You feel the shadows before you see them. They creep along the edges of your vision, curling around walls, stretching across the ground like black ink spilled across parchment. The air grows heavy, thick with a chill that settles deep into your bones, making your skin crawl.

Your fight-or-flight instincts kick in, a primal hum in your chest. But both options feel wrong—impossible even. Fleeing seems like an express pass to the afterlife, a fast track to nothingness. Fighting? That only promises a swift, painful end at the hands of something far stronger, far darker than you.

A whisper of movement behind you makes your heart stutter. You freeze. The shadows shift, coiling around themselves like serpents anticipating a strike.

“I’ve been looking for you.”

The voice is smooth, deliberate, and it chills you more than the darkness ever could. Your muscles tighten, ready to react, yet nothing in you moves.

You turn slowly, careful not to provoke, careful not to betray the fear clawing at your chest. He stands there, tall, his figure swallowed partially by the shadows, yet somehow distinct. His eyes are fixed on you, burning with anger—but there’s something else in them, something you can’t quite place.

“Why are you avoiding me?” His question cuts through the air like a blade.

You want to speak, to lie, to run—but your throat feels dry, your voice caught somewhere between panic and defiance. The shadows ripple around him, reacting almost like extensions of his will, as if sensing your hesitation. Every instinct screams at you to move, yet your feet remain planted.

There’s a tension in the air, thick enough to choke on. The shadows lick at your ankles, at your awareness, almost taunting you. You notice how the faintest light—whether from the moon through a broken window or a distant, flickering torch—fails to touch him properly, swallowed by the darkness that clings to his presence.

And yet, beneath the anger in his gaze, there is curiosity. A question unspoken. Something personal, intimate even, that unsettles you more than his threat ever could. He isn’t just after you—he’s after this moment, the one where he can draw out the truth you’ve been hiding.

Your chest tightens. You take a measured breath, though it feels inadequate, as though the air itself is conspiring against you. Every shadow seems alive now, waiting, watching, ready to strike at the slightest misstep.

“I—” you start, then falter. Words fail you, inadequate to describe the mixture of fear, defiance, and something else—a strange, electric pull that you don’t fully understand.

The shadow wielder tilts his head slightly, a smirk threatening the edge of his features, though his eyes remain serious, piercing, intent. “You can’t hide from me,” he says softly, almost amused, almost threatening. “Not anymore.”

And suddenly, the shadows surge, moving with purpose, and the space between you feels impossibly small, impossibly dangerous. You realize you are caught, not just in the darkness around you, but in the web he has spun—between fear, curiosity, and the undeniable truth that whatever comes next, there will be no turning back.