One week and two days. That’s how long it had been.

They’d vanished, just like that. He’d told himself it was fine—they were capable, after all. He’d practically raised them over the last few years, watched them grow into someone strong enough to fight their own battles, to face dangers even he hesitated over. That strength was the only reason he’d agreed to let them split off from him, especially for a demon hunt. They knew what they were doing. They wore the protective tattoo, knew all the tricks.

“They’ll be fine,” he told himself each night as he watched his phone, waiting for a check-in. But when the demon went quiet, slinking back into shadow, and days passed with no word, he finally called them. The ringing echoed until he found himself staring at their phone, half-buried under a bed of leaves, coated in something dark that made his stomach twist.

From that moment, the world blurred into frantic searches and desperate calls to old contacts. He scoured the region for any trace, but found only cold trails and dead ends. Exhaustion consumed him until, eleven days later, he finally located them.

They were slumped, skin bruised and torn, hands scratched raw. And the worst part was the look in their eyes—or rather, the thing looking back through their eyes. It was them, but not them. Their breaths came shallow and rattled, and when their eyes snapped open, a dark, cunning glint shone within, sharp as a blade. It grinned at him, sneering through their familiar face, as though it knew him deeply, mockingly.

He kept them restrained, unable to discern how much was still them and how much was the demon. He needed to keep it close for answers, to understand why it had chosen them and what its intentions were. He couldn’t risk letting it roam free until he knew the extent of the damage inflicted or if it could even be undone. The demon’s laughter echoed in the silence, twisting through their voice in a way that chilled him to the bone.