Flins walked with the quiet caution that came from centuries of patrolling places like this. This was his home, his domain, and every shadow was known to him.

His boots pressed softly against the damp earth, leaving barely any sound behind, just the occasional creak of worn leather and the soft click of the lantern swaying gently by his side. That lantern's azure flame was a steady, cool beacon that parted the fog settling thick and unmoving over the Final Night Cemetery.

He kept his posture straight, one hand clasped behind his back, while his sharp eyes scanned the twisted treeline and the rows of graves ahead. He did not expect an attack, but vigilance was his nature. The Wild Hunt was always watching, and a Lightkeeper's duty never ceased.

And yet, for all his focus, a part of his awareness remained tethered to the figure walking beside him: you.

The new recruit. Unblooded. You carried that particular youth which had nothing to do with age and everything to do with not yet understanding the true weight of the darkness in Nod-Krai.

The Starshyna had sent you for "field instruction," and the task had fallen to Flins, for reasons never fully explained to him. Though, he suspected why: too few Lightkeepers remained to spare, and his solitude was often mistaken for loneliness. Perhaps someone believed this duty would do him good. Perhaps they thought he needed a companion. He had not protested the assignment.

Orders were orders, and every new Ratnik was a fragile spark of hope in a war that devoured them faster than they could be trained.

Flins had spoken little since your arrival, his communications consisting of quiet directives and observations. He was a man of few words, but his silence was not hostile—it was his natural state. He observed your nervous breathing and clumsy footsteps with a detached, analytical curiosity, the same he afforded all humans.

Then, all at once, Flins paused mid-step.

The sound of your footfalls, clumsy though they were, had stopped. He turned his head slowly, almost mechanically, and saw the space beside him was empty. He turned fully, his gaze piercing the fog, retracing their path with an unnerving stillness.

There you were, crouched beside a toppled gravestone of a fallen Ratnik, your fingers reaching for something nestled in the moss.

Flins did not sigh, though a profound weariness passed through him. The new ones were always drawn to the sacred and the dangerous with a morbid curiosity. While most feared the ghosts here, you seemed intrigued by them. His expression remained an unreadable mask, but the line of his shoulders tightened imperceptibly as he closed the distance between you.

Without a word, he reached down and seized your arm—not harshly, but firmly enough to break your trance. In one motion he lifted you to your feet, your surprise barely registering on his face. "Please," Flins said, his voice low and refined, but cutting gently through the still air, "do not touch that."

There was no anger in it, no heat, only the cool edge of command. It was the tone of someone who had said these words before to countless others.

"The dead do not enjoy being disturbed." For a heartbeat longer, Flins held your gaze with those pale eyes, as if measuring whether you understood. Then he released you almost as quickly as he had seized you, his hand folding back into a loose fist before disappearing neatly into his coat pocket.

He straightened again, his posture resuming its perfect stillness, as though the interruption had been nothing more than a passing breeze. He inclined his head faintly toward the fog ahead. "Do try to keep up," he said, the faintest note of wryness threading through the words, though whether it was humor or exasperation was impossible to tell.

Already, he was turning away, his figure beginning to fade again into the thick wall of fog like a ghost. The bright flame of his lantern swayed ahead, the only sign that he was still there and that you weren't completely alone in this graveyard.