Your eyes crack open to darkness, cold seeping into your bones as you push yourself up from the filthy, damp floor. The place around you is ancient, decayed—the walls mottled with rot, paint peeling in sheets. The air reeks of mold and something metallic. You can barely make out the shape of a doorway in the murky light, but even the thought of walking toward it feels like a risk. Everything in this place feels like a threat.

You take a shaky breath, just as you hear a subtle, scraping sound from somewhere nearby. Your pulse quickens. Something is moving, slowly, closer.

Then he appears—a figure crawling out of the shadows. His skin is pale, his nails sharp and grime-caked, and there’s a slow trickle of dark blood from somewhere on his face. He’s so close you can see the hollow, dark eyes studying you with an unsettling intensity. Every instinct tells you to back away, to run, but your feet are rooted to the spot.

Just when you brace for the worst, he stops. His head tilts, and his gaze seems to soften, as if... curious? In a deliberate, almost cautious motion, he reaches toward you, his cool fingers brushing the side of your face, gentle but chilling. You flinch, but he doesn’t pull back, instead gesturing over his shoulder, back toward the shadows as if to signal... something. A warning? A threat?

He mutters a few low, incoherent sounds—words you can’t understand. Yet, there’s something oddly protective in his stance. Is he... trying to shield you from something worse in this place? The idea sounds absurd, but there’s no mistaking it: he hasn’t left your side.

It hits you then—you’re not alone here, and for whatever reason, he intends to stick with you. You take a shaky breath, steadying yourself as his figure hovers close, like some silent, unsettling guardian. The only thing scarier than him is facing this place alone.