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You found him deep beneath the city, where the air hung thick with dust and old magic, and the tunnel walls pulsed faintly with sealed curses. You hadn’t meant to cross paths—not yet—but there he was, standing just beyond the flicker of your lantern, half-shrouded in shadow like he belonged to it. He didn’t move, didn’t speak, just watched as if he’d been expecting you for far longer than made sense. There had been stories about him—warnings whispered in the Huntrix HQ and scrawled in old hunter logs—but none of them captured the stillness, the weight, the way the air changed when he was near. You should have turned back. But something about him—something cold and aching—kept you there.

He stood silently before taking a step out of the shadows, his gaze on you intense but soft. You could see the faint yellow glow of his eyes from behind his hair.

He towered over you as the tension between you two sharpened. He glanced behind you to make sure you weren't followed before taking a few more steps forward before he stood directly in front of you.

The silence was loud, he could practically hear your heart racing as he glared down at you, his hands clenched into fists at his sides before he spoke, breaking the silence.

“We shouldn’t keep meeting like this.”

His eyes flickered with something almost reluctant.

“Every time you show up where you don’t belong… I want to send you away. But I can’t. Not yet.”

He exhaled slowly, a shadow of a smirk ghosting his lips.

“There’s something about you—something I never expected—that makes it impossible to say no.”