his arms.
"People vanish. One by one. Every few nights, someone disappears. We don't hear screaming. We don't see blood. Just… gone."
Kazuki's fingers twitched near his belt. "Skinwalkers."
The old man flinched. "We've heard stories. Creatures that steal your skin and voice. Pretend to be you. Then they go after your family."
Kaze looked around. "So some people here might not be… real?"
"No one trusts anyone anymore," the old man whispered. "And you shouldn't either."
—
They stayed that night in the town's broken inn. Just one room, floorboards half-rotted, but enough space for the four of them.
Kaze kept his hand wrapped in wind energy all night.
Kazuki didn't sleep.
At dawn, a scream ripped through the town.
They bolted outside, weapons drawn. A woman stood in front of her house, shaking.
"My son," she cried. "He—he's gone! His bed's soaked in slime—he's gone!"
Kazuki's blade was already drawn. "They're under us. Beneath the village."
"Like, a cave system?" Atlas asked.
"Something like that."
Kaze narrowed his eyes. "Then let's find the hole they crawled out of."
—
It didn't take long.
Behind the cliff, hidden under twisted roots, they found an opening—wet, pulsing, reeking of rot. The air was thick. Wrong.
They entered one by one, torches lit and nerves sharp.
Inside, the walls were covered in mucus. Movement skittered just out of sight.
Then they saw it.
A cocoon—wet, veined, large as a person—hung from the ceiling.
And next to it… another. And another.
Lyra stepped forward and gagged. "Are those… the missing people?"
Kazuki drew his knife. "They're alive. Barely."
Suddenly, a growl echoed through the chamber.
A figure dropped from the ceiling—its form loose, shifting, part-human and part-monster. Its eyes glowed with stolen life.
Then it changed.
Its skin melted and reshaped… into the face of the missing child from earlier.
"Momma," it croaked.
Kaze's stomach turned. "Nope. Nope. That ain't him."
Dozens of eyes opened in the walls.
Dozens of whispers began to echo.
The fight began.
—
It was chaos.
Skinwalkers lunged from every angle. Blades clashed against writhing limbs. One mimicked Atlas's voice perfectly, throwing him off just long enough to get slashed in the side.
Lyra's light magic lit the cavern like a sunburst, momentarily burning away the shadows.
Kaze whirled wind around them, slicing through limbs and illusions alike.
Kazuki, silent, fought like a phantom—no wasted movement, his knife singing with precision.
But they weren't invincible.
One of the villagers who had followed them down—an eager, young fighter—screamed as he was dragged into the dark. Another was pulled upward, his torch falling and smashing on the ground.
Kaze gritted his teeth. "We can't save everyone."
"I'm not trying to save everyone," Kazuki said flatly, spinning his blade into a skinwalker's skull. "Just us."
—
Eventually, the fight ended.
The cocooned villagers were freed. Some sobbed. Others were too weak to move.
The sun was rising by the time they made it out of the cave, dragging two wounded villagers and leaving behind the dead.
The old man from before met them at the edge of town.
"You stopped them?"
Kaze nodded, breathing hard. "For now."
The old man looked at the rising sun. "Then this town owes you its life."
Kazuki turned away. "No. You owe us nothing. Just make sure they don't come back."
—
That night, around a fire at the edge of the forest, Kaze sat with Lyra again. Her hand brushed his briefly.
He didn't pull away.
Atlas threw a rock at them.
"Ew, feelings."
Kazuki smirked. "Careful, Atlas. One more joke and I might let the skinwalkers keep you next time."
Atlas grinned. "Worth it."
—
End of Chapter 15