The syringe wasn't as shaky as before.
Don't get him wrong—it was still shaking, just… less so.
Progress.
Eli sighed, eyes drifting toward the walls of his hospital room. He was getting tired of this place. He was clearly fine. What more tests could they possibly need to run?
Pushing off the bed, he slipped the syringe back beneath the pillow and quietly opened the door.
He walked toward the front area where Ms. McCall usually sat, expecting to see her at her desk.
Instead, the tall officer was there.
Sitting in one of the waiting chairs.
Detective Megel was nowhere to be seen.
The man didn't give off any obvious malice—but just to be sure...
Light shimmered around Eli's pupils as he activated his vision.
The world flared.
Eli squinted.
Too bright.
His eyes weren't used to this level light yet.
He pushed through the glare, honing in on the man's shape beneath the flood of color.
And then, he saw it.
Strange.
The officer's essence was… different.
Almost like Lydia's.
But not quite.
It was like her energy—yes—but only on the surface.
As if it was sitting on his skin.
Not seeping from within.
What did that mean?
Before he could analyze further, the officer looked up.
He dove beneath the nearest cover he could find—a rolling meal cart, metal and linen clattering faintly around him.
Thankfully, it didn't seem like he'd been noticed.
But then... the cart started to move.
He wasn't about to get caught now.
He crouched lower, moving with the cart as it glided down the hall. Into an elevator.
Up a few floors.
The ride was slow. Eli peeked from under the cloth, just enough to glimpse the male nurse's shoes.
When the elevator stopped and the cart rolled forward again, Eli seized the moment. The nurse was looking away—perfect.
He slipped out, silent as mist, and ducked into the nearest room.
"I could be a ninja," he whispered to himself with a smirk.
Then he paused.
The room felt... familiar.
There were two beds. One was empty.
But the other…
His brow furrowed.
For some reason, he couldn't stop focusing on the empty bed.
It was empty. That much was clear.
But the longer he stared… the more his eyes were pulled downward.
Not to the sheets.
Not to the mattress.
But underneath.
There was something off about the space beneath the bed.
Too dark.
Too quiet.
He blinked.
No change.
Its shadow, thick and wrong, like it had been painted there.
And then…
A sound.
Barely there.
Whispering.
He turned his head slightly, listening.
Another whisper.
Then two.
Then five.
They weren't clear. He couldn't make out the words.
they shouldn't have been distant.
They were close, just
Right under the bed.
He took a step forward.
The floor creaked.
The whispers were growing.
Still quiet, but more of them now—layering, overlapping.
like muffled voices crawling from the depths of the sea.
His skin crawled.
Why was he walking toward it?
He didn't know.
He crouched beside the bed, breathing shallow.
The edge of the frame cut into his field of vision like a blade.
He didn't want to look.
But he did.
Slowly, his head tilted.
Eyes narrowing.
The world around him seemed to dim—as if the hallway light couldn't quite reach this side of the room.
His breath fogged slightly in the air.
Then—he saw it.
Not the floor.
Not the wall behind the bed.
Just blackness.
A pit.
A hole in the world.
Eli stared, heart pounding.
And in that moment, the whispers stopped pretending.
They screamed.
A loud, inhuman, gut-wrenching scream.
His hand moved without thought.
Drawn toward the void.
Drawn into it.
He tried to pull back—he did.
But his body wasn't listening.
Fingertips touched the edge.
Then crossed it.
And just as they vanished into the dark—
Something grabbed him.
It was cold.
No human hand.
And then he screamed.
The voice that left his throat…
Wasn't only his.
…
…
…
Nurses rushed back and forth along the hallway.
A small crowd had formed near one of the doors—tension thick in the air.
Pushing through the group, Ms. McCall barreled down the hall, guiding a stretcher toward the room. Her expression was tight, her hands white-knuckled.
Inside, it was worse.
"Oh my God, Doctor—I'm not getting anything!" McCall shouted, panic cracking her voice.
The other nurses looked to the doctor, wide-eyed.
"Turn it on!" he ordered.
One of them grabbed the defibrillator. She rubbed the paddles together, sparks jumping between them.
"Clear!" she shouted, pressing the paddles to the boy's chest.
His body jolted.
"Nothing," McCall said, voice trembling.
The doctor's jaw clenched.
Again.
The paddles hit him a second time.
Still nothing.
From the boy's mouth, thick black tar began to drip—slow, unnatural.
It oozed from his lips like oil, slick and dead, pooling on the floor.
And then—somewhere else in the building—
A young girl twisted in her hospital bed, clutching at the sheets.
Her skin was dark and slick with sweat, her voice ragged with desperation.
"No…" she whimpered.
"No…"
"NNNOOOOOO!!!"
A shockwave ripped from her throat—
a pure white scream, vibrating like glass under pressure.
Windows shattered.
The walls rattled.
Monitors sparked and died.
The sound hurtled through the halls, an invisible force barreling toward the room with the dying boy.
Back in that room, the nurse's hands trembled.
The defibrillator paddles struck the boy's chest again—
just as the scream hit.
He shot upright.
Tar burst from his mouth in a stream, now laced with streaks of blue light that danced through it like lightning in a storm cloud.
A glowing blue barrier exploded outward, slamming the nurses and the doctor back into the walls.
Everything went still.
The light hummed, alive and furious, fighting back against the scream.
It pulsed—once—twice—then a single bubble of light broke off, flying from the boy like a spark.
It moved through the wall.
Through the air.
Straight toward the girl.
In her room, the air still trembled, glass shards littering the floor. She was screaming into the void, the sound bending space itself.
Then—the bubble arrived.
It floated gently in front of her face.
Then slowly, circled her.
Spinning tighter…
Compressing…
Until it was a small sphere, glowing faintly—
and then slipped silently under her bed.
Her body went limp.
Her scream stopped.
Her eyes rolled back…
And she collapsed into sleep.
Eli gasped, finally able to pull himself back—separating from the bed with trembling limbs.
His breath came fast.
What the hell was that?
His fists were clenched tightly,
There was something in them.
Frowning, he opened his hands.
A glowing shape rested in his palm, warm.
Item: Mountain Ash
Level: 9
Attributes: Spirit, Purity
Defense: 600 / 739
Attack: 500 / 580
Synchronicity: 60%
Description:"Hmmm… you're a desecration to your own presence. Ye shall be desecrated no more.